We looked at each other intently, far too long for one of us to have been driving. He seemed to have an instinct for the road, though, that allowed him to stay on the asphalt no matter in what direction his eyes were turned.
“I’d like to think I would, but honestly, I don’t know if I’m strong enough, selfless enough. But yeah, I’d like to think I could do it.”
Once again, a thoughtful silence descended over the interior of the car. Bo appeared to be as lost in thought as I was, so when he pulled off the road and parked along the edge of some trees, I was surprised.
“Where are we?”
“As far as we can go by car,” he answered, getting out to come around and let me out.
Bo offered me his hand, but he didn’t let go of it. He shut the door behind me and tugged my hand, pulling me close to him as we set out into the forest.
“So how far does Lucius live from here?”
“About three miles.”
Inwardly, I cringed. I was in good shape, but a three mile hike through the woods was not my idea of a fun night.
As we trekked along the well-disguised path, Bo led me over fallen trees and through a shallow creek, around water holes and in and out of pine stands. It seemed we’d been walking forever when Bo stopped.
His head whipped around and his eyes darted to and fro, trying to locate something. His expression was one of fierce alertness. The tiny hairs on my arms rose to attention.
I whispered, “What is it? What’s wrong?”
Without looking at me, Bo raised a finger to his lips. I held my tongue, swallowing my next worried question. Something about Bo’s body language had made me immediately apprehensive. It was more than his caution; it was as if an ominous warning was rolling off of him and crashing over me in cold, menacing waves.
Though there was no denying that my senses had been more acute since drinking Bo’s blood—something I didn’t even want to think about, much less question—I still wasn’t able to discern what had him so tense, and that just made me all the more concerned.
But then, milliseconds after I detected a pleasant brown-sugar smell on the light breeze, I heard the whoosh of an object flying through the air right before something slammed into me, sending me careening through the woods like a human projectile.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
It took me a few fuzzy seconds to realize I’d been hit by a person. It felt as if I’d been hit by a cement truck going a hundred miles an hour, or so my wavering mind believed. My consciousness faltered like a flickering light bulb and I struggled desperately to stay awake, determined to hold on to the world.
I lay on the ground with half my face buried in a bed of dry leaves. I was trembling from head to toe, but otherwise completely immobile. I strained to focus my eyes on the figures I saw looming in the distance.
I was facing the direction from which I’d come and I could see Bo a couple hundred feet away. He stood in a shaft of moonlight as it filtered through the trees. It dappled the ground all around him and sprinkled his rigid body with silvery spots. Even in the pale light, I could see the tension in him.
Bo’s face was contorted in fury and his eyes were an unnatural, ghostly green that looked almost white in the low light. His lips were curled back from his teeth in a gruesome, fang-laden snarl and, even from where I was, I could see that his pale skin was cracked like an old canvas painting.
Multiple low growls rang sinisterly through the still of the night. I couldn’t tell which noises were coming from Bo and which ones were coming from the two men that were circling him like vicious predators. Their backs were to me, so I could only see that one was taller and thicker than the other. I imagined, however, that their faces were distorted in much the same way as Bo’s. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that they were vampires, and they were on a mission—a deadly mission.
Bo backed up a step from the two and dropped slowly into a crouch. I saw him grab something from the ground at his right hip. His fingers curled around the dark object and he stilled. He was poised to strike, battle ready.
In a flash of movement so quick I could barely follow it, the taller vampire charged Bo, hurling himself through the air toward him. Bo straightened, catching the vampire in flight and, turning, used the vampire’s momentum to throw him to the ground.
Bo landed on top of him and raised his arm above his head. He paused for one long heartbeat, his moonlit form like a mercury-dipped statue. I saw what he held in his hand. It was a piece of wood as thick as a baseball bat with ends just as blunt.
My vision pulsed with every heavy throb of my heart. It stopped beating for one instant when an animal-like roar split the air. A shiver raced down my back as Bo brought his arm down in one lightning-fast motion.
I heard the sickening crunch of bone followed by the hiss of spraying blood as a chest exploded. I couldn’t keep my eyes open, but against the backs of my eyelids, my mind painted a clear image of the scene. I could plainly envision the broad head of the makeshift stake crushing the sternum of that vampire and obliterating his heart.
When I was finally able to open my eyes again, it was as if I’d fallen asleep and awakened hours later to a totally different scene. And Bo was not making out as well in this one. He was being held aloft by the shorter of the vampires, his feet dangling several inches off the ground. I could see the chalky fingers that were wrapped around his throat.
In one sharp movement, Bo jabbed his fist into the other vampire’s elbow. I heard the splinter of bone as the arm buckled. The milky fingers lost their grip and Bo fell to the ground.
The other vampire backhanded Bo, a violent strike, but one that barely moved Bo’s head. Bo’s lips lifted in a scary smile before he slammed his flat palm against the vampire’s chest.
The vampire stumbled back, but righted himself quickly and charged Bo in a tackling motion that put his shoulder right into Bo’s stomach. I heard a grunt as the vampire drove Bo back against a tree, pinning him against it with a branch-shaking thud.
Straightening, the vampire lifted his arm and punched at Bo’s face. Bo shifted his head to one side and the fist missed his face by a scant inch. The vampire’s knuckles made contact with the tree and it crumbled under the impact, bark and shredded wood flying out in an explosion of debris.