Reclaimed (Wolf in Exile Part 4): Werewolf Shifter/Vampire Paranormal Romance Page 4

  “I’ll have you know that I’m older than most here. I can help you. A five-minute feeding will get you about a month of memories. Ten minutes: Just under two months. Fifteen minutes or more: I can take you back just under three months. Any more than that and you’re putting yourself at risk of death. Only rogues kill hosts needlessly, which is why I need your consent to save you and turn you if it comes to that. My record is clean with UCON and I wish to keep it that way.”

  “I’ll settle for ten minutes. Two months back should be enough…I hope.”

  “And your consent…you have to say the words. You willingly offer your blood in exchange for your memories. You give consent to turn you, should your heart stop beating.”

  Kalena repeated the words.

  “Follow me. If you want your memories, you must focus in quieter surroundings.” The vampire turned on his heels and parted through the crowd.

  “You’re crazy,” Tracy whispered as they followed him.

  “Evidently so.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The vampire led them down a long, narrow hallway past the main party and into one of the smaller rooms. The atmosphere seemed more relaxed as there were fewer people around to observe what was going on, but Kalena could still hear the throbbing music through the walls.

  Black leather armchairs and ottomans were placed strategically throughout the small room. Pillar candles sat in metal scones on the walls. The flickering flames were the only source of light. A lavender aroma floated throughout the room. Whether it was to create a calming atmosphere or mask the scent of blood and vampire, Kalena didn’t know. Maybe both, since the aura was doing its job. Most of the seats were occupied, but there was a common element: vampires feeding from others. Not just males feeding from women, but female vampires also feeding from men.

  “Change your mind?” the vampire inquired.

  Kalena shook her head. “As long as you keep up your end of the bargain.”

  The vampire chuckled in return. “Never trust a vampire. If you’d ventured into any other coven in search of your memories, you might not have been treated so kindly. You’re lucky and safe here.”

  “What does he mean?” Kalena directed her question to Tracy.

  “The Blanc coven doesn’t allow rogues within their circle. There are ruthless covens, meaning if you step into a vampire party during a feeding, you’re pretty much fair game and labeled prey. Those vampires are called rogues because they don’t follow standard rules.”

  “She’s right about our coven. We may be considerate to others not like us, but don’t take that as a sign of us being meek or vulnerable.” The vampire pulled out a leather stool and motioned for Kalena to take a seat. “You’ve done this already, so it shouldn’t be as painful.”

  “Sure.”

  After Kalena was seated high on the stool, he picked up her hands, turned her palms down and placed them in her lap.

  “You should relax,” he said. “If you can remember, focus on a time period from which you want the memories extracted.”

  “Okay,” Kalena replied, after a sigh of reluctance. She glanced to the left in search of Tracy.

  “I’m here,” her friend reassured her. “I’ll time him. Ten minutes.”

  Kalena relaxed her shoulders, took several deep breaths, and let her mind take her to the place she least wanted to return: the moment of revelation about Gavril, when she was tied to a chair and he’d ordered the men to administer the D996 shots.

  The vampire touched her skin in the process of swiping her hair away from her neck, causing a chill to run down her spine.

  Kalena closed her eyes and zoned out of the present. She took a moment to realize that the vampire was counting down. 7. 6. 5…

  She shut out his voice and forced herself to return to the moment when Gavril had decided her fate. She hardly noticed as the vampire sunk his fangs through the vein on her neck. Her fingers stiffened then gripped the fabric of her jeans.

  Focus. I sense nothing but fear. What’s happened has already happened. Focus more.

  This time his words were in her head, not spoken.

  Weird. The other vampire, Tomas, had not had this type of power. In either case, he was right. The absolute worst-case scenario had already happened.

  Kalena relaxed her shoulders, which wasn’t an easy task with a vampire’s fangs stuck in her neck, funneling her blood for nourishment.

  “She’s seen too much. Get rid of her,” Gavin said. “Clean up her memory first. Three doses.”

  “Why, Gavin?” Kalena screamed, struggling against the bindings used to secure her hands behind her back.

  Gavin turned around and he looked as though he pitied her, but in one split second, the look was gone. “I have no choice. I told you I was a very dangerous man, but you agreed to continue seeing me anyway.”

  Her gaze flew back and forth between the two men that had brought her to Gavin. They were wearing Silex security guard uniforms. “You lied to me! You work here, don’t you?”

  Gavin laughed. “Maybe she’ll need more than three doses.” He directed this comment to the men. “As a matter of fact, bring me the first one.”

  “A woman was murdered back there in the labs. Don’t you care? What’s going on here?” Her voice was hoarse from screaming.

  Gavin sighed and shook his head. “Obviously you can’t handle all of this. I should have known. Which further proves my point that it will be best if we erase everything you and I shared.” He came closer and threaded his hand through her hair.

  “What do you mean?” She glared into his eyes, but she was sickened by the haughty look in his gaze.

  One of the men handed Gavin a needle. She nearly passed out from the sight of it.

  “I trusted you.” Her breath came out in a rush.

  “That’s why you must now forget me,” Gavin replied. “When you wake up, you won’t remember much of anything. I’m going to put you away for a little while. A few months maybe, just to be sure that your memories won’t come back.”

  “My memories?”

  “You were just in the wrong place at the wrong time,” he stated before piercing her with the needle through the meatiest part of her arm.

  She shrieked and jolted out of her memory.

  It’s already happened. The vampire’s voice was in her mind again. Interesting. Shall we delve a bit deeper?

  Kalena nodded, closed her eyes again, and tried to focus once more.

  A couple of minutes passed before her attention faded to the interior of some room. Sort of like a master bedroom, but a little more formal. She wore a sheer nightgown and was seated on the bed. A notepad and pen with the name of a popular hotel chain gave her location away. She wasn’t in anyone’s personal bedroom. She was in a high-end hotel. A tray of empty champagne glasses was perched on the footrest near the bed.

  Kalena swung her legs over the edge of the bed, prepared to rise, but happened to glance over her shoulder to see Gavin pulling out a wooden box with some needles.

  “How long do you have to take your medication?”

  “Indefinitely,” he replied. Gavin was always terse in his replies, leaving her to wonder if he was bitter about the illness he claimed to have, or just bitter in general.

  “You always take one shot right before we’re together, and then one right after. Why?”

  “Because I burn the most energy with you.”

  “Is that good or bad?” she asked.

  “Good because the shots make me crave sex. Bad because the supply is exceedingly low.”

  “Can’t your doctor just increase your prescription?”

  “It doesn’t work that way. The medication is only for a select few, and it’s not mass produced.” He aimed the needle at the vein near his inner elbow and administered the injection.

  She cringed. “Looks like you’ve gotten used to sticking yourself with that thing.”

  “It makes me less of what I am now and more of what I want to become—without all the h
assles, of course.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We agreed, no intruding questions, yes?”

  Kalena swallowed down her rising suspicion and rose from the bed. “We did.”

  This sexual relationship with Gavin had gone on for weeks. After tonight, Kalena wouldn’t see him again. She doubted he’d miss her. There was no love here. Only the need for satisfaction. Hers and his. Yet, she wondered who was on the better end of the bargain.

  The memory faded…

  Kalena’s breathing slowed and her muscles grew slack as the vampire continued to feed.

  A couple more minutes…care to go for another round?

  How odd that the vampire could intercept her thoughts and pull her memories at the same time. But whatever he was doing…it was most certainly working.

  “Okay,” she whispered and took a deep breath. But before she could pull from any more suppressed memories, the vampire’s hold on her neck ceased and a biting draft wafted over her.

  On her next breath, she brought in a very familiar scent.

  “Thane?” She pivoted on the stool, slowly.

  Thane was not pleased. He held the vampire in a vice grip about the neck. The vampire’s eyes were still widened in shock and his face had reddened. She presumed this was either from all the oxygen being squeezed out of him, or the fact that he’d just eaten. His toes barely touched the ground as Thane dangled him.

  “Kalena, what are you doing in this place?”

  She stood from the chair. “I came to find out what happened to me.”

  The vampire’s skin was now losing color fast, and several other coven members sprang into action. They cornered Thane and his two Epsilons like prey. Tracy, Danika, and the girl’s two guardians were also surrounded. Almost everyone in the room, except for the humans, had fangs or canines dropped.

  “Put him down. He was only helping me,” Kalena urged. She didn’t want to see violence here. Not now, not ever again.

  “Did he hurt you?” Thane asked between clenched teeth.

  “No, I asked for it.”

  Thane’s eyes shifted to all of the vampires circling around them. “Asked for it…or were lured into it?”

  “Let him go,” a vampire from the circle hissed. “We’re under the guidance of Luxar. You know we follow the rules of UCON here.”

  “No one takes from what is mine.” Thane must have squeezed the vampire tighter because his eyes glossed over.

  “How do we know she’s yours? She’s not marked…she’s a human,” another vampire challenged.

  Thane growled. “Well, now you know…”

  Tracy moved to stand between them. “I’m sorry, Alpha. I was only trying to help.”

  “This was my fault,” Kalena said. “I begged Tracy to bring me, and they did what I asked and nothing more.” Kalena approached Thane and pressed her palm against his chest. She caught his gaze. “I’ll explain everything. Put him down.”

  Thane loosened his grip and the vampire fell to his knees, gasping for breath and rubbing at the bruise around his neck.

  “I’m so sorry,” Kalena said, pitying the vampire and feeling terrible about the way he had been assaulted by Thane.

  The vampire glanced up slowly, his chest still heaving. “Next time, you oughta tell the vamp who’s helping you that you have a crazy ass shifter for a boyfriend.” With that, he got up and backed away through the crowd.

  Thane stretched out his arm and opened his palm to her.

  Kalena frowned and glared at him, but decided that arguing with him in the middle of a vampire party wouldn’t be very effective. Especially now that the vamps were looking at them like they were the enemies.

  She placed her hand into Thane’s palm, and he led the way out of the building with Tracy and his two Epsilons following closely behind.

  CHAPTER NINE

  “How could you do that to someone who would help me?”

  “He was helping himself to your blood,” Thane replied.

  Kalena unleashed her aggravation as soon as she and Thane were seated in the large SUV. The driver and Zeff were in the two front seats. Danika and one of the guardians she’d come with were in the middle seats. Ulrick had agreed to drive Tracy back to her home.

  “It was the only way that he could help me get my memories back,” Kalena declared. “We’ve done this already. I needed to know more about what happened to me.”

  His eyebrows rose and then drew closer together. “Why didn’t you tell me this was what you had in mind?”

  “When I made up my mind, you had already left for UCON. Plus, you have your own issues to deal with.”

  “You’re right, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t have helped you with this. This world…our society differs greatly from the human world. You can’t go around trusting everyone. We run in circles for a reason.”

  “That was stupid of me to ask a stranger, I admit it, but I was willing to risk my life to learn as much of the truth as possible. The vampire said he was older and that he could help.”

  Thane frowned. “He lied.”

  “How do you know?”

  “An older vampire would have been able to take me down the moment I threatened his existence. My ability to subdue him tells me that he was made recently…maybe in the last ten years or so.”

  Kalena shook her head. “But he drew on my memories easily. Almost too easily…”

  “He may have had skills, but he was no elder. He told you what you wanted to hear so that he could feed from a human.”

  She swallowed, thinking about all the possible downfalls her choice could have resulted in.

  “Never trust anyone outside of our circle. Do you understand?”

  “He just wanted to help…and he did,” she stated.

  “Never,” he stated firmly. “Many of the pureblood vampires, and even some of the hybrid rogues can’t be trusted. Not with your memories, and especially not with your life.”

  She folded her arms across her chest. “Well excuse me for choosing to believe that you wouldn’t want to know anything else about my no-strings-attached relationship with your brother and taking it upon myself to investigate the truth.”

  “I don’t care how many strings were attached in your arrangement with Gavril. You’re mine now. My responsibility. And now that most everyone of both shifter and vampire blood knows it, the next person to introduce you to any harm whatsoever, whether intentionally or unintentionally, will feel my wrath.”

  “The vampire never tried to hurt me. In fact, your brother is the only man who has tried to kill me. Tell me, does the same rule apply for your kind? Should I be skeptical and untrustworthy of all shifters, as well?”

  In the middle of their quarrel, Danika had turned around in her seat and glanced back and forth between the two of them, wide-eyed. “Umm, you two are aware that you’re not the only ones in the car, right?”

  Kalena’s neck heated when she realized she’d just dissed an SUV full of shifters.

  “We’ll finish this discussion tonight,” Thane said. “It’s my fault that I didn’t tell you everything myself. You’re one of us now, and I plan to remedy that.”

  Kalena sighed and settled back into her seat. She didn’t have enough strength to continue the argument with him. Another bout of nausea consumed her, but she was grateful she was sitting this time. However, Thane didn’t seem to miss her increased state of fatigue. He slipped one arm around her waist and pulled her close to his side.

  Thane pressed his lips to her forehead. “Offering blood two days in a row isn’t something a human should do...not even an altered one. If you allow me to, I’ll help you regain your strength quickly.” This time he spoke softly to her.

  She rested her head against his chest and closed her eyes as she attempted to regenerate from the blood loss until she was able to reunite with Thane again. His warmth reminded her of just how much she needed him.

  When they reached the ShadowRock estate, everyone exited the SUV. Danika disa
ppeared quickly into the home with Zeff and her guardian on her heels. Nigel, the driver, waited beside the car for instruction from his Alpha.

  “Nigel, I’ll take it from here. I’ll be spending time offsite tonight. Will you help get a message to Brant that I would like a meeting with him first thing tomorrow morning, here at the estate?”

  Nigel nodded and handed Thane the keys to the SUV. When he was gone, Thane turned slightly and held out his palm. With his other hand, he held the passenger door to the SUV open.

  “Will you come with me?” he asked her.

  Kalena hesitated. “Why not here?”

  “I want some time alone with you like it was before. We need to talk.”

  “If it’s about what I did or said tonight…”

  He frowned. “No, not just about tonight. About everything.”

  She glanced at him uneasily before she slipped her hand into his. He helped her into the passenger side of the SUV, closed the door, and then steered them away from the mansion.

  CHAPTER TEN

  It was well past midnight by the time Thane and Kalena reached their destination in the woods. There were no streetlamps, sidewalks, or gravel-stoned paths leading up to the ranch like there were back at the ShadowRock mansion. The home was small, but sat on a large clearing in the forest. The hanging tree branches and moss overshadowed the ranch, making it look more secluded than what she was used to.

  It dawned on Kalena that she hadn’t been to her apartment since she was caught snooping in the labs at Silex.

  Thane brought the SUV to a halt a few feet from the porch and turned off the engine.

  “This was where I came when I needed to be alone, way before my time at Area S2. When my job as Alpha became a little too stressful.”

  Kalena sat up in the seat and glanced out of the window at the darkness surrounding them. “Does anyone actually live out here?”

  “There are two shifter families here. They’ve been living out here for decades, though. It’s nothing like the surrounding towns where there’s a home on every corner. Out here, it’s more like every mile.”