Blood Bond . Amy Blankenship

a deceptively calm voice while refusing to look at her.

      “I’m still alive,” Tabatha pointed out.

      “For now,” Kane lied but felt satisfaction when the rest of the drive was made in irritated silence.

      Tabatha sat in the passenger seat with her arms still crossed over her chest. She adamantly refused to think about that kiss and she sure as hell didn’t think about how sexy he had looked hovering over her… angry or otherwise.

      As soon as Kane pulled the car into her driveway he sighed, running a hand through his hair when she jumped out of the car and took off like she’d been bitten. He found the thought rather ironic considering he had bitten her before. Getting out of the car, he silently followed her knowing it was the wrong thing to do.

      Tabatha slammed the car door behind her and rushed to the front door of her apartment. As soon as she had the door safely closed behind her, she turned and spent the next few seconds locking all four locks and the deadbolt then flipped the living room light on.

      “For now my ass!” she glared at the door finally feeling vindicated… until she turned around. Tabatha screeched when she saw Kane sitting on the sofa like he owned the place and threw her small pocketbook at him.

      “You’re uninvited!” she raged then waited to see if he would go poof and vanish. It was actually a good thing he didn’t because she would have hurt herself with the hysterical laughter that would have followed.

      “Damn it, why are you still here?” she demanded and kicked her high heels off toward him, satisfied when he had to move his leg to avoid one of them.

      To her amazement, Kane just sat there staring at her with that infuriating expression that looked like a cross between amusement and anger. He shimmered and vanished for a second then she heard the thump of something hitting the door on each side of her. Tabatha couldn’t move due to him pinning her against the wood behind her. She heard thunder outside and felt her fear rise with the sound.

      Kane leaned forward a bit until his cheek was almost touching hers and inhaled the mixed scent of her anger and fear. It was like an aphrodisiac and served to remind him why he hadn’t taken his soul mate as soon as he’d found her. If anything, he was fighting the urge to take her against the door… hard and fast.

      The gods may have linked them together, but they had been wrong in their pairing. For her sake… they had to be wrong. When he leaned back enough to see her face, he was satisfied to see her anger and fear were still present.

      Tabatha felt her bangs move with every breath he was taking as he stared down at her with those heated eyes. She became entranced watching his amethyst pupils enlarge and then felt disappointment shudder through her… she didn’t want to forget.

      “Before you hocus pocus me… give me a truth,” she whispered, “A real, honest to God truth.”

      “A truth love?” Kane dropped his gaze to her lips and lowered his head until his lips were barely brushing against hers… not a kiss but something far more intimate. “I’m more dangerous to you than any demon could ever be.”

      Tabatha blinked away the sunlight filtering in through the window and sat up in bed. She pulled her knees up and wrapped her arms around them, glaring out at the daylight that almost seemed to mock her. Growling to herself, she huffed blowing her bangs up in the air.

      “Dangerous my foot,” she grumbled. “He’s so dangerous that he tucked me into bed before leaving.”

      *****

      Zachary was looking at the map on the wall with his head tilted to the side. They had pinned every strange event that had occurred within the last few months trying to see if there was a pattern forming. They’d started out with only a few colored pegs but, as more documentation was found, pins had started form a pattern.

      Angelica took a black marker and drew a circle around the slums and the surrounding area. “Misery has been operating inside this area,” she stated. “The other occurrences we found appear to be other demons getting brave and coming out of hiding.”

      “What about what happened at Love Bites?” Trevor asked. “That wasn’t exactly fitting with her MO.”

      “We might need to enlarge her area before long,” Chad offered. “And what about the body we found earlier today?”

      They all shivered remembering the scene. They had received a call from the police about the body of a young man being found and thought they needed to see it. The man had been about twenty years of age and was wearing the remnants of a tee shirt with the local college name on it.

      When they got there, the police had taped off the entire area and about one hundred yards all around it. Chad had thought that odd and went to talk with a couple of his buddies on the force, when he came back his tan was noticeably paler.

      “What is it?” Zachary asked.

      “They said we need to see for ourselves… it’s just as bad as what you described about the bus the other day.”

      As the four of them approached, Trevor had to breathe through his mouth in order to keep the smell from making him sick. The worst part of it was he could taste the acrid odor and that was just as bad. Zach gave him a surgical mask from his jacket pocket… he always kept a few on hand for situations like this. When they saw the body, even Zachary had to turn away and take a few deep breaths.

      The body had been literally ripped apart and everything that had been inside was on the outside. The worst part was they could all see where something had actually eaten parts out as whole chunks were gone. Long claw marks covered what little bit of flesh was left and the bones were visible, some of them broken and poking out.

      The eye sockets were the worst as they stared straight up… the eyes had been dug out. Part of the scalp had been ripped away and the skull punctured with brain matter still slowly oozing out of the hole. The mouth had been pulled open and left hanging and the tongue also devoured.

      Large portions had been gouged out all over the body and the stomach was lying wide open. Angelica turned away from the scene and covered her mouth with a hand to avoid nausea… it wasn’t helping.

      “Poor bastard,” Zachary whispered and knelt down next to the boy. This past week had flown by with a frenzy of demon activity and it didn’t look like it was slowing down. “What’s the official word?”

      “The police say it was an animal attack.” Chad answered.

      Angelica shook her head, “No animal did this,” she rasped and headed back to the car. “It was the grave.”

      Zachary shook away the memory and looked away from the map toward Angelica. “What did you mean when you say it was the grave?”

      Angelica frowned, “It’s all I could feel from the body. The wounds were almost too old for me to even feel that. I don’t know how to better describe it but to say that it was the grave that killed him.”

      Zachary stepped away from the map and went to his laptop sitting on the coffee table. Linking up with PIT, he sent a message to Storm documenting the latest events… his response was immediate.

      “Looks like Storm's pulling in PIT’s major players.” Zachary informed the others and paused before looking up at his teammates. “He’s brought in the fabled Ren… he’s already here.”

      Trevor shivered visibly at the mention of Ren’s name. Ren had always been the phantom of the group… more of a legend than a real person because Storm was the only one who had ever met him. He’d once asked Storm who was the most powerful member of PIT and Storm hadn’t even hesitated in his response. But if Storm was sending his second in command, then that meant he was sending an army right behind him.

      Zachary and Trevor both knew what that meant… the war was starting.

      Chapter 3

      During his teenage years, Ren had made it a habit to log into