Page 39 of Blood and Magic (RBMC: Helena, MT #2)

Vermillion

F urious didn’t begin to describe the emotions raging inside my veins. This was all my fault. I was in charge of Vanderbilt Ranch while Orion was gone, and I’d let it all go to shit. I thought I’d set up the perimeter correctly. I thought our security was tight. I’d been a fucking idiot.

As we all stood in the meeting room, waiting for Kodiak to start church, my nerves frayed with the memory of watching Maeve fall apart in my arms. Kodiak didn’t begrudge her for her outburst. Christ, he was lucky she hadn’t drawn her claws.

But if anyone deserved her wrath, it was me.

I’d reacted poorly this morning, shoving her away when I should have pulled her closer, and now she’d lost everything.

“We found the horses a few miles in the woods,” Poe said. “I don’t know how they got out, but they’re fine. We brought them to our stables to keep them safe.”

Thank fucking fuck for that. Maeve didn’t need any more heartbreak.

When I’d gotten her back to the homestead, I put her in my bed, coaxed her to sleep, and left her to plan our next steps.

The room was full of Bastards, the officers at the table around Kodiak, who sat at the head with one hand gripping the chair, the other fisted under his chin.

“They took off to the east,” I said, detailing the footage I’d seen on the security cameras after we returned.

They’d figured out how to loop the feeds closest to the house so it didn’t set off any alarms to those watching from the homestead, but I’d caught them on the outer boundary, sneaking off to whatever fucking rock they’d crawled out from under.

“I’ve contacted the fairies, but they’re conveniently disinclined to get involved. ”

Nora and Aoife shifted in my peripheral vision. Aoife had been a member of the Montana fairy nest until mating Nora earlier this year. She spent most of her time here at the homestead, but that didn’t mean she’d revoked her family.

“I’ll talk to them,” Aoife said, gripping the small axe on her waist.

“Thank you,” Kodiak said with a nod. “What about the other Vanderbilts?”

“Orion and Sol are on their way home,” Moose said, brushing his long dark hair behind his ears. “Liam hasn’t returned our calls. I’ve sent three shifters out to pick up Galahad from boarding school, and Lycan insists he and Ava are fine.”

“The vampires in Europe are much more refined,” Ruby said.

As an enforcer, she held a high status in the pack.

As Kodiak’s sister, she was the only person who could hold his stare for more than a few seconds (aside from Guin).

“They wouldn’t start an international war without provocation, even to satisfy their American counterparts. ”

“So what do we do?” Talon asked. She ran her hands over her face and sighed. “We’re not strong enough right now to go after them.”

“But we can’t afford to sit on our hands,” Columba added. “They killed our friends. They killed the entire herd.”

“We need to be strategic,” Serpent said. “If we go after them when we’re weak, we’ll lose more pack members. If we wait, we risk more damage.”

“We need to draw them out,” Guin cut in from her spot next to Kodiak. “If we set a trap, we can pull them into our territory, where we know the odds are to our advantage.”

“Are you offering yourself up as bait?” Ruby asked, giving Guin a toothy smile.

Kodiak’s sister had never liked the Vanderbilts, and last year, she’d been the most prominent opponent to us going after Sol and Guin when they’d been abducted.

To her, the pack’s safety always came first. I couldn’t blame her for that mentality, especially since the Vanderbilts were responsible for the deaths of her parents and countless others.

“If needed,” Guin said, baring her teeth back at the enforcer. “I’d do anything to end this war. Wouldn’t you?”

Ruby scoffed and rolled her eyes, now tinged with the red of her wolf’s namesake.

“This isn’t up for negotiation.” Kodiak leaned forward on the table, resting his elbows on the edge, clasping his hands in front of him. “We will retaliate, but we need to be smart.”

“I like the idea of a trap,” I said. “It allows us to control the circumstances.”

“Perfect,” Guin said. “Put me out in the open. I’ll draw them in, you take them down.”

“No,” Kodiak said immediately.

“Why not?” She squared her jaw, hissing the word through clenched teeth. “It’s the perfect plot. They want the heir, that’s me.”

“He wants Sol,” I said. “And if not her, then Maeve.”

“He wants a Vanderbilt,” Guin countered, shifting her irate gaze to me. “And he’s stupid enough to accept whichever one he gets.”

“I’m not putting your life at risk,” Kodiak said, which seemed to confuse her even more.

She furrowed her brows. “I’m not letting any of my siblings take that spot.”

Kodiak held up a hand, and to my shock, she closed her mouth and pursed her lips.

“When Orion gets back, and only when Orion gets back, will we act. He’s the second in the pack for a reason.

” Kodiak shifted his shoulders. “Moose and Larentia, gather our guns. Serpent, work with Ruby on a location.” Kodiak barked orders at everyone else in the pack, seeming to cover all the bases, but he didn’t say anything to me.

“Fenris, the envoy from the Steel Roses MC, is here. Explain the situation to him, and see if he has any contacts in the immediate area who might be willing to help.”

My best friend nodded. The Steel Roses were a national group, but we’d recently allied with their Madison County chapter out of Virginia. They needed help with supply lines to the West Coast, and we needed backup. Jameson, the president of the National Chapter, had approved the alliance weeks ago.

“I know the witches down in Asheville are always willing to hunt down a few monsters. I’ll call Jameson and Duchess to see if any other chapters can come in,” Kodiak continued.

“We’ll get back up. We can’t do this alone, and it’s time we stop acting like they’re only a threat to us.

The Scorpions are a danger to every Royal Bastard territory. ”

When he was finished, the rest of the pack cleared out, leaving me to sit in my chair, dumbfounded and pissed off that I hadn’t been given anything to do.

I stared at him.

“Mill?” He raised his eyebrows once everyone had left.

“I didn’t hear orders for me,” I said. “I want to sink my fangs into Scorpion necks, too.”

He sighed through his nose. “I saw the marks on Maeve’s neck today.”

I froze. “And?”

“That isn’t a mating bite."

Crossing my arms, I shifted my hips uncomfortably.

“What happened? And don’t you dare lie to me.”

“Kodiak, I’m…” How exactly was I supposed to confess this to him?

If I said I craved her blood, that I had been since that night in her room when she ran her fingers over my lips, covering them in the delicious stuff, he’d confine me to quarters until Morwyn figured out what was wrong with me.

But fuck, hadn’t I been the one to push Maeve away?

Hadn’t I been the one to recognize there was something distinctly messed up about my attraction to her? “There’s something wrong with me.”

“Oh, I am well aware,” he said. “I’m glad you’re finally admitting it.”

“Taking her blood during her transition was bad enough,” I said, running my hands over my jeans. “But this morning, I couldn’t stop myself. I fucked her and then I drank from her and I…”

I loved it. She loved it.

Kodiak ran his hands over his face and head before planting them on the table to lean toward me.

“Listen, it’s not your fault, okay?” He adopted his gentle voice, the one he usually reserved for cubs. “You didn’t ask to die and be brought back to life. You didn’t make the call to leave the ranch unprotected. And you can’t help whatever’s going on with Maeve.”

I blinked back tears, the weight on my chest nearly suffocating me despite Kodiak’s words.

“I need to kill them,” I said. “It’s a fire inside me. I have to take them out.”

“Which is why you will take Maeve to Morwyn as soon as she’s awake. I want a full workup on both of you.”

That confused me. “You think it’s biological?”

“I think something happened to you when you worked on the ranch seventeen years ago.”

I heard what he wasn’t saying. My heart stammered, my hands balling into fists. “No, she’s not my?—”

Despite being hazy from the change, my wolf yipped in my head, perking its ears and wagging its tail. It agreed with Kodiak, and maybe deep down inside, I’d known all along. It was why Guin didn’t smell like me after her transition, why our connection faded so quickly afterward.

I thought of the first time I’d seen Maeve, brace-faced and wearing her hair in pigtails.

She’d been a child, and my instincts then were more protective than anything else.

After I left, I tried to move on with my life, but no one else satisfied me the way simply being in her presence could.

When I saw her again at Orion’s wedding, my entire body reacted like I’d suddenly been catapulted to life.

“Being alpha means I have a connection to all of you,” he said.

“When you join the pack, you make a blood bond with me, and it is through me that our magic is unified. What no one else knows, what only another alpha can know, is that I feel you all. I see you in my mind like a web, interconnected by relationships and friendships and genetics. For a long time, you’ve had a faint line trailing from you, disappearing off the map. ”

I drew in deep breaths while he continued, my pulse thundering in my veins as his explanation started to ring true.

“I thought it was Guin, but once I met her, once I met Maeve, my hypothesis changed.”

“What is it?” I asked the question, but I didn’t need to because I already knew the answer.

“You tell me,” he said, his eyes imploring me to come to my own conclusions.

“Do you think that’s why I crave her blood? Do you think I’m…” I couldn’t say the words, but I had to. I fucking had to. “Do you think I’m a vampire, Kodiak?”