War of Hearts (True Immortality 1)

“Aye.” He took off his rucksack and urged her to do the same. After hiding them behind a tree, he nudged her in front of him and they crouched low as they broke out of the trees and dove against the building. Conall pulled the large double doors open and Thea followed him inside.

It was entirely empty.

There were stalls and chunky metal gates everywhere but no animals and no people. There wasn’t even a strong smell of animal waste in the air, just a musty scent and sparse bits of old hay scattered about.

Her eyes swept over the disused barn.

Unfortunately, there was nowhere they could set up a defensive position. Everything was out in the open.

The thought had barely processed when the tingling on her neck increased. “Conall—” She whipped around as two female wolves stormed into the barn, handguns blazing.

Thea’s body moved before she could think, instinct fueling her speed as she jumped in front of Conall and felt the bullets ricochet through her like hot stings. She shoved the Scot with such force, he flew into the air out of the way of the spray.

Thea turned as the wolves reloaded and she thanked fuck they weren’t packing automatics as she pushed through the awful feeling of having metal foreign objects lodged in her back. Two were through and through. Three were not.

Dipshits.

It took seconds to kill them.

Break wrist holding gun. Tear heart out of chest. Rinse and repeat.

A deep sadness filled Thea as she stared down at the two women, but she knew she had to kill them. If she’d merely knocked them out, they would have come after them again, and Thea needed time to take care of the three bullets inside her.

Whoever this coven was, they underestimated her. They weren’t exactly sending their finest to fight her. Well, except for the strong vampire in Prague who Conall had annihilated. Speaking of which ...

Groaning, she bent down and picked up the handgun, releasing the magazine. Silver bullets winked in the light. Just as she’d suspected. These weren’t for her.

Hearing Conall moving across the barn toward her, she turned and showed him.

He stared fiercely at the bullets and when his eyes finally met hers, she saw confusion and something she didn’t quite understand burning in his pale gaze.

Feeling a bullet lodge itself a little deeper into her back, hot blood soaking her shirt, Thea dropped the gun. “Uh … we need to get to a bathroom.”

Conall reached for her, spinning her around. “Jesus fuck, Thea. How many?”

“Five, but one in my arm and another in my shoulder were through and through. There are three in my back.”

He reached for the hem of her top. “Let me—”

“No!” Panic suffused her at the thought of him tending to the wounds. “I can do it.”

Anger radiated out of the wolf and he gave her a clipped nod. “I need to bury the bodies in the woods. Can you wait?”

Waiting sounded a whole lot of not fun, but Thea knew they needed to cover their tracks. She nodded.

Conall was remarkably fast and efficient, though he wore a grim expression as he buried the wolves who had been sent to specifically kill him and capture her.

He came back, their rucksacks in hand, looking pissed and distracted at the same time. “Let’s go.”

Sweat trickled down Thea’s temples as she followed him out. As they walked into the yard, she could feel a bullet move deeper with every step. She wasn’t going to make it into town.

“We need to find an empty farmhouse or something.” She ignored the pinching pain all over her back.

“Aye, your back is soaked in blood.” He grimaced. “If someone sees you, we’re done for.”

“Well, it looks like it might be our lucky day,” she said with more glibness than she felt as they walked out of the farmyard to encounter a road. It appeared to lead straight into town and across it were two houses nestled among the trees.

Conall hurried them toward the houses and pushed her behind a tree. “Wait here while I check things out.”

As she waited, Thea reached a hand behind her neck, sliding it beneath her shirt where she felt a bullet in her shoulder. Tweezers would be good, but this bullet wasn’t lodged too deep. She dug her fingers in, wincing. Thea yanked it out just as Conall reappeared.

He eyed the squashed silver bullet in her blood-covered hand and shook his head.

“What?” she snapped, growing irritated by the pain in her back. Her irritation, however, fled at the expression in Conall’s usually icy eyes. There was something warm in them.

“You’re tough as leather, lass.”

Annoyed by the prickle of pleasure she felt at his words, she rolled her eyes. “Admire me later. Do we have an empty house?”

“Aye. This way. But we best be fast.”

“It would really not suck if you’d stop stating the obvious.” She hurried after him, up a gravel drive toward a quaint family house with a red-tiled roof.