Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 126570 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 633(@200wpm)___ 506(@250wpm)___ 422(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 126570 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 633(@200wpm)___ 506(@250wpm)___ 422(@300wpm)
“Something’s not right,” Raphael says before turning to the side.
A large amount of blood suddenly spews out of his mouth.
“Fuck!” I shout in alarm.
Before I can do anything, Dav is wrapping a big, beefy arm around Raphael’s shoulders, mindless of the blood getting all over him. “I didn’t think your type got sick?”
I feel a flare of annoyance before I’m bellowing, “Andrei!”
“I’m here, Father.” Andrei speeds through the room and quickly kneels beside Raphael. “What’s happening?”
Looking over to Dav, I say, “We don’t. I must apologize for the mess we seem to have gotten on you.”
“Would it surprise you if I said I’ve had worse?” Dav says.
Staring into his eyes, I say. “I’m sure we all have, I suppose. Would you mind terribly if we finished our meeting at a later time?”
Dav shakes his head and lets go of Raphael. “Not at all.”
When I try to pull away to see Dav quickly out, Raphael grips my forearm.
Pulling me down tight to his side, Raphael sputters blood against my ear as he harshly says, “Something is happening… I don’t know what... I feel sick… and drunk… I haven’t been drunk since I was a human.”
In the background, I hear Chloe quickly escorting Dav from the house and out to his car. Dav is nothing but manners, but he’s moving quick, eager to get away.
“Poison?” I ask Raphael, even though I highly doubt it.
“No,” he growls before another burst of blood comes streaming out of his mouth.
“What the fuck?” Matthias says.
“What do you feel?” Andrei asks Raphael.
“I don’t… I don’t know… but I feel an impending doom,” Raphael answers.
“Doom?” I ask.
Nodding his head, Raphael slowly pushes us away and moves toward the table. Using the end of the table to straighten himself out, he looks to me and says, “Like the world is shrinking into one place all at once.”
“Raphael?” Chloe asks quietly, reappearing out of thin air. “What do you hear?”
Looking between the two, I feel as confused as the rest of the men standing here with me.
What does he hear? What the fuck does that have to do with him vomiting?
“A faint heartbeat?” Raphael murmurs more to himself than anyone else.
“A what?” I ask.
The moment my words come out of my mouth, his eyes roll into the back of his head and his body slumps to the floor like a boneless bag of meat.
There have been instances in my life when I’ve felt time stop. Like it stops so completely I could pluck out a specific grain of sand spilling inside an hourglass.
All of us, save one, is stunned into inaction.
Chloe vanishes, reappearing with Raphael’s head in her lap.
Her eyes stare up at me as she whispers, “He’s connected… He’s hearing her.”
My head wants to shake at the impossibility. It’s too damn soon. It’s unheard of. Never. Never has this happened before.
Not in the same coven.
But one moment, Raphael is fine, and the next he’s spewing blood...
“Asher, what in the ever-living fuck is going on?” Matthias asks as the rest of my sons crowd around Raphael.
Looking over to Andrei, I see him raise his eyebrows at me, but he doesn’t voice his opinion.
“Does it match with how I collapsed?” I ask Andrei.
“From what Raphael described? Maybe? But you didn’t vomit blood or hear things,” Andrei says.
Listen to me! Chloe slams through the walls of our bond. Her mind like a battering ram from the days of my youth.
“Listen to me,” Chloe growls viciously to the room at large. Tenderly, her hands cover Raphael’s ears. “I feel it.”
“Feel?” Maddox asks, his voice a harsh rasp from disuse, before he quickly looks to Caden.
“You can feel it?” Caden clarifies for them both.
Chloe nods her head. My poor wife is now covered in blood as she cradles Raphael’s head in her lap like she would a wounded animal.
“Mother,” Ambrose says in a delighted voice, “feels things through the spirit of our dear blood brothers. Or perhaps through the bond we all share with Father.”
“We need to get a sample of Raphael’s blood,” Andrei says with a grin.
I growl so deep at him he freezes instantly.
“No, leave him be until he wakes,” I say with a deep push of calm through the room.
Maddox elbows Caden hard enough that Caden elbows him back. “We want to know if this means we finally get a little sister to pick on?”
“Mother!” Ambrose sings. “We can all dance together, and you must promise I get to help dress her!”
Sighing so deeply I’m not entirely sure she’s mentally well, Chloe points to Caden and Maddox. “Go to your rooms, all of you. Especially you two.”
“If you dare touch my fated…” Raphael rasps out slowly. “I’ll pull your entrails through your eye sockets.”
Squatting down close to Raphael, I ask quietly. “Is it her?”
“Yes, but she’s very weak, and very sick. I don’t know what’s happening, but she’s terrified.” Raphael pulls himself up until he’s sitting. “I’m sorry I’ve ruined your dress, Chloe.”