by Elisa Paige
“Nic,” Siska warned in a low voice. “What’re you doing?”
In the rearview mirror, I caught the white flash of her teeth against her dusky skin and had time to think oh shit. She hammered the brakes and threw the SUV into a tire-squealing slide. Siska swore, Nic laughed out loud and I clung to the door handle, hoping fervently I didn’t whack my tortured leg.
When we stopped moving, I lifted my head to look out the window and was astonished to see we were fitted perfectly in the narrow spot—Nic’s insane job of parking had just cleared the four-door in front of the SUV and the Jeep behind us.
“Next time, I drive,” Siska snarled, climbing out and slamming his door.
“Like you could park better.” Nic grinned, looking plenty happy with herself.
I pried my fingers from the door handle and sat up gingerly, the aches and pains revived by my full-body clench. I was trying really, really hard to ignore my left leg. And it really, really wasn’t working.
Siska came around to the driver’s side rear door and opened it, easing me with surprising care from the backseat and bracing me while I leaned against the SUV. It seemed he was counting under his breath.
Nic got out and stood next to me, still grinning.
“The sachem ordered me to watch over his family’s line, White Owl,” he growled. “Do I have to remind you that you’re the last one?”
Her amusement faded in an instant. In a voice soft as silk, she told me, “Siska uses my tribal name when he’s pissed off, like it’s supposed to make me straighten up and obey an elder.” Shoving past us, she walked away but her words easily carried. “When I’m dead, you’ll be free, Running Wolf. With no more obligations.”
“Dammit.” He swore under his breath. “That’s not what I meant.”
Taking a deep breath against my leg’s throbbing agony, I gimped excruciatingly to the SUV’s back bumper. “She has to know that.”
“Sometimes I wonder.” His voice was so faint, I didn’t think he meant for me to hear.
My vision swooped as though I was sliding down a black tunnel as blood loss took its toll and the world tilted. When everything steadied, I was in Siska’s arms and he was striding along, carrying me without effort.
“This is so undignified,” I muttered, but couldn’t bring myself to tell him to put me down. The idea of walking right now was vastly unappealing. “Where are we going anyway?”
“The motel where we’ve been staying.” He gave me an amused look. “You could use a little cleaning up and I need to take care of that knee before it heals badly.”
“Thanks, but I can handle it.”
Siska lifted a brow, but didn’t respond.
I sniffed. “I smell water.”
“Lake Michigan is three blocks east of here.” A door banged open somewhere up ahead and around a corner and we both heard the sound of humans approaching. Siska looked down at me. “Do you have the energy to hide us?”
The answer was a resounding “no,” but it went against my instincts to admit an additional weakness. Willing it to be true, I said, “Sure.”
With plain cussedness, I managed to shade our forms just as two middle-aged couples rounded the corner ahead. Siska stood to the side so they could walk past us—I’d have to tell him later that the humans could’ve walked through us at that moment and never known the difference.
When the couples were gone, I let our forms solidify, trying really hard to not pass out. A half-dozen of Siska’s long-legged strides and we were at the guests’ entrance between the garage and the hotel. A still-angry Nic was waiting for us there and opened the card-key door without comment.
Siska’s voice was soft by my ear. “A quick elevator ride and you can rest, Sephti.”
Blinking, I looked up at him and was surprised by the kindness in his gaze. It took a few tries, but I managed to croak, “Shower first. Then food. Then rest.”
“Your knee needs attention.”
I clenched my teeth. “I’ll deal with it.”
He chuckled. “Koda was right. You are stubborn.”
We got to the elevator then and I was thrilled not to encounter any more humans on the way to our room. I said as much while Nic unlocked the door and we entered the nondescript two-room suite.
She laughed humorlessly. “Just one of the joys of hanging out with a mature vampire.”
“Oh?” I asked, not understanding the bitter undercurrent in her voice.
“You must really be out of it not to sense how he’s projecting. Even my lowly human senses feel it.”
The muscles in Siska’s jaw tightened as he headed for a door that led to the bathroom. I pushed it open and he turned sideways to get me through without banging my leg on the frame.
“What’s going on?” I asked quietly. “Why is she so angry?”
His somber eyes flicked to my face as he set me down on the toilet’s closed lid. “Is there anything else you need?”
It didn’t escape my notice that he hadn’t answered the question. Shrugging inwardly, I considered his offer but hesitated saying anything. I didn’t like owing anyone.
Siska lifted a brow. “Tell me.”
“I wouldn’t ask, but I just got a new bike after the last one melted.”
“You want me to go get it?” When I nodded, he flashed a quick grin and it occurred to me that he might welcome some time away from Nic’s escalating temper.
I gave Siska directions to the garage where I’d left the Ninja and handed him the key. Any anxiety I’d had about someone else riding my motorcycle dissolved at his almost lustful look when I told him it was loaded. Then he asked me how fast it would go and my anxiety came back a thousandfold.
“Not a scratch!” I called to him as he left the bathroom and crossed the sitting area. “I know you hear me, Siska!”
The outer door opened and shut, but not before I caught his wicked laugh.
I peeled off my jacket, wincing as the wounds on my neck and a long one on my side stretched. Slipping off the daggers’ belts from around my waist, I laid them on the counter beside me. A quick look down confirmed my assumption—the new T-shirt with the glittery skull was a total loss. And when I let my gaze travel further to look for the first time at my mangled left leg, so were my pants.
The knee had swollen grotesquely and blood adhered the once-beautiful black leather to my skin. Swearing, I slipped a dagger from its sheath and oh-so-carefully placed its wicked-sharp tip against the ripped pants. Still exhausted, my hands were anything but steady. Breathing deep and trying to get the trembling under control, I grimaced at how much worse things could get if I stabbed myself trying to get undressed.
I was so focused on the task, I didn’t notice I had an audience until Nic swore and stomped over to me. “You’re almost as bad as I am.” She held her hand out for the dagger, imperious.
I stared at her.
Her scowl deepened. “Being mortal, I have a finite time to live. I’d just as soon not blow it watching you act all paranoid.”
“My instincts are unpredictable.” I swallowed. “I’m not sure it’s wise for you to be armed so close to me.”
“You’re serious.”
“Yeah. I don’t want to kill you.”
Nic’s automatic laugh died at my expression and anger flickered in her black eyes. “If I wanted to, I could have killed you half a dozen times by now.”
I gave her a soft smile, showing her my sharp teeth and letting my awareness slip its leash to fill the small bathroom. “No, Nic.” I laced the words with a lot of growl. “You could not.”
Her tawny skin flushed. “Then I’d bleed all over you and haunt your sorry fae ass for eternity. Now give me the damned blade.”
“I’m not fae,” I grumbled reflexively. Focusing inward, I poked at the savage part of me like you’d jab at a sleeping dragon. When nothing stirred, I looked sideways at Nic.
She flapped her empty hand. “Growing old here.”
Having to laugh, I tossed the dagger easil
y into the air. Catching it with practiced care by the flat of the blade, I held out the grip to her, grinning that she’d taken a step back at my suddenness.
“I’ll remind you that this was your idea,” I said with a wry twist to my mouth. “Why’d you jump? You hang out with a vampire, I’d think you’d have a pretty high threshold for speedy moves.”
Giving me a dirty look, she took the dagger, knelt and examined my leg. “You move differently than a vampire.”
Relieved that my instincts were still quiescent, I watched Nic’s bent head. “How so?”
She eased stuck-on leather away from the top of the deep wound and flicked a sympathetic glance at me when I hissed. Slipping the blade’s razor-sharp tip through the pants, she whistled appreciatively at the ease with which it sliced through. “I’ve got to get one of these knives.”
I considered telling her they came with a price far steeper than the keen ehrlindriel weapons deserved, but didn’t have the emotional energy to go there.
Easing leather from brutalized skin and exhibiting far more gentleness than I would have expected, she answered my question. “I’m not as familiar with other vampires. But with Siska, you never even see him move. He’s so fast, he just appears wherever he wants to be.”
Wanting something to think about besides the agonizing drag of my pants being peeled away from my mangled thigh, I said, “I was surprised to see a human and vampire together.”
“Yeah, we get that a lot.”
“What’s it like for you?”
Nic worked in silence for a while, her head down so I couldn’t see her face. Just when I thought she wasn’t going to respond, she said, “His awareness and power are like being next to a dozen downed electric lines. It vibrates in your bones. In your teeth.”
“That’s not really what I meant.”
“I know.”
I drew breath to make a snappy come-back when Nic’s forearm brushed across my swollen knee. Its steady, just-this-side-of-tolerable pain erupted into a scorching volcano.
“Sorry.” She saw my surprise and the corner of her mouth lifted. “I am. Especially since this next bit is going to hurt like a sonuvabitch.”
Before I could ask what she meant, she jerked one side of the sliced-open pants away from its hold on my thigh, the adhesion spreading the wound’s lips and tugging at my knee. The breath fled my lungs, and had I been capable of swearing, I’d’ve turned the air blue with it. I gasped, clutching at the counter and working to remain upright.
Nic sat back on her heels, waiting while I panted through clenched teeth. Part of me was intrigued that, even though she was the cause of the blazing agony, my instincts remained quiet.
When my breathing was back under control and I could more or less focus, I nodded for Nic to continue.
“The last section will go easier,” she reassured me. “The blood flowed down and stuck the pants to your lower leg, but there aren’t any wounds to contend with. I’ll do my best not to jar your knee.”
I muttered something unintelligible.
Picking up her earlier train of thought, she said, “You move differently than Siska. Differently from anyone I’ve ever known. And there’s an awareness to you that reminds me of tigers I’ve seen at the zoo. You can almost feel the way they’re categorizing everything around them as either prey or competition. There’s an intensity in their bodies, even at rest. A too-aware light in their eyes when they look at you. The tension builds and builds and all they’re doing is just lying there. Then when the attack finally comes, it’s an explosion of lethal motion—all the more shockingly violent for its absolute suddenness.”
I felt my face blanch. “That’s how you see me?”
Nic nodded. “So do you want to slice the waist open or you want me to do it?”
“I can manage that part, thanks.” Accepting the dagger from her, I made short work of the pants left between the top of my thigh and the waistband, then slit the right side down that leg and tossed the useless scraps of leather in the trash can. Easing the torn and bloody T-shirt off, I hurled it to join them.
“You have anything else to wear?” Nic asked.
Twisting my mouth into a rueful smile, I shook my head. “I travel light.”
She nodded as if I’d just confirmed something she’d been thinking—something that had nothing to do with clothing.
I made it to my feet and hobbled toward the tub, glancing over my shoulder at Nic as she leaned her hip against the bathroom counter. She looked stricken as she stared at my body.
I turned on the hot water and glanced down, belatedly realizing I was in just a bra and panties. “Sorry. I keep forgetting not everyone is okay with—”
She made a noise in her throat. “It’s just…I’ve never seen so many scars on one person. You look like you went through a meat grinder. A couple times.” Nic shook herself. “Sorry. That was unintentionally rude.”
I quirked a brow at her.
“I’m always rude on purpose, but not then.” Her brief humor faded and there was a question in her eyes she seemed hesitant to ask.
“What?”
She surprised me by blushing, since I hadn’t imagined her capable of it. “I was just wondering why your hands, neck and face aren’t scarred.”
I busied myself adjusting the faucets. “The stable master was allowed to do whatever he liked, so long as the results could be covered by clothes. The lord said scars turned his stomach.”
“Bastard.” Nic’s sudden rage was both touching and disturbing.
I shrugged. What was there to say?
She looked at me with her jaw set, but I had the sense she understood. Pushing away from the counter, she paused in the doorway. “Towels are under the sink. Yell if you need anything.”
“Thanks.”
Nic gave me a shy smile. It made her look very young and I imagined its effect on Siska if he were to see it. “Yeah, well, if you tell anybody I was nice, I’ll shoot you and make sure it hurts.” She shut the door on my laugh.
I finished undressing with great care, wincing at the throb of cracked ribs, torn flesh, sore muscles…the usual assortment after losing myself to a frenzy. Worse than the physical pain—which sucked big time—was the deep shame of having lost control. I’d been doing so well, dammit. Not since that night in Dallas had I blown it.
I eased carefully into the shower, swearing as the pounding hot water did unspeakable things to my wounds. Pain and exhaustion conspired to keep the clean-up to maybe five minutes, a record for me. When I’d finished toweling off, I noticed that Nic had slipped in and left a T-shirt and sweatpants on the counter. Smiling to myself that she wasn’t quite the hard-ass she liked to pretend, I got dressed and finger-combed my wet hair.
Swaying with weariness, I opened the door and hobbled out into the motel’s living area. Nic was working on a laptop computer and grunted a greeting as I staggered to the oversize sofa. Easing myself down onto it, I grabbed two cushions and gingerly settled my knee onto them. The bent position and elevation helped, although the joint was still cantaloupe-sized. When I shoved up the pants leg, I saw that the chunk bitten out of my thigh was no longer bleeding, but it looked like raw meat.
“Heads up,” Nic called before tossing a rolled-up tan bandage at me. “Wrap your knee with that. It’ll help.”
“Strangely enough, I’ve done this before.” I smiled at her to soften my sarcasm.
She turned back to her computer. “That reeks.”
“Yup.”
Practice made for quick work and I had my knee bandaged in no time. Leaning back, I reflected on how different this suite was from the last I’d stayed in. And how different the company. Down that path lay dangerous emotion and impossibilities, so I stuffed it all into the deepest recesses of my mind.
Closing my eyes, I explained, “I need to rest so I can heal. Don’t come too close to me or make any sudden moves, though. Okay?”
I could feel her dark regard as she rotated her desk chair to look at me
. “I can see rooming with you won’t ever be boring. Do you always warn people before you drift off to la-la land?”
Yawning, I shook my head. “You’re my first.”
There was a long silence. “It’s because I’m human, right?”
I cracked an eye open. “I don’t intend any insult.”
Her mouth twisted. “Nobody ever does.”
I couldn’t think of a response to that, so I shut my eye. Making a sleepy noise, I tried unsuccessfully to stifle another yawn. “No touching me, either.”
Her dry voice made me smile. “There go my plans for the night.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Geez.” Nic snorted. “I thought Siska was literal.”
I shifted my shoulders to get more comfortable. “What do you suppose is taking him so long?”
“Probably the mass demonstrations.”
“Huh?” I craned my neck to stare at the back of Nic’s head.
Without turning to look at me, she nodded. “Orchestrated using Twitter and Facebook, about an hour before the demonstrators were told to take to the streets. Not just Chicago. L.A., New York and Houston, too. There would’ve been one in Boston, but the weather sucked.”
“Are they all humans?” She nodded again and I winced. This couldn’t be good. “To what purpose?”
“Depends who you talk to.” She typed at top speed. “Chicago P.D. says at least fifty thousand are demonstrating here.”
“But why?” I started to sit up, but stilled when she turned toward me and waved me back down.
Nic rubbed a weary hand across her face and slouched in her chair, idly turning it side to side. “The ‘why’ of it is always fear when that many people take to the streets. Which easily morphs into anger, especially dangerous in a crowd that size.” Fingering a delicate turquoise necklace at her throat, she grimaced. “Philippe’s on-air bloodfest woke humans up. There will always be those who doubt everything they see, but the majority understand now that the world isn’t what they thought. Neither is their place in it. So they make their signs and parade through the streets, proclaiming their outrage and demanding Somebody Do Something.” Nic emphasized the words in a fake announcer’s voice, wrinkling her nose with distaste.