Enraptured (4 page)

“It’s a possibility,” Ian replied.

He could hear the rustle of sheets as his
brother sat up and the thud of his feet hitting the floor. “What
happened?” he demanded. Ian hurriedly filled him in on the events
that had unfolded tonight. “Where are you?”

“In the woods, by the campus.”

“Get out of there. Stay hidden and stay in
touch.”

“Ethan, that man knew what I was, and this
girl was with him earlier tonight. I also don’t know where the
other vampire is. I think I lost him, but you could be walking into
a trap.”

“I’m on my way.”

Before Ian could respond the line went
dead.

***

Ian ran out of the woods when he saw the
headlights entering the back parking lot. He’d traveled more than
thirty miles away from his school, a school he didn’t think he’d
ever see again after this night. The Jeep pulled to a stop fifty
feet away; before the headlights could turn off, he pulled the back
door open. His eyes landed on his brother-in-law, Stefan, sitting
in the backseat, a resigned expression on his face.

“You shouldn’t have come,” Ian told him as
he slid into the car with the woman still curled unconsciously in
his arms.

The inside light of the SUV caused Stefan’s
dark eyes to shine like onyx; his black hair stood in disheveled
spikes around his face. “Was it a hunter?” Stefan demanded.

“I don’t know,” Ian admitted. He went to
close the door when something poked him in the thigh. Reaching
down, he tugged a stake from a holster tied around her waist. He
hadn’t bothered to search her while he’d been trying to keep her
hidden; she wasn’t exactly capable of trying to kill him right now
anyway. The stake was confirmation that whoever had left the
original scars on her neck hadn’t bothered to erase their existence
from her mind, he realized as he lifted it before him and then
flung it out the door.

“Nice,” Stefan muttered and shook his
head.

Ian gave her a quick pat down search. He
uncovered two more stakes he threw out the door, before closing it.
He glanced nervously back at the woods; he’d caught no hint of
anyone else amongst them in the hour he’d been out there, but he
wasn’t about to take any chances with the safety of his family.

In the front passenger seat, Ethan’s wife,
Emma turned to look at the woman. “Is she ok?”

“I gave her some of my blood to keep her
alive, but I didn’t want to give her too much. She needs medical
attention. Unfortunately, she hasn’t woken up, so I can’t alter her
memories.”

“I called Mandy to help. David and Mike went
to pick her and Jill up. They’re going to meet us,” Emma told him.
Her gaze fell on the girl again before she turned around in her
seat.

He briefly met Ethan’s emerald eyes in the
rearview mirror before his brother shifted into drive and pulled
out of the parking lot. “Where are we going?”

“A cabin Brian and I own in the Cascades. I
haven’t been there in years, but Brian said he still uses it once
in a while,” Stefan answered.

Ian lifted an eyebrow at the mention of
Stefan’s old, sort of friend, Brian. He knew his brother-in-law and
Ethan weren’t fans of Brian. Stefan must have been more troubled
than he was letting on, if he’d been willing to involve Brian. “Is
Brian going to be there?”

“No. He knows we’ll be using it, but he’s on
the East coast right now.”

“What’s he doing there?”

“I didn’t ask and I don’t care.”

Ian may not mind Brian as much as the
others, but he also didn’t care to know what the vampire did in his
free time. He glanced down at the woman in his arms. The creamy
color of her skin and the black lashes curled against her cheeks
intrigued him. A primal urge he didn’t understand, caused him to
run his finger over her silky cheek. Her lids fluttered but didn’t
open.

“How did you get Isabelle to stay behind?”
Ian asked Stefan as a way to distract himself from the warmth of
her body.

“I didn’t wake her before I left,” Stefan
replied.

Ian released a snort of laughter. “She’s
going to be
pissed
.”

“Fortunately for me, she’s not as fast as
she used to be, now that she’s six months pregnant.”

“She’s still going to kick your ass.”

Stefan ran a hand through his hair. “She
probably will, but she has no business being here. Not if it was a
hunter you encountered, and not while she’s carrying our child.”
Ian agreed with him, but he would never admit that to his sister.
Pregnant or not she could probably kick all their asses. “Is anyone
following us?”

At Stefan’s question, Ian realized Ethan’s
eyes kept darting to the rearview mirror and Emma was focused on
the side mirror. “Not that I can tell,” Emma answered. “There’s not
much traffic at this time of night.”

Ian turned in the seat to look behind him.
“I think if either of them had found me in the woods, they would
have attacked me before I made it to the car.”

“Or they could have been waiting to see
where you would go,” Stefan murmured.

“Maybe we shouldn’t involve Mandy and Jill,”
Emma worried.

Ethan took hold of her hand and squeezed it.
“They’ll be fine. Ian lost whoever shot at him and the vampire that
attacked her.”

Stefan turned sideways in his seat to stare
out the window. “You were lucky.”

“Luck had nothing to do with it,” Ian
scoffed.

“It was only
one
hunter, if there had
been more it could have been a different outcome.”

“They hunt in packs?” Emma inquired.

Stefan rubbed at the stubble lining his
chin. “Humans, who sometimes learn of our existence, usually hunt
in packs. So do the true hunters, but they’re braver and stronger
and will come at you one-on-one. However, sometimes you will find
hunters and humans working together to rid the world of what they
perceive as evil. I think they use the humans as bait, but that’s
my own personal theory.”

“Hunters aren’t human?” Ian questioned.
Stefan and Brian had talked about the hunters before, but none of
them had really asked much about them. None of his family were
vicious killers; he’d believed their chances of ever encountering a
hunter were slim to none. He’d been wrong.

“No,” Stefan answered flatly.

“What are they then?” Ethan demanded.

Stefan cracked his knuckles as he continued
to watch the road behind them. “Only they know for sure. I can tell
you the rumors I’ve heard about them, but their origin, existence,
and capabilities are secrets they guard closely.”

Emma’s hazel eyes shimmered in the lights of
the few other vehicles on the road when she turned in her seat to
face him. “What are the rumors?”

“That they have the strength and ability of
vampires, but don’t require blood. Some vampires believe they were
conjured by witches during a time when magic used to be a central
part of this world. The witches created them as a way to counteract
the evil of vampires.”

“Witches?” Ian snorted in disbelief.

“There are many who don’t believe vampires
walk this earth, but we are living proof that isn’t true. Why do
you doubt witches could walk this earth, or that they used to walk
it?” Stefan asked.

Ian frowned at him. “Do you believe they
did?”

“No, I think it’s a lot of bull,” Stefan
said with a laugh. “I’ve been here for two hundred and sixty-nine
years, and I’ve never encountered a witch. But who knows, maybe
they exist.”

Emma’s hand wrapped around the headrest of
her seat as she leaned closer to them, “What other rumors are
there?”

Stefan shrugged. “That hunters are stronger
than normal humans because they keep vampires and drink their blood
to gain strength. Others believe they were created by some force
for good in the world, as a way to counteract the evil vampires can
wreak upon this earth.”

“What do you believe?” Ethan asked.

“I tend to go with the theory of when demons
mated with humans and created vampires, they also created humans
who were stronger than normal humans and had some, but not all, of
the traits of a vampire. They might not, and probably don’t have to
drink blood. They aren’t as strong as we are, though they are
powerful. They don’t realize that not all vampires are killers.
Hunters age; they’re stronger and faster than humans, but they’re
different than us.”

Silence descended over the vehicle, Ian
glanced down at the sleeping woman in his arms. Who and
what
was she? She felt and looked entirely human, but the man she’d been
with had definitely been a hunter. He’d been too fast with that
crossbow to be entirely human; no human would have been able to
come close to nicking him with an arrow.

“Are they going to be able to find us?” Emma
asked nervously.

“No, if there’s no one following us now, we
should be fine,” Stefan replied.

“Can they find out where Ian lives?”

“I didn’t use my real address for anything
on my college forms,” Ian answered. “I used a lot of manipulation,
and changed more than a few memories, to slide through. The few
friends who came to visit me at our house don’t remember how to get
there.”

“You won’t be able to go back school,”
Stefan said.

“I’d already figured that out,” he muttered.
He’d been looking forward to his last couple of months with his
friends, but after what had happened tonight, never seeing them
again was probably getting off easy. Both he and this woman could
be dead right now.

“I still think the family should leave home
and go somewhere else, just in case,” Ethan said. “At least for a
little while. We can’t take any chances the hunter or vamp can
somehow track them.”

Stefan nodded his agreement. “You’re
right.”

The woman’s mouth pursed, she stirred in his
arms before going still again. “How is she mixed up with the
hunters?” he pondered aloud.

“Are you sure she’s not a hunter?” Emma
asked.

He stroked her cheek again and inhaled the
heady scent of her blood. He’d never encountered human blood quite
like hers, but he didn’t get an inhuman or more than human vibe
from her. He hadn’t gotten one from the man she was with either,
while they’d been in the bar. “I don’t sense anything superhuman or
witchy about her,” he said.

Stefan scowled at him before glancing at
her. “Her blood smells different, but the blood of the hunter I
killed didn’t smell like that.”

“It does,” Ian agreed. “What did the blood
of the hunter you killed smell like?”

“Like blood. I didn’t know it until I tasted
it, but there was power in the hunter’s blood. That’s why I believe
they were most likely created the same way we were.”

“Well, we won’t know what she is until she
wakes up; we’ll get our answers then,” Emma said.

Stefan eyed her carefully, and Emma leaned a
little further away from her. Ethan’s eyes shone the strange
reddish-green color they’d become before he and Emma had completed
the mating ritual. If Ethan considered this woman a threat to his
wife, he’d kill her and never look back. Ian shifted, instinctively
pressing her closer against his chest. Ethan’s gaze slid away to
focus on the road once more, but he gripped the shoulder of Emma’s
seat, keeping his arm in between her and the woman.

The woman in his arms stirred briefly before
going still once more. Ethan took an exit ramp and raced down it at
speeds that probably would have petrified a human, but Ian found it
tame. Stefan directed him up and down the hilly roads. They drove
through a small town with a bus station, hardware store, diner, a
bar and other small stores that were all shut down at this time of
the night or actually early morning. Leaving the town behind, they
climbed higher into the mountains.

“Turn here.” At Stefan’s instruction, Ethan
pulled onto a bumpy dirt drive. It twisted through the trees and
climbed steadily upward. Ian yawned. It had nothing to do with him
being tired and everything to do with trying to ease the pressure
on his ears. Beside him, Stefan did the same thing.

A circular driveway emerged at the top of
the hill; Ethan pulled the Jeep up in front of the small cabin. He
parked it next to David’s sleek black Camaro. Ian stared at the one
story log cabin illuminated by the fading moonlight. The front
porch sagged beneath the weight of its years. The simple design,
and the logs used to build it, brought to mind the late eighteen
hundreds and the pioneers. In the distance, the lonely howl of a
coyote rang through the mountains and echoed across the clearing.
If they weren’t sitting in this Jeep right now, he may have
believed he’d taken a step back in time.

David and Mike stood outside the cabin,
leaning against the wall beside the doorway. Light flickered in one
of the windows; he couldn’t tell if it was from a lamp or if they
were actually using candles and lanterns inside. As soon as Ethan
turned the vehicle off, the front door opened to reveal one of
Emma’s best friends, Jill. Ian pushed open the Jeep door and
stepped into the cool breeze stirring the night. Mandy emerged in
the doorway behind Jill as they approached the cabin.

“Is she ok?” Jill inquired, anxiously
bouncing on her toes.

“I gave her some of my blood, but she still
needs medical attention,” Ian answered.

He stopped outside the door as Stefan walked
inside. “Come in,” Stefan said over his shoulder, allowing the
vampires to finally enter the home.

Jill and Mandy stepped aside to let him
inside. The lights flickering inside were from a lantern sitting on
the glass topped, wagon wheel coffee table in the middle of the
living room. To his right, a single candle burned on the counter in
the kitchen. “Are you ok?” David demanded, his gaze resting on the
blood staining Ian’s shirt and the tear in it.

“Only a scratch,” he assured the man who had
been like an uncle to him his entire life.