BlackWind

by Boyett-Compo

  “One thing I'll say about Baybridge,” Sage said. “The food is excellent and they give you enough of it. You want seconds just ask.”

  Bronwyn took his advice and ordered the chicken and dressing, jellied cranberry sauce, sweet potato soufflé, and Waldorf salad. She was amazed to find the cafeteria offered real sweetened tea, Southern style.

  “We have a heap of folks from Georgia and Alabama,” the cashier said when Bronwyn handed her a meal card. “They got to have that sugar water with their meals.”

  “You can't have a decent meal without sweetened tea,” Sage pointed out. “It wouldn't be right, Jonelle.”

  The black woman chuckled as she took his meal card and ran it through a machine. “Save some room for egg pie, Miss,” she told Bronwyn. “They ain't brought it out yet, but it don't stay long on the table when they do.”

  “Egg pie?” Bronwyn gasped, looking at Sage.

  He nodded. “We're talking cholesterol city with no less than one dozen eggs in the custard.” He told Jonelle to ring up two slices and to page him when the pie appeared.

  “I think I've died and gone to heaven,” Bronwyn said as they took a seat not for from the cashier.

  “Today was Southern Harmony Day. Tomorrow will be German Umpah-pah Day,” Sage said, unwrapped the plastic wrap from his tossed salad. “They'll be serving black pumpernickel, German potato salad, hasenpfeffer, and whatever else might strike the Teutonic taste buds. Next to Southern day, it's my fave.”

  “I assume there are Spanish, Italian, and Chinese days, too?” Bronwyn asked as she salted her dressing.

  “Along with Irish and French. Occasionally, we have a Mixed-Up day where we have Middle Eastern, African, and a few other nationalities. It's great.” He started to say something else but his page went off and he looked around at the cashier. She nodded. “That's our dessert,” he said and hopped up.

  Bronwyn cut a forkful of jellied cranberry and was just putting it into her mouth when she saw Viraidan Cree enter the cafeteria. He glanced at her, then headed into the kitchen.

  Sage placed a huge slice of pale yellow pie, piled high with meringue, before her. “He can't eat normal food like the rest of us.”

  “Does he get something special?” she asked, keeping watch on the door.

  “I guess,” he snapped. “I don't know what they give him, but he comes in and gets a big sack of it every day.” He sat and pulled his chair up to the table. “Doesn't deign to eat with us lowly medical types.”

  “Where does he eat? In his apartment?”

  Sage shrugged as he sprinkled pepper on his salad. “I guess if the weather's bad, but most of the time I've seen him sitting up on the hill overlooking the lake.”

  Bronwyn chewed thoughtfully as the kitchen door opened and Cree marched out, a brown paper bag in his hand. “Must be a sack lunch, huh?” she inquired.

  “With him, it could be raw chicken gizzards and hog entrails.”

  Bronwyn grimaced and took a sip of tea.

  “I heard Brian O'Shea came to see you,” Sage said before shoveling lettuce into his mouth.

  Bronwyn wiped her lips with her napkin. “Um hum.”

  “Did he tell you about our Reaper?”

  Bronwyn stared at him. “Excuse me?”

  “I know what he is.” Sage speared a chunk of tender chicken. “Brian warned me if I told anyone about what I'd seen, he'd pull off my ears, and if he didn't, Cree would.”

  “Then should you be telling me?”

  “I know he had to have told you because you turned three shades of green when I mentioned hog entrails.” Sage grinned.

  “Well, that's not exactly conducive to pleasant dining conversation, do you think?’

  “He told you. I'd bet my ears on it.”

  Bronwyn picked up her knife to cut a piece of her chicken. “Let's say he did. Tell me how you know about Cree.”

  “I followed them.”

  Bronwyn dug her fork into the chicken, then dragged it through some gravy that had been poured over the dressing. “Followed them where?”

  “To the level where the containment cells are located.”

  She looked up."You've seen them?”

  “No, but it hasn't been from a lack of trying,” Sage confessed. “Once I found out they were there, it's been like an itch on my back I can't reach to scratch. One of these days, I am going to get a look at those things.”

  “If you didn't know about the cells when you followed Brian and Cree, why were you following them?”

  “This was about two months after good old O-negative came to work here. He was acting weirder than normal and I knew something was up. They passed me in the hall and Cree literally growled at me. His eyes were wild and he was sweating bullets, let me tell you! Brian had him by the arm and was leading him, as though Cree would try to break away and trip out into the wind.”

  “He was going into Transition.”

  “I didn't know what was wrong, but I was sure going to find out. I watched the elevator go down to the third subbasement and stop. I thought that was strictly power-grid land, you know? There isn't supposed to be anything down there but mechanical stuff. So when the elevator came back up, I went down to that level, but the door wouldn't open because I didn't have the key. It's like those penthouse suites at fancy hotels, you know? They require—”

  “I know what you mean,” Bronwyn interrupted. “If you didn't get in, how did you find out about the cells?”

  “Brian opened the elevator, and there I was,” Sage replied. “God, I thought the man was going to rip me a new one, but all he did was slam me up against the cage wall and tell me if I knew what was good for me, I'd keep my mouth shut.”

  “What happened then?”

  “On the way up in the elevator, Brian told me about the containment cells. I was surprised as hell to learn there were things like that at Baybridge. But I nearly dropped my drawers when I learned Brian had been using them for himself.”

  “What?” Bronwyn yelped, drawing everyone's eyes.

  “Keep the shrieking to a bare minimum, huh?”

  “Are you...?” she began, but at Sage's shushing, she lowered her voice. “Are you telling me Brian is like Cree?”

  “That I am.”

  “Brian is a Reaper,” she said in a toneless voice.

  “Not as powerful as O-Neg, but able to leap tall file cabinets in a single bound when the moon is full.” Sage took a sip of tea, then wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. “I knew about Brian before I knew about Cree.”

  “How?”

  “You know about the tenerse?”

  Bronwyn nodded. “So?”

  Sage scooped up a large forkful of potato salad, plopped it into his mouth, and talked around it. “They can't give it to themselves, the tenerse, you know? It has to go into the jugular and into the jugular only for it to be effective. The parasite doesn't want to be controlled, so it won't allow them to inject themselves. I don't know who gave Brian the injections at Fuilgaoth, but he needed someone here to do the dastardly deed. Brian chose me for whatever reason and I'm the one who pops him with the stuff.” He grinned. “Hurts like hell, if his expression is any indication.”

  Bronwyn recalled the conversation she'd had with Brian a few days earlier. “He says it makes your blood boil.”

  “Wouldn't be surprised. Until the day I learned about the containment cells and what they are used for, I thought tenerse was just some high-powered steroid or narcotic Brian was tripping on. Didn't have a clue it was anti-werewolf liquid! Hell, I didn't even know werewolves were real until then!”

  “Do you give the tenerse to Cree, too?”

  “Are you kidding? Old O-Neg would bite off my fingers if I tried to stick a needle into his thick neck. Brian gives it to him. I guess one parasite doesn't care about another.”

  “How many people know about this?”

  “You, me, the two bloodsuckers,” Sage answered. “That's it, I think.”

  “I don't understan
d,” Bronwyn said, her appetite gone. “How could Brian have had that special cell built and Dr. Wynth or your father not know?”

  “Here's what I think happened.” Sage leaned forward. “You remember back when the Brits managed to infiltrate Fuilgaoth and close it down?”

  “Yes.”

  “The facility at Fuilgaoth was dismantled and the land given to the Irish people for parkland. They sold some of the equipment and some of it came here to Baybridge. I'd be willing to bet that among that equipment was one of the containment cells, intact and ready for use. We didn't have Five North until Brian came to work here. That part of the prison wasn't excavated until he took over. He designed it, supervised its building. It would have been easy just to have that room dropped in with the rest of the lockdown cells. Who would question it?”

  Bronwyn thought about it, then nodded. “I can see that happening. He knew he'd need it and he probably had already decided to bring Cree here as head of security.”

  “That was the Day from Hell, in my book.”

  “Doesn't he do his job?”

  “Only too well. It's like living in a Fascist state at times, if you ask me.”

  “I get a feeling you two don't care for one another.”

  “You got that right, girl.” Sage wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Let's drop the subject of old O-Neg and talk about something more fascinating.”

  “Like what?”

  “How fascinating I find you and how I want to jump your bones every time I see you.”

  Bronwyn chuckled. “You are incorrigible, Hesar!”

  “Nope, just horny. How ‘bout it? Wanna relieve some of my tension?”

  Bronwyn's pager went off. She took it off her belt to see who was summoning. “Gotta go.”

  “Whatcha going to do for supper?” Sage asked, taking up his fork again.

  Bronwyn stood, picking up her pie and glass of tea. “Whatcha got in mind?”

  “It's taco night at Taco Poncho in Grinnell. How ‘bout that, then a movie and a big box of popcorn, cup of soda, then home to have wild, dirty sex with me?”

  “Tacos, popcorn, soda, and no sex, and we've got a date.”

  He sighed. “Okay, but you don't know what you're missing.”

  “Six o'clock?” she countered.

  “On the dot. I'll pick you up.”

  As she was leaving, Bronwyn waved at her mother and Sage's father, sitting alone in a secluded part of the cafeteria. Her mother made a sign for Bronwyn to call her. Bronwyn nodded and hurried back to her office. When she arrived, she was surprised to see Cree waiting.

  Despite the neatly pressed black uniform, the Captain of the Security Services looked rumpled. At some point after she'd last seen him in the cafeteria, he had taken the clip from his hair, which now hung loose about his face. There was pallor to his skin. His eyes were bloodshot, with dark circles accentuating the high plains of his cheeks, while his goatee glistened with moisture.

  “You took your damned sweet time getting here,” he complained.

  “Did you have an appointment?” she snapped.

  “I don't make appointments.”

  “With me, you do.” She looked at Mari Beth. “Is that understood?”

  The secretary shot a nervous look at the Reaper. “Dr. McGregor, I—”

  “Go to lunch,” Cree ordered Mari Beth without looking her way.

  The woman jumped up, ran to the file cabinet and retrieved her purse, then took off as though the hounds of hell nipped at her heels.

  “How dare you?” Bronwyn said, turning on Cree. “You can't come in here and—”

  One moment she was in front of the secretary's desk, the next she found herself plastered against the wall, Cree's hands tight on her upper arms as he pressed into her.

  His fierce eyes bore into hers. “Let's get something straight, Doctor. I don't make appointments and I don't call to let you know I'm coming. When I need something, I get it when I want it, where I want it, and how I want it. I won't take backtalk from you and I won't argue with you. What I say goes and what I do isn't questioned. Do you understand?”

  He was so close she felt his body heat, felt the rise and fall of his wide chest against the front of her lab coat. His grip on her arms was painful but she would not give him the satisfaction of knowing he was hurting her. His breath was salty, but not unpleasantly so, as it fanned the wisps of hair at her temple.

  “Let go of me,” she said quietly.

  He stared at her, his grip tightening even more. She stood perfectly still as his savage gaze crawled over her face, settled for a heart-stopping moment on her lips, then captured her eyes. He said nothing, only watched her, his body as tense as a coiled spring.

  “You don't frighten me, Captain,” she said, raising her chin. “And you are not intimidating me, if that is your intent, so you might as well take your hands off me.”

  “You have an appointment tomorrow to interview George Vance and Jason Faulkner,” he said as though she had not spoken.

  “So?”

  “You are not to schedule appointments with Class Seven inmates without my permission.”

  Bronwyn's eyebrows drew together. “Why the hell not? There is nothing in the protocol that says I have to—”

  “I am telling you. You will not meet with any Class Seven inmate without me being present in the room with you.”

  “Oh, no,” Bronwyn drawled, shaking her head. “You can not be present during any sessions. That's a breach of doctor-patient confidentiality—”

  “If I'm not there,” he said, a muscle working in his jaw, “you don't have the interview. It's as simple as that.”

  “You can't do that!”

  He pulled her against him, the full length of their bodies from chest to thigh coming into hard contact.

  “I can do anything I like,” he said, his voice a mere whisper.

  With his rock-hard thighs and belly tight against her, Bronwyn's knees threatened to buckle. Her breasts were being flattened against his broad chest; her nipples hardened into nubs at the contact. In the damp region between her legs, a wild pulsing started that made her heart beat faster and enlivened her breath. Her vision lowered to his neck, where a vein beat strongly in the thick column. His goatee smelled of cinnamon cologne mixed with a scent that made her womb quicken. She ached to thread her fingers through his long black hair and pull his mouth to hers. The thought brought a groan, but she wasn't sure if it was his or her own.

  “Just do what I say,” he whispered. “I am only trying to keep you safe, Bronwyn.”

  For a long time, she stared into his eyes, wondering if he was as effected by their nearness as was she. When she felt his grip relax, then slip from her arms, she almost moaned.

  “Bronwyn?” he questioned, stepping back. “Do you understand?”

  She mentally shook herself, then straightened her lab coat, pulling it together over her chest. She nodded, all anger inexplicably gone.

  “I will bring a set of headphones and my radio,” he told her. “I won't listen to what you two are saying and I don't read lips so I won't be privy to what is being discussed.”

  “You read minds, though, don't you?” She had no idea where that question came from and was surprised when he nodded.

  “Aye, but I won't,” he said firmly, then moved back, allowing her room.

  “They are that dangerous?” she queried.

  “Some are. And even though much of the time they'll be restrained when you are in session, insanity can give a man strength and resources he wouldn't normally have. You never know what they are capable of doing. I want to make sure you're safe with scum like Faulkner and Vance.”

  Still experiencing sensations she found disturbing, Bronwyn went to her office door. “You could have just asked.”

  “Then I wouldn't have had a reason to put my hands on you.”

  She turned to gape at him and found his face as red as the triangle on his black shirtsleeve. She was stunned when he dropped his gaze and tur
ned to leave.

  “Captain?” she called, halting him at the door.

  He looked at her.

  “Next time, just ask.”

  “I think we understand one another, Bronwyn. There won't be a next time.”

  Long after he had gone, Bronwyn stood beside her office door and tried to calm the racing thunder of her heart.

  * * * *

  Cree cursed all the way back to his office. He was annoyed with himself for having lost control, furious he had made the comment about putting his hands on her. He struck out at the corridor wall, putting a dent in the steel panel as he stormed into his office. Slamming the door behind him, he threw back his head and howled with frustration, the sound reverberating through the room.

  “What the hell did you do?” he snarled, flinging himself down in his chair.

  He looked at his trembling hands. His palms itched, were slick with sweat. With a snarl, he thrust his arms across his chest and buried his hands in his arms pits. Breath rasping through his lungs, he had to clench his teeth to keep from howling again.

  She had been soft under his hold. Her flesh had smelled of raspberries. The press of their bodies had driven him nearly insane with a desire he knew he could not appease. He ached; he needed; his blood was throbbing with passion.

  “Bronwyn,” he groaned, covering his face with his hands.

  There had been a time, he thought as he hovered in his misery, when he could have denied the pull she had on him. Until she had shown up at Baybridge, she had been but a distant, if ever-present, memory. The other part of him dreamt often of the pretty teenage girl with the long brown hair and emerald green eyes. The other part of him had remembered scents and touches and the sound of her voice. The other part of him had longed for the girl.

  But this older part, the man within him, had seen the woman in her. He had inhaled the scent of her womanhood and it had beckoned him with its siren call. This older part now had the feel of her on his palms, the sound of her soft, Southern voice in his ears. He longed for her. He ached for her. He needed her, as he never had Chandra.

  “Though he may be eased by surrogate manipulation, a Reaper may physically mate with only one female in his lifetime and he must remain loyal to that mate even unto death!”