Chosen

Until now.

Lance grabs my shoulders, eyes boring into mine. “Underwood knows, A

“He sent you to me?” I shake my head. “No, Culebra sent you to me. I remember. It was at that bar, Glory’s. You said Culebra sent you.”

Something flashes behind Lance’s eyes—shame, sorrow, remorse.

And the lie.

He looks away. It wasn’t Culebra. It was Julian. Him and Warren Williams.

CHAPTER 15

No. It can’t be true.

I jump up, away from Lance, not wanting to look at him, not trusting myself to be close.

I feel everything he’s feeling. A hurricane of conflicting emotions.

It doesn’t matter.

Because mingled with the regret, the fear, the love, is everything he’s hidden from me.

The lie that it had been Culebra who sent him to me as a distraction all those months ago. That Underwood and Williams were working together. They wanted someone to get close to me. Someone supernatural. Someone who could be controlled. Someone I would be attracted to.

They sent me Lance.

Bile burns the back of my throat. I clutch my stomach to keep from gagging.

How could I have been so naive? I think back to conversations I had with Culebra about Lance—I never once broached the subject of how he knew Lance. I never thought to ask. I didn’t care. I was gullible and accepted Lance as eagerly as a bitch offered a pork chop.

Oh, and how that fucker Williams played me. He made fun of my relationship with Lance. Made me defend it. Knew if he mocked it, I’d most likely stay with Lance.

And I did.

God.

I want to howl with rage.

How could I have been so stupid?

I have to get out of here.

Where are my car keys?

I dart frantically around the room. My head and stomach—my blood—is on fire. I sweep things off the nightstand, Lance’s mug, a book, a lamp. The sound of breaking pottery doesn’t quell the thirst for vengeance. I grab a chest at the end of the bed. Push it with so much force it slams into the wall.

Even the splintering of wood, the rain of broken plaster, is not enough. Fury makes the animal leap to the surface.

I feel Lance, moving toward me. I whirl to face him.

He stops. He sees it in my face. Danger. The animal enraged, betrayed. The animal wounded.

He steps back.

Finally. I spy my keys and purse on a chair. Where I’d thrown them after finding Lance last night.

Last night.

I can’t think about it now.

I can’t think of anything except getting away from here.

Lance tries to reason with me. He holds out his arms. He uses words like danger and risk, caution and threat. Empty words from far away that ricochet around my head like leaves in a whirlwind. He wants to protect me.

I bare my teeth, laugh and snarl. “You can’t protect yourself.”

He lets his hands fall to his side. He has no answer to rebut the truth.

I’m done.

I don’t bother with shoes. I run downstairs, almost smacking into Adele. She jumps out of the way. She has a fresh pot of coffee in her hand. I smell the hot coffee as it spills, see her jerk as it scalds her. She yelps.

I don’t stop.

“A

But I’m past her. Her voice trails behind me as I race through that cavernous house. Too much space that suddenly feels claustrophobic, I’m so anxious to get away.

From far off, I hear Lance pounding down the stairs, too. I have a wide lead. I hit the remote control on my way out the back door and by the time the garage door opens, I’ve got the Jag in gear and I’m screeching out of the driveway.

I’m at the gate when an explosion shakes the car.

A boom. Deafening. Painful. My hands clasp my ears.

Then silence. Nothing until the security guard is out of the guardhouse and pounding on my window. “Are you all right?”

I look up at him, ears ringing, head reeling, smell of blood in my nose. I open the door, stumble out. “What the hell was that?”

He’s looking over my shoulder, back the way I came. “I don’t know. Came from the direction of one of the houses.”

One of the houses? I follow his gaze. Black smoke roils up against the distant sky. There aren’t that many houses on this road. I can see half of them from here.

I can’t see Lance’s.

Jesus.

I start to run, oblivious to the guard’s pleading that I should stay with him, that I’m hurt.

Hurt? It isn’t until he says it that I realize the blood I smell is my own. I must have hit my forehead on the steering wheel or the dash. I don’t know. I don’t care. I wipe the blood out of my eyes with a forearm and keep going. The fastest way is over fences, through yards. Easy for me. Easy for vampire.

Follow the smell, the smoke. Acrid. Metal and rubber.

A car?

No one around. No one peering out windows or spilling from doors to see what happened. Where the hell is everyone? Are these all vacation homes? Are they all empty? No matter. The absence of mortals gives the vampire rein.

Two minutes and I’m at the scene.

The last house at the end of the road. A ball of flame surrounds a red MG.

Lance’s car.

CHAPTER 16

A figure moves inside the car.

Lance.

A dry heave racks my body as a sickening flashback to another vampire caught by flames propels me back.

Ortiz in a warehouse. A burst of light as his body ignited.

The vampire retreats.

I couldn’t save Ortiz.

I can’t save Lance.

Can I?

Another flash. Williams face. Distorted. Angry. You could have saved Ortiz. Flames can’t hurt you.

Lance is pushing at the door, pounding on the window. Neither yields. He can’t seem to break free. His strength should be enough. Is it his terror of the fire? Fear that even if he gets out of the car, he has nowhere to go?

The floor of the garage is a sea of flame. Something in the garage exploded, not the car. The flames haven’t touched Lance yet. But they’re creeping toward the car. They could ignite the cloth top or the gas tank sitting in the undercarriage.

Adele at my side, screaming.

“Help him!”

Lance claws at the roof of the car, trying to rip it open.

He hears Adele, looks back, sees me. When our eyes meet, he stops fighting. He drops his hands, shakes his head. He resigns himself to death. Like Ortiz. He welcomes it because—

Reparation.

He doesn’t want me to risk my life for his. It’s there in his thoughts. Sorrow and regret.

No.

I won’t lose him.

The need to save him is stronger than the fear. The animal is stronger than the human. I need vampire. She is reluctant to come back. Flames are one of the ways we can die. She remembers Ortiz, too.

I force her to come. We have to try. She relinquishes control with a snarl and a cry.

I crouch, leap through the fire toward the car like a lioness through a burning hoop. I’m at the car. Hands grasp scorched metal, pull. Flames lick at my skin, my clothes. Pain rips into me. I hop on bare feet, first one then the other, to keep from howling with it.

The door is stuck. I gather all my strength, heave and pull it from the hinges. I toss it away, reach in, pull Lance out. I scoop him up, cradle him against me, leap again. One minute we’re in hell and the next, we’re lying in the grass at the side of the driveway.

Then a whoosh and another burst of light and heat as the gas tank of the MG catches. The car is consumed in a fiery ball.

Too close.

Sirens. From the highway.

I look over at Lance. “Are you all right?”

Adele looming over both of us. “My God, A

What’s wrong with her?

Lance speaks then. You came back.