Page 17 of Taste of Death

What a word choice. I had a feeling thatnicewas anything but a compliment.

“I’ll miss your probing questions,” he added teasingly. “I’ll have to encourage my staff to ask more. Or else I’ll be explaining my family history to the walls.”

“Well, I mean we might still see each other around, right?” I couldn’t suppress the hopefulness in my voice. “We live close enough to each other.”

Novak ducked his head, swiftly stepping around me to walk up to the garage’s side door, where he pounded his fist three times. “That’s not likely to happen, I’m afraid.”

The door opened before I could ask why, and then things happened too fast for me to track. There was a snarling noise, and then Novak was being dragged inside by two fists gripping his jacket.

“Novak!” A rush of sudden, instinctive urgency took over me. He was mine and something was attacking him, taking him from me.

With no time to dwell on that thought, I followed him through the door, my vision red and my fangs long and snapping. Not to feed, but to use as weapons.

Novak was pinned to the wall by two other vampires. They braced their hands against his shoulders and elbows, their grips unrelenting.

“What the fuck are you doing here, Novak of Rathka’s Order?” a third vampire asked coolly, hanging back. I recognized him as Thorne, the head of Blood ‘til Dawn. From what little I knew, he was essentially the king of vampires.

“Get off of him!” I snarled at the two restraining Novak, who wasn’t even fighting back. “Let him go, you psychos!”

They ignored me while Thorne moved in and began searching Novak’s pockets. At his slightest flinch, one of the vampires braced his massive forearm against Novak’s throat.

“Don’t touch him, you animals!” I cried. “He just walked me over here. What the hell is your problem?”

Two more people rushed in from the house, and I knew by scent alone that it was Tavia and Cyan. They did nothing to stop the assault while the big vampire said to Novak, “Try anything, Rathka’s Bastard, and I’ll crush your fucking windpipe.”

Novak, to his credit, did not look threatened or the least bit afraid. “Noted,” he drawled.

I, on the other hand, couldn’t compose myself to the same degree. How could I when Blood ‘til Dawn was treating him like a criminal?

“You guys are crazy! Let him go! He didn’t do anything!”

“Amy, you don’t know what his kin have done to us,” said one of the vampires pressing Novak to the wall. “They almost killed Cyan.”

My attention turned to Tavia, who was looking at Cyan like the sun set and rose on him. “Is that true?” she asked, glancing at me for a moment before returning her gaze to him. “Hisclan were the ones who injured you that night?”

I wasn’t sure what Novak’s clan had to do with the last twenty-four hours, or why he was currently being restrained because of what other people had supposedly done.

Cyan kept his gaze fixated on the only innocent vampire in the room, as far as I was concerned. Even if he wasn’t physically holding Novak down, he was complicit by just standing there and doing nothing.

“Yes. Thorne and I were attacked by the remnants of Rathka’s Order that night,” Cyan confirmed. “Novak here is the only of them left who isn’t a cannibalistic monster.”

“A title I’m happy to carry,” Novak said wryly.

Was I hearing things right? They were suspicious of him because he was the last of his clan who was… a normal vampire?

Before I was turned, Tavia had told me about Cyan getting injured while out on a patrol. She’d been very general without many details, but we’d heard stories about monstrous vampires since we were kids. Mindless, bloodthirsty creatures who were more likely to maul someone to death than simply drink blood.

Not unlike the vampires who had attacked our settlement and killed me.

“I’m sure you are, Cursed One.” Thorne stepped away, apparently finished with the patdown. “The only question that remains is what were you doing with our brusang?”

“I’m notyours,” I snapped. “I’m not anyone’s.”

Thorne turned his menacing red eyes to me. If it weren’t for the fear that flashed through me, it would have been fascinating to note how dangerous his gaze seemed, despite being the same color as Novak’s.

“You’re considered the kin of Cyan’s blood mate,” the clan leader said. “That makes you ours. Our kin, our family.”

“I did nothing but provide her shelter from the sun, along with blood and a meal of meat for sustenance.” Novak answered Thorne’s question calmly. He never responded to the Cursed One moniker, which had to be deeply insulting. “Nothing inappropriate or untoward occurred.”

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