Hunted_The Guardians' League Book One Read online

  Hunted

  Guardian's League 1

  By

  Amelia Elias

  * * *

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Epilogue

  * * *

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Samhain Publishing, Ltd.

  2932 Ross Clark Circle, #384

  Dothan, AL 36301

  Hunted

  Copyright © 2006 by Amelia Elias

  Cover by Scott Carpenter

  ISBN: 1-59998-034-7

  www.samhainpublishing.com

  First Samhain Publishing, Ltd. electronic publication: June 2006

  Hunted

  Amelia Elias

  * * *

  Dedication

  To Kim, who loved Diego at first sight and never let me give up on him.

  * * *

  Prologue

  The blue sedan looked almost black in the golden light of the sunset, but Sian was certain it was the same car that had been tailing her for the last half hour.

  It was a nightmare she’d become all too familiar with over the last three years.

  Sian shifted gears and accelerated around the corner, darting into an almost nonexistent space between a semi and a tour bus and hoping to disappear before the sedan caught up with her. After this her pursuer would know she’d spotted him, but there was no help for it. There was no way in hell she’d lead him any closer to her home.

  “Come on, Baby,” she murmured to the engine. “Give me a little more!”

  Baby was up for the challenge. Sian blessed the ever-present California traffic for the cover it provided and ignored the blasting horns as she wove recklessly through tiny gaps between cars, flooring it and racing up the first onramp she found. Not for the first time, Sian was grateful she hadn’t resisted the urge to buy the Mini Cooper. Baby had cost more than she could reasonably afford to spend but it had been love at first sight. She hadn’t regretted it. The little car’s insane acceleration and maneuverability more than made up for the cost.

  Sian stayed on the highway only until the next exit. After whipping through the turn-around, she sped back the way she’d come from before turning off the access road. She kept a wary eye on the rearview mirror as she tried to lose the sedan in the maze of downtown San Francisco. Her little trick would have fooled most drivers but she didn’t dare relax. These people were professionals.

  Professional hunters, professional trackers. Professional killers.

  The sun slipped below the horizon as the light bled from the sky. The fading daylight made it difficult to be certain, but after fifteen more minutes of aimless driving passed without sign of the sedan, Sian breathed a sigh of relief. Her intuition told her she’d lost them. She wished she’d been able to get the license plate but hadn’t dared let the car get close enough to her for it to be visible.

  No matter. She shivered. She was certain it would be back.

  Her heart sank even as her mind raced, cataloging all the things she had to do to get ready to run again. She always kept a getaway bag packed under the bed so she didn’t need to worry about clothes. Her only personal keepsakes, a photograph of her parents and her mother’s wedding rings, were right on the bedside table—no problem there, she’d just stuff them into her purse on the way out.

  Her gun was always on her.

  Nothing else in her little apartment meant anything to her but Sian still seethed with impotent rage at being forced to leave it. She’d been in San Francisco six months, long enough to get to know her neighbors as more than potential allies or threats, long enough to befriend the homeless cat always hanging around her door, long enough to fall in love with her little flat, which cost more than a three thousand square foot house would have back home in Savannah. Those six months had felt like a lifetime, an eternity of safety after the hell of the two and a half years before it.

  She couldn’t even remember how many times the Witness Protection Program had moved her around before she’d struck out on her own. No matter where they sent her, she’d always been found. It hadn’t taken her long to suspect someone was leaking her whereabouts but she’d never been able to get the agents in charge of her case to take her suspicions seriously.

  “You must’ve told someone,” they’d said. “You must have slipped up, Ms. Lazuro.” It was always Ms., never Officer, and it never failed to make her grind her teeth. “It happens. You need to be more careful.” According to them, the Witness Protection Program was infallible. It had to have been Sian, who had the most to lose, who’d screwed up.

  Apparently this time she had. The Witness Protection Program was a thing of the past and she’d come to San Francisco on her own, telling no one where she was headed and changing everything she could on the way—her hair, her clothes, her car and her name. She’d thought she’d lost them at last.

  Clearly, she’d been wrong.

  Her enemy had found her yet again. Deep inside she’d been expecting it for a while now, the slightest sense of something wrong growing closer day by day. She’d learned to trust her instincts from the cradle and they’d never let her down during her years as a cop.

  And right now those instincts were screaming at her that danger was here. The life she’d created was dead and if she didn’t want to join it in the grave she’d better hurry. It was a warning Sian had every intention of obeying.

  She’d just switched lanes to cut through an alley, intending to take a shortcut home, when someone sprinted out of the shadows right in front of her. A massive figure was in hot pursuit and as the first man disappeared between the buildings his pursuer whirled around to freeze in the beam of her headlights.

  Sian screamed and jerked the wheel out of reflex, catching only the briefest impression of a man with demonic cat-like eyes and teeth too sharp and long to possibly be human before Baby collided with him. The sickening thud of the impact filled her ears as she lost control. When the little car spun out, Sian’s head whipped to the side and shattered her window.

  And the world vanished into blackness.

  * * *

  Chapter One

  Some nights, being one of the good guys just sucked.

  Diego groaned as he picked himself up off the pavement, one arm wrapped around his screaming ribs. He flexed his jaw experimentally to see if it was broken. The instant explosion of pain confirmed that it was. He felt warmth on the side of his neck and traced it back to its source with his free hand. Blood oozed steadily from his ear and he bit back another groan as a fresh wave of pain crashed over him. Damn, that little car had flattened him but good.

  If he’d been human, he was positive he’d still be lying on the pavement and not going anywhere soon. At least the Outcast had fled before he’d been run down or he’d be in a world of trouble right now.

  The car had spun to a stop a few yards inside the little alley but gawkers already gathered. They couldn’t see Diego—remaining unseen in a crowd during a crisis was an extremely useful t
rick he’d learned centuries ago—and were no doubt wondering what had caused the car to spin out of control. He watched for a moment, expecting the door to fly open and the driver to emerge, wild-eyed and shaken.

  No one got out of the car.

  “Look at the blood,” one of the onlookers murmured with a sick sort of fascination. “Can you see in? Is she dead?”

  He stepped gingerly over to the car, hissing in a sharp breath when the movement jarred his almost certainly fractured ribs. Blood was exactly what he needed, but even more importantly, he needed to see how badly injured the driver was. The last thing he’d intended was to cause a mortal pain tonight.

  “Shoo,” he grunted to the gathering crowd, infusing his voice with a compulsion they couldn’t resist. “Go away and don’t come back.” They went and he opened the driver’s side door, wincing again at the red smear that streaked the starred window.

  The driver slumped over the steering wheel, blonde hair obscuring her face, a dark stain over her left temple. So much for his good intentions. He ignored the call of her blood and gathered his strength to heal her. He reached for her wrist and slipped her watch off to press his fingers to her pulse—present and steady. Good. Diego closed his eyes and sent his senses searching through her.

  He swore when he found the skull fracture. Not good.

  There would be no quick roadside healing. Diego reached across the woman’s limp body and unfastened her seatbelt before lifting her carefully from the seat. The protests of his ribs rose into a symphony of agony. He clenched his jaw and bore it. Casting the cloak of darkness around her, too, Diego stepped back into the relative privacy of the alley before taking to the skies with the unfortunate woman nestled securely in his arms.

  He sincerely hoped his Steward had restocked the emergency fridge recently because Diego was in no condition to hunt and the scent of blood rising from the woman’s injury was more than tempting to a hungry vampire. His body ached for the life-giving liquid to heal his own wounds and he would be expending even more energy when he healed hers.

  He could do nothing else. Hunting the Outcasts, vampires who killed their prey, was only part of his ancient vow to keep mortals safe. It didn’t matter if this woman had been driving like a lunatic when he’d startled her. All that mattered was he’d caused this injury, however inadvertently, and now he would put it right.

  By the time he landed on his lawn, Diego was in agony. “James!” he shouted, kicking the front door open and leaning against the wall, still holding the unconscious woman in his arms.

  He heard the Steward pounding down the stairs a moment before he skidded to a stop in the entryway.

  “God, Diego, what happened to you?” James demanded, recovering from his shock and rushing to him.

  “Take her,” Diego growled through his teeth, ignoring the question. He knew his fangs were showing but he hurt too much to care.

  “You’re in no condition to be bringing women home,” James said as he took her from Diego’s arms. Diego took a shallow breath and let it slowly out in relief when she was no longer pressing against his fractured ribs. One of the drawbacks of being a vampire was his heightened sensitivity. He felt everything much more intensely than a mortal, and these were wounds that would’ve rendered any mortal he knew unconscious from the pain.

  But he couldn’t give in to weakness yet. “Take her upstairs,” he told James, pushing himself off the wall and squaring his shoulders. “She needs healing.”

  “You need healing,” James countered, not moving. “What happened to you, Diego?”

  Diego glared at him. James didn’t seem to get the subservient part of his role at all sometimes. “It hasn’t been the best night,” he said, shrugging off his leather jacket with a groan and letting it drop to the floor. “Long story short, our guest here just ran me down with her car. Get her upstairs where I can take care of her and then you can fuss like an old woman, all right? After you go retrieve her car, that is.”

  “You really want me to bring home the instrument of your destruction?”

  Diego barely managed not to growl. “No, but she might want it back when she leaves and I’m sure she’d rather it not be stripped to the frame when she gets it. Now will you please take her upstairs so I can heal her and get her out of here?”

  James gave him a concerned look before turning to do as he asked. Diego kicked his boots off and left them lying beside the discarded jacket before following slowly.

  James met him on the second floor landing. “I put her in your room,” he said, still looking at Diego in concern. “You won’t have to go far to collapse when you’re done with her.”

  Diego nodded and started to move past him, but James stopped him. “"You need blood,” he said bluntly, forcing Diego to look him in the eye. “And not the bagged crap you hate.”

  “The bagged crap will suffice.”

  James crossed his arms stubbornly. “You need the real thing, Diego.”

  Diego shook his head. “Either you’re volunteering, which you know is against the rules, or you’re offering to go drag some poor soul back here for me to feed on, which is also against the rules. Which is it?”

  James rolled his eyes. “You and your rules,” he growled. “You’d rather suffer than let me help, fine. Bagged crap coming right up.” He turned and started down the stairs, grumbling under his breath about stubborn vampires.

  Diego turned to his door and sighed. He really, truly didn’t feel up to this right now, but there wasn’t much choice. Dawn waited for no one and if he wanted James to have time to stitch him up before daybreak, he didn’t have any time to waste.

  The woman lay atop his comforter, unmoving but for the gentle rise and fall of her breath. James had wrapped a towel around her head and Diego was relieved to see no blood had soaked through it, indicating the bleeding had pretty much stopped on its own. He crossed the room and sat beside her on the mattress before taking her hand and sending his powers through her wounded body to heal her. He barely noticed James coming in with a large mug of warmed blood and drank it with hardly a thought. Her brain was bruised and swelling badly. He didn’t dare ease his concentration for a second as he worked to stop it before she was damaged permanently.

  An hour later, Diego breathed a sigh of relief and released her hand, certain she wouldn’t have any lasting effects from their collision. His tired mind spun as he used a moist washcloth to bathe her face, revealing too-pale skin no longer darkened by bruises. She’d lost a lot of blood before he’d intervened, and although he had several bags of whole blood stored, he didn’t dare try to replace it. He didn’t know her blood type and, as a vampire, the only way he knew to discover it was less than scientific. He couldn’t imagine she’d appreciate regaining consciousness to find a complete stranger sucking on her neck.

  Besides, he was hungry enough that only taking a sip might be beyond even his iron control right now. He saw the spare blood bag James had left on the bedside table and reached for it, piercing it with his fangs and drinking it down despite the shudder that worked through him at the horrible, rubbery flavor. James was right. He hated bagged blood. The Steward’s offer of his own tempted Diego for a moment before he rejected it. He’d rather choke down this nasty stuff than feed off someone under his protection.

  Diego finished the bag and turned back to his patient, examining her face as he worked to wipe the last traces of her ordeal away. She wasn’t exactly beautiful but something about her heart-shaped face and the delicate smattering of freckles across her nose and cheeks was absolutely charming. Blonde eyebrows, a shade darker than her golden hair, arched over her closed eyes. Her lashes lay thick and dark on her milky cheeks and he found himself wondering what color her eyes would be when she opened them again.

  She was lovely, and it had been far too long since he’d seen a woman in his bed.

  Diego shook his head. Those thoughts would get him exactly nowhere. He sighed again, looking down at her clothes in an effort to change the directio
n of his thoughts. Her dress was bloodstained, the vibrant coral fabric ruined. Any female he’d ever known would go into hysterics at the sight of blood covering her clothes, and the last thing he wanted to deal with was a hysterical woman. Much as he wanted to finish with her and allow James to tend his wounds, Diego had to get the bloody dress off her first.

  He rose to grab one of his shirts before rolling her onto her side and easing down the zipper. Diego did his best not to look and stripped the dress off her in as an impersonal a way as he could, but he wasn’t dead—despite the tales of folklore and legend—and there were some things beyond any red-blooded male’s power to ignore.

  Like her long, smooth throat, which drew his eyes inexorably down to what had to be two of the most gorgeous breasts lace had ever embraced. His palms itched to cup their fullness but he resisted, easing the dress down past her sweetly rounded hips. Dios, the woman had a body that could make a Victoria’s Secret model green with envy. Sweat actually broke out on his forehead as he revealed a peach garter belt that perfectly matched her bra and panties.

  His breath caught at the sight of it. He had always been a fool for a woman in garters.

  And this was another line of thought he had no business pursuing. Diego forced his eyes away from temptation only to find himself staring at a pair of legs created to evoke only one thought in any man—how to get them wrapped around his waist, as soon and as often as possible. She was very tall and those luscious legs went on and on. He flung the dress aside and took a deep, fortifying breath before reaching for the clasp of her delicious garter belt. As lovely as it was on her, it would be far too uncomfortable to sleep in, and he was doing this for her comfort.