Page 51 of Blood Ties
“Gaby,” Grayson stated, obviously upset with my rudeness. I waved him off. I didn’t want to break the trance I had created. I still wasn’t great at influencing people, but I was getting better.
“You will be quiet the rest of lunch. You will not listen to mine and Grayson’s conversation. You will hear nothing spoken between us until we leave here. Now eat your food quietly.” I broke my eye contact with her and turned my sights to Grayson, who was staring at me with an angry bewilderment. “Oh, like you wouldn’t have done it too.”
“Gaby, she’s still a person.”
“A person who wouldn’t shut up about our sex life! Speaking of, maybe I should remove that image from her brain?”
“No, leave it.” I crinkled my brow at him not grasping why. “The sight of us together is just a little insurance to let her know that if she took this job for any other reason than work, then she’s going to be disappointed.”
“Did you set it up on purpose?”
He chuckled lightly, “No. I just saw how quickly your mood was unraveling and thought you could use a pick me up.”
“Well, afterthislunch, I think I deserve another.”
“Done.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Two weeks later, Grayson had a business meeting in Los Angeles. He had been gone for two nights already and still had one more before he’d be home. I had done my best not to ask if Chloe was going with him. I trusted him, but I couldn’t get on board with the fact that they were working together. Grayson had offered for me to come along, but I had too much going on with planning Damien’s extravaganza, not to mention that he had decided he wanted to throw a formal dinner party in a little over a month. So I was pretty busy these days. In the past, I had always had help when it came to planning, now with it just being me, I was getting a little overwhelmed.
I had been spending so much time with Damien that I was a little glad Grayson had the meeting out of town. It meant that I could get a little more work done without having to feel guilty about spending less time with him.
It was after dark when I was leaving The Angelo Tower. I decided to walk to a nearby restaurant and eat, since no one was waiting for me at home. I gave Shawn a ring. It had been a little while since I had seen him. I was glad things were going so well with Clive, and I was happy for them, but I missed my friend.
“Hey, It’s me,” I spoke to his voicemail. “Grayson’s out of town and I’m all alone. I miss you. Call me back.” I was just hanging up the phone when I was suddenly slammed into with such a force and speed, that one moment I had been walking along the sidewalk, the next I was halfway down an alley.
My head was a little foggy by the rapid movement. It was different when someone else did it to you, than when you moved that quickly yourself. As my eyes began to focus I saw four vampires surrounding me. The city lights reflected off of three of them, showing their pale skin, the other was dark enough that he could almost hide in the shadows. His black attire and bald head only helped matters. Two looked like they could be brothers with their matching light brown hair and cinnamon eyes. They stood in the middle, with a blonde vampire on one end and the bald one on the other. I could feel the power rolling off of them and I’d guess that they were all around two hundred years old, roughly. I didn’t know what they wanted. They obviously knew I was a vampire, so it wasn’t like I was easy prey. They all slowly came stalking towards me. I knew one on one I could take them; after all, I had taken on Anton who was twice any of their age. But having all four of them? I wasn’t so sure.
I peeked quickly over my shoulder and noticed that no one was guarding the exit that way. One of the brothers, noticed and came rushing towards me before I could make a move. I didn’t want to fight them. I didn’t even know them, but I was definitely going to defend myself.
I crouched down, shoving my fist to his chest meaning to send him flying, but I put too much strength behind it. My hand slid into his chest with such ease. Instinct took over and I gripped his heart, ripping it from his chest. I saw the look of shock cross his face before his eyes glazed over. As he folded to the ground, the other three watched until his body stilled then locked their fiery gazes on me. I threw the heart down preparing for the fight that I knew was coming. They rushed me. I slammed my fist into the first face I saw, feeling a distinct crunch under my knuckles followed by a deafening cry. I felt arms wrap around me from behind trying to lift me from the ground. I used this as an opportunity to kick the one in front of me before head butting the one behind me. He released me causing me to hit the ground on my knees scrapping them against the pavement. I tried to stand, but felt a hard kick to my stomach, knocking the air out of me. My hands slid out from under me and the man kicked me again to the face causing blood to spray from my mouth. The other two grabbed me and lifted me from the ground. I struggled against them until I managed to break free from one of them.
“Now!” Shouted the blonde one. I didn’t know what he meant, but it caused me to freeze for a moment when suddenly something heated, scorching hot, slammed against my neck. I screamed in agony before I lost control of my muscles, my body went limp. The vampire to my right was the only reason I was still vertical, then he let me go. I fell to the ground hard, landing on my side feeling the asphalt scrape my arm and a sharp sting in my head.
I felt drugged. I tried to move, but my limbs felt so heavy. I opened my eyes and everything was hazy making it difficult to focus. I could still feel the burning on my neck and tried reaching for it, but my hands wouldn’t obey the orders I was sending.
“Stupid bitch!” Someone spat before sending a swift kick to my stomach. I tried to scream but nothing came out. I opened my eyes to see the blonde vampire hovering over me. “It’s about time, Marty. She already took out Trevor.” The blonde one explained. Just then I saw a redheaded man with gray lining his changing hair move from the shadows. I hadn’t seen him before.
“Trevor was an idiot. He knew who she was and what she was capable of,” the bald one explained.
“At least we got her. Now his death isn’t meaningless,” the one with light brown hair spoke leaning against the wall. His gaze stayed on me, almost as if he was afraid that even in my current state I was still going to escape and kill them all. Then it hit me. No one knew where I was. Grayson wasn’t coming home until tomorrow evening. That would be the earliest that anyone would notice I was missing.
I tried to fight, but the harder I fought the more my consciousness tried slipping away. “Yeah, sweetheart. That ain’t gonna work.” The blonde squatted down in front of me. “You see Marty over there?” He pointed to the redheaded man. “He’s a warlock. He’s cursed you. So you’re going to stay like this as long as we want.” He pushed my hair from my face. I tried to swat him away, but I don’t think my hand even got airborne. “You are a pretty little thing, aren’t you? I bet daddy would be real sad if anything bad happened to you.”
“Jim…” The bald vampire warned.
“What? We ain’t sending her back anytime soon, might as well have a little fun with the little bitch.”
His words made my skin crawl and a layer of goose bumps broke across my arms showing it. The blonde noticed.
“Do you like that, baby? Does the idea of being with a real vampire turn you on?” He ran his finger up my arm. Grabbing me by the shoulder, he rolled me onto my back. “You been with that human you turned for too long. Time to remember what you’ve been missing.” My eyes shifted to the others standing around, but none of them looked at me. They were all looking away. They all thought this was wrong, but wouldn’t stop him. I felt his hands on my shirt. He pulled it out from where it was tucked in my pants and ripped in open sending the buttons scattering. I closed my eyes using all my strength to fight against what was about to happen next as I braced myself for the feel of his hands on my skin, but nothing happened. I opened my eyes and he was no longer there.Did I do it?I wondered to myself as I felt my energy wane. I looked to where I had seen the others just moments ago, but my hazy vision must have been bad because I could no longer make them out either.
I tried harder to focus, but I couldn’t make anything out and it only drained me more. Then I saw the blonde approach. I tried fighting when his hand came towards me, but he reached for my neck and pulled what had been burning me off. I winced when it detached.
“Gaby? Are you okay?” I looked to the blonde before me and wondered why he was being kind. “Did they hurt you?”They?I did my best to focus on him. As his image became clear, I realized that the blonde in front of me wasn’t a vampire, but an angel.Sebastian. I couldn’t help but let a tear escape. Never had I been so glad to see him.
“It’s okay, Gaby. I got you,” he insisted gently before pressing something warm against my mouth. Instinctively I opened and felt the warm rush of fresh blood, but the lingering effects from the spell were even more powerful than blood. Blackness swallowed me and I felt like I was being lifted into the air.
