Cassie Alexander: Bloodshifted

It’s been a long ride, hasn’t it? And yet there’s still a little further left to go. I need to acknowledge, as always, my husband Paul, whose support means more to me each passing day—I could not have written this book without him. And my alpha reader, Daniel, whose encouragement has always kept me on my toes and pressing on. I’d like to thank Rose Hilliard, my editor, who makes all of my books vastly better than they would have been otherwise, and Michelle Brower, my agent, without whom I would have no books out at all.

Other people I owe a debt of gratitude for being patient with me while I paced, stared off into space, or who listened to me figure things out on GChat or Twitter are: Rachel Swirsky, Barry Deutsch, Cory Skerry, Sam Schreiber, Deirdre Saoirse Moen, and Brittany Maresh.

After five books, my real-life friends deserve another round: Violet, Char, Jocelyn, Marra, Melissa, Corinna, thanks for listening and caring and giving me a life to have outside of books and writing.

And last but in no way least—the girls on my shift deserve one last shout-out. Nightshift rules, dayshift drools. I love you all.

We were alive.

It didn’t matter that I was blindfolded and being kidnapped by vampires, as long as my child and I were still alive.

Right?

We just have to get through the next eight months, baby. The car I was sitting in shifted gears. I felt it speed up and knew each mile was carrying me farther away from everything I knew and everyone I loved. My past was spooling out behind me like a ribbon and I didn’t know if I’d be able to catch the end of it before it ran out.

If Anna was smart, she’d made Asher go back with her on the next flight home. I imagined him looking out a plane window at the same blackness I saw inside my blindfold, wondering if he’d done all he could, if there’d been another way. I wanted to touch him again so badly I ached.

I reached up for the necklace he’d given me instead. The vampire sitting beside me growled in warning, and I carefully set my hand back down.

Eight months was longer than Asher and I’d even been dating. But when I’d found out I was pregnant everything felt right—up until the cruise ship we’d been on had been taken over by a madman who’d released a parasite designed to ensure the death of everyone on board.

We’d had to fight for our lives, and I’d gotten infected. By the time our life raft was found, I was dying. Asher and I had already watched the parasite take down an entire ship, so we knew there was no cure. Except for vampire blood, the supernatural cure-all. Anna had called in a long-distance favor to save me and the other survivors when she realized she’d never make it across country in time. Unfortunately, the vampire blood came with an actual vampire, Raven, and had the side effect of binding me to him forever afterward, completely under his control, like a chained dog.

Which was why I was currently racing away from Asher and the dream of our future life—because now, not that long after treating daytimers back at floor Y4, I’d been forced to become one.

My job was to get through my pregnancy in one piece. Once I had the baby it would be safe for Anna to change me into a vampire too. Then I’d be free of Raven, and back with Asher. I just had to make it eight more months. I didn’t know how I would manage to be a wife or a mother as a vampire afterward, but I’d be free, and it would be enough. When I was back with Asher, we could work everything else out somehow. I had to believe we could—because eight months being enslaved to a strange vampire without thinking I had a semblance of a life to go back to would kill me.

I slid my arms across my stomach to hug myself, and my right hand found the cool metal of the seat-belt buckle.

“You can’t escape.” A fact, stated by my now-Master, Raven. He was driving, and his accomplice Wolf was sitting beside me in the backseat. I kept my hand on the buckle in a small act of defiance. But the truth was that if he ordered me to let go of it, I’d have to. Or if he told me to open the door and throw myself out onto the open road, I’d have to do that too. I’d survive it—Anna had told me I’d be almost invulnerable for a time, as Raven had given me so much blood to heal me that he’d taken me to the edge of turning me himself, enough to give me the beginnings of fangs—but it would still probably hurt.

I’d been hurting for so long that being well now was strange. My last days on the Maraschino had been punctuated by pain—morning sickness, a black eye, a dislocated shoulder, the parasitic infection that’d taken most of the other cruise passengers’ lives, then being stranded on a life raft for days with no water or food. It was ironic to finally feel whole just as everything in my life was becoming irrevocably fucked.

By now my family would know that the Maraschino had sunk with everyone on board. There’d never be any safe way to explain what had happened and how I’d survived, much less the vampire blood thing. It would be kinder to just let them think I was dead, and that was an ache not even blood could fix.

Thinking about my mom, that she wouldn’t ever get to meet her grandson—the velvet bag Wolf had blindfolded me with suddenly felt too tight. My heartbeat sped up before I could control it and I knew the vampires would know—

Cold fingers pressed against mine on the buckle. Apparently my captors weren’t convinced I wouldn’t try something stupid. Maybe they knew me better than I did. Wolf chuckled as he pried my fingers off. He ran his hand underneath the sash across my chest, yanking it tight, touching far too much of me along the way. “Safety first,” he warned sarcastically.

I stayed absolutely still, like a rabbit when a hawk passes overhead. He noticed that too, and I could feel the contour of the seat beside me shift as he leaned even nearer.

“Stay scared,” he whispered. “Servants last longer when they’re scared.”

I twisted my head away from him and toward the window. He laughed as though he’d just made the most amazing joke—and I realized he was laughing at me. The ice of my fear dissipated, thawed by my rising anger, and my heartbeat slowed, becoming deliberate.

If I died, it would kill Asher. I’d promised him I’d survive—that we both would. Anything we have to do, baby, we’ll do it.

“Fear makes servants more eager to please, doesn’t it, Wolf?” Raven chided from the front seat. His voice rumbled over both of us with power, giving me a chill.

“Yes, Sire,” Wolf agreed, returning to his own side of the seat. I felt the car downshift and take a left-hand turn. I didn’t know where were going but I knew for sure we’d be there by dawn.

Raven raced the night. I could feel us swoop around other cars on the road, taking turns at speed. I’d started off trying to memorize things, as if I could bread-crumb trail my way back to my old life, when I realized we were going in circles, probably more to make sure that we weren’t being followed than to trick me. But we were slowing now, making turns more frequently—we’d reached civilization, wherever that was.

Then the car slowed drastically and descended, and I realized a parking garage belowground made sense for vampires. We wheeled sharply to the left and came to a precise stop as Raven hit the brakes and shifted into PARK.

“Home sweet home,” Raven said. He got out of the car, slamming the door behind himself.

Wolf exited the vehicle as well. I sat still, waiting, until I was startled by a knock at the window to my right. “You can open up your own door.”