Blood Passage (Blood Destiny #2)

by Connie Suttle

  * * *

  "Who can say what that youth had inside his body," Griffin told Merrill. "And she still had a bit of the werewolf poison in her system. It didn’t mix well." He dried his hands after washing them in Lissa's bathroom. "I eliminated all of it," he went on.

  "If I'd known that, I would have sent her after a drunk," Merrill grumbled.

  "How were you to know?" Griffin said, tossing the towel onto the marble vanity. "Stop blaming yourself, she'll be fine."

  * * *

  "Merrill is away," Franklin advised me when I made my way downstairs the following evening. It was Wednesday night and with Merrill's absence, I was left with nothing to do.

  "I feel better, at least," I said. "I haven't felt good for days."

  "I know. Merrill told me," Franklin said. "Come over here and give me a hug." He was sitting at the kitchen island, his empty plate beside him. He'd already eaten and Lena had gone home for the evening. Moving to his side, I put an arm around him, burying my head against his shoulder.

  "Here, now, what's all this about?" Franklin turned and placed both arms around me.

  "I don't know if I can do five years of this," I sniffled a little against Franklin's shoulder.

  "I know," Franklin rubbed my back a bit. "Merrill's a fine teacher. We'll get you through this." I didn't say it, but if there were more lessons like the bite lesson, it was going to be a really long five years.

  The roof was the first place I went, and then the hot tub and the library. I even watched television a little and that's something I don't do often. One of the articles I caught mentioned a display of tiaras that had been worn by Princess Diana—both the Cambridge Lover's Knot tiara and the Spencer family tiara. They'd been lent to the London Library and displayed in a special case. Guards were posted around them for a week, but someone managed to steal them anyway. The royal family and the Spencer family were quite upset over the whole thing.

  Thursday night when I woke, I did my usual in addition to changing the sheets on my bed. Lena offered every time but I was able-bodied and bored. I did it myself, usually on Thursday because that was Lena's day off. Clattering downstairs later so I wouldn't frighten Franklin by sneaking up on him, I found him in the kitchen as usual. Instead of his usual cheery hello, I received a pain-filled glance. Franklin sat on a barstool, his skin gray and clammy. Merrill was still out of town (where, I had no idea—he never told me and I never asked).

  "Franklin, what's wrong?" I asked, feeling his forehead. His skin felt hot and he was shaking slightly.

  "My side is killing me," he said, placing a hand on his right side.

  "Oh, good lord," I said. "Honey, we have to get you to the hospital." Pulling my cell from the pocket of my jeans, I tried Merrill's numbers first—there were two of them. I got voice mail both times. Then I tried calling Charles. Same thing—voice mail. "Franklin, I hope you know where the hospital is," I told him, and lifting him easily in my arms, carried him toward the garage.

  Merrill has a pegboard inside the garage where all the car keys are neatly labeled and hung. Figuring the Cadillac was the least expensive thing to replace if I wrecked it, I settled Franklin into the passenger seat. I had no experience whatsoever with driving on the left side of the road, so I got my trial by fire that night. I'm sure all those people honking and offering rude gestures meant well.

  Franklin was giving me directions as best he could but I could tell he was in terrible pain. "Just hang on, honey, okay?" I kept telling him while trying to negotiate left turns. To me, all of it was backward. When we pulled into the emergency room drive, I raced inside and placed compulsion on the first person in scrubs I could find. They brought out a wheel chair and we got Franklin settled into it and on his way inside. Thank goodness, Franklin had his wallet with him; I didn't even know his last name, which turned out to be Wright. He even had an insurance card since he was listed as a U.S. citizen. The nurse must have suspected the same thing I did because they took him in right away. Sure enough, it was his appendix.

  The waiting room was as cold and cheerless as it could possibly be as I sat there, waiting for the surgeon to come and tell me how Frank was doing. "It wasn't abscessed or perforated, although that wouldn't have held true much longer," the doctor informed me when he appeared several hours later. "You got him here at a good time. We'll probably keep Mr. Wright for a couple of days; he's in good shape for someone his age."

  "Thank God," I sighed. "Thank you, doctor, I was really worried."

  He smiled at me. "No worries," the smile turned into a grin. "You could have coffee with me later, to show your appreciation."

  "Well, we'll see about that," I said, putting him off. Just what I needed—an amorous human physician.

  I was allowed to visit Franklin in his room a while after that, but he was asleep still, after coming out of recovery. Stroking his forehead a little, I dropped a kiss on his cheek and whispered quietly that I had to leave. It was nearing five in the morning and I wouldn't get home before daybreak if I didn't go soon. "Someone will be here later," I informed the nurse as I was leaving.

  "We'll take good care of him," she promised. I gave her my thanks and headed toward the car.

  Traffic had slowed down quite a bit; I was in that dead space just before the morning rush began and I left the London area behind before it really started up. My memory is much better now than it used to be—I found my way home, discovering that I'd left the garage door open when I'd driven the car out earlier. After checking the entire house, I left yet another message for Merrill. This time I explained what had happened and where Franklin was, adding that I'd done the best I could. I also told him that the Cadillac was in one piece. I'm sure that was a minor miracle, considering my state of mind and my inexperienced driving on the wrong side of the road. A note for Lena was the last thing I did, writing down Franklin's room number along with the name of the hospital and leaving it for her on the kitchen island. I was a wreck when I went to bed at dawn.

  Lena was in the kitchen when I hurried downstairs Friday evening. "Master Merrill is on his way to the hospital, Miss Lissa," she said. "I went to see Franklin as soon as I got your note," she added, her pretty, brown eyes worried. "They told me he was doing fine but how can you tell?"

  Lena was a worrier, it appeared. "He'll be all right, I think," I reassured her. "The doctor was very nice and seemed quite competent." I didn't say what I really wanted—why hadn't Merrill waited for me to wake so I could visit Franklin, too? Now I was stuck there at the house. No way did I want to call Merrill on his cell phone just so I could whine about being left behind. I'd just go to the roof and pout instead.

  I thought about Franklin and about Don while I sat dejectedly on Merrill's roof. The six-month anniversary of Don's death had come and gone; we were into August already. Franklin also came into my thoughts often, so I sent up a little prayer for him. Does anybody listen to the prayers of vampires? I had no way of knowing. Merrill floated up and joined me on the roof about an hour before dawn, sitting down beside me with a sigh. I didn't say anything as he settled himself in a comfortable position.

  "Franklin's fine," he said right away. "I should have waited for you I know, little vampire," he waved away the words that threatened to spill from my lips. "He asked about you first thing and I felt ashamed of myself. If you hadn't gotten him to the hospital as quickly as you did, things might have turned out much worse. The surgeon said his appendix was on its way toward perforation and that might have caused peritonitis."

  "I know," I said. "I had an uncle who died of that during World War II. The good news is that I didn't wreck the Cadillac. Not that I didn't try, inadvertently. All those people who honked and screamed obscenities did it in the nicest way possible."

  Merrill chuckled and placed an arm around me. "Gavin said you asked about a vampire manual once. You could have taken the online course for all this and done just fine I think, but rules are rules."

  "Yeah, well," I grumbled, deliberately holding back
my opinion of vampire rules.

  "Franklin may be home when you rise, Lissa. He'll need care for a few weeks. You may help with that if you want."

  "Of course I want to," I grumped. "I don't have much else to do."

  "I know," Merrill said. "We may have to do something about that. And we have to keep Franklin entertained too, while he's recuperating."

  "We should get him an MP-3 player," I said. "He loves soundtracks and swing bands. Audio books, too, you know. All that stuff could be downloaded onto an MP-3 and Frank could read and listen without having to get up and change CDs, which is what he does now."

  Merrill stared at me as if I'd grown another head for a moment. "Well, we'll see about getting him one, then. I trust you know how to work it?"

  "I do. One of the law clerks showed me how. And believe me, if I can operate something like that, anybody can. Of course we'll have to get an online account or something so we can get the music he wants, but it's easy after that."

  "Then we'll see about doing that," Merrill smiled. "Come, I'll take you off the roof tonight so you won't have to climb down."

  Merrill can float easily, just as I'd seen Gavin do. Merrill drifted both of us to the lawn outside his manor. "That must come in handy," I said, straightening my clothes when we reached the ground. "If I float, I have to be mist."

  "I've never been able to turn to mist," Merrill sighed regretfully, leading me into the house. "I've often wished I could, but it wasn't to be."

  Franklin was listening to a new iPod the following evening when I checked in on him. "Want something to eat?" I asked, peeking into his bedroom. He had a huge suite with a separate sitting area, shelves for his current reads, a large flat screen on the wall and a little bar area that held a fridge and a small sink.

  "I want fried chicken," Franklin grinned at me, pulling the earphones from his ears and motioning me inside his suite.

  "Are you supposed to be eating that?" I gave him a skeptical look, my hands on my hips.

  "No, but you asked what I wanted." His color was definitely better and he offered a cheeky grin.

  "You know what, I'll make some for you, just this once," I said, taking off for the kitchen. Franklin got his meal an hour and a half later, complete with his favorite mashed potatoes. I sat and talked with him while he ate.

  "So, how long did the doctor say to stay off your feet and not do anything strenuous?" I asked.

  "I'm not supposed to go back to work for four weeks," he said. "But I'll be bored to death by that time."

  "Maybe we can get a laptop or something for you and you can play solitaire or one of those shoot-em-up video games. In between reading, of course," I said. "And I can cook, that's not a problem. The thing is, though, if I'm trying a new recipe, there's no way I can taste it to see how it turns out. If I try something new for you, you'll be the guinea pig."

  "I'll be happy to," he said. "Can you make barbecue by any chance?"

  "I don't make my own sauce," I said. "I've never tried; I only buy something already made. I can pull something off the internet, though, and we can try that out."

  "Well, maybe we should do that," he smiled encouragingly. "I'm willing to try it."

  "All right. Barbecued chicken or ribs?"

  "How about both?"

  "Okay. If it turns out all right, we can freeze some of it," I said. "But you have to be honest about how it tastes so I'll know if we need to try a different recipe."

  "I'll let you know. Ask Lena to pick up anything you need."

  "I'll leave her a list," I said. We talked for a while longer, Franklin finished his dinner and I took his dishes away. "Yell for me if you need something," I said before going through his bedroom door.

  "Now, you don't want to help me into the bathroom," he replied a bit stiffly.

  "Are you kidding? I once watched five hundred werewolves in human form take a whiz on the nearest trees. I'm used to it now." I left him laughing and holding his side.

  * * *

  "Honored One, here's another stack." Charles carried a pile of letters into Wlodek's study, setting them on the older vampire's antique desk.

  "Would that there were ways to tell them to stop this already," Wlodek grumbled. "I thought we would have a year, at least, before they all learned of this and started requesting meetings."

  "What are we going to do?" Charles watched Wlodek's face carefully as the Head of the Council leafed through one request after another.

  "Many of these are much too young to be asking," Wlodek sighed, setting the stack aside. "All it will take is an older one placing compulsion or attempting murder—discreetly, of course."

  "Of course," Charles nodded.

  "We will have to bring her out in this year's meeting instead of next year," Wlodek grimaced. "She will not like this in the least, I am guessing."

  Charles heartily agreed.

  Chapter 2

  "These are quite good," Franklin bit into the ribs I'd brought him. Lena had gone ahead and cooked the ribs for the most part, I'd just added the barbecue sauce I made and baked them a little longer while the chicken was cooking.

  "It was a Kansas City barbecue sauce recipe I pulled off the internet on Merrill's computer," I said. "I think it's a little sweet; it has brown sugar and molasses in it."

  "It's nice," he said. "Maybe not as good as barbecue I've gotten in Memphis but still good."

  "Well, there you go," I said. "Does anybody make barbecue like they do in Memphis?"

  "Possibly not," Franklin smiled and took another bite.

  "Now," I said, pulling out a pen and a pad of paper, "tell me what else you'd like to eat and we'll see what we can do about that." I had a list of potential meals when I took his plate away, including meatloaf, spaghetti, stuffed peppers, beef stew, chicken and noodles, all sorts of things. It worked out well, too, that I could leave out a list of grocery items for Lena. She'd buy it during the day and leave the cooking with me. Cookies found their way into the menu, too—once a week.

  "These are the best oatmeal cookies I've ever had," Franklin crunched into one.

  "I use old-fashioned oats instead of the quick kind, which is what the original recipe called for. I liked these a lot better."

  Franklin also got restless two weeks after he'd gotten home, so Merrill gave him permission to teach me how to drive in England. The Range Rover was the vehicle of choice; Merrill insisted we take that since it could take the abuse better (he has such a poor opinion of my driving). We drove all over the countryside. It was really nice, we didn't meet up with much traffic and I got to see a lot that I hadn't seen before. Franklin had a great time. We even stopped at a small café somewhere to get a cup of coffee and allow him to use the restroom.

  We went out every night for four nights, after which Franklin pronounced me "fit to drive." We'd even gone into London the last night and wandered around. What I wasn't expecting on the fourth night, however, was to find Gavin at the house waiting for me when we returned.

  "You look happy," he said, while giving me a brief hug. I still wasn't sure how I felt about him—or us, for that matter. Did I trust him? That answer was still a huge no.

  "I feel better about driving around, now," I said. "I had to take Franklin to the hospital three weeks ago and probably scared the bejeezus out of both of us getting him there. What about you? Clap anybody in irons, lately?" I was still pissed that he'd chained me up in the Council's jet while holding the harshest compulsion on me. I wasn't even able to blink without his permission. And scared? If I'd still been able, I would have wet myself.

  "You're not going to forget that, are you?" he winced a little.

  "Not anytime soon," I said.

  "Did you have anything planned for tonight?" he asked.

  "I was thinking about getting in the hot tub, but that's something I can do another time. Why?"

  Franklin was sitting at the island in the kitchen, having a cup of tea and listening to our conversation. Merrill was in his study, taking care of busine
ss. Anyway, that's what he'd told Gavin.

  "I just want to see you. Talk to you," Gavin said.

  "I want to talk to you, too, and it has to be in private," I said.

  "Why don't you take him into the spa room; it's nice and soothing in there," Franklin suggested. "I'm going to bed." It was around midnight and Franklin was tired, I knew.

  "Goodnight, then," I kissed Franklin on the cheek. He hugged me and went off toward the stairs.

  "What did you wish to talk about?" Gavin asked as we walked toward the room Merrill had added onto the back of his manor house. It held a wide, heated pool and a hot tub, with a beautiful slate floor surrounding both and glass windows all around. Patio furniture was scattered in the corners, along with potted palms and other tropical plants. The pool itself had a waterfall that emptied into it and the sound it made really was soothing, whether you were human or vampire.

  We sat down at a tiny table in one of the corners. I studied Gavin for a few moments before saying anything. He had the slightest beginnings of fuzz on his head; his hair would be slow to grow out. He'd lost his hair when a rogue vampire aimed a flamethrower at him, burning not only the hair from his head but the entire front of his body as well. I was frightened that he might not live over it at the time. Without Radomir's help, he wouldn't have. Gavin was lucky to be among the living. As much as vampires can be living, I suppose.

  "Merrill asked somebody to come and teach me how to bite," I said, looking Gavin straight in the eye. "He practiced on me so I'd know how it was done. I fainted, Gavin. Now, I only know of one other time when that happened. Would you care to explain that to me?"