Aidan laughed and pulled himself off the sofa, coming to stand in front of her. Her pulse sped at his nearness, and she wondered if she had the same effect on him—probably not. No matter what he said about wanting her, she didn’t have the looks for somebody like him. She looked like a flat-chested geek next to that woman Lucy. That vampire Lucy.
He bared his fangs slightly, and she reached out and touched an index finger to the tip of one canine. It was razor sharp but delicate, extending about a quarter-inch longer that of a human, and it was slightly curved. She tugged on it, but it felt real and didn’t give. It was a damned fang.
As she pulled her hand away, she felt a sting and saw blood well up on her finger where she’d nicked the tip. She raised her eyes to Aidan’s. He’d grown still, his irises a wintry blue, his pupils dilated. On his face was an expression of stark hunger.
Damned if this woman wasn’t going to be the death of him. He’d fought a raging hard-on since he got to the suite, and now Krys stood there with her finger in the air, blood trickling slowly from the cut, studying his face as if he was a specimen under a microscope.
Aidan reached for her hand and lifted her finger to his mouth. She didn’t pull away, so he slid his lips around her fingertip, sucking out a tiny extra measure of her sweet, rich taste before caressing the cut with his tongue.
“Oh.” She gasped and pulled her hand away from him.
“You OK?” He stroked a hand down her arm, wanting to hold her but not daring to move too fast. He’d come here tonight expecting her to be overcome with fear and revulsion. Instead, after the shock of it, she’d been more curious than frightened. And, by some miracle, she still wanted him, even knowing what he was. He could tell from her heartbeat and the heat wafting off her skin. So much for thinking that the truth would drive her away and let him bury his asinine mating instincts six feet under. They’d not only dug their way out; they were building a damned pyramid.
She stared at her fingertip. “It’s healed. How did you do that?”
“We’re predators, Krys.” He needed to keep reminding her, as well as himself. He wasn’t just a man with fangs. “One way we survive is that our saliva contains a chemical that can produce pleasure in those we feed from, and then heal them quickly.”
She shook her head. “So you make it feel good when you feed, and you don’t kill the people you feed from?” She continued to watch her finger, pressing on it, looking for any sign of the wound.
Time for a dose of reality. “A lot of vampires kill their victims. They enjoy it, even make a sport of the hunt and capture. But we’re trying to make a different kind of life here, one where we can remember at least a little of what it felt like to be human. Where the people who keep us alive are treated with respect and friendship. Believe me, keeping you here against your will goes against everything I believe in.”
Krys gave him a doubting look. “Sorry, but you sound naïve.”
Aidan smiled. “You’re not the first—”
The sounds of movement from the hallway caught his attention. Time for her to see another reality. “We may need you tonight,” he said, opening the door. Melissa stood in the hallway, giving them a tentative smile.
Krys frowned. “Mark should be recovered by now.”
“The patient isn’t Mark,” Aidan said. “It’s Mirren. Will you help us?”
Several emotions played across Krys’s face at once—at least one of which, he was sure, was a curse. But after a pause, she nodded and followed him across the hall.
She was treated to the sight of Mirren Kincaid, all six-foot-monstrous of him, sitting on the sofa in a room just like hers. He looked even worse than he had at the meeting two hours ago.
Mirren glanced up at Krys with misery-filled eyes and nodded, then turned a hard glare on Aidan. “I’ll be damned if I’ll let you use these.” He picked up what looked like a pile of silver-linked chains and threw them with enough force that Aidan had to take a step back to avoid being clocked.
“Then you are damned, my friend, because you will use them.” Aidan picked the chains up and advanced toward the sofa. “Nobody’s self-control is that good.”
Melissa moved around Aidan to stand beside Krys.
Aidan looked back at them. “Mirren absorbed more of that vaccinated blood last night than we thought. So we’re going to drain out the bad stuff and replace it with fresh blood.” He turned back to his lieutenant. “And he’s going to let us use the silver chain on him so he doesn’t get all nasty and hurt somebody, isn’t he?”
Mirren’s jaw tightened. “Fuck you.”
Aidan took a length of chain and wrapped it around Mirren’s right wrist, then stretched it to a rear sofa leg and fastened it with a padlock. “Sorry, mo chara,” he said softly, repeating the action with the right wrist. With his arms secured, Mirren’s mobility was limited. He slouched further on the sofa and glared at anyone who’d make eye contact.
Aidan glanced at Krys to see if she was frightened, but she and Melissa were whispering. Melissa was explaining how silver reduced a vampire’s strength to that of a human, and Krys was asking about Mirren’s symptoms.
He fought back a smile. “What would you guess is wrong with him if he were human?”
Krys looked shocked till Melissa said drily, “Something you should probably know—they hear everything. There’s really no point in whispering around them.”
“Ah. Well.” She turned a sexy-as-hell shade of pink. “Clammy skin, pallor, tremors.” She frowned as her eyes scanned Mirren’s face. “Have you been nauseated? Vomiting?”
Everyone stared at her except Mirren, who propped his head on the back of the sofa and closed his eyes.
“He has,” Aidan said. “What would your diagnosis be?”
“Probably food poisoning.” As soon as the words were out, she groaned. “I mean, I don’t know if you eat. Well, I guess you don’t eat. You drink, or—something.” She shrugged and blushed furiously.
Mirren started laughing, a low rumble at first, and then a choking, gasping sound. Aidan stared at him. Mirren never laughed. He might smile every once in a while, but laugh?
Aidan grinned at Krys. “I’d say you’re a pretty good doctor.” In more ways than one. She’d defused the tension in the room without realizing it.
“How far off was I?” she asked.
“I told you the pandemic vaccine turned human blood poisonous to us.” Aidan looked down at Mirren. “Our enemies have gotten a supply of vaccinated blood. The buckshot that caught him last night had been scored and then soaked in it. He didn’t get enough to kill him, thanks to you, but he got enough to make him sick.”
Krys looked worried. “I don’t know what to do for that.”
“All you have to do is hit a vein,” Aidan said, nodding at Melissa. She handed over a needle, an IV line, some empty bags, and other supplies.
“Explain it,” Krys said. “What am I giving him?”
“You’re not giving, darlin’. You’re taking,” Mirren answered. He was still slumped against the sofa back, but he watched her through hooded eyes. “You have to bleed me out.”
“Oh, no.” Krys thrust the needle back at Melissa, who shook her head and retreated, hands up.
“It’s the quickest way for him to get better,” Aidan said, wishing he’d spent more time preparing her for this and less time acting like a love-starved idiot. “If we wait for the poison to work its way out of his system, he’ll be out of commission for at least a week. I really need you to do this.” He paused for a beat. “Please.”
She squared her shoulders and nodded, then took the IV bag from Melissa and walked to the sofa. Mirren had closed his eyes again but she talked to him softly as she worked. “Are you sure this won’t kill you?”
Mirren grunted. “No, I’ll just wish I was dead.”
“Once you’ve drained him enough, we’ll feed him,” Aidan said. “The chains are for your safety, not his.”
Krys blinked but didn’t respond. She tied o
ff Mirren’s arm, found a good vein, and deftly slid the needle in and taped it in place. Other than a slight flare of his nostrils, Mirren didn’t react as the blood raced through the tube and began dripping into the bag.
“Is that color normal? It’s more magenta than crimson.”
Aidan stood next to her. “Yeah, that’s about right.” He was still amazed at her calm. She was clearly in her element around medicine, even if it involved vampires.
“How much blood do I take?”
He shook his head. “I’ve only seen this done once before. Keep draining till the bloodlust starts. You’ll know when you’ve taken out so much he can’t stand it and he’s trying to break the chains. Then he’ll have to feed.”
“Oh, my God.” Krys and Melissa looked at each other, one horrified expression mirroring the other.
Mirren cracked one eye open. “You better have plenty of donors on hand, A. Otherwise I’m coming after your ass.”
“Tim and Jennifer are on their way,” Melissa said, and turned to Krys. “They’re Mirren’s familiars.”
“Check with Will,” Aidan told her. “He was rounding up a couple of others as well.”
After Melissa left to track down Will, Aidan took Krys’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “You cool with this? Melissa can probably handle it if you want her to.”
Krys looked at Mirren a few moments, and then shook her head. “I’m OK. Tell me exactly what I need to do.”
He admired her courage—whatever core of steel was inside her that made her look squarely at what frightened her and confront it. Maybe he’d be able to handle Owen better if he had a big dose of it himself.
“Change out the bags when they need it. When he really starts struggling, let his fams take over. They know what to do.”
“Won’t you be here?”
He’d like nothing more than to take his daysleep in her room, in her bed. But that would require a trust he didn’t have, a trust no vampire gave easily. He’d never met daybreak any place that wasn’t his alone and completely secure—or at least not since the early days with Owen.
“Dawn will come before long—that part of the vampire legends is true. Mirren will probably stay awake because of the procedure, but as soon as he feeds, he’ll be out for the day. He can just stay here and one of his fams will stay with him.”
She frowned as she switched out IV bags, looked up at Mirren, and found him watching her with intense eyes that were already beginning to silver with hunger. “Probably not what you had in mind when you came to town, is it, darlin’?”
“Uh, no. It’s...” She jumped when Aidan rested a hand on her shoulder. He might have exaggerated how calm she was.
Mirren closed his eyes and clenched his fists, straining slightly against the silver chains as blood began filling the second IV bag.
“I’ll tell you what it is,” he said, his voice rough. “It’s un-freakin’-believable.”
This was a life he could get used to. Owen rolled onto his side and curled his body around the soft curves of the woman lying next to him, pulling her close and running kisses along one silky shoulder.
“Aren’t you the early riser.” Lucy rolled into his embrace and pulled his mouth to hers.
He broke the kiss first, smoothing the thick, dark hair away from her face.
“Let’s feed, then I’ll show you how much of an early riser I am, love.”
She laughed and imitated his brogue. “Fine Irishman that you are. Your brother and Mirren don’t have much of an accent left unless they’re turning it on for effect.”
He collapsed on the pillow and stared at the ceiling. “Aidan left Ireland and everything in it a long time ago.”
“What happened back then, to make you two hate each other so much?”
Owen threw back the blanket on the old mattress they’d dragged into the middle of the floor in a windowless back room of a deserted house on the outskirts of Penton—supplies Lucy had helped dredge up so they wouldn’t have to rut on the floor like bloody beasts. Lighting a candle, he walked to the living room and pulled the blinds apart slightly. All quiet. A light snow fell in the illumination of the streetlight.
He lit a second candle and returned to the bedroom with both of them. “My brother is a bloody hypocrite. He hates that he’s a killer, like all of us are. Don’t buy his noble act, girl. He’s done worse than me.”
Lucy sat up, letting the blanket fall to her waist, and Owen’s eyes took in the full breasts and slim waist. She was a fine-looking woman, no doubt about that. Trustworthy? Not in a million moons.
“I’ll agree that Aidan has a bad case of holier-than-thou,” she said, crawling from the bed and coming to stand beside him. “What did he do that was so awful?”
Owen slid an arm around her and pulled her to him again, burying his face in her hair. She smelled like lilacs, and his fingers felt rough as they played over her skin. “I’m bored with talk of my boring brother.”
Lucy moaned as he nipped her shoulder with his fangs and sucked on the wound. “God, that feels good—I’ve missed having someone touch me.”
He raised his head and cupped her jaw in his palm. “I’m sorry I killed your mate. If I’d known you, I wouldn’t have gone after him. Just wanted to get Aidan’s attention, that’s all.” He shrugged. It hadn’t mattered to him who he’d used to make his arrival known—Lucy’s mate had been in the wrong place at the wrong time.
She rested her head against his chest. “I loved Doc. I won’t deny that. But you exposed Aidan’s weakness. He didn’t act.”
Owen laughed softly. “So you wish he’d hunted me down and killed me then and there, do you?”
Lucy pulled away from him and dug around the pile of clothes on the floor till she found the black dress she’d worn before their daysleep. She slipped it over her head. “When it first happened, yeah, I wanted him to kill you,” she said, handing his clothes to him. “Better put these on—it’s cold enough to freeze a dead man.”
Owen tugged on his pants and sweater, wishing like hell Lucy was for real. But he knew more about her than she realized. “So, if you wanted me dead, why haven’t you done the deed yourself? Afraid Saint Aidan will be mad at his lieutenant?”
Good. She’d blanched at the reference. She hadn’t told him how highly placed she was in Penton’s organization. He wanted her to know that he’d done his homework.
“I left Aidan because he didn’t kill you,” she said, turning hard green eyes on him. “I realized then how weak he was, that he couldn’t lead Penton and deliver on what he promised. In my mind, that makes you a stronger ally.
“Besides,” she said, sitting in one of the chairs, “I’m no longer a lieutenant. He cut me off.”
“Is that so?” Owen studied her. He’d been alone a long time, and someone like Lucy could make life fun again. Hunting, feeding, seeing new places. He already knew the sex was brilliant. Tempting to try, but a mistake would be lethal. She wouldn’t get over the loss of her mate so quickly unless she was one coldhearted bitch, which was exactly how he had her pegged.
Question was, how far would she take this charade of having ditched Aidan? “What about the humans bonded to you—you have someone?”
Lucy paused before answering. “I just bonded a new one. Daniel. Why?”
“Seems to me as a show of good faith, you could share.” Owen leaned against the wall and stuck his hands in his pockets. “Our food supply is thin. Shite, we’re all thin.”
“That you are, but still sexy as hell.” Lucy stopped to kiss him as she walked to the corner and dug a cell phone out of her purse. Punching in a number, she waited for a moment and then spoke briefly, giving someone—Daniel, he hoped—directions to the house, with orders to keep it quiet, come to the back, and make sure he wasn’t followed.
They waited in silence for ten or fifteen minutes. Owen tensed at the soft knock on the back door. He didn’t follow Lucy as she headed through the kitchen, but he pulled a knife from his jacket on the floor and slipp
ed it into his pocket, waiting to see if she returned with a stake-wielding Aidan or Slayer or a young stud she’d enthralled. Daniel came as a surprise. He was handsome, but at least forty.
He halted when he saw Owen. “I know who you are—you have the same eyes as Aidan.” He turned to Lucy. “Why are we here? He’s the one we’re supposed to stay away from. Does Aidan know he’s here?”
Owen scowled. No, and this blighter with his cocky mouth was the reason Penton was such a stupid idea. Sheep needed to know their place.
Daniel stiffened as Owen moved behind him and placed a knife at his throat. He pricked a small cut beneath the man’s ear and licked off the blood that welled up. Daniel shivered and looked at Lucy. “Wh-what’s going on? You said I’d only have to feed you.”
Lucy looked at the floor. “I said you were on the menu tonight. For both of us. I’ve cut my bonds to you so I can share.” She looked up at him. “It’ll be OK, Danny.”
The man didn’t try to pull out of Owen’s grasp as he snaked an arm around his waist from behind. “It will be OK, Danny-boy,” he repeated, staring over the man’s shoulder at Lucy. She met his gaze, bit her lower lip, nodded.
She was handing over her human to gain his trust. Maybe she was on the level. Or maybe he’d been right the first time—she was a coldhearted bitch.
“Join me, love.” He reached around Danny and held out a hand. She walked toward them slowly and wrapped her fingers around his, pressing herself against Danny from the front so the man was sandwiched between them. Owen closed his eyes, hearing the thunder of Danny’s pulse, feeling the rush of blood from vein to vein, smelling his fear.
He looked over the man’s shoulder at Lucy again, and smiled. She angled her head to the right, licked Danny’s neck just below his ear, and bit. The man grunted, and then relaxed as she began to feed.
My turn. Danny tilted his head back, eyes closed, as Lucy fed. Owen had clear access to the other side of his neck. He bit without bothering to lick and anesthetize, and held on to Danny’s waist as the man jerked and groaned.
Redemption (The Penton Vampire Legacy) Page 13