Matthias’s expression was tense. “You can trust me when it comes to the safety of Sara.”
“She’s a dhampyr. A female infant dhampyr.”
“Your point?”
“I know about the immortality ritual you participated in.”
Matthias shook his head. “That was against my will, the final straw in my dealings with Kristoff. That he’d sacrifice his own child—”
“For the chance to live forever. That’s right. Drinking the blood of a dhampyr like Sara could give you that immortality back couldn’t it, Matthias?”
I felt cold. “You’re not suggesting—”
“That Matthias would sacrifice Sara in order to save his long life?” Declan’s face was stony. “Actually, that’s exactly what I’m suggesting. And it’s all the more reason why I won’t tell him where she is.”
I watched Matthias, worried about how he’d react to this. He drew closer to Declan and he didn’t look happy. In fact, I could see a slight tremble to his fists he clenched at his sides.
“She’s my daughter. Other than Kristoff, she’s my only family.”
Declan shook his head. “This doesn’t give you any right to be near her in your current condition. You’re the one who’s admitted you’re near death.”
“You don’t trust me.”
“That’s right. I don’t.”
Matthias looked at each of us in turn. “Then how do I gain your trust?”
Declan frowned. Perhaps he was expecting Matthias to throw a temper tantrum, but he didn’t. I felt his sincerity that he meant his daughter no harm. It made my heart ache a little for him.
Still, I was conflicted.
I wasn’t sure why this conversation was making me so emotional, but I felt tears sliding down my cheeks. “You’re wrong about one thing, Declan, I don’t trust easily. I don’t trust Matthias in many matters, but when it comes to Sara, I . . .” Both men were staring at me now with strange expressions on their faces. “What’s wrong?”
“Jill—” There was a catch to Declan’s voice. “Your face . . .”
I reached up to wipe at my tears. When I pulled my fingers back I saw that they were covered in blood so dark red that it was almost black.
A moment later a curtain of pain descended over me, making me collapse to my knees. I braced myself on the floor, hunched over, and saw the blood drip to the cheap beige carpet there.
After a moment, all I could feel was agony. All I could see was blood.
And then darkness claimed me.
6
THERE WAS LIGHT STREAMING IN THROUGH THE WINDOW when I woke. I sat bolt upright in the bed, but felt a firm hand on my shoulder.
“No, Jill. Lay back.”
I blinked and the world became less blurry. Declan was beside me. A quick scan of the motel room showed we were alone.
“What—?” I touched under my eyes.
“It stopped. The blood stopped right after you passed out. Are you in any pain right now?”
I felt achy, like I’d run a marathon, but there was no intense pain like I’d felt before. “No, I—did that really happen?”
“I’m afraid so.” His expression was stony, cool, and collected, but his hands were warm as he stroked the hair off my forehead. I settled back down on the pillow. “I was worried about you.”
“You don’t look worried.”
His gaze moved to my face and there was again that frustrating flatness to his gray eye thanks to the serum. “My emotions were all fucked up last night, but I’m back to normal now. But don’t think for a moment that I wasn’t worried. That I’m not worried now.”
“The Nightshade,” I said, my voice shaky. “It’s killing me, Declan.”
There was a flicker of something this time in that single eye of his. He knew I spoke the truth. “There’s no reason to believe it’s that serious.”
My throat felt thick and the fear I’d felt before came flooding back. “It felt pretty fucking serious to me. I was bleeding out of my eyes.”
“It stopped.”
“So what happens next?” My voice caught.
“I don’t know.”
I laughed a little and it sounded slightly hysterical. “Well, at least you’re honest.”
He brushed away a tear sliding down my cheek with his thumb. The color of it was clear, not dark red, which was a relief. “I’ll never be anything but honest with you, Jill.”
“Thank you.” I felt guilty for holding information back from him, like who his father really was, but it still didn’t feel like the right time.
He stood up from the side of the bed and walked toward the window to look outside. “Matthias isn’t here anymore. Your blood was too much for him to handle. I guess when it’s inside of you he can find a way to control himself. When it’s not, he needs to be controlled. For his own good.”
I glanced around the room again, this time registering uneasily that several things were askew and there was another deep splintered dent in the wall near the door as if a body had been slammed into it. The lamp was on the floor, broken, as was the television, its screen cracked.
“Looks like there was a fight in here.”
“It was over quickly. The vampire was weakened, so I handled him easily.” At my look of shock, he continued, “I didn’t stake him, even though I was tempted. He seemed as worried about whether you’d live as he was thirsty for your blood.”
I grimaced. “I don’t suppose there’s a Hallmark card for that, is there?”
“I’ve contacted Noah.” Declan pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and glanced at the screen before putting it away again. “He needs to step up his game and find out more about the Nightshade formula and what the hell we can do to fix this.”
“You really think he can get that information?”
“I hope so.”
“Me, too.” The achiness was fading away, so I sat up again. “I think I’m okay, at least for now. I feel much better.”
“Good. I got you some breakfast in case you were hungry when you woke up.” He sat down at the small table in the corner of the room and pulled a large muffin wrapped in cellophane and a small bottle of orange juice out of a brown paper bag.
“Haute cuisine.” I got up from the bed, testing my legs. Declan looked ready to come to help me the moment I showed any signs of needing him, but he stayed where he was. “Thank you.”
His attention didn’t leave me for a moment as I made my way over to the table. I was dressed, but the sweater and jeans I’d been wearing last night had been replaced by a large black T-shirt—one of his. I looked down at myself.
“You cleaned me up?”
“I couldn’t let you lay there covered in blood.”
I had to smile. “So romantic.”
He looked vaguely uncomfortable with the comment. “Eat something. You need your strength.”
“What would I do without you, Declan?”
His lips thinned. “Likely you would have lived a long and healthy life.”
“What’s the fun in that?” I was trying to make a joke to help push away the anxiety I felt, but knew I was failing miserably. “Maybe I should inject the fuser potion Matthias brought me last night right away.”
“I think we should wait. The fuser itself is too hard on your system to use it after one incident. We’ll use it only for emergencies.”
“That felt like an emergency.”
“But it passed, and it was different from the original symptoms you had from the Nightshade.”
Right. That was pain, nausea, and vomiting up a nasty black inky substance.
Will the fun ever end?
Sure it would. With my impending death.
A distraction would be a good thing. Luckily, there were plenty to choose from. “If Matthias couldn’t even hold his own against you, what chance does he have against an indestructible immortal vampire like his brother?”
“He has no chance.”
“There you go again with the brutal hones
ty.” I unwrapped the muffin and began to pick at it. I was hungry, but my stomach felt unsettled. “We can’t just sit by and let Kristoff start working on his new world order like a Hitler with fangs.”
“No, we can’t.”
It felt too big to me to wrap my head around, especially since I’d never met Kristoff before. All I had to go by was Matthias’s opinion of his brother, but that was enough to make me terrified of him.
But how could he be stopped if Matthias was in such bad shape?
Suddenly something occurred to me. “What if Kristoff bites me?”
“What?”
I touched the fang marks on my neck from the blond vampire from last night. “What if he bites me and my blood strips away his immortality like it did to Matthias? Then he could be killed.”
“That’s not going to happen.”
“But—”
“No, Jill.” Although Declan looked emotionless, there was command in his voice. “Put it out of your mind. It’s a stupid idea.”
I felt his words like a slap. “It’s not a stupid idea. It could work.”
He exhaled. “Okay, maybe not stupid. But you’re being naïve. There’s already a rumor about a woman with poisoned blood. He’ll know it’s you. If Matthias can usually control himself around you, then so can Kristoff. If the Nightshade was given to a number of humans, then maybe there’d be a better chance. But there’s only one of you, and I won’t let you put yourself in that kind of danger.” I opened my mouth to say something but he held up his hand. “The discussion is over, Jill.”
I wanted to argue with him. One of the reasons I’d had a hard time keeping a job back in my regular life was that I was allegedly “difficult to manage.” I liked to do my own thing even if it didn’t follow the rules to the letter. This didn’t go over well with management—any management. I guess I just had a very specific way of thinking that didn’t jive with most other people. When I got an idea into my head, it was nearly impossible for me to ignore it. Even if it was a shitty idea.
This wasn’t a shitty idea, but I did get why Declan had a problem with it. He didn’t want me to get hurt. He didn’t want me to put myself in harm’s way. It was what he fought against on a daily basis. He tried to protect me, even from myself. He even refused to teach me how to use a gun even though I’d asked him several times. His theory was if I stayed out of trouble, I wouldn’t need one. It was one of the many things we disagreed about.
I inhaled deeply. “I’m not that naïve.”
“Sometimes you can be when it comes to shit like this, Jill. And that extends to your dealings with Matthias, as well.”
My jaw tightened. “Which means what?”
His knuckles grew whiter on the edge of the table he currently gripped. “He’s not a noble knight on a quest to save humanity. He’s a vampire who drinks blood and lived a selfish life of luxury, using the fear of his subjects to keep them in line, at least until that luxurious existence of his was taken away.”
My mouth felt dry and sour so I took a swig of the sweet orange juice. “I know all of that. But I honestly don’t think he’d hurt Sara. He might be a bastard when it comes to a lot of things, but I honestly think he’s”—I hissed out a breath as I tried to think of the right word—“sincere when it comes to his daughter.”
“He would have sank his fangs into you last night if I hadn’t stopped him. And if he was right about his lacking immortality, your blood would have killed him. He still couldn’t resist it. That worries me about his impulse control.”
My grip tightened on the bottle. “And what about you?”
“What about me?”
“You said my blood . . .” I hesitated. “Last night when you—when you lost control. I’m worried that could happen again.”
He stood up from the table so fast that I jumped. “Last night my mind was elsewhere. But I can control myself when my head’s in the game. Your blood is distracting to me, but it’s not torture being around you because thankfully I’m not a full vampire. For Matthias, I believe it is.”
“Quite a compliment,” I said dryly. “I’m torture to be around.”
“If Anderson had lived to see Nightshade in action, I’m sure he would have been proud to see how successful it is.”
I shivered at the memory of my bloody tears. “Matthias really couldn’t stop himself?”
“That’s right.”
I thought it through. “So if we use my blood to get to Kristoff, I’ll have to cut myself first. Make sure I’m bleeding. Then, just like Matthias, he’d have a harder time controlling himself.”
Declan looked at me directly. “I advise you to let this subject drop, Jillian.”
I bit my bottom lip. “Uh-oh. Full-name usage. Somebody’s not happy with me right now.” My gaze moved from him to something laying on the table next to us. It was a file folder. “What’s that?”
He put his scarred hand on top of it. “Some research I’ve been doing.”
“On what?”
“Dhampyrs.”
“What about dhampyrs?”
He eyed me. “Sometimes I forget how many questions you ask.”
Despite everything, I almost grinned. “If you want answers, you have to ask questions.”
He flipped the folder open and inside I saw printouts, photos, handwritten notes, and other typed documentation. “I’ve been looking into other dhampyrs that have existed in the area, trying to understand more about what I am. Carson never wanted me to learn about this. But the events of the past couple of weeks, his association with Dr. Gray all of these years, and everything he kept from me, have made me question a lot about what he always told me and what he made me do.”
“Like the original serum.”
“Yeah.” He paced to the other side of the room and back, his arms crossed over his chest. “When I went off it I felt fine, other than having to suddenly deal with my fucked up emotions. So I thought he was wrong about everything he’d ever told me. He made me believe that without the serum I’d eventually become just like the monster dhamps.”
My chest tightened. I wasn’t sure I liked where this conversation was headed. It reminded me too much of the one I’d had last night with Matthias on this very subject.
Declan’s emotionless face was like stone as he looked down at the research he’d gathered. He said nothing for so long that I reached out and touched his hand.
“Declan . . . what’s wrong?”
He blinked. “I don’t want to be a monster, Jill.”
He said it flatly, but there was pain in his expression. “You’re not.”
He shook his head. “I’ve killed a lot of vampires in my life and I’ve done so without any guilt because I hate them. But . . . but last night . . .”
“You didn’t hurt me.”
“I wanted to. For a second, I wanted to. And that’s not acceptable to me.”
“It’s the new serum that caused that,” I said firmly. “It’s a shitty side effect, and with Noah’s help we’re going to find a way to get it out of your system completely. It’s simple.”
“You’re right, it is simple, but not for the reasons you’re thinking.”
“Then what?”
He glanced at the damage he’d done to the bed last night before looking at me. “My father was right about everything.”
I shook my head, panic rising inside me again. “No, he was only saying those things to keep you in line.”
“He was saying those things because they were the truth. I didn’t want to believe it, but it’s the truth. And the research I’ve been doing the last week has led me to that conclusion.”
“Research,” I repeated, glancing at the thick file folder. “Is that where you head off to all alone?”
“Yes.”
“And that’s the reason we’re in Los Angeles right now?”
“I had a few things I needed to check here.”
So much for him not keeping secrets from me. But I didn’t hold it against him. Sometime
s you had to handle personal matters personally. And this was about as personal as it got. But now that it was out in the open ...
I grabbed the file folder and looked at some of the pages. Each one seemed to be a case study with a name at the top and a date. Two dates. The birth date and the date of death for whomever was mentioned.
My hands felt cold as I flipped through the papers. “And what did all of this tell you?”
He scrubbed a hand over his scalp and came to stand next to me, looking down at the papers. “It tells me that my father was right. A dhampyr born with the human side dominant will become more violent the older they get. In fact, there are very few dhampyrs who live beyond three decades.”
My gut churned. “Why? Do they get sick?”
He shook his head. “Nearly every case I’ve found, the dhampyr has been killed. Usually in self-defense. I only found one other than me that’s still alive and in the area. The rest are dead.” His face had paled and the scars on his left cheekbone looked like shiny streaks. “Look for yourself at my notes. They’re murderers, rapists, child molesters. At a certain point, even if they are on medication like I was, it stops working. The proof is right there.”
“You’re different,” I said without hesitation, although my heart was sinking. This is exactly what Matthias had told me. I hadn’t wanted to believe it then, either.
“When I was on the regular serum, I was different, because that side of me was repressed. But the new serum can’t control the monster that’s waking up inside of me. There’s no going back.”
My eyes burned. I closed the folder and stood up. “I don’t accept that.”
He snorted. “You don’t?”
“No.”
“Just like that.”
“That’s right. Let me tell you something, Declan. I know you. Sure it’s only been a couple of weeks and those weeks haven’t exactly been a joy ride, but you’re a good man. You’re one of the best—if not the best—men I’ve ever known in my entire life.”
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