Page 118

I pour my love and words into the bond, hoping by some miracle he can hear me or at least feel me. I can’t believe I was so afraid to have his children. If I could turn back time, I’d react differently. I just…I needed a damn minute to wrap my head around it.

“I’m on my way to you. Just stay alive for me, Honeybee.”

I gasp when I hear his voice in my head. That’s never happened before.

“Alaska?”

“Beloved.”

Hearing his voice is such a relief.

“I don’t know where I am. I’m in a cave. Probably somewhere on a mountain. I see snow. It’s cold. I’m bleeding. It’s bad, Alaska. I don’t have a lot of time.”

“I know. I feel it. I feel you. I smell you. I’ll be there soon. Don’t give up on me, okay? I need you.”

I inhale when I feel the connection weaken, his voice suddenly gone, and a chill of despair floods me. I glance down at my side and see why. Blood is starting to pool on the ground. I’m losing strength.

“Oh, he’s going to be so mad when he sees you’re dead.” He trails a finger down my cheek, and I yank my head away from his vile touch.

“Don’t fucking touch me.” Sweat drips down my forehead, a bead rolling over my top lip and onto my tongue.

The longer I stare at the hunter, the more pieces of this messy puzzle fit together. “It was you. You sabotaged my plane.”

A sickening grin spreads across his face. “I got very lucky with you, didn’t I?” He pats my cheek. “I wanted to make sure Alaska and his friends didn’t get the blood supply coming to them. I had no idea you were his mate. Earl tried to stop me, but people who get in my way…die.”

Poor Earl.

“Now I have you. The quickest and easiest way to kill Alaska.”

I don’t say anything to him. I can’t. My teeth clatter together; the blood loss and frigid cold weather are getting to me. I have to stay alive. Alaska will find me. He has to find me.

Us.

I’m finally whole. I finally know what love is. I finally know what it’s like to be in love, and it can’t be taken from me now. It can’t.

“What a shame. Such a beautiful human to be damned to a soulless creature.”

“The only one damned is you,” I sneer, trying to show how disgusted I am by him. “And his soul is better than yours will ever be. You can spend the next century trying to prove you’re superior. You can try to explain your choices somehow make you better than a vampire, but you’re nothing but a serial killer with filthy fucking grime pumping your heart. You’re a psychopath keeping ‘your daddy’ happy because you want to make him proud. You’re pathetic. You can’t even live your own life. You have to listen to your ‘maker.’ You’re nothing but a fucking idiot who can’t think for himself.”

He moves fast. Not as fast as Alaska, but quicker than I can. He has his hand wrapped around my throat, anger setting his irises on fire.

“Keep talking, and I’ll snap your neck right now. You die now or later. I don’t give a fuck. Either way, your vampire should be on his way to save you.” He drags me closer, his hot, rancid breath drifting over the shell of my ear. “And I’m going to kill you right in front of him. I want to watch all the hope and life drain from his eyes when you and the little corpse you’re carrying die.”

His threat has a breath hitch in my chest, and a tear rolls down my cheek. Alaska and this baby, yes, they are everything I didn’t know I wanted. Alaska came out of the blue, and I never thought I’d fall in love. I never thought he’d be who I want to spend the rest of my life with. And yes, having a child scares the hell out of me. I don’t know what to expect or do.

All I know is that I want what Fate has planned for me.

I want it all.

“Aw. Don’t cry.” He wipes my tears away with dirty fingers, mud caked under his nails. “I promise, I’ll make your death quick once he is here. You won’t suffer. Not like he will.”

Another tear rolls down my cheek when I lean forward, causing his hand to tighten around my throat even more. “I’m going to haunt you in my afterlife.” I decide to take it a step further and lie. I need to use every advantage I can. “I know Death, and I’m going to ask if I can be a Void. I promise you this: I will spend the rest of your days hunting you. I’ll make sure you’ll never sleep, you’ll always be afraid, and you’ll always wonder when I’ll get you. And when I do, I’m going to drag you to parts of the underworld you know nothing about. I’ll make sure your soul is tortured and that I will be the one inflicting the pain.”

His eyes widen, then narrow into slits. “You’re bluffing. You don’t know Death. That’s impossible. Not even my maker, Ceroes, knows Death.”

“I guess when you kill me, you’ll have to find out.”

He releases the grip on my throat, and I curl over, falling onto the wet, cold ground, coughing until I taste blood.