Yew Queen Trilogy, стр. 134

A scent grabbed my nose and my mouth watered, my stomach roaring. It was coming from the red-head. I swallowed as all sounds went quiet except for her breathing, her heart beating.

“Jess. No.” Akh turned to whisper to the woman. She ran toward the door, bright hair flying.

Stomach insistent, demanding, I leapt from one wall of coffins to the next, the jump exhilarating, cooling my sweating body and making me feel so alive. Running down the closed coffins, dodging the an open and its inhabitant’s grasping, skeletal fingers, I tried to remember how I’d ended up here.

But the memories weren’t there. One day I’d been jumping off cliffs at Loudon Lake, ignoring Akh’s instructions to lay low, and the next, I’d been waking up here in this insane place.

The human’s scent pulled me from the second set of stacked coffins to the floor where I landed right in front of her. She cowered in the corner, fingers covering her face.

“Hey.” I held out my hands. “I’m not going to kill you. I’m not a murderer like some of them. I am really good at feeding, then letting you go.”

She yelped and I heard Akh murmur something behind me. He was coming and I had to hurry. He wouldn’t let me release her. He had always killed the ones I fed on even though he kept his own collection of willing humans. It was unfair and I was tired as shit of his arrogant games.

Mouth watering like crazy, I stepped forward and ran a shaking hand over the woman’s soft cheek. I really had no choice. I had to eat. Now. “Relax. It’ll be okay.”

And then my mouth was on her neck and her warm, wonderful blood was on my lips.

Magic and life tingled through me, filling me with energy and strength.

I licked the bite wound so it would heal closed, then I moved back. “See?” I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. Gods, I felt amazing. “You’re fine. You can go.” I leaned forward and she jumped. “Run now. Because this guy back here is a real nasty one. He won’t be cool with it.”

Her eyes darted like a bird’s, then she took off through the doorway like she had wings.

I spun to face Akh. “She’s fast for a human. Please don’t kill her.”

Akh looked down on me and raised one jet eyebrow as he rolled his sleeves to his elbows. His tie was tucked into his shirt between the buttons and his slacks were pressed into submission. Power emanated from him like he was plugged in to the very heart of the universe. He’d been close to a bunch of super-powered mages back in the old Egyptian days when he’d ruled as pharaoh so it never surprised me. What did surprise me was how my body flooded with heat when he was nearby. You’d think I’d know better after the two weeks I’d spent dealing with his lording over me, before I had been shoved into a coffin. Regardless of the fact that he was most likely the reason I’d been put to sleep, I longed to rip his fancy clothing right off and feel the curves and planes of his broad chest, what I was sure was a muscled stomach, and those freaking sexy as hell man hips that framed his slim waist. I licked blood from my bottom lip, then bit it like a lovesick loser.

But damn. Anyone would be feeling the same in my place.

“Jess.” Akh’s eyes glittered and I was reminded of a cobra. “You know you can’t just let them go like that. They’ll tell the world.”

“I won’t let you kill her.” I crossed my arms and stood in the doorway, knowing this was stupid. I couldn’t outmuscle or outrun him. But maybe just standing up to his arrogant ass would do something for the woman.

“Lucky for her, I have more pressing issues at hand.”

Akh whirled and threw a hammer fist at another vampire, a man with a scraggly blond beard. The vampire growled as he fell. He’d be up again soon though. When a vampire went wild, there was no room for mercy. They had to be staked and staked good.

And right now, Akh and I were facing a room full of wild vampires. Almost all of the coffins were tumbling to the ground to open wide or were already releasing their angry occupants.

Akh handed me the broken arm of the wooden chair I’d noticed earlier. The other chair arm was gripped in his white-knuckled hand. A bead of sweat ran down his handsome temple. Shit. I had never seen Akh scared.

“Remember your training. If you aim for the heart,” he said, “we might be done by sunrise.”

I raised the stake and went to my bloody work.

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