Hierarchy (11 page)

Bronwyn suddenly felt cold, bone deep cold. “He killed a lycan?” she asked hoarsely.

Luke shrugged. “We’re tough, but we aren’t invincible,” he said wryly. “And vampires know our weak points. Yeah, he killed him. From what I heard it didn’t take him more than ten minutes and it wouldn’t have taken that long if he hadn’t toyed with him first to get the information he wanted. And that’s saying something. Tommy Two Horses was as tough as they come.”

Bronwyn thought for a few minutes that she’d burst into tears. “If …if all that’s true, he’ll come after you, Luke!”

Luke snorted. “He’s already looking for me. Tommy didn’t hold back. He told Constantine I was the one who’d snatched you.”

Bronwyn tried to get out of his lap, but his arms tightened around her. “I have to go! I can’t stay here if it means I’m endangering … everyone!”

“Worried about me?” Luke asked with that cocky grin she found so appealing.

“Of course I’m worried about you!” she said angrily. “I don’t want anything to happen to you! And I especially don’t want it to be my fault.”

“Nothing’s gonna happen to me and it wouldn’t be your fault it anything did.

This is between me and Constantine.”

“But it’s
because
of me!”

He shook his head, but he didn’t exactly deny it, and she realized after a moment that it wasn’t because of her—per se. It was because of the prophesy and the fact that Constantine, she supposed, believed she was the ‘promised one’ the lycans had been looking for or at least that that was what Luke believed.

And maybe he was right. Maybe that was the only reason Constantine had been interested in her and the only reason he was trying to get her back.

She didn’t think she’d honestly believed any of the time that a man like him—

vampire—would have any real interest in her as a person. She was way too ordinary. It must have been something else he was interested in all the time.

Regardless, if she wasn’t in the picture, then they wouldn’t have anything to fight about. She didn’t want anything to happen to Luke. It made her sick to think it might, made her feel like crying, but she didn’t want Luke to hurt Constantine either. She didn’t know how likely that was, but it must at least be a possibility.

It was clear as bell, though, that Luke wasn’t going to listen. He wasn’t going to back down. He
wanted
the fight—the insane man—lycan!

Well, if they wanted to fight she didn’t suppose she could stop them, but she had no intention of being in the middle of it. They could just find another excuse to try to kill each other!

She was leaving! She didn’t know how, and she didn’t know where she could go, but she hadn’t come to the city for this! She didn’t know how everything had become so

… complicated and so dangerous, but it was obvious that it wasn’t something she should
66

be mixed up in, not when she’d only come looking for love—and a baby!

Maybe that was all the prophesy had ever been about—finding a man who would give her someone to love who would love her? And maybe it had been more, or as much, wishful thinking on her grandmother’s part? She’d said often enough that she regretted that it seemed her line was dying out. She’d had only one child herself, and lost her at a very young age—when
she
was born! And it had seemed even to her that she would never get married and have children of her own after everyone in Greenville had begun to think of her as freak and she hadn’t trusted anyone enough to date them more than once, much less consider settling with them and having a family.

What if her grandmother had only told her a story to inspire her to go out and find someone?

She honestly didn’t know. Nanna had been ‘big’ on stories to fit every situation when she’d been growing up, using them to encourage her, or discourage from doing things she didn’t approve of. It
was
possible, she concluded.

She wished, now, that she’d paid more attention when her grandmother had given her the ‘prophesy’, but she’d been too wrapped up in grief then, too scared about being alone, about losing the only person she’d ever loved that cared about her. It was even possible that she’d garbled the prediction herself since nothing about her grandmother’s last days was really clear in her mind.

She’d never know for certain now. Nanna was gone. She couldn’t ask her.

Maybe
, if she could find someone with a
true
gift like her grandmother had had, she could speak to her from the other side, but there were very few people who had a true gift and a lot who only pretended they did to get money out of people.

* * * *

Luke had known a showdown was inevitable, and yet it still sent a jolt through him when he stepped out of the safe house with Bronwyn and saw Constantine was waiting for them. Then again, he had to admit that, maybe, in the back of his mind, he’d wanted to end it. He’d taken care from the first always to move Bronwyn during the day when he knew Constantine wouldn’t be about to present a problem. Not that the silly legends about them were true, at least not entirely. Vamps didn’t burn up and turn to ash if the sunlight hit them. It was sheer torture for them, however, since they were acutely photosensitive—a few minutes were enough to give them severe burns and blisters and even vamps weren’t fond of that kind of pain—aside from the fact that they were vain as general rule and hated any sign of weakness in themselves.

He’d been chafing for a fight, though, ever since he’d discovered just how determined Constantine was to get Bronwyn back. He’d hated Tommy Two Horse’s guts, but he was a lycan—brethren—even so and it chapped his ass that Constantine had caught him with his pants down, literally, and cut him down before he could even get his wits about him.

Not that Tommy had had a lot of wit to gather up! He’d always been a little shy on brains—not to call him an idiot—but then he hadn’t really needed a lot to get where he was. Any contest between lycans was more a matter of skill and brute strength than brains. Once they shifted, they were more beast than anything else and even he had problems
thinking
instead of acting on his instincts.

Vampires were cold blooded bastards, though. They didn’t loose their cool
67

because they didn’t get pissed off—not like lycans—so they always had their wits about them and that gave them a definite edge in a contest when they had speed and strength to match any lycan.

Beyond that, Bronwyn was right. She couldn’t live the way she’d had to since he’d rescued her. She deserved better … and as long as she was on the run and he had to keep her hidden, he wasn’t going to be making a lot of progress toward figuring out how he was going to claim her as a mate.

And he had every intention of doing so, prophesy be damned. If she wasn’t the promised one, so be it. Somebody else could have the honors. He’d never expected to be the one to claim the ‘promised one’ so he wasn’t going to be disappointed if she wasn’t it.

He
was
going to be severely pissed off if he found out she and or her Nanna had hatched a plot to pull a fast one on them, but he figured he’d get over it.

* * * *

Feeling almost as if the breath had been punched from her lungs, Bronwyn struggled to catch her breath at the sight of Constantine. She’d forgotten how handsome he was. She hadn’t realized just how much she’d missed him. Because she’d been trying to convince herself that she didn’t matter to him and it was better to get over it than to pine for someone who didn’t care about her and never would. He’d come after her, though. Didn’t that mean he had to care? At least a little?

His gaze skimmed over her almost hungrily and she felt a rush of desire, of excitement.

“You have something that belongs to me,” he said coldly when he met Luke’s gaze again.

Luke flicked a look from her to Constantine and folded his arms over his chest almost casually. “Is that a fact?”

Constantine’s expression hardened. “It is.”

“Well—you know what they say—finders keepers, losers ….” He shrugged.

“Mine now.”

Bronwyn didn’t know whether she was more horrified that Luke seemed determined to provoke a fight or angry and hurt because they were talking about her as if she was just … a thing. Some
thing
they’d decided they both wanted to claim.

If she hadn’t been both hurt and angry, she didn’t think she would’ve had the nerve to do what she did but, with high emotion riding her, she pulled free of the lycan that had grasped her arm and marched out to stand between the lycans and the vampires who’d gathered. “Now wait just a damned minute! I don’t
belong
to either damned one of you! I’m not a
thing
you can own! So if you two just want to have a pissing contest you can count me out! I want nothing to do with it and
obviously
it has nothing to do with me!”

A gleam of humor entered Constantine’s eyes, although she could see he was torn between amusement and anger. “This
pissing
contest as you so eloquently put it has everything to do with you, my dear. Are you trying to tell me, in a delicate, roundabout way, that you’ve chosen him? I hesitate to distress you, but if that
is
case, he’ll be a very dead lycan before I’m done with him.”

“Yeah, now that you mention it, Connie, I’d like to hear that answer myself!”

Constantine’s eyes narrowed on Luke at that. Bronwyn was almost surprised
68

steam didn’t shoot out of his ears. He dragged his gaze from Luke after a moment, however, and pinned her with his penetrating stare. “Enlighten us. Luky Lycan wants to know as well as I.”

Luke chuckled but there was no humor in it. “Good one, Connie! Luky Lycan!

That’s funny as hell. Did you think that up all by yourself, or did you have help?”

Now they were getting downright juvenile. The problem was, they were still managing to thoroughly piss one another off and they were scaring the hell out of her.

“How about neither?” she said unhappily, feeling her chin wobble. “I don’t have to, you know! Go ahead! Kill each other if you’re determined to, but don’t
use
me as an excuse!”

She would’ve stalked off and made a grand exit then except two of Luke’s goons grabbed her and hauled her back into the circle of lycans waiting to watch the battle. The vampires took exception to that—especially Constantine. He almost seemed to surge forward before he stopped himself and bent a deadly look on Luke. “If we’re done with the breast beating, I suppose we may begin now?” he said coolly, peeling off his dark jacket and tossing it toward his minions.

Luke skimmed out of his jeans—which was all he was wearing—shifting to beast form as he peeled them off. He flexed his muscles and assumed a fighter’s stance, displaying knife like talons.

Constantine gave him a cool look and unsheathed his own talons.

Bronwyn couldn’t contain a whimper of distress.

It drew both men’s attention. Luke jerked his head. “Take her inside. She doesn’t need to see this,” he said in a growly voice she barely recognized.

“If you hurt her, you’ll be the next to die,” Constantine called after the two lycans that had begun pulling her toward the building they’d just left.

“They didn’t hurt me, Constantine!” Bronwyn said a little desperately. “They were only trying to protect me! Please don’t hurt anybody! Please?”

She didn’t know if he heard her or not. He didn’t respond and, what was worse, she could see by the expressions on the lycans’ faces that she’d insulted them.

Well! Better that than dead!

They released her as soon as they’d pushed her inside and moved back to the door, either to guard it or to watch. Bronwyn didn’t know which, but the sounds of battle from outside caught her attention and for many moments all she could do was strain to see what was going on and hear when she discovered she couldn’t see. The crowd shifted restlessly a few moments later, however, and she was sorry she’d gotten a view of what was happening. Both Luke and Constantine were bloody all over from slashing at each other with their razor sharp talons.

She turned away at the ghastly sight. Struggling with the urge to cry, she covered her ears and rushed away, hoping to distance herself. It was that thought that finally penetrated her mind enough for her to realize that no one was actually watching her. All of the vampires and all of the lycans were completely focused on the fight between their leaders, champing at the bit to take part in it, she didn’t doubt.

After glancing back at the lycans who were supposed to be guarding her and seeing that they really were completely focused on the fight, she dried her eyes with her hands and headed to the nearest exit. The door, she discovered, was in their line of sight, but the windows weren’t. Holding her breath for fear the window would screech and
69

give her away, she pushed the first one she came to open and scrambled out. There were vehicles everywhere—it looked like a party was in progress at the back of the house.

Right! Sniffing, she headed toward the street, checking the cars for keys as she passed them and finally hit pay dirt. Wrenching the door open, she climbed in and started it. She had to resist the temptation to peel out. It was tempting since it did occur to her that it might actually distract Luke and Constantine from trying to kill each other, but she didn’t know that it would do anything more than postpone the inevitable, especially if they caught her.

She managed to keep her foot light on the gas pedal until she’d reached the corner, but her flight instincts took control then. The car tires squealed as she took the corner and floored it.

She felt better as soon as she’d put some distance between herself and the fight, began trying to convince herself they really hadn’t intended to fight to the death any of the time. It was just … testosterone!

They were both going to be seriously pissed off to discover she hadn’t waited around to see who’d won!

She couldn’t think about that now, though! She was free! What the hell was she going to do with her freedom when she didn’t have any idea of where she was?

70