Twice Tempted: Between Two Alphas (Mia and Cameron) novel Chapter 86

Chapter Eight-Six

MIA

I open my eyes.

There are wraiths around me. A circle of them. They’re hungry and mindless and drawing closer.

I’m alone.

No. Nala is with me.

I take comfort in that. I may not have a pack, but she is always with me.

We snarl.

The wraiths draw closer.

Then another being descends.

We’re in the woods. By the scent of the pines, I’d say somewhere in Wyoming. The grasses are knee-high and dry like straw. There is a hum of beetles and other insects. It’s just after sunset, and the sky is still light despite the sun sinking below the horizon.

This creature…smells like death. Not rotten or foul, just old and vacant. Like the inside of a crypt or the recesses of a library.

He’s huge. Easily six foot four or taller. Built like Cameron or Eric. Wide across the shoulders and long in the legs. His arms are so muscled they’re held out a bit from his body. His hair and eyes are black. His skin is bronzed and his features are hewn in strong lines. I’ve heard the cliches of statues and gods and celebrities, but they’d all fit. For the symmetry. There is a perfection to this man that is otherworldly.

He approaches one wraith. A blonde. She’s tall and willowy. Beautiful. Her eyes are red and crazed with the need for blood. But she doesn’t attack.

She stays stone-still as this man punches his hand through her chest. He squeezes her heart in his huge fist, exploding it.

She shrieks and then collapses.

He moves to the next wraith. It too stands eerily still. It’s a male, maybe twenty-five. A handsome guy with short spiky hair. The guy shares the blonde’s fate.

Around the circle he goes.

Killing indiscriminately.

As each wraith falls. I can’t help but feel a twinge of sympathy.

They weren’t born this way.

They were made.

Created by this very master vampire.

His actions are akin to a father killing his own children.

It’s cruel.

He approaches the last. She’s maybe thirty. Brown hair. Brown eyes. Where many of the other wraiths were tall and beautiful, this woman is average. She’s shorter, full-figured. Her face is pretty in a simple way.

Before he can rupture her chest, she glances over her shoulder at him. Whatever trance he’d put them in, she seems able to break it, at least temporarily.

“Thank you,” she whispers.

He pauses. Then nods.

Rather than rip out her heart, his fangs drop. They’re huge. Easily an inch long and capable of shredding her skin. He bites her neck, gently, if a creature like this is even capable of such a thing.

He drains her. I watch the life leave her body and count each last pulse of her heart. Then he drops her to the ground and kneels beside her. He cuts open his own throat with a slash of his hand and forces her mouth open and against him.

“Drink!” he commands.

She’s motionless. A rag doll beside this massive man.