He rips the arm off one and uses it to slap another with a gleeful chuckle. Seeing him in his element is kind of disturbing. There’s no doubt he’s a machine, though, and swiftly kicks the legs out from a vampire trying to sneak up behind him.
I grab the vamp once they’re down and, with a hefty throw, knock down a small group like bowling pins with the body. It won’t kill them, but it’s enough to disorient them while we handle those closing in on us.
Too many.
There’s too fucking many, I think to myself. They just keep coming. Appearing from seemingly nowhere. The worst part is I can’t smell them. At least I can hear them, but having that one sense stolen from me is debilitating.
I dispatch one vampire, only to have another wrap its arm around me and pull me backward. Trying to shake him off, I attempt to bite at any piece of skin I can, but it’s fruitless.
My eyes widen in horror as I pull at his arm, trying to yank him off me. I might be stronger, but another vampire grabs ahold of me, and then yet another, and finally one more, until four vampires are carrying me—one holding eachlimb. I shudder and feel a foggy cloud of fear flood my mind at the familiar memory of being held down.
A shrill scream rips through the air. The scream of mymate.
I fight against their hold with everything I have, a new wave of panic overpowering the trauma that has started to bleed through.
Ava.
I have to get back to Ava.
She needs me.
“Ava!” I roar.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Zavier in a similar position, held against the wall by multiple vampires. He rages and growls, but it makes no difference.
A sudden blinding bright light and heat bursts forth, and I fall to the ground, dropped by the vampires holding me.
The light is so bright that I have to roll to my stomach and cover my face with my hands. Even then, the light still manages to leak into my closed lids. The heat gets impossibly warmer, and I grit my teeth against it. My skin prickles with discomfort.
Just as suddenly as it came, it ends, and the space is bathed in near darkness once more.
Silence greets me and I roll over, slowly opening my eyes. A few sparks of white dance across my vision, but I blink them away.
Gasping, I take in the scene around me. Zavier lies slumped against one wall, looking around, stunned. Celine has been blown against the opposite wall, completely knocked out. Her arm sits at an odd angle. Once Zav realizes, he shouts her name in agony and rushes over to her.
“Ava?” I voice, crawling toward my own mate. She lies in the center of the blast, the space around her entirely clear.
It dawns on me then to check the other vampires—if they’reall knocked out, they should be easy enough for me to dispose of.
But all I find in their places is …ashes.
My eyes slide back to my mate and widen.
Did she…?
I pull her into my arms and listen for a pulse. It’s faint but there.
“What the fuck just happened?” Zavier asks, sounding a bit breathless, worry tainting his tone as he pulls Celine into his chest.
I force myself to hold his gaze. “I think … I think Ava just came into her powers.”
CHAPTER 37
AVA
“How does this feel? Any pain?”The doctor gently turns my arm this way and that, but I shake my head.
“No, it feels fine,” I reply in annoyance.
