Page 22 of Blood and Magic
I nodded. I’d never be able to forget this particular odor. We’d taken out a lot of them the night we’d rescued Sol, but they’d almost returned the favor with yours truly. I owed Marx a couple of canines to the neck, and I intended to pay up.
“How many scents do you pick up?” Fenris asked.
I glanced around and closed my eyes, letting my inner wolf take over. When it came to tracking and hunting, the animal had the natural instinct. Enraged that someone had come so close to the house without anyone knowing it, my beast growled and tasted the air.
“Three. Maybe four, including Marx.” My voice came out deep and grumbly.
“Me too,” he said. “Should I tell the others?”
We were here with Holden, Poe, Columba, and Aquila. Holden was friends with my brother, and Poe was still relatively new to the pack. Despite this, he had become a trusted brother and friend. He always volunteered to take a shift at the Fiver when it was needed, and he didn’t complain about any of the shit the MC put him through. He’d come to us from Baltimore a few years ago, which was how he’d gotten his road name. Columba and Aquila were twins, born in the pack a few years after me. They worked hard, and eventually, they had patched into the Royal Bastards. I outranked them all.
I didn’t see how I could keep it from them or Kodiak. It would be in our best interest to have everyone on alert.
“Wake them up, bring them out here.” I stalked back toward my cabin as Fenris followed closely behind me. “Quietly. I’ll check the security footage.”
He nodded and headed toward the ranchers’ house while I went back to mine, going straight for my laptop. After Sol and Guin had been abducted, Orion had wasted no time setting up the most sophisticated alarm system Montana had to offer around Vanderbilt Ranch. If anyone trespassed on this territory, it should have gone off. It should have alerted me.
After clicking a few tabs, I pulled up the video footage of the surrounding woods and went back a few hours. I didn’t have to go far.
Just after dinner time, Marx and his cronies came into view, dropping out of the trees like monkeys. I only saw four from this angle, but other cameras picked up at least five more. Nine in total.
The leader looked right into the camera with his disgusting, smug grin and raised an eyebrow like he knew exactly where our perimeter started. If he’d come any closer, he would have tripped the motion sensors. But he knew enough to stay out of range…which meant he knew more than I felt comfortable with.
He pulled out his phone and tapped on the screen before laughing and shoving it back into his pockets. Then, he climbed the tree holding the camera, bringing his face inches from the lens.
“Tell Big Sis that one Vanderbilt is as good as another. If I can’t have the ginger bitch, I’ll take a twin.” He smiled, showing off his golden front tooth and his elongated fangs. “Hell, I’ll take both of them. I don’t give a fuck. A deal is a deal, especially with me.”
My blood boiled. My canines extended. My claws threatened to shoot out of my fingertips.
“I’ll take the twin.”
Like fucking hell he would. I’d kill him before he ever got close to her. No one would touch her. No one.
Mine, my wolf howled.
But I squashed that down because what the fuck?
I barely knew her. Seventeen years ago, she’d been the girl who followed me around the ranch, and now that she was a fully grown, beautiful woman, she surely had better things to do. Hell, her attitude the morning I joined her for breakfast was enough for me to know she wanted nothing to do with me. Despite being hungover and wrecked, she was still the most gorgeous person I’d ever seen. I wanted to pull her across the table and spread her out to dine on her for breakfast. But that, too, I swallowed down and stuffed into a remote part of my consciousness.
Kodiak had said no touching the Vanderbilt, and the alpha’s orders overrode everything. There was only one exception to that rule: when a shifter’s mate was on the line. But that was a ridiculous notion. Maeve wasn’t my mate, and I likely would never have one. Who the fuck would want to put up with my brooding ass? If I didn’t find them before I died, I certainly had no hope of finding them now.
I switched through the rest of the camera angles, watching as the vampires retreated the way they’d come, climbed into the trees, and disappeared into nothingness. I’d have to organize a search party later today, and I grimaced as I thought about what wouldn’t get done because I had to send people out to hunt for vampires.
Fuck.
My attention caught on footage of Maeve wandering through her house while the vampires were in the woods, her arms wrapped around her midsection, her eyes soft, and a frown on her lips. She looked almost…sad. All of the Vanderbilts were aware of the security cameras inside the hallways and common areas of their house; they’d been installed for their protection. For the sake of privacy and other obvious reasons, we didn’t have any line of sight to their bedrooms. When Maeve entered her room and shut the door, I told myself to leave it alone. If she wasn’t safe, we would have heard something.
But I couldn’t resist. A clawing, nagging need to be sure urged me on. It took me no time to hack into her pathetically undefended laptop, which she’d left open on her desk in her bedroom, and hijack the camera.
It was dark, but when I switched the settings to night vision, I saw Maeve sitting up in bed. She rubbed her hands over her face and brushed them back through her hair.
“Stop dreaming about him, you stupid, silly girl.” She clicked on her light and swung her legs to the side of the bed, hanging her head between her shoulders.
Sighing, she stood, the hem of her silky white nightgown barely reaching her mid-thighs. The top cut in a V down to her breasts, and I swallowed as a wave of desire surged through my chest and into my gut, pooling in my balls. Her wild black hair hung over her shoulders, and her icy-blue eyes were even more radiant at this time of night. She walked to the balcony and out of sight of the laptop camera, but she was still talking to herself.
“What are you doing, Vermillion?” she murmured. “Are you dreaming of me, too?”
Fuuucckkkk.
