Rising Son (The Juliana Lucio Series) (26 page)

The flight wasn’t long and it got us to D.C. with plenty of time to avoid sunrise. We didn’t have any way of knowing what Michael’s plans were so we were going to stake out the inauguration site thinking that was our best bet.

We knew he wanted the reveal to be as public as possible, so we each took various points of the amphitheater to try and scout out where Michael and the rest of his Coven may have been hiding. I was crouched in the rafters above the stage looking out among the crowd that had been waiting for a full day to hear the new President of the United States make his inaugural address. The crowd was packed tightly together increasing the difficulty I was having scanning for vampire signatures among the audience. It was easier to just ignore all the humans in the area rather than trying to distinguish between them all.

We knew our approach to the search left us vulnerable to attack as we were each alone and thus weaker by being separated, but we needed to cover more ground, so we took the risk. This proved to be more dangerous than I had realized when I abruptly felt the heat of a hot branding iron being shoved into the fragile recess of the back of my neck. I just barely caught hold of the rafter beam preventing my crashing into the crowd below when I lost my footing from the pain.

I tried to scramble away from the burning heat that held me trapped in its grip, and as I yelled out in both pain and anger at my unknown torturer a piece of thick, stiff leather was shoved into my mouth preventing my screams of agony from making their escape. I spied scaffolding off to my right and knew it was going to be my last opportunity to fend off my attacker.

I jumped away from the scalding heat at my neck not sure if I could make the landing or not, but knowing it was my last chance to free myself. Before I even tumbled onto the shaky landing I found myself further entrapped by silver netting that was thrown on me from somewhere above.

The pain was excruciating.

The netting was heavy, yet made of fine silver and as it burned my skin I thought it might melt right through me. I writhed in pure anguish on the wobbly scaffolding, high above the oblivious crowd below. My eyes finally met those of my attacker.

A human male.

A human had attacked and taken me down without me so much as noticing him. As my skin began to send tendrils of smoke into the air, my human attacker laughed.

“I tried to warn you. If you only would have kept away then none of this would have happened to you. I know how painful burns can be, after all.” He waved his fingers at me, which showed newly healing skin from gasoline burns. I was hit with understanding.

“Yep, it was me that sent you that little hint. On Monica’s orders, of course- She’s going to turn me as soon as this is all over.”

I raged against my restraints trying to pull the netting off, but only further injuring myself in the process.

“Well enough chit chat, let’s get you back with the others,” he said as he roughly threw me over his shoulder as I began to blur in and out from the pain.

I came to as he abruptly dropped me on the floor of a room and yanked the netting off me ‘until the show later’. They didn’t want us too crispy after all. There were two other vampires in the room I didn’t know, but from the looks of William, Ana, Martin and Victoria we w
ere all captured the same way--
with silver netting thrown over the top of us. We all had burns in the shape of a net seared into our skin; the smell of burning flesh wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon. We each had our hands bound together with a silver braided rope that we couldn’t break, yet continued to burn us. I was the only one in the room that was gagged though.

“How did they manage to capture us all?” Martin bellowed through his pain.

“Humans,” Victoria winced, “I was so focused trying to find vampire signatures that I ignored all human signatures. They got me from behind,” she finished weakly.

“Me too,” Ana said.

I tried to spit the gag out but I couldn’t. I tapped Victoria’s foot and tried to sound out Christian’s name.

“I don’t know where he is,” she said painfully, but not so much from the pain in her wrists.

I closed my eyes and leaned back against the wall trying to conserve my strength and also trying to break the chains wrapped around my wrists
by
varying intervals. We were all getting weaker the longer the silver was wrapped around us. There was an intense bass coming through the walls that startled me to awareness. I looked around for the source of it, but couldn’t find it.

“They’re starting,” William told me, “that’s the crowd roaring.”

I wanted to weep that this was it. Where was Christian? Was he going to make it out of here? Would he be able to protect Evan and Antonio?”

I started to hear a loud, “Mom!” piggybacking on the sound of someone speaking on a microphone. I shot straight up and started to thrash as much as I could, but I couldn’t yell back. I couldn’t make a sound.

There it was again, “Mom! Juliana!”

The others heard it too and answered the call for me. Everyone sang out Christian’s name as loud as they could manage. We could hear him opening and slamming shut doors, and then he made it to ours.

It was locked.

“Back up, Christian!” William called out to him.

William gestured Martin to the door. They shimmied over with bound hands and feet and lay on their backs next to the door.

“Now,” William said then they slammed their feet into the door just knocking it open. It made it apparent how weak they were that it took both of them to get it open.

Christian came running in with blood dripping down his neck.

“We need to leave now!”

“The chains, Christian, we can’t do anything until you get them off us,” William panted looking like he was about to pass out.

Christian was reaching for the chains wrapped around William as I frantically shook my head back and forth. I think they all thought I was just being impatient.

“Don’t let your blood touch him,” Ana warned. “Tell us what happened.”

Christian dried his hands on his tee-shirt then deftly start
ed
unwinding the silver from William’s hands and ankles, then moved on to each of us as fast as he could manage.

“I was caught and thrown into a room down the hall. The vamp that caught me said they were waiting for us and had been watching us since we flew in to the airport. They said their guy on the inside told them they could find us there, what we looked like, everything. Then in walks Sebastian and I think I’m saved right? Until he says that he was there to turn me. Apparently you’re too big a hassle, Ma? He thinks I would be easier to control and just as powerful. He never told Michael I was your son 'cause he wanted to turn me himself. But we gotta go. Now. This place is crawling with vamps, and I just killed one of their top guys.”

Christian helped me up and started to pull me out of the room.

“How did you kill him?” Martin asked.

“I have no clue. He just attacked me and bit my neck. I tried fighting him off then all of a sudden he’s clutchin’ his throat and gurgling on the ground like a dead man. I wasn’t gonna wait to see if it wore off. I sprung the blade from my boot, staked him in the chest and got the hell out of there.”

“You lie, he would never betray us!” Martin yelled at Christian.

“Look, believe what you want, but that lying bastard is dead. I don’t know what my blood did to him, but if he hadn’t attacked me and betrayed your kind he would still be alive. Stay here i
f you want, but I’m getting my m
om and everyone else outta here.” Christian was right in Martin’s face. He pulled my arm yanking me out of the room.

“We need to stop Michael, Christian!” I tried to pull away from him, but I was so weak I couldn’t.

“It’s too late.” He stopped in the hallway facing everyone. “Don’t you get it? You lost. Our only hope is to get out of here alive. There will be no stopping the Coven tonight.”

We all looked at each other feeling the pain and anguish of a battle lost. Then we heard Michael’s familiar voice coming over the loud speaker. Speaking not to us and not even just to the country, he was speaking to the world.

All of mankind would soon hear his words.

Each of us exchanged one more look and knew that we all wanted to live to fight another day.

So we ran.

We all ran down the corridor, hoping to find freedom, at least for now, while we listened to Michael’s melodic voice.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, may I have your attention please? I have an important announcement I would like to make . . .”

About the Author

L.C. DeCarlo
is a native of Arizona. She has tried several times to leave, but the desert keeps pulling her back in! The rest of her family is from Chicago, IL where the books take place, even though most of them are now scattered about the country. Her family is her heart and soul, and the true inspiration for the love in her books.

Find out more about the next book in the series at:

www.lcdecarlo.com