Free Betrayed by Morgan Rice Page B

haven’t noticed. Anyway, the person on duty brings in the meal for everyone else. One of Aiden’s rules. He wants us all to eat together, to dine as civilized people. It’s actually more drinking than eating, but at least we do it together.”
    Rose went running over to the table, jumped up on it, and started sniffing. As she did, she started to whine.
    “I think she’s hungry,” Caitlin said. “Is there anything I can feed her?”
    Polly smiled, “I think we can manage that.”
    Polly walked over to a stone cauldron, lifted its lid, reached in, and pulled out a slab of raw meat. Rose’s eyes lit up at the sight.
    Polly threw it across the yard and Rose bounded after it, pounced, and ate in delight.
    “Thanks,” Caitlin said, so appreciative. She didn’t know what she would have done without Polly.
    “No shortage of raw meat around here,” Polly said with a smile. “Rose will be in heaven.”
    Suddenly, Rose issued a low, guttural growl. It shocked Caitlin, as she had never heard Rose make any noise remotely like it. She assumed that maybe some other person or animal had approached Rose while she was eating, but she looked around, and saw nothing. She followed Rose’s gaze, and then saw what she was looking at.
    There, in the distance, a teenage vampire approached them. Dressed in all black, he wore a sullen expression, and his large, black eyes burned with a fierce hatred. Even from so far away, Caitlin could feel a dark energy coming off of him. She could also feel her new friend, Polly, tense up beside her.
    “That’s Cain,” Polly said. “He’s one of us. But he doesn’t always act like it. He has real dominance issues. He can be the typical bully. I think that’s why he was left here to begin with—nobody else would deal with him. We’ve all asked Aiden to kick him off, but he refuses. Aiden still believes he can cure him, from whatever he has. I myself don’t. I can’t stand the sight of him. Usually, though, there a lot of us around, and when there are others, it’s not quite as bad. In fact, I rarely see him out and about. He must have sensed that you were here. A newcomer. That’s him—always wanting to assert his territory. Unfortunately, I’m not as strong as he is. We’ve gotten into our fights before, but I always lose, and it’s painful. And Aiden’s never around to see it. He’s been punished, but it hasn’t done much good. I’m sorry, but the other 22 of us are great, I promise. Every family has its rotten apple.”
    As Polly talked, Cain slowly approached, now about 30 yards away.
    Rose’s growling grew louder as he walked in their direction. As he walked past Rose, her growl turned into a snarl, and Cain reached down and smacked Rose as hard as he could, right on the nose. Rose, still a puppy, just yelped and cowered.
    Caitlin was outraged.
    “Don’t you touch my dog!” she screamed.
    “Is that which you call it?” Cain answered in a dark, guttural voice.
    Caitlin could feel the rage beginning to well inside of her. This was her first experience of true vampire anger, and it far exceeded anything she had ever felt as a human. She only hoped that she could control it.
    Cain stopped just a few feet before them. He looked Caitlin up and down with something like a scowl. Caitlin felt as if she were being violated.
    “So what’s this new riffraff that washed on shore?” Cain asked, glaring at her.
    “Don’t you talk to her that way,” Polly said.
    Cain looked at her maliciously. “I’ll talk to her anyway I please,” he said slowly. “And there’s nothing you can do about it.”
    He turned back to Caitlin.
    “I asked you a question.”
    Caitlin met his dark, raging eyes, and felt the hatred pouring through them.
    “It wasn’t a question,” Caitlin shot back. “And even if it was, I wouldn’t answer it,” she added defiantly, through gritted teeth.
    Cain slowly shook his head and smiled.
    “You have a big learning curve ahead of you,” he said.