Free What Rough Beast [Blood Oath 1] by Kari Gregg Page B

hair, cupped her cheek in his palm.
    "You'll need blood. Come to the library.” Garrick paused in the doorway. “Alone. She's safe for now."
    Luc lifted a languid hand to wave him out.
    Neither man believed the lie.
    Nor did Kate.
    Garrick sprawled on a leather chair angled to form a conversation pit with an overstuffed couch he'd chosen for the library. He'd decorated the room with a blend of feminine prints, flounces, and light colors with sparse touches of oak and buttery leather to add texture. Glass-fronted shelves lined three walls floor to ceiling, the fourth wall tinted glass. Beyond it, the bayou at midnight was a wonder of nocturnal creatures and violent spears of green that faded to inky shadow.
    He'd worked on this room alone for fifteen years.
    But he worried about the chair.
    "Have you lost your mind?"
    "It's the way of our people."
    Luc paced behind the couch, running anxious fingers through his dark hair. “Our people are brutal, primitive, and completely uncivilized."
    Garrick chuckled. “You must meet Peter.” At the young vampyr's questioning frown, he tipped his head toward the swamp. “The pack's alpha."
    "Weres.” Luc shuddered, staring into the darkness. “They're out there? Now?"
    "Yes.” His head fell back. “They are most eager to meet my Kate."
    "I don't want those animals anywhere near her. I don't know what you could've been thinking.” Luc scowled. “And she's not your Kate."
    "She never will be, mine nor anyone else's, if you refuse your responsibilities as her guardian.” His gut clenched. “If you turn."
    Luc rubbed his hand over his face. “I was in Nathaniel's stable thirty years. You were there how long? A hundred?"
    "One hundred and sixteen.” And another hundred and forty with his first master, before Nathaniel. Garrick had spent a quarter millennium in slavery—almost as long as Luc had been alive.
    "And still you demand this of me.” Luc's gaze skittered away. “Don't you remember it?"
    Garrick stared at him. “I try not to."
    Luc grunted. “Perhaps to someone else, I could do it."
    "Nathaniel has been dead three centuries, Luc."
    "We killed him."
    "Yes. We did. He's dead, but until you leave what happened in the stable behind you, Nathaniel's poison lives on. In you."
    He threw frustrated hands in the air. “Oh, for God's sake. Not that again."
    "Yes, that again. The scars you carry from Nathaniel are keeping me from my mate, and if we must, we will deal with them one by one."
    Luc's black eyes pleaded with him. “You can't expect me to drain you. You'd hate me for it."
    "I'll hate you if you don't.” His lips thinned. “What happened in your suite should convince you of how perilous our situation is. My strength must be tempered."
    "Physically, you are the stronger, but I'm clever. I managed her—and you. My blade was to your throat when you needed to be checked, was it not?"
    "You bested me.” Garrick chuckled at the perverse combination of irritation and pride that made his chest swell. “But you must not depend on me to underestimate you again. My instincts cannot be reasoned with, Luc. I won't be able to resist them much longer. When I get past your sly defenses—and I will—how will you stop me, a creature who's seen over five centuries? You're barely more than a child."
    Luc frowned. “I was never a child."
    "No, you weren't.” Garrick's smile faded. “One of my many sins. Don't make me pay for it now."
    Luc crossed his arms, his troubled stare returning to the bayou.
    "You know our kind, what we are. What I've become.” Garrick's hands fisted on the arms of the chair. His stomach roiled with sick dread. "For God's sake, help me."
    Luc's shoulders slumped. His breath left him in a defeated rush.
    Anticipation and terror made Garrick's heart pump faster, but with it, a cunning compulsion he hated. Because Luc would do it, and the young vampyr trusted him too much.
    Garrick slackened his body, muscle by muscle, while Luc circled behind him. “If