Page 35 of Haunted Nightmares
“Useless to try. Your power has been dormant too long.”Zenlothanai laughs, the sound causing my stomach to flip as I bite down harder on Sadie’s throat.“Drain her, finish her, then do the same to them.”
My eyes open of their own accord only to land on Archer’s arm in front of my face, the young vampire pleading with his mate to come back to him while he works more of his blood between her lips.
The smell is both revolting and enticing. Their exposed veins emitting a scent that has me starving and when my vision changes to tracking body temperature, I know it’s a matter of seconds before I crack.
I will drain this female, kill her deader than she already is and then I will move to Archer and Declan, successfully extinguishing all three of them before…
A loud squawk from the driver side window pulls me back to reality, grounding me just as Declan swerves and shouts a string of obscenities before the raven flies inside the van. And just when it lands on the arm of the passenger seat, turning its head to look me right in my face, Sadie’s back bows with a raspy gasp.
“Bloody fucking hell,” I grunt after removing my fangs. “Christ, I don’t remember it taking that long before.”
“You weren’t a walking corpse last time,” Declan says as he watches me fall back on my ass in the rear view mirror.
“Bugger off.”
“She ok?”
I glance at the couple before me, analyzing both while Archer cradles her in his lap, eagerly feeding Sadie while they both silently cry.
“She lives.” I nod and scoot to lean against the cool metal behind me. “But neither of them are ok.”
Declan gives me a small smile before stepping harder on the gas. “Softie.”
“Fuck… fucking b-bitch…”
“Wraith? Areyouok?”
Shaking my head I allow my body to go lax, sagging against the wall of the van while my head begins to spin. My pulse skyrockets before bottoming out, repeating a few times before my stomach rolls and just when I’m sure I’m about to pass out yet again, I feel talons digging into my shoulder while a beak begins to preen my hair.
Goddamn raven to the rescue, because my heart rate immediately starts to even out but whatever magic the bird possesses isn’t enough to keep me conscious and after the night I’ve had, I think I’m ok with it.
“Thank you.”
My head lolls toward the raspy voice to my right, one I don’t recognize and am positive I’ve never heard before. Which is a red flag on its own but given the fact that my entire body is burning from the inside out and I can’t get it to work the way I want it to, it’s second on my list of concerns at the moment.
“I can tell you’re awake and since everyone seems to think you’re going to be a jerk to me as soon as you can speak, I wanted to get that out of the way now.”
Forcing one of my eyes to open, I try to focus on the blurry figure accompanying the clearly female voice only to squint briefly against the bright purple hue beaming from her body.
Well, that’s grand.
It seems as though the conversion was a success and now Sadie wants to get a leg up before I regain all of my faculties. But since I’m too sore to argue, I simply roll my head away from her and nod.
“I do have a question for you, though, and Archer said you’re able to send your thoughts into other people’s heads and?—“
“I can… when I am so inclined, but I am…”
“Tired, I know. I only woke up a little while ago but Archer told me we’ve both been out for around thirty hours. After he described what you did I can only imagine?—“
“What… is your… question, Sadie?”
“Who was the other person you converted?”
Not expecting that to be what she asked, my eyes flutter open as I slowly turn to face her again.
A cobalt blue stare meets me head on, the dark orbs sitting above freckled, lightly tanned cheeks. Her curly brown hair has been brushed through and most of the blood that streaked her face is absent but the evidence of Sadie’s ordeal is still very clear.
At least Archer isn’t fucking around on his duties as mate so far.
