The Perfect Ten Boxed Set

by Dianna Love

And now for the payoff question: “So,” she said casually, “how’d you get from there to here?”

  He glanced up from checking her catheter bag. His easy expression didn’t change, but she sensed a new edge in him. “I found a new war to fight.”

  She inhaled sharply. There could be no mistaking his meaning. “The vampires, you mean?”

  He produced an instant digital ear thermometer, applied it to her ear canal and nodded his satisfaction. “Normal.”

  Ainsley refused to be distracted. “You didn’t answer me. Is the new enemy the vampires?”

  “They are a contagion that has to be contained.”

  A contagion to be contained. She swallowed to ease her fear-dried mouth. If she were infected…

  Think about something else, Ainsley.

  Her gaze locked on the nurse again. Given what she’d pieced together so far about Delano Bowen’s activities, she figured it was a safe bet he’d picked Eli Grayson with a view to more than just his nursing skills.

  “What do you do for Dr. Bowen, Mr. Grayson?”

  The big man finished making an entry in a hand-held electronic gadget and dropped the PDA in the pocket of his lab coat. Then he met her gaze with a level one of his own, letting her see the soldier beneath the nurse persona. “Whatever he needs me to do.”

  She suppressed a shiver. He meant what he said. And he intended her to know it. Her mind reeled. A soldier who’d left the service of his country to lay his fealty at Delano Bowen’s feet… Who was this Dr. Bowen to command such devotion?

  “And now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to draw just a wee bit of blood so we can check on a few things.”

  She stopped breathing, watching as he prepared to draw blood from the vein in her left arm. “You’d be able to detect it already?”

  He’d moved away from the bed for a moment, returning with a tray of blood collection tubes. “Detect what?”

  “Whether or not I’ve been infected.”

  He looked up from the task or organizing the tubes by their color-coded stoppers, no doubt arranging them by order of draw. Which color was for the vampirism test?

  “Infected?” he echoed, surprise clearly etched on his face. “You mean, with HIV or hepatitis?”

  “With the vampire virus.”

  “Ah, no.” He cleared his throat. “No, nothing like that at this stage. Just the standard stuff you’d look for after such a massive transfusion. You know, hemostatic abnormalities, citrate toxicity, acid-base changes, that kind of thing.”

  Of course. Talk about getting ahead of herself. At this stage, they were just guarding against post-transfusion complications. “Sorry. Go right ahead.”

  Again, his touch was deft as he worked.

  “That’s it for now,” he announced. “I’ll be back at frequent intervals to check on you, but if you need anything at any time, you can page me with this.” He drew a small device from his pocket and placed it on the bed table within easy reach. “Just push the button if you need me, and I’ll be here in under a minute.”

  “Eli?”

  He was halfway to the door with his cargo of blood-filled tubes, and turned. “Yes?”

  “The catheter…”

  He smiled ruefully. “Can’t take it out yet, I’m afraid. But very soon.”

  “That’s not the issue. I know you’ll need to monitor my output for a while. But I was just wondering … did you … I mean, who—”

  Fortunately, he deduced her question before she had to stutter the rest of it out.

  He smiled. “Yeah, it was me. Dr. Bowen called ahead, so I was here and ready for you when you arrived. He did help me get those wet clothes off you and get you into that dry gown and wrapped in some heated blankets, but I did the rest. He may be the MD, but he knows we nurses are the experts at this stuff.”

  She smiled back, unaccountably relieved that it hadn’t been the intense doctor who’d touched her so intimately, if clinically.

  “Thank you.”

  “No problem.”

  “Eli, can I ask you one more question?”

  “Sure.”

  “I know he went out after that vampire who attacked me. He said he’d come back safely, but I know how freakishly strong that creature was. What do you think? Will he come back?”

  If she hadn’t been studying his expression carefully, she might have missed the brief flash of surprise in that flat, handsome face.

  “You don’t miss much, do you, Ms. Crawford?”

  “Ainsley,” she corrected. “And I try not to.”

  “Well, here are two more tidbits you should know about Dr. Bowen. First, if he says he’ll do something, he’ll find a way to do it. And second, he can handle himself very well.”

  On that note, he exited the room with samples in hand, leaving Ainsley alone with her thoughts.

  Her thoughts immediately turned bleak.

  Lucy, I messed up. I messed up so bad. I’m sorry.

  Fortunately, exhaustion overtook her before she could berate herself anymore.

  Chapter 3

  DELANO’S PULSE pounded as he strode down the darkened street. Not from exertion, and certainly not from fear. His pulse pounded because he couldn’t get that picture of Ainsley Crawford out of his mind.

  He’d watched her writhe in her sleep, knowing her dreams were sex-drenched. Watched for long minutes as she touched her breasts and arched her body, until decency finally reasserted itself. He’d been about to wake her when the monitor alarm had gone off, saving him the trouble.

  And saving her some face, no doubt.

  Had he woken her himself, there’d have been no hiding his awareness of her arousal. In which case he would’ve had to explain her state was literally a chemical by-product of her vampire encounter. Powerful, inescapable, but fortunately temporary. Indeed, it was clearly fading as they’d spoken.

  Too bad he couldn’t quell his own reaction quite so easily.

  He shook the thought away and focused on the task. To his annoyance, he found he’d overshot his target. Cursing under his breath, he retraced his steps and turned down the correct boulevard. Two more turns and he stood before Edward Webber’s lair. Of course, he’d staked the place out three weeks ago, so finding it again tonight was no difficult feat.

  Delano found the place unlocked. Carelessness or arrogance?

  Arrogance, he decided. Webber was a mere 50 years old, 21 of those years natural ones. He was a veritable infant among his kind. Short on guile and long on brutality, was our Eddie.

  Eddie was also on death’s door. Delano found him prostrate on the Oriental rug in the living room.

  Closing himself to the smell of fear and impending death, Delano carefully set up his blood centrifuge on the marble-topped table near the spot where Webber had collapsed. Then he knelt beside the vampire to examine him.

  Respiratory distress was patently obvious. The nasal flaring was a dead giveaway, but it was the way Webber’s chest, abdominal and neck muscles labored for each breath that spoke to the depth of his distress. Delano pressed two fingers to Webber’s carotid artery and was not surprised to find the pulse far, far too rapid.

  It did not look good for young Edward.

  Delano opened his medical bag, retrieved the materials he needed, and quickly drew blood for his tests.

  “Bowen…?”

  “Ah, he wakes.” Finished, Delano removed the tourniquet and lifted his gaze to meet Webber’s. Eyes fevered and glassy. Another symptom for his mounting list.

  “Have you … come … to finish me … off?”

  Yes, Webber was not long for this world. No wind at all to get his words out. “No.”

  “Good. Gotta say… feel like shit. Be a sitting duck.”

  “Small wonder you feel bad.”

  Delano stood and crossed to the table, where he slipped a tube of blood into the centrifuge and turned the machine on. Then he returned to Webber’s side.

  A tremor shivered through Webber’s frame. “What’s wrong with me?”<
br />
  Delano dragged a blanket from the unmade bed and draped it over the dying vampire. No, correction: dying man. “Give me a few minutes and I’ll tell you for sure.”

  “What do you think is wrong with me?”

  Webber had to pause after every word or two. Bowen was tempted to tell him to save his breath, but there was little point. He wasn’t getting out of this room alive.

  “What do I think? I think you ate something that didn’t agree with you.”

  A harsh growl. “Fuck you, Bowen.”

  “Indeed.”

  The centrifuge stopped, and Bowen went over to retrieve the tube of blood.

  “What is it?” Webber called. “What … are you doing?”

  Delano lifted his eyes from the tube of blood he’d extracted. It was all he could do to contain the exultation that rose in his chest. None of it showed in his voice as he held up the tube.

  “I just fractionated your blood, so we can get a clear look at your plasma, your white blood cells and your red blood cells. See that severely red-tinged layer on the top? That’s your plasma, the liquid portion of your blood.”

  “What about it?”

  “It’s supposed to be yellow.”

  “Jesus,” Webber croaked. “What are you … saying? Goddammit, Bowen … what have you … done to me?”

  Delano bared his teeth in a smile. “It’s not what I’ve done, Edward. It’s what you’ve done.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You picked the wrong woman to make a meal of.”

  “Wrong woman?”

  Webber lifted his head. He looked like he was having trouble focusing. He’d be dizzy, no doubt. Probably nauseous, too.

  “Which one?”

  Delano sucked his breath in through his teeth. “You fed again? After I drove you away from the woman?”

  “Had to. Felt weak…”

  Dammit. This clouded the matter. “Did you kill that one, Webber? Hmmm? Did you drain her and leave her to die in some alley?”

  He shook his head. “Got away. Too weak to—”

  A mighty spasm wracked the vampire’s body, dragging an agonized groan from deep in his chest.

  Delano watched, crushing the emotions that rose in his own breast. This rogue didn’t deserve pity. He’d slain hundreds — no, thousands — of humans. He’d left a trail of corpses from Halifax to Miami, from Vancouver to Mexico City, and points in between, for nearly 30 years. He was an unrepentant predator, and he richly deserved his fate.

  Delano’s mind slid away to another time, another place, another rogue to whom he’d given the benefit of a doubt. A creature who rewarded his act of compassion by going on to slaughter legions of defenseless men and women.

  “What in God’s name … have you done?”

  “God’s name?” Delano lifted an eyebrow. “Not a bad idea to invoke it now, if you’re ever going to, Edward Webber. Because you’re dying.”

  Webber bared his fangs in a threatening hiss that normally would have made Delano leap back, but this time he made no attempt to move out of range. The vampire, or what was left of him, was too weak to threaten a kitten.

  “Fuck you, Bowen.” Webber’s chest rose and fell rapidly, abdominals pumping ceaselessly like a fish trying to breathe on dry land. “You’re crazy.”

  “I’m afraid you’re the one who’s fucked, as you so crudely put it. The first one you fed on — she was the bad choice. She carries the Merzetti blood.”

  “No!” Another shuddering spasm, another sustained, guttural groan. “No,” he rasped, when he had breath enough to talk again. “That’s a goddamn fairy tale. Told by long-tooths like you to keep the rest of us in line. Won’t work.”

  Slow as that message had come out, Webber had to pause a moment to recover his breath, signaling with an upraised finger that he wasn’t finished.

  “They’re prey, Bowen,” he said when he could continue. “Prey! When you gonna get that through your head? Fucking food is all they are. And we’re at the top of the food chain.”

  “Not anymore, Edward. Not you, anyway.”

  “Shit.” Another shudder, this one weaker. “Merzetti Effect … it’s real?”

  Delano nodded. “As real as the genetic mutation reversal that’s going on inside you right now.”

  “Reversal? Jesus Christ. I’m really … going back?”

  “Yes.”

  “Sucks, but I don’t … see why it means … I’m dying.”

  “Trust me, Edward. You’re dying. Of acute hemolysis, to be specific. But thanks to your feeding again, I don’t know whether this attack on your red blood cells is being mounted by the Merzetti blood or whether it’s your second victim’s blood that’s killing you.”

  “Merzetti bitch… Had to be.”

  “Not necessarily. The mutation reversal might already have begun when you infused yourself with your second victim’s blood. Maybe she just wasn’t your type.”

  “My type?”

  “Your blood type, Edward. You could be suffering from a simple but catastrophic ABO incompatibility.”

  “No!”

  “I’m afraid so. You’re having an acute transfusion reaction. The mutation reversal would leave you open to it.”

  “Jesus!”

  “For what it’s worth, the Merzetti woman’s blood was your type, or at least what your type used to be, pre-mutation. I hoped it would reverse the mutation, but I didn’t know what else it might do. Now, thanks to your muddying the waters with your second meal, I still don’t know.”

  “You picked me! Motherfucker! You lured me … with her … as the bait.”

  “Guilty as charged.”

  Webber made a weak lunge. Delano didn’t even bother to retreat.

  “Kill you! Rip out your heart while it’s still beating … suck it dry.” The fight slowly went out of Webber as he realized the futility of his threat. “Must be something … you can do!” He clutched at Delano with clammy hands. “For God’s sake … Bowen … have mercy!”

  Mercy? Delano felt his face harden. He removed Webber’s hand from his arm.

  “First, Edward, you’d do better to ask for God’s mercy. I have none to give you. And secondly, you’re too far gone for my help. You were too far gone before I drew that blood. Even if I wanted to, I can’t offer you the support you need here. I just don’t have the tools. And you’d never make it to hospital, even supposing they knew what to do with you when you got there.”

  Another tremor. “Then don’t leave me.”

  Delano arched an eyebrow. “To die alone, you mean? Like you left every one of your victims to do?”

  “Please … I’m sorry.”

  Black-hearted sonofabitch wasn’t sorry. He’d do it all over again if he had the chance. But he was dying and he was frightened and he was human, dammit.

  Bowen sat on the nearby bed. “I’ll stay.”

  Chapter 4

  AINSLEY JERKED AWAKE. The room was dark but for a pool of yellow light cast by a small reading lamp in the corner, but she felt none of the usual waking-in-a-strange-room confusion. She knew instantly where she was. And she knew he was there.

  “Dr. Bowen?”

  A soft laugh. “You have extremely keen night vision, Ms. Crawford.”

  She angled her head in the direction of his voice. There. A shadow, to the left of the door. “I don’t know about that. Pretty average, I’d say. But I could sense you in the room.”

  He stepped into the light, or at least his black-clad legs did. Rather long legs, she noticed.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to disturb you. I just wanted to check on you.”

  “I’m feeling much better. Stronger.”

  “So Eli told me.”

  Another step carried him further into the circle of light. Lean hips, the gleam of a belt buckle, the first two buttons on a black shirt, hands hanging loosely at his sides.

  His hands…

  A memory flickered in her brain, shrouded and diffused like sheet lightning puls
ing behind a bank of clouds. Those hands … she’d felt them cradling her head, lifting her torso, felt his lips pressed hotly to her throat…

  God, what was wrong with her? Fantasizing about her rescuer again, for pity’s sake. It was that damned dream. It had been so vivid.

  He took a seat beside her bed, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. The light spilled over his face then. A sharp thrill — half fear, half fascination — shot through her. Oh, man!

  A few strands of wet hair fell forward from that widow’s peak she’d admired before, suggesting he was fresh from the shower. But his jaw was still darkened by the shadow of beard stubble. Had he had that earlier tonight?

  Yes. She’d felt it when he’d carried her. Or at least, she thought she remembered it. And his eyes still burned with all the intensity she remembered. She found herself wishing he’d take off the glasses.

  A panther. That’s what he reminded her of. Powerful, glossy, breathtakingly vital. And extremely dangerous.

  She swallowed to moisten her mouth. “The vampire?”

  “He won’t trouble you again.”

  She couldn’t quite suppress a shiver. “He’s dead?”

  A slight pause, but no flicker of expression. “He’s dead.”

  She digested that, or rather, she tried to.

  Her first reaction was profound relief. It flooded every available brain receptor like a blast of narcotics. Relief that the beast who’d come so close to taking her life had paid with his own life, damn him. Relief that the creature that might have infected her — goddamn him again! — would infect no one else.

  But her relief was followed immediately by horror. Horror at her own reactions. Horror at the actions of the dark Dr. Bowen. If he were right, if vampirism was a blood-borne pathogen, then her attacker was just a man. Granted, he’d treated her as though she were little more than a walking Tetra Pak, but he was nonetheless afflicted and in need of curative treatment.

  And what of her? What if she were to develop this mutation? Would Dr. Bowen dispense with her as easily as he had her assailant? Would his brow be just as unruffled afterward? God, she’d seen Botoxed newscasters with more expression in their foreheads than this man was displaying. And this after admitting to a kill. Or at least, not denying it.