“God help me, I haven’t been away from this stinking place long enough,” Cyrus muttered from the passenger seat.
“You know, you could sleep. I hear it’s the thing for humans to do at night.” I myself had not gotten enough sleep on the trip. I found myself longing for my bed, only to realize it wasn’t really my bed I wanted to be in.
A pang of homesickness brought tears to my eyes. I wanted to be lying beside Nathan, inhaling his scent, listening to his blood as it moved through my veins. For a moment, the pain was so intense I nearly screamed my longing like a child having a temper fit.
I needed Nathan. I loved Nathan. Everyone knew it but him.
“Are you all right?”
I still hadn’t adjusted to the new Cyrus, so it took me a moment to realize there wasn’t a hidden trap in his words. I wiped my eyes and nodded. “I’m fine. I’m just very tired.”
“You could have let me drive. I would have picked up speed. When I was more comfortable.” He paused to look out the window. “My God. Nothing has changed.”
“Well, the bus schedule changed. And they finished the bigger YMCA since you…died.” I pointed toward the south side of town. “I’d show you, but I’d rather get home before I burn to a crisp.”
He nodded. “I don’t mean to sound crass, but what exactly am I going to do here?”
Signaling to change lanes, I shifted into the exit that swooped smoothly down to the heart of town. “I haven’t figured that out yet. You can stay with us for a while.”
“I don’t think Nolen will be happy about that.” Cyrus sounded almost apologetic. Probably because he didn’t want to sleep in the van again.
“Nathan is currently indisposed to object to anything. But I’m not asking you to stay as a guest. You have to stay with us because I don’t want your father getting ahold of you.” I sent him a pointed glance. “And I don’t want you trying to find him, either.”
He gave a mock salute. “Yes, ma’am.”
“I don’t want to fight with you about this, Cyrus.” It still stung to say his name.
He frowned. “Don’t flinch. It’s not like I stabbed you in your heart or anything. I’m human now. You have nothing to fear from me.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but his deep sigh cut me off.
“I do want to find my father. But not for the reasons you suspect.”
Pushing down a huge lump of fear, I tried to sound chipper. “Well, maybe I’ve misjudged you.”
He looked at me with unwavering accusation in his eyes. “You’ve never done anything but.”
I let his comment pass—there must have been a gas leak rendering him high and a complete amnesiac to say something so profoundly stupid—and we rode the rest of the way in silence.
But I couldn’t quiet my mind as we neared the apartment. I had to forcibly remind myself that this wasn’t a joyous homecoming. Our ordeal was far from over, and I had no idea what I was going to find when we arrived. By the time I pulled up to the curb in front of the building, I could barely keep the image of Linda Blair’s spinning head from my mind.
I took a deep breath to fortify myself and grasped the door handle. “Here goes nothing.”
“Wait.” Cyrus’s fingers, startlingly warm on my dead flesh, closed over my arm. He took my shocked hesitation for compliance. “It seems like it was only a few days ago you left me. My chauffer drove me here every day, and I would park at this very curb and imagine you upstairs with Nolen.”
Cyrus clasped my free hand with a firm, earnest grip. “You hurt me. You think I didn’t love you. I didn’t. I thought I did, but now I know I was wrong. But I cared for you. I did truly care for you.”
I swallowed. Maybe if I hadn’t known he was dead, I would have prepared for this moment. If I had planned a confrontation, it would have been a spectacular one. But I hadn’t had a reason to. I didn’t know what to say now or how to react. I couldn’t even tell what I was supposed to be feeling.
“You broke my heart, Carrie.” His gaze locked with mine, and for the first time I saw nothing but honesty in the clear, blue depths of his eyes.
He leaned forward slowly, his catlike grace not lost to death and resurrection. Before I could think rationally—and it would have taken awhile, considering the totally bizarre circumstances of the moment—Cyrus kissed me.
The phrase “like riding a bicycle” came to mind. Though it had been two months, during most of which he’d been deceased, my body responded to him the way it had when we’d shared blood. Utter, uncontrolled desire that crashed over me like a tidal wave and stole every rational thought.
I didn’t touch him, but I didn’t pull away. He wrapped his arms around me. It was awkward because of the steering wheel, but he was still as good a kisser as he’d been as a vampire. My toes curled and I shifted on the seat, trying and failing to force away the tingling ache in my body.
He leaned back, his face flushed, beads of perspiration standing out on his forehead. His gaze fell to my lips, then rose to my eyes, then flitted to the windshield.
“Oh, look,” he panted, pointing dismissively to something beyond the glass. “That’s where I cut your heart out.”
It was so matter-of-fact, so remorseless. The pain of that night—my own, coupled with Nathan’s anguish, as well—sawed through me the way Cyrus’s knife had. Under the weight of the stress and worry I’d been carrying, the hurt was too much to bear. Tears gushed to my eyes and I slapped him, leaving a shocking white handprint that turned quickly to angry red.
I could tell from his expression he knew what he’d done. He reached for me helplessly, but I pushed his hands away.
“How could you do that?” I wanted to wipe his kiss from my mouth, to erase the feeling of his lips from mine. “How could you…”
I couldn’t finish. I didn’t want to say he’d kissed me. I hated knowing that he still had that seductive power over me, that it hadn’t all been because of the blood tie we’d shared. And I hated that whatever that sick attraction was, it had, for the moment, forced all thoughts of Nathan from my mind.
At the top of the stairs, the door opened to reveal a very alarmed woman with a crossbow. I recognized her long black hair and exotic features. It was Bella, the assassin from General Breton’s office. The clothes she wore were familiar, as well. They were mine.
She raked an appraising glance over Cyrus and me, then flipped the bow against her shoulder in a less-intimidating stance. “You must be Carrie.”
I nodded and opened my mouth to speak, but an earsplitting scream interrupted me.
The werewolf’s brow creased in gentle concern. “It sounds worse than it is. I have administered a decoction of herbs to soothe him, but they have not taken effect.”
I mumbled a numb “thank you.” The scream had jarred me. I’d never heard it outside of my head before.
Max emerged from the hallway, wiping his hands on his jeans. “He’s fed, at least.” He froze at the sight of us, an indecisive smile playing tug-of-war with his lips. “You’re back.”
“I know.” It probably seemed cruel of me not to rush immediately to Nathan’s side, but I couldn’t. Not after what had happened—what I had let happen—in the car.
Max frowned at me, as if he picked up on my guilty vibe. True to his damned awesome perception, he turned to Cyrus. “Hey, I’m Max.”
Cyrus betrayed nothing, a skill honed to perfection over seven centuries of intrigue and manipulation. It was like a program that clicked on automatically, and I was secretly thankful for it.
He took Max’s hand and shook it firmly. “We’ve met before. When you and your friends broke into my house and murdered me.”
Max’s good-natured smile never wavered, but I saw Cyrus’s knuckles turn white in his grasp. When he released him, Cyrus surreptitiously wiggled his fingers.
Max cleared his throat. “Nathan’s been asking for you.”
“Then he’s…” I didn’t know how to phrase the question, so I looked helplessly to Bella
, who seemed, strangely, more compassionate than Max.
“No, he’s still possessed. He just got a whole lot more lucid when we shot him with the tranq dart,” Max said, throwing the bloody towel over his shoulder. “He’s messed up, physically. He’s just a mass of bruises. And he’s terrified. Maybe you could help calm him down.”
As if on cue, another scream rent the air.
“Yeah.” I wiped my sweating palms on my jeans and threw a quick glance to Cyrus. “Stay here. Max will play nice.”
I expected some comment as I walked down the hall, something to either buoy my spirits or knock me down a peg for being such a lousy fledgling. But I should have known better. Max would scold me privately, after the hard part of all this was finished.
The room was dark, probably to lessen the stimulation for Nathan. When I stepped through the door, he shouted and twisted against whatever restraints Max had come up with. His big body stressed the bedsprings and made the frame groan. The sound immediately conjured up memories of all the times I’d heard it under much more pleasurable circumstances. Then I felt suddenly guilty and perverse.
I wondered if he knew I was there. I could escape now. I don’t have to stand here with him knowing what I’ve done.
Then I remembered the blood tie, and I wanted to smack myself in the head. I hadn’t been consciously blocking him from my thoughts. Could he have heard them?
Would he understand if I spoke? The last time I’d seen him, he’d been a mindless, blood-soaked animal. We’d communicated through the blood tie, but only briefly, before whatever was wreaking havoc with his mind had taken hold of him again.
I couldn’t speak, anyway. I opened my mouth, but what would I say? I leaned against the cool, painted wood of the closed door, my breath far too loud in the tortured silence.
Finally, Nathan spoke. His voice was raw and exhausted, but it was Nathan, not the monster who’d attacked me. “Carrie?”
“It’s me.” I took a careful step forward. Though I knew he was restrained, though I knew he was my sire and I had nothing to fear from him, all I could remember was the blood splashing onto me from his torn skin. Morbid as it seemed, Nathan’s blood had always smelled like home to me. The memory of the putrid stench of it the night he’d attacked me kept my feet rooted stubbornly to the ground.
“They’ve tied me up, dotaír.” His slurred endearment, Gaelic for doctor, brought a sad smile to my mouth. After a drunken sigh, he added, “And drugged me.”
“I’ve missed you.” I had to force the words past a lump that felt dangerously like impending tears. “How do you feel?”
“Drugged,” he repeated with an inebriated chuckle. “I’ve missed you, too.”
“You sound a lot better than you did the last time I saw you, at any rate.” I tried to inject some humor into the statement, but it fell flat.
Only silence greeted me. For a moment, I wondered if Nathan had fallen asleep. Then, very quietly, he said, “Did I hurt you? I don’t remember.”
With sudden violence, he strained against his bonds and shouted in the frightening language he’d used the night he’d been possessed. He finished his angry tirade with a growling, “Let me up!”
“I can’t do that, Nathan.” I tried to be firm, but my voice shook. So did my hands, as I stepped closer to the bed and laid just my fingertips on his chest.
He sank back onto the mattress almost immediately. “Carrie?”
After all I’d been through in my life, the death of my parents, the heartbreak of failed relationships, the physical pain of having my heart literally ripped out, nothing had ever hurt as bad as watching my sire struggle against this unseen enemy.
His helplessness evaporated the last of my fear. “It’s me.”
“Don’t leave me alone,” he begged, clawing frantically at the cuff around his wrists.
“I won’t.” I climbed onto the bed, into the slim space between his body and the edge of the mattress. “I’m not going to leave you, Nathan.”
He relaxed more when I pressed myself flush against him and draped my arm over his chest. Despite the darkness, I saw something change in his eyes. They were still glazed from whatever herbal concoction the werewolf had given him, but now I recognized him there.
His foot found its way from under the blankets and he hooked it around my ankle. “I’ve made a mess of things, haven’t I?”
“No,” I assured him, reaching to smooth a stray lock of hair from his forehead. “We’re going to fix this.”
He shook his head. “I meant with you.”
I couldn’t hold back my tears anymore, but I refused to let him see them. I buried my face against his side. “I’m not afraid of you, Nathan. You haven’t done anything to hurt me.”
“You were my second chance,” he said sleepily. “And I screwed it up.”
I stayed with him, partly because I’d promised, partly because I needed to touch him to assure myself of his presence, physical if not mental. Being there seemed to keep the beast at bay, and if nothing else, I could assure him some rest.
Still, his words echoed in my brain. “You were my second chance.”
I didn’t want to apply any hidden meaning to them, but as in most things, what I wanted and what I got were two different creatures.
Was I his second chance at love? That sounded incredibly corny, like the title of a movie you’d see on the women’s channel. His second chance to have a relationship with someone he didn’t end up killing? I should certainly hope so.
Or did the words even apply to me? He was drugged and possessed, drifting in and out of lucidity. What were the chances he was talking to some demon creature in another dimension?
Or this one? I cast a fearful glance around the shadowy room, then dismissed that notion. I was too old to be afraid of the dark, especially since the other half of me was consumed by fear of the light.
Well, maybe not half. There had to be room for guilt. I’d banished that useless emotion for two months. Why was it leaking into me now at every available chance, like water into a sinking ship? I didn’t like the feeling. I wondered how Nathan could live with it.
Then it hit me, as obvious and absurd as a fish falling from the clear, blue sky.
He couldn’t live with it. And that was what kept him in this state. His guilt kept him prisoner.
As soon as Carrie had left the room, Cyrus found himself descended upon by the two assassins that remained.
“Make yourself useful,” Max growled, and the woman handed Cyrus a thick book with yellowing pages. As she leaned over him, he caught a whiff of what could only be described as “wet dog” smell.
He brightened instantly. “You’re lupin?”
He should have realized his mistake before he made it, he noted as she lunged for him. Her fingernails sank into his shoulders and her teeth snapped inches from his throat before the vampire hauled her off.
“Filthy, murdering beast!” She spat at him, kicking out with such vehemence that she left the floor, the vampire’s grip the only thing keeping her upright.
“Whoa, calm down, it’s an easy mistake,” Max said, turning her away.
Poor bastard’s going to get it now, Cyrus thought with an inward chuckle. If the most demeaning insult to a lupin was being called a werewolf, it was ten times worse the other way around. “I apologize, deeply. I meant no offense. In the past, my only experience has been with your estranged brethren.”
“They are not our brothers, murdering coward!” Her voice still held an edge of hysteria, but she was controlled enough to brush the vampire’s hands aside without seeking to do more damage immediately after. “I know who you are!”
“Have we met?” It was an intentionally cruel remark. He folded his arms across his chest and waited for what she would inevitably say.
“I read the files! I know of your cruelty to my kind. The hunts you arranged for the pleasure of the lupins. Only you called them dogfights when you joked with your friends!” Her golden eyes widened. Would she
weep?
The vampire put his arm around her in a proprietary, protective gesture. Very interesting.
“He’s done a lot of things.” Max glared at Cyrus. “But we need him, for the time being.”
Sighing deeply and theatrically, Cyrus spread his hands. “Look, I’m very sorry for any wrong I’ve committed, intentionally or accidentally, against any member of your pack or kennel or whatnot. I mean that truly and sincerely, from the very core of my being. But I’m tired. Please imagine what it’s like to be raised from the dead by a deranged vampire-motorcycle-gang-religious cult, only to be dragged across the country in a van driven by your ex-lover and fledgling who hates you and no longer sympathizes with the human need for waste elimination. I have neither the energy nor the inclination to write a ten page statement officially apologizing for the evils of my past, and if you expect me to, kindly throw yourself beneath the wheels of a moving train.”
When he’d begun to speak, the words didn’t sound so bad. They weren’t tactful, but they didn’t seem confrontational in his mind. Apparently, the vampire had a different perception of things. This time, he lunged forward, only to be held back by his woman. “Don’t talk to her that way!”
“I’ll talk any way I please.” Cyrus’s patience, worn thin by grief and too many hours without sleep, had reached its limits. “I’m not here by choice. If I had it my way, I’d walk out that door and never see any of you again.”
Except Carrie. He’d already lost her once. Since being with her again, he felt too keenly the heartbreak that had still been with him when he’d died. But if she’d have let him, he would have stayed with Mouse, in the desert, until death came to him again.
It seemed death was the only time he had a moment’s peace.
“No one’s stopping you,” the vampire growled, his face shifting to take on the fearsome snout and snarling teeth that marked his true identity.
For a moment, the werewolf stepped back. As if feeling her horror himself, Max shook his features back to a more human visage. Then, apparently aware she’d hurt his feelings, she laid her hand on his arm. “We need him to help us, Max. He is tired and he has been through much. We cannot expect him to react any differently. He is only human.”
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