Page 15 of A Bond Beyond Blood (The Butcher’s Daughter Trilogy #1)

V inny

Surrounded by humans and vampires alike, I waited for Jacqueline as close as I could get to the chaos surrounding the tree. When I arrived, I sent a text with my location, but there’d been no response. And now, thirty minutes later, there was still no sign of her.

Punctuality was her favorite thing, and this was twice now she’d been late for a meeting with me.

Yesterday, however, she had an excuse. I’d forgotten it was the date of her father’s death—an oversight I wouldn’t allow to happen twice. Had today’s grief become too overwhelming for her? Had she decided not to carry on her father’s favorite tradition?

Maybe it was too painful.

Or... maybe she didn’t want to share something so sacred with me after all.

Fuck.

Tilting my head back, I looked up at the massive tree and breathed deeply, hoping to catch the scent of her in the air even with all these people around. It was a long shot, but I tried nonetheless.

I’d been here plenty of times, but Ricci family tradition dictated visiting during that first week of January to miss the holiday rush. The old man hated crowds.

If he could see me now.

I shook my head at the thought of my father seeing today’s New York. So much had changed since his passing. He wouldn’t even recognize midtown.

He’d hate it here.

We were different in that sense, he and I. As the times changed, I evolved with them. I enjoyed progress and didn't fight against things I didn’t yet understand.

I checked the time on my phone again, then pulled up her number and sent a quick text.

After a few minutes, when Jacqueline still didn’t respond or appear out of nowhere in the crowd, I hopped up onto the wall of a fountain, ignoring the shouts of a security guard nearby, and scanned the sea of people for the only one that mattered.

By half past ten, as I watched the crowds dispersing, and the ice-skating rink personnel began ushering people out, I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong.

Jacqueline wouldn’t flake on me. Not without a text.

She’d been ghosted herself in the past and I knew her well enough to know she wouldn’t turn around and treat someone with that same level of disrespect.

With a grunt of frustration—at the situation and at myself for waiting so long to go find my girl—I jumped down off the fountain’s wall, gave the red-faced security guard a toothy, fang-filled grin, and hurried toward the car.

That little fuck Gannon could have returned, caught her by surprise, used their past connection to weasel himself inside her house, then...

“Goddammit!” I punched a wall as I approached my SUV, wincing as the cement cracked loudly in the night, but I didn’t look back to assess the damage. I jumped in the car, turned the ignition, then threw it into drive and headed toward Fiorino’s Meats with my heart in my throat.

Why did I suggest meeting here instead of offering to pick her up?

Some fucking first date this was.

I raced through traffic, running red lights and dodging cars on my way toward the village.

When I reached the back of the shop, the car was barely in park before I jumped out of it and raced to the stairs leading to her apartment, but then the wind changed and I froze.

The scent of her blood was overwhelming.

My fangs extruded and the hunger burst to life within me even though I’d hit the bank before our date tonight. I fought through the bloodlust as it burned through my veins and clouded my thoughts, then finally pushed it down to a tolerable level so I could think.

Jacqueline was bleeding. Where?

I looked up at the apartment. The lights were on, but there was no movement within. Swiveling back, I ran down the stairs to the rear entrance of the butcher shop. The door pushed open easily, unlocked, and I raced inside, stopping as I came upon her body.

“No,” I yelled as I knelt beside her. “Jacqueline!” In the span of a few seconds, my brain caught up to two sounds: her heartbeat was one, and I exhaled with relief.

Her quiet crying was the other.

“Oh, fuck, Jacqueline,” I said as I nudged her to look up at me.

When she lifted her head, a roar tore from my chest at the sight of her face.

One eye had the telltale purple mottle of a blooming bruise, and her lips were swollen. Blood trickled from her mouth and nose, and another blotch of mottled bruising marred her cheek.

“Who did this to you?” I growled.

Her face crumpled as she struggled to sit up and crawl into my arms. “He didn’t want to be saved, Vinny,” she said, her crying getting louder now that she was in my arms.

I tensed as the scent of her blood became overwhelming, fighting against the thirst as I tucked her close to my chest—

She cried out, wincing in pain.

I cursed under my breath. “I’m hurting you.”

“It’s okay,” she lied. “Please take me home.”

“Who did this to you?” I asked again, picking up on another vampire’s scent but unable to place it.

Jacqueline just shook her head and tucked it against my chest, muttering words I couldn’t understand through her tears and I shook my head. Anger, frustration, and hunger warred within me.

Whoever dared lay a fucking hand on her would pay with their life.

If it was that kid Gannon, her useless excuse of an ex-boyfriend, I’d make it extra painful for the little fuck before I ripped his head from his body and pissed down his throat.

But first, I had to tend to my girl. She was bloody and beaten, and the blood on her face wasn’t even the worst of it, judging by the way she cried out when I tried to pick her up.

She’d been through the ringer tonight and all I could say about her attacker was that they were lucky she was still alive.

Had she died...

No. I couldn’t fucking fathom it.

I tightened my grip on her and left the shop, then marched up to her apartment with revenge and thirst at war with my desire to care for this woman in my arms.

As soon as I entered the apartment, I froze.

The one who harmed her was in her apartment.

On high alert now and ready for anything, I set her on the couch and brought my finger to my lips to silence her. Then I turned around, fangs bared, and crouched—

When the man stepped casually out of the kitchen, a glass of wine in his hand and an old blood stain drying on his shirt, I quickly retracted my fangs.

“Shit,” I whispered, eyes wide.

Elias Bristol had returned.

I didn’t know what this meant, or why he’d left Jacqueline in such a state, but I did know my place.

So I dropped reluctantly to one knee and bowed my head.