Night Unbound(7)

He struggled to keep his heart from beating faster at the notion.
“Were you with Seth?” Lamech asked.
That rat bastard? Hell no.
“Why did you meet with Seth in the Arctic?” Jared demanded, taking the whip.
“Coincidence,” Zach replied through cracked lips.
The whip tore into Zach’s chest.
“What is your interest in Seth?” Lamech asked.
“What’s yours?” Zach countered.
“What it has always been,” Jared said. “If we don’t keep Seth and his little Immortal Guardians in check—”
Zach laughed, then nearly wept at the pain it inspired. “When have we ever kept them in check?”
Another crack of the whip.
More feathers fluttered down into the void.
Lisette. Just think of Lisette.
If he had infiltrated her dream, then he must finally be regaining strength.
Not physically. Physically he had never been weaker.
But perhaps all of those fantasies he had been weaving around the fierce female immortal had accomplished two goals: distracting him from the pain and strengthening his mental gifts.
Mind over matter.
He found a smile.
Who would’ve thought that shit actually worked?
 

 

The dream haunted Lisette for the next two weeks. She had seen no sign of Zach since, neither awake nor when ensconced in slumber.
Each night she doggedly continued to hunt and slay vampires too insane to recruit.
Honestly, she didn’t know why they weren’t just killing them all. Humans infected with the virus had no hope. They would become vampire. They would lose themselves to madness. And they would prey upon humans, killing and often ruthlessly torturing them. Melanie had found no cure for the virus. Nor had she and the other researchers at the network found a treatment that would prevent or reverse the progressive brain damage the virus caused in humans.
Wasn’t simply killing them the kindest thing immortals could do? Spare them those painful moments of realizing they had suffered a psychotic break and done something unspeakable? Spare them that slow descent into insanity? Spare them those last few lucid moments when they knew they were losing everything they once had been and were becoming monsters?
Yet, Seth had ordered them to continue to keep an eye out for vampires who weren’t too far gone.
Lisette sighed. At least she didn’t have to converse with the vamps the way other Immortal Guardians did. She could hear every depraved thought in the vampires’ heads. Which also made it easier to kill them.
Every damned night without fail.
Then, as dawn approached, she would return home and seek her bed with an eagerness that disgusted her, hoping she would once more encounter Zach in Morpheus’s realm.
Why was she so obsessed with the mysterious elder?
Why were he and Seth at odds?
Hell, if Bastien—who had thought himself vampire, loathed the Immortal Guardians for two hundred years, and pitted a vampire army against them—could turn around and join the Immortal Guardians, what the hell held Zach back? What bad blood existed between him and Seth? And how bad was it?
Lisette trusted Seth implicitly. Always had. So why should she doubt his judgment now? Because Zach had saved her life?
Well, that had been pretty big. The mercenaries who had cornered her and drugged her would have captured her and dissected her if Zach hadn’t killed them. He could have just let her fall. Why save her instead if he were such a bad guy?
She released a sigh full of frustration.
And why could she not stop thinking about him? Had she not learned her lesson? Had she not already suffered at the hands of a so-called bad boy? She was immortal today because she had fallen in love with a man who had skated the edge. A rake. A reprobate. A charming, yet evil scoundrel who had nearly killed her by trying to turn her against her will.
How stupid would she be to make the same damned mistake twice?
“You look pissed,” Tracy commented.
Lisette tried to erase her frown as she took the weapons her Second offered and prepared for the night’s hunt. “I haven’t been sleeping well.”
A moment of silence passed.
“Do you want me to stay at David’s for a couple of days?” Tracy asked.
Lisette smiled. “No. It isn’t you. Or your dreams. It’s . . .” She shook her head. If she told Tracy she was pining for a man who appeared to be Seth’s enemy, Tracy would be unable to keep the knowledge from Étienne, David, and Seth should they read her thoughts. “It’s nothing.”
“Bullshit. You’ve been restless and moody for weeks. Months, actually.”
Lisette hadn’t realized Tracy was that attuned to her.
“Is it time to move on?” her Second asked.
“Move on?”
“Ask Seth for a transfer? Things have quieted down around here. I don’t think he’d refuse, if you told him you were homesick and wanted to spend some time in France or that you needed a change and wanted to go . . . I don’t know . . . anywhere but here.”