“I’m sorry,” her mother murmured. “So sorry.” And then she, too, turned away.
Tears ran down Kaitlyn’s cheeks as one by one, her aunts and uncles disowned her for loving Zack.
Zack, who stood at the far end of the tunnel, his dark gray eyes filled with pain and sorrow.
All she had to do was deny her love for him and she could go back to her own people. They would forgive her. They would welcome her with open arms.
She paused, torn by conflicting emotions. She loved her parents, but she was a grown woman now. She had a right to love anyone she wished. Didn’t she?
“Katy. Katy, come to me.” Zack’s voice, filled with grief.
How could she deny him?
“Katy . . . Katy.” The agony in his voice tore at her heart.
He needed her.
How was she to decide between her parents and the man she loved? It wasn’t fair. But Zack needed her. She could hear it in his voice.
“Ka-ty . . .” His voice, weaker now, threaded with pain. “Katy!”
She bolted upright in bed, the sound of his voice ringing in her ears. “Zack, where are you?” She glanced around the room. She hadn’t imagined his voice, or the underlying agony.
Throwing back the covers, she hurried out of her bedroom and into the hallway. She paused there, listening. And then she heard it again, Zack’s voice, echoing in the back of her mind. He was in pain. He needed her.
She glanced up and down the hallway, then shook her head. He couldn’t be here.
Katy.
She turned toward the sound of his voice, followed it down the corridor to the small door that led up to the ballroom, then stopped. This was ridiculous. What would he be doing in the ballroom, of all places?
She opened the door and peered into the darkness, her feet climbing the stairs seemingly of their own volition. Up, up, up, until she came to the ballroom.
She tiptoed inside, and looked around, then moved toward the windows on the far wall. She had never been up here this early in the morning. The scene before her was breathtaking. A few scattered clouds hung low, drifting puffs of white against the lightening sky. The rising sun painted broad strokes of ochre and crimson across the horizon and splashed the clouds with glowing shades of pink.
Katy.
She turned away from the window as his voice sounded in her mind once again. “Where are you?” she cried in exasperation.
This was the highest room in the Fortress. If he wasn’t here . . . Turning on her heel, she ran out of the ballroom and hurried up the short flight of stairs that ended on a small landing. She had never been in the room beyond. Her father had warned her to keep out, saying that the tower was in ruins, the walls crumbling, the floor unsafe.
She stared at the squat door. There was no latch. Placing her hand on the wood, she pushed, but nothing happened.
“Zack?” She pressed her ear to the door. “Are you in there?”
“Katy.” Her name was a sigh on his lips.
A well-placed kick broke the barrier between them. Scrambling over the broken bits of wood, she stared at Zack, momentarily too stunned by what she saw to speak.
With a groan, he shifted his weight. The sound spurred her to action and she hurried toward him. “Are you all right?” She dropped down on her knees beside him.
It had been a foolish question. His neck was raw and blistered from the thick silver chain around it. His ankles, too.
“Who did this to you?” she demanded.
“Your father.”
Kaitlyn shook her head, unwilling to believe that her father, the man she had idolized all her life, was capable of such wanton cruelty. “Why? Why would he do this?”
“I’m the enemy.”
“You’re not my enemy,” she said, biting back her anger. She glanced at the patch of blue visible through the hole in the roof. When the sun was overhead . . . She refused to think of what would happen then. Instead, she grabbed hold of the chain that bound his ankle and pulled with all her might.
Nothing happened.
She tried again, frowning as the silver grew warm in her hands, and then began to burn. Silver had never burned her before.
Ignoring the pain, she tugged on the chain again and yet again, but to no avail.
“Katy, stop,” Zack said. “Your hands . . .”
“I don’t care. I have to get you out of here.”
“Stop.” He took her hands in his. Her palms were red and blistering. “I think your father has infused some vampire mojo in the silver.”
With a sigh, Kaitlyn sat beside him, her legs stretched out in front of her, her thigh brushing his. “I’m so sorry,” she murmured. “I didn’t think he’d do anything like this. What will happen when the sun is overhead? Will you . . . ?”
“Burst into flame? No. Only the dead do that.”
“But it will burn you, won’t it?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll go get some towels and blankets to cover you with. And an umbrella, if I can find one. And something to drink . . .”
“A negative, if you’ve got it,” he said with a tight smile.
“This is no time for jokes.”
He caught her by the hand. “Stay, Katy.”
“But . . .”
“Just for a little while.”
She sank back down beside him, her gaze searching his face. “Do you need to feed?”
“Are you offering?”
She nodded.
Zack swore softly. It was one thing to take a taste while they were snuggling together, another to feed off of her, as if she was no more than prey. And yet, he could feel the heat of the rising sun, knew it would leech his strength as it seared his flesh.
Kaitlyn brushed the hair away from her neck and tilted her head to the side. “You need it, Zack. Just do it.”
He slid his arm around her shoulders and kissed her, his lips moving over hers, trailing kisses over her cheek, down the side of her neck, back up to the soft tender place beneath her ear. He didn’t want to feed off her, but the change in her breathing, the sudden thundering of her heartbeat, wiped away all thought of resisting. She moaned softly as his fangs pierced her flesh, not a sound of pain, but of pleasure.
Her blood was warm and sweet and it took every ounce of willpower he possessed to pull back. To let her go.
She smiled at him.
“Katy. Dammit . . .”
She pressed her fingertips to his lips. “Don’t.”
“It isn’t right.”
“Stop it. If I needed blood, you’d give me yours, wouldn’t you?”