Read Til Death (Jane #5) for Free Online

pull them through the gap, the torture was almost more
than I could bear. Tears were rolling down my cheeks and I bit down
on a scream as the metal pressed tight against my flayed skin. It
quickly became too much and when Anson returned moments later, I
was panting and sobbing like a child.
    He sighed and knelt beside me. Pulling a
cloth from the bucket he had brought in, he began washing blood
from my face. It stung whenever he hit an open sore, but the wounds
there were nearly healed. He finished my face and lifted a bottle
from the floor, popping the cap off so that it spun in the air and
clanked to the stones.
    "Drink," he said, holding the bottle to my
lips.
    I glared at him, but took a sip. He had
warmed it up for me and the blood tasted like liquid heaven in that
moment. I followed that sip with a big gulp, sucking on the bottle
until he pulled it away from my lips.
    "You're not an animal yet, Jane," he said
with a small quirk of his lips before he picked up the cloth
again.
    He started wiping my arms, clearing away the
spots not still covered by my ever-shrinking dress and I watched
him for a bit.
    "Who is Raymond?"
    My question startled him and he looked at me
with squinted eyes. "What do you mean?"
    "I mean, who is he? What does he want? Why is
he like this?"
    Anson frowned and went back to washing. I
didn't think he would answer until he spoke, his voice a bare
whisper. "He is insane. He wishes to take over the world,
essentially. He feels that vampires should rule, not humans. He
chafes under the rules that are thrust upon our kind and desires
to, well... He intends to turn humans into slaves, into cattle. And
he wants to be the one to lead the vampires, though he would never
say such a thing outright."
    "And he's the one who hurt Victoria?"
    He nodded as he gently moved the cloth
between my mangled fingers. I flinched once, but held still as best
I could.
    "He kidnapped her, with my help. He intended
on using her, making her his queen and his pawn. She was much
beloved in the vampire community and I believe she would have been
able to sway quite a few of the younger kids to his cause. But she
broke too easily. He expected her to last beyond the first few
torture sessions, but she broke in the second. And she did not just
break, she was destroyed. Her mind was gone. She was useless to him
at that point. So he gave her to one of his newer vampires, one of
his pets. And that is how you found her."
    Tears rolled down my cheeks as I thought of
the torture that Victoria had gone through. I was experiencing it
first hand and my heart went out to her.
    "Where did Conrad fit into Raymond's
plans?"
    Anson laughed. "You did Raymond a favor
there, actually. Conrad was supposed to be his lackey, a figurehead
in Europe while Raymond stayed in the United States. But Conrad
grew too ambitious. He started ignoring Raymond's commands and
began to build up his own empire. If you and your crew had not
killed Conrad when you did, there may have been a war between the
two. I have no idea if the war would have been good for you or
cause more chaos, but you saved Raymond the time and effort by
taking out his only real opposition. Sad, really. I kind of hoped
to see those two go head to head. It would have been an epic
battle."
    I frowned. "Shame. I wish we would have
known. We could have held off on our attack and taken them both out
at once."
    Anson smiled at me. "You have high hopes. It
is unlikely that you would have been able to take them both on at
the same time, no matter the size of your attack force. Conrad was
a force to be reckoned with, but Raymond is ten times worse. And
they were both smart. If you gave them a reason to work together,
you would have been doomed from the start."
    I let Anson work in silence for awhile,
leaning my head back against the bloody chair as I wondered how on
earth I went from being a happy bride on my wedding day to a
mangled mess of tortured flesh. It couldn't have been more than
twenty-four hours