Free Cast in Blood (Morgan Blackstone Vampires Book 1) by Michelle Rabe Page B

Why is he so pissed that I started to walk into the room?
    “Be certain that it does not happen again. I will not be so forgiving a second time,” Lucian ordered before he stormed out. Charles stood for several moments, in shock, before he shook it off and stepped through the door, closing it behind him. Needing a moment to get his thoughts back in order, Charles picked up the fallen pages of the contract.
    “That. Was. Very. Strange,” he muttered under his breath, pronouncing every word with exaggerated care. He crossed to the chair he’d sat in for the past ten nights, and tossed the folder onto the seat. Charles frowned and put his hands on his hips, taking a careful survey of the room. What was that flash of silver? Was I just seeing things? Nothing looks out of place. But I haven’t lived almost five centuries without learning that looks, more often than not, are deceiving. He closed his eyes, and inhaled a long, slow, breath. His heightened sensory receptors took over, and sifted through the information. The mixture of scents floating through his lungs was what he’d expected, except for a sharp metallic note, faint but there, and recent. Okay, so that silver thing wasn’t a figment of my imagination.
    “What the?” Charles whispered, to the silent room before he pulled out his cell phone, and sent a text to Christophe to summon him. “Please, let him not be with a woman,” he sighed, and crossed the few feet back to the bed. This is insanity. What am I expecting to find? Charles thought, his brow knitting together as he concentrated. That she’s being drugged? If so, by whom? Why? With what?
      “Not many drugs are powerful enough to incapacitate us. Some of the more potent opiates can have an effect on our kind, but it’s nowhere near what it does to a human. The drugs move through our systems too fast.” He recited the lecture that Morgan had given him one night, about a century before. Christophe had been foolish enough to drink from an opium addict. While his best friend had been sleeping it off, Charles had asked Morgan about drugs and how they affected vampires.
    “Now, if a vampire drinks from a human who has taken the drugs, that’s a different story,” Morgan’s wry chuckle echoed through Charles’s memory. “The drugs seem to be more potent and their effects last longer,” she’d explained, while wiping Christophe’s brow with a wet cloth.
    “So it would stand to reason, that if Morgan had been injected with something, it would have worn off by now, unless the injections are continuing,” Charles mused and knelt beside the bed. “Even if the drugs were in human blood they would have worn off by now.” As an unpleasant thought crossed his mind, Charles ran a hand over his face. “Oh shit, this isn’t good.”

    Twenty minutes later, he was kneeling beside the heavy mahogany four–poster, when Christophe stepped into the room. The blankets, which had covered Morgan to the chin, had been shifted so they lay high up on her chest. Christophe frowned and paused, wondering what had possessed Charles to shift them from their usual position, closer to Morgan’s neck.  
    “Nicholas might take offense if he finds you like this old friend. He gives you a pass, and probably even likes you, in a weird way, because you are Morgan’s Blood Child however…” Christophe shrugged, letting Charles finish the statement in his mind.
    “Shut it Christophe.” Charles shook his head. “I know you’re trying to make light, but I think we have a serious problem on our hands.”
    “What?” Christophe asked and walked to his friend’s side.
    “Her neck.”  
    Taking the high road for once, Christophe said nothing and looked where Charles had indicated. “What’s that?” he whispered, without thinking, when he saw a small bruise on the skin above her carotid artery.
    “I can’t be sure, but I think it’s an injection site.” Charles replied and began pacing at the end of the bed.