And the sonofabitch who’d hurt her would pay.
He stood with Jane in his arms, holding her tightly. The SOB had fled, but Aidan could still hear the echo of his pounding feet. It would have been so easy to give chase. To stop the killer. To rip out his throat.
But then I might lose Jane. And that wasn’t a risk he could take. If she died this way, such a violent death, then she’d come back as a vampire.
I’d be the one sent to kill her. It would be on me. It would be—
Sirens screamed in the distance. His head jerked up as he listened—those cop cars were racing their way. The killer had called Jane, had baited her into coming after him. Had he also called other cops?
Was he staging some kind of scene? It sure looked that way.
Aidan growled as he held her tighter. The cop cars were coming in fast, and they were nearing the entrance to the cemetery. If they saw Jane, they’d take her to their human doctors. Those doctors would try to fix her.
She wasn’t ready to be fixed yet, not by their science.
So he didn’t go to the entrance. He just ran straight for the big, stone wall that surrounded the cemetery. He ran faster and faster and when he got to that wall…
He held Jane against his heart and he jumped right the fuck over the wall.
***
She’d shot him. And the shots freaking burned.
He ducked behind an old building, one with boarded up windows and the scent of rats clinging to its exterior. He huddled low and gritted his teeth as the pain seemed to roll through his body.
The bitch, the bitch. He’d been distracted by her because her scent…it kept messing with his head. So he’d lingered at the cemetery. He’d gone closer to her.
And she’d shot him.
His claws were out. His fingers were trembling. And he seemed to be growing weaker with every single moment that passed.
What in the fuck?
He was supposed to be invincible. A god among the stupid humans but that cop, she’d brought him down. His eyes squeezed shut as he battled the pain. He hoped that bitch was dying in that cemetery. Another body to join the dead. He’d sliced her as hard and deep as he could.
Sirens echoed through the night. The other cops, rushing in. He’d intended for them to find Travis’s body and the pretty detective’s corpse. A double kill like that—no way would it not make the news.
Only he hadn’t been able to stay around and make sure the detective died. Her scent—shit, it had messed with his head.
She shot me.
The burning wasn’t stopping. He just seemed to be getting weaker and weaker and…
He lifted his trembling hand. One of the bullets had hit him near his heart. He started clawing at his chest, wanting that terrible pain to stop. That burning…he was burning from the inside, out. He clawed and clawed and—
His claws scraped over the bullet. He pulled it out, clenching his teeth to hold back his scream of pain.
This shouldn’t happen! No one hurts me! No one!
If the cop wasn’t dead, he’d get her…he’d make her suffer. Torture, so much torture. She’d beg him to end her suffering. She. Would. Beg.
His fingers burned when the bullet touched the skin there. Small tendrils of smoke rose from his hand, but he didn’t drop the oddly heavy bullet. He lifted it up, squinting his eyes.
Silver.
She’d shot him with silver.
He threw the bullet away and began clawing at the wound on his left shoulder. A few moments later, with smoke trailing from his fingers, the second bullet was out.
Time to get the third…
Silver. Detective Hart had known the score about the paranormal world. She’d used silver on him.
He couldn’t wait to use his claws on her again.
***
Annette Benoit didn’t like the werewolf mansion in the swamp. When a woman almost died at a particular spot, well, it wasn’t as if it left the best impression on her.
But the werewolf alpha had summoned her out to his place and when a werewolf like Aidan issued an invitation…
No one has the option of refusing.
She slammed the car door shut and glanced over at her driver, the always too handsome Paris. He’d been very stoic during the drive. He’d appeared at her shop and only said that Aidan needed her.
She wondered just what the emergency was that waited inside the mansion, but before she could even take a step toward the house, another car was rushing up behind her. She turned her head, blinded a moment by the vehicle’s bright lights. She didn’t have any kind of enhanced vision, so the lights made it hard for her to see anything beyond the big bulk of the SUV.
Someone jumped out of the driver’s side of that SUV. “Hurry the hell up!’
Ah, she knew that voice. Garrison. One of Aidan’s younger minions.
At his order, someone did hurry the hell up—the passenger side opened and a man with slightly stooped shoulders hopped out. He rushed for the mansion’s front door, a small bag gripped tightly in his hands.