Ash(28)

“How’s our girl?” he asked, crossing toward us, smiling the entire time. I locked in on his beautiful face, appreciating the fallen angel look he was rocking. Hey, I was female and he was hot, and thankfully not my dad.

“Eyes forward.” Ryder’s voice was cold again. What was this guy’s problem?

With a loud exhalation, just so he knew I was annoyed, I started up the sequence again. Ryder crossed the mat to meet Lucas off to the side. They started to chat, but in a tone too low for me to hear. Left jab, right hook, left leg kick, drop and sweep. It was irritating me already. I couldn’t imagine three times a day for a week.

God, help me not die of boredom.



Dinner for Jayden and I consisted of a trip to the feeding room during our scheduled time. I had told Tessa only to meet me once a week, and we were still days away from that, so I didn’t check with the receptionist for any scheduled feedings. I grabbed a couple bottles of O-negative and we left the feeding hall and made our way to the entertainment section. This was on a higher level of the Hive. Level forty-four. I followed Jayden to a plush lounge. Live music filled the space, low and jazzy. Soft green velvet couches circled the room; on a dais stood a baby grand piano. A sexy and voluptuous vampire with long golden brown hair was crooning out a sultry song as a man played on the piano.

No one came near us. The jumpsuits did their job of keeping the ash who had yet to survive the culling separate. We were nothing more than numbers.

We found a free lounge and sank into it. Jayden guzzled his blood, wincing as he banged his elbow on the side of the chair.

“You healing okay?” I asked him.

He’d been training separate from me, with the other male ash, and it was already starting to get brutal. Ryder had assured me that our training would continue to be different times from the rest. That way none of them could ferret out my weaknesses before the fights. It was under two weeks until the culling and everyone was freaking out. I’d trained twice already today, not to mention weights, and all I could think about was that stupid five-step program. One thing was for sure, those movements were going to be stuck in my head for a long time to come.

“Yeah, I’m sore but okay,” Jayden answered, tilting his head back, the low lights shining across his perfect, dark skin. “Word got around that we were attacked and somehow survived. It’s raised the odds on us, moved us toward the end of the culling schedule. So of course every ash and their dick have decided to take me out early.”

I sat a little straighter. “I should be training with you. You need me in your corner.” As little use as I might be, I could watch his back. “Fucking Ryder has me doing some stupid five step movement. I need weapons training. I need to know how to rip an ash’s arm off and beat him to death with it. No five steps are going to help with that.”

Jayden’s dark eyes flashed as he opened his eyelids, and then he was laughing – throw-back-his-head-until-his stomach-ached kind of laughing. “Girl, I could not have asked for a better roomie.” It took him a few moments to compose himself. He even had me joining in his laughter; it was contagious. He finally pulled it together. “You should be grateful. Ryder is the shit. He is a scary mother and there is no one in here who would take him on. Whatever he is teaching you, you learn it until your brain bleeds. It will most probably save your life.”

As if his words had conjured up the man himself, I sensed a dark gaze on me, and as I twisted to the side, my eyes clashed with a set which were looking quite silver at the moment. There was something between us, a spark. A moment happened then that was hard for me to describe, but all I knew was that I couldn’t tear my gaze away from him. If he’d have beckoned me right then, I’d have gotten off my chair and hightailed it over to him. Which was not a feeling I had ever experienced before.

“Ever noticed that you and Ryder both have eyes which are a hell of a lot more vampire than ash?” Jayden was watching our exchange, and the boy was pretty much fanning himself as he grinned.

Ryder broke the spell, turning to one of the sexy six, and I was finally able to catch my breath. Wait! What had Jayden said?

“Vampire eyes?” I asked, letting my confusion release. “I have ash eyes. Only a little more intense.”

Jayden nodded. “You do, even though your silver is a lot more defined than the others – and sometimes when your emotions are charged they get very silver, with this splash of green. It’s almost … alive.”

I was guessing right now they were very silver, as he put it.

“I’ve seen the same thing with Ryder. It’s almost as if the pair of you hold a little more of the virus in your DNA than the rest of us.”