Blood Price (16 page)

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Atar flinched when the young woman in the white coat inserted the needle into his arm, drawing blood from his vein into a large tube. The needle didn’t bother him. Rather, what they planned to do with his blood was what concerned him. He turned away from the phlebotomist to look into the sharp eyes of Koenig. “How do you think I can give you immortality?”

He brought up a palsied hand to smooth down the white tufts of hair sprouting from his head. “It’s in your blood. Your DNA, to be specific. Once I map it, I’ll discover how your race lives so long, while mine withers and dies in a century.”

The woman finished, snapping the tourniquet when she removed it from his arm. She disappeared through the second steel door leading to a smaller room adjoining his prison/lab, from which she had appeared just a short time ago at Koenig’s summons.

“I’m not immortal.”

“From a human perspective, two thousand years is close enough to be counted as such. Think what I can do in two thousand years.” His eyes glistened, either with unshed tears or madness. “All I can accomplish…by then, I might find the answer to true immortality.”

Atar wanted to refute the man’s assertions but how could he? Science might make it possible for the lunatic to map his DNA, figure out the biological reason for the Makheets’ long lifespan and use it to his own benefit. A cold sweat broke out over his body thinking of the possibility. He had to escape before any more of Koenig’s experiments could proceed but how? All three guards held rifles. From the larger bores of two, he knew they must be tranq guns but the third was definitely a machine gun of some type.

He tried a different track. “How will immortality benefit you, stuck as you are in that frail body? Do you want to live the next two millennia as an invalid?”

Koenig’s mouth tightened and his mustache slashed downward. “Soon, I’ll be able to repair this body. I just need more time. Time that you’ll give me, Atar.”

“I won’t help you.”

The old man laughed, although it was more of a raspy wheeze. “You don’t have to. You can’t escape. I can have my scientists do whatever I wish to you and how will you fight them? Perhaps you plan to morph to a different form?” His expression turned sly. “I learned enough about your race from the Makheet female I studied before to develop an inhibitor to prevent your transformations.”

Real fear welled in Atar then. He fought back the sense of helplessness, knowing if he gave up trying to escape, he never would get out. “I don’t believe you. If you had that, you’d have given it to me by now.” The cold sweat turned to liquid fire gushing down his face and soaking his armpits. He had been unconscious for who knew how long. How did he know they hadn’t already given him the inhibitor?

“I want to collect samples of your normal physiology before tampering with your biology.” He glanced at the clock on the wall as the woman who had drawn his blood returned in the company of an older woman. Both wore white scrubs, with masks shielding their faces below the eyes. “In fact, it’s time to collect samples.” He nodded to the doctor, who approached Atar, wheeling an ultrasound machine behind her.

Atar tried to twist away when she squirted cold gel on his chest but had nowhere to go. Seconds later, the wand glided over his slick flesh and a picture of his hearts appeared on the monitor hanging on the wall.

“Excellent. I wondered if dual organs were a characteristic only of your females or if it was a redundancy system built into your kind by evolution. Your female counterpart survived nicely without one of her hearts, so I presume it will be the same for you.”

Atar gritted his teeth, refusing to respond to Koenig. He endured the doctor’s scan of his body silently, conserving his strength for an opportunity to escape, should one arise.

A few moments later, the doctor put away the wand and her assistant whisked the machine back to its place against the wall.

“Tell me, Dr. Harding, what did you learn?”

Her crisp English accent lent an air of intellectual distance to her words that Atar was far from feeling. “Comparing this scan to the records of the female my predecessor studied twenty-five years ago, they are nearly identical, except for reproductive organs. The male specimen has more lung capacity than the female, with a primary heart that is twelve-percent larger—”

Koenig waved his hand. “I don’t care about that right now. How is he different from me? Can you find the secret?”

Harding hesitated. “The male has two hearts, three lungs, extra ribs, significantly different reproductive organs, a larger liver, two spleens, four kidneys and a digestive system that is foreign to me. It will take time to unravel how it works. I think the answer lies in his brains. Most likely the primary brain but possibly in the auxiliary.”

“Then take them.”

Harding shook her head, disturbing the pixie-cut of the silvery-blonde strands. “That isn’t wise at this juncture, Herr Koenig. If you’ll recall, the female specimen died within hours of removal of her auxiliary brain. I’m not familiar with the structure of the Makheet brain. It would be better to study his anatomy and examine his brains with C.T., MRI and PET scans before removal.”

A coughing fit seized Koenig, shaking his frail body unmercifully, leaving him weak and red in the face when it passed. “I don’t have time for that. Weeks, Harding. You said it yourself. I need the answer now or I’m going to die. Take his goddamn brains or I’ll find someone who will.”

Atar’s eyes widened as the discussion played out. Their aloof act made him feel as if he didn’t exist, although it didn’t remove him from the fear of what they planned. Bile crept up his esophagus when the doctor’s shoulders slumped forward and she nodded.

“Very well, but understand I can’t accept responsibility for the consequences if I don’t find an answer before the subject dies. This might be your last opportunity to study one such as him.” She licked her lips, as if nervous. “Perhaps if you would reconsider taking the vampire-werewolf enzyme, there would be more time to study—”

“You know I’m too weak to survive the transformation. It has to be him. You had better find the answer or I won’t be the only one departing this world, Dr. Harding. Do I make myself clear?”

Atar watched her expression, searching for a sign of fear. She hid it well but her lips trembled slightly. “Yes, Herr.”

The old man turned his wheelchair to the door without another word, obviously satisfied with the outcome of the confrontation between he and the doctor. His guards preceded him from the room and Atar closed his eyes, listening to the quiet sound of Koenig’s wheelchair crossing the floor, wondering if it would be the last sound he ever heard.

Why hadn’t he told Nikia how he felt about her? It seemed unlikely he would ever see her again and she would die thinking he hadn’t loved her, had only used her for gratification. Would knowing he believed in her and had been there during the banishment be enough to let her know how he felt?

His eyes snapped open when a commotion erupted, the beginning signaled by the rapid crack of automatic gunfire. To his astonishment, one of the guards in front of Koenig went flying backward through the air, crashing into the wall. He fell to the tile floor with his neck bent at an awkward angle.

His next shock was to see Nikia step through the door, holding Koenig by the front of his shirt, with his feet suspended off the ground. His heart sang and his first thought was of holding her again, not of escaping the terrible fate planned for him by Koenig.

Chapter 12

Nikia’s eyes spat fire. She could feel them burning as she looked at the man who had kidnapped and planned to torture them. For good measure, she gave him a shake, initiating a round of coughing that turned his face gray and racked his body. With a sound of disgust, she dropped him on the floor, where he curled into a ball and continued coughing.

The soldier with the tranq gun had watched it all with horrified fascination and just as he started bringing up the rifle, Nikia leaped at him, transforming to a wolf as she went. An aborted scream issued from his throat when she knocked him to the floor and took his neck between her teeth, biting down forcefully. His blood flowed into her mouth, reminding her of her earlier hunger and she lapped it up, taking her fill.

Reason returned with the edge of her hunger blunted and Nikia padded away from him, returning to her human form as she moved toward her clothes. Peripherally, she saw the horror on the face of the two women standing beside Atar. She bared her bloodteeth to the older one before bending to retrieve the slacks and sweater.

She dressed quickly and took the magnetic card from her pocket, using it to lock the door in case one of the guards had somehow triggered an alarm before she dealt with them. The third one she had attacked still lay in the corridor, bleeding from the shot his partner had fired into his stomach when Nikia deflected the barrel as it was aimed at her.

She turned around, fastening her gaze on the younger of the two women. “Free him. Now.” The woman scrambled to work the straps as Nikia addressed the one she thought Koenig had called Harding. “You, where are his clothes?”

Her hand trembled when she pointed to the smaller room adjoining the lab. “I’ll get them.”

“No.” She waved the sidearm she had taken from Del Torro. “Come to me.”

With a sob, Harding slowly approached, staying a step out of reach when she stopped. “What do you want? I’ll give you anything.”

“How do we get out of here?”

Her pallor faded slightly at Nikia’s words. “I will show you. There is a passage for easy movement between the labs and main area. It goes to the garage.”

Moving quickly, Nikia lunged at Harding, putting her arms around the woman, while pressing the gun to her temple. “You won’t try anything while acting as our guide, will you?”

Harding shook her head, dislodging the gun slightly.

Nikia looked up as Atar stood, swaying for a moment and bracing his hand against the table. “You should get dressed.” Her voice was remarkably calm, considering how she was shaking inside.

He moved into the other room, emerging a minute later wearing his own clothes. He looked at the phlebotomist. “What about her?”

“We can’t have her raising the alarm.” She glared down at Koenig, who lay on the floor in the fetal position, shivering with fear. “Him either, should he get control of himself. Tie them up, I guess.”

Atar searched through the various drawers, finally holding up an industrial-size roll of surgical tape. “Think this will work?”

“Yes.”

She moved the gun against Harding’s side while Atar taped Koenig and the young woman’s hands and feet together before running strips of tape across their mouths. When he stood up, he appeared unsteady but wasn’t in the same state he had been when they drugged him in Prague. Either they had used a smaller dose or he and Nikia had been out a long time.

He tucked the tape in his pocket and they left the lab, going through the smaller room, which led to a set of double doors. Nikia gave Atar Jaharra’s card but the display box failed to change when he scanned it.

She jabbed the gun deeper into Harding’s side. “What’s going on?”

“Take my card. Only Herr Koenig and a few of the doctors have access to this passage.”

Atar took the card from the clip on her coat and ran it through the reader. The red light turned green and the doors slid open with a hydraulic whoosh.

They stepped forward and Nikia stumbled when the floor under them moved. Her finger tightened on the trigger and she craned her neck, looking for the source of attack.

“It’s an auto-walk,” Harding said, apparently picking up Nikia’s tension.

Atar put a hand on Nikia’s shoulder. “Do you want me to hold her?”

“No, you don’t look steady enough.” Not that she was feeling very steady herself. The surge of adrenaline that had accompanied her this far was fading fast and it took great effort to hold Harding. If the woman had struggled at all, she probably would have broken free. Nikia didn’t want that to happen because she didn’t want to shoot the doctor. Not yet, anyway. They needed the heartless bitch to lead them to the exit.

They walked on the walkway, adjusting to the movement within a few steps. It seemed to speed up their progress, making Nikia doubly cautious. She saw Atar’s eyes constantly scanning the way ahead and behind them as they moved through the corridor, past multiple steel doors that all seemed to be in the locked position.

“What are you doing here?” Nikia asked when they passed yet another room with opaque glass and an even thicker door than the others.

“Experiments. Herr Koenig has an interest in genetics. He believes the proper combination of DNA will yield the perfect weapon.”

“You’re creating living weapons?” Atar sounded as horrified as Nikia felt. They traded a look that spoke volumes.

“Herr Koenig has vision—”

“Save it,” she snarled, urging Harding forward as they approached another set of doors. “Where do these lead?”

“This is the garage.”

She was skeptical and pushed the gun deeper into Harding’s flesh. “Convenient. Why does this secret corridor lead to the garage? Are you certain it isn’t going to open to a room filled with security?”

Harding shook her head emphatically. “Herr Koenig renovated the warehouse to serve as a garage for the vehicles. The other half is the cryo-storage area, where we keep samples not actively being studied. Please think about it. Doesn’t it make sense to have the medical corridor lead to biological storage?”

It did make sense. After sharing a look with Atar, she returned his nod and he opened the door. They tensed, expecting an ambush but it was a quiet room they stepped into with caution. Nikia shivered at the chill of cement against her bare feet. “Are there lights?”

“There is a panel on the wall by the door.”

Atar looked and must have found it because several overhead lights flickered on, revealing a large garage, with an assortment of vehicles—everything from a Cadillac to a tractor-trailer, even a Hummer.

“Keys?” Atar asked Harding.

“In the safe against the wall. You will need my card.”

Nikia watched Atar as he made his way to the steel safe mounted to the wall, sliding her card through to open the door. As he sorted through keys, she examined the room again before speaking to Harding. “You’re being very cooperative. I can’t help wondering why.”

“You have a gun. Herr Koenig pays well and the work is intriguing but I am not going to die for this.”

“You might,” she said in a whisper, hoping it sounded sinister enough to terrify the doctor. She didn’t plan to kill her but didn’t mind making her sweat. From what little conversation she had heard between Koenig and Harding, both were high on her list of people who should die to do the world a favor.

Atar returned. “Let’s go.”

Nikia nodded, releasing Harding gradually, who was smart enough not to make any sudden movements. “One more thing. Where are we?”

“Prague.”

She shook her head, not believing Harding. “Koenig is German. We must be somewhere in Germany.”

“No. His experiments were a disappointment to the German government and the Herr fled his native land.” Harding nodded for emphasis. “Prague is a city where rules are more…flexible.”

Atar snorted. “Shall I tape her?”

She shook her head, bringing the pistol up quickly and smashing it against Harding’s head. “No, let the bitch have one helluva headache.”