From the Shadows (A Shadow Chronicles Novel) (16 page)

“Then why not let me narrow the list down by giving me a few names, eh?” Owens
retorted.

Race growled, but he rattled off a few names,
likely just to get Owens off his back. I was not remiss to his inclusion of Merrick, whom I knew he despised, and I wondered just how many of the people he’d mentioned worked for Vienna Silk.

And how many of them were vampires.

After Race walked through the apartment with Owens and gave him a detailed list of things that had been broken and their value, answered yes to whether or not he had renter’s insurance, and gave him contact information because he still intended to leave town, the detective left, followed by the crime scene investigators. Lochlan walked through the door as the last technician went out, and he whistled as he took a look around.

“It
certainly looks like you got on somebody’s shit list, chimaera,” he said.

I scowled at him as Race tensed. “Not now, Lochlan.”

“As you wish,” he replied smoothly.

Race was standing in the middle of the living room with his head hanging down, his hands on his hips. I was worried about him, about the anger I knew was barely held in check. Though I suspected that right now being comforted was the last thing on his mind, I nonetheless stepped up to him and wrapped my arms around his waist. Race tensed again, then relaxed enough to wrap one of his arms around me and lay his cheek to the top of my head. He sighed heavily, and then we were all startled by the ringing of his cell phone
, which he pulled out of his pocket and snapped open without even looking at the caller I.D.

“Hello?” he said wearily.

“
I trust by now you’ve gotten my message
.”

Being that my head was resting against his chest, not to mention my own excellent hearing, I was able to pick up the voice of the person on the other end of the phone. And even were I not able to hear him, I’d have certainly guessed
who it was by the way Race stiffened and began to breathe sharply.

“You mother
fucker
!” he shouted into the phone, pushing me away to pace. “I swear when I get my hands on you—”

Merrick laughed. “
You’ll do what, freak
?”

“Do you really think breaking into my place and destroying my property is really going to entice me to change my mind? You’re a fucking idiot,” Race seethed.

“
Listen clearly, freak
—”

Before Race could say another word, Lochlan stepped over and snatched his phone out of his hand, and I had to rush to hold Race back from going after him. Loch held one finger to his lips as he pressed the speakerphone button and said, “I think
you
should listen clearly, laddie.”

“
Who the hell are you
?” Merrick asked angrily. “
You’re interfering in the affairs of Vienna Silk, asshole
.”

Lochlan shot a surprised look Race’s way, though to Merrick he said, “Is that supposed to frighten me? I know vampires far more intimidating than that little pretender.”

“
If you know Vienna’s a vampire, dickhead, then you know she’s the most powerful vampire in the state
,” Merrick taunted.

Lochlan chuckled. “I beg to differ, little man, for I do believe that the title of ‘most powerful vampire in the state’ belongs to my father,
Diarmid Mackenna.”

Silence met his declaration, and Lochlan smiled. “I see I have your attention now. I’ll make what I’m about to say plain and use small words, that your
simple, addled brain might comprehend well enough to deliver this message to your mistress: The boy is ours now. And I expect a check made out to Mr. Covington for an amount no less than ten thousand dollars to be remitted by registered mail to the Mackenna Corporation’s corporate headquarters. I do believe your mistress will know where that is.”

With that, Lochlan snapped the phone shut, then he crushed it in his hand, tossing the pieces aside nonchalantly as Race snapped at him, “What the fuck, man? That was a four hundred dollar phone!”

“So buy another one. You’ve ten thousand coming as compensation for this mess,” Loch replied smoothly.

I scowled at him. “Do you really think they’re going to pay?”

“Why Juliette, my dear, have you no faith in your favorite vampire?” he asked, a smirk gracing his handsome face. “Trust me, she’ll pay, if only to buy herself some time to plot her revenge.”

He looked Race up and down then. “So, you walked out on Vienna Silk? My, my, you’ve balls of steel for that, lad.
She’s not one to be trifled with, and like most any vampire, she takes betrayal very, very personally.”

“If your sire is such a scary bastard himself, what makes you think she won’t just let me go rather than not have to deal with him?”

“Because Vienna hates my father. And now she thinks we’ve stolen you away from her. She’ll not let that go unanswered.”

“Why does she hate him?” I asked.

Lochlan looked at me. “Vienna has despised Diarmid ever since he left her for another woman—a mortal woman. The same woman with whom he conceived a child.”

I felt my eyes go wide and my mouth drop open. “You mean he left her for Saphrona’s mother?” I asked incredulously.

He nodded. “Aye. And even though Clare Percy died in childbirth, she’s hated her all this time too. And Saphrona by association.”

I threw my hands up in the air
. “Great. Just what we needed: Another crazy bitch vampire pissed off at us.”

Lochlan laughed and reached over to clap Race on the shoulder. “Welcome to the family, mate.”

After rescuing what we could of Race’s things, which sadly wasn’t much, we cleaned up the mess Merrick had left. The complex manager had come by as we worked to let Race know he had
called someone to fix the door, and Race let him know that he’d be contacting his insurance agent about reimbursing the complex for the damages. He also apologized profusely and reiterated that he had no idea who would do this to him, but that he’d sure like to find out. The manager suggested that “The people who broke in was probably teenagers high on drugs, when they shoulda damn well been in school. Kids these days got no discipline.”

Lochlan went out to the Escalade to try and sleep again after the man left us alone, handing me his keys and saying that
his biology was finally winning out over his brain. He’d be virtually comatose by the time we got to leave Cleveland, he reminded us, so someone else was going to have to do the driving. I laughed because I knew how he felt about letting anyone else drive that tank of his, though truthfully I was pleased that he trusted me with it. Of course, I’d never driven anything as big as an Escalade before (Mark’s Dodge Ram was smaller, though not by much), so I was also slightly intimidated.

When it was just Race and I in the apartment at last, I stood watching him stare out the window, his arms crossed over his chest. His back was stiff and his muscles taut, and I knew that even now, his anger was simmering just under the surface.

“What am I getting into, Juliette?” he asked suddenly.

I frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Your good buddy told Merrick ‘The boy is ours now.’ Said Vienna will think I’ve been stolen from her.” He whirled on me, jabbing his finger toward my face. “I didn’t walk away from that psycho bitch just to get stuck under some other vampire’s fucking thumb. I’m through with this shit—I don’t
belong
to anyone!”

Irritation flared. “First of all, you can get your finger out of my face. Second, you can stop yelling because I haven’t done anything to warrant having your anger directed at me. And third, if you had been paying attention at all, you’d have realized that Lochlan was only saying all that to help you. He’s not forcing you to trade one vampire master for another, he’s not like that.”

“And you know this how? You’ve known the guy what, a month?”

“I’ve known you less than a day,” I retorted.

“Juliette, you’ve known me nearly all your life,” Race countered.

I shook my head. “No, I knew you for a few years when I was a kid, and it’s been nearly twenty years since I saw you last. Clearly the Race Covington I knew back then is
not
the Race Covington standing in front of me right now. That Race was a happy kid who liked hanging out with his best friend and teasing his pal’s little sister. This one is an angry, brutish jerk who can’t even recognize a helping hand when it’s right in front of his face!”

My voice had risen as I spoke, reflecting back at Race the anger he’d shown me. He started, and stared at me for a long moment before asking carefully, “Where the hell is
this coming from? All this anger? I mean, I get that I’m pissed about my stuff, but I am not usually so quick to anger. I’m not normally like this, Jules, I swear.”

I sighed and stepped away from him, wanting some distance between us even though I knew what was going on. “I think,” I said slowly, “that our bond, or the magic that created it, is doing this to us. I’m not usually so quick to temper, either.”

“But why is this happening? If I understand your explanation correctly, then it should be drawing us closer together, not driving us apart.”

I laughed without humor. “No offense, lover, but your understanding of
shapeshifter magic is limited. Granted, so is mine, but I know a lot more than you do.”

“Then tell me what this is all about, because I don’t like fighting with you,” he said. I looked over at Race and saw that his expression had changed to one of pleading. I knew then that it was time to explain about the bonding ritual, because I had the sneaking suspicion it might be behind the temper flashes.

I sighed. “Obviously I’ve only ever observed shifter-human bondings, but from what I’ve seen, there’s a push-and-pull aspect to the imprinting. While the couple is certainly driven to engage in higher-than-average amounts of sex, those that choose not to complete the bond by skipping the old ritual almost always have volatile relationships. Passionate, to be sure, but volatile.”

Race lifted an eyebrow. “And those that go through with it?”

I looked at him squarely. “In my experience, their relationships are closer, stronger, than those who don’t. Squabbling is rare, and hurt feelings are quickly forgiven. Lovemaking is more intense and pleasurable. But again, those are werekind who’ve imprinted on humans. I think it’s safe to assume that with us everything is intensified, because we’re both two-natured. For all we know, our relationship could implode if we don’t go through with it—and then, of course, there’s the collateral impact on werekind as a whole.”

“You’re talking about the ability to imprint on other shifters? Like Lochlan mentioned might be a part of us bonding?”

Nodding, I sighed again. “I think his friend Marian was right. Because there hasn’t been a single recorded double imprint in over three hundred years, since about the time he says she died—until ours.”

Race ran his hand over his face and then through his hair. “So what does this ritual enta
il? It’s obviously something you’re reluctant to tell me about, but I think I need to know if we’re to decide whether or not to go through with it.”

“You do need to know. You have a right to know, Race, and like I said before, I’m not keeping it from you on purpose. But this ritual
literally binds us together. I won’t be able to live without you, because if you die, you’ll take a piece of my soul with you. If I were to die, you’d soon follow because I’d be taking a piece of your soul with me. It’s one of the reasons mates are held in such high regard, why they’re so fiercely protected and cherished. We will truly need each other to go on living.”

I sighed again and sat on the arm of the ruined couch, which we’d
set upright earlier as we cleaned. “The ritual is theorized to be the price our animal halves demand we pay for the magic that runs through us. There have been some human mates who balk at it, and I can understand why. But they don’t understand what it means to have to answer to the beast.”

“What do we
have to do, Juliette?” Race asked softly.

“You would take me from behind, as our wild brethren do, and you would bite my neck hard enough to draw blood. In your mind, you would say an incantation as you drink my blood, as you literally take me into your body. The incantation
and blood drinking would bind our minds, our bodies, and our souls together. We would know each other’s thoughts, feel each other’s feelings. We’d be able to find one another anywhere, we’ll experience each other’s pain, we’ll know when the other is in danger.”

“
I have to drink your blood like a fucking vampire?!”

“Yeah. Why do you think so many human mates hate the idea? Hell, there are shifters who hate it
, because none of us like to admit we have anything in common with them. Except when it comes to shifters, bloodsharing creates more than a simple blood bond. It creates a bond that ties us together for the rest of our lives.”

I picked at a loose thread on the tattered couch. “I have wondered a time or two since meeting Saphrona whether or not vampires realize that
bloodsharing makes the bond between mates even stronger. Then again, being connoisseurs of blood drinking, perhaps they do know.”