She's brave. Jenni can smell her fear. It's a yummy scent, which makes Jenni feel ashamed.
“I don't want to kick you out, Jenni. I mean—you took care of Bray—boy, did ya. But I got Ella, and I don't know what kind of trouble you're in. And nurses make a lot of money, right?”
Jenni holds Devin's gaze. “Yeah.”
She knows that she'd be perceived as rich in Devin's eyes. And to the rest of the world—she is. Who owns their own place at almost twenty-eight? Nobody. Of course, almost anyone, if they had the choice, would have their parents back instead of money.
“Just stay the night, take what you need, then go, ʼkay?”
Jenni shoulders slump, and tears clog her throat before she looks away.
“Cops will get who you are soon enough,” Jenni says as they continue walking.
A branch snaps back, striking Jenni in the neck. She hisses at the biting contact. Lifting her hand, she touches the cut at her neck, and her fingers come away stained with blood. Nice one.
Devin breaks out of the woods first, turning. “Yeah. My car being at the hospital, you tossing me over your shoulder and sprinting into the woods? Surprised they're not already here.” She shakes her head.
“Yeah,” Jenni whispers. Folding her arms, she cups her elbows, scanning the backyard of the dated apartment complex as the lawn rolls into the dormant blackberry bushes that border the forest, a few rotting berries still clinging to the prickly canes.
All at once, everything overwhelms her. The hunger, the uncertainty—the danger she might have inadvertently put Devin and her daughter in.
Jenni bursts into tears in the middle of a lawn at a rundown apartment building of a girl she's known less than a few hours.
“Hey,” Devin says softly and takes her hand again, towing Jenny to the bottom of a flight of steps.
Each pebbled tread is suspended in metal, and they climb as a sobbing Jenni stumbles after her.
They reach a cheap door marked Number 212.
Devin unlocks and opens the door. A bleary-eyed older gal looks up from a book, sees them, and hoists herself off the couch.
“Devin, what's happened?” She glances between them.
“Darlene, meet Jenni—Jenni, Darlene.”
Jenni nods, tears still streaming down her face. It's like she's made of water or something.
“Oh dear, what's ever the matter?” the old lady asks.
It's too much, too near to what Jenni's own mother would've asked if she were alive. She sinks where she stands, and Devin closes the door softly. “Listen, Darlene—I need to get my friend cleaned up and fed. It's been a long night—”
“I'll say,” Darlene says, lips thinning into a single line as her eyes clearly take in the scene of Jenni on the floor and Devin smelling like vomit.
“Is Ella okay?” Devin asks, clearly trying to distract the older woman.
Darlene nods, brows puckering. “Yes, she's just fine.”
“Can I pay you tomorrow?” Devin asks.
Darlene's brow quirks, appearing offended. “You know I only take payment because you force me. I'd watch that darling child for nothing.”
Devin nods and touches her shoulder. “I know, Dar. I just—I need a little bit of time. Bray came by work tonight, and there was a showdown...”
“Oh dear.” Darlene covers her mouth, eyes widening. She looks first at Jenni, then at Devin, then at Jenni again. “Were you part of this scuffle?”
Devin sighs, wrapping an arm around the older woman. She begins herding her to the door. “Jenni helped me, Dar. I'll fill you in when you come back on Thursday, ʼkay?”
Darlene nods, wary eyes shifting to Jenni.
She knows something's up with me.
Devin practically tosses her out the door, closes it, and slides the bolt. She turns and leans against the door. “I love her but, damn. Nosey as hell.”
Devin breezes past where Jenni sits on the worn carpet. “I'm gonna check on Boo then be right back.”
Jenni gives a distant nod. Probably her stomach is digesting her spine at this point. She's so beyond hunger that the drywall covering the dingy apartment walls is beginning to look appetizing.
Damn, damn, damn. Jenni feels the tears drying on her face in a sticky mess. She's spent.
Devin breezes back in. “My little angel is knocked out.” She smiles, and Jenni is taken aback by the expression. The change in her features removes all the hard edges, and the young woman Devin must be looks back at her.
“What?” she asks self-consciously, patting down her hair.
“Nothing,” Jenni blinks, refraining from rubbing her eyes. “Do you have any food?” she asks in a meek voice.
Devin's face lights with surprise. “Hell yeah. Got an entire bucket of KFC.”
Jenni salivates. She uses the corner of a beat-up coffee table as a handhold and stands awkwardly, giving Devin critical scrutiny.
“What?” she asks again.
“You're skin and bones.”
Devin shrugs. “Look who's talking.” She grins.
Jenni doesn't. Everybody is unhealthy skinny after treatment. Hell, Jenni didn't even have hair left when they were done, and her tits are nonexistent. At least her hair grew back, but the color was so light, Jenni dyed it black.
It looks awful, but at least she's got hair now. Girls never know how much their femaleness is tied to hair until they’re bald.
Devin scrunches her brows, apparently seeing something on Jenni's face. “Are you okay?”
Jenni shakes her head, breathing deeply. “I'm really not, but you know how everything looks so bad in the middle of the night without sleep?”
Devin gives a wan smile. “Totally.”
“Well, if I can eat, shower, and sleep—I might feel human again.”
Of course, as soon as she says it, Jenni knows that's bullshit. She's not human.
Not anymore.
*
Something soft brushes Jenni's nose.
She lifts a hand without opening her eyes, and moves it out of the way with a lazy swat of fingers. A soft exhale, on the verge of being a snore, eases out of the tight recesses of Jenni's chest as she begins to relax again into sleep.
She's just starting to doze again when the second light touch occurs.
Jenni's eyes snap open.
A pair of eerily familiar brown eyes gaze back. But they're not Devin's. They belong to a very pretty little girl with eyelashes so long, they nearly touch her light-colored eyebrows.
Jenni blinks.
The girl is holding a Barbie doll, if Jenni's any judge of little girl toys. The long hair from said Barbie is brushing across Jenni's face, tickling her nose.
“Hi. I'm Ella. Wanna play with my Disney princess?”
“Ella!” Devin calls from the other room.
Jenni licks her lips. “Sure,” she replies, but the word sounds like a poor imitation of a croaking frog.
Ella climbs up on top of Jenni, where she's been lying on the couch, and sits on her stomach.
That same stomach was distended from all the drumsticks she sucked down in the middle of the night but is now as flat as a pancake again. Does this mean she has to eat constantly?
Jenni grins.
Does this mean I get to eat constantly?
Finally, a perk.
“Whatcha smiling about?” Ella asks, beginning to groom the Barbie's hair with a small glittery-pink comb.
“No dieting,” Jenni quips and moves to sit up, almost toppling Ella.
She grabs the girl, easily hefting her along with herself—one armed. Jenni decides she could totally get used to the strength she's gained. In fact, Jenni doesn't think werewolf status could have been gifted to a more grateful subject.
Ella laughs as they clumsily readjust on the couch.
“You're funny.” Ella touches a stray hair that crosses Jenni's nose.
Jenni smiles and finally introduces herself. “I'm Jenni.”
“Mama's friend?” The little
girl's pale-blond brows scrunch as she tries to figure out relationships of random chicks who just appear overnight.
Jenni nods, deciding that's easier. After last night, they're certainly acquainted.
“Ella!” Devin calls out, more loudly this time.
“Better scoot.”
Ella gives her a sly smile. “Maybe Mama will forget ʼbout cleaning up my messes.”
Jenni shakes her head. “My mom never did.”
“Never?” Her large brown eyes widen.
She grins at Ella, patting her golden head. “Never.”
Ella grumps, “Better go.”
“Good thinking.”
Ella hops off, grabbing the doll and brush from the floor where they fell during her graceless dismount off Jenni's stomach—which growls again.
What a pain in the ass.
Her eyes travel to the fridge. Suddenly, Jenni remembers her purse. Spying it in a pile on the coffee table, along with her deep-red Old Navy hoodie, she stands.
She feels light-headed, sits again, then stands. Better.
Scooping the purse off the scarred surface, she roots for all the cash she has in the world. Two twenties and one ten.
She finds a Mama's mood is good magnet on the fridge and centers the bills beneath it, firmly attaching the money to the fridge.
She opens the freezer and looks inside as icy air bites at a face still warm and fuzzy from sleeping so hard.
Jenni rubs her eyes, peering inside the cold box of the freezer, and sees a pint of Ben and Jerry's. She reaches for it then eyeballs the one that's hiding behind it. She rolls her bottom lip between her teeth, caves, and grabs that one, as well.
“Oh my God,” Jenni whispers reverently, clutching Banana Split and Salted Carmel Almond against her chest, not even caring a bit that it's freezing and beginning to melt against the incubator-like heat of her body.
It is ice cream.
Devin comes around the corner, sees her holding the two pints, and says, “Oh—hey, don't ya think it's early for dessert?” Her lips quirk.
“No,” Jenni growls, protecting the ice cream like a football player ready for touchdown.
Devin's brows lift.
Ella is right behind her, brown eyes wide, taking in Jenni's attempt at breakfast.
“I like her, Mama. She eats ice cream before supper.”
Devin throws up her hands, clearly exasperated. “You guys.”
You guys.
Jenni smiles at Devin. “Thanks.” A tight lump forms in her throat. She can't talk past it.
Devin stares at her for a beat. “Youbetchya.” She walks to a small drawer by the sink. There's no dishwasher. She pulls out three spoons.
Jenni wants to cry but doesn't.
Instead, the three of them sit down at ten in the morning and mow through the best ice cream in the world.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Slash
Slash's first conscious thought is the burning in his wrists. They feel like they're on fire.
The sweat running from his brow eases the rust on his eyelids, and he slowly opens his eyes.
The environment is dim and dank. Slash doesn't turn his head, allowing his eyes to adjust. Onions hang in netted cages from a ceiling crisscrossed with hand-hewn floor joists. Shelves line the walls made of roughly tumbled local rock. The gruesome contents of glass jars stare back at him.
Eyeballs. Tongues.
A squat, wide jar topped with an ecru-colored lid holds what appears to be an entire brain suspended inside an undetermined fluid.
Non-human, Slash easily recognizes. Fuck.
Judging by his nose, he's still within proximity of the witch's dwelling. Her stench is everywhere, even in the depths of what is clearly a cellar.
Slash is not easily given to panic, but his mate's whereabouts are uncertain. His eyes search the murk, easily finding wide wood planks leading up to a door with a black porcelain knob.
He shuts his eyes, trying to disassociate the relentless agony of his wrists from his thought processes.
Della the witch is not omniscient. If she were, she would have known the buckshot, silver or not—is not enough to kill a Red.
But it hurts like a bitch.
And she's strung him up like a swine for slaughter. With silver bindings. Fuck.
Slash moves slowly, not sure how much care, if any, she took while getting him down here and hoisted. He finds his head doesn't swim with a concussion, nor does his neck feel as stiff as it should.
Yet his heartbeats pile up in a mountain of fear that's slowly building inside his body. He doesn't know where Adrianna is, and he doesn't trust that witch as far as he could throw her.
And I'd like to throw her. His palms dampen with want. Female or not, Della inserted something into his mate's food, sickening her.
Slash hears the growl before he's aware of it and silences himself as the door at the top of the flight of stairs opens with a dragging of the bottom and a creak of hinges.
Light pours forth, cascading down the dusty, flat treads descending to the dirt floor where his feet trail.
Quickly, Slash scans the items in the cellar, cataloging their usefulness. Maybe he can get free and get a weapon? He could add Della to her own morbid jar collection. One piece at a time.
“You awake, Red?”
No reason to keep her in suspense. “Yes.” Nothing comes out; his throat is parched. He clears it. “Yes.”
“Good. Now don't get any plans. I have your mate right here.”
“Adrianna,” Slash calls out, and her name sounds more like a growl than a word.
“Slash,” she answers, and he strains to hear and scent her state of being.
He can't smell dick. His body is trying too hard to heal, and the bindings of silver are continuous obstructions to that physical goal. Slash has never been great at using his senses when the agony of healing is upon him. “Do what she wants.”
No answer.
Please, Adrianna, no stubbornness.
“Be a good bitch and tell him.”
Tell me what? Slash's guts bottom out.
“Move!”
Adrianna appears, gripping the makeshift handrail that looks like it was assembled by an amateur a half-century ago.
Adrianna turns to stare at Della directly behind her. Her features are tight with anger. “Stop shoving me. I can walk on my own, cow.”
The slap rings in Slash's ears, and his beast rises like a high diver surfacing to break free of the water.
Adrianna's face rocks back, and her palm touches where Della struck her.
“Move your butt, bitch.”
Adrianna's shoulders slump, and she descends the steps slowly.
Their eyes meet, and tears that stood like water on glass begin to roll down her cheeks. “Slash,” she whispers, her gaze skimming over him.
“Keep moving.” Della shoves her with something he can't make out.
Adrianna stumbles on the last step, and Slash strains to reach her, barking out in agony as the bindings sink silver fire into his flesh.
Slash grits his teeth, unable to do anything but watch as Adrianna braces her fall with her palms on the dirt floor.
Plumes of dirt waft, and she coughs.
Della puts a foot on her rear and shoves her.
Adrianna flies forward, and Slash's eyes drill the witch. “I will kill you,” he promises.
Della smiles, her earlier facade gone. A new woman sneers down at him in disdain.
Chestnut hair tumbles in loose waves around her shoulders. Modern pants and a fitted blouse cling to every bit of her tall, curvaceous frame.
But her eyes are like a ferret's: dark brown and resembling slits inside a face too angular to be considered anything but shrewish.
Della looks the part of witch. And her assuming a younger countenance doesn't make her less of a crone in Slash's eyes.
Slash hasn't lived almost three centuries to not understand another's intentions. Della's are plain. The process hasn't
been revealed, but Slash knows she intends to do more harm.
“Obviously, you won't die.”
Slash smiles, hating Della with every physical inch of him.
“Nope.”
He forces himself not to look at Adrianna.
His beast wants to come. And that's fine.
Just not now.
Slash cannot hope to protect his mate if he plays that hand too soon.
And if he were a betting male, he would say Della's waiting for it. To spring some other torture at him.
Slash can bide his time. He's adept at that.
“I am a cursed witch.” She hikes her chin as though deigning them with her news.
He says nothing, and Adrianna doesn't, either, which worries Slash. But he continues to give Della his full attention. Learning her motivations is all that matters right now.
Not his fatigue.
Not the agony of his burning wrists.
“My wards are a spiderweb of sorts.” Her lips curl in a calculating smile. “Nothing gets through unless it is the right something.”
“True love,” Adrianna says from the ground, and Slash wastes a glance.
Her face is filthy. A smudge of dirt across the bridge of her nose hides the sprinkling of golden freckles he knows are there.
Slash feels his eyes go wolfen and quickly looks away as his beast bulges beneath his skin, trying like hell to push out where it can.
His nailbeds begin to bleed as his talons burst loose from their prison of flesh.
He longs to rub his aching eyes.
“His beast does not like his mate in a position of vulnerability,” Della says.
Drops of deep-red blood drip down his arms as his beast tries to force the change. The moon is near-full, close enough for a Red to form fully into his wolf.
Not now, he commands his beast. His body quakes. The change is a shining thing at the edge of his mind.
Adrianna's voice trembles, “No, Slash—she can kill you.”
Della nods. “I can, and I will. I only need the whelp.”
Slash's inhale is a sucking wound of stale air. “What, witch?”
She nods, obviously pleased with herself. “I need a newborn, begat from supernaturals who love each other. Once sacrificed, the babe will be my release.” Her fingers clench into a triumphant fist. “He or she will be my freedom from the prison of my suffering.”
Redemptive Blood Page 10