plowing through the mud and the stone and the brittle bones of the dead, as if he could somehow dig his own grave and bury his miserable heart.
He dug until he hit water, until his back ached, until his fingers bled.
Still, the pain did not abate.
A scream of fury boiled up inside him, but when he opened his mouth to curse her very name, he couldn’t bring himself to say the words.
Charlotte D’Amico…
The taste of it so close to his lips brought her beautiful face to his mind, and deep in the dark cavern of his soul, the devil rattled his chains.
It wanted out.
It wanted to destroy.
It wanted to consume.
And for the first time in forty-nine years, one month, and twenty-four days, Dorian was ready to set that monster free.
He rose to his feet, blood dripping from his hands, panting like a ghoul as he scented the air for prey.
Fuck. Kill. Feed.
The mantra hammered through his skull in time with his heartbeat.
Fuck. Kill. Feed.
Some dim, faraway part of him knew it was wrong, knew he had to fight it, knew he couldn’t lose control.
Fuck. Kill. Feed.
But that part of him—the human part—cowered in the shadows as the devil gathered strength.
Fuck. Kill. Feed. Fuck kill feed fuck kill feed fuck kill fe—
The snap of a twig, the whisper of the night breeze through the pines, and a new scent reached his awareness, wild and musky. Dorian spun on his heel, hackles raised.
Wolves.
The shadows came alive with them—nearly a dozen. They surrounded him, growling and snapping, closing ranks until they’d penned him in completely.
He tried to blur out, but his movements were slow and uncoordinated, the long-distance travel and emotional turmoil finally catching up with him. He stumbled and swayed, and the wolves descended, knocking him on his back.
Dorian got in a good kick to a soft snout, but the favor was returned with a sharp bite around his ankle, another piercing his shoulder. Pain sizzled through his skin, burning up his leg and down his arm, finally unleashing the desperate howl he’d been holding back all night.
Dorian tried to kick again, but he had nothing left. No fight. No wits. Just a shell with a blackened heart, his final words a hoarse scream.
The wolves clamped down harder, sending twin bursts of agony through his limbs.
He was about to close his eyes and welcome his end when a man crept out from the dark woods, his nude flesh streaked with mud, leaves and sticks tangled in his matted hair.
“Ease off, boys,” the man said. “He ain’t one of ‘em.”
The wolves retreated—all but the one clamped around his ankle. A pup, Dorian realized. Warm blood leaked from the fresh wound in his shoulder, soaking the earth.
“Long way from the city, nightwalker.” The man crouched down beside Dorian’s prone form and extended a hand, unperturbed by his own nudity on the chilly autumn night. “Thought you old-ass vamps knew better than to provoke a wolf on his home turf.”
Dorian took the offered hand and let the man haul him to his feet. He swayed again, and the wolf attached to his ankle bit down harder.
“And I thought you stopped taking in stray dogs in the eighties,” Dorian said. “Yet here we are.”
A collective growl rumbled through the pack, but the man fisted Dorian’s hair and gave his head a playful shake, a grin splitting his mud-streaked face. “God damn, it’s good to see you, Red.”
Through the pain, the rage, the sheer exhaustion, Dorian smiled, his chest filling with an old, familiar warmth.
“You as well, Cole. Now, if it’s not too much trouble…” He gestured at the ferocious little mutt still attached to his ankle. “Would you kindly remove this fucking beast from my person? Or would you rather I tear his head off and feed it to the others while you watch?”
Chapter Two
“Rogue vampires?” Dorian asked. “In these woods?”
“Been trackin’ the fuckers all week.” Cole handed him a mason jar filled with something he’d poured from a dusty brown jug. “They keep slippin’ the traps.”
Sitting at a dingy linoleum table in Cole’s backwoods kitchen, an icepack on his shoulder and the wounded ankle bandaged and propped up on a chair, Dorian sipped the moonshine. He was fairly certain it would eat through his stomach lining—the stuff could probably strip the paint from his cars—but at least the burn distracted him from the blistering pain of his wounds.
Contrary to popular myth, the wolf bites wouldn’t kill him. But they would take a few days to