Blood Ties Bundle: Blood Ties Book One: The Turning / Blood Ties Book Two: Possession / Blood Ties Book Three: Ashes to Ashes / Blood Ties Book Four: All Souls' Night. Jennifer Armintrout

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ found was another dead end. Cyrus would rule me as surely as the Movement would, and that wasn’t something I could accept. My whole life, I’d been ruled by one thing or another. First, my father, who’d been so busy planning my future career, I’d wondered how he’d found time for his own.

      “You’re my job, Carrie. It’s my duty to see you do well in life.”

      How disappointed he’d be in me now. But then, I’d been just as bad as him, pushing aside adolescent dreams of romance for study and determination, until medicine consumed my life and any relationship that wasn’t a calculated career move seemed like a waste of time. I’d let so many trivial things get in the way of my own happiness that I couldn’t remember what the things that might have made me happy were anymore.

      My body grew numb as I walked back to Nathan’s apartment. I hadn’t left a note, but I’m sure the hastily riffled-through faxes would give him a hint as to where I’d been. Tension coiled like electricity in the air as I crossed the street. The windows of the apartment were dark, but the shop’s easel sign was on the sidewalk. I steeled myself against the unavoidable stench of incense and headed down the stairs to the bookshop.

      There was no need for the precaution. The air was clear and no peaceful music soothed me as I entered the room and leaned against the counter. I heard muffled cursing, followed by the distinctive thud of books hitting the floor.

      “Need some help?” I called.

      Swearing followed a startling bang. Nathan emerged from the shelves, one hand pressed against the top of his head.

      “You’re back,” he said flatly, wincing as he ran his fingers through his hair.

      “Sorry. I had some stuff I needed to do.” I couldn’t tell him, I decided. If he asked, I wouldn’t lie, but it would be suicide to volunteer the information.

      He didn’t say anything. He went behind the shelves again and continued doing whatever I had interrupted.

      I followed him. He slammed the books into their places on the shelf and walked past me to the other end of the shop, where he fussed with a display of tarot cards that didn’t look as though it needed rearranging.

      “So, are you going to talk to me or what?” I asked quietly as he fanned out an open deck as if they were a row of magazines on a coffee table.

      “I’m sorry. I’m being rude. How was your evening? Did you have a nice time with your sire while I rummaged through your burning apartment?” The sarcasm in his voice was like a slap in the face.

      My temper rose. “You went to that apartment all by yourself. I didn’t ask you to go. All you wanted was your precious book!”

      “This isn’t about the fucking book!” He slammed his fists on the table. A sealed deck of cards bounced onto the floor. “How long did you wait before you went snooping through my stuff to find his address? Did you give any thought to what you were going to do? No! After everything I told you, after what you lived through at his hands, you went after him unprotected. He could have killed you!”

      “But he didn’t. I can handle myself,” I said.

      “You don’t know what he’s like!” Nathan yelled as he put a display of candles in order.

      I hoped he broke every damned one of them. “And you do?”

      “Yes!” He turned to face me, a handful of orange candles still in his hand. “He’s capable of things you can’t imagine. Things you wouldn’t want to know.”

      “He’s a killer. It’s in our blood to be killers. It says so in your freaking vampire bible!”

      “Is it in our blood to torture? To maim? Is it in his blood to prey on the weak and exploit kids like Ziggy? Because I’ve got the same blood in my veins that he does, and I’ve never had the urge to rape and murder a sixteen-year-old girl!”

      I couldn’t believe my ears. Cyrus was definitely evil. In the short time I’d known him I’d heard him refer to humans as pets and seen him casually feast on a corpse as though it were a fine cut of beef. But I knew myself, and I would never have been so attracted to someone capable of such a heinous act. “He couldn’t have done that.”

      “Are you so sure? Because it was on the last order. I’ve got a newspaper clipping about her disappearance upstairs. He was awfully proud of her. Apparently, the fun for him is in killing the girls as he’s violating them. He likes to watch them die while he’s inside them.”

      Nathan’s description of the obscene act made my stomach churn. I covered my mouth with my hand. “I don’t want to hear any more.”

      “No, you want to experience it for yourself.” He exhaled noisily. “But you go ahead and do what you want.”

      “That’s not what I want.”

      “Hey, I really don’t care. Apparently, nothing I say is going to matter.” He went back to his candles.

      His calm fed my growing anger. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

      “It means no matter what I say, you’re going to do what you damn well please.”

      “Why shouldn’t I?” I shuffled the artfully arranged cards into a single pile on the tabletop. “The only words out of your mouth are ‘don’t do that, Carrie,’ and ‘it’s dangerous, Carrie’ and ‘I’ll kill you, Carrie,’ but you never tell me why!”

      “I dispense information on a need-to-know basis!”

      “You sound like my goddamned father!” I shouted, stamping my foot.

      Nathan made an exasperated sound and threw his hands up in the air. “What the hell are you talking about?”

      “If I ask questions, you get all evasive. You don’t want to share anything about your life, but you seem to want me to just blindly trust that you know what’s best for me.” I pointed at him. “How do I know you’re not just as dangerous as Cyrus?”

      He stepped so close to me that our shoes touched. “Oh, believe me, I’m the most dangerous thing in this room right now.”

      “Oh, yeah?”

      “Yeah, and you’re about to see just how dangerous.”

      I tilted my head so I could look him in the eye. “Is that a threat?”

      “You tell me.” His breath was cold on my face.

      We glared at each other in silence, tension dancing between us like a ballerina with a broken leg. I don’t think I’d ever been more infuriated.

      He turned away, but neither of us had spent our anger. This was merely the eye of the storm.

      He faced me again, his arms folded across his chest. “Fine. Prove to me you can take care of yourself.”

      I hesitated. “What?”

      “Attack me.”

      “You’re not serious.” I laughed.

      “The СКАЧАТЬ