Sacrifice Read online

  Sacrifice

  by

  Luxie Ryder

  Evernight Publishing

  www.evernightpublishing.com

  Copyright© 2010 Luxie Ryder

  ISBN: 978-0-9867225-3-0

  Cover Artist: Dara England

  Editor: BL Brown

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  DEDICATION

  To my family and friends—thanks for your support.

  Sacrifice

  Luxie Ryder

  Copyright © 2010

  Chapter One

  Hallie Matheson gave the cord on the blind a hard flick and let it snap up to the top of the frame. The jerk banging on her door in the middle of the night was going to get an earful…

  Instead, she screamed.

  A pale face contorted with agony pressed against the glass. The fist Hallie assumed to be making all the noise flattened on the pane as the man it belonged to pushed himself back a few inches and opened his eyes.

  “Hallie, it’s me.”

  She screamed again for a different reason. “Ethan!”

  Her hands shook as she fumbled with the knob, desperate now to let him in. The latch came free of the lock and the door swung out of her grasp, slamming into the wall with a glass rattling thud. With nothing left to hold him up, Ethan Butler’s considerable frame fell to the floor.

  “Oh my God…what happened?”

  She rolled him over and bit her closed fist to silence another shriek of terror. A deathly pallor had stolen the tan from his handsome face, replaced with a waxy gray. His usually sparkling blue eyes were now dark as night, the whites almost obscured by tiny, blood red veins.

  Hallie pressed a hand to his forehead, recoiling instantly from the cold, clammy flesh under her palm. “You need a doctor.”

  “No!” Ethan rolled away from her, groaning as he struggled to his hands and knees. Hallie ignored his protest and wrapped both arms around his torso to help him to his feet. “I just need to lie down a minute, that’s all.”

  He lurched towards his apartment door, the one opposite hers, leaving Hallie with no choice but to go with him. If he fell again, he would take her down too. She was relatively strong and fit for a thirty-five year old woman but her five foot six frame was no match for his. At almost a foot taller than she, Ethan’s impressive size had been the first thing she’d noticed about him. But right now, with his huge, muscular body half slumped over hers, she wished he was smaller.

  Hallie used all of her strength to prop him against the wall and reached into the pocket of his jeans to search for his key.

  “Hey, don’t get fresh.” His hoarse croak brought her attention back to his face.

  “You wish!” I tried it once and look how badly that played out. Despite the painful reminder of her failed seduction attempt months ago, his teasing words relieved her. There couldn’t be too much wrong with him if he could make a joke. But then his crooked grin contorted into another grimace as a spasm of pain tore through him and his hands clutched at his stomach.

  The moment she opened the door he fell into his apartment. Ethan struggled to his feet, determined to make it on his own and staggered to the bedroom, sprawling on top of his bed. He groaned deeply when Hallie switched on the light.

  “Ethan, what happened? Do you need a doctor?”

  “No.”

  “You keep saying that but there’s obviously something very wrong with you.”

  “Damn it, Hallie! No doctors!”

  She swallowed the urge to tell him to kiss her ass. After all, he’d just turned up after two weeks away and pounded on the door at three a.m. until she’d let him in. Instead she offered, “Suit yourself.”

  Hallie decided to leave him to his self-inflicted misery, convinced now more than ever that he was drunk or stoned or something, until another agonized groan stopped her in her tracks. When it passed, he lifted his head and gazed her way.

  “I’m sorry…okay? I didn’t mean to shout.”

  She sighed. “Have you been drinking?”

  The crooked grin she knew well reappeared. “No, but I could sure use one right now.”

  Whether he’d been joking about the drink or not didn’t matter, once the words left his mouth Ethan passed out almost immediately.

  Hallie gave Doc Fletcher a call just in case, hoping he could calm her nerves, but unfortunately, his mention of food poisoning left her more frustrated as well as frightened.

  “I don’t think it’s food poisoning, Doc. For a minute back there I thought he was dying.”

  “Thought I was dying after I had me some bad shrimp once.” He chuckled as if remembering it fondly. “Stop worrying. Cold sweat, stomach cramps—sounds like food poisoning to me. He just got back from New Orleans you say?”

  “That’s where he said he was going when I spoke to him last week. Said he was there on business and asked me to take in a package he was expecting while he was away.”

  “Shrimp,” Doc Fletcher said, as if pronouncing a final diagnosis.

  Hallie pushed a little harder. “I’d feel much better if you’d come take a look at him.”

  “Can’t do that right now, honey. Maisie Johnson is waiting for me to deliver her twins. I’m pretty sure young Ethan will be okay, but if you’re worried, you should take him to CountyGeneral.”

  Hallie put the phone down before she said something to the kind old man she might regret later. County was twenty miles away in Tillbrook. How in the hell was she supposed to convince Ethan to get in her car and stay alive until she got him to a medic? She grabbed a robe from her apartment and walked back to his bedroom, regretting—and not for the first time either—that she’d never left the hick town she grew up in. Fairborne had a population of only two thousand and didn’t need its own hospital. When her grandmother became ill, Hallie was forced to make a forty mile round trip everyday to visit her in Tillbrook.

  Ethan was still in bed but his clothes were strewn across the floor, and he’d pulled a sheet half over his body. She tiptoed across to look down at him, tempted to check his forehead again but afraid to disturb his much-needed rest. Her gaze travelled over his body, to the dark chest hair still glistening with sweat. Ethan was toned and hard, right down to where the sheet rested on his hips. He groaned softly and she looked back to his face, afraid he’d caught her drinking in the sight of his naked torso, but he slept on.

  A dark, angry bruise on the side of his neck caught her attention. Hallie leaned closer to look at it but he rolled away, obscuring her view. Maybe he’d scratched it on the door frame when he stumbled into the room. Her own wrist throbbed from banging into the wall when she tried to help him.

  After a while, Hallie grew bored of waiting to see if he would stay asleep and wandered into the lounge, unsure what she should do. She couldn’t just leave him to fend for himself. What if he woke in agony again? More importantly, what could she do for him if he did?

  She flopped down on a couch and looked around the room. Ethan lived well. It annoyed her to see he’d done a better job with his half of the house than she had with hers. So he had looks as well as taste…typical.

  The walls of the lounge were a subtle coffee shade, complimented by taupe leather sofas facing each other in front of the fireplace. A large Persian rug covered most of the stripped wooden floors and a mahogany bookcase dominated the window wall, facing a pl
asma screen on the opposite side. The expensive furnishings put the modern utility style units in her bland beige home to shame. Still, it wasn’t her fault she didn’t have as much money as him.

  Hallie couldn’t help but notice he had no pictures of family or friends…or even girlfriends, but then Ethan Butler had been an enigma since the day he’d moved in.

  When her grandmother passed away earlier in the year, Hallie decided to rent out half of the house she’d inherited. Since losing the only family she’d had—her mother dying in childbirth and she’d never known her father, Hallie’s grandmother had been everything to her. The convenience store she’d inherited along with the house kept her busy at first but after only a few short months, Hallie was desperately lonely. The few friends she’d had growing up, either married or moved away as soon as they were old enough. Hallie stayed on in Fairborne to take care of her grandmother and never got around to dating much or making new connections.

  Converting the house into two apartments would give her extra income to aide her flagging business, and possibly the company she craved.

  When Ethan turned up to view the apartment a few days after she placed the ad, Hallie was thrilled someone showed interested in renting so soon. But when he arrived to view the apartment, she didn’t know what to think. The gorgeous Ethan looked about her age, but wore a ten thousand dollar watch and rolled up in a vintage Aston Martin. Hallie almost told him he had the wrong address, but a desire to spend a little more time drooling over the visitor had her leading him into the house. He signed the lease a few minutes later. By the time he left, Hallie had a major crush on the tall, delicious man with the tousled brown hair and dazzling smile, and she got a fistful of cash. He’d paid six month’s rent in advance and asked how soon he could move in. Two days later, he arrived with a van load of furniture.

  The local gossips must’ve heard about the handsome stranger living in her house, by next morning business boomed at the store. The very people who’d caused her financial problems by choosing to get their supplies at the new mall close by, suddenly couldn’t stay away.

  “What’s the story with that tall drink of water living in your Grandma’s house?” one of them had asked, causing the half dozen others in the store to stop their chatter and pause to listen. The woman let her gaze roam over Hallie’s long blonde hair and slim body, as if assessing how much competition she’d be should the woman try to get friendly with Ethan herself.

  “No story. I needed the money and he needed a place to stay. That’s it.”

  “What’s he like?” asked one of the women, her gaze sharp and calculating. “Is he dating?”

  “I’d pay that pretty young thing to live in my house!” someone shouted.

  The women gathered around, inundating Hallie with questions and comments. She put up her hands to keep them at bay. “I don’t know much about him. He’s only just moved in and we’re not really acquainted yet.” She’d gazed around at their eager faces and smiled, knowing one sure fire way to put an end to the conversation. “Now, did you ladies just come in to snoop, or are you actually gonna buy anything?”

  They’d drifted out of the convenience store, a few of them paying for an item or two before they left, and hardly came back since. It was clear all they wanted was a bit of gossip and she didn’t have any to give. Hallie groaned as she remembered that that wasn’t quite true anymore, not that she’d have told them anyway. No, she’d take her embarrassing seduction attempt to the grave.

  Hallie blushed at the memory of the welcome dinner she’d organized a couple of nights after he’d moved in. Okay, so she’d been attracted to him at first glance but it seemed only sensible to get to know him better, after all, the man was living in her house. They’d spent a pleasant evening getting acquainted. His accent told her he’d grown up in Louisiana, same as she, although he never mentioned where he’d lived before his move to Fairborne. Besides learning about his job as a reporter for, The Faustian Times—an occult magazine—she’d found out very little else.

  Having dinner together had quickly become a habit, with both of them taking turns to cook, four or five nights a week. Hallie had the new friend she’d craved but soon friendship just wasn’t enough. One night, after a few glasses of wine and a lot of flirting, she’d moved in a little closer, made confident by the message she detected in his gaze. At first, he’d responded as she dreamed he would, dragging her across the last few inches separating them and crushing her lips with his own. The kiss rendered her breathless and evoked a deep hunger for more. But suddenly, he abruptly pulled away, apologized for his behavior and damn near ran out of her apartment. Ethan had avoided her in the four months since that night.

  Hallie groaned as she chased away the memory of her humiliation and put her feet up on the sofa. The gossips would have a field day if they knew that, she thought acerbically, sinking down into the plush cushions, her head heavy and her eyes burning from the urge to close. Ethan’s gentle snores filled the night and she hoped his peaceful slumber meant the worst had passed.

  Maybe Doc Fletcher was right.

  Sometime during the night she woke suddenly, confused when she didn’t instantly recognize her surroundings, as the memory of a nightmare lurked at the edges of her mind. In her dream, Ethan had cried out for her, his voice painful and heavy with need, but she hadn’t been able to find him. She’d followed the sound of his cries to a dark basement where he lay dying, his face as contorted and unrecognizable as it had been earlier.

  Hallie got up to check on him, unable to shake the fear she’d woken with until she could see for herself that he was okay. She tiptoed into his bedroom, resolving to take him to a hospital if he looked no better than before. But when she got there, the bed was empty and the window wide open.

  Ethan was gone.

  “I can hear you in there, so you might as well let me in.”

  Ethan clenched his fists, feeling guilty for ignoring Hallie’s pleas which tested the fragile grip he had on his new and terrifying urges. Didn’t the fool woman know he was avoiding her for her own good?

  He hadn’t laid eyes on her since the night two weeks earlier when his life ended and he became a vampire. He’d awoken, still in the throes of the change, to find Hallie asleep on his sofa. The last time he’d gazed at her beautiful face, he was standing over her, fighting the urge to sink his newly formed fangs into the tempting vein beating in Hallie’s exposed throat. Ethan fled her home that night, hiding underneath a deserted house nearby until darkness fell. Then he raced away in his car, driving non-stop until he reached his friend and mentor, Clive.

  Hallie wasn’t giving up. “I just want to check if you’re okay,” she said, sounding as if her lips were pressed against the wood. “Please, Ethan. I know you are in there.”

  The confusion and sadness in her voice tore at his dead heart. He should have stayed away and gone back to his own home but Clive said it was still too risky. Yeah, well staying here was risky too—for Hallie at least. Wanting her so badly but being unable to have her tortured him constantly, despite Clive’s reassurances that his obsession with her would pass. Instead, it just got worse. Ethan lay awake every night, the thought of her naked, warm body mere feet away drove him crazy with need. He knew his kind had insatiable sexual appetites—for sex as well as blood—but then why didn’t he want anyone else but her? Pushing her away all those months ago was the hardest thing he’d ever done and his desire for her had only intensified since.

  He should’ve never come back, but in his crazed condition, and with the venom killing the last of the human in him, all he could think of was seeing her one last time. Ethan didn’t know how many hours he’d spent wandering in terrified agony that night, trying to make his way home to Hallie.

  About to leap from the window and escape into the night, the scent of her tears assaulted his nostrils and he realized he’d made her cry. He walked back towards the entrance to his apartment, testing his willpower by standing close enough to smell her sweet sk
in through the wood separating them. When the urge to tear the door off the hinges and drag her into his arms didn’t come, he knew he could risk seeing her.

  “Give me a minute, okay?”

  He ran to the kitchen and heated a quart of blood in the microwave, downing it desperately. A shudder ripped through his body at the bitter, coppery taste he was sure he would never get used to. He didn’t need to feed again but Clive warned him that a hungry new vampire couldn’t afford to be around people, not unless he wanted them to know what he was.

  Hallie had wiped away her tears by the time he cracked open the door, but he could still see the tracks on her face and the redness around her pretty green eyes. She’d lost a few pounds in the last couple of weeks, evident from the way the sweat pants that used to hug her lovely curves now hung loosely from her hips. Another thing he felt responsible for.

  “H…hi,” she said, her voice still husky from crying. “Can I come in?”

  Ethan wanted to tell her to stay away, but as he struggled to find the right words without causing her more pain, his delay in answering clearly upset her. Her beautiful green eyes sparkled with unshed tears. It physically pained him knowing he was the cause of her sorrow.

  He moved out of the doorway, gesturing for her to enter, and took a last deep breath of air before her scent and taste assaulted his senses.

  “Thanks.” Hallie took a seat, perching on the edge of the very sofa where he’d almost ended her life. Ethan didn’t join her. Instead, he remained standing, watching her silently. The highly sensitive awareness coursing through his body warned him she was more than a little angry. She was livid.

  “Now I can see you’re perfectly okay. Do you mind telling me why the hell you’ve been so mean to me? I took care of you, only to find you had disappeared in the middle of the night, and I haven’t laid eyes on you since.” She stood up abruptly and moved towards him, her finger jabbing at his face. “The least you could do is thank me for helping your sorry ass!”

  Ethan took a step back, unsure if he could handle it should she touch him. “I sent you some flowers. Didn’t you get—”