The night didn't scream. It whispered.
It began with the sharp click of metal against glass subtle, almost delicate. A sound so quiet it should've gone unnoticed. But Adrian's ears caught it immediately. He bolted upright in bed, every nerve alight.
Kai stirred beside him. "What is it?" he whispered, still half-asleep.
Adrian didn't answer. He was already moving naked feet silent on the wooden floor, his body coiled and tense like a predator on the hunt. The security alarms hadn't triggered. That was the part that sent ice down his spine.
Someone had bypassed his system.
He pressed a button hidden beneath the bedside drawer. A faint hum echoed through the walls reinforced shutters sliding over the windows, locking the house down.
"Stay here," Adrian growled, grabbing the blade hidden behind the bookshelf.
Kai was fully awake now, heart pounding. "No. I'm coming with you."
Adrian turned to protest, but the look on Kai's face silenced him. That same look he'd worn when he stood between Adrian and death weeks ago. Unshakable. Fierce. Stubborn as hell.
"…Fine," Adrian muttered. "But stay close."
They crept through the hallway like shadows, Adrian leading, Kai close behind. Every creak of the floor, every shifting breeze outside the window, made Kai's skin crawl.
Then they saw it.
The back door was open.
Adrian's breath hitched. I locked that. He was certain. There were only three people in the world who knew how to crack that lock, and one of them was long dead.
He motioned for Kai to stay put and stepped outside into the cold night.
Nothing.
Then movement.
From the trees at the far edge of the property, figures emerged. Two… no, three. Clad in black, faces obscured, but Kai could feel it vampires. Adrian had called them scavengers once. The low-level kind. But their presence meant one terrifying thing:
They'd found them.
Adrian didn't hesitate. He threw his blade, catching one square in the throat before it could move. The vampire crumpled, gurgling. The others charged, fangs bared, hissing like animals.
Kai didn't freeze.
He threw a surge of energy from his core a pulse of his omega aura so potent it made the second vampire stagger, clutching their head in pain. Adrian finished the job with a knife to the chest, twisting until the body went limp.
The third? Coward.
He ran.
Adrian nearly chased him but Kai collapsed.
"Kai!" Adrian caught him before he hit the ground. His body was trembling violently, sweat beading on his brow. "What the hell was that?"
Kai blinked slowly, chest heaving. "I...I don't know. I just… I felt this power. Like a fire inside me. But now…"
He went limp again.
Adrian lifted him into his arms, panic clawing at his throat. "Hold on, mi amor. I've got you."
But as he carried him back into the house, something gnawed at him. That vampire… hadn't been attacking.
He'd been scouting.
Marking.
And he'd gotten away.
Which meant… this wasn't an isolated hit.
It was the beginning.
Adrian kicked the door shut behind them, bolting it tight, though he knew a lock was useless if those bastards came back in force. He laid Kai gently on the couch, brushing the sweat-soaked strands of hair from his omega's forehead.
"Kai… baby, come on. Talk to me," he whispered, voice strained.
Kai's eyelids fluttered. "M'tired…" he murmured, voice barely audible. "It felt like… I reached inside something too big. Like… like it wasn't mine."
Adrian clenched his jaw, fury simmering in his gut not at Kai, but at the audacity of the world to try and rip him away.
"You did good, mi amor," Adrian said, voice low, soothing. He cupped Kai's cheek. "You saved us both. Again."
But in his mind, a storm was brewing. That display of power wasn't natural not for an omega. Not even for a rare one. And it sure as hell wasn't just a desperate burst of instinct.
Something had changed.
Adrian stood, grabbed his phone, and called the only person he trusted with this kind of madness Lucien, the exiled vampire warlock who owed him more than a few favors.
"Yeah?" came Lucien's groggy voice on the other end.
"They're back. They came for us tonight," Adrian growled. "And Kai… something's not right with him. He tapped into something. It wasn't just strength it was ancient."
There was a pause, then Lucien's voice dropped into a whisper. "You need to get him somewhere safe. Now."
Adrian glanced at the front door, at the blood trail leading out into the trees. "We're not running."
"You don't understand," Lucien hissed. "If Kai accessed that kind of power, they're going to want him. And if it's the kind of power I think it is… Adrian, he might be more than just an omega."
Adrian's stomach sank. "What the hell does that mean?"
"It means," Lucien said, voice tight with dread, "that Kai might be the last remnant of something we buried centuries ago. Something powerful enough to end all of us."
Adrian hung up without a word.
He turned back to Kai, who now stirred with more life in his eyes, though his body was still trembling. Adrian wrapped a blanket around him, pulling him close, as if his own body heat could shield him from destiny.
"I won't let them have you," he whispered fiercely against Kai's hair. "I don't care what's in your blood, or what the hell they think you are. You're mine. And I will burn down the world before I let them take you."
Kai nestled into him with a faint hum, eyes fluttering closed again. But Adrian didn't sleep that night.
He sat on the edge of the couch, blade in hand, watching the door.
Waiting.
Because he knew this fragile peace was already crumbling and the real war hadn't even begun.