Book 2 of The Watchers, Dead of Night, comes out this Wednesday, so here’s a little look at what to expect!
***
Silas had told me of the vampires’ strength, but the reality of their inhuman abilities hadn’t truly sunk in until Lucius stopped me mid-flight, then held both my wrists together as he gripped them with a single hand. I couldn’t keep myself from gasping in pain as the bones ground against one another. He didn’t seem to notice, or at least, I thought I could safely say that he didn’t care.
And right after he had taken hold of me, we were — well, I couldn’t tell exactly what we were doing, only that in the next instant, we moved through the house at such speed that everything moved past me in a crazy, chaotic blur, paintings and doorways and windows flashing past before I could begin to focus on a single element. At last we burst through a doorway, and he flung me down onto a bed.
My bed, I realized a second later, as the room gradually stopped spinning enough for me to recognize where I was. Or at least, the bed I had been using while a prisoner in this house.
I didn’t have time to process anything more than that, because Lucius Montfort loomed over me, his already pale face now stark white with fury. He put one hand on my throat and pushed me down into the pillows. His fingers tightened, and I gasped. No, he wasn’t actively choking me, but I could feel the threat behind that grasp, knew he would have to do so very little to start cutting off the air I breathed.
“You will listen,” he said slowly, the dead calm of those quiet words somehow far more frightening than shouting would have been. “You are here on my sufferance, Serena Quinn. You are here because I believe you could be of some value. The moment I decide otherwise….” His grip tightened almost infinitesimally, but I still couldn’t prevent myself from letting out a small, terrified cough. “When that happens…if that happens…the only decision left will be whether to take your life myself, or whether I should hand you over to the others to play with. Do you understand?”
I managed to nod. With that pressure on my throat, I wasn’t sure I would be able to get any actual words out.
“I’m glad we understand one another.” Suddenly, he let go, and I began to cough in earnest.
All solicitude, he picked up the glass from my bedside table and went into the bathroom. I heard water running, and a moment later he returned and handed me the glass. “Drink.”
I didn’t dare refuse. I sat up on the bed, then took the water from him and sipped. Slowly, because I knew that to gulp it down, no matter how much I needed it, would only make me cough again.
“Good,” Lucius said, after I had drunk about half the contents of the glass. He took it from my shaking fingers and set it down on the nightstand. “Now, are you going to attempt to get away again?”
“No,” I whispered. Of course, it was a lie, an empty assurance to keep him from hurting me. I might have been frightened near to death, but I couldn’t allow fear to stop me.
“I am not sure I believe you.”
“I — ” “
Shh.” He laid a finger against my lips, silencing me. His other hand slid down my hair, and I shuddered. “Such a pretty, pretty toy. It would be a shame to break it….”
