by J. R. Ward
The waitress smiled as she wrote on her pad. “I love your accent.”
Layla inclined her head graciously. “Thank you.”
“I can’t place it—French and German? Or… Hungarian?”
“Those beers would be great now,” Qhuinn said firmly. “We’re thirsty.”
When the woman went off, he hairy-eyeballed the other diners, getting markers on their faces and scents, listening to the talk, wondering whether there was an attack coming. Across the way, John was doing the same. ’Cuz, yeah, it was so relaxing taking a Chosen out into the world.
“We’re not very good company,” he said to Layla after a while. “Sorry.”
“I’m not either.” She smiled at him and then John. “But I am enjoying being out of the house.”
The waitress came back with the order, and everyone eased away from the table as glasses and plates and the cup and saucer were arranged.
Qhuinn snagged his tall glass as soon as the coast was clear. “So tell us about him. We can be trusted.”
Across the table, John looked like someone had goosed him in the ass, especially as Layla blushed.
“Come on.” Qhuinn took a pull off the black and tan. “It’s obvious this is about a male, and John won’t say a thing.”
John looked over at her and signed; then flashed Qhuinn the bird.
“He says, duh, he’s a mute,” Qhuinn translated. “And if you don’t know what that final gesture was, I’m not going to be the one to tell you.”
Layla laughed and picked up her fork, cracking the hard top of the crème brûlée. “Well, I’ve been waiting to see him again, actually.”
“So that’s why you’re hanging around?”
“Is it bad of me?”
“God, no. You’re always welcome, you know that. Except who’s the lucky guy?”
Or dead one, depending…
Layla drew in a deep, bracing breath, and took two mouthfuls of her first dessert—like the thing was a V&T. “Promise you shan’t tell a soul?”
“Cross heart, hope to die, all that shit.”
“He’s… one of your soldiers.”
Qhuinn lowered his glass to the table. “I’m sorry?”
She lifted her cup and sipped from the rim. “Remember when that fighter came into the training center back in the autumn—he’d been with you against the lessers? He was injured badly and you were taking care of him?”
As John sat up straight in alarm, Qhuinn swallowed his own case of the fucking-hells and smiled smoothly. “Oh, yeah. We remember him.”
Throe. Second lieutenant of the Band of Bastards.
Holy shit, if she thought she was into him, they had a huge problem.
“Annnnnd,” he prompted, forcing his voice to stay level. Good thing he’d put the Guinness down—he was stressing enough to crush the glass.
Then again, he supposed shit could be worse. Throe wasn’t going to be able to get anywhere near her—
“He called me to him.”
Layla started to pick at her moon pie, and good goddamn thing: He and John had both bared their fangs.
Humans, he reminded himself. They were out in public with humans.… Now was not the time for the canine display. But fuck…
“How?” he hissed—only to dial back. “I mean, you don’t have a cell phone. How’d he reach you?”
“He summoned me.” As she waved her hand like that was no big deal, he told his inner caveman to pipe down, sonny. There would be time to sort the hows out later. “I went and there was another soldier—injured badly. Oh, God, he was beaten so badly.”
Tendrils of pure panic feathered across the back of his neck and pegged him in the chest, jacking his heart rate up. No… oh, shit… no—
“I don’t understand why males are so pigheaded. I told them to bring him into the clinic, but they said he just needed to feed. He was having trouble breathing, and…” Layla fixated on the moon pie as if it were a screen, as if she were remembering every single thing that had happened. “I fed him. I wanted to care for him further, but the other soldier seemed in a hurry to take him away. He was… powerful, so powerful, even though he was hurt. And as he looked at me—I felt as though he was touching me. It was like nothing I’ve ever known before.”
Qhuinn shot a stare over to John without moving his head. “What did he look like?”
Maybe it had been one of the others. Maybe it hadn’t been—
“It was hard to tell. His face had been wounded so badly—those lessers are vicious.” She reached up to her mouth. “His eyes were blue and his hair dark… his upper lip was twisted—”
As she kept talking, Qhuinn’s hearing took a little TO.
Reaching over, he put his hand on her arm, stopping her. “Baby girl, hold up. That first soldier called you out to where?”
“It was a meadow. A field in the farmland.”
As the final pint of blood drained out of his head, John started to mouth various curse words, and damn right with all that. The idea that Layla had been out in the night, alone and undefended, with not just Throe, but the heart of the beast?
Plus… holy hell, she had fed the enemy.
“What’s wrong?” he heard her ask. “Qhuinn…? John…? Whatever is the matter?”
FIFTY-SEVEN
Across town, in the meatpacking district, Tohr outted both his black daggers in preparation to strike. Z and Phury were a mere block over from him, but there was no reason to call them—and not because he was rocking the whole death-wish shit again.
These two lessers up ahead were suffering from a fantastic case of the meanders; they were just ambling along like they had nothing better to do than wear down the soles of their boots.
The Society was overrecruiting, he thought, mining too deep into the pool of miscreant antisocials. And then once they were inducted, the SOBs weren’t getting enough training or support—
Against his side, his phone vibrated as a text came through, but he ignored it as he broke into a jog. The snow cover helped muffle the sound of his shitkickers, and thanks to the cold air blowing into him, he had no scent to give himself away—not that these fools would have noticed either.
At the last moment, however, something tipped them off and they pivoted around.
He couldn’t have asked for a better response.
He nailed them both right in the neck, ripping through their carotids, opening second mouths below their chins. As their hands shot up, he tore through the space between them and wheeled about, ready to escort them onto the ground if necessary—
Oh, but no. The pussies were already falling to their knees.
Whistling through his teeth, he signaled to the others as he outted his phone to call Butch for cleanup—
He froze. The text that had come in was from Doc Jane: I need you to come home right now.
“Autumn…?” As his brothers came skidding around the corner, he looked up. “I gotta bounce.”
Phury frowned. “What’s happened?”
“I don’t know.”
He dematerialized on the spot, ghosting to the north. Had she hurt herself? Maybe down in the clinic working? Or… fucking hell. What if she’d been out in town with Xhex and someone had aggressed on her?
As he re-formed on the steps in front of the mansion, he all but broke down the doors of the vestibule. Good thing Fritz cut the need for a carpenter by answering the inner one quick.
Tohr blew by the butler at a dead run. He was damn sure the guy was talking at him, but there was no tracking that or any other conversation. Hitting the hidden door under the stairs, he fell into a pounding gallop as he shot through the underground tunnel.
His first clue as to what was wrong came as he burst out of the supply closet and into the office.
His body flipped out, the signals from his brain cut off by interference and a change of focus that made no sense: An erection, thick and long, punched at his leathers, his head swimming with a sudden, crushing need to get to Autumn and—
His body responded instantly, trembling as an overriding need struck him. He had to get to Autumn—unless he serviced her, she was going to spend the next ten or twelve hours in hell. She needed a male—him—inside of her, taking care of her—
Tohr lunged for the glass door, arm outstretched, hand ready to shove the transparent, fragile barrier aside.
He caught himself just as he opened the way.
What the fuck was he doing? What the fuck was he doing?
Another scream echoed down to him, and he sagged as a wave of sexual instinct nearly brought him to his knees. As his higher reasoning browned out again, his thought patterns ground to a halt as all he could think about was mounting Autumn and easing her torment.
But as the hormones ebbed, his brain started cranking over again.
“No,” he barked. “No, no fucking way.”
Pushing himself away from the door, he scrambled backward until he hit the desk and grabbed onto the thing in preparation for the next onslaught.
Images of Wellsie’s needing, the one when they had conceived their young, flickered through his mind, the onslaught as unrelenting and undeniable as his body’s urges. His Wellsie had been in such pain, crippling pain.…
He’d come home just before dawn, hungry, tired, thinking he was going to enjoy a good meal and some bad TV before they fell asleep against each other… but as soon as he’d entered through their garage, he’d had the same response he was fighting now: an overwhelming urge to mate.
There was only one thing that caused that kind of reaction.
Six months before that, Wellsie had made him swear, on the very basis of their sanctified mating, that when she went into her next needing, he would not drug her. Man, they’d had a fight over that. He hadn’t wanted to lose her to the birthing bed; like a lot of bonded males, he would have rather they remain childless for the rest of their long lives together than for him to be left with nothing.
And what about you fighting? she’d yelled at him. You face your own goddamn birthing bed every night!
He couldn’t remember now what he’d said to her then. No doubt he’d tried to calm her down, but it hadn’t worked.
Something happens to you, she’d said, I’ve got nothing either. You think I don’t go through that crucible every fucking night?
What had he said to her? Fuck him, he didn’t know. But he could picture her face clear as day as she’d stared up at him.
I want a young, Tohr. I want a piece of you and me together. I want a reason to go on living if you don’t—because that’s what I’m going to have to do. I’m going to have to keep living.
Little had they known that he’d be the one left behind. That the young wouldn’t be why she died. That all the things they had fought over that night hadn’t been the right worries.
But life was like that. And as soon as he’d walked into their house, he’d wanted to call Havers, had even gone to the phone. But in the end, and as usual, he hadn’t been able to deny her.
And instead of bleeding after the needing had passed, she’d found herself pregnant. Incandescent had barely described her joy—
The next scream was so loud, it was a wonder it didn’t shatter the glass door.
Jane burst into the office. “Tohr! Listen, I need your help—”
As his hands clawed into the desk’s edge to keep himself in place, he shook his head like a crazy man. “I’m not doing it. I’m not servicing her—no fucking way. I’m not doing it, I’m not doing it, I’m not doing it—”
Babbling, he was fucking babbling. He didn’t even hear his own words as he started to lift up the desk and slam it down over and over again, until something hard and heavy got knocked onto the floor.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he dimly thought it was too fucking ironic that he was losing it in this room again.
He’d found out Wellsie was dead in here.
Jane held her hands up. “No, wait, I need your help—but not in that way—”
Another wave of instinct made him grit his teeth and have to bow his upper body as he cursed.
“She told me not to call you—”
Then why was he here? Oh, fucking hell, the urge— “Then why did you text me!”
“She won’t take any drugs.”
Tohr shook his head—only this time it was in an attempt to improve his hearing. “What?”
“She’s refusing the drugs. I can’t get her to consent, and I didn’t know who else to call. I can’t reach Xhex—and no one else is close to her. She’s suffering—”
“Drug her anyway—”
“She’s stronger than I am. I can’t even get her back on the bed without her lashing out. But that’s not the point—ethically, I can’t treat someone who doesn’t let me. I won’t do that. Maybe you can talk to her?”
At that point, Tohr’s eyes got with the program and actually focused on the female. Her white coat was torn, one lapel hanging loosely like a flap of white skin. Clearly she’d been roughed up.
Tohr thought of Wellsie in her needing. When he’d gotten down to their room, it had looked like the place had been ransacked. The bedside table and everything on it knocked over and broken. The clock radio on the floor. The pillows off the mattress, the sheets split.
He’d found his female on the far side, on the carpet, in a ball of agony. She’d been naked, but flushed and sweating even though it had been cold.
He’d never forget the way she had looked up at him and, through her tears, begged him for what he could give her.
Tohr had mounted her fully clothed.
“Tohr…? Tohr?”
“Have you quarantined the other males?” he mumbled.
“Yes. I even had to send Manny away. He was…”
“Yeah.” The guy was probably calling Payne in from the field. Either that or spending a lot of meaningful time with his left hand: Once a male got exposed, he was perma-hard for some time, even if he left the vicinity.
“I also told Ehlena—and she said she’s got to stay away. I guess sometimes one female’s cycle can affect the others? And nobody wants to be pregnant around here.”
Tohr put his hands on his hips and bowed his head, pulling his shit together. He told himself he was not some animal to take Autumn on whatever bed she was lying on. He was not.…
Shit, how much was he willing to trust that resolution? And what the hell was she thinking? Why the fuck wasn’t she taking the drugs?
Maybe this was a ploy. To get him to service her.
Could she be that calculating?
The next scream was heart-wrenching—and pissed him off. In its wake, he told himself to turn around to the supply cabinet and put the thing to good use—except he couldn’t leave Doc Jane. Sure enough, she’d make another attempt to help Autumn and get shanked again.
He looked over at the healer. “Let’s go down together—and I don’t care if she consents or not. You’re going to put her out of that misery even if I have to pin her to the fucking floor.”
Tohr took a couple of bracing breaths, jacked up his leathers.
Jane was talking to him, no doubt spouting all kinds of ethical-this and ethical-that, but he wasn’t hearing it.
That walk down the corridor took forever: With each step, his body’s needs tightened up, transforming him into a bomb of instinct. By the time he got to the door of the recovery room she was in, he was bent over, clutching himself at the groin even in front of Doc Jane. His cock was pounding, his hips straining—
He opened the door. “Fuuuuck…”
His bones nearly snapped in two as half of him went to lunge forward and the other half had to hold himself back by the steel jamb.
Autumn was on the bed, on her stomach, one knee up to her chest, her other leg extended out at a tortured angle. Her shift was twis
ted tight around her waist, and soaking wet from the sweat, her hair a knotted mess tangling around her upper body. And there were spots of blood near her mouth—she’d probably bitten through her lip.
“Tohrment…” Her broken voice rose up. “No… go ’way.…”
He lurched over to the bed and put his face in front of hers. “It’s time to stop this—”
“Go… ’way.…” Her bloodshot eyes met his without focusing as tears streamed down her spectacularly colored face, the hormones suffusing her skin with a peachy tint like she was an old-fashioned, hand-painted photograph. “Go—no—”
The grunt that cut off the word rose in volume to another scream.
“Get the drugs,” he snapped at the healer.
“She won’t take them—”
“Get them! You may need her consent, but I sure as shit don’t—”
“Talk to her first—”
“No!” Autumn hollered.
All hell broke loose at that point, everyone shouting at each other until the next wave came and shut him and Autumn up, the two of them once again bowing under the pressure.
Lassiter’s appearance registered in the heartbeat between the surge easing off and the next round of arguing: The angel stepped up to the bed and extended his palm.
Autumn calmed instantly, her eyes rolling back in her head, her limbs loosening. Tohr’s relief, such that he had any, was that at least her suffering had eased off. He was still gripped by the need, but she was no longer killing herself.
“What are you doing to her?” Doc Jane asked.
“Just a trance. And it’s not going to last.”
Still, that shit was impressive. Vampire minds were stronger than human ones, and the fact that the angel could pull this kind of reaction out of her in her condition suggested he had some special tricks up his sleeve.
Lassiter’s eyes met Tohr’s. “You sure?”
“About what,” he snapped. Fucking hell, he was on the verge of losing his mind here—
“Servicing her.”
Tohr laughed in a cold burst. “Not in the cards. Ever.”
To prove the point, he lunged to the right, where a tray of syringes was on standby, clearly intended for Autumn. Nabbing two, he punched them into his thighs and shot himself up with whatever was in them.