"She'll be fine."
"What? Are you crazy? She's bleeding out here?" Jack tried to pull out his phone. Allister's hand landed on top of his, and he said once more, "Piper is fine. Go back to your room and forget about everything you saw here today."
I shivered against the feel of Allister's power on my skin. They didn't say he had a silver tongue for nothing.
Jack stared blankly at Allister for a long moment and then nodded. "Piper’s fine. I'm going to go back to my room."
"Good. You do that." Allister smacked him on the cheek lightly before pushing him toward the door.
Jack walked stiffly out of the room. Drake walked in after him. He watched Jack leave and then saw me bleeding on the floor. "What's up with the Big Man? And what'd you do, Piper? Walk into a knife?"
I looked up at him and winced. "Haha. You're hilarious." I shifted back until I could lean against the wall as Darren knelt before me. "Mizuki did it."
Drake sucked in a breath. "What? And you just let her go?" He stalked across the room and headed for the door. Allister stopped him. "Don't just stand there."
"This is going to hurt," Darren said, drawing my attention back to him before he wrapped his hand around the knife's handle. I braced myself, looking up at Allister to see him shake his head at his brother. "Don't."
I bit back a scream as Darren pulled the knife from my leg.
A rush of footsteps poured into the kitchen. Rayne and Marcus appeared in the doorway. They took one look at me and then the blood flowing from my wound. Rayne rushed over to the fridge and grabbed his silver container of blood before disappearing back into the dining room. Marcus stayed, his nostrils flaring, but he made no move to leave or feed.
"What happened?" Marcus asked.
I leaned my head back against the wall. "Can we save the explanations for after I don't bleed to death?"
"Here." Marcus lowered himself to my side, slashing his wrist with a single nail before holding it out to me. "Drink. You'll heal."
I groaned and reached out for his arm. "I'm not going to get any sleep this week, am I?" Lowering my mouth to his wrist, I sucked down the thick coppery liquid, swallowing until my leg didn't throb quite so much. "Enough," I pushed his arm away and turned my head the other way.
"You're not completely healed," Drake complained, leaning against the kitchen island. "You'll scar."
I looked up at Drake and scowled. "I'll live."
"I would like answers now." Marcus hovered at my side. "Who did this to you?"
"Don't worry about it." I pushed up off the floor and swayed, Darren and Marcus both reached for me at the same time. "I'm good." I shook them off and then inched up until I could sit at the table instead of on the floor.
"I will worry about it." Marcus loomed over me. "If someone has attacked you, they have declared war on our family. I must know who it is."
"Where's Antoine?" I ignored his question and turned to Darren.
"He went to shower. Do you want me to fetch him?" Darren moved to go, but I caught his hand.
That's why he hadn't come running at the commotion like the others. A vampire's hearing had limits. "No. Stay." I smiled weakly up at him. "Rayne will get him." While Rayne might not be able to handle so much of my blood at once without feeding, I knew he wouldn't be too far away. At my words, there were footsteps on the staircase, and then a door slammed somewhere.
"Tell us," Drake insisted. "Have the hunters finally turned on us? Do we need to go into hiding again?"
I waved him off. "I'm not going to repeat myself. Wait." To Darren, I asked, "Can I get some water?"
Darren nodded and moved over to the kitchen. No doubt doing more than I asked of him.
It didn't take long for Rayne to return with Antoine close behind him. The master vampire had barely gotten dressed, let alone dry his hair. The white strands of his hair were almost gray from being wet as it soaked into the silk of his button down shirt. Antoine took one look at me, and the blood drying on my calf and snarled.
"I'll kill them."
"Stop," I called out to him, "wait. Don't go doing anything rash. I'm fine." Darren placed a cup of tea on the table before me. I gave him a look, but he pushed the cup closer, urging me to take it. Sighing in defeat, I was too tired to argue anyway, I picked up the cup and took a small sip. Grimacing at the taste, I sat it back down to look at the vampires in the room. "We have a problem."
"Obviously." Drake laughed darkly. "The hunters need to die."