Hellhound (26 page)

I sucked in a yelp. My eyes clenched along with my
lips. “What are you doing?”

“Getting us out of here.”

“Put me down.” I pushed against him, but that only
made the bitter pain worse.

“And let him tear you alive?”

On second thought, getting out of here wasn’t a bad
idea. “Take me to the domicile,” I ordered.

He stood while he held me in swelled arms. The veins
in his neck bulged when he craned his neck to look down at me. Manly dark
angel, yeah, yeah, yeah, I couldn’t think of him like that.

The expression on his face was one of incredulity.
“Are you serious?” He raised one thick brow. “That was a shape-shifter from our
clan. He either went rogue or was on a kill order. Now who would want to kill
you?”

Oh, I could think of a few people.

“A better question, why did he smell like a tracker?”

I gaped at him. I had no idea why. Surely, we didn’t have
anyone who could be both a tracker and a shape-shifter, that would be illegal
breeding.

Shaking his head, Demetrius bent his knees, looked up,
and took off. I clung to him with my good arm, which was cradled in between us,
clutching some piece of material from his shirt so that if he dropped me, I
wouldn’t release a hold on him. I lowered my chin and tucked into his chest and
throat so the force of the wind didn’t break my neck. My eyes became slits so I
could see what we passed over.

We traveled several miles away from the compound, the
territory, and then over the city.

“Has anyone been around the apartment?” he asked over
the wind.

He knew the answer to that, but I complied and
answered, “No.”

We didn’t utter another word for the remainder of the
flight, which seemed to last for hours. He flew straight ahead. Under cover of
darkness, and this far up, I doubted that anyone could have registered us. No
one would know the criminal had abducted me.

Chapter Twenty

I couldn’t reach around to the opposite pocket in my
coat to fish out my keys, so Demetrius, locking eyes with mine, probed around
until he took hold of the keys. I felt his fingers pushing, and then what felt
like unnecessary strokes.

“Don’t get too touchy, feely in there,” I muttered
through pressed lips.

He gave me a half smirk glinted with sarcasm. Keeping
his hands tight around my good wrist, he unlocked the door and gently shoved me
through first. Closing and locking the door behind us, he switched on the
lights. He kept me in his clutches while he wandered through all the rooms,
searching for any unwanted guests and confirming the windows were secure.

He quietly took me to the kitchen and cleaned off the
blood, which hurt like a son of a gun. I hissed, jerked away, but he held me
intolerably tight. I healed fast, and the bones were moving back into place.
When he dried off my wounds, they closed but left scars. In a matter of hours,
or less, I might feel completely rejuvenated and able to battle him yet another
time.

I was getting tired of this nonsense.

Demetrius stood close to me while he worked on bandaging
my wrist with a stint that he kept in the first aid kit. Stubble graced his
face. His hair was overgrown and needed a cutting. For a second, I experienced
a flashback to the day when he approached me on the observation deck at the domicile
and stared out into the city without glancing over at me. I enjoyed his profile
quite a bit, the low brows, straight nose, thin lips, and strong, square jaw
line.

I hadn’t been this close to him since the morning of
the murders. I tensed. Normally I wanted to jump him being this close after a
brawl, but now I wanted to sink my fangs into his throat. My heart beat hard
and fast, and he looked up at me.

One corner of his upper lip curved over a fang in
warning. He knew what I was thinking.

I sighed. “Why’d you come back?”

“That or let you die?” He reached over and grabbed an
old shirt of his.

“Why not? You would be free, right?”

He glared at me.

“No one else could hunt you down. With me gone, it
would be safe to say that you could live in some type of peace.”

“You think that’s what I want?” he snapped, his face
suddenly so close to mine that he could’ve bit my lips off.

I stared at him, half startled, half immune. His green
eyes darkened, clouded over until he fought the darkness and shoved it back
inside of him.

“You think I want you dead? You think I want anyone
dead other than whoever was a part of this?”

I glanced down at his lips, then met his eyes. “What
do you want then? You keep saying that you didn’t do this, but we have proof.”

He grabbed my wrists, reminding me that I was still
hurt despite having healed considerably. He took me around the counter to the
kitchen, pulled out a dining table chair, turned it around to face him, and
shoved me.

My butt hit the wooden seat. Demetrius proceeded to
bend down at my side, and tied my wrists behind the chair back. I yelped again,
but bit my lower lip, perforating the skin to draw my attention. I didn’t want
him to know how much pain I was truly in, though I suspected he already guessed
since I behaved myself.

I licked the blood that oozed from my lip before he
settled down in front of me. He squatted between my knees, and looked up at me.

“Now you don’t have a choice but to listen to my side
of the story.”

I rolled my eyes and looked away. He jerked my chin
back, and I hissed.

“Pay attention, my love, because you can’t trust them.
I told you that from the beginning, didn’t I?”

“Propaganda.”

He grunted in exasperation. “I promise to return to
the clan with you after this.”

That was unexpected. “Just like that?”

“Yes.” He spoke slowly with a solemn face. “I didn’t
do this, but I know that you’ll only realize that after the memory retrieval. I
can tell you my story now, but they’ve rigged things so intricately that you
still wouldn’t believe me. I don’t want this for you. I can’t run forever from
you, and I don’t intend to make your life miserable by chasing after me for the
rest of your life.

“I’ll come quietly, with no intention of running. Hear
me out and once you’re healed, we’ll leave. Even though we know that shifter who
attacked you is from our clan, you’ll take me back the Council.”

He protected me from a rogue shifter in the shape of a
cougar plagued with madness. I didn’t know what to think, who the shifter
could’ve been.

What was Demetrius’s end game? He killed my father and
Nathanial, and then fled in what seemed like a poorly devised plan, but he had
months to think about this moment, to plot. Once he returned to the Council and
executed whatever plan he conjured up, I didn’t care just as long as he didn’t
hurt anyone else. He would be their problem, though I was fairly sure he would
die quickly. I listened.

He continued, “This is the only way for this to end. I
have no idea who did this to you, to me, but I know that when I took
Nathanial’s essence, he was already dying. If I come back with you, you can
perform the memory retrieval and see for yourself that I’m not the criminal
here. I trust that you’ll solve the case after my death.”

“Then talk quickly because sunrise isn’t that far
off.”

He shook his head, but calmly explained, “We were
summoned to the domicile for a supposed ceremony. Did you ever find out what it
was?”

“No.”

“Well, make sure that you ask about it. Who summoned
us?”

“Claudius, though Danther was the one who physically
called us.”

He unloaded his story on me in a crash of
determination. “Your father came to me on several occasions, as had your
mother, to persuade me to leave you alone. You were meant to marry Nathanial,
and I would fight to the death to prevent that, but I would not murder. I
respected Elder Augustus, and even Nathanial.

“You left that morning. Danther came looking for you.
I told him you were out, and I went down to the throne room early to avoid the
traffic. There wasn’t a soul in sight, no sub sentries or minions.”

“Danther knew where I was because he ran into me.”

“Then he was up to something or asked before he ran
into you.”

It was probable. Danther couldn’t be trusted. “Go on.”

“I heard a commotion, so I ran to the throne room. One
door was slightly opened, so I slipped through. Whoever was there was gone. He
must’ve run in the opposite direction, maybe escaped through the tunnels,
though no one seems to know how to navigate them except the sub sentries and
the daughters of the maenads.

“The room was empty except for two bodies. Your father
was already dead, I checked him. Nathanial was convulsing, on the verge of
death, so I took his essence in hopes that it could come in handy to solve the
case. That’s why I had blood on me.”

I scoffed. “Yeah right, that’s why you took an
undertaker’s powers?”

He ignored me. “I went back upstairs to find you. I
overheard mutters about collecting the trackers between the sentries. Someone
informed them about the deaths already. I was halfway to the cafeteria when I
heard them, so I turned and immediately went back to your apartment. You
weren’t there. I knew it was a conspiracy, so I packed my things.

“I knew that I couldn’t walk right out of the domicile,
so I opened the window and removed the screen. I tuned in to the archers above
and the sentinels below. They were on a stop or kill order.”

He swallowed. “If I had the wickedness to conceive
such an evil plot, I wouldn’t have done it during a ceremony when there were
more people around than usual, and when the guards and sentries were already on
high alert. I would’ve done it at night so I could transform into a cloud and
get away, when I’m stronger. You know these things.

“You came in shortly after, and I had to flee. I could
see it in your eyes that you wouldn’t run with me to a safer place so I could
tell you my side of the story. Maybe I should’ve swung you over my shoulder and
kidnapped you.”

I shook my head. “I would have returned to the clan. I
would’ve seen the murder weapon,
your
dagger.”

“The one that was stolen weeks prior! Why would I
leave my dagger there, a direct line to convict me?”

I swallowed. “I saw the memories of a witness who saw
you stabbing Nathanial.”

He looked appalled and muttered, “No. Some type of
mind trick, fantasy that filtered through the cerebral chamber.” A light seemed
to go off in his head as he returned his eyes to mine. “Our kind is capable of
many extraordinary things. Isn’t it feasible that someone could look like me?”

I rolled my eyes. “Tick, tock, you’re running out of
time.”

Silence encompassed us.

“Well, that’s my story,” he said in his usual gritty
tone. “I went after you. I mated with you, tore you away from the throne and an
arranged marriage. I knew they would target me, but not like this, not by
killing their own.”

“And that’s where your story is flawed. You think the
Council set you up, but they wouldn’t kill the clan leader. Claudius would be
the one to want you dead most of all, but he would never sacrifice his own
blood.”

Demetrius dropped his head. “The only way you’ll know
is when I walk through the cerebral chamber. Promise me that you’ll make sure
they allow me this.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“It’s broken and they won’t wait around to get it
fixed for fear of you fleeing.”

He laughed. “So death is it? They’ve got it all
figured out. At least take my memories and pardon my name in death. I’m a man
of my word. As soon as you’re healed, we’ll go.”

He shifted on his feet, and wrapped both arms around
me to untie the shirt that he used to bind me. I looked away. His face was too
close to mine, and the sight of him disgusted me. I felt a trickle of blood on
my lip. I licked it. Suddenly, he jerked my chin around and kissed me, tongue
and all.

He moved away, taking the shirt with him, leaving me
gasping for air and quite vexed. I swung around and clawed him with my good
hand. Demetrius pulled back, still on his haunches, but took the brunt of the
swipe. I drew blood. He lifted a hand to touch the fluid, glanced at his hand,
and then smirked.

“Worth a final kiss.”

We both stood, though he towered above me by a good
six inches. He handed me the crescent, which glowed in anticipation, and then
held out his wrists, his fists slightly clenched. For a moment, I stared at
them, half expecting him to attack.

“I’ll forgive you now for your hatred against me, for
killing me in a matter of hours. I want you to know that whatever pain and
regret that you feel after the fact will go away. I wish that you could trust
me, but I understand why you can’t. For that, you are forgiven as well.”

“Haughty, aren’t we?” I muttered, slapping on the crescent,
which bowed around him.