Caleb by Sarah McCarty Read Free Book Online

head.
    “Are
you telling me that the big, macho Johnson brothers went goth to the point of
getting cosmetic dentistry?”
    “Technically,
I don’t think goths are vamp imitators,” Slade offered almost conversationally.
    “We
don’t have time for this,” Jared interrupted. “We need to get on with it.”
    “Get
on with what?” she had to ask, even though she was reasonably sure she didn’t
want to know. The hairs on the back of her neck were prickling, and a sick
feeling of dread settled in the pit of her stomach. First the monster wolves
and now . . . this.
    Jared
grabbed her arm again. “Caleb needs a reason to live.” He pulled her toward the
bed. “You’re going to give it to him.”
    She
dug in her heels. It didn’t do any good. The man was incredibly strong. “By
giving him blood?”
    His
smile was cold and hard. “You’ll give him a hell of a lot more than that.”
    He
held her bloody wrist to Caleb’s dry, cold lips. Caleb was so still, she
couldn’t even feel a breath against her skin.
    “You’re
crazy,” she breathed, staring, as everyone else was, at Caleb. Waiting in
horror and a sick fascination for him to do something. As if he was capable of
doing anything except dying right then. She shook her head. This was insane.
    She
braced her feet and pushed back against Jared’s grip. “You don’t have time to
indulge in this mass delusion. You need to get Caleb to the hospital.”
    Jared
merely held her wrist more firmly against Caleb’s lips while the other brothers
stood, tense with anticipation. Waiting. She didn’t know what they expected of
her, but she knew she didn’t have whatever they thought it took to revive a
dead man.
    Caleb’s
eyes flew open with a suddenness that jarred a scream from her throat. She
jerked back, met the barrier of Jared’s strength, and went nowhere.
    “Feed,
Caleb,” he whispered, for the first time showing the faintest hint of
vulnerability as he scraped his nail across her raw wrist. The pain made her
gasp. Fresh blood welled. Caleb’s nostrils flared as his eyes changed from dead
flat to a deep green lit with strange, swirling golden lights.
    “Feed,
damn you,” Jace whispered as if terrified of disturbing the moment.
    Caleb
closed his strangely glowing eyes. Allie’s knees went weak with relief. He
wasn’t going to do it.
    “Son
of a bitch!” Slade cursed. “He said he’d never do it again, and you know how he
is.”
    Tension
flooded the room.
    “Oh
no you don’t,” Jared muttered as he stared at Caleb. Allie dared a glance at
his face. His lighter eyes began to glow in the dark room as the lines of his
face settled into an expression of formidable determination. “You got us all
into this. You don’t just get to walk away.”
    Who
or what were these people? Pain in her arm drew her eyes down. She could only
stare in openmouthed shock as the nails on Jared’s hand grew into talons that
curved and pierced her skin. The scream that welled in her throat died as a
presence pushed into her mind and quelled the instinct, holding her bound,
paralyzing her in a cocoon of horror and pain.
    We’re
vampires .
    Jared’s
previous statement reverberated in her head, growing from a small black speck
of knowledge to an ominous dark cloud of incomprehensible certainty that
blocked all hope. With a calm slash of his thumb, Jared laid her wrist open.
Blood sprayed over Caleb’s mouth and face. Her horror exploded into terror.
He’d severed her artery. She needed to clamp off the wound, but she couldn’t
move. Couldn’t scream, couldn’t do anything but watch as Caleb’s eyes sprang
open in his bloodstained face, the swirling golden light consuming his pupils,
a vivid contrast to the crimson stain of her blood.
    Everything
in her recoiled. This wasn’t her Caleb. She’d never buy a fancy bra to tempt
something like this.
    Could
they really be vampires? Even witnessing what she was witnessing, she couldn’t
accept it. Vampires did not