“There they are. They see me, but they’re not acknowledging me. They might be afraid someone would recognize either them or me. They’re headed our way. I’ve got Carissa’s extra blades for them.”
“Hell. Three men are walking straight for them. I’m intercepting them.” Not giving Pasha a chance to respond, Zachary disappeared, not something he’d planned to do at the airport because he knew when her family saw him vanish, they would believe he was a vampire and there to harm the family and not the other vampires. But he had to reach the rogue vampires quickly before they could hurt the family and in a way that told them he was a vampire, not a hunter. Though he suspected the rogues would have waited until they reached the parking tower where the security guards wouldn’t be and fewer people would see what they intended to do.
Zachary appeared in front of one of the vampires, his long red hair pulled back in a tail, and stopping all three of them in their path. Zachary smiled. “You’re Josh Thompson from Virginia, aren’t you?”
The redhead frowned at him, the other two men pausing to see what Zachary had to say. “No, and we’ve got business to attend to. You’re interfering, whoever you are.”
At least Zachary had given Pasha time to arm her cousin and her mate and hurried them and the kids toward the parking tower, trying to avoid the danger. He assumed the redhead was in charge of these vampires because he was leading them.
“You’re working for Crichton, aren’t you?” Zachary telepathically asked as the three men shoved past him and attempted to follow their prey. They knew the family and now they knew Pasha was with them. “I heard he was getting rid of a hunter family and I’m game.” This time he spoke the words out loud.
The redheaded vampire turned and bared his teeth at Zachary in a way that told him to get lost. If the vampire had thought Zachary was a hunter, he knew the vampire would have gone for the juggler. But no hunter could vanish and appear like a vampire and they couldn’t telepathically communicate with vampires. Zachary had every intention of stopping the three vampires from going after Pasha and the others so they could make their escape.
Zachary extended his wrist blades and struck the redheaded vampire in the heart, killing him instantly. The vampire wizened up and collapsed on the floor, wrinkled, parched skin and bones, and clothes. An ancient. Good. Zachary was certain Crichton wouldn’t have as many ancients here as he did newly turned vampires and since the ancients were harder to kill, he was glad they had one less to deal with.
“What the hell are you doing?” one of the two vampires remaining asked telepathically, his black brows furrowed.
It really confused the vampires when one of “their own” attacked them, but Zachary assumed from the men’s inaction, they believed the vampire might have had it coming.
“I’m as rogue as they get,” Zachary said, and stabbed the second one in the heart. The vampire was like the other, an ancient, and his skin shriveled up as he collapsed on the floor. Like the other, there was no blood, the blood in their veins turning to dust. And then the rest of him turned into dust.
Several passengers hurried out of the building, not wanting to get involved or witness a vampire war. Three security guards rushed to see to the matter, but then waited a distance away to see the outcome.
If vampires wanted to kill vampires, more power to them. The police didn’t get involved. If hunters killed vampires, they had to have some proof the vampires were rogues. In this case, it would be easy to explain because of the killings Crichton and his men had done against the hunter families without provocation and law enforcement wanted it resolved in the hunters’ favor.
The last vampire lunged for Zachary, trying to grab him by the neck, his extended canines bared, ready to rip Zachary’s throat out. Zachary had hold of the vampire’s wrists, trying to keep him from biting him, unable to reach the vampire with his wrist blades. Pasha raced behind the vampire and stabbed him in the back with her hunter’s sword, all the way through the heart. When this one died, he looked just like he did in life, bleeding, like a normal human would, so he had been newly turned.
Zachary wasn’t surprised the last one was newly turned, though he wasn’t expecting to see two ancients out of the three.
Brows furrowed, the security guards still waited to see the outcome, since he was still a vampire and Pasha was a hunter. They weren’t telling the police or anyone other than the hunters they were working with that he and the other two hunters had been turned. Best to keep that information secret to use to their advantage.
All Zachary could think of was how Pasha had aided him. Still, he wasn’t sure what prompted him to hug her when he knew how much she hated that he was a vampire. But he wanted her to know how much he appreciated her assistance. She was stiff at first, then yielded and hugged him back.
For a moment, it was like holding an Olympic gold medal in his arms, a win like nothing he’d ever experienced. She was hot and soft and sexy, and he couldn’t help but love her curves, her whispered breath on his neck, and her arms wrapped around him.
He let out his breath. They had to take care of her family and he needed to talk to the officers. They released each other and Zachary explained the business with Crichton to the security officers. “These three men were after more of some of the hunter family,” Zachary said, while Pasha called O’Connor for a cleanup team at the airport.
Zachary used his vampiric persuasion to ensure the security police followed the hunters’ orders, not the vampires.
Then she and Zachary hurried to the SUV where the family waited for them.
“You know, you scared my family half to death when you moved like a vampire to confront the others. It isn’t my fault if my cousin’s husband runs you through with the hunter’s sword I just armed him with as soon as we reach the SUV,” Pasha said.
Zachary smiled wryly. “If so, then I will have set out to do what I had hoped to in the beginning when I learned I had been turned, though now the notion of falling in battle at the hands of a vampire appeals more.”
She shook her head. “After all you’ve done to help us already, don’t you see the good you can do?”
He was surprised she would feel that way. Maybe she was changing her mind about her sister, brother, and him being vampires. It didn’t mean she would want to be his mate ever though. He didn’t answer her. If the good he did always came under scrutiny because hunters couldn’t see which side he was on, then no.
When they reached the car, Pasha said, “I’m driving. You explain to my family how you became what you are.” She introduced them first, everyone wide-eyed as they watched him climb into the SUV.
“I was helping to save Pasha and her parents and ultimately Danai and Adonis from a vicious vampire in Dallas and his minions when I was turned. Believe me, I’m one of the good guys.”
Of course her relatives were shocked. But then Jeremy said, “Hell, we’re glad you’re on our side. We didn’t know what to think. First, you were with Pasha and we thought you were a hunter, come to join us in the fight. Then you vanished like a vampire, appeared in front of the vampires out to get us, and started talking to them. Not killing them. Just talking to them like you were all good buddies. We were certain you were telling them you had identified Pasha and the rest of us as the ones they were after. Imagine our surprise when we saw you killing the one.”