Blood Lure (15 page)

Shit, who would do something like that—and why?

A faint murmur came from the man’s lips, then one of the medics threw Tommy a puzzled look.

“Are you Tommy?”

“Yeah, that’s me.”

“He’s asking for you.”

“What? But I don’t—”

“He’s asking for someone named Tommy, and that’s you.”

“Huh.” Tommy moved closer and stared down at the man’s face, handsome despite the blood and smoke that streaked his skin. “I’m Tommy,” he said, leaning closer. “Do you know me?”

“Don’t…” The man’s voice was so weak, Tommy had to put his ear to the man’s lips in order to hear. “Don’t let them take me to a hospital, Tommy.”

“What? ‘Course you gotta go to the hospital. You’re pretty cut up and you need a doctor, pronto.”

“No. In my pocket is a friend’s phone number. Take it and please call him. His name is Jared Lantos. Tell him that Andrew needs his help.”

“Is he a doctor?”

The man hesitated for a moment, then said, “Yes, and he will help me.”

“Okay, I’ll call him to let him know which hospital you’re in.”

The man’s piercing blue eyes caught and held Tommy’s, and the young fire fighter felt his breath hitch in his chest as recognition flooded over him.

“You’re the guy I met the other night, in the bar… Andrew, right?”

Andrew nodded. “Please call my friend. His name is Jared.”

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Tommy put his hand inside Andrew’s pocket and pulled out a folded slip of paper with a phone number written on it.

“Okay, guys, we gotta move,” one of the medics said. “You can carry on your tête-à-tête some other time. This guy needs medical attention, not a heart to heart.”

“Right.” Tommy stood aside as the medics loaded the gurney carrying Andrew into the ambulance.

“Call Jared now
.”

The voice in his head was so clear it could have been Andrew talking to him, but that was impossible. The ambulance doors were closed and they were pulling away. He reached for his cell and punched in the number just as Chief Lambert yelled, “Cordain, get your ass back over here, now!”

“Hello?”

“Oh, hi… Jared Lantos?”

“Yes.”

“You don’t know me,” Tommy said, jogging over to the quint. “My name’s Tommy Cordain. I’m a fireman, and, uh, a friend of yours, Andrew, was just taken out of a fire in a hotel room on Robinson. He’s on his way to the hospital but he asked me to call you, and—”

“Which hospital?”

The guy, Jared, sounded agitated.

“Uh, St. Agnes on Van Nuys, I think.”

“Thank you for letting me know.”

The line went dead.

“Well, you’re welcome—jeez.”

“Cordain, get over here,” Lambert barked at him. “Get off the phone and start helping the guys over there.”

“Right there, Chief…”

Who would’ve thought I’d see that guy again, and wasn’t it crazy how I suddenly remembered
him when he looked at me like that?

How could I have ever forgotten those beautiful eyes…?

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“What’s wrong?” Joey asked, seeing the grim expression on Jared’s face as he closed his cell phone.

“Andrew’s in trouble. They’re taking him to a hospital. Carlos, we must go, we must stop them from examining him.”

He looked at Joey, an apology forming on his lips.

“It’s okay,” Joey said quickly. “Chris and I understand.”

Jared kissed him hard on the mouth. “Thank you. We’ll be in touch as soon as we can.”

Carlos and Chris embraced, then the two vampires headed for the balcony. Chris and Joey watched as their lovers launched themselves over the balcony railing, and up into the night sky.

“That’ll take a bit of getting used to,” Joey remarked, his eyes following the fleeting shadows until they disappeared from view.

Chris took Joey’s arm and led him back inside. “Have you flown with him yet?”

“No.”

“
That’s
what takes getting used to.” Chris chuckled at the memory. “You know I have no head for heights. I nearly peed myself the first time he took me up there, higher than the clouds. If it had been possible to break a vampire’s ribs I would’ve at that moment. I was holding on so tight, he pretended to wince.”

“So what do we do now?”

“Wait. There’s nothing we can do to help. I imagine they’ll either bring Andrew back here, or over to Marcus and Roger’s place. Depends on how badly the guy’s hurt.”

“Do you know Andrew?”

Chris shook his head. “No, haven’t met him.”

“He’s Jared’s ex.”

“Oh.”

“It’s okay. He seems like a nice guy. There was some tension there for a while, but they’re friends again, and Andrew went out of his way to make sure things were good BLOOD LURE

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between us, the night we met. I think it took him a long time to get over the fact he and Jared were no longer lovers, but he seems to be okay with it now.”

“So, how are
you
dealing with all this?” Chris asked. “How did you find out?”

“Would you believe my father was the one to know before I ever did?”

“What? But how?”

“Remember all those stories he used to tell us when we were kids, about vampires and demons? Well, it seems my dad actually met a vampire, long ago when he was a kid. The Lady, he calls her.”

“Wow…” Chris looked at him with big eyes. “So he knew Jared was vampire, and told you? You must have freaked.”

“I did. I thought Dad had finally lost it, then Jared convinced me and told me he could cure Dad’s dementia—and he did.”

“Fantastic, Joey. So you two are forever companions now?”

“Well, we haven’t gone the whole way. Of course I’m going to say yes, if he asks me. He drank from me. I offered to give him my blood after he gave so much to my father, but I haven’t drunk his blood yet. He seems reticent about that bit.”

Chris nodded. “It’s a big step—a major bonding.”

“But you took it?”

“Yes, and I haven’t regretted it for a moment. You’ll get to meet some other guys who have taken the blood bond, but who remain mortal like you and me. Ron Hendricks—he manages an Italian restaurant in West Hollywood—he’s been with his vampire lover Jean-Claude for over two years, and is still mortal.

“Carlos told me he’ll wait until I’m ready for the change. He said he’d never pressure me into it, but the more I’m with him, the more likely that prospect becomes—despite what it entails.”

Now the barriers were down, and the two friends had no more secrets between them, Chris was free to recount how he had discovered Carlos was vampire and how badly he’d reacted to the knowledge that the man he was in love with was an immortal.

“He had to take away all my memories of him, which was why I acted like a dummy every time you mentioned his name.”

Joey chuckled. “Yeah, I remember that. I just thought you were in denial and I didn’t want to upset you by pressing the point.”

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“And what I’ve never told you for fear of freaking you out is that Carlos was being stalked by vampire hunters who kidnapped me and used me as bait to get to him.”

Joey’s jaw dropped. “What? Jesus, Chris, why didn’t you tell me?”

“How could I? You’d have thought I had gone off the deep end. Poor Chris, finally certifiable, totally nutzoid.”

“Yeah, I guess I would have.” Joey gave his friend a rueful smile. “Obviously, the hunters didn’t get you or Carlos.”

“No. Thanks to his vampire buddies. You said you met Marcus and Joseph…”

Joey nodded.

“They joined forces with Carlos and rescued me.” Chris’s eyes gleamed as he remembered. “It was fucking amazing, Joey. There I was tied up in this rat hole, and Carlos and the others—they tore the place apart—with their
minds
, Joey.” He shook his head. “We thought we knew everything there was to know about vampires from watching those dumb movies, but, I’m telling you, that was beyond anything I ever dreamed they could do.”

Joey stared at his friend in silence for a long moment.

“Joey?”

“Yeah… I was just trying to imagine what you must have gone through then.” He reached out and hugged Chris to him. “Jesus, I wish I’d been there for you, too.”

Chris held him tight and chuckled. “Well, the use of the
mind
part might have been a little difficult.”

“Creep.” They laughed together, then Joey sat back. “What did they do with the hunters?”

“They let them go in the end. I thought Carlos was going to take some kind of revenge on them, but Marcus persuaded him to let them go. Wiped their minds and sent them on their way.”

“Wow.”

“I hope I haven’t scared you off the idea of sharing with Jared.”

“God, no. He’s so… fantastic. But can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“The blood…” Joey gave his friend an anxious look. “What does it, uh,
taste
like?”

“Sweet, spicy… Like nothing you’ve ever tasted before.” Chris grinned and added, “If I could get my folks to distil a wine that good, they’d be millionaires in no time.”

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Jared and Carlos alighted by the emergency entrance to the hospital just as an ambulance pulled up outside. Jared probed the interior with his mind.

“Andrew’s in there,” he told Carlos, who nodded his agreement.

“Plan?”

“We take him before they can get him inside. Then it might be too late.”

“There are two paramedics in there with him,” Carlos said. “They may have already discerned that something is not quite as it should be.”

“We must make them forget. The driver too, and get any report they may have started.”

“Right.”

They moved forward. The doors to the ambulance swung open, and two young men jumped out. They looked worried.

“George, I can’t understand those readings at all,” one was saying. “And what happened with the radio when I tried to call in his vitals? Man, the way his blood—”

The paramedic gasped in surprise as Jared spun him round to face him.

“George, what the—”

Jared’s hypnotic gaze cut the man short. Jared sat him alongside George on the ambulance floor, then strode round to the cab where the driver was just about to fill in his report log, before getting out of the ambulance.

“Thank you, I’ll take that.” Jared removed the pen from the man’s hand.

“Hey! What the fuck—?” That was as far as the driver got before simply forgetting whatever it was he thought he was reacting to.

“Ready?” Carlos was holding Andrew in his arms.

“Ready.” And the two vampires lifted off again into the darkness.

“Looks like silver poisoning
,” Carlos informed Jared as they flew towards the Hollywood Hills and Marcus’ mansion. “
He’s covered in tiny puncture marks, like they were made by some
kind of needles
…”

“Bastards. Hopefully, Marcus will know what to do
.
I’ll apprise him of what’s happened
.
We can
call Chris and Joey once we get there.”

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Marcus and Joseph were waiting at the door when they arrived.

“Lay him on the couch in the living room.” Marcus hustled them all inside. “Silver poisoning you say? Yes, and cunningly administered,” he added, baring Andrew’s chest.

“Barbs of some kind. See, some of them are still imbedded in his flesh. Those must be removed. It is a miracle he has not met his final death.”

“What can we do?” Jared asked.

“Blood, and lots of it. We must all give him as much as we can. Have you fed? Roger, Micah…” He beckoned to the young vampires. “Bring me a bowl and a soft cloth. His skin must be washed with blood so that each wound can heal, then he must drink—if he can.”

While Marcus hurried to find a pair of tweezers, Jared and Joseph stripped Andrew’s shirt and pants from his unresisting body, revealing myriad tiny wounds covering his torso and limbs.

Jared growled low in his throat at the sight. “If this is Fieldman’s work, he will pay for this,” he rasped. “The knowledge he has of us must be wiped clean from his wretched mind.”

Marcus returned with the tweezers and set about pulling out each barb that remained in Andrew’s flesh.

“Roll him over so we can examine his back. Yes, there are a few,” he muttered, pinching Andrew’s skin between his fingers then seizing the barbs with the head of the tweezers and drawing them out.

Roger returned with the bowl and cloth. He stared at Andrew’s naked body. “Jesus, who’d do a thing like this to him?”

“Those who fear us,” Marcus said quietly. He bit into his wrist then let his blood drip into the bowl. “Joseph?”

Joseph nodded and followed Marcus’ example, as did Roger and Micah.

“We will save Jared’s and Carlos’ blood for Andrew to drink. We can only hope we are not too late.”

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Tommy left the fire station later that night. He hadn’t been able to forget Andrew his entire shift. He pulled his cell phone from his pocket and punched in the number for the hospital he’d copied from the fire station report sheet.

“Oh, hi, I’m checking on the condition of a patient. Andrew…uh, sorry, don’t know his last name. He was admitted earlier after a fire in the Barclay Hotel on Robinson.”

“One moment, please, while I check.”

Tommy listened to the ‘hold’ music grinding in his ear, then the receptionist said,

“Sorry, sir, no fire victim from a Barclay Hotel was admitted this evening.”

“What? But I was with him when the medics put him in the ambulance. I’m a fireman, I pulled him outta the building myself.”

“Well, I’m sorry, but he wasn’t admitted to this hospital. They may have taken him somewhere else?”

“Uh, yeah, that’s a possibility, I guess. Okay, thanks. I’ll check another hospital.”

“Good luck, sir. Hope you find him.”

Tommy frowned as he closed his cell phone. This didn’t make any sense. Why would the medics take Andrew to anywhere but the closest hospital? The guy had been in critical condition. He grabbed the slip of paper with Andrew’s doctor’s number on it and punched it in.