Текст книги "Chains of Darkness"
Автор книги: Caris Roane
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Her eyes went wide. “Did you feel that?”
He nodded. “Almost like a steel door slamming shut. It’s the bond.”
“I feel so strange right now. More than just human.”
“That would follow. You were siphoning some of my power before, but now it will become a strong, steady flow. Your vision will improve as well.” He glanced down at the powerful chains that held him captive. “And now we’ll see if the bond will be enough to take care of this part of the equation.”
He focused on his manacles, on the charge Daniel had placed within the chains. If they hadn’t been preternaturally enhanced, he could have broken out of them two seconds after they’d locked in place. But Daniel’s power had made them impervious to his natural strength.
He let his newly enhanced power flow, and little by little he felt Daniel’s locking mechanism give way. He applied the full force of his ability, but the resistance to his effort stunned him.
“I can sense what you’re doing. I might be able to help.” Claire placed her hands on his arms, and that small touch caused his power to surge. The next moment the charge within the shackles fizzled. A little more pressure and the manacles split apart, falling off his arms.
Claire squealed her excitement. “Yes!”
Adrenaline spiked and his heart rate went through the roof. “Hell, yeah.”
He repeated the process for his ankles. Once the shackles fell away, he was free.
He stepped away from Claire and turned in a circle. “I haven’t had these off in a year. Now just like that, they’re gone. They’re fucking gone.”
Suddenly he glanced toward the entrance to the cell. “Daniel’s coming.”
Then without warning, his stomach seized once more. Drawing away from her, he doubled over, the pain like fire through his abdomen.
* * *
Claire saw that Lucian’s blood-madness issue had just resurfaced. “How do we fix this?”
“It’s not going to be simple. I’ll need to feed from you again soon. But right now I can’t even move.”
Suddenly she heard running down the hall, as well as Daniel shouting. She couldn’t mistake his voice. He must have divined that Lucian was close to making an escape.
She embraced Lucian and extended her disguise to envelop him as well. “We have to leave.”
“I can’t, not yet.”
She felt the level of his pain. Once more he was almost paralyzed.
“I have you hidden behind my disguise, but can you at least move with me, away from the shackles on the floor?”
He nodded. “I’ll try. Just pull me, if you can. I’ll see what I can manage.”
She took his arm, tugging at him. He started shuffling so that she was finally able to get him back near the wall where she’d originally been standing.
Daniel appeared in the short tunnel entrance and immediately strode to the chains lying on the stone pavers near the smooth wall. “Where the hell is Lucian?”
At least ten guards had followed him inside. The one in charge stepped forward. “He was in here just a few minutes ago. No one went in. No one out except the cleaning crew. I swear it.”
Daniel, his flecked blue eyes glowing, turned in a slow circle as he checked out the entire space. He ended up facing the exact spot where Claire stood with Lucian. It was clear that he didn’t actually see them, yet he must have sensed their presence, or maybe Lucian’s.
“I know you’re still in here, my son. I can feel you but I can’t see you. Show yourself. I take it you’ve had help. It will go easier with you if you don’t defy me right now.”
He started moving slowly in their direction.
Claire rubbed Lucian’s shoulders. “You’ve got to fly us out of here. Now. Daniel can’t see us, but he’s coming straight for us.”
Lucian groaned loudly as he forced himself to stand upright. His eyes were narrowed as if in great pain, but he put his arm around Claire’s waist. “Okay.”
Having flown with Rumy, she knew the drill and threw her arms around his neck. She held on tight.
Daniel was only fifteen feet away and moving faster now.
She shouted, “Lucian, get us out of here.” The vibration of flight began.
Daniel lunged the remaining the distance, just grazing her back as Lucian shifted to altered flight.
His words trailed after them. “I’ll come after you, Lucian. You’ll never be able to hide from me, and when I find you, I’ll destroy you.”
But Lucian had them in the phenomenon called altered flight, allowing them to pass easily through any kind of solid matter. Faster and faster he flew, away from the horror of his prison cell, away from Daniel.
Pressed against him the way she was, she could feel the solid weight of him, not just his physical body, but what he carried in his soul. Rumy had said that he bore the sins of his father. Maybe that was what she felt from Lucian: the weight of all that sin.
In that moment, she knew she really was in trouble. She hadn’t expected to be able to feel so much of what Lucian felt, to divine his soul. Her quest, which had begun with a need to find Zoey, had just become layered with elements that disturbed her deeply, that threatened how she viewed who she was, even what her life should be. She was a simple New Mexico girl with a degree in social work and a job rehabilitating prostitutes. She wanted a husband and a home of her own one day. But sensing Lucian in this way made her long for things she couldn’t put a name to.
As he sped back to Italy, however, the effects of the flight hit her like a brick. Her head once more felt split wide and her stomach boiled.
Can you hear me, Claire?
She frowned. Even though she’d known that telepathy came with the connection they now shared, it was still strange to have another person’s voice in her head. I’m here. Is this real? Are we talking mind-to-mind? She winced again. Damn, altered flight hurt.
Yes. Mind-to-mind. Sorry about the pain. I can feel that you’re hurting. Can’t be helped.
I know. But just to warn you, I’ll probably pass out when we arrive back in Italy.
Is Rumy expecting us?
At the secret entrance. He said you’d know where that was. Do you?
I do.
She felt him shaking suddenly. Hey, you all right?
This fucking blood-madness.
I’ll feed you when we get there.
I’m counting on it.
She felt his flight begin to slow. Glancing down, she recognized the familiar Italian landscape below, and despite the pain she realized exactly how much the completion of the chain-bond had improved her vision. The night was dark, but she saw everything as though warmed by the sun in late afternoon, even though it was the middle of the night.
She breathed a sigh of relief as Lake Como came into view. Rumy’s extensive sex-club complex ranged well into the surrounding hills, through miles of caverns and caves, invisible to human eyes. She could even see through the heavy disguise that covered the secret entrance to the club.
A tall vampire, in black leather, with an automatic weapon slung over his shoulder, stepped aside as Lucian descended onto the small landing platform.
The moment she let go of Lucian, however, the pain and nausea caught up with her. She fell to the pavers of the landing area, her head spinning.
Her last thought before she passed out was that she really hoped she wouldn’t throw up.
CHAPTER 2
Lucian gathered Claire up in his arms, working hard to ignore the scent of her blood. The flight, however, had helped relieve the bulk of his symptoms, and he felt more like himself. Still, he knew the relief he experienced would be short-lived.
For now he’d get Claire and himself to a private room.
He crossed the threshold and addressed the guard closest to the door. “Where’s Rumy?”
“In his office. He’s expecting you.” The guard didn’t flinch at Lucian’s naked state.
Lucian nodded. He knew the way well. All the brothers had spent time at The Erotic Passage, both for pleasure and at other times to recover from battle wounds. Each had served for decades as a policing force in their world with an eye to bringing Daniel down for good.
Moving into the hall, he veered right, headed up another hall, then made another right. The arched wood door was wide open.
Rumy leaned against his desk, arms over his chest, his gaze falling to Claire. He frowned. “Is she hurt?”
“Just flight sickness, she’ll be okay. Looks like we have a couple of issues to deal with. Daniel is after the extinction weapon and Claire wants to find her friend, someone called Zoey. But you know all about that.”
“You’ve summed it up exactly.” Rumy held his gaze and smiled. His fangs were permanently on display and he even had calluses on his lips. “So how the hell are you, boss?” Rumy always called him that, though it was in no way a formal designation. He wasn’t the boss of much these days. Before he could respond, however, Rumy’s gaze once more dropped to Claire. He smiled. “So how do you like Claire? She’s got some crazy-ass courage, this one.”
Lucian scowled as he looked down at her. “I guess she does. But these blood-chains chafe like hell.”
“You mean you don’t like being bound, not even to a beautiful woman?”
“Hell, no, and this one’s human.”
“But strong.”
Lucian nodded. “Yes, I’ll give her that.”
Rumy looked the same, his black curls cut close and oiled. His snug black T-shirt showed off his muscled lean body. The man was short, but he’d forged a powerful place in their society as a linchpin for the underworld. No one touched Rumy.
Even Daniel generally left The Erotic Passage alone.
When a tremor ran through Lucian and he grimaced, Rumy left his place by the desk, passed by Lucian, then held his hand gesturing into the hallway beyond. “I’ve got a room set up for you both. You can be private, talk a little, get to know each other. I already had your clothes brought in from Uruguay.” Lucian had a home there, one Rumy had access to for exactly this reason. Rumy was one of the few vampires on the planet he trusted with his life.
“Much appreciated.”
Lucian had been through blood-madness recovery more than once, so he knew what to expect. But it always surprised him how long it took to get rid of the initial debilitating and dangerous symptoms—which could hit at all the wrong moments.
As Rumy headed down one of the restricted hallways in his club complex, Lucian followed him. “So how did Claire come to be here?”
“Daniel held her prisoner in Florida, using her to watch after a boy he’d been holding captive there. That’s what she’s been doing for the past two years, taking care of him.”
“He wanted her as a nanny?” This didn’t make sense.
“Daniel never does anything for just one reason. You know about Adrien, right?”
“Not exactly. I saw him a couple of times with the woman who took him out of the Himalayan prison.”
“That’s Lily. They’re together now. She bound him, the way Claire bound you. Josh was her son, the boy Claire took care of. You starting see how this wheel turns?”
“Not yet.”
“Daniel chose Lily—plucked her from the human world, just as he did Claire. Both women have strong vampire markers, real potential in our world. Wouldn’t you say that’s true about Claire? I mean, think about the disguise she made.”
“You’re right. Even Daniel couldn’t see through it.”
“Lily had other abilities, but mostly she could track things.”
It all began making sense. “So Daniel’s original intention had been to use these women to bind us and create tracking pairs.”
“Yes. But he’s lost control of the process, thanks to Lily and now Claire.”
“And he’s after the weapon.”
“More than the sharp points of his fangs, Daniel wants that extinction weapon. He knows that if he can get hold of it, he can rule forever.”
“Over my dead body.”
“I’ve sent out rumors that Claire escaped from her captors by herself but the truth is I helped get her out along with the chains you’re now wearing.”
“Then Daniel had the chains ready to go, which means he had this planned all along.”
“He’s a patient bastard. But now you and Claire are here. I’m sure he didn’t count on Claire having the ability to create that kind of disguise—and he sure as hell didn’t plan on me rescuing her.”
Rumy kept them both moving, making turns left and right in what was a real maze of a cavern system. “You’ve been a good friend, Rumy. I didn’t expect to make it out alive.”
Rumy inclined his head to the woman in his arms. “You owe your life to her. I only helped get her to Daniel’s Dark Cave system, but she did the heavy lifting.”
Lucian nodded. “So what do we know about this extinction weapon?”
“Apparently there’s more than one. Adrien destroyed the first one, and it looks like Daniel’s hot after whatever he can find that remains.”
“Is there a finite number? Two? Ten?”
“We’re not sure.”
Rumy led him through several winding back tunnels near his office, a section of the club complex that only a select few on his security staff had access to. Finally he stopped before a door, then pushed it open. “Here you are.”
The room had a basic setup, nothing special, in part because of its medical use. There were even wrist and ankle restraints on one half of the queen-sized bed. The bathroom was close, as was a nearby dresser.
A table and chairs completed the spare decor.
He moved inside and carefully settled Claire on the bed, on the side without the restraints, then removed her shoes. She was still out cold, which was for the best. She’d be hurting when she woke up.
His clothes, as well as Claire’s, hung on a nearby rack.
Rumy gestured to the dresser. “You’ll find the usual inside. Socks, underwear. The bathroom is fitted up with toiletries. You should be all set.”
Rumy took care of the details, but then as the owner of the huge sex-club complex, he had to. “I thought you could use some time alone with Claire, maybe bring her up to speed about our world. I kept the info to a minimum. She didn’t know much when I brought her here, and I didn’t want to overwhelm her. I guess Daniel had his Florida house staffed with humans, though Claire said there were vampire rumors anyway.” He glanced around. “So, can I bring you anything?”
“Claire will need food. So will I, for that matter.”
Rumy nodded. “You got it. Anything special?”
Lucian chuckled softly. “A burger would be great. Maybe some fries.”
“I’ll be back in half an hour.”
Rumy took off, closing the door behind him.
Claire stirred on the bed, moaning softly. Lucian reached for his clothes. He didn’t want her to wake up and have to face the full expanse of his naked male body again.
He dressed quickly in a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt. He didn’t bother with shoes, but it felt good to have clothes on after such a long time. For the past year, though at different locations, he and his brothers had been kept in a filthy cave in the Himalayas, naked the entire time.
Tremors ran through him now as he drew a chair close to Claire’s side of the bed. He needed blood desperately, but he didn’t want to scare her.
Taking her hand in his, he rubbed the backs of her fingers gently. “Claire, I need you to wake up.”
Maybe he should have asked Rumy to send another woman to him to get this initial feeding out of the way, but he couldn’t. The blood-chains already worked on him, forcing his attention toward Claire. Besides, he’d tasted her blood; selfish bastard that he was, he wanted more of what he’d sampled.
* * *
As Claire opened her eyes, she blinked several times. Her head felt like it was trying hard to split wide open.
“Good, you’re waking up. How are you feeling?”
She turned and saw Lucian sitting beside her. She lay on a bed of some kind in a small room with very bland beige furniture and white walls.
He held her hand, a comforting gesture given the situation. “I’m okay except for the hammers pounding on the inside of my skull.”
At that, Lucian’s lips curved. “That’s funny. And unexpected.”
“I’m not much of a weeper, just thought you should know.” She closed her eyes again. “I believe I hate altered flight.”
“It can be a real bitch for humans.”
The chain at her neck vibrated softly. As she opened her eyes and once more turned to look at him, the depth of his physical need struck her. According to Rumy, he’d been deprived for a long time, at least a year. “Oh, God, Lucian, I’m sorry. Let’s get you taken care of. So how do we do this?”
She tried to sit up, but he shook his head. “Just lie still. I thought, if it’s all right with you, I’d take from your wrist. It’s much less invasive, and you can keep resting.”
“Okay. Do whatever it is you need to do. Yes, lying prone for a little while longer will be better.”
Rumy had made it clear what being chain-bound to Lucian would mean, so Claire had known this moment would come. But as he angled his shoulders, then leaned over her arm, her heart started pounding. She couldn’t believe this was happening. A vampire would soon bite her and take her blood.
She watched his fangs descend as he hovered above the collection of veins at her wrist.
He glanced up at her, his gray eyes darkening with need. “I’ll do this as gently and as quickly as I can.”
“That sounds good.” What else could she say?
She turned her head, wincing in anticipation, but she felt only the slightest prick, then his lips surrounded the wound.
Claire looked back as Lucian began to suck.
The sensual, steady draw on her wrist made her lips part. She’d dreaded donating to Lucian, but now that he took from her, nursing at her wrist, the room started warming up. The soft suckling sound began to remind her of other things.
The first wave of desire flowed over her like the rush of a wave on the seashore. She drew a long breath, as her gaze became focused on the muscled slope of Lucian’s shoulders and back. She felt an impulse to cover his neck with her hand and caress him as he took from her.
She gave herself a shake, trying to repress the sudden desire that had taken hold of her, when suddenly, while still drawing her blood, he looked up and met her gaze. You taste of the sweetest herbs, Claire, though I think I said that before.
His voice in her head didn’t help, either, but sparked her sudden need. You did.
His gray eyes were dark with what she knew was a desire that matched her own. She found it hard to breathe and put a hand to her chest.
Thank you for this, Claire. I’m feeling much better. Stronger. And thank you for bringing me out of captivity. I owe you.
“You’re welcome.” She spoke the words aloud, but her voice sounded hoarse.
Worse, because of the blood-chains, she could feel how aroused he was. The vampire hadn’t had sex in a long time. He was very male and would have needs. Even Rumy had told her that much, trying to prepare her.
But her own case wasn’t much different. She hadn’t been with a man in over two years because of her imprisonment in Florida.
Yet what troubled her wasn’t so much that she might end up having sex with the vampire she’d just rescued, but how much she suspected she was going to like it.
A shiver ran through her.
Claire? As he continued to draw her blood into his mouth, he stroked the length of her forearm. His touch was so warm, even gentle against her skin. She didn’t mistake the invitation for what it was.
She felt tempted as she never had before and nearly offered up what right now had become an almost painful longing the entire length of her body. But it was way too soon. She looked away from him. “I’m trying to gain my bearings.”
Just as you should.
She didn’t look at him again while he fed. Instead, she looked anywhere else, trying to ignore what she really wanted to be doing.
The first thing she noticed was that someone had taken her shoes off. Then her eye was drawn to the ceiling, which she realized was quite beautiful despite the bland surroundings. A wave of what looked like light blue granite ran the entire length, but carved and polished to resemble a flow of water.
Good. She had something to focus on besides the fact that she was feeding a vampire and really liking it.
When he finished at last, he released her wrist, licking the small apertures at the same time.
She drew her arm close, looking down at the skin, expecting to see a wound. Instead the puncture marks were gone, and only a slight redness to the skin told her what he’d been doing. “This is amazing.”
“We’ve had thousands of years to evolve. And I’ve released a serum into your bloodstream that will replace the supply quickly. You shouldn’t feel faint or anything.”
She shifted to look at him, startled all over again by the fact that she was here in such a strange new environment, sharing a room with a vampire, and that she was bound to him.
He sat back in his chair, definitely more relaxed. His color looked better, and his gray eyes had a brightness they’d lacked before. He was incredibly handsome, which wasn’t going to help her desire for him at all.
“I can see that you’re feeling better.”
He nodded. “Much better. The flight here seemed to help as well. Maybe just being away from that cell.”
She glanced down her arm once more, then back to him. “So what’s it like? Feeding, I mean.”
His brows rose. “I don’t know. Like breathing, I suppose. It’s just part of my life.”
“Of course it would be.” She stared at him for a long moment, wondering so many things. She took in his new wardrobe. “You found some clothes, I see.”
He gestured with a toss of his hand toward the wall at the foot of the bed, where a tall rack sat. “Rumy had clothes for both of us brought in.”
When she’d initially arrived two days earlier, Rumy had given her a few basic garments in addition to the clothes she’d had on. It looked as though he’d since added to her wardrobe. “I can see that.”
She glanced around and for the first time noticed the bed was a little different: The far side had what looked like a low steel bar running its length with some kind of cloth attached to it.
She pushed herself to a sitting position. “What is that?”
“Restraints. Though I’ll be stable for a while, maybe even a few hours, the recovery from blood-madness takes time, and I’ll probably spiral out of control at some point. The bindings will be necessary at least once during the process. But Rumy told you this, right, or some version of it?”
“Sort of. I think he didn’t want to weigh me down with too many details.”
He glanced at her. “So your name is Claire. What did you do before you were abducted? I mean, who are you? Where did you come from?”
“Santa Fe in New Mexico. Do you know it?”
“Sure. What was your life like there?”
“Well, my family has lived in the area for three generations. I had my own place, of course, but my mom and dad were only a couple of miles from my apartment. My brothers are eighteen and twenty-one now. When Rumy brought me here I went on the Internet and found that they’re all doing well. Both the boys are in college.” She repressed a sigh. She didn’t mind sharing the details, but the conversation was reminding her way too much of her family and how much she missed them. She couldn’t imagine how hard her sudden disappearance had been on everyone.
Lucian watched her closely. “And what about your friend, Zoey, were you always close?”
She chuckled, though her throat had started to ache. “More like sisters. We grew up together. Lived on the same street. We even roomed in college. But we’re so different, I mean even physically, she’s shorter and has black hair, blue eyes. And she has a totally wicked sense of humor. She had really long fingernails though, with jewels on them.” When tears touched her eyes, she cleared her throat and changed the subject. “She majored in economics and worked for an investment firm.”
“And you?”
“I have a master’s in social work. Before being taken out of that club in Santa Fe, I worked with ex-prostitutes, not an easy job.”
He frowned. “I’m sure it wouldn’t be.”
She found it a lot easier to talk about her work rather than either her family or Zoey.
She added, “Prostitution is rarely a first choice for these women. Most of them suffered horrendous childhoods before they entered the profession, so trying to extract them from that kind of work involved treating two layers of dysfunction at the same time.”
“We have a similar problem in our world, especially working with the sex slaves we recover. There’s always a lot of damage.”
She watched his gaze slide to the floor and his jaw flex a couple of times. “What are you thinking about?—because the chains tell me you’re really upset. Of course, I can see it as well. What’s wrong?”
He met her gaze. “I’m thinking about your friend Zoey and my brothers, what we’ve all been through, including you. Daniel is the author of all this suffering, and I want him dead. You wouldn’t even be here if it weren’t for Daniel—and then there’s Marius.” He shaded his face for a moment as grief swelled over him. She felt ill as she recalled the event. She closed her eyes and let the moment roll through them both, knowing this wouldn’t be the last time.
When he drew a deep breath and seemed more himself, she asked, “So what exactly is Daniel’s role in your society? I mean, I know that he’s in charge right now, but what does that entail?”
“Daniel set himself up as head of the Ancestral Council and now rules our five governing courts. He has tremendous power as an Ancestral. But he also has great wealth because of the sex-slave operation he’s built. That wealth has bought him many allies, which is part of the reason he succeeded in taking over the Council. Right now he’s damn near invincible.”
“And what’s an Ancestral?”
“It’s the name given to any vampire who achieves a certain level of preternatural power. Only a small portion of our population become Ancestrals, and Daniel’s at the top of that food chain.”
A knock on the door made her jump.
“Are you okay with someone else coming in here?”
Claire glanced at Lucian, almost startled by the question. For some reason, maybe because of the brutality of the situation she’d found him in, she hadn’t expected him to be concerned about her comfort level.
“And now you look surprised. You don’t think me capable of kindness or consideration?”
She met his gaze. “I just thought, given what you’ve been through … I don’t know, you just surprised me.”
He looked away from her, his jaw hardening. She hadn’t meant to offend him, but she could see that she’d touched a nerve. She just wasn’t sure exactly what it was.
Rumy’s voice sounded through the door. “Okay to come in? I brought food.”
“Well?” Lucian asked, but this time his voice had an edge.
“Of course. It’s Rumy. And I’m sorry if I offended you.”
His jaw worked. “You didn’t.”
Right.
“Come,” he called out.
His voice had an authoritative ring. Rumy had told her that Lucian ran a small policing force in their world, protecting as many innocent people as he could from the depredations of Daniel and those aligned with him. Clearly, he was used to command.
Rumy came in, along with wait-staff and a trolley bearing two covered dishes. Her stomach rumbled, partly no doubt because she’d just fed a vampire, but she also hadn’t eaten for several hours.
Rumy glanced at Lucian. “You’re looking better.”
“I feel much better, thanks to Claire.”
* * *
Later, after he and Claire had consumed a simple but savory meal of burgers and fries, Lucian knew the time had come to get down to business.
Rumy had left so that they could eat in peace, especially since the subjects that would soon be under discussion weren’t going to be pleasant. But Lucian now got Rumy on the room’s landline and asked him to rejoin them, to discuss how to proceed with finding out what had happened to Zoey and with locating the weapon.
When Rumy came in, however, he wore a serious scowl.
“What’s wrong?” Lucian offered Rumy his chair, but the short vampire paced instead.
“We’ve just had word that Daniel is offering a big reward to anyone who can give him solid information about the whereabouts of the remaining extinction weapons.”
Lucian’s nostrils flared. “How much is the bastard offering?”
Rumy turned toward him. “Millions, in increments, depending on the value of the information given. That asshole has set up a goddamn tip line.”
“Oh, that’s bad,” Claire murmured.
Lucian glanced at her, then back to Rumy. “Well, the good news is that it won’t be an easy process—he’ll have thousands of crackpots leaving false information. That alone will slow him down.”
“But his organization is big enough to handle it. I think we’re in serious trouble. All he needs is the right bead on the weapon, and he’ll gain control of everything,”
Claire tilted her head. “Do you think he did this because he no longer has you under his thumb?”
“Maybe. This move smacks of desperation.”
Rumy rubbed his thumb against the side of one of his always present fangs. He finally sat down on the edge of the bed, facing the table. Lucian’s gaze fell to the low steel bar that could be raised to hold one of the restraints. He didn’t want the reminder that at some point he’d once more spiral with blood-madness.
“Rumy, is something else on your mind?” Claire asked. “Please, don’t hold anything back on my account.”
Finally Rumy met her gaze. “Here’s the thing, Claire. I have a connection who found out who Zoey went to after she was abducted, because the truth is she never went to auction. Daniel kept her for himself.”
Claire put a hand to her mouth. “Oh, God.”
“I’m sorry.”
Lucian watched tears rush to her eyes—this woman who wasn’t a weeper. But he couldn’t fault her, not when she’d just heard that her good friend had been at Daniel’s mercy for the past two years, if she’d even survived that long. He couldn’t imagine a worse fate for a young human female than to be taken into Daniel’s Dark Cave system.
Claire, to her credit, straightened her shoulders. “Is there even the smallest hope she’s still alive?”
“We have no way of knowing.”
At that, Lucian shifted his gaze back to Rumy, and a certain suspicion entered his head. “You haven’t told her everything, have you?”
Rumy met Lucian’s gaze. He didn’t blink, but his tongue flicked out and licked both of his fangs. “I didn’t think it was wise.”
Lucian’s temper shot through his skull and he was on his feet. “What the fuck? Rumy, are you telling me you sent Claire into that pit of hell to rescue me without letting her know the score first? Dammit, she should have had the facts laid out for her before she made a decision to do something that dangerous. You used her.”
