Jess Haines - Enslaved By the Others

If he was telling the truth, and he really was the last of his kind, it made sense that he would go to extraordinary lengths to save himself. Sara was his life insurance policy now, so he probably wouldn’t hurt her. He’d do whatever it took to protect himself. The problem was that he had proved himself willing to kill in the process.

Considering I was a murderer, too, and had even considered killing Gideon on multiple occasions, I couldn’t exactly throw stones.

His voice had gone low, but the frustration in it was still evident. “You think I’m a monster, too. I bet you think I’m no better than Max, lying and using those vampires and killing like I did.”

“No,” I replied, “but I am thinking you and I seem to excel at making the same kinds of terrible life choices.”

He scoffed, the derision evident in his voice even if I couldn’t see his expression. “Please. Don’t patronize me.”

“What, you think you’re the only special snowflake who ever made a bad decision? Get over yourself.”

Another disbelieving snort. He was starting to piss me off. Mostly because I saw far too much of myself in him, right down to the bad decisions, smart-ass responses, and martyrdom complex. He wanted to do the right thing but went about it all the wrong way—just like I always managed to do.

“You know what? Fuck you and your attitude right to hell.” I glared in the general direction of his shadow. “I’ve killed people, too. Probably for much more selfish and much stupider reasons than you. You’re not the only person in all of creation who ever did something terrible they regretted later. If you want to go play the part of the victim, you go right ahead—but you damned well better get over it quick and start looking at how you can atone for the wrongs you did. Start with figuring out how to let Sara go and make nice with Arnold. Maybe then you won’t have to look at The Circle and the vampires in New York like they’re all out to play the next round of let’s-see-who-tries-to-kill-me-this-time.”

His eyes flared again, glowing like a pair of tiny green lanterns in the dark. He didn’t come back at me with a snarky reply, so I hoped he was thinking about it instead of brushing off the idea out of hand. There was a conscience in there, buried somewhere under the fierce drive to survive. Without Max in the picture, there was a possibility he could afford to be a better person now. Maybe I could find some way of convincing Arnold and Royce to help him start over.

Chances were I’d have to talk them out of tearing him to bits first, but—hey—one problem at a time, right?

The gleam of his eyes gradually died away, shifting fabric rustling as he scooted closer to me again. “I’ll think about it. Let’s find your friends and see if you can convince them to let me out of here in one piece first, hmm?”

Cringing at the prospect, I helped him back up, resigning myself to the battle ahead. I would have to use my wits instead of a sword this time, but that didn’t make it any less intimidating to consider. Facing down Angus, Arnold, and Soo-Jin’s protests wasn’t going to be fun. And who knew what Royce would have to say about it once he found out.

Grunting with effort as he leaned his weight on me again, I wrapped my arm around his waist and shuffled forward. I managed to huff out a few words between pants after we made it to the door.

“Hey, if I can get you out of here in one piece, promise me something?”

“Depends. What?”

“First thing you do, take a shower.”

He laughed, and I was starting to think maybe we’d be all right after all.

It took awhile for us to find Arnold and Sara. Gideon had some kind of connection to her that told him roughly where she was, but the problem was that, like me, he had been confined to a few specific rooms and wasn’t familiar with the layout of the building. He couldn’t tell what floor she was on, only when he was getting closer to her. It was a royal pain in the ass when we both realized that he’d taken us in a circle because she was either on the floor above or below us.

Plus he wasn’t a very good navigator in the dark, getting frustrated when I didn’t turn right that second when he told me to, usually when it was too late for me to cleanly maneuver us through doors or around corners. Ass. At least there weren’t too many rooms with the lights off.

Considering Kimberly and the vampires with her had gone after the captives belowground, I was willing to bet that Arnold and Sara must have gone in search of them once they lost track of us. They must have thought that was where we went, too.

By the time the thought occurred to me, I was already on the verge of exhaustion and Gideon’s grip on me had slipped a couple of times due to his growing weakness. He’d tied his handkerchief around his neck, and he’d stopped bleeding awhile ago, but being upright wasn’t doing him any good. He needed rest, and so did I.

The only bright spot in my day was that the way to the underground cells wasn’t hard to find once we did a bit of backtracking. The trail of blood helped.

Dark red footprints led to and from the hole that had been pounded in the security door. Judging by the way the metal behind the veneer of shredded silkscreen wallpaper was twisted and bent inward, one of the vampires had decided busting through was a more expedient method of getting inside than letting Kimberly try Arnold’s tactic of shorting out the locking mechanism’s circuitry.

I examined the entryway with a wary eye, then glanced up at Gideon. The muscles in his jaw were tight, but I wasn’t sure if it was from pain or nervousness. “You got any magic tricks up your sleeve if we run into trouble?”

“Not really, but desperation is the mother of invention.”

“I thought that was necessity.”

“That fits, too.”

The temptation to run my hand down my face in exasperation was strong, but thanks to the tacky coat of ick on my hands, I wasn’t about to touch any part of myself without washing first. It was no wonder half the Others in the country wanted him dead. He was an annoying smart-ass, just like me. Blowing out an exasperated breath, I gestured as best I could with my off hand.

“Look, there’s no way I can carry you down those stairs. Stay up here and be ready to do your thing if something follows me back. And for God’s sake, don’t wander off.”

He made a face. “Like I could, even if I wanted to. You’re my Get Out of Jail Free card, Copper-top, so don’t go getting yourself killed. That would be really inconvenient for me.”

I rolled my eyes, tone gone dry. “How sweet, I didn’t know you cared.”

After setting him down by the top of the stairs, where he would have a clear view of both the hallway and the blood-spattered stairwell, I made my way down. I took it slow, fighting a growing sense of terror and claustrophobia. The last time I was down here, Max had kept me locked up in a tiny room, telling me I was nothing but a piece of property to be used or discarded on a whim. The vampires who had participated in his slave auction had been down here, every bit as ancient and formidable as Max. Some of them might have hung around, and I had no doubt I would be dead long before Gideon or anyone else could help me if they were waiting in the dark.

Still, there were other people trapped in the rooms below. Even if I didn’t have the advantage of claws and fangs and supernatural strength anymore, I had to do something to help them.

Telling myself that wasn’t making it any easier to take each successive step. Neither was the blood on the walls.

When I rounded the bend and could see down the corridor, I grimaced. The beautiful gold inlay in the hardwood was lost under a sea of red. There were bodies in the hall, not all of them in one piece. People-sized holes had been made in walls and doors, the smell of death and piss and desperation an overwhelming, smothering blanket. Every door was open, most of the rooms dark.