This was it. The end.

So why wasn’t Lorcan afraid?

“You think you’re going to take my head?” Lorcan shook the head in question. “You do underestimate me.”

“Your death has been a long time coming,” Alerac told him. “So let’s not wait any more.”

His claws flew up and went right for Lorcan’s throat.

There was still no fear in Lorcan’s eyes.

Alerac sliced his claws across Lorcan’s neck.

And Jane fell to the ground. Blood poured from her neck, from a wound that she shouldn’t have. From a wound that matched Lorcan’s.

Lorcan’s throat was bleeding, but he was still on his feet, and his eyes gleamed with an unholy light.

“Jane? Jane!” Alerac rushed to her.

She tried to put her hand over her neck, to stop the flow of blood.

“Kill him!” Alerac ordered his men. “Do it, now!”

The wolves leapt forward to attack.

One wolf sank his teeth into Lorcan’s forearm.

Jane screamed as phantom teeth tore into her arm.

“What the hell…?” Alerac stared at her wound with desperate eyes. Then he whirled toward the swarming wolves.

Phantom teeth sank into her leg. Tore muscles.

“Stop! Stop the attack!” Alerac bellowed.

The wolves froze.

Jane couldn’t get off the ground. Blood soaked her.

Lorcan was on the ground, too. Covered in just as much blood. His head was turned toward Jane. He was…smiling. Still.

“I’ve linked us,” he said, the words little more than a whisper, yet she heard him clearly. “You don’t remember, but you accepted the bond. You won’t ever be his, not really, because you are mine. Body and soul, forever.”

No, no, this wasn’t right.

“My pain…is yours. Your life…is mine.”

She wanted to deny it, but Jane couldn’t. Not when her injuries were a perfect match to his.

“Go get that witch!” Alerac pointed to the woods.

She’d tossed the witch that way, hadn’t she?

Darkness thickened around Jane.

“If your wolf, kills…me. Then he kills you…too.”

Sick bastard.

She turned her head. Saw the flames, still shooting into the sky. Her brother had gone into those flames.

I didn’t get to know him.

Her heart ached.

“Jane, it’s going to be all right.” Alerac was before her. He’d slit his lower arm, and he pushed the blood offering toward her lips. “Just drink from me.”

She was hurt badly, she knew it. The wounds should have killed her—and Lorcan.

Without Alerac’s blood, she would die right there on the ground. So Jane drank. And as she drank, Alerac’s powerful blood healed her.

It also healed Lorcan.

Soon he was on his feet, no wounds on his body. Healed too fast, from blood that he’d never tasted.

“Amazing, isn’t it?” Lorcan murmured. “How some bonds can cut through flesh and be buried in the blood? And that is our bond. Through blood and pain…until death.”

Two wolves broke from the woods. The blonde woman was in front of them. She was bleeding, stumbling, but she didn’t look in immediate danger of dying.

Zoe hurried toward the witch. “You try a spell on me, and I’ll knock your ass out.”

The blonde’s head was bowed. “You are already under one spell. Mine will not weaken you anymore than you are—”

“Did you just say I’m weak?” Zoe leapt for her.

“Don’t kill her, Zoe. I need the witch alive.” Alerac’s voice. Flat. Alerac pulled Jane to her feet, then he wrapped his arm around her. Wolves still circled Lorcan, trapping him with their bodies. “You sonofabitch, you think you’ve won, don’t you?”

Lorcan smirked. “Unless you’re planning to kill the vampiress there, then, yes, I have.” He rubbed at his neck, at the wound that wasn’t there any longer. “You see, you can’t kill me—not f**king ever—not if you want the one you call Jane to keep walking on this earth with you.”

How had he done it? How?

Magic, witchcraft, terrified Jane.

And Lorcan pissed her off. “You killed my brother.”

A shrug. “He was going to die anyway. The poison had eaten up his insides, and it was starting to play with his mind.” Lorcan tapped his forehead. “The mind is the weakest part, you know. Once it breaks, there’s no saving the body. Or the soul.”

“You don’t have a soul,” she whispered.

“And you don’t have a life,” he fired back, “not without me.”

Alerac’s body felt like stone against hers. She knew he wanted Lorcan’s head. But if he attacked Lorcan, then Alerac would hurt her.

“You had men in that house,” she said, her mind struggling desperately to find a way out of this nightmare.

“I had bait in that house. They were expendable.”

So cold. Callous.

“I also have men coming from the woods now. I’d say, Alerac, that you have about one minute to get your pack to safety, and then the silver bullets will start flying.” Lorcan’s lips twisted. “Ah, didn’t I tell you? I planned for that stupid human to tell you my location—and to tell you about the so-called cure for Ryan. I needed you here. I needed you to bring me Jane.”

And they had.

“There was no cure,” she said, voice leaden.

“Sure there was,” Lorcan told her, frowning. “Death is the cure. It always is.”

What?

“Now leave Jane here with me, and run while you can.”

Alerac’s head tilted toward the woods. “I don’t smell them.”

“I’ve cloaked their scents. A little trick I learned from a voodoo priestess in Africa.”

Alerac’s teeth snapped together. “Don’t smell ‘em, but I hear ‘em—attack!”

The wolves jumped into motion, even as the thunder of gunfire erupted. Bullets slammed the two wolves who were next to the witch. They howled in pain, and their coats thickened with blood.

The witch sank to the ground, her hands going over her head.

Then a bullet drove into her shoulder.

More bullets. More cries. More blood.

“Enough!” Alerac roared. Then he was hurtling forward. Transforming, shifting, and running toward the woods.