“I will be here to aid in his teachings,” Naomi replied, her demeanor calm and reasonable. “I will not desert either of you. But it must be this way, or I believe he will continue to go mad. His instincts are muddled and his thought processes are off. He is too powerful from just drinking a mere dilution of your blood. I will not be able to make another after him. It is too unpredictable.”
“So you’re saying my blood botched the job of making him into a fully functioning vampire, and only I can fix it?” I asked. “By giving him more blood?”
“Oui.” She shrugged. “There is nothing more I can do now. He must feed from you, or you must end his life. He cannot go on like this.”
I glanced down at Ray. Killing him was no longer an option if I wanted my father to stay alive. I sighed. “Looks like this is your lucky day, Ray. You get to cause me some pain and in return I finally set your mind straight. I guess we should’ve done this from the very beginning all those years ago. It would’ve saved us a lot of trouble.”
“Yeah, we’ll see about that, Hannon,” he said. “My mind is full of some crazy shit right now. I don’t think even your blood can erase it completely.” He eyed me as I knelt in front of him, my knees sinking into the dirt floor. This cave was rudimentary to say the least.
“Well, we have no choice but to give it a try.”
“What if I don’t agree and I don’t want you as my new Master?”
“If you can come up with another alternative, I’m all ears. But I don’t see any other powerful vamps waiting in line to give you their blood. Like it or not, this is the only option we have in front of us.” I gestured at Naomi. “Ask her if she had a choice in picking her Master.” I turned to address her. “Naomi, did anyone ever ask you if you wanted to become a vampire before they turned you?”
“Non,” she said. “Of course not. Vampires hunt their prey and their prodigies with precision and care. There is no free will involved. If you are chosen, and given the gift, you are eternally grateful.”
I arched an eye at Ray. “See? If you want to stay a vampire, you bite me. There’s no other way.”
Rourke strode toward us, his face set. “Jessica, I don’t like it,” he said. “I’ve never heard of a shifter making a vamp. There could be unforeseen problems we don’t know about.”
“I know it’s not ideal.” I switched to internal because Ray didn’t need to know what we were discussing. But saving Ray has become a top priority in the last half hour. There’s no way I’m letting my father die if Ray is his salvation. And I’m not technically making him—Naomi did the making—but he already has my blood in his veins so there’s no choice. Rourke, I have to finish this or he dies and with him, my father. I can’t let that happen.
I still don’t like it. What if something goes wrong?
My best guess is this will work. I’m already getting hazy internal signals that he’s bonded to me. I think once he has my blood, he might actually be forced to listen to me.
Rourke crossed his arms and gave me a hard look. I understand you feel the need to do this, and I will support you if you choose to do it, but, Jessica, if something goes wrong, we have to agree to end his life.
I will agree—I paused, meeting Rourke’s gaze—but only after he fulfills his role in all this.
Jessica, the sacrifice may be too big. What if he goes crazy and we can’t control him? What if he kills you instead?
I have to do whatever it takes to save my father. We can’t go into all the what-ifs or we’d drive ourselves crazy. If this were your father, you’d be doing the same thing. We are having this conversation prematurely. Let’s go ahead with the transition and see what happens. If it’s anarchy, we can regroup after.
“Are you two finished?” Ray asked, glancing from me to Rourke. “Because I’m hungry as hell. And if I don’t have a choice about you being my Master, I can still choose to eat. And there’s one more stipulation. When you’re done making me, I want these chains gone.” He rattled them to accentuate his point. “Or the deal is off.”
“One thing at a time, Ray,” I said. “Let’s see if this works first and then we can negotiate your freedom next.” I leaned closer to him as Rourke’s worry thumped against my chest, along with Tyler’s and Danny’s. I extended one arm and met my mate’s eyes. Pull him off of me if I lose consciousness, but don’t kill him. Promise me you won’t kill him if he hurts me. He needs to stay alive.
I won’t kill him, but I’m not going to promise I won’t make it hurt.
I glanced at my brother. “Tyler, you know I need to do this.”
“I know.” Tyler nodded. “At this point, I’d feed the bastard too.”
“Come on, let’s go,” Ray said impatiently, his eyes oscillating between silver and full black as he eyed my arm like a meal. “I’m starving here.”
“Take it easy—I’m going as fast as I can,” I said as I maneuvered myself into a better position. I slowly moved my arm in front of him and braced the other one against the wall. His fangs elongated even farther as my flesh came closer, and then his face started to do the horrid vamp slide, his cheekbones extending, his chin lengthening.
He lunged once I was within reach, his fangs penetrating my skin deeply.