Black Magic Rose (11 page)

But this time he didn’t startle Dragomir. It would have been impossible for anyone to sneak up on the vampire. He’d spent the last seven hours forcing himself to be alert, to ignore the soft breathing and sleepy moans coming from the house, to believe petunias could be in bloom in late October in Rhode Island after three frosts had covered the ground.
 

He was ready for battle. He bolted through the trees, newly carved stake in hand, and pinned Osgar to the ground, stake positioned above his heart. “She sleeps. Trained well. Leave her to rest.”
 

Dragomir focused on Osgar, searching his thoughts for intentions, demanding to know what the werewolf wanted of Sofia.
 

“Okay. No need to come undone, man.” Osgar’s hand gripped Dragomir’s shoulder, and he pressed up slowly, baring his teeth.
 

Dragomir snickered as he came up against Osgar’s mental defenses. But he pushed past, searching for intent.
 

Finding Osgar’s plans for Sofia was not difficult. The thoughts lay right at the forefront of Osgar’s mind.
Protect Sofia
. That was all he intended. His more primal interests lay deeper, hidden, and they didn’t include Sofia.
 

“She will come out when she’s ready.” Dragomir’s voice was lower than he’d intended. The stake pierced through Osgar’s jacket.

“Man, I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but I’m not a vampire. Cut the crap.” Osgar’s grip tightened and he snarled. His eyes shifted, pupils widening. His muscles vibrated. Dragomir felt him focusing his energy, preparing to shift.
 

Dragomir loosened his grip on Osgar and jerked the werewolf up to stand.
 

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Osgar shoved Dragomir away. “You’ve been acting weird since you got back from Rome. And I’ve been tolerating it. But one more move like this and I’m letting loose.” He straightened his jacket and brushed the dirt and leaves off his jeans. “You hear me? Cut the shit, man. You may be the vampire, but I’m no pup.” He headed toward the house. “Oh, and I’ll come and go as I please from the house.” He glared over his shoulder. “She allows
me
inside in spite of what
my master
might want, remember?”

Dragomir returned to his pile of stakes and watched Osgar ascend the front steps, open the door, and go inside. Not more than ten seconds later Osgar appeared on the back deck. “Hey, dummy. Get the hell back to Cader. The sun’s coming up.” Osgar pointed toward the sky and shook his head. “You’d better talk to Jankin. There’s something wrong with your brain. I may be bound to protect you, but there’s no protecting you when you lose all common sense.” He went back inside.
 

The lock clicked shut.
 

What was Dragomir doing? He’d always respected Osgar, trusted him, cared for him even, in spite of the wolf’s very relaxed presentation. The sun was nearly up and here he stood outside and dumbstruck. He scooped up his weapons and ran for Cader.
 

Osgar was right. Dragomir would speak with Jankin. He had every intention of getting the answers he needed.
 

Chapter Ten

“Conversion Code W. Conversion Code W. Conversion Code W.” The overhead page blared.
 

“We’ll continue this later.” Rick crumbled the draft of the Workplace Violence Policy in his hand and threw it on the table, then shoved his chair back and followed Fergus from the conference room. The entire third floor cleared for the third time that day. This time Sofia did not stay behind as Dr. MacDuff had advised her to do during orientation. She ran to the Emergency Room with everyone else. Something strange was happening and she wasn’t sitting by the sidelines.

She’d been practicing tracking the wolves all day, which was probably the reason she hadn’t made any headway in her actual work. To her surprise, the closer she got to the ER, the less she had to try to notice anyone. Energy moved in fits and bursts all across the ground floor.
 

Jamieson had left his post. Now sitting at the front desk was one of the volunteers. Mrs. Sheehan looked up from her magazine. “It’s a madhouse in there.” She hitched a thumb toward the ER and turned back to the article.
 

The ER no longer looked like a hospital. It now resembled a news scene after a prison riot. Furniture was tossed about. Loose papers floated in the air. Light fixtures dangled back and forth by thin cords. Growls erupted behind curtains. Doctors barked orders at nurses. The pharmacist ran back and forth handing out medication and trying to help where she could.
 

The curtain for room one jerked open and the charge nurse, Janet, marched out. “Just hold him like that Jamieson. I’ll get the chain.”
 

“Yes, ma’am.”
 

Sofia’s jaw dropped. Old Mr. Jamieson, whom she was certain had to be in his eighties, sat on the floor with a burly young man at least twice as wide as he trapped between his legs in a scissors hold. He wrenched the man’s arm behind his back and held his head cradled against his chest in a chokehold.
 

The young man panted and moaned, rocking as if in some sort of trance.
 

Sofia stood at the nurse’s station, watching the nurses and doctors deal with what appeared to be complete chaos.
 
Screaming patients threw equipment and the staff dodged, ducked, and restrained. It was absolute pandemonium.
 

Fergus removed a pair of thick winter gloves hanging on hooks above the nurse’s station. “Janet, what’s the report?” He reached beneath the nurse’s desk and slid a box forward.
 

“Six victims. Two in tachycardia, two in shock, one subdued with Dilodid, but the effects are wearing off, one still holed up in the ambulance.” The nurse put on a pair of gloves and reached into the box to pull out a long silver chain. “You and Rick take room three. Room one is almost done, though we’ll need someone to sit with him. Then I’ll get room two. Room four should be fine for a few more minutes. But once her body processes the meds, forget it. She ripped the door off the hinges coming in.”
 

Screaming, Charlie sailed through the emergency room entrance, where the doors no longer hung. He landed on his back beside Sofia. “Hey! What are you doing down here?” He scrambled to his feet and ran toward the door before she could answer.
 

Janet shook her head.
 

“He’s doing fine.” Fergus pulled on the gloves and wrapped a length of chain around his hand. “Osgar with him?”

Janet nodded.
 

Fergus handed one end of the chain to Rick. “Let’s get these done. They need to be moved to the Lower Level right away. This department wasn’t built to handle this magnitude of traumas.”
 

The three shot off in opposite directions. The ER had gone from a medical unit to a wrestling ring.
 

From the nurses station Sofia watched as Janet knelt beside the man in room one. “What’s your name?” Her tone was matter-of-fact and her movements firm, yet gentle. She wrapped the chain around his neck, appearing unfazed by his groans.
 

He glared and panted through gritted teeth. His eyes bulged and darted from left to right and back again, never settling on anything.
 

Sofia hadn’t ever seen anything like this. She wasn’t accustomed to being with screaming, frightened patients. The ones she’d seen on the units upstairs were calmer, quiet. Someone cried out, a piercing, terrified cry. Sofia’s heart sped. She had to focus on remaining calm, pushing back her fear of what might happen.
 

Janet’s fingers went to the man’s wrist, and she remained silent for several seconds. “His pulse is two-twenty. He may not even make it to sunset.”
She draped the chains down his back and around his wrists then hogtied him, winding the chain in and around itself in a figure eight.
 

“Sofia, come here.” Janet waved her over. “I need your help.”
 

Sofia stumbled forward, wanting to help and praying she didn’t lose courage and run. “Is this how you typically care for psych patients?” Sofia knelt down beside the man. “I’m pretty sure this isn’t legal.” She motioned to the chain restraint.

A metal pan clanged on the floor across the department and skittered past room one as if it had been launched from a cannon. Instruments pelted the nurse’s desk and a feral scream pierced the air. Sofia ducked in time to avoid being hit by an IV pole that had been thrown like a javelin straight into the room.

“Call Osgar,” Dr. O’Rourke yelled. “Stat.” He ran past them into room two, drawing the curtain behind him and barking orders. “Let’s get him on the table. Get the straps. We’ll secure him and move him down.”
 

“Osgar! Osgar!” The secretary yelled toward the open door.
 

“This guy’s not a psych patient. None of them are. They just think they’re going crazy. Stay with him. Yell if anything weird happens,” Janet said. Then she and Jamieson ran from the room, Janet giving orders and Jamieson running toward the open doors of the ambulance.
 

“Osgar! Osgar!” The secretary leaned over the desk toward the door, yelling even louder than before.
 

“Betty! He’s outside and busy. Stop yelling.” Janet swatted at the secretary before darting into room two.
 

A woman cried in room five. “What’s happening to my son?” She tried to lean past the technician in the doorway.
 

“We’re taking care of him, ma’am. Let me help you. What’s your name?” He guided her back to a chair.
 

“Melanie. Melanie Andrews. That’s Michael, my youngest boy. He’s sixteen.” Her voice cracked.
 

Michael screamed, a sound the likes of which Sofia had never heard. It was a cry of pain, of agony. She looked down at the man she’d been told to stay with. His breathing quickened, every breath a shorter, faster pant than the one before. She rubbed his arm. “It’s going to be fine. They’ll take good care of you here.” Though she wasn’t entirely sure she believed herself. She’d never heard of a hospital where they restrained the patients quite like this.
 

Sofia forced herself to focus on room two, to try to sense what was happening behind the curtain.
 

Dragomir hadn’t been kidding. Wolves were obvious. There was no doubt about it. They were entirely different from him. Tracking him was like monitoring a phantom, difficult at best. His energy seemed to fade and disappear, then reappear elsewhere. Sofia had stumbled several times trying to keep track of him.
 

But the wolves were another story. Their energy never faded. Instead a constant stream of busy life flowed from one wolf to the other literally connecting each of them with one another. And if emotions or excitement were involved, the energy raged.
 

As easily as she could see the secretary standing at the desk, she felt four different werewolf energies in room two. Each individual current coursed into the next, merging together and focusing in one direction, for one cause.
 

“Get his shirt off and find the bite. The least we can do is ease the pain,” Dr. O’Rourke said.

“Aye, doctor.” The sound of shredding clothes followed.
 

“It’s here, on his waist. Let’s get the jeans off,” another voice said, and the shredding continued.
 

A tortured scream ripped through the air.

“Michael, look at me,” Dr. O’Rourke ordered. “Look at me, son. We’re going to help you. Pay attention to my voice.”
 

The four energies flowed together, and the young man’s screaming quieted to whimpers. Soft murmurs escaped from behind the curtain. Sofia strained to understand the words, but it was useless. She couldn’t comprehend the low chanting.
 

Coming through the doors from the ambulance, Osgar wrestled with another panting and grunting man. “Get the straps. We’ll bring him down after we secure him.” He tumbled to the floor with the man, rolled over, and grabbed the man’s arm to keep him from pulling a nearby stretcher down on top of them.
 

“We need more help in here,” a nurse yelled from room five. “Call the floors. They need to send someone down.”
 

Melanie Andrews stood on a gurney screeching. Her blond hair was a wild mess above her contorted face. She breathed with an open mouth, groaning with each exhale. Her body hunched forward as though she was about to launch herself off the table.
 

“Sure thing,” Betty called.
 

Sofia scooted further into the room dragging her panting patient with her, but keeping her attention focused on the open doorway. She did a double take when she found Betty, her desktop computer, and phone all under the desk.

The secretary smiled at her. “Oh, this job gets a little hairy sometimes. I’m better able to get my work done down here.” She held the phone on her shoulder, fixed the headband holding her hair back, and smiled. “It’s been crazy around here lately. But that just makes the time pass quickly.” She held up a finger to her lips. “Ruth? Yeah, it’s Betty…”