Midnight Rising (Midnight Breed 4)

What about the other people in this high-rent estate? Just more vampire fantasists like him, who believed they descended from a solar-allergic alien race?

And here she was, the unwitting participant, abducted and held captive against her will by a wealthy, blood-drinking cult who believed she was somehow linked to them by virtue of a simple birthmark. Hell, it sounded like a story that was tailor-made for a tabloid front page.

But if anything Rio had said was true...?

Good Lord, if there was anything real about what she'd just heard, then she was sitting on a news story that would literally change the world. One that would alter reality for every human being on the planet. A chill ran up her spine when she considered how important this could be.

"I have a million questions," she murmured, venturing a glance across the room at Rio.

He nodded as he got up from the chair. "That's understandable. I've given you a lot to absorb, and you'll be hearing even more before it's time for you to decide."

"Time for me to decide?" she asked, watching as he strode over to the door to leave. "Wait a second. What am I going to have to decide?"

"Whether you become a permanent part of the Breed, or go back to your old life with no knowledge of us at all."

She didn't eat the breakfast Rio brought her, and the dinner he delivered later that day sat untouched too. She had no appetite for food, only a gnawing hunger for answers.

But he told her to save her questions, and when he came back in to inform her that it was time for the two of them to leave, Dylan felt a sudden rush of trepidation.

A gate was being thrown open before her, but it was dark on the other side. If she looked into that darkness, would it consume her?

Would there be any turning back?

"I don't know if I'm ready," she said, held in the mesmerizing snare of Rio's eyes as he came toward her in the room. "I'm...I'm afraid of where we're going. I'm afraid of what I'm going to see there."

Dylan looked up into the handsome, tragic face of her captor and waited for some words of encouragement - anything to give her hope that she would come out of this all right in the end.

He didn't offer any such thing, but when he reached out and placed his palm to her brow, his touch was gentle, incredibly warm. God, it felt so good.

"Sleep," he said.

The firm command filtered through her mind like the soft rasp of velvet over bare skin. He wrapped his other arm around the back of her, just as her knees began to sway. His hold on her was strong, comforting. She could melt into that strength, she thought, as her eyes drifted closed.

"Sleep now, Dylan," he whispered against her ear. "Sleep."

And she did.

Chapter Thirteen

One of the Order's black SUVs was waiting inside a private hangar as the small jet out of Berlin taxied in from a corporate runway at Boston's Logan Airport.

Rio and Dylan were the only passengers aboard the sleek Gulfstream twin engine. The jet and its human pilots were on round-the-clock retainer for the Order, although as far as the two flyboys knew, they pocketed their sizable cash salaries on behalf of a very private, very wealthy corporation that demanded - and received - complete loyalty and discretion.

They were paid extremely well to not so much as lift an eyebrow when Rio had carried a dead-to-the-world, psychically tranced woman into the aircraft in Berlin, nor when he took her off the jet in the same condition some nine hours later in Boston. With Dylan resting soundly in his arms, her backpack and messenger bag slung over his shoulder, Rio headed down the brief flight of steps to the concrete below.

As he crossed the short distance to the Range Rover idling in the hangar, Dante got out of the driver's side, jacking one elbow up on the open door. He was dressed in night patrol gear - long-sleeved tee-shirt, fatigues, and combat boots - all of it as black as his thick, shoulder-length hair. A black semiauto pistol was holstered under his left arm, another gun strapped to his thigh, but it was the two curved titanium blades sheathed at his hips that Dante never left home without.

One of the Order's newer members was with Dante too, riding shotgun. Ex - Darkhaven Enforcement Agent Sterling Chase, also garbed in combat gear and loaded for bear, gave Rio a nod of greeting from inside the vehicle. Chase looked as hard-ass as any warrior, his razor-cut golden hair covered in a black skullcap, steel blue eyes hard and steady in his lean face, the shrewd gaze a little emptier than Rio recalled it from a few months ago. Now there was hardly any trace of the uptight, holier-than-thou bureaucrat who'd showed up last summer asking the Order for help and then laying down his own rules of how he expected the warriors to work with him. Dante had not-so-affectionately dubbed the Darkhaven Agent "Harvard," a nickname that stuck even after Chase left his old civilian life and joined up with the Order.

"Jay-zus," Dante said, cracking a broad smile as Rio approached with Dylan lying slack in his arms. "Talk about going off grid, man. Five months is a helluva vacay." The warrior chuckled as he opened the SUV's back door and helped Rio get Dylan and her gear situated inside. When they were settled, Dante shut them in, then hopped back behind the wheel. He pivoted around to face Rio. "At least you came home with a nice souvenir, eh?"

Rio grunted, flicking a glance at Dylan sleeping on the backseat beside him. "She's a reporter. And a Breedmate."

"So I heard. We all did. Gideon told us all about your run-in with Lois Lane back there in Prague," Dante said.

"No worries, man. We're gonna clamp a hard lid on her story and her pictures before any of that shit goes public. As for her, calls have already been made to find her a place in the Darkhavens if that's her choice after all this is over. It's as good as handled."

Rio didn't doubt a word Dante said, but he couldn't help wondering which way Dylan was going to go in the end. If she chose the Darkhavens, it would only be a matter of time before a savvy Breed male convinced her that she needed him and ought to be his mate. God knew she'd have no shortage of candidates. With her unusual beauty, she would be the flame they all converged on, and the thought of her being pursued by a bunch of sophisticated, smooth-talking, mostly useless civilians set Rio's teeth on edge.