Dominic grimaced. “That’s the point.”
“You have changed,” Sevris said. “Not necessarily for the worse. You might actually survive the Leveling.”
Dominic growled.
Sevris knelt beside me. With the elongated talon of his pointer finger, he carefully sliced my cast in half and peeled it from my leg. Three pen stakes and two silver nitrate sprays fell out with a clatter onto the street.
Rafe let loose a long, high whistle. Dominic raised his eyebrows.
I shrugged, fighting back a grin. “A girl can never be over-armed these days.”
Sevris ignored our banter. He unwrapped the ace bandage and gauze around my calf and exposed the red, angry lines of stitches that held my skin together. The wounds were clean but swollen and obviously irritated from not receiving the rest the doctor had prescribed. A few of the stitches had torn through the skin and were trickling blood.
“Is this really the time or the place?” Rowens asked, eyeing my leg speculatively. “Wound care should wait until we’re in a sterile environment.”
“He’s worried about you catching an infection,” Rafe said. He laughed. “How cute.”
“What are you doing?” Greta snapped, obviously in agreement with Rowens. “What will exposing Cassidy’s injuries prove?”
Dominic didn’t respond. He knew that Sevris would convince her more thoroughly with actions than he could with words.
Sevris’ expression never wavered despite their conversation. His face was composed and focused, but I wasn’t fooled. Beneath the calm exterior, he was triumphant inside. I could see the anticipation in his eyes. Master vampires rarely allowed others to drink from their night bloods—with good reason—and Sevris planned to savor the experience.
I held my breath and hoped that Sevris would be able to control his urges better than Rafe had. The irresistible, savory spice in my blood made it impossible for most vampires to stop drinking once they started. As much as Dominic wanted to see me healed, I didn’t completely trust Sevris not to lose control. Hell, sometimes I second-guessed Dominic’s ability to maintain control, and he was Master vampire of New York City.
Sevris cupped my bare calf in his hands and pricked each stitch with the razor edge of his fang. As the stitches severed, the tension holding my skin together relaxed, and the wound gaped open.
I gritted my teeth against the sight and the pain.
“Stop,” Greta snapped. “I don’t know what the hell you think this proves, but I’ve seen enough.”
Sevris licked deep inside my wound, allowing excess saliva to pool from his mouth into my leg.
“I suppose my suggestion for a sterile environment was ‘cute’ after all,” Rowens said faintly.
Sevris’ tongue probed my wound, his movements swift and bone deep. His saliva burned as it healed. Coupled with the sharp slice of his tongue as he licked, the typical discomfort and near sexual heat of being healed by Dominic instead bordered on pain with Sevris.
Dominic must have seen some indication of that pain in my expression. “Cassidy?” he asked.
I opened my mouth to reassure him, but Sevris licked even deeper. He tore through healthy muscle and tissue to reach the fractured bone beneath, and my eyes rolled back.
“Stop,” Greta said again, and this time, her voice wavered. “She’s had enough.”
The blaze of Sevris’ healing shot through my tibia. I heard my nails crack and break as I gripped the sidewalk, searching for an anchor to keep me from drifting off.
The click of a bullet prepped in its chamber. “You heard the lady,” Rowens said, his voice low, cold, and resolute. “She’s had enough.”
I wrenched my eyes open, not sure when I’d screwed them closed. Sevris was eyeballs deep in the meat of my calf, literally, healing me from the inside out. I understood the necessity—he couldn’t heal my skin before healing muscle, and he couldn’t heal the muscle before healing the bone—but knowing the reason behind his actions didn’t stop the agony they caused.
“Cassidy, you must speak before Rowens shoots Sevris in your defense and Sevris kills Rowens in self-defense.” Dominic’s hand was suddenly in mine, his fingers uncurling my grip from the sidewalk and lacing through my fingers. I squeezed his hand to find the strength neither of us had and focused my pain-blurred gaze on the scene before me.
Rowens had his gun aimed on Sevris. Greta looked about to draw her own weapon. Rafe was growling, his features half-transformed. Nathan eyed us all warily, obviously unwilling to test his strength against bullets or vampires.
And Sevris, bless him, was ignoring them all.
“Stand down, Rowens. I’m fine,” I ground out between clenched teeth. “Better than fine. You’ll see.”
Rowens didn’t move. He didn’t shoot, but he didn’t put up his gun either. “I’m not seeing much of anything but your blood spilling across the pavement and Sevris thoroughly enjoying your pain. Show me otherwise.”
“You’ll see,” I said on a gasp. “Patience.”
“I’m at the end of mine,” Greta snapped.
Sevris moved on from my bone to the muscle. The pain was still there and still debilitating, but the burning sensation and needle-like sharpness of his probing tongue was different somehow, like the subtle nuance of a scalpel’s surgical incision rather than the frenzied stab and twist of a kitchen knife. “Just a minute longer,” I lied. “You’ll see.”
Dominic tightened his grip on my hand. I took a deep breath and squeezed back.
Several minutes passed in tense silence, and I forced myself not to react to the movement of Sevris’ tongue. Finally, eventually—taking longer than I imagined Dominic would need to heal me but working just as thoroughly—Sevris pinched the edges of my skin closed and licked over the seam to seal the wound.
He glanced up, meeting my gaze over the nearly healed sliver of scar on my calf. The lingering, throbbing memory of pain was exhausting, but presently gone. Even so, my smile, though genuine, felt strained.
“Thank you,” I said, grateful that he’d healed me, and even more grateful that he’d done so without allowing instinct to override reason. Mentioning that I was relieved he had the strength to resist eating me seemed insulting, so I let the gratitude stand without explanation.
Keeping eye contact, he flicked his tongue over the remaining wound, and in two quick swipes, the scar dissolved too.
He straightened. “You’re welcome.”
I turned to face Greta, but she wasn’t looking at me anymore. Neither was Rowens, and although he still hadn’t technically put up his gun, he wasn’t aiming it anymore, either. His arms had dropped, along with his jaw. Both he and Greta were staring at Sevris with a strange mix of fear, disbelief, and wonder.
Sevris extended a hand to me, the barely-there smirk of anticipation back on his face.
I took his hand for the help, despite the grin, and stood.
Everyone’s eyes and expressions of fear, disbelief, and wonder shifted to me.
Greta was shaking her head. Even as she opened her mouth and inhaled to speak, she continued shaking her head back and forth in denial. “How?” she finally asked.
“An enzyme in their saliva enhances blood clotting and healing in humans. Handy when human blood is their main source of food; they can feed from an artery and heal it before the person loses too much blood.”
“They feed on humans,” Greta said dryly.
“They feed on human blood,” I corrected. “Humans don’t necessarily need to die for them to eat,” I said, but my defense sounded weak, even to my own ears.
Rowens recovered and re-aimed his gun, training his sights steadily on Sevris. Greta didn’t look convinced either.
I glanced at Dominic. “Maybe we should demonstrate feeding as well.”
“How are you feeling?” he asked, and the fact that he was still more concerned for my well-being than his own moved me like nothing else could.
“Better than ever,” I lied. My head still spun from bloo
d loss, my hip still ached as usual, and my back still stung from the residual pain of his injuries, but compared to the agony and immobility I’d experienced in the last five minutes, I felt brand-new.
He narrowed his eyes at me. “Try the truth this time.”
I sighed. “I’m feeling better than before. Better than you,” I pointed out. I eased myself back down to sit on the ground next to him and offered my still bleeding wrist at his mouth. “Heal yourself,” I encouraged him. “We’ll convince her together.”
Dominic’s growl was low and rattling. He didn’t want to bleed me—he certainly didn’t want to hurt me—but he was weak and injured, and that meant he was also ravenous. He opened his mouth, baring the long, protruding length of his fangs.
“You attack, and I shoot,” Rowens said calmly. “Simple action /reaction.”
Dominic pulled back from my wrist and glanced at Rowens. “Attacking requires resistance. Do you see any resistance from Cassidy?”
Rowens shook his head. “She’s suffering from Stockholm syndrome.”
Dominic laughed, further baring his fangs, his expression anything but amused. “She is not being held captive, against her will or otherwise.”
Greta placed her hand on Rowens’ arm and squeezed his bicep. “I trust Cassidy. Let this play out,” she said.
Rowens didn’t drop his aim, but his finger relaxed minutely on the trigger.
That must have been permission enough for Dominic. He sealed his lips around my wrist and sucked at the tender wound there from Rafe’s bite. Typically, his bite was electrifying, consuming, and orgasmic. Literally, he could bring me to orgasm by piercing my skin with his fangs and sucking my blood through the wound. Every swallow brought waves of dizzying, soul-baring pleasure.
With the approaching Leveling, he’d lost many abilities, and the power to produce an orgasm with his bite was obviously one of the abilities he no longer possessed.
I gritted my teeth against the uncomfortable suction of his mouth on my wound as he drank. He glanced up at my sharp intake of breath and, realizing I wasn’t distracted by pleasure, made short work of his meal. He drank quickly, without savoring my taste, and was careful not to tear my skin with his fangs.
The sting of Dominic’s shredded back faded with his every swallow of my blood. I tried to focus on the recession of his pain, but as his pain became more faint, the discomfort of his fangs embedded in my wrist became more prominent. Just when I might have asked him to stop, the sting of Dominic’s wounds faded entirely, and he pulled away.
We stared at my oozing, bloody wrist between us. The edges of Dominic’s mouth pinched grimly.
“Sevris,” he said, offering up my wrist to him, “would you, please?”
“With pleasure,” Sevris said. He bent over my wrist and, with two quick swipes of his tongue, healed the jagged wound.
I stood to face Greta, albeit a little more shakily than a moment before, and extended my hand to Dominic the way Sevris had extended his hand to me. Unlike Sevris’, however, the hand I extended to Dominic visibly trembled.
Dominic took my hand for appearances’ sake, but he stood without my help. We turned to face Greta and Rowens together, our hands still locked, our fingers laced, more than just allies. I felt the pain of his injuries. He bled from the depth of my wounds. We had each other’s backs as partners, but more than that, we bled and recovered as one person. We’d rise and fall and struggle our way back to the top, and we’d do it together.
At one time not that long ago, such a realization would have terrified me. Being intertwined that deeply and certainly with anyone, let alone a vampire, would have been incomprehensible. Now, the very fact that it was Dominic with whom I was intertwined made it acceptable. A warmth and strength I’d never before possessed swelled through my chest.
Greta was still shaking her head at us. She moved to step forward, and Rowens blocked her.
“I don’t think you should—”
Greta knocked his arm out of her way and stepped toe to toe with Dominic. “Turn around.”
He raised an eyebrow, ever cool and collected.
“I need to see your injured back,” she explained. “You’re alive and standing, which should be proof enough, but everything you’re telling me and showing me is unbelievable. I need to see it for myself.”
Dominic hesitated, obviously uncomfortable giving anyone his back, especially now that he wasn’t at full strength. He glanced down at me.
The weight of implicit trust in that one action was humbling. Something warm and lingering and nearly suffocating swept through me, and I hoped against everything sane and precious in this world that I had the strength to bear that kind of trust.
I nodded.
Dominic let go of my hand and gave Greta his back.
Her jaw went slack as she stared at the blood-soaked tatters of his shirt and the untouched, baby-smooth perfection of his skin beneath. She was still shaking her head as she raised a hand to touch what her eyes couldn’t accept. I wasn’t the only one trembling.
Dominic’s jaw clenched when Greta’s hand grazed his scapula, but otherwise, he remained stock still.
Greta closed her mouth, stepped back, and tightened the pieces of herself that had fallen slack with disbelief. “What do we do now?” she asked.
I took a deep breath. “We let Dominic and his, vamp—um, people, alter the scene, so the public has a rational, sane explanation for what happened. No one is ready for this.” I gestured to the dead Damned behind us. “Not yet, anyway.”
“And then?” she asked.
“And then Cassidy and I take shelter in my coven in preparation for the coming dawn,” Dominic said. “As you now know, I’m nocturnal, and where I go, Cassidy goes.”
Greta didn’t look convinced.
“We all need to rest and recuperate,” I added. “The Damned included. They took a huge hit, thanks to the Day Reapers.” I gestured to the mutilated body of the Damned behind us. “If we take the dead Damned back to the lab, maybe Dr. Chunn can learn more about their strengths and their weakness. They’re difficult to kill, but obviously not immortal.”
“How was that one killed?” Greta asked.
Silence.
Even Rafe and Ronnie held their peace. I struggled not to glance at Nathan and give him away.
Nathan let loose a snort of disgust. “With my bare hands.”
My head jerked up sharply. “Don’t,” I muttered.
He shook his head. “Every other secret is out. Why not mine?”
I turned back to Greta, ignoring Nathan. “Once we’ve had the chance to rest and recuperate and Dr. Chunn examines the remains, then we can discuss our next move,” I reasoned. “There’s no point in planning a counterattack before we know all the facts.”
Greta eyed us critically, her gaze flicking between Dominic and me. “I agree to your plan, Cassidy. We’ll rest and reconvene in a few hours, giving Dr. Chunn the opportunity to examine the bodies. Dominic and his people,” she said pointedly, obviously not missing my earlier hesitation, “can fix the scene in the way they see fit for now, but we need a press conference to release this information, sooner rather than later. After Dr. Chunn figures out what we’re dealing with. And after I notify the feds. And after we—” She swiped her hands down her face. “This is a fucking nightmare.”
I nodded. “Agreed.”
“And I take Nathan back to the lab,” Greta added.
I jerked, taken aback. “I don’t think so.”
“We need all the information we can get to use against these creatures: their strengths and their weaknesses, like you said. Considering that Nathan killed one of them, he’s obviously one of their weaknesses.”
“He’s not a body for experimentation. He’s my little brother!”
“Not so little anymore.” Nathan placed a hand on my shoulder. “It’s okay, Cassidy. I’ll go.”
I blinked. “But you can’t just—”
“I need to help,” Nathan said. “
I need a purpose.”
“You have a purpose,” I scoffed. “Just because no one remembers—”
“I was erased!” Nathan exploded. His ears pointed, and his fangs elongated. He closed his eyes, and I could see his desperate struggle for control in the deep crevices at the corners of his lips, crevices that hadn’t been there a few months ago. He covered his face with his hands to hide his transformation, but his fingernails had sharpened to talons.
Dominic placed his hand on my waist and urged me back, but I patted his hand in reassurance. Even as a rampaging, heart-eating, psycho killer, Nathan had been my little brother. I wasn’t giving up on him now.
“You weren’t erased. Only forgotten, and not by everyone. Not by me,” I reminded him.
When Nathan dropped his hands and looked up, his face was once again composed and perfectly human, but he wasn’t looking at me.
“I used to be one of the Damned,” he told Greta. “I was transformed by Jillian into one of those soulless, heart-eating creatures, but Cassidy tracked me down and transformed me back the best she could.”
Greta raised an eyebrow. “Back into what?”
Nathan shrugged. “Isn’t that Dr. Chunn’s job to find out?”
Greta inclined her head.
“I don’t like it,” I insisted, but from the satisfied look on Greta’s face, the matter was settled.
Nathan grinned at the sourness in my tone and stepped forward. Dominic tensed, but I knew better. I met Nathan halfway and wrapped my arms around his waist. He hugged me back, his arms resting on my shoulders.
“I’ll be fine in Dr. Chunn’s care,” he murmured in my ear. “If the Damned can’t kill me, she certainly can’t.”
“Be careful. Take care of Meredith, and call if you need me,” I said, my voice muffled in his shirt.
“I will.”
“I’m serious. You didn’t ask for help with Jillian last time, and look what happened.” I pulled back to meet his eyes. “We’re a team, and that means we play the game together, got it?”
He nodded. “I’m not the same person I was when I sought out Jillian. I won’t make the same mistakes.”
“Good. I love your dumb ass, but I’m sick of saving it,” I said, letting my arms drop.
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