Ashes to Ashes-Blood Ties 3 by Jennifer Armintrout Read Free Book Online
Authors: Jennifer Armintrout
handed me his nearly full mug. "I've already had two cups. You finish this off."
I stood, sipping my blood in silence, while Nathan studied me covertly, pretending to be interested in his bare feet, the floor tiles and the pots and pans suspended over the island.
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He knew I hated being watched while I fed, but his surreptitious looks made my stomach fill with butterflies.
Max cursed fluently as he scrubbed the stained tiles with a roll of paper towels and an absurd quantity of glass cleaner. As the minutes ticked by, it became painfully apparent none of us wanted to be the first to appear at Bella's meeting.
"What do you think we're going to talk about?" I ventured finally. My voice ruptured the quiet so suddenly, Max hit his head on the counter as he straightened in surprise.
Blind to his distress, Nathan shrugged calmly. "A battle plan, I assume. With the Movement gone, we have no centralized form of communication. We won't be able to get information from other operatives, and we don't have the means to track the Oracle without Movement connections."
"Not to mention the Soul Eater," I added softly. A flicker of pain crossed Nathan's face at the mention of his sire. "He's still out there."
"I hate to say it, but that might have something to do with the Oracle's disappearance," Max commented, still holding a hand to the top of his head.
As though the air had been sucked from the room, I gasped, and Nathan took a great, hissing breath at the realization the two vampires were likely connected.
"What could the Oracle want with the Soul Eater?" I asked quietly.
"What wouldn't she want with him?" Nathan replied grimly. "She has power, but she's been isolated for centuries. Think of what that would do to you." Max nodded in agreement. "You'd definitely lose touch with a lot of your connections."
"And it would be easier picking up an evil coup in progress than starting your own from the ground up." My throat clenched. "My God… You don't think… " Max looked from me to Nathan and back again, his jaw tight. "It would be handy to have a god in your pocket, and totally possible if you got in on the ground floor." The door from the dining room swung open and Bella stuck her head in with a disgusted look. "I did say fifteen minutes, did I not?"
Max shot us a withering glance and mimed choking the life out of what I assumed was an imaginary werewolf.
Like the rest of the condo, the dining room was oversize and ostentatious. I had seen it only a few times—once on the tour, another when I'd become disoriented and taken the wrong door from the foyer. Max rarely used the room at all. He preferred to drink his meals in the stark, antiseptic kitchen, rather than mahogany-paneled, windowless grandeur.
Bella had set up at one end of the massive table, in the clean, golden light of one of the dual chandeliers. She seated herself at the head of the table, behind a miscellany of archaic-looking objects, some of which I recognized as items Nathan sold in the bookstore. The others—a piece of black, concave glass resting atop a wire stand, and a large collection of what appeared to be desiccated chicken bones—were totally foreign. Max took the chair to her left and scoffed at the heap of bones. "Dinner?" Nathan pulled out a chair for me on her right and sat between Bella and me. Though she'd clearly heard his comment, Bella didn't give Max the pleasure of a response.
"I tried diligently all day to make some kind of contact with my fellow assassins. Unfortunately, the werewolf contingency has all but fled Spain to return to our ancestral
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forests, and I know very few vampires."
"Surprise, surprise," Max muttered under his breath.
"I do not want to alarm you." Bella turned in her chair so she faced Nathan and me. "But I feel we are at a
I stood, sipping my blood in silence, while Nathan studied me covertly, pretending to be interested in his bare feet, the floor tiles and the pots and pans suspended over the island.
Create PDF files without this message by purchasing novaPDF printer ( http://www.novapdf.com )
He knew I hated being watched while I fed, but his surreptitious looks made my stomach fill with butterflies.
Max cursed fluently as he scrubbed the stained tiles with a roll of paper towels and an absurd quantity of glass cleaner. As the minutes ticked by, it became painfully apparent none of us wanted to be the first to appear at Bella's meeting.
"What do you think we're going to talk about?" I ventured finally. My voice ruptured the quiet so suddenly, Max hit his head on the counter as he straightened in surprise.
Blind to his distress, Nathan shrugged calmly. "A battle plan, I assume. With the Movement gone, we have no centralized form of communication. We won't be able to get information from other operatives, and we don't have the means to track the Oracle without Movement connections."
"Not to mention the Soul Eater," I added softly. A flicker of pain crossed Nathan's face at the mention of his sire. "He's still out there."
"I hate to say it, but that might have something to do with the Oracle's disappearance," Max commented, still holding a hand to the top of his head.
As though the air had been sucked from the room, I gasped, and Nathan took a great, hissing breath at the realization the two vampires were likely connected.
"What could the Oracle want with the Soul Eater?" I asked quietly.
"What wouldn't she want with him?" Nathan replied grimly. "She has power, but she's been isolated for centuries. Think of what that would do to you." Max nodded in agreement. "You'd definitely lose touch with a lot of your connections."
"And it would be easier picking up an evil coup in progress than starting your own from the ground up." My throat clenched. "My God… You don't think… " Max looked from me to Nathan and back again, his jaw tight. "It would be handy to have a god in your pocket, and totally possible if you got in on the ground floor." The door from the dining room swung open and Bella stuck her head in with a disgusted look. "I did say fifteen minutes, did I not?"
Max shot us a withering glance and mimed choking the life out of what I assumed was an imaginary werewolf.
Like the rest of the condo, the dining room was oversize and ostentatious. I had seen it only a few times—once on the tour, another when I'd become disoriented and taken the wrong door from the foyer. Max rarely used the room at all. He preferred to drink his meals in the stark, antiseptic kitchen, rather than mahogany-paneled, windowless grandeur.
Bella had set up at one end of the massive table, in the clean, golden light of one of the dual chandeliers. She seated herself at the head of the table, behind a miscellany of archaic-looking objects, some of which I recognized as items Nathan sold in the bookstore. The others—a piece of black, concave glass resting atop a wire stand, and a large collection of what appeared to be desiccated chicken bones—were totally foreign. Max took the chair to her left and scoffed at the heap of bones. "Dinner?" Nathan pulled out a chair for me on her right and sat between Bella and me. Though she'd clearly heard his comment, Bella didn't give Max the pleasure of a response.
"I tried diligently all day to make some kind of contact with my fellow assassins. Unfortunately, the werewolf contingency has all but fled Spain to return to our ancestral
Create PDF files without this message by purchasing novaPDF printer ( http://www.novapdf.com )
forests, and I know very few vampires."
"Surprise, surprise," Max muttered under his breath.
"I do not want to alarm you." Bella turned in her chair so she faced Nathan and me. "But I feel we are at a
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