He did look awful. Even from where she sat, she could see the dark circles under his eyes and the sallow pallor of his skin. When he glanced up and met her gaze, she could also clearly see red lines in the whites of his eyes.
He half smiled at her, his cockiness stripped, leaving only a vulnerable man behind. He appeared confused and uncertain as he looked at her.
She didn’t want to feel any sympathy, but it seeped into her heart regardless of her efforts to trample it down.
“Gabe’s right, you look terrible.” She set the photos on the table.
“Must be jet lag.” He started picking out fragments of different materials from the bucket and placing them on the work area in front of him.
Despite her anger, she stood and walked over to him. When she neared, she could see the sheen on his forehead. Sweat was beading over his skin. She didn’t find it hot in the room at all. In fact, she had been tempted to retrieve a sweater from her locker in the staff quarters.
She put her hand on his arm and was nearly seared. His skin was blistering. “You’re feverish.” She set her palm on his forehead and on the back of his neck. “Have you taken blood lately?”
Leaning into her touch, he shook his head. “I haven’t had a chance.”
“Idiot têtu.”
“Would you quit calling me names? Especially in French. It reminds me too much of my mother.”
“Well, you deserve it.” She guided him to a chair in the corner. “Sit. I’ll get you something to drink.”
She rushed out of the room, down the hall and into the staff room. A vending machine stood along one wall. Digging out change from her jean pockets, she fed some coins into the machine and pushed the button. A plastic bottle of blood fell into the tray. She took it out and rushed back into the work room.
Twisting off the cap, she handed it to Kellen. “It’s O negative. I hope that’s okay. I didn’t know what you preferred.”
He took the offered drink and downed it in two big gulps. When he was done, he shut his eyes and let his head fall back with a sigh of satisfaction. “Thank you.” He opened his eyes and looked at her. Despite the redness, his eyes sparkled like blue diamonds.
“Is it the disease?”
“I don’t know.”
She chewed her bottom lip. “Is that why you freaked out on me?”
Lifting his head, he reached for her hand. “I don’t know. Possibly.”
“You don’t know much, do you?”
Touching him again sent shivers racing over her body. She wanted to crawl into his lap and wrap her arms around him. Licking her lips, she thought of the way he had kissed her, the way he had touched her. Her thighs tingled with the memory of it.
She hated that her attraction to him hadn’t dulled. Their lovemaking had only increased her desire for him. Even if he hurt her afterward, her body responded to him. It was her heart that held back. Her heart and her mind. Her body had always been the treacherous one.
“Sophie, I—”
Olena burst into the room. “We have a few possible suspects. Gabriel wants to see everyone in the conference room right away.”
Kellen dropped Sophie’s hand and stood. Sophie turned her attention to Olena. The vampiress was eyeing them with one elegant eyebrow raised.
“Oh, did I interrupt something scandalous?”
Sophie shook her head, her throat tight and unable to form words, then she walked out of the room without looking back.
Chapter 13
Kellen slid into one of the chairs at the conference table, trying hard not to stare at Sophie. Already seated at the end, she hadn’t glanced in his direction when he had walked into the room. Her regret was palpable, like a curtain of electricity, and he desperately wanted to soothe it away but wasn’t sure if she’d let him.
He had so many things he wanted to say to her. First off was an apology for acting the fool after they had sex. It had been an explosive event for him and he still wasn’t comfortable with the emotions swirling in him, but he knew he had hurt her, and for that he was sorry. She didn’t deserve his erratic and distant behavior.
But he had no idea what to say to make up for that. Was it even possible to make up for acting so callously?
He also wanted to tell her about the book he found last night. And about the memory that nearly drowned him, about Vietnam. Crazy as it might sound, he strongly suspected that there was a connection between him, his experience in the war and Dr. Bueller.
Gabriel stood at the front of the room, a stack of files sitting in front of him on the table. “Here’s our update so far: the investigation into NORM is slow-going. The human authorities are binding us with a bunch of ridiculous red tape. The receptionist has been thoroughly questioned, and it looks like she is in the clear. All of the deceased were investigated, and they are all in the clear, too. So that still leaves us with no viable suspects.” He patted the stack of folders. “After some digging, we found out that Dr. Bueller had quite a few malpractice suits against him.” He flipped open the first file folder. “Some of these cases are ten years old, but a few are more recent.”
“Maybe one of them got impatient and decided to take matters into his own hands,” Sophie added.
“Exactly what I was thinking.” Gabriel tapped his pen on the table. “And after Sophie and Kellen discovered that the doctor may be living a dual life, I’d say we’ve got a very interesting case on our hands.”
“What do you want us to do?” Olena asked.
“I want you and Sophie to cross-reference these files with the current patient records, and the surveillance photos François printed out for us. Maybe we’ll get lucky and find a match.” He looked at Kellen. “I want you to keep putting the second bomb together. If they are the same type, maybe we can track this guy from the components.”
“I’d also like to look deep into the doctor’s background,” Kellen said.
Gabriel raised a brow. “You know something I don’t?”
“No,” he lied. “Just a feeling.”
After a thorough look over, the inspector finally nodded. “Okay, I’ll go with that because your last ‘feeling’ saved Sophie, which I appreciate.”
Sophie glanced at him then, and the floor nearly fell out from beneath him again. He wanted to reach across the table and grasp her hand, touch her face, anything to make a connection again. For as much as they had been linked earlier, he could feel her slipping away from him. Although he wasn’t sure if he wanted her for keeps, he certainly needed her for now.
Gabriel slid the folders down the table toward Sophie and Olena. “That’s it for now. Let’s hope we have something by the end of the day. A suspect to question would be nice.”
Kellen watched as Sophie gathered the files, then stood and exited the room. Reluctantly, he stood and followed. Olena walked beside him, wrapping her hands around his arm.
“You look like someone ripped your heart out,” she said, her eyes twinkling with her secret knowledge.
“Haven’t you heard? I don’t have a heart.”
She chuckled. “Hmm, I think you like to pretend you don’t. But it’s there. Pumping hard. Yearning for what it may not have.”
They stood in front of the workroom. Sophie was already inside, busy going through files. Kellen’s gaze automatically tracked her from across the room. She was like a flame that lit up his darkness and made life easier.
“It will take a lot to tame the wild beast,” Olena said, breaking him out of his reverie. Kellen looked at the vampiress. “If you really want her, it will take more than just your sexual prowess. That girl needs patience, trust and love. If you’re willing to put that out, you might just have a chance.” Smiling, she patted his arm and then went into the room to help Sophie with the files.
Love? What the hell did Kellen know about love? Nothing. He wasn’t even sure he loved his mother. She hadn’t been an easy person to love, always full of unkind words and a cruel disciplinary hand.
He could definitely offer S
ophie trust, possibly patience, even if he did have images of her naked body constantly in his mind. But love? He hadn’t been planning on anything that problematic. Not with the way he was. Not with the disease inside his bloodstream slowly destroying his mind. What kind of relationship could he honestly give her, knowing his days were numbered?
Rubbing his head, he thought maybe it was best that they had ended before they ever truly began. He couldn’t offer her any more than he’d already given. A few nights of good sex was about all he could muster. He had problems, and the last thing he wanted was to hurt anyone. Especially someone like Sophie—someone he was really starting to care for. Despite his aversion to emotion, he possessed a wide range of them for her. It was strange and frightening for him because he didn’t really know if it was solely because of her effect on him, or if the Sangcerritus was in overdrive, upping the pace to devour his mind.
Either way, the best thing for them both was for Kellen to keep his thoughts and his hands to himself.
He walked into the room, his head forward, resisting the urge to look at Sophie, and went to work on reconstructing the second bomb. The sooner he could help solve this case, the sooner he could move on and do what he had come to Nouveau Monde to do—find a cure to his affliction or die trying.
After a couple of hours, Kellen had put together the second bomb. It had been an easier task than the first one, because he suspected the bomb would be the same. And it had been, except for the outer casing, because it had been stashed in a cupboard. The timer, a gold watch this time, had started the moment they had entered the doctor’s residence. But the construction of the IED had been exactly the same.
He’d been able to work in relative peace and quiet, as Olena and Sophie had taken their tasks to another room. However much he liked watching Sophie move, he’d been thankful for the reprieve.
Now that the bomb had been reconstructed, Kellen was intent on digging into Dr. Bueller’s background. The bombs, the doctor’s secret hideaway and the books on his shelves were connected. The Miss Saigon poster also rubbed him raw. He didn’t really peg the doctor for a big musical fan. He could be wrong, but something about it gave him pause. Had the doctor been in Vietnam?
After a thorough search through city documents, Kellen found files like banking information, phone records and background checks on Dr. Jonathon Bueller. But nothing alerted him to anything out of the ordinary. According to the records they had access to, the doctor never served in the army of any country.
Using the World Wide Web, Kellen searched for any other information he could uncover. What he discovered was a number of articles about research on his blood disease, the same ones Kellen had found with his search on Sangcerritus before coming to France, and a website about his medical practice. He’d need to dig into genealogy to find what he was hoping to unearth.
He’d have to ask Gabriel if they had access to a genealogy department in the city. He wanted a lineage search, since the doctor didn’t have a wife, kids, or any next of kin listed. For a vampire, it wasn’t abnormal, as he’d outlive everyone—except if he had married and procreated with another vampire, which in itself was extremely rare. Or if he had been successful in turning someone. But so far, all the evidence pointed to nothing of the sort. As far as Kellen could tell, no one knew the doctor all that well.
Standing and twisting out the kinks from sitting so long, Kellen left the workroom to go locate Gabriel. He’d try the inspector’s office, the lab, and then the other workrooms. He’d avoid the one in which he knew Sophie and Olena were likely still to be working. He wasn’t quite ready to see Sophie again. Diving into work had exorcised her from his mind, at least for a while; but now that he was roaming around the offices, hands and mind free, his thoughts had strayed to her again.
He was definitely in a bad way.
Striding down the hall, he poked his head into Gabriel’s office but didn’t find the inspector. He was walking toward the lab when he heard Gabriel’s voice from around the corner.
With the question already on his lips, he turned the corner but pulled up sharp when he saw who the inspector was talking to—the lycan cop who had been around Sophie earlier.
“Kellen.” Gabriel almost looked nervous, as his gaze flitted from the lycan back to Kellen.
“I was wondering if you had access to genealogy,” Kellen asked, trying hard to avoid the way the other lycan was glaring at him, nostrils flaring.
“Yes, we do.”
“I was just looking for you, vampire.”
Kellen glanced at the bigger lycan and pointed to himself. “You’re looking for me?”
Gabriel cleared his throat. “Kellen, this is Constable Duncan Quinn.”
Ignoring the inspector’s introduction, Duncan moved toward Kellen, his meaty hands fisted at his sides. “I have a few words to say to you.”
“Yes?”
“Stay away from Sophie.”
He supposed he should have sensed the lycan’s jealousy the moment he came upon him. He decided to play the fool. “I’m sorry?”
“The word around is that you’re flirting with her.”
Kellen smiled. It never failed to amaze him how fast gossip could travel. “Ah, well, you see, I think that’s up to Sophie, don’t you think?”
Duncan stepped into Kellen’s space, puffing his chest out like a gorilla. “No, that’s where you’re wrong, vampire. It’s up to members of her pack like me to ask you, nice and polite, to stay away from her.”
Kellen shook his head when what he really wanted to do was send this guy sailing across the hall. “It amazes me how you ever managed to evolve.”
“What did you say?” Duncan stared down Kellen.
“You’re acting like a Neanderthal.”
“Are you calling me names, bloodsucker?”
Gabriel took that moment, finally, to step in. “Look, Duncan, this isn’t the time or place to solve this. Cool down and go for a walk.”
“Stay out of this, Gabriel. This is between me and the freak here.”
“Freak, huh?” Kellen gave him a sardonic half smile. “So says the man that turns all hairy and barks like a dog at the sight of a full moon.”
Duncan obviously didn’t enjoy Kellen’s sense of humor as much as Kellen did.
The lycan poked Kellen in the chest with one meaty finger. “Don’t mouth off to me, little man.”
As quick as lightning, Kellen had Duncan by the throat and was backing him up down the hall. Surprised, the lycan tore at Kellen’s hand with distended claws. It didn’t faze Kellen. He couldn’t even feel it as his flesh was ripped open and blood rushed down his forearm. He had only one thought: to hurt Duncan Quinn.
The big man kicked at Kellen’s legs with punishing blows and swung at his head with beefy fists made for bruising. Every solid connection just amped up Kellen’s anger until he could see nothing but red. Literally. It was if the world had been bathed in blood. He could even smell it all around him. Hunger twisted his stomach.
Glaring into the lycan’s face, Kellen felt like breaking the man’s neck. Duncan’s face was starting to turn purple, his eyes bugging out. Swiveling, Kellen tossed Duncan up against a wall. The impact cracked the wallboard.
Leaning into Duncan’s face, Kellen hissed, “Who’s the little man now?”
He didn’t hear Sophie approach, but he felt her hand on his arm. The warmth from her palm penetrated the crimson fog in his mind. Slowly, he could feel his fury seeping away, like a small leak in a balloon.
“Kellen, let him go,” she ordered.
Puffing through his nostrils, Kellen tried to slow the adrenaline rushing through his system. He unhooked his fingers from Duncan’s neck and moved away.
The lycan slumped down the wall to the floor, rubbing at his bruised throat. He coughed and sucked in air, coughing even more.
Kellen didn’t look at Duncan but at Sophie, who stood next to him. She was examining his shredded hand. “Are you okay?”
“Is he okay?”
Duncan barked. “What about me? That psychopath nearly killed me.”
Gabriel was there, holding his hand out to Duncan to help him to his feet. “He didn’t kill you, Duncan.”
“I want to press charges. You saw him attack me.”
“I saw you provoke him, big guy. So let’s just call it an even split. If he had killed you, I would’ve definitely arrested him.”
Duncan pushed Gabriel’s helping hand away and glared at Sophie. “I can’t believe you care about this guy. He’s a freaking nut job. Look at his eyes! They’re as red as blood.”
Kellen watched Sophie’s face as her gaze fell from his. Was there a blush on her cheeks from embarrassment? More anger was starting to flare inside him. He needed to get away before he did something unforgivable.
Turning on his heel, he strode down the hall. Sophie called after him, but he didn’t stop. His strides turned quicker and soon he was running.
Chapter 14
It didn’t take Sophie long to track Kellen down. His cinnamon scent was distinctive and strong, especially in his emotional state.
She had followed it through the lab, out the front doors, down the street and to the tree-lined park adjacent to the main building. She’d spent many evenings in the park, running through the thick woods in her wolf form. This was where she came to think and cool off.
Except, Kellen wasn’t running off his fury. Instead, he stood in the big stone fountain, jets of water streaming over his head.
As she neared, she could almost see steam rising from his body as the cool liquid hit him. It must have been a trick of the light, or the heat of the sun, because that couldn’t be possible. A man, vampire or not, couldn’t run that hot—could he? Maybe the disease had increased his body temperature.
He didn’t turn to face her, but she sensed he knew she had approached. It was in the way his shoulders bunched and his breathing increased.
She sat on the edge of the fountain, the fine mist of the water hitting her face. “That’s an interesting way to cool off.” She glanced around and noticed that no one else seemed to be in the park. At least, not where they were situated.
Vivi Anna - [Valorian Chronicles 04] Page 8