Hotbloods 2: Coldbloods
Bella Forrest
Contents
Also by Bella Forrest
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Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Epilogue
Read more by Bella Forrest
Also by Bella Forrest
HOTBLOODS
Hotbloods (Book 1)
Coldbloods (Book 2)
THE GIRL WHO DARED TO THINK
The Girl Who Dared to Think (Book 1)
The Girl Who Dared to Stand (Book 2)
The Girl Who Dared to Descend (Book 3)
The Girl Who Dared to Rise (Book 4)
The Girl Who Dared to Lead (Book 5)
THE GENDER GAME
(Completed series)
The Gender Game (Book 1)
The Gender Secret (Book 2)
The Gender Lie (Book 3)
The Gender War (Book 4)
The Gender Fall (Book 5)
The Gender Plan (Book 6)
The Gender End (Book 7)
A SHADE OF VAMPIRE SERIES
Series 1: Derek & Sofia’s story
A Shade of Vampire (Book 1)
A Shade of Blood (Book 2)
A Castle of Sand (Book 3)
A Shadow of Light (Book 4)
A Blaze of Sun (Book 5)
A Gate of Night (Book 6)
A Break of Day (Book 7)
Series 2: Rose & Caleb’s story
A Shade of Novak (Book 8)
A Bond of Blood (Book 9)
A Spell of Time (Book 10)
A Chase of Prey (Book 11)
A Shade of Doubt (Book 12)
A Turn of Tides (Book 13)
A Dawn of Strength (Book 14)
A Fall of Secrets (Book 15)
An End of Night (Book 16)
Series 3: The Shade continues with a new hero…
A Wind of Change (Book 17)
A Trail of Echoes (Book 18)
A Soldier of Shadows (Book 19)
A Hero of Realms (Book 20)
A Vial of Life (Book 21)
A Fork of Paths (Book 22)
A Flight of Souls (Book 23)
A Bridge of Stars (Book 24)
Series 4: A Clan of Novaks
A Clan of Novaks (Book 25)
A World of New (Book 26)
A Web of Lies (Book 27)
A Touch of Truth (Book 28)
An Hour of Need (Book 29)
A Game of Risk (Book 30)
A Twist of Fates (Book 31)
A Day of Glory (Book 32)
Series 5: A Dawn of Guardians
A Dawn of Guardians (Book 33)
A Sword of Chance (Book 34)
A Race of Trials (Book 35)
A King of Shadow (Book 36)
An Empire of Stones (Book 37)
A Power of Old (Book 38)
A Rip of Realms (Book 39)
A Throne of Fire (Book 40)
A Tide of War (Book 41)
Series 6: A Gift of Three
A Gift of Three (Book 42)
A House of Mysteries (Book 43)
A Tangle of Hearts (Book 44)
A Meet of Tribes (Book 45)
A Ride of Peril (Book 46)
A Passage of Threats (Book 47)
A Tip of Balance (Book 48)
A Shield of Glass (Book 49)
A Clash of Storms (Book 50)
Series 7: A Call of Vampires
A Call of Vampires (Book 51)
A Valley of Darkness (Book 52)
A Hunt of Fiends (Book 53)
A Den of Tricks (Book 54)
A SHADE OF DRAGON TRILOGY
A Shade of Dragon 1
A Shade of Dragon 2
A Shade of Dragon 3
A SHADE OF KIEV TRILOGY
A Shade of Kiev 1
A Shade of Kiev 2
A Shade of Kiev 3
THE SECRET OF SPELLSHADOW MANOR
(Completed series)
The Secret of Spellshadow Manor (Book 1)
The Breaker (Book 2)
The Chain (Book 3)
The Keep (Book 4)
The Test (Book 5)
The Spell (Book 6)
BEAUTIFUL MONSTER DUOLOGY
Beautiful Monster 1
Beautiful Monster 2
DETECTIVE ERIN BOND (Adult thriller/mystery)
Lights, Camera, GONE
Write, Edit, KILL
For an updated list of Bella’s books, please visit her website: www.bellaforrest.net
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Copyright © 2017 by Bella Forrest
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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Chapter One
“RUN!” Navan roared.
It was already too late. As I lunged out of the way, the coldblood who had sensed me clutched the fabric of my suit.
“Invisibility suit,” he snarled.
I tried to wrench myself away, but his grip held. His arm didn’t even budge. Now, the other rebel coldbloods were circling me, like panthers about to pounce.
The next thing I knew, Navan was throwing all of his body weight forward. The chair he was tied to crashed into the legs of the coldblood gripping me, and in the millisecond in which his grasp slackened with surprise, I managed to rip myself free. My legs jerked into motion, sending me racing between two coldbloods with their wings spread wide.
“Leave me!” I heard Navan yelling at me from behind.
His request tore me apart, but I pushed my emotions aside. I darted through the open door, and out in the hallway, running as fast as my shaking legs would carry me. Overhead, the fluorescent lights seemed to flicker in time with the word repeating in my head: Run. Run. Run.
I heard the wrenching of metal behind me. A quick glance back revealed a silver door hurtling my way, and I hurriedly ducked—though I didn’t miss the door’s sharp corner, which grazed my cheek in its thundering path down the hallway.
Laughter echoed after it.
“Don’t you know it’s only a matter of time?” a shrill voice called, and I turned to see a coldblood approaching from the end of the hall. He was advancing slowly with his muscled arms out, his hands feeling at the air.
Breathe, Riley, I reminded myself. You’re wearing an invisibility suit, which blunts the ability of regular coldbloods to smell you. This coldblood is probably less powerful than the one back there. Just keep quiet and he won’t find you.
I clapped a hand over my mouth to muffle my terrified exhalations. The coldblood was advancing at a rapid pace, swiping his hand across everything in his path. Painstakingly, I tiptoed forward. The door was only ten feet away, but if he heard me and flew ahead…
Crouching, I scanned the ground. I spotted a tiny, rusty nail and closed my fingers gingerly around it. With one rapid flick of my wrist, I chucked it across the floor. Seconds later, the coldblood had slammed into the wall where the nail had landed. Trembling overtook my body at the sight of the wall’s now caved-in form. If he had heard me, then that would’ve been me.
The coldblood grunted as he recovered and strode closer to me than before, only a few feet away, and advancing fast. As he moved, his silver-haired head roved like a searchlight, his bulging brown eyes set into a glare over his wide, aquiline nose, while his arms lashed out violently. Heart pounding, I tiptoed ahead as quietly and rapidly as I could.
When I reached the set of double doors, I paused. There was no way around it: once I opened them, the coldblood would know exactly where I was.
Now only a couple of feet away, the coldblood had paused too. His roving head stopped to face right where I was. His mouth spread into a fang-toothed smile. His wings unfurled, and I took off.
Bang! The wall where I’d been a second ago bent.
Bang! The door I had just raced through burst off its hinges.
Outside, the harsh wind swiped across my cheek, and I flattened myself against the wall a few feet away, on the left side of the exit.
The remaining door whined as it swung open, and the coldblood’s head appeared, swiveling slowly, a furious scowl overtaking his features. He lunged forward to the right of the door, the side opposite me, striking his arm out at nothing.
By now, my whole body was one trembling gasp away from being discovered. If I moved, he’d find me. And if I didn’t, well… I couldn’t hide for long.
I lifted my foot, then froze as the coldblood threw himself in my direction, stopping mere inches away from me. My heart stilled as he paused. He took one sniff, then another, his nostrils flaring.
And then he shook his head, and swore under his breath.
“You guys going to help or what?” he yelled over his shoulder, presumably to those back in the bunker, and a second later, he raced away, back into the building.
I let out a ragged sigh of relief, and wasted no time finding out whether the other coldbloods would take him up on his request. I staggered away from the bunker, my footsteps picking up speed over the hardened Siberian snow. Only once I’d put a few yards between me and the squat stone structure did I stop and take a look around. I swallowed hard.
While the bunker’s immediate surroundings had been thankfully deserted, here, closer to the main camp, was a different story. A yard or so ahead, it was bustling with activity: coldbloods and shifters threading in and out of brown tents, as well as loitering and talking to their own kind in groups. This tent village extended both ways as far as the eye could see. If I wanted to get around it, the trip would take hours, maybe even longer. Right now, I needed to head back to the ship and alert the Fed using the ship’s comm device. To do that, I had to find the edge of the camp’s invisibility shield. That meant navigating my way directly through the camp, around coldbloods and shifters alike.
My decision reluctantly made, I turned back one last time, fists clenched.
I’ll come back for you, Navan, and get you out of there. Just like I promised.
My fingers rose instinctively to my lips. They were tingling with the memory of our passionate, doomed kiss. I sucked in another deep breath before continuing. If I got caught standing here like a melodramatic idiot, that was not going to help Navan. I had to make it through the camp, and I had to do it now.
As I neared the camp’s border, I practiced taking shallow breaths and light steps. The snow was thankfully not soft, but the frozen ground was muddier around the camp, which would not be that easy to pass over quietly. I also had to hope that I wouldn’t bump into any more highly sensitive individuals like that imposing coldblood back there. If I was heard, smelled, or felt again, there’d be little to no chance of escaping.
A large structure a dozen feet away caught my attention. It was cylindrical, almost like an overgrown metal silo, and it was emitting a low, ominous creaking sound—as if it had something inside it that was turning slowly. My gaze moved to the top of the structure, and I stilled.
Billowing out of the top of the silo-like building, in great big red puffs, was smoke. Deep, red smoke. I’d never seen red smoke before.
That… That can’t be from…
I turned away, a wave of nausea overtaking me at the thought.
Humans. That’s who the coldbloods and shifters have been stealing. Humans like me.
Even as I hurried on, I couldn’t tear my eyes away. I didn’t know the science behind how smoke could even be red like that, but the sight played on my worst fears… and what else could be going on in there? Where were all the humans they’d been bringing to this place?
The questions both terrified me and motivated me. Getting back and telling the Fed about this camp wasn’t just for Navan—it was for all humans, too. If the coldbloods and shifters got their way, we’d be nothing but cattle for their factory farming, with them using our blood to fuel their immortality elixir obsession. I couldn’t let that happen.
At the edge of the tent city stood an old picnic table, with relaxed coldbloods crowding around it and playing some kind of board game. Everyone I passed wore the same ice-blue uniform, while no one seemed to be on the lookout for danger. Apparently, word of my escape hadn’t reached them yet. The whole camp seemed distracted—some stirred up with talk of Navan’s recent capture.
“Jareth’s son—really!” one pudgy shifter woman remarked, her long, bony finger scratching at her veiny neck.
“So they’ll kill him?” another shifter woman asked, her slit eyes blinking rapidly with excitement.
I hurried on before I could hear their answer, but as I continued weaving my way past tents, I took a deep breath. That shifter woman is an idiot, I told myself. I had heard the higher-up coldbloods talking; they wanted to use Navan, not kill him.
Consumed with worry nonetheless, I nearly walked into the muscular arm of a broad coldblood, and I scrambled out of the way with seconds to spare. Luckily, he trudged by obliviously, his footfalls thudding on the frozen ground.
A quick look around bolstered my spirits. Although my head was pounding, I was nearly through the camp. Already, the tents were growing sparser, as were the coldbloods and shifters I had to sidestep.
From what I’d come across, if these coldbloods were anything like the ones on Vysanthe, I could see why Navan didn’t like them. Maybe I was biased, knowing what they were doing to humans, but the coldbloods I passed seemed arrogant and cruel. Some would shove each other as a way of greeting, others merely to assert their dominance. Shifter and coldblood would exchange a few words when necessary, although both mostly kept to themselves. Evidently, old divisions died hard, even when the two species were working together.
Hearing the sound of running feet behind me, I quickly moved to one side.
“The captured coldblood’s human companion has escaped! It may be in the camp now!”
I swore beneath my breath. The speaker was a small, quick-footed shapeshifter, whose thin lips were open wide with what he was yelling: “We can’t let it escape!”
As nearby coldbloods threaded out of their tents and around the little shifter, I gulped. Getting out of here wasn’t going to be as easy as I’d hoped.
“What do you mean ‘escaped’? And how do you know it’s still here? You’re always running around crying about one thing or anoth
er, Haldorf,” a female coldblood jeered as I crept by the small group. Other coldbloods, judging by the expressions on their faces, seemed to share her annoyance and skepticism.
“The human has an invisibility suit,” Haldorf responded in an equally biting tone. “It is probably headed back to its ship. Right now, it could be anywhere—even here.”
As I continued, a coldblood a few feet away commented, “Oh come now, my senses are more powerful than that. If there was any human within a hundred miles of here, you can bet your wee little shifter ass I’d know about it.”
I hurried on, stifling a dry chuckle. Now definitely wasn’t the time to get complacent; I hadn’t made it through yet, though I was at least getting close to the invisibility shield.
I recognized the far-off tent as one of the last things I’d seen before Navan had been snatched. It had all happened so fast that I hadn’t even processed our surroundings. But now, here, half a yard away from it, I recognized the structure, an ice-blue tent that towered above the rest. Housed on top was a camera, its head roving in a way reminiscent of the coldblood that had chased me. A metal skeleton frame supported the tent, wires threading in and out of it. The place was probably some sort of surveillance center. I kept my distance from the tent as I continued—who knew what that hulking high-tech camera was capable of seeing.
Step by step, I neared the spot of thin air that I was pretty sure was the shield. My breathing grew more labored the closer I drew. This was it.
I darted forward, and a quick glance back confirmed that the shimmering globe of the invisibility shield was behind me. I launched into a sprint, and didn’t stop until I reached Navan’s and my broken-down ship.