Page 25 of Siege of Blood and Betrayal

“Yeah, she knocked on the door right before my lights went out. She snapped my fucking neck.”

He barks a laugh. “Harsh. What did you do to deserve that?”

I clear my throat and stride over to the bar, unwilling to answer that question. “You saw nothing when you got here?”

Jax taps the ash off the end of his smoke and exhales a golden cloud of feel good. “Nope. I got back, parked the car, and came up to find you taking a nap. I figured the fastest way to find out what I missed was to wait until you woke up.”

The royal blue face of my Tag Heuer glows against the darkness of the room. I squint past the pain spearing my mind and read the numbers. Almost midnight.

Hours have passed.

Fuck. Where the hell is Zane? And how the hell did Scotland McCullough catch me unaware?“I can’t believe she snapped my fucking neck.”

Jaxon chuckles, finishing his bonding moment with his smoke. “I wouldn’t spread that around, mate. Makes you sound like a pussy instead of a royal guard.”

I roll my eyes. He’s one to talk.

Some days, I can’t believe he’s even a full-blooded vampire. Between his slender, jogger-fit physique, his aversion to killing,and his passion for online gaming, I’d swear he’s got human in him.

My phone beeps with a notification, and I pull it out of my pocket. It’s an unknown number. I read the message and the pounding in my head is joined by a searing sense of betrayal burning in my blood.

“Whoa, what does it say, dude? You’re looking cray-cray right now.”

I reread the text on the screen. The sender didn’t register in my contact list, but there’s no doubt in my mind that it was sent by Zane.

Turned bastards invaded the compound.

Bran and my father are dead.

Bran transferred his duty to Scotland.

The two of us are safe and formulating a plan.

I don’t even know how to unpack those four sentences.

Bran transferred his duty to Scotland?

The two of them are formulating a plan?

I guess that says it all.

Opening the door and finding Scotland in the corridor earlier was a shock. Waking up knowing that she downed me is infuriating. But what adds insult to injury is that not only did the bitch drop me, but then she and Zane left me here to run off and regroup.

I’ve devoted every waking moment of my life to the Toronto prince and the guy just fucks off. I thought I meant more to him than that. But it’s just like when we were teenagers—the moment Scotland is in the room, he sees nothing and no one else.

Does he honestly believe he’s safer with his old human playmate than me?

Does Bran?

That betrayal is a dagger through my chest. Bran has been my mentor and father figure since he took me under his wing at fourteen. He was the one who brought up the topic of me succeeding him. He trained me to take his place.

And now he bestowed his Sacred Squire powers on Scotland? Not me—the vampire Viking emotionally and physically conditioned to take on an army to defend Zane—but his little girl.

Did she say something to him? Was this part of some plan to get back at me for what happened all those years ago?

Doesn’t matter.However it happened, here I am, once again, on the outside looking in with those two.

Un-fucking-believable.

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