It was only a split second, but it felt like an eternity.
My shout of warning to Raquel as the pole jetted toward her heart only confused her. She turned to me and left herself even more exposed and open than she was only moments ago.
Jean Paul fell to the floor and tried to scramble over to her to knock her out of the way.
Vlad’s shout of triumph rang hollow in my ears as images of Raquel from the last two hundred years whirled through my brain. I would love her in this life and beyond. Nothing would change that. The last several days of my life had been the most wonderful I’d known and I wouldn’t trade any of it.
I’d even take the next chapter in our love story gratefully if it meant she would live.
Autopilot was my mode as I mentally gauged the velocity and weight of the silver stake with a critical eye. In split seconds, my entire world crumbled around me. I shot from my spot and flew at Vampyre speed into the path of the stake. Raquel’s scream pounded through my head as a fire like I’d never known pierced my chest.
Fuck… I’d hoped it would hit lower. Lower would have been so goddamned much better. The room spun and as my body contorted as my mouth filled with liquid. I tried to swallow. If I could drink, I’d be fine—but it just kept coming up. Nothing would go down. Why wouldn’t it go down?
“Damn you, Heathcliff,” Raquel shouted from a far away place. “You can’t die on me. You promised you wouldn’t die. I’m a Master fucking Vampyre. I don’t need your macho caveman bullshit tendencies. I need you… I need you to live,” she sobbed hysterically.
She shook me, but it felt like someone else’s body was moving. A reddish haze covered everything in my vision and with sickening clarity, I realized I hadn’t killed Vlad. Raquel was above me crying like the world was ending. Tears fell from her eyes and onto my face.
I had to tell her to run. Vlad was still here. He wanted to hurt her.
Where the fuck was Jean Paul? Words refused pass my lips as my joints sizzled agonizingly with the silver from the stake streaming through my blood.
“You will not die. You will not die,” she ground out as she bit down on her wrist and pressed it to my mouth.
Her blood poured over my chin along with my own that refused to stay within the confines of my body. She was so very beautiful, even in her distress. Her shouts grew softer even though her beautiful lips continued to move frantically. Slowly she began to fade away.
I was drowning in my own blood. I couldn’t thrash or even explain. The stillness of my body was not a comfort. It was a failure. The fire raging inside me was a combination of the silver winding its way through my system and fury. Fury at not having ended the life of the man that wanted to kill the most important person in the world to me.
I knew it was too late. I knew there was no way to reverse the effects of the silver, not to mention I was fairly sure the fucking stake went through my heart. The heart that was breaking slowly as I watched my mate come apart as she mumbled garbled words at me and pressed her soft lips to my face. The world was so fucking unfair…
Her scent was faint, but it was there. I needed to remember. I wanted to take it with me. I needed…
I loved her with my heart, my soul and now my life… but it was good.
She was good.
She would live.
I could close my eyes.
I’d saved her.
And then my beautiful world that held Raquel as the center of the universe faded to black.
Chapter 24
“Well this is some fucked up shit,” a hushed female voice said.
“Be quiet,” another snapped in frustration.
The pacing around the area was rampant and the whispering nonstop. Tension filled the air and the staccato tapping of heels on hard wood produced the rhythm of a disjointed tap dance. The rustling of papers and far off sounds of splashing water slightly muted the drumming of the feet on the floor.
“This was an enormous mistake,” the loudest of the men informed the crowd. “It’s against the laws of nature and we’re not even sure who in the Hell is even in there now.”
“I don’t care,” a woman said flatly. “I’ll know.”
“Was this selfish?” a different female asked quietly.
The woman with the flat voice replied coldly. “In the same situation you would have done exactly as I have done. Do not judge me until you’ve stood in my shoes.”
The silence was long and then the movement recommenced.
“It’s been a week, child. There are only hours left. If you haven’t said your goodbyes… the time has come,” a kindly male baritone said trying to comfort the flat voiced woman.
“If anyone so much as utters a goodbye, I will end you. If you have no faith then I’d suggest you leave,” she hissed.
The raw pain in the woman’s tone was heartbreaking. Her belief in a miracle was undeterred even though she seemed alone in her convictions. A soft murmuring of words jumbled together assuring the poor woman that they would stand by her floated in the air like muffled music in a somber key.
“I know you people don’t want to hear anything more from my fucking trap, but there were stipulations to this deal,” the woman who’d spoken first revealed.
“What are they?” the woman with the flat voice asked tonelessly. “Actually I don’t care. He is owed a favor and I called it in. What’s done is done.”
“Well… because it wasn’t technically you he owed the favor to, he tagged on some motherfucking extras,” the foul mouthed one replied.