Page 58 of Lured

As I continued with the story, I told Ludis that Leo had spoken of being an enthralled and what that meant before telling him that I had been scared. I made out that Leo was pushy and I had to take a break and that he knew pretty much everything from there.

Ludis got up and growled as I finished speaking, thankfully letting go of me again.

I tried to straighten up and neaten up as I did. At the same time I glanced across at the other people in the room. They were no longer having an orgy in the middle of the room, but several of the vampires were drinking some blood and one of the enthralled was resting. She must have been staring at us for a while, but she seemed out of it or high.

Before Ludis could ask me anymore or put me through anything else, another vampire came in. He looked around and seemed relieved when he spotted Ludis.

The situation was terrifying enough, but I knew this was one of the vampires from Vegas as well. I didn't dare move or cause a fuss while there were now two vampires between me and the door, and this new addition was certainly loyal to Ludis.

“I can't find Butch.” The new vampire looked agitated and looked around. “He was supposed to be telling me what we were doing the day after tomorrow, but he's not shown up. And his scent just disappears. It's like he vanished.”

I frowned, knowing that it would mean Leo got to him in some way. If that was true, then why hadn't he come back for me. Maybe he wasn't going to.

“Okay. You're going to have to do what Butch was going to do, if we can't find him. Whatever you do, stay away from Drew and anyone else on this ship. I want you to collect your stuff. Anything you need to survive and get off this ship as soon as you can. You're going to get what I need for me.”

“Where do I need to go?” the vampire asked, nodding as if he was more than eager to do what Ludis asked.

Ludis opened his mouth as if he was going to tell the vampire and then looked around. I tried to look as if I was simply scared and huddling, not paying any attention, but I didn't expect him to believe it.

“I'll message you with the details in a few minutes. Go.” Ludis spoke without looking away from me. “I've got a problem to deal with here. I'm going to deal with that and then go after Drew.”

I shuddered. This was bad. I didn't doubt that I was going to be held responsible for Butch's disappearance.

Chapter 25

Leandro

An hour had slipped by and I still had no idea where Butch was supposed to be going or what he was supposed to be doing. All I knew was that Butch wasn't talking. I had tried everything I could think of so far, and still Butch had held on. He was close to passing out and even for a vampire he was being pushed to his limits.

I tried to think of more I could do as I studied him from behind. The vampire was barely alive and I had needed to take a break to give his body a chance to recover. This wasn't how I had wanted this to go and I knew I had been away from Anais for a long time.

Given Ludis, I had no doubt that he would be finishing up with his enthralled, if he wasn't already. I was sure that he would then turn his attention on my enthralled.

The longer I was away, the more of an excuse I would also have to come up with for Ludis to believe me. Especially if I still didn't have answers. On top of that, I was fairly sure that Ludis would notice his favorite vampire was dead and he wasn't there to do the commands of the jumped up turned.

I stifled a sigh of frustration and considered my options again. After a short while, I grabbed a glass of water and chucked it onto Butch's face. It snapped him out of a sort of exhausted doze and brought him back around.

“All right,” I said. “I want to know where you're going, who you're meeting and why. And I'm out of patience. I know there is at least one other vampire who knows and if you won't tell me, I'm going to kill you and then I'm going to go ask them. I'm done with this whole situation.”

Butch chuckled again, something he had done several times. It was clearly to antagonize me, but I wasn't about to let him have his way, even at this point in the conversation. I was sure that was what he wanted.

Of course, he was in so much pain that at this point it might be a blessing to him to die. I had no doubt this was more pain than he had ever been in.

“I'm not telling you anything.” Butch glared at me, the resolve still there. “Nothing that you don't already know. But you might want to go find that enthralled of yours.”

“My enthralled?” I asked, figuring that at least he was talking for once.

“Yeah. By now Ludis will probably have finished her off. He knows. Knows you're not really called Drew and she's in this with you.”

“In this with me? She's a girl I picked up in Vegas,” I said, knowing that there was almost no chance it mattered, but I found myself defending her anyway.

This time Butch laughed. “He's killed her by now. She's not anyone's anything. Of course, he plans to at least enjoy her once before. Just to find out what you see in her.”

I let out a growl, knowing that I couldn't let that happen, but Butch seemed very convinced that it had already happened.

I got up, knowing that I had promised Anais I would keep her safe. If Ludis had gone after her and Butch knew, then he would have gone after her the moment I walked out of the door. Although it was also possible that Butch was saying this to get me to act rash, to get me to end this or just leave and go to save Anais.

Maybe even give the game away.

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