He hadn't fed in two days. Not since just before he had picked her up that night. He couldn't do it. His stomach had been in knots since he'd left her curled up in another male's bathtub. He'd left her there, vulnerable and crying. His need was intense and clouding his thoughts. He swore he could hear her calling his name. In the back of his mind, he heard a whisper.
Help me, Chase. I'm afraid. Please, help me.
The voice brought to life the protective instinct Chase had for Danielle. He needed to feed worse than he realized if he was hearing voices.
Idly he thought, Where are you, Lovely? and was shocked up off the sofa when he got an answer in the form of a picture in his mind. It was dark, but he could see light shining under a door, illuminating the bottoms of shelves and boxes. He could hear the very same music that was playing in the club. She was there, and she was calling him! Or maybe he was actually going crazy.
Just then, Vince came in his direction from the door. Seeing the alarm on Chase's face, he scanned the floor. "What's up, man? You got trouble?"
"Have you seen Danielle? I think she is here somewhere."
Vince looked away and shook his head before returning to answer, "Well, she was here a few hours before we opened. Maybe you're just catching an old scent."
"What do you mean she was here? Why didn't you call me? Why didn't you tell me?" Chase growled right up in Vince's face. "When did she leave?"
"Vince didn't see her leave. He gave her the privacy she asked for, and when he came back downstairs, she was gone. She was sitting outside crying when Vince got here. She asked him not to call you and asked to drink in private. He provided her with Nathan and left them alone," Vince defended with his hands up in surrender. "It seemed like a good opportunity. You know we've been coming up blank on her, so I figured if I befriended her she might give some info directly."
"Nathan was her host?" Maybe he would know where she went.
"Yeah, but he left not feeling well before his shift started. Vince had to call in another guy and figured she must have gone a little overboard and left the poor guy weak. He was looking pretty drunk, eyes all dilated and unfocused." Vince smirked at the thought of Dani draining the human to exhaustion.
Chase heard it again. I need you, Chase. So weak and quiet, the voice almost wasn't audible.
"Check every square inch of this building now! She's here!" Chase shouted and took off to look for her himself.
After a thorough search, Chase started to doubt his sanity again. Vince appeared at the stairs and waved him over. Vince turned and headed back down the steps. Chase stalked down to the storage level of the building to find Vince.
Danielle was in the back, laid out on the floor with her face toward the rear door, recreating the exact image portrayed in Chase's mind. Vince tried to rouse her while Chase stood for a moment in shock. He snapped to attention and began to growl at Vince.
"I think you've done enough already; get out of my way! Go bring my car around and have Kayden meet me out front now!" Scooping the lifeless-looking beauty up onto his lap, he sat on the floor trying to get a response out of her.
"Lovely, can you hear me?" She didn't answer. He held her face by the chin and opened an eyelid with his thumb. Her pupils were entirely black, her fangs extended, and her breath was very shallow.
Chase rose to his feet in one smooth motion and carried her out the back door and around the front to avoid pushing through the crowd upstairs. He told himself over and over like a mantra, "She will be fine. She will be fine."
When he got outside, Kayden was leaning against the door of his waiting car, looking annoyed. Kayden's eyes flew open when he caught sight of Chase running at him. "Open the door and help me get in the back." Kayden obeyed, and Chase climbed in, still holding Danielle. He laid her on his lap and began to look her over more closely for injuries. "Drive to my place quickly. I don't care if you have to run every light. Can you get Doc Stevens to meet us there?"
Doc Stevens was a vampire with a medical degree, who made house calls for vampires. It wasn't as if they could go to the hospital for care. His expertise was needed if someone was severely injured, and he usually attended all the vampire births in the area. Being a doctor gave him the perfect opportunity to feed. His busy practice brought human patients to him daily.
Chase knew something was very wrong with Danielle. He tried uselessly to wake her, and her eyes were all wrong. A vampire's eye only reacted like this to extreme emotion or intense need like stress, anger, hunger, or passion. It wasn't simple drunkenness if Nathan had been able to walk out on his own motor. He'd have been dead from alcohol poisoning for her to have been laid so low.
"Doc will be there shortly. He's finishing up with a patient in the area. We really need to get this girl help. She doesn't know when to say when." Kayden shook his head in shame for the girl.
"Something is wrong with her!" Chase raged. "The person she fed from left on his own two feet after speaking to Vince. That means I'm gonna have to find him, because she didn't make it to the basement on her own." He ran his hands through her hair and whispered to her when they arrived at his building.
Chase handed Danielle over to Kayden so he could climb out of the backseat. As he emerged, he saw the last person he wanted to see sitting on a bench in the vestibule. Samantha was not going to like this, but he couldn't deal with her now. Retrieving Danielle from Kayden's arms, he took off for the elevator. "Kayden, deal with her, and then come help me."
"Aw, man!" Kayden drawled. "Give her back to me, and you deal with that nightmare."
Chase ignored this suggestion. He didn't like seeing Kayden touching his Lovely. She looked so fragile, and she smelled weird. She smelled like someone sedated. The smell of it was overwhelming her usual delicious scent.
Samantha jumped to her feet when he entered the building and asked, "Who the hell is that? Please tell me you're not killing your prey these days."
The elevator opened and Chase jumped in, hitting the penthouse button without responding or so much as looking in Samantha's direction. Again he told himself, "She's going to be fine. She's going to be fine."
Mason was taken off guard when the call had come in from Tessa. He knew something was terribly wrong. The last time he'd seen her was the day he told her of Griffin's engagement to Sarah. That had been a difficult day for both of them. Tessa had lost her mate and the father of her newborn to another female, and Mason was feeling guilt and responsibility for the separation of his best friend from his new family.
Tessa was very lucky that the baby was able to accept human breast milk. It took several frustrating tries, but once she was hungry enough, the babe sucked it down greedily. Tessa was able to care for the baby without vampire intervention.
The day Tessa gave birth to Griffin's child, the midwife broke her vow of silence and reported it to his parents. Lloyd and Adele Vaughn were the heads of the House of Vaughn, and her information was very valuable. A human would not be tolerated. Mason knew Griffin would be followed when he returned after meeting with his parents. His mother wanted him to bring her the child and to get rid of the mother. If Griffin wouldn't do it, they would wait until he left her again and take care of the situation themselves. So Mason hid her and the baby without Griffin's knowledge. Tessa and the newborn were already long gone when Griffin returned to his condo to retrieve them after the confrontation with his parents. Griffin searched high and low for his mate and the baby, using every resource at his disposal without tipping off his parents. Unfortunately his parents were also hunting for them. At that point it seemed to Mason that the bond between Griffin and Tessa had to be weaker than Griffin wanted to admit. If they'd had a true vampire blood bond, Griffin would have been able to feel her presence clearly. He would have known for sure that Tessa was safe, but Griffin lost hope with every day that passed.
Mason had planted fake medical records to make them believe neither mother nor child had survived. Mason had felt like the worst friend ever for not reassuring Griffin that his family was under Mason's protection, but he couldn't risk their lives. Mason had to wait for the records to be discovered before he could take Griffin to their hiding place. If he told Griffin they were safe before that, it would all be for nothing. He would rush to Tessa's side and give them away.
The information was found within a couple months, but his family had waited another month to tell Griffin. Mason was afraid they hadn't taken the bait and were still searching, so he waited for Griffin to come to him with the sad news of their deaths. That had been Mason's mistake. He believed his best friend would call him immediately in need of comfort, but Griffin didn't call Mason until days after he had proposed to Sarah. Then they were in a pickle. Griffin was already bonded to Tessa. Mason thought Griffin was insane for bonding with a human, but his love for Tessa was plain to see. Mason had wondered if it would work like a normal bonding for that reason, and it did work, but as far as he could tell the bond was weaker than a true vampire bonding …