Page 43 of Bitten by Bloodmoon (Mateless Shifters #2)

Lumi

“ N yx and I need to talk to you,” I send to Ambrose. I haven’t talked to him or felt for our connection since the Moonlight pack and Moonfire coven attacked us.

I’m still lying on Nyx’s naked body. I never want to move. I want to stay hidden in the covers with him forever. But now that I’ve realized what I have to do, I need to do it. I need to carry out my plan.

Nyx tugs at the door to my mind again, begging to be let in. He wants to know what my decision is—who I chose as a mate.

But he can’t know. It kills me that I can’t tell him. I have to block him out after what we just did. But I can’t have him talking me out of my decision.

“I assume you mean in private without anyone else knowing?” Ambrose sends back.

“Yes. Do you have a place where we can meet safely?”

There’s a long pause. “Yes, I’ll send you the exact coordinates. I have a house in the woods that’s about halfway between the Bloodmoon pack territory and my territory. Meet there in three hours.”

“See you in three hours.”

I’m shocked that Ambrose didn’t make me promise more things. If he thinks this is a trap, he’s not even questioning me about it. He didn’t ask if he could bring Emeric or anyone else to offer protection for him. He still trusts me.

Nyx is still beneath me, except for his thumb that lightly traces circles over my lower back. He doesn’t rush me. He doesn’t ask me. He patiently waits.

I’m still processing our night together, just as curious about his own feelings about what transpired as he is about mine. But we’ve both blocked each other out, and our time is up.

“Ambrose gave me a latitude and longitude to meet at. It’s a house somewhere between his territory and ours. He said he’ll meet us there in three hours alone,” I say.

Nyx doesn’t respond at first. He wants to say no, that it isn’t safe.

“I doubt we have time for a bath, but we can at least take a quick shower first? Otherwise, we’re going to reek of each other, and Ambrose is going to lose his mind before even talking to us,” he says.

One second he’s under me, the next he’s in the bathroom, and I hear the water running. I collapse into the bed with a soft, infectious smile and a blush staining my cheeks. He wanted to bathe with me—so sweet and romantic.

When I walk into the bathroom, I’m not sure what to expect. Nyx watches me with a hungry gaze that he quickly tames with a blink of his eyes, returning to all business.

“You’re gorgeous, can I wash you?”

I bite back a smile. “Yes.”

He holds out his hand and I take it, like he’s about to lead me out onto the dance floor.

Instead, he leads me into his shower. Water hits me from the four shower heads that are in here, melting any soreness away.

He steps in behind me, his massive frame easily fitting in the expansive shower that three adults could fit in.

I don’t think too hard about who else might have enjoyed taking a shower with him here.

He grabs a bottle of shampoo and squirts some into my hair, then his fingers start to scrub. He doesn’t say a word as he works. He doesn’t even speak while rinsing the soap out of my hair. He stays silent as he takes a washcloth and rubs soap all over every inch of my body.

I don’t tell him that if the point is to wash the scent of each other from each other’s bodies, then showering together might not be fully helping. But I’m enjoying the quiet silence. The slow study of each other’s bodies without talking and without sexually touching each other.

I watch as, under his touch, the markings of the runes begin to fade back into my skin.

The gold lighting up the edges disappears.

He washes the runes away like they’re nothing more than a marker drawn on my skin.

The runes had spread from my chest to my arms, claiming more of my body for their own pleasure.

I hold my breath as he washes over my chest and breasts, scrubbing the runes away along with the soap.

I’m happy to watch them vanish once again.

I can’t make sense of it, just like I can’t make sense of why they became visible when Nyx started fucking me.

The water rinses the soap off my body until there is nothing left for Nyx to wash on me.

I take another washcloth and soap and do the same to Nyx’s body. I wash over his arms—where thin black scars have darkened almost overnight. His entire chest is the same. I can see every cut, scrape, and hit he’s ever endured in his life, and there isn’t a part of his body left untouched.

I have questions, so many questions, as does he. But in this moment, neither of us asks them.

“We should go,” Nyx finally says after I’ve cleaned and examined every inch of him.

I nod.

What feels like seconds later, we are running through the forest, me on Nyx’s back while carrying a small backpack of clothes and supplies to the spot where Ambrose agreed to meet us.

“Let your wall down just a little,” Nyx says as we approach the location. He’s shifted back into his vampire form and gotten dressed.

I raise an eyebrow at him.

“I’m not going to read your mind or push to get any thoughts, I promise. But if things go south, we need to be able to communicate easily. You can still block me out from what you don’t want me to know. Just let me talk to you in your mind again,” he begs.

I study him closely, unsure if I should, but I trust him. And I trust myself, so I lower the wall. A few feet behind where it was before, I build a new wall, still blocking him from most of my mind.

“This better?” I ask.

His shoulders relax a little. “Thank you, love.”

My heart skips when he looks at me like that. Fuck, I have to get it together if I’m going to be able to make it through this.

Nyx grabs my hand, holding me back as his ears perk up. “Someone found us.”

“Ambrose?”

“More than just Ambrose.”

“He wouldn’t betray me by bringing others. He might bring Emeric, but that’s it.”

“He would betray me .”

I frown, knowing that there is no arguing with Nyx about that. But I know Ambrose differently than Nyx does, which makes me proceed with even more caution.

Something hard and fast hits Nyx right in the chest.

“Run!” Nyx screams at me.

I glance back to where Nyx hit the ground and see the vampire that hit him.

“Trust me. I’m fine. Run!” Nyx says again.

Dammit .

I run. I pull my blade out and run as fast as I can, trusting that Nyx is strong enough to take on one vampire by himself.

“Ambrose?” I call out in my head, trying to figure out if he’s made it here or not.

“Run,” his whispered breath comes into my head.

Fuck .

Unlike Nyx’s order, Ambrose’s is weak. He’s hurt. Captured. In trouble.

I halt running, turning in circles, trying to figure out which way to run. I never saw the cabin when I started running, but my intuition tells me that’s where I should go. That’s where Ambrose is.

I slam my walls down, opening my mind to both Ambrose and Nyx, allowing them full access to everything. It’s risky, but it’s necessary for our survival. Everyone will be too preoccupied with staying alive to dig deep into my thoughts for answers.

I start running toward the cabin, to where I know Ambrose is.

“Lumi, no!” Nyx shouts. Now that my mind is open to him, he knows where I’m going.

“I have to. He’s hurt.”

“I’m coming. Stay alive,” Nyx says.

But I can tell by how breathless he sounds that he’s fighting off more than one vampire now. I don’t know how long it could take him to help.

“Where are you?” I send to Ambrose as I approach the house. I can sense him inside, but I don’t know where or in what condition he’s in.

“Run, Lumi, they’re using me as bait,” Ambrose says again.

“I’m not leaving. Now, where are you? How many? Anything that could help me save your ass would be helpful.”

“Back bedroom. There’s a window you can enter through. Hurry, they’re gone now, but I don’t know when they’ll come back.”

I know Nyx hears everything, so I don’t bother repeating Ambrose’s location to him.

The cabin is small, so it doesn’t take me long to locate the entry. I creep up to the window, raising my head just enough to peek inside. Ambrose is tied to the bed, and he’s lying in a puddle of his own blood.

“Hold on, I’m coming,” I tell Ambrose.

A light groan is all I get back.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

I try prying the window open, but it doesn’t budge.

So I turn backward and slam my elbow as hard as I can into the window.

It breaks, but the noise is loud enough that I’m sure the vampires heard.

I throw my body through the shattered window, ignoring the burn of glass slashing open my skin as I push myself through.

I force myself onto my feet and am next to Ambrose in the next second.

“Ambrose, I’m here.”

His eyes are shut, his chest is rising and falling so slowly that every time it falls, I’m afraid it’s not going to rise with another breath again.

His limbs are tied to the four posts of the bed.

There are bite marks on his neck, wrists, and ankles.

He’s lost so much blood. The vampires didn’t even drink it; they just spilled it out on the bed.

I move to one of his wrists with my blade, and I work on cutting through the rope binding him, but it’s slow work.

“Hold on, Ambrose. Hold on,” I whisper to him, my heart thumping wildly in panic.

“Our trap worked,” I hear an unfamiliar deep voice behind me.

I don’t stop sawing, hoping that if I can just get one limb free, then we’ll survive this. He’ll get free. He’ll be able to stop this.

“Your wolf shifter alpha is dead, or he will be in a matter of minutes. Don’t waste your energy,” the menacing vampire says from behind me.

I saw faster, so close.

“We’re not going to hurt you, though. You’re the snow wolf. The one who can break the curse. We just need you to break it for the vampires, not the shifters. That’s why you’ll choose the Nightfall lord as your mate.”

“That’s not how it works. I don’t get to choose.”

I keep talking, keep trying to buy myself time. One more strand.

It breaks.

One of Ambrose’s arms is free, but he still doesn’t move. He can’t. He’s too weak, too near death.

Fuck.

“Nyx, I need you to make me shift.”

“Only Ambrose can control your wolf.”

“He’s unconscious. But you can control it too with your mind control.”

There’s a pause. “I made a blood deal with you that I wouldn’t use mind control. I can’t do it. I’m close. The vampires won’t hurt you. They need you alive to end the curse. I’m almost there.”

“But they don’t need Ambrose. He’s out of time.” A tear rolls down my cheek. “Please.”

Nyx growls, the sound echoing through my body with a force I’ve never felt before, and then I’m shifting. Faster than I’ve ever shifted before, like he’s forcing my body to move faster, to bend my frame and turn my skin to fur as fast as his vampire moves.

In seconds, I’m standing in the small bedroom in my white fur with golden streaks and eyes that scream, ‘I’m going to kill you.’

At the sight of me, one of the vampires runs. The other stands frozen, like he can’t move at all.

Nyx.

Is he mind-controlling them, too?

I don’t think. I attack, going straight for the vampire’s throat. The vampire starts to move at the last second as I leap. It takes a swipe at me, trying to knock me away, but I’m far more determined to win this fight than he is.

I rip.

I tear.

I don’t stop until he’s dead on the ground.

I know he’s not permanently dead. I’d need to put a stake through his heart for that, but it’s enough that I can draw my attention back to Ambrose.

I shift back. Nyx is pushing me back into my human form as quickly as he shifted me into my wolf form.

“Ambrose! You can’t die. Don’t you dare fucking die!” I scream at him.

I make quick work of the ropes, using what remains of my canines to tear through the thick cords. And then he’s free but still not out of the woods. His breathing is labored. There is more blood outside of his body than inside.

“Riven will be here in three minutes,” Nyx says.

Thank gods. I tear off fabric from my clothes to start applying pressure to the worst wounds on his neck, trying to keep the remaining blood inside.

“Three minutes. You hold on for three more minutes. Help will be here in three minutes,” I keep repeating the words over and over with desperation clinging to every word. I need him alive. I need him to stay alive. I need him. I need him. I—

“Yes, my queen,” he finally replies.