Hunger (22 page)

She nodded and watched them go. Serge shut the door behind them. As soon as it closed, she turned to Tor.

“Spare me the lecture. I get that I should probably respect them. Everyone else does. And how does that work anyway?” She looked up into his clear blue eyes and frowned. “How is it they get respected for killing and protecting bloodlines, and you don’t?”

“It’s a position thing, Eve. I have a rank within my bloodline, they have a rank outside of all bloodlines. Even the lords and ladies pretend to respect them.” Tor released her and leaned his backside against the large wooden table.

“Pretend to respect them?” Colour her intrigued.

He dipped his chin. “Lord Hyperion of the Validus plays Serge like a chess piece, and the man obeys. His allegiance to the Validus is strong even though he should have no allegiance to anyone other than the Law Keepers.”

So Serge was a Validus, a member of the most powerful and oldest bloodline out of the seven.

“Lord Valentine of the Aurorea and Lady Prophecy of the Caelestis have blatant disregard for their two Law Keepers and the laws in general. They’re mated and they’ve joined their houses. The Law Keepers tolerate them.”

“Why? Mating between bloodlines is forbidden, isn’t it?” She couldn’t bring herself to believe the Law Keepers would allow it, not when Vincent had issued a veiled threat about such a thing just moments ago when he had discovered she and Tor were mated.

Tor sighed and scrubbed a hand over his ice-blond hair. “It is complicated where their bloodlines are concerned. They were joined once before, by a similar mating between lord and lady. The Law Keepers did nothing then, so they can do nothing now. Their predecessors bound their hands a little.”

She bet that stung Vincent and Daemon. No wonder Tor had said to Lincoln that he had his doubts the two could work together.

“So which is the Caelestis Law Keeper?” Eve moved closer and Tor spread his feet, leaving room for her to wedge herself between his knees.

“Vincent. Expect him to be the most civil. He’s also the youngest. Daemon has a few centuries on me and has been the Aurorea Law Keeper for most of my life. Serge is as old as the hills. He’s probably celebrated his thousandth death day.” Tor caught hold of her waist and pulled her closer.

She settled her hands against his chest, warming inside at the feel of his hard muscles beneath his black t-shirt.

“So you’re pretty young?” she said and he smiled.

“Not that young. As a vampire, I have three centuries on you.”

Wow. That explained the clothes he had been wearing in the memories she had seen of him. She stared at him, trying to imagine that he had been born in the seventeen hundreds or late sixteen hundreds.

“What was Norway like back then?” She walked her fingers over his chest.

Tor’s smile broadened. “Much like it is now. I was from the country, up north. It hasn’t changed much. Sometimes I go back to watch the lights in winter.”

“What are they like?” She had always wanted to see them, had been fascinated by pictures of them.

“Beautiful… like you.” He leaned in and pressed a kiss to her cheek. He whispered against it, “I’ll take you to see them. Whenever you need to escape, we can go there, far away from the world.”

“Just us?” she whispered back, losing herself in a fantasy of an isolated log cabin in the mountains, making love in front of a roaring fire, and then watching the northern lights dancing across the sky.

Tor brushed his lips across her cheek. “Just us.”

It sounded too good to be true.

She wanted that slice of Heaven with Tor.

All that stood between her and that future was her past.

A past she would lay to rest.

So she could seize her future with both hands.

T
or watched the Law Keepers working the crowd around the Oude Kerk across the canal from him and Eve where they loitered outside an old brick townhouse. Dressed in plain clothes consisting of black jeans, t-shirts and black jackets, the three males blended into the humans but still stood out to the vampires.

Tor hadn’t seen a single weakling since they had arrived. Any in the area must have hightailed it when they had spotted three powerful purebloods. He could only hope that their presence might also draw them back. If they still needed vampire blood, these three males could easily provide the strength and potency they required.

Eve leaned against the building beside him, her hands jammed into the pockets of her black jacket, a pout in the air around her. The Law Keepers had refused her offer of assistance, saying completely the wrong thing to justify their response—she was to be Chosen Daughter of the Vehemens bloodline.

When she had asked why they cared about that, Vincent had made the mistake of mentioning they had orders from the lady of her bloodline to keep her out of combat.

His beautiful mate was still seething about that.

He could feel it in her, a ripple of discontent and darkness that grew stronger at times, as if she mulled over the Law Keepers’ orders and the hell she was going to give her sister because of them.

Tor edged closer to her, leaned against the brick wall beside her, and brushed her left hand with the back of his. She looked up at him, the grimness instantly lifting from her face and a smile replacing it.

“Bored?” he said in a teasing tone, one that was beginning to feel less foreign.

He kept his gaze on her but locked his senses on the people passing by along the pavement lining the canal, monitoring them to ensure they weren’t a danger to Eve. He was strong enough that his senses reached the other side of the canal too, touching on the trees that lined the pavement there and the thicker flow of people, and occasionally the Law Keepers as they passed through.

“What gave me away?” She sighed and tipped her head back, staring up at the heavens. Stars spotted them despite the city lights.

“The Law Keepers will get bored soon too, and when they’ve gone to widen the search area we can do some scouting of our own.”

“I’m fairly certain they’re to blame for the lack of activity.” Eve scowled at the three men as they each worked a different section of the foot traffic flowing through the area.

Vincent seemed to get the best reception from the vampires he stopped, and also the strongest reaction to his news. They were telling everyone who wasn’t aware of the current spate of attacks on purebloods to keep out of the city if they wanted to hunt alone, or to pair up with another vampire and work in tandem.

Tor had almost laughed at that suggestion. None of the vampires would take it as an option. He had serious doubts that many of them would heed the warning too. These vampires hunted in this area because the human prey were distracted and easily persuaded into dark corners.

Daemon stopped a brunette female and Tor almost choked when the man cracked a smile, taking on a whole new appearance, one that made him look as though his chest might actually contain a heart.

Tor stared at the woman, watching the way she responded, her body language speaking volumes.

“Is she a vampire?” Eve said at his elbow and he shook his head. Daemon escorted the woman away, leading her down an alley. Eve pushed away from the wall. “Is he doing what I think he’s doing?”

Tor shrugged. “A man has to feed.”

“He’s on the clock… and what is that supposed to mean?” She turned on him now, her pretty face darkening. “You want to go find a woman?”

“No,” Tor barked and shoved away from the wall. He reached out to grab her arm and she stepped backwards, faster than he could anticipate, placing herself beyond his reach. “I don’t want to feed, Eve.”

“But you’ll need to at some point… and it’ll be a woman, right?” The strength in her voice tailed off at the end, until she sounded uncertain.

Everything male in him demanded he comfort her and do whatever it took to erase her hurt and all the doubts that clouded her heart.

Tor caught her arm and gently drew her to him, until her boots touched his and she had to tilt her head right back to hold his gaze. He swept his fingers across her cheek, marvelling that she let him do such a thing, still struggling to come to terms with the fact that she was his now.

His forever.

“I won’t feed from a woman. I swear it. You’re the only woman for me, Eve. The only one I need,” he said, his eyes locked on hers and his grip unrelenting, keeping her close to him. “But you need to swear to me that you’ll never feed from a man.”

“That might be a little difficult,” she said in a blunt tone, one that covered any hints about why it was so damn difficult for her to keep her hands off another man when he was vowing to feed exclusively from men for her sake. Her flat, unreadable expression shifted, revealing a touch of mischief. “I mean. I wouldn’t be able to feed from you.”

He conceded that point. “Other men. Swear to me you will never feed from another man… unless your life depended upon it.”

Eve sidled closer and pressed her hands to his chest, scalding him through his sweatshirt. “Very well. I vow that I won’t feed from another man unless it’s an emergency. Now you vow to do the same with women.”

“I think I made that vow the moment I set eyes on you.” Tor dipped his head and brushed a kiss across her lips.

She responded sweetly, tiptoeing to bring her mouth into firmer contact with his, her tongue caressing his lower lip and seeking entry. He opened to her, wrapping his arms around her at the same time, drawing her flush against him.

He was growing to love stealing little moments with her like this, a minute or so in which she became his whole world, dominating his senses and filling him completely.

She drew back before he was ready, her dark gaze meeting his, overflowing with hunger he wanted to satisfy, one that echoed within him. He couldn’t do anything about it right now. As much as it pained him, they would have to wait until the Law Keepers had concluded their work for the night.

Eve tensed and darted her head towards the old church.

“What did you feel?” Tor set her away from him and scanned the thinning crowd. It was growing late and the area would shut down soon, leaving only a few drunken revellers behind.

“I thought… I could have sworn I smelt him.” She stared off into the distance, her dark brown eyes unfocused.

He took a deep breath, trying to catch the scent himself. There were so many it was hard to filter out one among them. He shifted right and left along the front of the building, keeping to the shadows as he searched the crowd again. There were too many people for him to spot a single male from this low angle. He needed a better vantage point.

Serge appeared beside him, a silent shadow, his blue eyes dark in the low light. “Problem?”

“I thought I smelt Adam.” Eve’s gaze darted over everyone again and she shook her head. “I swear I did.”

“Come on.” Tor grabbed her arm and didn’t wait to see if Serge would follow.

He pulled her down the alley away from the canal and up the fire escape they had used before when staking out the area. When he reached the roof, he crouched low and hurried across it.

Eve sank down behind the wall that enclosed the roof and peeked over it. Tor squatted beside her.

Serge appeared next to him. The man had moved silently, one with the breeze, an ability only the oldest of their kind possessed. This close to him, Tor could feel his incredible strength, power that came not only from his bloodline but his age. The Validus male was ancient.

“We are looking for what?” Serge said, his voice heavily accented with a Russian clip.

“A man with dark spiky hair. Last time we saw him, he was wearing blue jeans and his favourite black leather. It’s a bit beaten up and worn. It was how I recognised him.” Eve gripped the wall, her eyes constantly scanning the people milling around below them.

Tor did the same, on the lookout for the man who had betrayed her. If she thought she had smelt Adam’s scent, then she probably had. Hopefully, the bastard hadn’t caught her scent. Weaklings had inferior senses, although they were still high above the level of a human’s.

Serge growled something dark in Russian. Tor’s gaze shot to him and then tracked his to what he had spotted. A weakling.

Vincent was closest, and if he had the man’s scent, he wasn’t giving it away. He casually ambled through the people, his hands in his jacket pockets, his eyes dancing over the red windows and the women on display. He was closing in on the weakling though.

“Tor,” Eve said and grabbed his arm. She pointed and his gaze leaped to what she had seen. Another weakling, this one closing in on Vincent.

They meant to trap him.

Vincent either wasn’t aware or was playing them like a professional. He paused to study one window in particular, giving the two weaklings time to close in.

Eve tensed.

The bastard had made his appearance, trailing through the crowd around the church, just another man on the hunt for a woman to the casual observer. His hand went into the pocket of his leather jacket. He was gearing up to inject Vincent.

“We need to get down there, now.” Eve was on her feet and sprinting for the fire escape.

Serge nodded and leaped over the wall, landing in a crouch on the street several storeys below. Tor didn’t hesitate to do the same, following him. His boots hit the pavement, jarring his bones with the force of his landing, and he straightened. Eve skidded around the corner and froze, her brows drawing down above her dark eyes.

“Cheaters,” she muttered and hurried along the canal towards the bridge.

Serge looked tempted to leap across the canal. Tor was too, but there was a law against revealing their existence to humans and he would definitely do just that if he leaped the thirty-foot expanse of water in one go. Even Law Keepers weren’t immune to the laws.

Tor took off after Eve and caught up with her at the bridge. Serge sprinted past them both, little more than a blur, moving through the crowd like the wind without disturbing any of them.

The man was definitely old.

A scuffle broke out, drawing Tor’s attention back to Vincent across the canal.