The Vampire's Betrayal

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Authors: Raven Hart
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through the foyer to the door, all the while offering to travel through the underground tunnels to ensure she made it safely to her apartment. She demurred, but their voices lowered as they continued their good-byes.
    Melaphia grasped my arm. “What are we going to do?”
    “You’re going to go upstairs and go to bed, and Jack and I are going to take our rest as well.”
    “But—”
    “There’s nothing we can do at the moment. I’ll have a serious talk with Jack first thing tomorrow. We’ll both need all of our strength for that.”
    I heard Jack close the front door behind Connie. Melaphia nodded and hugged Jack as they passed each other in the doorway between the kitchen and the foyer. I heard her footsteps on the stairs up to the bedrooms.
    Jack leaned against the doorjamb and regarded me warily. “Mel told you about Connie.” It was a statement rather than a question.
    “Of course. This is a grave situation, Jack.”
    “Look, she doesn’t even know she’s this slayer.”
    “She will.”
    “How? Who’s going to tell her?”
    Jack’s defiant attitude was already playing on my nerves. “We’re both weary. Let us discuss this when we’ve had a chance to get our rest.”
    “We’ll discuss it now. Who’s to say she’ll ever find out? I mean, whose job is it to tell her, anyway?”
    “I don’t know,” I admitted. “Melaphia is going to do additional research.”
    “She’s going to have to look it up? How much do you know about slayers?”
    “To be perfectly frank, not a great deal. However, I did get some information about them while I was in Europe.”
    “What information?”
    “There seems to be a feeling among the European vampires that a prophesied slayer is or soon could be among us. If she’s not already.”
    Jack ran a hand through his hair in a gesture of nervousness I’d seen a thousand times. “A feeling?”
    “The old ones can…sense certain events, as you know. Olivia, like Melaphia, is attempting to learn everything she can. Until they know more, you must keep a close eye on Connie.”
    Olivia was my second in command in Europe. She had recently uncovered a cache of documents she hoped would shed light on the history of the blood drinkers.
    “Why? What am I looking for?”
    I could tell that Jack was deep in denial, something he would have to snap out of quickly if he was to survive. “You’re looking for any sign that your girlfriend wants to kill you.”
    Jack
    “If she comes at me with the pointy end of anything, you’ll be the first to know,” I assured William.
    “Don’t be glib. This is serious.”
    William gave me one of his stern looks, the kind meant to scare me. And I was scared all right. I went the extra mile to block my thoughts so he wouldn’t know the secret I was keeping from him right then. If he knew that Connie’s learning that she was the Slayer was as simple as her memory coming back, there was no telling what he would do.
    “Yeah, I know it’s serious,” I said, and suddenly remembered another serious subject. “Hey! I saw Eleanor in the underworld. She attacked me and said you killed her. What the hell happened?” At the mention of Eleanor’s name William looked so sorrowful I was sorry I’d brought her up.
    “I was forced to destroy her. She lied to me about her role in Renee’s kidnapping.”
    Big mistake on her part. You did not ever lie to a master vampire, especially the one who made you. The lie of omission I just told—or rather, didn’t tell—was only made possible by the control I’d honed through years and years of blocking out William’s ability to read my mind. As a fledgling, Eleanor wouldn’t have had the power to do that, at least not for very long. “Eleanor was the one who led Diana and Hugo to Renee?”
    “For the purity and mystical qualities of the child’s blood, yes. I could not allow Eleanor to live after that.”
    “William, I’m sorry. Really I am. I know that you made El to be your mate for the long

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