by Donya Lynne
“That’s the Millennium Park parking garage.”
“Yeah, and guess what?”
“What?”
“Less than five minutes after he pulled in on his motorcycle, he came back out on foot.” Io sped up the playback and stopped as a black-clad figure exited the garage, headed north on Michigan Avenue, crossed the intersection at Randolph Street, and disappeared inside the Heritage building.
“That’s a residential building,” Micah said, frowning. “Do you think he lives there?”
Io shrugged. “Hard telling.”
Micah straightened. It seemed too easy. If Skeletor knew Micah would tap into Chicago’s street cameras, why would he lead him to where he lived?
“Did he come back out?”
Io shook his head. “Nope, and I’ve scanned all the footage. He went into the Heritage and stayed there.”
“Doubtful.” Micah’s instincts told him he was missing something.
“Maybe he wants you to find him.”
“Why? So I can kill him?” Because killing the guy was right near the top of his to-do list. Right under stuffing his foot up the guy’s ass.
“Maybe that’s the game he’s playing. Maybe this was all just an elaborate ploy to get your attention, and he wants something from you.”
“Oh, he’s got my attention all right.” Micah considered his options then pulled out his phone. He hit Severin’s speed dial. As he waited for Sev to pick up, he said to Io, “I want you to do background checks on everyone who lives at the Heritage.”
“That’ll take some time.”
“I don’t care. Do it. I want this asshole.” He started for the door.
“On it.” Io turned back to his console just as Sev picked up.
“It had better be burning, bleeding, or in the middle of an apocalypse for you to interrupt me right now, Micah.” Sev sounded out of breath.
Micah heard Ari moan in the background. Those two fucked more than he did, and that was saying something, because his favorite pastime was exploring Sam’s body as often as he could.
“Don’t you two ever quit?” he said.
Sev let out an irritated sigh. “Either tell me why you called, Micah, or I’m hanging up.”
Micah grinned. He respected Sev’s style. “I need you. Now.”
Sev cleared his throat, and Micah heard a rustling noise that sounded as if Sev’s head was planted firmly in a pillow. “Um, not only am I in the middle of something right now, but you’re gonna make Ari jealous saying shit like that to me.”
“Like what?” Ari said in the background.
It sounded like Sev put his hand over the phone, but Micah still heard him say, “Nothing, I’ll tell you later.”
Micah chuckled softly. “Fuck your mate, Sev, but make it a quickie. Then get over to the Millennium parking garage.” Micah marched down the hall toward his office.
“The Millennium garage? Why?”
“Just hurry and fuck your mate and get going. I’ll e-mail you the details.” Micah disconnected.
He needed a day walker for this task, and since Trace was cooped up with Medusa’s daughter, that left Severin.
Sometimes, being a full-blooded vampire pissed him off. Mixed-bloods had all the fun. They could go out in the sun, came with a variety of nifty powers, and had a lot more flexibility, in general.
No more than ten seconds after he e-mailed the video and all the pertinents to Sev, Micah’s mobile rang.
He answered without checking the caller ID. “Micah Black.”
“Micah.” It was Brak.
Shit, he’d forgotten to call him.
“Brak, hey. I’m sorry I haven’t called about Trace. It’s been . . .” He thought back over the last twenty-four hours. “Crazy. Very crazy.” Understatement.
“Oh, okay.” Brak sounded disappointed.
Micah felt like a cad for dropping the ball. “He knows you’re here, Brak. He knows you want to see him. But things got a little out of hand, and there’s been some personal shit going on . . . and the bitch—I’m sorry, female—who was supposed to sign for his release has got a hair up her ass and—”
“When can I see him? It’s important I see him, Micah.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I’ll make sure to set something up soon.”
“And our father. Is he doing better?”
Maddox had been moved to the new underground facility a few days ago. He’d been too much of a loose cannon to keep here, where they couldn’t secure him without strapping him to a hospital bed about a foot too short to hold his massive form. And Micah wasn’t going to have any of that shit. The new facility had Plexiglas hospital rooms for these exact situations. Maddox could remain safely tucked away until his mental synapses began regularly firing to the tune of less violent outbursts. Right now, his mood blew with the wind, sometimes creating a tidal wave and sometimes a refreshing ripple. And sometimes he was a tsunami, like he’d been the day he redecorated his hospital room by breaking just about everything not bolted down and putting a few holes in the walls for good measure.
“Your father’s safe. He’s behaving erratically, so we thought it best to keep him—”
His desk phone blared, then the incoming speaker turned on. “Micah! We need you in the trauma unit! NOW!” Urgency shot through Dr. Snow’s voice as something crashed in the background.
Trauma was where the victims of Bishop’s lab had been taken, and a couple of them had been in pretty bad shape. This couldn’t be good.
“Brak, I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go. There’s an emergency.” He was already racing out of his office. “I’ll call you back.”
He disconnected before Brak could say anything more.
Trevor strolled around the corner up ahead, wearing nylon shorts and a sweat-drenched T-shirt. His face was turned downward as he read something on his phone. Micah was glad Trevor had chosen to stick around for a while now that his friend, Gina, was settling in as Malek’s new mate. The guy came in handy in tight situations at a time when they were badly shorthanded. Like now.
“Trev! I need you.”
Trevor glanced up then immediately stuffed his phone in his pocket and snapped to attention. “What’s going on?”
“Trauma unit. We’ve got a problem.”
Trevor fell into stride alongside him as they ran down the hall. “Any idea what?”
“Something that requires some muscle if they called me.” So the more muscle he could take with him, the better.
They cranked around a corner and almost ran into Stryker, who jumped out of the way.
“Where’s the fire?” Stryker quickly recovered and joined them.
“Trauma unit,” Trevor said.
A few seconds later, the three of them plowed into the medical ward and were greeted by angry shrieks coming from behind the double doors where Bishop’s victims had been taken.
Holy hell! That shit sounded more mutant than vampire.
God help them if one of Bishop’s vics had turned.
Micah busted through the double doors to find the staff scurrying every which direction, some with hypodermics, others simply trying to get out of harm’s way. One ducked as a flesh-colored upchuck tray flew through the air.
“What’s going on?” He and the others rushed into the fray.
One of the nurses pointed toward the second room on the right. She was out of breath and bleeding from a gash over her eye. Fear blasted from her gaze. “It’s Kieran. He’s melting down.”
Melting down. Hopefully that wasn’t the medical term for a patient who was going mutant.
The commotion from inside the room intensified. Machines buzzed, and metal crashed against metal as someone yelled for help.
“Help them!” Micah said to Trevor, pointing to the nurses rifling through medical supplies. Then he snapped his fingers at Stryker, who looked like a howitzer in a T-shirt. “You’re with me. Now!”
He and Stryker rushed into the small room just as Kieran picked up a nurse and to
ssed her as if she weighed nothing more than air. She slammed into the wall and crumpled to the floor.
“Get her out of here!” Micah shouted at the other nurses.
Dr. Snow struggled to get close enough to inject Kieran with what Micah assumed was a sedative.
Shit better be strong enough to knock out a brontosaurus. Kieran was severely out of control.
“Micah!” She caught his eye. “I need you to hold him down.”
Just how was he supposed to do that? By asking nicely? Not gonna happen. He and Stryker would have to do their best cement truck impersonation if they had any hope of restraining this guy.
One of the other nurses shouted, “Grab him! Don’t let him go!”
Kieran strained for the door. The muscles and tendons of his neck were strung tight, his fangs exposed, black eyes full of fear, panic, and something else. Evil. Pure evil.
Fear, panic, and evil. There was a Hallmark moment if he ever saw one.
Kieran spotted Micah, and evil took the lead as his eyes narrowed into malicious slits. “You’re dead.” He sounded more like a gorilla trying to speak English. The black mass of tattoos covering his arms, chest, and torso shifted and slithered over his skin.
Okay, that was fucking bizarre. Who was this Kieran character, and how the hell did he have tattoos that moved?
“Jesus, he’s . . .” Trevor stood in the doorway, his mouth hanging open as he stared at Kieran.
Micah dashed a glance at Trevor. “He’s what?” But he didn’t have to hear Trevor’s answer. He could see it in his mind.
“Beautiful.” Trevor breathed the word more than said it.
“Yeah, well, he seems about ready to tip to the dark side, so put your tongue back in your mouth and give us a hand.”
Trev hurried into the room. “I’m there. Just . . . damn!”
Great. Trevor had a hard-on for the Antichrist.
“You’re all dead!” Kieran seethed violence. “I’ll kill you all for doing this to me!” He flung off one of the nurses trying to contain him. She tripped over her own feet and fell ass-first to the floor in her haste to get away from him.
Micah jumped over her and shot around him, wrenching Kieran’s phantasm-covered arms behind his back before he could take another step. Shit, Kieran was strong.
Kieran growled and thrashed, tugging against Micah’s hold. Then one of the wispy, black markings lifted off Kieran’s skin and began to curl around Micah’s wrist.
And freaked Micah the fuck out!
Are you shitting me?
“Stryker! Trevor! Get over here! Take his other arm.”
Whatever those tattoos were, they weren’t ink.
Within seconds, he, Stryker, and Trevor had Kieran in a stronghold and dragged him to his knees. The black tendril left a trail of ice as it continued winding its way up Micah’s arm. What the hell was it doing to him?
“Doc! You’d better hurry up if you’re going to get that needle in him!” Micah clenched his jaw and pulled on his reserves, his muscles straining.
Dr. Snow rushed forward and stabbed the hypodermic into Kieran’s shoulder, plunging the contents into his arm.
Kieran screeched, and Micah winced as the sound split his eardrums. But the black-tattoo-ghostly-devil-mark thing released Micah’s arm and snapped back onto Kieran’s skin.
Thank God.
Within seconds, Kieran’s body sagged, but he wasn’t unconscious. Just super chilled.
“Please, God,” Kieran said, voice ragged, “just kill me and get it over with. I can’t live like this anymore.” Desperation, sorrow, and fatigue wrapped around Kieran’s words, and he sounded as if he were surrendering, but to whom? Then a weak but malevolent chuckle rose unexpectedly from inside Kieran’s chest. “God can’t help you, and I’ll never let you die.” This voice was different than the one Kieran had just used to beg for death. It sounded as if someone—or something—else had taken up residence inside his body and was using Kieran’s voice to talk to him. Talk about your split personalities.
Micah eyed the freakish tattoos as he let Kieran go and hastily backed away. The farther he got away from that devil paint, the better. Given the conversation Kieran had just had with himself, Micah was starting to think there was a lot more to Kieran than met the eye, and he would bet those living tattoos weren’t ink, but something worse. Much worse.
Kieran’s drugged gaze wobbled to his. “Who are you?” He was back to voice number one. The normal voice. The one Micah guessed was Kieran’s true voice.
“Name’s Micah.” He raked his hair off his face, breathing hard. “How about you help me out, Kieran, and stay calm so we can get you back into bed so that nobody else gets hurt?”
Kieran’s face relaxed further, and his lips parted. For a moment, he didn’t say anything, just sat there on his knees in the middle of the floor as he looked around. “Where am I? What is this place?”
“You’re in Chicago. At AKM. We rescued you from Bishop’s lab.”
A shallow frown crossed Kieran’s brow, and Micah sensed the pain of cobalt withdrawal assaulting him. “It hurts.” Kieran tried to pull out of Trevor’s and Stryker’s hold, but the sedative Dr. Snow had given him was doing its job, making him docile. Manageable.
The nurses shrank away as Micah warily stepped forward, eyeing those wicked black markings, and lowered onto his haunches. “You’re in withdrawal. Bishop drugged you. He was giving you cobalt. We’ve been detoxing you, but it’s not going to be easy. It’s going to hurt. But that’s a sign it’s working and the shit’s getting out of your system.”
Kieran’s face contorted painfully as he tried to free himself again. “It HURTS!” Kieran threw back his head and shrieked toward the ceiling. The nurses cringed and skittered from the room. He doubled over and groaned, his tattoos breaking through their outlines and bleeding black into the surrounding skin.
Micah frowned as the images rolling through Kieran’s mind began splintering into fractured shards, as if Kieran’s brain was running into interference and could no longer process rational thought.
Then Kieran’s body went deathly still. His demeanor changed so suddenly that it felt like a wizard had slammed his magical staff against the floor and sent a shockwave of silence through the room. An instant later, Kieran’s head snapped up. His eyes glowed red.
Ummm, okay . . .
“Let me go.” They were back to voice number two. The one that belonged to someone—something—else.
Kieran tore himself out of Trevor’s and Stryker’s grip and lurched to his feet, knocking Micah over. The fist he took to the jaw sent his brains into next year. The one that landed on his abdomen a split-second later nearly made him lose his breakfast.
That was going to leave a bruise. On his stomach.
In a blink, Kieran leaped off him and shot toward the door. Micah scrambled to all fours, coughing through the pain in his diaphragm, and looked up as Stryker blocked the exit like a concrete wall. Trevor staggered to his feet then gave chase. Moving with the speed and grace of a leopard, Trevor caught Kieran’s arm, kicked his feet out from under him, spun him around, and locked him in a choke hold as he drove him to his knees again.
Go, Trevor! Micah hadn’t known he had it in him.
“Calm the fuck down, buddy,” Trev said. “You’re not going anywhere right now.”
Kieran resisted, growling and spitting as he tried to reach around and pull free of Trevor’s hold. But Trevor had him, and he had him good and tight. His biceps and the muscles in his forearms and shoulders flexed impressively as if he were tapping into every last reserve of strength he possessed to keep Kieran down.
Micah jumped to his feet and reached for the hypodermic Dr. Snow had just picked up. “Give it to me!”
Pale-faced, she handed it over.
He spun back around. “Hold him still,” he told Trevor.
“I’ve got him.” Trevor’s voice strained. “Just hurry up. He’s stronger than he looks.”
“No shit
.” He knew firsthand exactly how strong Kieran was. What he didn’t know was whether it was the cobalt withdrawal, that freakish black shit crawling over his skin, or the unknown entity squatting in Kieran’s body making him that strong. Two out of three? All of the above?
Micah drove the needle into Kieran’s neck and plunged the contents into his body as Kieran’s red eyes lasered fury at him.
“I’ll kill you!” Kieran strained but began to relax almost immediately as the sedative went to work.
“Yeah? Well, you’ll have to get in line behind everybody else.” Micah pulled the needle out and carefully handed it back to the doctor.
Hopefully, this dose would top off the first and knock Kieran out for good.
Within seconds, Kieran melted into a mass of lax flesh in Trevor’s arms.
Thank God. Micah collapsed into a nearby plastic chair and rubbed his bruised stomach.
“You okay?” Dr. Snow touched his shoulder.
He combed his hair off his face. “I’ll be fine.” He looked around the disheveled room. It appeared the drama was over, but the cleanup would take a while. “What the hell happened in here?”
One of the nurses poked her head into the room as Trevor lifted Kieran and carried him toward the bed.
Dr. Snow motioned her to enter then turned her attention back to Micah. “We were pulling him out of his induced coma today. Everything was going well, and then he just went crazy.”
“Obviously.” Micah scanned the mess of broken equipment littering the floor. “Maybe you should transfer him to the new facility, where they can keep him under observation in one of the Plexiglas rooms.”
“Once we stabilize him, I’ll consider it, but he’s obviously too strung out on cobalt withdrawal to move right now.”
Kieran’s head lolled back over Trevor’s arm, exposing his neck, to which Trevor sucked in an audible breath.
“You doing okay there, Trev?” Micah said.
Trevor nodded hypnotically without looking at him. “I’m good.”
Micah could almost see the little hearts with cupid wings fluttering around Trevor’s head. Looked like the Antichrist had an admirer. Micah only hoped Trevor knew what he was getting into with Kieran. Falling for this guy couldn’t be good for anyone’s health.