“Nothing. How much further?”
“I’m parked in there.” He nodded toward a parking garage further down the block. When she hesitated to follow, he sighed impatiently. “Look, I’m not going to try anything. I told you, I need your help.”
She pursed her lips together but didn’t respond, just gestured for him to continue. When he paid the valet at the window, Ro saw that he handed him much more than what was quoted for the daily rate. “Insurance,” he explained when he noticed her raised eyebrow.
When the valet returned, she was surprised to see him riding a motorcycle. She didn’t know much about bikes, but she knew enough to recognize that it was fast and had a lot of horsepower.
The valet climbed off, handed the key to Dean, and walked away. He handed her the helmet and said, “Put this on.”
“What about you?”
“I don’t plan on getting into any accidents. Besides, it’ll take more than a spill to stop a wolf, as I’m sure you’re well aware. Can you say the same?”
“Just don’t try anything...”
“Oh, and I probably should warn you. You could try riding behind me with one hand holding your gun against my back, but I really wouldn’t recommend it.”
Annoyed that he called her out, she rammed the helmet onto her head. After a few moments of her fumbling with the buckle, he fastened it for her, the gesture making her feel like a child. He climbed on, steadied the bike, and instructed her to get on behind him. Her heart thumping wildly with adrenaline, anticipation, and a small amount of fear, she wrapped her arms around his waist and bit back a scream as he revved the engine and accelerated out of the garage.
Ro was all too aware of how vulnerable she was as he merged into traffic. She was on a motorcycle with a werewolf being taken to some unknown destination. “Fucking stupid,” she muttered again, glad the sound of wind and traffic drowned her out.
She was used to taking mass transit most places, and a car or van to the rest. The act of riding a motorcycle was completely foreign to her. Her arms tightened around him as he turned onto the FDR and accelerated north. At least he drove cautiously, none of that weaving between cars shit. She briefly wondered if that was for her benefit.
Once out of the city proper, the traffic lightened and the skyscrapers gave way to the cliffs and trees of the Palisades. As they continued north, Ro began to lose track of where they were. The road seemed to twist and curve in unexpected places, and she was too anxious to make note of every turn they made.
After what seemed to be an interminable ride into increasingly less populated areas, he paused at an intersection and called back, “You okay?”
She nodded automatically, but then realized he probably couldn’t see her. “Yeah.” The sheer terror from the ride had made all thoughts of an ambush flee her mind. So long as they made it there intact, she’d gladly face whatever horrors awaited. Once she was off this death trap, she could get her dad, kick this guy’s ass, and then catch an Uber back to the city.
After another mile or two, he steered the bike to the entrance of a narrow road which Ro realized was actually a long driveway barred by a rusted iron gate. After opening it, he maneuvered the bike through, then closed it behind them. The drive sloped upwards through the trees until it opened up onto a circular driveway in front of a massive, dilapidated looking house.
Dean parked by the front door and turned to her. “We’re here.”
Grateful to be stopped, Ro climbed off the bike, her legs a bit wobbly from the ride. She pulled off the helmet and shook out her hair. She noticed him staring at her as she finished. “What?”
He cleared his throat and muttered, “Nothing,” then held his hand out to her.
She stared at it for a moment until she realized he was reaching for the helmet, which she finally handed to him. “Where are we?” she asked, feeling a bit foolish.
Without answering her, he went to the front door, lifted a hidden panel in the siding, and punched in a code. There was an unmistakable click and he pushed the door open before gesturing for her to follow.
She hesitated for the barest of moments, realizing that if this was indeed an ambush, then it was about to be sprung. So be it. She’d committed to whatever was coming the moment she’d gotten onto his bike.
What she found inside surprised her. For starters, there was no pack of angry monsters waiting to disembowel her. The interior was relatively clean, if a bit sparsely furnished. The door closed behind her with a definitive click of an electronic lock being reset, the sound echoing slightly in the near empty hall.
She didn’t like feeling locked in, especially in this place where she couldn’t be sure where she was or whom she was with. More to dispel the silence than anything, she said, “This place looks empty. If you were lying about my father...” She felt for the gun at her side and laid her hand on its reassuring bulk.
“Don’t worry. He’s here. Come on.”
She took note of her surroundings as she followed so as to familiarize herself with the layout, in case she needed to fight her way back to the entrance. The home was stately, if relatively empty, with an old Victorian feel. Despite the modern locking system at the front door, the rest of the place seemed steeped in the décor of the past century.
He led her up a grand staircase, their footfalls echoing on the bare wood of each step. As they climbed, she got a sense of how stately the home must have been in its prime.
She followed Dean to the top where the hall branched in opposite directions. He took a left and eventually stopped in front of an open doorway. Inside was an ornately carved four poster bed upon which lay a still figure.
“Dad?” Her voice came out in a whisper.
“He’s sleeping,” someone else replied.
Ro jerked, not realizing that there was another person in the room. She silently cursed herself for being sloppy, letting her emotions get the better of her. Automatically, her hand went to the gun strapped to her side, but Dean stepped in front of her.
“Relax. It’s just Coop. He’s the friend I told you about, the one who’s been helping me.”
“Cooper Maddox at your service,” he said, rising, his eyes quickly darting toward Dean in a questioning manner.
Ro didn’t relax, but she did allow her hand to drop from the weapon.
The other man, Coop, was tall, taller than Dean. Muscular and with a shaved head, he reminded her of a live action Mr. Clean. The random thought left her mind as quickly as it had appeared. This was not the time for silly comparisons. She dismissed him with a curt nod and approached the bed slowly.
Her father looked pale, but he was breathing. Though she was loathe to admit it, the nurse in her could tell he’d been well taken care of. His thick grey hair was combed and clean, and his beard had been trimmed. “How long has he been like this?”
“It comes and goes,” Dean said. “I mean, we’re talking over a month. He’ll seem like he’s getting better, but then he’ll slide back. His current condition started about a week ago. It looked like he was fighting the infection, but then he took a turn.”
“And you never thought to bring him to a hospital?” She whirled on him angrily. “He needs antibiotics and proper medical treatment.”
“We’ve been providing that,” Coop interjected, as if affronted.
“Then why is he still sick?”
The two men glanced between each other meaningfully until Dean said, “It’s okay. She knows. In fact, she’s one of them.”
“Well isn’t that just brilliant?” Coop scoffed. “We’re caring for someone who wants you dead. So what do you do? You bring over one of his healthy buddies, who presumably also wants you dead. Let me know what to put on your gravestone. Nah, scratch that, I already have it. Here lies Dean Mason, world’s biggest fucking idiot.”
Dean crossed his arms and glared at the other man. “She’s the one who was hunting me the last time I got out.”
“And that’s be
tter why?”
“Just shut up and listen. Remember what I told you about what happened? She’s the one who brought me back, made me myself again.”
“So you keep telling me. That’s your plan, then? You’re going to try to use her to develop that cure now? You get points for not giving up, even if you lose a few for being a dumbass.”
“I have to try. It’s better than hiding in a cage every full moon.”
Ro stood over her father and patiently waited for the two men to stop bickering. She didn’t enjoy being argued about as if she wasn’t there, but she was more focused on his condition than the dick waving contest going on.
After a few more moments of back and forth, Dean stepped over to the bed. “I’m pretty sure it’s the bite.” He pulled down the sheet to reveal her father’s left shoulder, which was covered in a large white dressing. He loosened the tape around the gauze and pulled it away, causing Ro to inhale sharply.
The bite wound looked red and raw, the skin around the ragged teeth marks swollen and almost purple, the open areas crusted black with dried blood. She rounded on Dean. “He needs a hospital. He’s probably septic.”
“It’s not infected,” Coop said, stepping in. “We collected cultures and the wound is clean.”
Though she was impressed he even knew what that meant, she didn’t acknowledge it. “It’s a bite and everyone knows how much bacteria is in saliva. You might not have done the cultures right.”
“I know what I’m doing, Miss High and Mighty Wolf Hunter or whatever you are. Dean does, too. Whatever is going on inside of him, it’s not being caused by a bacterial infection. There’s a ... I hate to say this, but I think there’s an extranormal element here. I don’t think he can be treated by medicine alone.”
“So, what, are you some kind of voodoo witch doctor?”
Dean cut in. “Think about it. What do you think will happen if we bring him to the hospital, huh? Any doctor who looks at that wound is automatically going to think it’s from a rabid dog or maybe a bear and give him the standard treatments before even testing him. It could set him back, maybe even kill him. Is that what you want?”
Ro hated to admit it, but he had a valid point. “Okay, fine. But as you said, he took a turn for the worse in the past week. Why?”
“It’s just a theory, but I think it’s because the full moon is coming. Whatever causes ... this is becoming stronger with the lunar cycle and his body is trying to fight it off.”
“The question is why?” Coop replied. “I mean, you said hunters are immune, right?”
Dean nodded then turned toward Ro.
“Yes,” she confirmed.
“So then, what’s happening? Or is this how it normally works?
“We...” Ro trailed off. She realized that a lot of what she knew about her immunity was hearsay. Scratches and cuts were pretty par for the course for a hunter, but so far as she knew, she couldn’t remember actually meeting another of the Guild who’d gotten bitten this badly and not been torn to shreds in the process. “It’s ... complicated.”
“Of course it is,” Coop replied with a roll of his eyes. “Isn’t it always?”
Dean stood up from her father’s side, a thoughtful look on his face. “I’ll admit I’ve been thinking about this a bit.”
“Always a dangerous thing.”
Ro ignored Coop. “And?”
“And I have a theory that you might be the key ... for both of us,” Dean said after a few moments. “We might be able to transfuse him with some of your blood, give his immune system a boost, if you will. That might help his recovery.”
She considered that for a moment, then grudgingly admitted, “That might be the least stupid thing that’s come out of your mouth since I met you.”
♦ ♦ ♦
She allowed Coop to draw a sample of her blood, her free hand never far from her holster, then she sat at her father’s bedside holding his hand. The two men disappeared with the vial, presumably to start whatever analysis they had planned.
She was forced to admit that what Dean had said made sense. She and her father shared the same blood type. If he’d received a massive dose of the infection and was badly wounded on top of that, perhaps getting a transfusion of some of her antibodies would aid in his recovery. She sincerely hoped that would be the case. To think him dead, then to find him only to lose him again, would be even more terrible than losing him in the first place.
All hunters were prepared for the inevitable, but it was all about dying in combat to the wolves – brutally yet swiftly. To watch him suffer a slow death, however, was worse than anything she could have prepared herself for. She’d seen many patients near death come through the emergency room doors and had watched others as they wasted away, but she wasn’t ready to experience her own father being one of them.
She felt more helpless than ever before. He had always been the one to care for her, and now to see him like this, so frail and weak...
Ro sat in the chair and leaned forward, resting her head against his right shoulder. Tired and with the adrenaline of the past hour wearing off, it wasn’t long before she fell asleep.
8
Dean observed from the doorway as Ro slept, her hair splayed across her face and her father’s shoulder. She couldn’t be too comfortable in that position, not with her body contorted in the chair and her head at that unnatural angle, but he didn’t want to disturb her.
Something stirred within him upon seeing her slumbering form, although he wasn’t sure what. She was abrasive and temperamental, the exact opposite of what he usually found attractive. Hell, she had potential to be downright lethal, but there was something about her, something that went beyond her fiery red hair and clear green eyes, something that went deeper than even her volatile temperament.
The beast inside him had remembered her from that night in the alley. One moment he’d seen the world through the wolf’s eyes – shades of black and white and grey – when, all of a sudden, it had transformed into a world of color and clarity.
Almost as if she sensed him hovering in the doorway, Ro stirred and sat up. She stood and stretched her back and arms, lending credence to his observation about her uncomfortable looking position. She turned and then gave a start when she noticed him leaning against the doorframe.
“Good morning, sleepy head,” he said with a quick smile, trying to cover up the fact that he’d been staring.
“What time is it?”
“I was kidding about the morning. Sort of, anyway. It’s about three a.m. Coop’s down in the lab while I take a break.”
“He’s in the lab? I thought that was your specialty.”
“To his credit, he knows a lot. Jack of all trades type of guy. He was a medic in the Army before he came to work for me. He stuck around ... after ... because he feels responsible for what happened to his sister and my family, because he wasn’t there to stop it.”
She let out a bark of harsh laughter. “You should tell him to stop torturing himself. I don’t care if he was some super soldier back in the day. Against a pack of wolves, he wouldn’t have stood a chance.”
“Yeah, I get it, but he’s ... a loyal friend, sometimes to a fault.”
Ro glanced away, back at her father. Dean got the sense she was almost certainly thinking the same thing he was, that her dad looked about three inches from death. “You told me he got worse in the past week. How was he before then? Was he coherent?”
“Somewhat. Coherent enough to talk, but not really with it. Otherwise I probably wouldn’t be alive right now.”
“Yeah, he probably would’ve tried to strangle you with his IV tubing or something,” she stated with something akin to pride in her voice.
Weird family, Dean noted.
“Was he this bad during the last full moon?”
“He was bad, but not like this. It’s like the infection has gotten worse.”
“When can we transfuse him?” she asked.
“Hopefully soon. I want to run some tests first. Make certain it’s the right thing to do.”
“Certain?”
Dean shrugged. “As certain as we can be with a supernatural infection and an X-factor immunity.”
She pursed her lips, her brows knit in consternation. “And what am I supposed to do in the meantime? Leave him here for you to treat as your own personal guinea pig?”
The sudden turn toward bitterness shouldn’t have surprised Dean. After all, her father was injured and he was, by all accounts, a member of the species her people were at war with. Nevertheless, he snapped back, “Hey, I’m trying to save his life. Maybe show a little fucking gratitude, will you?”
He knew it was a mistake the moment the words left his mouth.
She stalked over to him, anger seeping from every pore. “Gratitude? You’re the motherfucker who bit him! Why should I show gratitude to someone who’s only helping me so he can save his own ass?”
Dean took an involuntary step back, if only to maintain some space between them since he didn’t want to be shoved into a wall or worse. “Look, I’ve told you once and I’m saying it again so it penetrates that thick skull of yours. I never asked for this. I’m not one of your blood-thirsty monsters out for fresh meat, and I’m not some Los Colmillos asshole looking to score some quick cash. I just want to get some of my old life back, and if that means taking care of your old man and making sure he survives to kill more wolves, then that’s what I’m going to do.”
She stared him down, her green eyes meeting his, for one beat, two, until finally she blew out a breath. “Okay, fine. I’m ... sorry.” The words came out as if she’d had to gargle them down with broken glass.
“Apology accepted. Now, let’s discuss...”
“But I’m staying here with him. That way we kill two birds with one stone. You do what you can to make sure he gets better, and I’ll supply you with the blood you need to find a cure.”
Dean nodded, inwardly smiling. It was the situation he’d hoped for. “Fair enough.”
Ro folded her arms across her chest. “I wasn’t finished, J. Crew. Here’s the thing. I want my own room, my own privacy. I’m not cooking or cleaning up any of your shit. I take care of dad and myself. Non-negotiable. That work for you?”
Lycan Moon: An Urban Fairy Tale (Lycan Evolution Book 1) Page 7