Lover Mine (Black Dagger Brotherhood 8)

Then she dematerialized right out of the carriage.

Darius cursed and pounded on the side panel with his fist. As Tohrment brought the horse to a clattering halt, Darius leaped out--

She didn't make it far.

The flash of her white nightgown appeared in the field to the left and he followed her suit, flashing over to her as she started to run. Lacking any true vigor, her weaving gait was that of the desperate but injured and he let her go for as long as she could.

Later, he would reflect that it was then when he knew for sure, during that mad rush she put upon them both: She couldn't go home. It wasn't what she had been through. . . it was what she was carrying forth from her ordeal.

When the female tripped and fell to the ground, she did nothing to shield her belly.

And verily, she clawed at the ground to keep going but he simply couldn't bear to watch the struggle anymore.

"Arrest your exertions," he said, pulling her up from the cold grasses. "Arrest thee now. . . "

She fought him with all the strength of a fawn and then fell still in his arms. In the frozen moment between them, her breath came out hard from her mouth and her heart raced--he could see her flickering jugular in the moonlight, could feel the quiver in her veins.

Her voice was weak, but she meant truly what she uttered. "Do not take me back there--not even to the start of the drive. Do not render me returned. "

"You cannot mean what you say. " With gentle hands, he pulled her hair back from her face and abruptly remembered seeing the blond strands in the brush in her room. So much had changed since she'd last sat before her vanity mirror and readied herself for a night with her blooded family. "You have been through too much to think clearly. You must needs rest and--"

"If you take me back there, I shall run again. Do not put it upon my father to see that. "

"You must go home--"

"I have no home. Anymore and evermore. "

"No one needs to know what has transpired. That it wasn't a vampire is of aid, as no one shall ever--"

"I am with the symphath 's young. " Her eyes grew cold and hard. "My needing came to pass the very night that he forced himself upon me and I have not bled as females do since. I am with its young. "

Darius's exhale was loud in the silence, his warm breath bearing forth a cloud of mist in the cool air. Well, this did change everything. If she held the young to term and brought it unto this world, there was a possibility it could pass for a vampire, but half-breeds of that sort were unpredictable. You never could be sure of the balance of the genes, whether they would lean to one of their sides over the other.

But perhaps there was a way to implore her family. . . .

The female grabbed the lapels of his sturdy overcoat. "Leave me for the sun. Leave me to the death I wish for. I would take mine own hand to my throat if I could but I am not that strong of arm and shoulder. "

Darius looked back at Tohrment, who was waiting by the carriage. Calling the boy forward with his hand, Darius said to the female, "Let me talk with your father. Let me pave the way. "

"He shall never forgive me. "

"It was not your fault. "

"Fault is not the quandary, the outcome is," she said bleakly.

As Tohrment dematerialized over and took form before them, Darius rose to his feet. "Take her back to the carriage and render you both into that stand of trees. I shall go to her father now. "

Tohrment bent down, awkwardly arranged the female in his arms and stood. In the boy's strong but gentle hold, Sampsone's daughter reverted to the listless condition she had passed the trip home in, her eyes open but vacant, her head lolling to the side.

"Take good care of her," Darius said, tucking the female's loose nightgown closer 'round her. "I shall return anon. "

"Worry not," Tohrment replied as he began striding away through the grass.

Darius watched them go for a moment and then cast himself upon the wind, re-forming on the grounds of her family's estate. He went directly up to the front door and put the massive lion's head knocker to use.

As the butler opened the portal wide, it was obvious that something terrible was afoot within the manse. His pallor was that of fog and his hands were shaking.

"Sire! Oh, blessed be, do come in. "