Without a sound, Bo reached down and took my hand. He led me back to Sebastian’s, back to our room, back to our hiding place.
The house was dark and quiet when we returned. I could only assume that Cade was sleeping since he was, in fact, mostly human and that Annika was either resting or hunting.
Either way, I didn’t care as long as she wasn’t around.
Bo led me straight back to the room that I was beginning to think of as “ours” and shut the door behind us. When he turned to me, the look on his face clearly indicated his intentions. Excitement skittered along my nerves and within seconds I could smel the passion warming his blood.
My mouth watered and I felt the subtle shifting in my gums that I was starting to associate with my teeth becoming fang-like. Desire slithered through me like a sensuous snake, intertwining with the need for blood in a way that was making it hard to separate one urge from the other.
The shril chirp of my cel phone barely penetrated the haze that was overtaking me. Bo had no such problem, though. It broke his focus instantly.
When I made no move to dig the little square out of my pocket, Bo slid his fingers into the snug slit of my jeans and worked it out. I could’ve cared less about the phone. Heat seemed to shoot out from his fingertips and set my core on fire.
“Savannah,” Bo announced softly, holding the phone out to me.
I wanted to turn and throw it through the window, but there were no windows in “our” room. Instead, I sighed and begrudgingly took the phone from him.
“Hel o?”
“Omigod, Ridley! They took Devon. They took Devon!”
The sensual fog lifted immediately, my mind honing in on Savannah with sharp clarity.
“Who? Who took him Savannah? What are you talking about?”
She began to sob.
“I think it was my mother.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
I had no idea what to say to that. I could tel by Savannah’s voice that her heart was breaking.
“I couldn’t see her this time, but I heard a woman whisper and it sounded like her. And I could smel roses,” she cried miserably.
“Savannah, was she alone? Did you hear anything else?”
I knew I could count on her picking up on any extraneous sounds. Since she’d lost her sight, Savannah’s hearing was probably nearly as sharp as a vampire’s.
“I think there might’ve been someone with her,” she sniffled. “I could see a tal , dark shape, but nothing clear. It sort of looked like the silhouette of a man, but there was something around him, almost like there was something coming out from him, from his back.”
I thought of Sebastian flexing his dark angel’s wings that night in the hidden room, the one just above my head, and I wondered if that was what Savannah was somehow seeing.
“Did you hear him say anything?”
“I heard the woman whispering to someone, asking if he was sure ‘he’ was the one, I guess referring to Devon.”
“Okay, wait. Back up and tel me exactly what happened.”
“You and Bo had just left and Devon was standing outside my window. He was getting ready to come inside when I saw his head jerk around. I guess he either heard or smel ed them or something. Anyway, he backed up and turned around and then everything happened so fast, he was just there one minute and gone the next.”
“Is that when you heard the voices?”
“Yeah. When Devon turned around, I saw the shape kind of come over Devon, like the darkness sort of swal owed him up, and then the woman asked if he was the one. No one ever answered her, though. The darkness just sort of melted away and they were gone. But I could smel her, Ridley. She smel ed like roses. She smel ed like Mom.”
I could only imagine how devastating it would be to find out that your mother and your boyfriend were both vampires and that your mother was playing for the wrong team. But to have her kidnap the love of your life? Not a good day by anyone’s standards.
“Savannah, maybe—”
“How could she do that to me, Ridley? How could my own mother take the boy I love like that? Just take him away from me after everything that’s happened? After everything I’ve been through?”
“Just remember that she’s not the person you remember.
She’s probably under the influence of some very powerful, very evil blood.”
“But I’m her daughter. How could she?”
I had no answers for Savannah. I simply sat quietly as she sobbed into the phone, heartbreak and betrayal gushing through the connection and fil ing the room in which I stood, several miles away. It was that sympathy for her that prompted my promise, a promise I had no way of keeping but one that I made nonetheless.
“We’l get him back, Savannah. I promise. We’l get Devon back for you.”
“Thank you, Ridley.”
She didn’t ask how, likely because she knew that my assurances were completely unfounded. But it gave her hope, as I’d meant for it to, and that was enough for the moment. Hope would stave off despair. Savannah had experienced far too much of that in recent days and I refused to let her suffer even more.
“I’l cal you later, okay? As soon as we can figure out what’s going on.”
“But how wil you do that? I mean, do you have any idea where they might have taken him?”
“No, but I think I know of a way that I might be able to find out.”
I looked at Bo and his expression told me that he knew what I was thinking and he didn’t like it one bit.
“Cal me as soon as you find out anything. Anything, Ridley, okay? Promise me.”
“I promise,” I said, injecting the word with as much optimism and conviction as I could manage. Al things considered, it wasn’t much. “We’l talk soon.”
After we hung up, Bo and I said nothing during what ended up being a protracted silence. It hung heavily between us, like an empty black hole surrounded by his disapproval and my desperation.
Final y, I offered my point of view.
“You know as wel as I do that this might have something to do with Sebastian’s plan to kil you. And Savannah’s been through enough. She needs our help. So does Devon.”
“You think I don’t know that?” he snapped.
“You know if there was another way, I’d choose it. But there’s not. You know there’s not. This is the only way.”
Bo’s lips thinned, his chiseled mouth straightening into a grim, tight line. He knew I was right. Stil , he didn’t like it.