Chapter 77: Chapter Seventy-Seven

to"Where is little Bastet?" Sinclair asked as he came into the house, looking at Damien and me who were standing in the foyer, conversing about the attack and what needed to be done. Damien of course was trying to find out what division was responsible for an attack of this multitude, as there were half a dozen different divisions who could have been responsible for this. I agreed with this, but Damien's idea was to kill them all, whereas I believed we should only kill the one responsible as we may at some point in time need the others. Thankfully, Damien's guards had caught three of the vampires who'd managed to escape, and they were currently in the basement being... Interrogated.

*'I can understand why he would rather kill all of them, but at some point in time, he has to realize that killing everything he doesn't like, won't solve all of his problems. This is both the best and worst thing about him as a king. He has no problem destroying something that he thinks is bad for vampire kind, but sometimes the groups he doesn't like, helps us to keep control and stay hidden from the humans for as long as we have.'*

"She left and hasn't come back yet," I said glaring at him. Damien was already losing his mind about it, as she'd already been gone for hours, and hadn't called or texted. He was not in a good state of mind as it were, and didn't need Sinclair to worsen that by bringing up things he already knew. The only reason he hadn't gone after her yet is that I kept him busy with figuring out who did this.

"Well, did you try to call or text her?" He asked, raising an eyebrow at me. It was clear he didn't care much about if it upset Damien or not, he only cared for Bast. Granted it was his right, but counterintuitive, despite how he felt about her.

"She left her phone and her wallet," Damien said as he walked past Sinclair and sat on the bottom step, staring in the direction of the driveway. I sighed and sat down next to Damien, knowing that I wouldn't be able to stop him from doing this, and my best bet was to join him, rather than trying. "How are Valerie and Samantha?" He asked after a few minutes of silence with a short sigh.

"They aren't crying anymore, and surprisingly, Samantha seems to be taking it better than Valerie is, despite not knowing about vampires before this," I responded, turning to look at Sinclair who joined us on the bottom step, looking to his left where the wedding was taking place, before the attack of course. *'That Samantha girl is one of a kind, and much more like Bast than Valerie is. A pretty little thing to be sure. Not beautiful as Bast, but still beautiful in her own right.'* I thought, thinking about the girl asleep in Bast's bed upstairs next to Valerie. I had to force myself to stop thinking about her before I let my thoughts get too far away from me, knowing the situation was too important to be thinking about the girl, or rather, any girl other than Bast.

"Yes, she is a weird little human, I'm not surprised with how well she's taking it," Sinclair responded as he eyed me with a slight smile, reminding me that he knew how I was feeling, which meant he practically knew what I was thinking, before turning his attention back to watching Bartholomew as he came back from disposing of the bodies.

"How do you mean, she's weird?" Damien asked him, finally breaking his eyes away from the driveway to look at Sinclair.

"She's quite mature for a girl of her age, and a hard-working little thing, she is," Sinclair said with a shrug as he turned back around, noticing both Damien and me were smiling in amusement. "What?"

"Hell hath surely frozen over." Damien said with a shake of his head, chuckling softly." The recreant is attracted to a human." he added, causing both of us to laugh, while Sinclair growled and shook his head.

"Almost as surprising as a recreant texting," I said causing both of us to laugh harder. We laughed at this for a few minutes, thankful for the distraction, before we heard footsteps coming rapidly down the steps behind us.

"This is a joke, right?" Valerie exclaimed as she and Samantha came outside, their eyes wide in surprise as they stood in front of us. I couldn't help looking over Samantha again as she stood in front of me, admiring her dainty beauty. Samantha was the type of girl who was beautiful without knowing it, opposite Valerie who knew she had a nice body and was quite comfortable flaunting it. While a girl like Valerie is fun to bed, she wasn't mature enough to be considered someone who I could love, let alone someone I could be with long term.

Samantha had long wavy red hair that fell to her hips, her eyes light brown with hazel undertones, and a pretty little button nose. The bridge of her nose had a modest sprinkling of freckles, while her body type was much like Bast's. She was the same height as Bast, with a petite frame, although her chest was a bit smaller than Bast's, she was arguably a shapely girl, without it being overwhelming. *'Wow, I didn't realize how beautiful she was before. I can see why Sinclair has taken a liking to her.'*

I glanced at Damien to find that he'd taken note of her and likely agreed with my assessment, but Damien only had eyes for Bast, as was the way it's been for nearly twenty years. While he can agree Samantha was beautiful, it couldn't be argued she couldn't hold a candle to Bast.

"What is a joke? How are you feeling?" I asked, pulling my attention away from Samantha to look at her instead. She rolled her eyes and stood in front of Damien, putting her hands on her hips as she glared at him.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" She asked him, her heartbeat erratic and loud, her usually brown eyes now nearly black with hatred and anger.

"It would be faster to ask what isn't wrong with me, Valerie. How about we skip all of that and get to you telling me what the hell you're referring to." Damien said with a sigh, looking up at Valerie with nothing short of utter disdain. I knew Damien didn't like Valerie, but it wasn't until now that I realized just how little he cared for her. He'd told me before that he felt she was a childish, annoying, loud, and obnoxious thing, and made it quite clear that he couldn't understand why I was attracted to her for anything more than her body. Valerie had what I could only describe as an equal hatred and aversion for Damien, but the two of them attempted to get along for the sake of Bast whom they both cared a lot for.

"Haha, real cute." Valerie spat at him before tapping a few things on her phone, then returned to glaring at Damien, shaking her head in distaste. "How in the FUCK did you allow her to do this?" She asked incredulously as she turned her phone around to show us. "Yet you have the audacity to say you love her?"

"Shit!" I exclaimed when I saw what she was showing us. It was a text from one of her friends saying; 'Dude! Bast turned herself in?!' followed with a picture of Bast being put in handcuffs.

Damien stared at the picture for a few moments, frozen in shock and disbelief before bringing his fist down on the step, crumbling it into millions of chunks as he stood with a growl. "Fuck!" He exclaimed with a snarl.

Samantha gasped out softly, her light brown eyes big with shock and fear as she took a few steps back, her bottom lip shaking softly as she watched Damien. I couldn't help but want to take her into my arms to comfort her. It wasn't just because of how beautiful she was, but something about her made me feel the need to protect her. I didn't understand the sudden need, but I held myself back as I felt my attention was better given to making sure Damien remained in control.

"Calm down, human, I'm of no danger to you," Damien said trying to sound soft, but his emotions taking more control than he meant to give them, as he sounded like he was growling at her instead. He shook his head at her, then turning back to Sinclair and me, shaking his head. "She turned herself in? Why in the hell would she do that?"

"I'd rather be in jail than be with a prick like you, maybe she felt the same way after you caused her closest friends to be killed." Valerie retorted, then widened her eyes with a scream as Damien whipped around to face her, his eyes blood-red.

I jumped in front of Damien, putting my hands on his chest to hold him back from lunging at her, looking past him to Sinclair who was just watching the scene unfold with an expressionless look. "Are you going to help me out here?" I gasped at him as Damien continued fighting me to get to Valerie. *'This dumb fucking bitch is asking to be ripped to shreds!'*

"Why should I? I've no problems with Valerie, but at some point in time, she needs to learn when to shut her fucking mouth. I'm surprised he's not attacking you for protecting her after what she just said." Sinclair said with a shrug as he leaned against the house, watching Damien with a smirk as he continued to try to get to Valerie.

"He's right, why the hell are you protecting her?" Damien snarled, punching me in the shoulder. It hurt like a bitch, but I was glad he wasn't trying to get to Valerie anymore.

"I'm not protecting Valerie." I spat at him, making sure to keep myself between the two of them, watching closely at Damien and Sinclair, as I was surprised Sinclair hadn't tried to kill her as well. If he did, I would have had no chance of stopping him and his blasted recreant strength and speed. "I'm protecting Bast. We will get her back, and when we do, how do you think she will respond to the news that you killed her best friend?"

This seemed to get through to Damien as he took a step back, but kept his eyes narrowed as he continued to glare at Valerie.

"Did she say anything, before she left?" Samantha asked softly, her soft honey-like voice sparking something inside me to life as I turned my attention to her.

"She said she should have known things wouldn't have worked out, me being who and what I am, with her being a human," Damien responded as he finally stopped glaring at Valerie to sit back down and close his eyes.

"So, it's your fault, yet again?" Valerie mumbled with a shake of her head.

"You, need to shut the hell up, Valerie," Samantha responded before stepping forward to slap Valerie across the face. Being Valerie's boyfriend I should have been upset by this, but I couldn't find the nerve to be. She deserved it without a doubt and needed to be put in her place. Damien, Sinclair, and I couldn't have done it as we don't believe in hitting a woman. Threatening, and killing, however, are just part of our vampire nature. But if we were going to hit her, the impact would have likely broken her neck. "Because saying things like this are helping? If you're going to keep acting like this, why don't you just leave?"

"Why are you even still here, Sammy? I'm here for my best friend and my boyfriend. You could have left, or better yet you should have just died with the rest of them." Valerie responded, holding her cheek where it has already begun to turn red from the impact.

"Sinclair!" I yelled, realizing that Samantha didn't seem the type to slap a friend, just because she was upset. Based off of the smirk I received, I was correct. Sinclair was toying with her emotions to make her angry enough to slap Valerie.

"We need to be focusing on the two most important things right now, and neither one of those is Valerie." Damien thundered as he stood again and looked back and forth between Sinclair and me, his eyes blood-red as he growled. "Are the two of you quite finished with acting like children? Good. Let's go see if our 'guests' are in a more talkative mood, shall we?"

"You two, leave," I said over my shoulder as Sinclair and I followed Damien back into the house, before heading down to the basement where the vampires were kept. When we arrived at the cage, I had to refrain myself from smiling as the glorious moans of pain met my ears. The two men and one woman had been tortured until they were only inches from death, then denied blood so they couldn't heal.

"Who is responsible for ordering this hit?" Damien asked them, kicking the bars which resulted in a loud bang, making the three jump in fear.

"May as well kill us, we will never speak." The woman growled, her blood-red eyes narrowed as she looked between Sinclair, Damien, and me. "Yo- AGH!" The woman had started to speak again but stopped as she threw her head back and screamed, the crude sound bringing a smirk to my face as I watched her. *'I always wondered how this power of his was of any great use, but this? This is something worth having. Sure, making humans fight is fun and all, but making her think she's in more pain than she is, without having to move an inch? Priceless.'* I thought as I watched Sinclair do the same to the two men in the cage as well, their screams and begs for mercy falling on deaf ears as his small smile slowly turned into something dark and twisted, just as was his soul, or lack thereof. 'It's about time you've shown yourself for what you are.' I thought as I watched Sinclair, his sinister pleasure growing more evident as his gold eyes scanned the crew.

"Sinclair," Damien said, not taking his eyes off of the woman, who was clearly the leader of the three, watching her in utter delight as she squirmed and groaned in pain. Sinclair nodded softly and stopped amping their emotions, bringing a screeching halt to the glorious sounds emanating from the group. "It will get worse, the longer you prolong the inevitable. Who?"

"Amelia!" One of the men gasped out as he struggled to sit up, gasping out like he was having trouble breathing. Damien looked to Sinclair who nodded and took all of the man's pain, making his eyes light up in relief, able to stand and walk to the bars, just in front of Damien. "It was Amelia, she told us we had to go to this wedding and kill everything with a heartbeat, especially the bride. My king, I swear. I didn't know it was your wedding, otherwise, I wouldn't have done it!" He said as he fell to his knees and touched Damien's shoes through the bars, begging softly to be spared.

Damien watched the man in disgust and took a step back, before nodding softly, giving Sinclair and me the go. We both entered the cage and tore the three to pieces, laughing as they screamed out in pain until their limbs and organs were scattered about the cage, their bodies now indistinguishable from another. "This king does not believe in granting clemency." Damien spat as he turned on his heels to go back upstairs.