“Sleeping? You fool!” Simon grabbed the still-groggy Eric by the collar, lifted the taller man from the sofa, and flung him across the warehouse floor. The befuddled guard ended up near the two women huddled in their cages at the far end of the room.
Shay raised an eyebrow at Tina. No words were needed; they both slipped back to their respective beds and made themselves as quiet and inconspicuous as possible. What had happened? Simon wasn’t a pussycat, but she’d never seen him in a rage. Fear-inducing iciness was more his style.
“I’m sorry, I just dozed off for a minute.” Eric climbed to his feet and backed away with a limp. “It’s never happened before.”
Oh, brother. And Shay had a patch of swampland in South Louisiana to sell Simon if he bought that load of crap.
“I sincerely doubt it.” Simon returned to his familiar, icy self. “Luckily for you, I don’t have time to deal with incompetent blood junkies. Get your ass out of here and go to the house in Bywater. Our esteemed visitor from Penton isn’t due until tomorrow night, but he might show up early. Despite my instructions, I also doubt he shows up alone, so I expect you to call should anything look amiss.”
Simon paused. “If he arrives and finds you asleep, I don’t need to describe your future, do I?
Eric swallowed hard. “No sir.”
Yeah, because he’d have no future. Shay had no doubt of that.
Once Eric had gone, Simon accompanied Shay to visit each of the women. The wheels of the rolling cart of supplies his flunky had brought squeaked as they crossed the concrete floor.
Tina’s vitals were fine, as were Sarah’s, but Lindy’s blood pressure was way too high. “Are you having any pain or cramping?” Shay did a second blood pressure check, and again got a high reading. The girl had been distraught since they’d brought her in, and stress could complicate any condition, especially pregnancy. “Any bleeding?”
Lindy nodded. “The cramping started earlier today and I thought it was something I’d eaten, but…” she glanced at Simon, who’d moved closer.
“But what?” he demanded. “Good God, woman, I’ve lived three centuries. Is there any bodily function of which you think I’m unaware?”
Lindy blushed. “I started bleeding an hour or so ago. I thought if I stayed still and quiet it might stop, but it hasn’t.”
Shay glanced over at Simon. “Where’s that portable ultrasound I asked for?”
His voice was clipped. “Tomorrow.”
“By tomorrow, she could lose the baby and be in danger herself. She needs to go to a hospital.” Shay had no clue what to do for her beyond basic common sense. Quiet, minimal stress, and other niceties not to be found in a riverside warehouse full of vampires and captive pregnant women.
“Not possible. Keep her quiet and calm. We’ll have the ultrasound when we have it.”
“She needs more than that now. She needs a fetal monitor. She needs a gynecological exam. There might be medications that could protect her and the baby.”
Simon gave her a look that would freeze boiling water on contact. “Back in your cage. Now. And you”—he turned to Lindy—“lie down, stay quiet, and don’t do anything to jeopardize this child.”
“Threatening her won’t—”
“In your cage now, Ms. Underwood. Need I remind you how very expendable you are?”
No, he already reminded her at regular intervals. But Shay was spared another warning by the ring of Simon’s mobile phone, which he snatched out of his pants pocket with a jerk. Somebody had sure pissed on his Wheaties tonight.
While he talked, Shay backed toward the cage that had become both her prison and her refuge, not wanting to turn her back on him. Once inside, she pulled the cage door closed behind her, wishing for once that she had a key to lock herself in.
On the other hand, maybe he’d forget to lock it.
Another vampire, a short blond woman Shay had never seen, arrived just as Simon ended his call. He handed her his keys and pointed at Shay. “Lock her door and keep an eye on the blonde at the other end of the warehouse—she’s ill.”
“Is everything all right, Simon dear? You look frazzled.”
“No, just do as you’re told. Frank’s pissed at both of us because of your fuckup in Atlanta.”
A good word for Simon’s demeanor: frazzled. Shay curled up on her bed, watching the woman lock the door of her cage without even looking inside. Fine with Shay. She didn’t want to know any more vampires, although this was the first female she’d seen.
Simon and the woman, whose name seemed to be Marianne, talked quietly and since she couldn’t hear what they were saying, Shay closed her eyes and tried to go to sleep. Jon had come in a little earlier to drop off some papers but hadn’t stayed long. Maybe the revolving warehouse door would be quiet for a while.
“Damn it.” Simon jolted her awake, and Shay sat up. Simon perched on one of the chairs, his fingers pressed against his temples, then pulled his phone out and tapped the screen. He listened a few seconds, then ended the call. “I’m trying to reach Jon, but he seems to be out of range,” he told Marianne. “Take backup, check out my safe house in Bywater, and send Rocky here to the warehouse. Something’s gone wrong; I can feel it.”
Shay pulled the light quilt over her and closed her eyes, pondering Simon’s behavior tonight. And what kind of vampire name was Rocky? Would it be too much to hope something horrible had happened to Jon?
And what would frazzle a vampire as scary as Simon?
Chapter 13 * Aidan
The bullet shattered Aidan’s cheekbone in an explosion of pain. Beads of car window glass blew into his eyes. The world spun on a fulcrum of agony. Everything went black.
He knew his eyes wouldn’t open, but they did. Holy hell.
A dream. He’d been back in that car with Cage three months ago, speeding in the middle of the night toward Penton after an attack in Atlanta. Gunfire had sounded a split second before the bullet hit him.
When he woke, his eyes had been bandaged. Now, however, he could see a plain white ceiling. He turned his head, which still vibrated with the memory of pain, and saw not Cage but Krys. She lay motionless in a bed near his.
The sight of her pale, heart-shaped face finally brought him out of his past and into the present. He was in one of the subsuites.
“And Aidan Murphy awakens.” Will Ludlam dragged a straight-backed wooden chair to Aidan’s bedside. “How do you feel?”
Aidan felt a lot of things. Sore. Confused. Tired. Heartsick. “How long have I been out?”
“One partial daysleep last night, and most of tonight. It’s almost four a.m. Glory and Mark fed you and Krys through an IV just after nightfall. I don’t want to give you false hope, but Krys has moved a couple of times since I got here at midnight.”
“Untie me.” Aidan’s tried to put some authority in his voice, but he was too damned weak. “I promise to stay put.”
Will arched an eyebrow. “Uh huh. Maybe when I leave.”
Aidan wanted to crawl into bed with Krys, to hold her, feel her body against his. To let her know he was here, that they were here together. That they could both survive. He had to believe that.
“Leave now, then.” Aidan paused. “And I mean that in the nicest of ways.”
Will grinned, flashing the dimples that had made him Penton’s most eligible bachelor until he’d finally fallen for Randa Thomas. “Actually, I have some business first.”
Business. God. Aidan didn’t think he could strategize about how to walk across the room without holding on to something, much less create any kind of battle plan. “I think Mirren needs to handle business for a while.”
“Not about security. He’s on top of keeping Penton safe, or trying. He’s turned the training center into a fortress. I just wanted you to look at a few sketches Nik drew and see if there’s anyone you recognize.”
“I could look at them better if you’d untie my hands.”
Will paused, then nodded. “Fine. Feet stay tied.”
“Fine.”
Will leaned over and untied Aidan’s left wrist, then gave him a wide berth as he crossed to the other side of the bed to untie his right.
Aidan snorted. “You really think I’m strong enough to reach over and crack your head on the corner of the bed? As tempting as that might be?”
Will shrugged, picked up a few sheets of paper from the floor beside his chair and handed them to Aidan. “The fact that you even asked the question means you considered it.”
“Good point.” Aidan flexed his wrists and arms, slid a hand down and along the bed rail and untied the rope securing his midsection to the bed. Pushing himself to a sitting position required reluctant help from Will.
“Feet?”
“Okay. But if you do anything stupid, we’ll both have to answer to Dr. Mirren.” Will finished untying him and Aidan swung his legs over the side of the twin-sized bed, laying the sheets of paper on the pillow until he was sure he could stay upright without help. He glanced at Krys, looking for a sign of movement, a noise, any hint that his moving around had any effect on her. Nothing yet.
“Okay, what am I looking at?”
“Just some stuff Nik picked up on. I’ll tell you more after you’ve seen them.”
Aidan stared at a couple of sketches of what looked like a warehouse. A couple of men who didn’t look familiar. He drew in a hissed breath at the next one. “Frank Greisser. Where is the son of a bitch? Who or what did Nik take these images from?”
“Look at the next one.”
Aidan held Will’s gaze for a few moments before returning to the sketches. Will might be a master vampire now, but he was no match for Aidan. He was hiding something, and Aidan would force the information from him if he had to.
He stared at the last drawing. One man was clearly Greisser, but the man with him looked familiar. Slender, dark-haired. Aidan thought a moment, then remembered: the man had attended a couple of Vampire Tribunal meetings in New York before everything went to shit. There was speculation that Greisser might be grooming him for leadership—until Aidan had been elected to fill the North American seat and the whole Tribunal imploded.
He glanced at Will. “This guy is from New Orleans, I think.” He studied the drawing a bit longer, reaching into his rusty memory banks. “Simon something. An old Louisiana name. Oh yeah, Landry. Simon Landry.”
Will had been looking at Krys, but his gaze shot quickly to Aidan. “We didn’t know his name, so that’s a big help. He’s been meeting with Greisser regularly, Mirren thinks. The earlier sketch was Greisser at the New Orleans airport.”
Aidan speared him with a serious look, annoyed that Will quickly looked away and focused somewhere in the vicinity of Aidan’s nose. The young vampire knew he could still be controlled. Aidan pulled on the connection of their bond, to see what was in Will’s head. The man was inwardly bellowing an old song called “The Sound of Silence,” drowning out any readable thoughts. He’d show Will some sounds of silence.
“Tell me what’s going on in New Orleans, Will. That’s an order.”
Will smiled at him again. “Simon Landry. That’s the info I needed. Thanks, boss. I’ll just text that name to some friends in New Orleans.” He got up and moved the chair back to the foot of the bed.
“You don’t have friends in New Orleans. Will, don’t you set a foot near that fucking door before you tell me…” Aidan tried to stand, wavered, then abruptly sat again.
Will opened the door but paused before leaving. “See you later. And by the way, Krys just moved her hand.”
Aidan barely registered the door closing and the deadbolt being thrown, locking him inside. He looked around for something to lean on, but the only thing within reach was the chair Will had been sitting in. He pulled it around the end of the bed and used the back of the chair as a makeshift crutch.
Moving slowly, Aidan walked to the far side of the queen-sized bed where Krys lay. He pulled his sweater over his head, turned back the lightweight quilt and crawled in beside her.
“Grá mo chroí,” he whispered, turning on his side and wrapping his left arm around her waist, pulling her close. My beloved.
He inhaled the warm, familiar scent of her, relishing the peace that spread through him. Holy hell, this is what they had needed all along, to be together. To share their strength. He’d left her alone to fight for her life while he pursued revenge, and in the process he’d endangered the thing most precious: their bond.
Mirren had been right. If he’d gone on the way things were, his stronger vampire nature would have won out and she would eventually have died—or he’d have released more and more energy until they both died. He prayed this intervention had come in time.
Her shoulder moved. Or had it been a muscle twitch?
“Krys? It’s me. Wake up, baby. Come back to me.” He willed her dark brown eyes to open, to laugh at him without needing to speak, to calm him, to complete him. But she didn’t wake.
He settled in beside her, tucking his head in the curve of her neck so he could hear the blood in her veins and feel the softness and warmth of her skin. He held his breath as her fingers moved, then her arm. She slid her hand until she could rest her fingers atop his, then grew still once again.
“Krys?” Aidan waited, but she didn’t move again. She didn’t wake. But she would. He felt it.
For now, holding her was enough.
Chapter 14 * Nik
Cage caught the human before he made it two steps toward his front door and freedom. “Oh, no you don’t, my New Orleans friend. I said we had things to discuss, and I quite meant it.”
Nik retrieved a set of handcuffs from a pocket and held them out. “Try these.”
“I like a man who comes prepared.” Cage grinned and jerked the man’s arms behind his back, slapping on the cuffs with an ease that told Nik he was no stranger to using them. From his long mercenary days, maybe.
“What’s your name?” Robin looked up at the human. “Who are you working for?”
The guy just looked at her with a smirk. “Nice acting job, bitch.”
Enough of that. Nik didn’t like the guy’s attitude, and they didn’t have time to waste.
Apparently, Cage was thinking the same thing. “Just take what you need from him, Nik. He must be bonded to some bloody vampire or other and he’s more afraid of his master than he is of us. A mistake, I might add.”
Nik approached the man, flexing his fingers. He must have seen something on Nik’s face he didn’t like.
“Help!” he shouted in the direction of the front door. “Help! I’m being robbed! Call 9-1-1!”
“Bloody hell. Shut him up.”
Robin grabbed a t-shirt that had been thrown over the back of a chair and stuffed it in the man’s mouth, mid-shout.
Nik didn’t bother with a wrist or touch on the shoulder. He wrapped the fingers of both hands around the man’s head and held on. Good thing about vampire strength. No matter how much the man squirmed, he couldn’t escape Nik’s grip.
Robin took advantage of the moment and patted the guy down, extracting his wallet from a back pocket. “Jonathan Lachey. Probably his real name. Doesn’t look smart enough to use a fake I.D.”
“All right, Jonathan. Let’s see what you can tell me.” Nik closed his eyes, and the clarity of the visions made his breath catch. Direct touch had always amped his visions, but nothing like this. As with the images from objects, however, he could now shuffle through the guy’s memories and thoughts like a deck of cards instead of suffering an uncontrollable onslaught. “He’s bonded to someone and trying to reach out mentally.”
“Better work fast.” Cage held Jonathan more firmly in place while Nik plundered inside his head.
Nik paused on an image and tightened his grip on the man’s skull. Nothing escaped but a strained whimper. “You were with Shay.”
And a lot of other women. So many. Several of the girls were pregnant, including Shay. He mentally dived deeper to hear conversations, especially t
hose with the black-haired vampire. Nik would make bets that was the one Jon was bonded to.
“Don’t kill him, Niko.” Robin put a hand on his arm, her voice low and lethal. “At least not yet.”
A buzz from Nik’s phone helped take him from that pit of dark anger—a little. He’d seen enough to get an idea what Frank Greisser’s game was. Cage’s phone buzzed a moment later, then Robin’s.
Robin held her phone up so Nik could see the text from Will: Dk hair vamp=Simon Landry. Greisser ally.
Nik nodded. “Where is Simon Landry? Where’s your boss, Jon?”
The man’s eyes widened and he shook his head. Didn’t matter. Nik had already seen the image of a spot he recognized.
“He’s at the warehouse.” Nik released Jon’s head and flexed his fingers again. A dull throb had set up in his temples but nothing like before he’d been turned. Vampire Nik had a mild headache. Human Nik would have been on the sofa with blood coming out his nose and ears, incapacitated for a day or two. “I have all I need.”
Cage looked almost as pissed as Nik felt, only not quite. Shay had been kidnapped by this scumbag, and she was pregnant. “Nik and Robin, go on out and disable his car,” Cage said. “I’d like a moment alone with Jonathan before I loosen the cuffs. I assume you have the key?”
Nik dug in his pocket and tossed the key to Cage. “Don’t be long. We don’t know what we’re going to run into in that warehouse and it’s already a few minutes after four.” He was glad Cage had taken over. Left alone with Jonathan Lachey, Nik would have killed him.
He and Robin headed out the door, but Nik paused to look back just as Cage gave Jonathan’s head a violent wrench to the left. His neck bones snapped with an audible crunch, and Cage gave an extra twist to sever the spinal cord. He leaned over, removed the handcuffs, and stuffed them in his pocket.
Only then did he realize Nik had remained in the door. “Don’t give me that bloody disapproving look,” Cage snapped.
Illumination (The Penton Vampire Legacy Book 5) Page 11