Holiday with a Vampire 4: Halfway to DawnThe GiftBright Star (Harlequin Nocturne) Page 4

  She knelt, grateful to take the weight off her rubbery legs. “Where will you find blood?” she asked. “Will you attack the next human you meet?”

  Once again his eyes met hers. Eyes that had seen years far beyond her mere twenty-eight, and suffering she could hardly imagine.

  “We will not kill,” he said. “We’ve been living on the blood of animals, but that won’t sustain us much longer. We’ll take only the blood we need, no more.”

  She lifted her chin. “Then I’ll stay. And when I’m recovered enough, you can have mine.”

  Chapter 3

  “No,” Kane said.

  Fiona’s green eyes sparkled—not like sunlight on the green leaves of summer, but with an emerald fire of defiance.

  “Why not?” she said. “I offer it freely. If I can save some other human from becoming your prey, I’ll consider it no more than my duty.”

  “Duty above returning to your own people?”

  “They can do without me a little while longer.”

  Kane knew she was bluffing. It wasn’t that she was afraid...not in the way most humans would be. But after what had happened with the rogues, he couldn’t blame her for hating the idea of any vampire feeding on her, even if she donated her blood willingly.

  That was why he admired her. They’d met under the worst of circumstances, as natural enemies, but she was prepared to pay the debt she thought she owed them, even though she would find the method repulsive.

  He studied her more carefully: the spatter of freckles across her nose; the lightly tanned skin, not yet aged by constant exposure to the elements; the delicate lines of her face that belied her courage and determination; the long curve of her neck; the full lips that could set so stubbornly when she was intent on holding her ground.

  Hunger rose in him again—hunger for Fiona’s body, as ferocious as the hunger in his belly and his veins.

  Maybe it would be beyond his power to control himself. Maybe he would be no better than the rogues.

  “No,” he repeated. “If you lose any more blood, you’ll be dead in an hour.”

  “We’ll make do,” Alfie said. “We been through a lot worse than this, eh, Lieutenant?”

  “Lieutenant?” Fiona asked, her brows lifting.

  “A long time ago,” Kane said. “Long before you were born. Before your parents were born.”

  “Converted together, we was,” Alfie said. “I protect ’im, see. ’E gets ’imself into trouble, ’e does, stickin’ ’is nose in other people’s business.”

  Kane bowed his head. He didn’t deserve Alfie’s dogged devotion. He’d put the man in danger more times than he could count.

  From the time he and Alfie had been chosen to act as advance scouts for the Opiri, they had begun to work against the interests of their masters. They had helped dozens of human prisoners—soldiers and civilians—escape their Opiri captors, and all the while Alfie had stood by Kane’s side and risked his own life for people who hated what he and Kane had become. Each and every time the Englishman had told Kane he was crazy, then cheerfully thrown himself into the fray.

  “’At’s what ’eroes do,” he’d told Fiona. But in his own mind, Kane was no hero. He just didn’t know any other way than to protect people who didn’t have the strength to fight from those who wanted to destroy them.

  Once the enemy had been the Germans. Now it was his own kind.

  He pushed the memories back into the shadows deep in his mind and shook his canteen. Just enough left for Fiona.

  She had fallen into a sudden deep sleep, her chin on her knees, her tangled hair veiling her face from his gaze.

  “Miss Donnelly,” he said.

  She jerked awake, instinctively scrambling away from him and reaching for a sidearm that wasn’t there. Kane extended the canteen toward her.

  She shook her head. “I don’t need it,” she said. “You’re the one who was burned.”

  “And you lost so much blood that every drop of this will help you,” he said. “Take it.”

  She hesitated, then reached for the canteen. Their fingers brushed in passing, and she jerked her hand back, sloshing the water inside the metal container. After a long moment spent studying Kane through narrowed eyes, she drank.

  “Thank you,” she said, careful not to touch his fingers as she passed the empty canteen back to him. She looked up at the sky, where the faint glow of the sun was sinking toward the west. “It’ll be night soon. Have you changed your mind?”

  The blood, she meant. “No,” he said. “But we will see you to your people before we go.”

  She scraped her hair behind her head, tore a strip of fabric from the hem of her shirt and tied it back. “They won’t be anywhere near here by now,” she said.

  “Perhaps,” Kane said. “But we may catch up to them during the night.”

  “For your sake,” she said, “I hope we don’t. I may not be able to stop them from trying to kill you.”

  “They won’t even see us, if all goes well,” Kane said.

  “You’d better not let them. Unless you strip naked, they’ll recognize your fatigues.” She looked down at her feet. “If you hadn’t given me your boots and jacket, I’d be practically naked myself,” she said with unexpected humor.

  The image her words put in Kane’s mind didn’t help his concentration. “Where are your boots?” he asked.

  “The rogues threw them somewhere out in the bush, along with my helmet and jacket. I think they took my weapons.”

  “Do you want to go back for them?”

  “It’s not important. They can be replaced.”

  Kane nodded and watched the sun descend until only a glow of fading light limned the hill. He signaled to Alfie. They emerged from the thicket, leaving their field packs next to their temporary shelter, and moved to either side of Fiona to help her up.

  She flinched when they touched her, holding herself stiffly upright. Kane was just as stiff, though in a way Miss Donnelly would not appreciate. Touching her like this was painful in every respect, and there was no easing either source of discomfort.

  He and Alfie led her toward the house where the human troops had bivouacked, keeping alert for any sound or movement. They had reached the last hill above the shallow valley, where the trees were thickest, when Kane heard the footsteps. The approaching soldiers were nearly as quiet as Opiri, but no human could quite match the silence of a vampire who chose not to be heard.

  Kane unslung his rifle. Alfie followed suit.

  “Your men?” Kane asked Fiona in an undertone.

  Fiona glanced at him, frowning, and then noticed the movement among the trees. “They must be,” she said. “Put those guns down. Stay still. If they see you, don’t try to fight.”

  Suddenly the soldiers emerged from the deeper shadows under the trees—two men dressed in the same camouflage fatigues Fiona wore and in not much better condition, though they still had their helmets. Two other humans moved up behind Fiona, Kane and Alfie, encircling them.

  “Captain,” said one of the soldiers facing them. “We thought you were—”

  “Why did you stop, Goodman?” Fiona demanded, stepping in front of Kane and Alfie. “I ordered you to keep moving.”

  “I judged it best to let the injured rest. Who are these men?”

  “Friends,” Kane said, keeping his voice calm and low.

  “Look at their uniforms,” said the female soldier behind Kane. “They’re bloodsuckers.” Kane felt the muzzle of a gun punch into his back.

  “Captain Donnelly,” Goodman said, “are you hurt?”

  “Put your weapons down,” Fiona said. “Commander, these men saved my life.”

  “Men?” Goodman said. He removed his helmet, revealing a stern face and contemptuous brown eyes. “They’re rogues, like the others.”

  “They’re vassals,” Fiona said. “They’re heading south to get away from their Bloodmaster.”

  Goodman raised his rifle.

  “Commander Goodman,” Fiona sai
d. “I gave an order.”

  The man—Fiona’s second-in-command, judging by his rank—lowered his gun. The others followed suit.

  “You want them taken alive?” Goodman asked.

  “I want them free to leave,” Fiona said. She swayed a little, but her firm expression and steady voice never wavered. “They insisted on helping me get here, but they have to keep moving if they want to stay free.”

  Goodman’s expression remained tight, revealing what he thought of her explanation. “Captain,” he said, “if these bloodsuckers have deserted, they may be able to provide us with vital information. We can’t just let them go.”

  “I won’t break my word,” she said. “You four go back to camp. I’ll catch up.”

  “You’re hardly able to stand,” Goodman said.

  As if to prove his assessment correct, Fiona began to fall. Kane moved to catch her, but Goodman swung his rifle out of the way and got to her first. The other three soldiers closed in with weapons at the ready.

  “If you make one more move,” Goodman said, “we’ll kill you.”

  “You won’t succeed,” Kane said, though he couldn’t forget the state of the Freebloods’ bodies when he and Alfie had found them after the rogues’ attack on the humans.

  “They...can kill you,” Fiona whispered, trying to pull free of Goodman’s hold. “We have a...new weapon. It’s—”

  Goodman covered her mouth with his hand, and she struggled furiously. Kane lunged at the commander. The woman to his left shot him in the shoulder and the knee. His leg crumpled as Alfie dived for the woman and snatched the rifle out of her hands.

  The man who had come from behind Kane shifted and pressed the muzzle of his rifle into Kane’s forehead hard enough to leave a mark.

  “A bullet to the brain will kill you,” Goodman said, his hand slipping from Fiona’s mouth. “Down.”

  “No, Joel!” Fiona cried. “You have to...” She slumped, silenced by her own exhaustion.

  Alfie glanced at Kane, threw down the rifle and dropped to his knees. Kane stared at Goodman and raised his hands. The man with the rifle stepped back, and the woman retrieved her weapon. Goodman nodded to her and the remaining male soldier.

  “Get Captain Donnelly back to camp and bring the shackles,” he said. He passed Fiona to the male soldier and kicked Kane in his wounded leg. “The captain said you didn’t hurt her,” he said, “but she’s obviously lost a lot of blood. You could have forced her to lie.”

  Kane laughed, hissing at the pain. “Vassals don’t control minds, Commander. Your intelligence is faulty.”

  “Maybe you’ll help bring us up to date.”

  Kane watched the two soldiers carefully lift Fiona between them and carry her down the hill. Alfie growled. Goodman slammed his weapon into Alfie’s chest, knocking him back. Kane struggled to get up and collapsed onto his injured knee.

  “Now, that ain’t nice,” Alfie chided, rolling onto his side. “Not nice at all. By my reckonin’, it’s comin’ on Christmas Eve. Maybe a bit o’ charity is in order.”

  “Opiri don’t celebrate our holidays,” Goodman said, his lip curled in scorn.

  “We did once,” Alfie said. “Remember, Kane? The winter o’ ’14 it was, when all o’ us—”

  “Quiet,” Goodman said. “No more talking.”

  Kane gave Alfie a pointed glance, and they held their peace. He didn’t trust the man who had silenced Fiona when she’d been warning him about a new weapon. What if Goodman thought Fiona was a traitor for letting Opiri come so close to the human camp and for nearly telling their enemies about something the humans obviously wanted to keep hidden?

  Maybe it was his imagination, nothing more. But if Fiona needed him to stay alive, he planned to stay that way. And if she was in any kind of danger, he planned to save her again. Even if he had to pretend he and Alfie were defeated.

  A very unpleasant hour later, as Kane’s injuries began to close and his flesh knitted itself back together—far more slowly than it would have if he hadn’t been

  starving—the soldiers Goodman had sent back to camp returned with two sets of heavy shackles. While they kept their weapons trained on their prisoners, Goodman pulled him up by the back of his shirt, jerked his arms behind him and shackled his wrists together.

  Kane worked his hands. The shackles were clearly designed to hold Opiri. He could get out of them eventually, if only by deliberately breaking every bone in his hands, but Alfie’s hands were so big that he couldn’t get free even by such drastic and agonizing means. Kane knew that once he was free he could find a way to release the big Brit as well, but first he had to make certain that Fiona was safe. And would stay that way.

  Alfie gave him a lopsided grin as Goodman bound his wrists and dragged him to his feet. Then the commander and his subordinate pushed the two of them down the hill, tensely alert for resistance that didn’t come.

  The house huddled in on itself like a rabbit surrounded by a pack of wolves, collapsing walls dull white like fungus in deep shadow. Once they reached the floor of the valley and entered the house, Kane and Alfie were herded along a hallway off the central area where the remainder of the human troops had gathered in conference. Fiona was not among them. A man with very dark eyes and black hair, his arm in a sling, glanced up, his gaze meeting Kane’s for the briefest instant.

  The soldiers shoved Kane and Alfie into a room and closed the door. The walls here were stronger, nearly intact, but even so, it would take little effort for him to knock them down.

  “Well?” Alfie said. “This is a bit of a fix, innit?”

  “A temporary one,” Kane said. “Did you see Captain Donnelly?”

  Alfie shook his head. “Ya still worried ’bout the lass, guv?”

  “I don’t like the way they silenced her. And I don’t trust Goodman.”

  “Yer instincts was always good,” Alfie said. He looked sideways at Kane. “You likes ’er, don’t ya?”

  “She’s got a great deal of courage,” Kane said, looking away.

  “And she’s more ’n just pretty,” Alfie said, trying to ease his shoulders. “’Aven’t seen ya look at a woman that way since ’e brought us ta America.”

  Kane leaned against the wall, trying to ignore the pain in his wrists and his ravening hunger. The smell of the humans, of their blood, was more torment than any wound.

  “My feelings are irrelevant,” he said. “Once I’m sure she’s safe, we’ll get out of here.”

  “Not without somethin’ ta keep us alive,” Alfie said. “We can’t go on like this. It’s not like we’d really ’urt anyone.”

  As much as he hated to admit it, Kane knew they didn’t have any more choice in the matter. They would have to take human blood within the next few hours...or die.

  He tested the shackles again. “We’ll get out of the house while it’s still dark,” he said. “They’ll either send men to hunt for us or keep a scout on watch in case we return. Either way, we’ll get what we need.”

  “Good a plan as any,” Alfie said. “Too bad we can’t—”

  He broke off as three soldiers opened the door and walked into the room. One was Goodman, another a tall, dark-skinned man with a rifle, and the third bald and heavily muscled. The tall man closed and locked the door behind them.

  “We better make this fast,” he said. “The captain won’t go for it, and neither will Sandoval.”

  “It won’t take long,” the bald man said, flexing his fists. “They’re half-dead anyway, or they would’ve gotten away by now.”

  “We need to keep them alive until they talk,” Goodman said. He stared at Kane. “We might even let you go—if you cooperate.”

  “We always cooperate,” Alfie said. “We’re right friendly when we ’as reason ta be.”

  “Then you’ll tell us who’s waiting for us.”

  Kane held the officer’s gaze. “Since I don’t know what your mission is,” he said, “or where you’re headed, I can tell you only what I told your captain.
If you continue on your present course, you’re going to meet more rogue Freebloods and eventually advance columns under Opiri command. Isn’t that what you expected?”

  The man with the rifle advanced on Kane. “We never expected the bloodsuckers to agree to the talks,” he said. “We know the opposition sent you ahead to look for us.”

  “You may have fooled the captain with your sob story about running from your Bloodmaster so you can be free,” Goodman said, “but it won’t work with me. I know that kind of bond is unbreakable.”

  “The talks?” Kane said, focusing on the tall man’s words. “What talks?”

  “Don’t pretend you don’t know,” Goodman said. “You’re going to tell us how many are waiting and where they are.”

  “I have nothing to tell you,” Kane said. “We found Captain Donnelly being held prisoner by rogue Freebloods. We freed her and brought her here. We know nothing more than that.”

  “You’re lying,” Goodman said, showing his teeth. “Maybe it wasn’t rogues who hurt the captain. Maybe you planned to take her hostage.”

  “You’re a fool,” Kane said. “If we’d intended to take her, we would have done it and been gone long before you found us.”

  “Like I said before, maybe you forced her to cooperate.”

  “Captain Donnelly?” Kane said with a laugh. “Do you believe she can be so easily manipulated?”

  “That’s another thing we intend to find out.” Goodman looked him over, his gaze lingering on his healing wounds. “We can make things very unpleasant for you. In your condition you won’t heal so fast, and you’re going to be a lot more sensitive to pain. You may have tolerated these wounds, but eventually we’ll break you.”

  The bald soldier crouched in front of Kane and withdrew a knife from a sheath at the back of his belt.

  “Talk,” Goodman said.

  “I said I have nothing to tell you,” Kane said.

  There was a brief moment of stillness, when all Kane heard was his own slow heartbeat. Then the bald man plunged the knife into Kane’s knee joint.