Blood of Retribution Read Online Free PDF Page A

newfound illusion of seclusion, Kegan is banging hard on the bathing room door.  What the hell?  “Do you have a death wish?” Kallen growls after dragging his lips from mine.
     
    “Your familiar is killing Alita,” he growls back, sounding ready to break the door down if we don’t open it.
     
    “Oh my god, are you serious?” I ask as Kallen and I spring to action.  Stumbling out of the bath in our haste, I bang my knee on the steps but hardly even notice.  Kallen has us both dressed in jeans and black t-shirts as we rush to the door and Kallen yanks it open.
     
    “Yes, I am serious!” Kegan says.  The look on his face tells me he’s more afraid than angry.
     
    “Where is she?” Kallen asks.
     
    “Next door.”  Kegan is already at the bedroom door and we are fast on his heels.
     
    Alita’s bedroom is just down the hall from ours.  Technically, it’s a guest room, but Alita uses it so often we consider it hers until she moves in with Kegan.  In the room, Alita is lying on the bed, her skin as pale as ash with a tiny bit of green mixed in.
     
    “What happened?” Kallen asks as I rush to the bed to heal whatever is wrong with her.
     
    “As soon as that damn beast walked into the room, Alita fell to the floor in pain.” 
     
    I hadn’t even thought about this.  If my familiar is made from dark magic, of course it would trigger Alita’s dark magic sensors.  I need to keep it away from her.
     
    As I sit on the edge of the bed and reach out to her, Alita screams and scurries away in obvious pain.  I snatch my hand back.  “Alita, what is it?”
     
    Kallen’s brows are furrowed as he looks between me and Alita, who looks as if she is really close to having a panic attack.  Then he wraps his hand around my arm and pulls me from the bed and then across the room.  “Is that better?” he asks Alita.  She nods and tries to get her breathing under control again.
     
    I look from her to my husband.  “What?  I don’t get it.”
     
    His lips are pressed into the tiny little line that comes before he tells me something I really don’t want to know.  I’m tempted to cover my ears.  “She was reacting to you just now.”
     
    I look up at him and shake my head.  “What?  That’s impossible.  I’m not evil.”
     
    Alita is still trying to get her breath under control when she says, “You…you have an aura around you.”
     
    Okay, I always have an aura around me.  We all do.  “Yeah,” I say confused as hell.
     
    She closes her eyes as a new wave of pain hits her.  “It is an aura of darkness,” she says quietly.
     
    My jaw drops to the floor and I practically trip over it in my sudden stupor.  Me?  With a dark aura?  I’m part Angel for goodness sake.  I can’t have a dark aura.  Then it hits me that not all Angels practice light magic.  A specific Angel comes to mind as proof.  Still, I shake my head emphatically.  “No, that can’t be.”
     
    I start to walk towards her again, but Kallen stops me.  “We should let her rest.  Perhaps she is still simply feeling the effects of your familiar.”  I look up at him and know that he doesn’t believe that at all.
     
    “How is she doing,” Tabitha asks from behind me, startling me half to death.
     
    “She thinks Xandra is evil,” Kegan says, almost as dumbfounded as me.
     
    Tabitha frowns.  “Nonsense.”  She bustles into the room with a bowl and a compress.  Sitting down on the bed, she dips the compress into the bowl and then places it on Alita’s brow.  Alita tries to smile in gratitude but can’t muster it through the pain.
     
    “We should let her be for now,” Kallen says quietly, tugging gently on my arm.
     
    I nod and let him lead me from the room.  He leads me downstairs into the main living room where he plops down on one of the sofas and pulls me down next to him.  “We will figure this out,” he says, kissing my cheek.
     
    I lay my head against his shoulder.  “Can we