Page 62 of Bloodhunter

I was afraid of none of those things.

I was Death, and with Silverlight in my grip, I rippedthrough the hungry vampires, screaming, my teeth clenched, my heart singing. Ilost my mind.

But then I saw something that brought my sanity screamingback to me, and fear chased away the dark rage.

Angus.

He roared into the clearing, his horns wicked, his body hugeand black, muscle bunching and rippling, deadly. But maybe even Angus couldbecome infected. And that terrified me.

“No,” I screamed. “Angus, go back.”

He caught a vampire with his horns, speared him through hischest, then shook him off and stomped another with his huge hooves beforegoring another one.

Blood flew.

Death had come to the woods of Raeven’s Road, and I was notthe only one carrying it.

Angus wouldn’t listen to reason as a man, and he for damnsure wasn’t listening to it as his animal. He roared and tossed his head andgored anyone in his path, and he was magnificent.

All I could do was help him.

The human female was dead, and the male lay sprawled acrossthe bloody ground, torn open, his intestines spilling from his body. Hetwitched, his right hand opening and closing, his eyes staring.

I ran Silverlight through his heart and put him out of hismisery.

And with a disorienting abruptness, the ground was litteredwith the dead and the world was quiet. Angus’s kills lay with torn apartbodies, entrails steaming in the cold air, but with the ability to come back.To rise.

I set about rectifying that.

And when I’d finished giving the diseased their true death, Isheathed the sword, fell to my knees, and sobbed. The night had been too muchand I was only human, after all.

Mostly.

Angus shifted to his human form and pulled me to my feet. Hewrapped his arms around me, murmuring quietly into my ear.

“You shouldn’t have come,” I wailed. “You could beinfected.”

“I’m not infected, honey.”

I wiped my eyes and leaned back in his arms to look up athim. “You don’t know that. There’s no cure, Angus. You have those many, manychildren to look after. You can’t be doing stupid shit like this!”

“Hush now,” he said, but his eyes twinkled. “Shifters can’tcatch a nasty vampire disease.”

I sniffed, and the beginnings of an enormous, hopeful reliefbegan to drift through me. “How do you know?”

He lifted an eyebrow. “Trinity. I know.”

And there in the woods, with the dead all around me, withthe horror of that night—Shane, humans, infecteds—still heavy on my mind, Ibegan to notice other things.

Like his scent. That irresistible, unforgettable, deliciousscent. It forced the decaying smell of death and disease out of my nostrils,out of my brain. I inhaled it eagerly, glad to rid myself of the stench ofinfecteds.

He stiffened against me, in more ways than one.

“Fuck,” he muttered, when my eyes widened.

Perhaps he thought I’d berate him for his reaction, but Ihad my own reaction. High on the aftereffects of battle, I pressed my palmsagainst his bare chest and stood on tiptoe to brush my lips against his.

“Trin,” he said, his voice hoarse and raw and strained.“What are you doing?”