Night Kissed (Chosen Vampire Slayer #1) - Mila Young Page 0,48
intentions toward my gorgeous prize were neither here nor there. A significant percentage of the bear tribe lay dead, dying, or otherwise incapacitated in the other half of the bar, but my main targets, the vampires, had by and large regained themselves and were closing in around me. Keeping my wits sharp had never been more vital.
“What’s the matter, old man?” I turned to the vampire brave enough to taunt me through a mouthful of broken teeth. He had obviously been a casualty of one of Seth’s uninhibited pummelings, and yet his spirit seemed undaunted. “You look bothered. Couldn’t be because your henchman ran off with the bitch, could it?”
“Watch your tongue, whelp.” I enunciated each syllable with sharp precision, just to make it clear that the metaphorical ice beneath his feet was very thin. “If it’s true my mood is less than charitable, then you ought to tread very lightly.”
“Ha!” He coughed and spat on the floor. “Listen to yourself, clanmaster. As if you really think we’re the ones who need to worry.” He glanced to the left and right, at the unbecoming faces of his cohorts. Their circle around me drew ever tighter. “But that isn’t the case, now is it?”
“I wouldn’t be so sure.” Logan had disappeared from sight, as was his wont, but I perceived him there, his frosted aura leaving a bite in the air. On my subtle signal, he stepped back into being at my side. The shadow of his fallen wings glimmered. Indulgently, I smiled at the intruders from Seattle. “What do you say we settle this? Right here, right now.”
The answer did not come immediately. We stared each other down, unblinking. Droplets of blood fell from the vampire’s chin to the filthy floor. Why they chose to hang out in such hovels, I had never understood.
At long last, he muttered, “Fine.” The uneasy truce endured a few moments longer. Then, at the same time, we leapt forward. I struck him first, knocking his punch off its trajectory. His closed fist, quick, but smaller than mine, swooshed harmlessly past my face. Meanwhile, the cartilage in his nose shifted audibly beneath my knuckles.
He grunted and backpedaled, weaving. His left hand rose to cover his ruined features. A tooth bounced from his lower jaw off the ground.
“Cheap shot, you bastard.” The narrowed eyes were yellowed and mean. “Should have known you wouldn’t know how to fight fair.”
“Come now.” I offered my most infuriatingly ingratiating smile. “I won’t apologize for your inability to hit me. That’s ridiculous.”
The eyes darkened with anger. He whirled on his back foot and charged forward again. This time, I side-stepped, allowing Logan to extend a deceptively impenetrable arm and clothesline him to the floor. The vamp lay flat on his back, all spirit drained from him. His gaze went glassy as he stared into Logan’s face.
“Man, screw this!” a young, dark-skinned vamp cried out impatiently, galvanizing the small crowd. They surged forward to immerse us in hand-to-hand combat. Logan’s first move was to open his ethereal wings, sending at least two enemies flying. He followed their flight arc all the way to where they hit the walls and fell.
While I admired the theatrics and the style of the fallen angel’s method, mine stayed utilitarian. Quite a contrast to the usual flair for the dramatic, inherent in most of the more elegant creatures of the night, but try as I might, I couldn’t scrub Seth and Veronica from my mind. Imagining my last glimpse of them as he led her off into the night made my insides churn.
I had to rejoin them as soon as possible. And that meant these weaklings were no more than useless obstacles.
But they had their own agenda on which they refused to give up, and they fought like madmen. I started off genuinely trying not to hurt them if I could help it, for as maddening as they were, the scope of the Seattle clan they came from far exceeded that of Anchorage. I needed to step carefully as clanmaster to avoid sinking my people into a trap we could not escape. Thus, the first vamp to stop cooperating in any fashion had his neck snapped.
A bold statement, but one that carried. The chaos around me paused in its intensity, long enough for the doomed vamp’s associates to process what was going on. The downed vamp struggled to get away, but his body couldn’t heal the damage I had done fast enough to save him. A broom