Anna didn’t know what the odd sensations meant, but she didn’t for a moment believe they could be good.
Clenching her hands so tightly that her nails dug holes into her palm, Anna turned her head to regard Styx with a wide gaze.
“He’s stopped moving.”
In the shadows of the car, the King of Vampires looked like some avenging god, all hard planes and coiled power. He was death, just waiting for the opportunity to deliver his gift. And in the back the golden-haired giant wasn’t any more comforting. Jagr might possess the sort of savage beauty that would make any woman’s heart leap in excitement, but there was no mistaking that frigid violence that crackled around him. He was a time bomb about to explode, and Anna didn’t want to be anywhere near when it happened.
If she hadn’t been terrified out of her mind for Cezar, she would never have been alone in a car with these two lethal demons.
“Good,” Styx growled, the tiny medallions in his braided hair catching the moonlight as he shot her a dark glance. “How is he?”
“I don’t know.” Anna wrapped her arms around her chilled body, hating the aching void that filled her heart. “He’s in pain, but he’s distant from me again. As if there’s some sort of shield around him.”
Styx reached out to give her arm a brief pat. “He’s protecting himself, Anna. A vampire has the ability to pull deep inside his own body. It will not only help him battle the pain, but it will convince others that he is not a threat.”
“So he’s…playing possum?” she demanded as she struggled to understand.
A grim smile touched Styx’s lips. “Something like that.”
Anna rubbed the goose bumps that prickled her arms. It was a relief to know that the muffled sensation wasn’t a sign that Cezar was on the brink of death, or that another creature was capable of severing their bond.
Still, it was unnerving as hell.
“I wish he wouldn’t,” she muttered. “I need to feel him.”
“We will get him back, Anna, that much I can promise you.”
She sucked in a deep breath, sensing they were getting closer to Cezar with every passing mile.
“I still don’t understand why Troy would kidnap Cezar. It makes no sense.”
“It makes perfect sense,” Jagr said from the backseat, his voice a low rumble.
Turning her head, Anna regarded the dangerous vampire with a hint of puzzlement. “Why?”
His smile was no more than the baring of his huge fangs. “So long as Morgana holds the vampire captive she knows that none of you will risk his life, not even to save your own. She can lure you to her lair and kill you at her leisure.”
Anna’s breath caught in her throat. Oh…God. Of course Morgana would hide behind Cezar like the coward she was. Somehow she knew that Anna would offer her life to save the man she loved.
“Jagr,” Styx rasped in warning.
The large vampire shrugged. “It is what I would do.”
“You really need to work on those social skills of yours, brother,” Styx muttered.
Jagr’s expression hardened with fury. “I am not your brother.”
Sensing that an ass-kicking was stirring, Anna hastily cleared her throat.
“No, Styx. I would rather know the truth.” She touched Styx’s hard arm, grimacing at the ripple of muscles that warned he was itching to hit something. Hard. “Do you think that’s Morgana’s plan?”
“Yes,” he grudgingly agreed.
“So what do we do?”
“Obviously we walk straight into the trap,” Jagr muttered.
There was a low growl as Styx’s power filled the air, sending odd prickles over Anna’s skin and making Jagr hiss in pain. Clearly whatever Styx was sending through the air was specifically directed toward a fellow vampire.
“Jagr, when I want your input I’ll ask for it. Are we clear?”
Anna held her breath as a tense silence filled the Hummer, the sense of violence so tangible in the air she could almost taste it.
Oh…shit.
Preparing to slide off the seat and hide beneath the dashboard, Anna was spared such indignity when Jagr gave a low grunt, and with obvious anger forced himself to speak.
“Yes, my lord.”
The prickling sensations ceased, and Anna managed to suck in a deep breath. Holy…crap. That was waaaay too close for comfort.
Casting Styx a wary glance, Anna blinked at the man’s smooth, aloof expression. There wasn’t the faintest hint he’d been on the verge of committing murder.
“So,” she said, more to break the uneasy silence than the need to speak, “do we have a plan?”
“We get Cezar, kill Morgana, and get the hell back to Chicago,” Styx retorted, his voice clipped.
Anna grimaced. Not much of a plan.
“Okay.”
Without warning the golden gaze swung in her direction, the hard features softening with a flare of compassion.
“Anna, if you’d rather wait in the car no one would think less of you.”
Her mouth fell open at the mere suggestion that she would cower in the car when Cezar was in danger.
“No way,” she barked, her eyes narrowing as Styx’s lips parted. “No, Styx. Cezar’s in trouble because of me. Besides, it’s my duty to face Morgana. I’m the one in the prophecy. No one else can hurt her.”
Styx’s expression hardened. “You do know that Cezar will kill me if something happens to you?”
She might be all kinds of stupid, but she didn’t even flinch beneath the hard glare.
“I might be Cezar’s mate, but I still make my own decisions,” she warned.
The vampire gave a short, humorless laugh. “That sounds remarkably familiar.”
Anna’s lips twitched at his reference to Darcy, but before she could respond she felt a tug deep inside her.
“Slow down,” she commanded, pressing her hand to the window, as if it would help her connect to Cezar. “Take the next exit and turn right.”
Without question Styx followed her directions, slowing the car as she shut her eyes and concentrated on the muffled sense of her mate.
Styx slowed the car as they traveled farther from the highway and deeper into the isolated farmlands. Three more times they turned onto progressively smaller, less traveled roads until the way became nothing more than two ruts between fields.
“He’s close,” she whispered softly.
Without warning, the car came to a halt and Styx reached out to touch her arm.
“Anna?”
Keeping her eyes closed as she clung to that fragile sense of Cezar, Anna heaved an impatient sigh. Dammit, she couldn’t bear anymore delays.
“What?”
“Anna, look at me,” he commanded, his voice sharp enough that her eyes snapped open to meet his fierce, compelling gaze.
“Why have you stopped?” she demanded. “Cezar is…”
“Cezar is in danger, yes I know,” he interrupted. “But Morgana is not his only risk at the moment.”
Anna frowned, really not in the mood to consider yet another horror that might be lurking in the shadows.
A demented aunt with a God complex seemed like quite enough.
“I don’t understand.”
Styx’s remote expression gave nothing away. “That is the problem. You are not a vampire.”
Her raw nerves flared at his words. That was why he’d stopped? To point out that she wasn’t a demon?
“That’s hardly a news flash, Styx. Do you have a point?”
The gold eyes narrowed. “You are not a vampire, so you do not fully understand what it means to be mated.”
“Styx, can’t this wait until after we’ve rescued Cezar?”
“No, because I sense your desperation.”
“She reeks of it,” Jagr muttered from the backseat.
Anna shook her head in frustration, a hint of her power leaking out to swirl through the car, heating the air and stirring her hair. What the hell was going on?
“Would you rather I didn’t give a damn what happens to him?” she rasped.
“It would be easier in some ways.”
Anna sucked in a deep breath, struggling to control her straining powers. Was Styx trying to piss her off so she would be ready to explode once she was near Morgana?
If he was, it was working like a charm.
“Styx, just tell me why you’re wasting precious time.”
There was a brief pause, as if Styx were carefully considering his words.
“Cezar has taken you for his mate,” he at last said. “If you die, he dies.”
Anna froze in shock. “You mean…he’ll actually die?”
“Not immediately. But yes.” He gave a stiff dip of his head. “You have become his reason for living, Anna. Without you, he will lose any instinct to protect himself. In fact, he will seek out danger in the hopes that he will find an end to his suffering. Vampires rarely survive more than a few months after the death of their mate.”
A cold chill clutched at her heart. Shit. Somehow Cezar failed to mention that little tidbit of info when he was telling her about the whole mate business.