Struck (A Vampire Novel) ✔

Forty-Nine

“Keep struggling, Elysia. The faster your heart rate is, the quicker this will happen,” Zachary informed me, but not in a mocking manner. He sounded more like he was instructing me, ever the insane teacher. He stopped in the hallway, pushing his hand against the wall. It slid open for him, leading us to another white room similar to the one Xander and Aveline had been left in.

Normally, I would have fought against being put inside any contained room. But as I peered into this room, what rational thoughts I did have were torn from my mind. Unlike Aveline and Xander’s contained room, this one had two metal seats rather than slabs. They were located on both sides of the room, facing one another. The left seat was empty, with the bindings open for an unknown victim. The right seat was filled by a familiar form.

His hair was wet from sweat. He was topless with open cuts left across his flesh. They didn’t appear to be healing, blood seeping across his skin slowly. His arms and legs were bound to the seat tightly, but he still held his hands in fists in defiance. He looked up from the distance to glare in my direction, but froze as his golden brown eyes landed on mine. His stare stunned me, causing me to freeze like a deer in headlights, especially when they narrowed uncertainly.

“Jacobi,” I meant to ask all kinds of questions. Why was he here? Why wasn’t he healing? And most importantly, why did he watch me so intensely? Did he suspect I helped my father contain him, as he’s obviously done? I opened my mouth, preparing to announce my innocence in everything, but Zachary began to drag me to the open chair without waiting for any type of reunion I might have with my mate.

I immediately began to struggle, downright refusing to be bound in that metal chair and left even more helpless than I already was. Before I could get a word in, Zachary turned around and swiped the back of his hand against my face, allowing a ringing slap to echo across the room. A responding pulse of pain reverberated throughout me as my heart rate spiked, causing me to yelp in agony.

“I’ll fucking kill you,” Jacobi’s voice snarled in the distance, his breath harsh and strained as he struggled against his own bindings. By the time my pain subsided enough for me to blink through my blurry vision, I was already bound impossibly tight against the chair facing Jacobi. Only it wasn’t Jacobi’s face in my line of sight. Zachary had bent down in front of me and was once again holding my face in his hands, moving across my skin and inspecting me determinedly.

“I will explain everything to you, Elysia. Regardless of how you might feel right now, I do want us to be allies,” Zachary said carefully, glancing back at Jacobi momentarily. I felt my heart grow heavier, despair filling me as I looked at the man I knew was my father referring to me as a wanted ally rather than his own flesh and blood.

“What are you doing? You’re supposed to be… you’re my…” I couldn’t bring myself to say it any longer, but Zachary drew his electrifying blue eyes back to mine with intrigue.

“Your father?” He answered for me, smiling momentarily. “It is true, you are technically my child, but I will never claim the likes of you as my true daughter. It’s best if you toss silly ideas like that from your mind. It would be easier to consider me your… creator; your God, if you will.” I blinked at him with wide eyes, utterly convinced now my mother was completely correct in her definition of Zachary. He was insane.

“And as for your mother,” Zachary laughed then. The unpleasant laughter sent a shiver through me, one that didn’t agree with my current illness and caused another pulse of agony through me. I closed my eyes, crying out against the burning sensation throughout me. Zachary waited for it to pass before he continued, “It’s best to just rip the Band-Aid off all at once. Your mother was not Elizabeth Brooks, or as she’s better known as, Elizabeth Monet.” I looked at him with disbelief, not understanding what he meant to tell me for a moment.