Sigma (3 page)

* * * *

Ignoring the burning in her back, Clementine swung her arm in an arc and slapped the smug grin off Sam’s face.

He staggered, almost dropping her, but kept his hold and balance. She must be weak from blood loss. The strike should have knocked him out.

Wriggling out of his arms, she clutched her sides. Pain radiated from her spine around to her abdomen. Sharp stabs still plagued every breath. She lifted the edge of her ruined t-shirt and examined her front. No exit wound.

The bullet was still in her, which meant it would hurt until someone dug it out. Her stomach turned at the idea. “I’m going to be sick.” She sunk to her knees and bowed her head.

“Easy.” Sam rubbed her neck. “Slow breaths. What can I do to help?”

She glimpsed his bare thighs, her eyes wandering higher and growing wider. “You’re naked.” She focused on the grass again, her nausea forgotten.

He chuckled. “I haven’t had time to dress since shifting.” He pulled on a pair of torn jeans that hung too low on his hips. If anything, they made him appear more appetizing.

“I need to feed.”

“Here.” He offered her his wrist.

“First, we need to dig out the bullet in my back. If I feed now, I’ll heal faster and then you’ll have to cut me open again.”

Silence.

She glanced at him.

His face drained of color as he swallowed visibly. “I don’t think we should hang around here, though.” He gestured to the decapitated Pal Robi security.

“I agree.” On unsteady legs, she rose and shuffled to his car.

He raced ahead of her and opened her door, then set his shredded shirt over the passenger seat. “Blood stains are hard on the upholstery.”

Ignoring the half-naked shifter, she curled forward on her seat, splinting her sides. For a moment she had mistaken him for a gentleman.

“Seat belt.” He reached around her.

She jerked at his touch, wincing at the sharp stab. “Are you joking? I’m shot and you’re worried about a belt?”

“After the night I’ve had? We’re bound to get into more trouble. It follows me like a bad smell lately. The last thing I need is to have a car accident and you thrown from the vehicle.” He weaved the belt through her limbs and clipped her in. “You are one tough broad. That bullet should have torn right through you.”

She almost smiled at his praise, but it galled her. “The bullets are special made to lodge in a vampire’s body. Not to kill, but to wound and slow prey with pain. As the wound heals, it hurts more.”

He shuddered. “Sadistic bastards.”

“Daedalus developed them.”

“Why am I not surprised?” He closed her door and entered on the driver’s side. “They wanted you alive, then?”

“Sam, can we talk less and drive more? My wound is closing.”

The engine protested as Sam cranked the key and pumped the gas pedal. His shaggy dark brown hair settled around his shoulders in a just-fell-out-of-bed way. Thick muscles moved under his skin as he cranked the key again.

Was that a prayer he’d just mumbled under his breath? She had risked her eternal existence for her master and he had abandoned her. Left her shot, with a stranger in a car that wouldn’t start, for a damaged human female.

Maybe the rumors were true? Whispers at Pal Robi suggested Daedalus had grown a heart.

She smiled inside. That would be something to witness.

Sam cursed a string of swears that left her ears stinging. The car wouldn’t start and sirens sang in the distance. He started swearing again.

The pain worsened but it didn’t compare to her growing fear. What were they going to do? She wasn’t accustomed to having to make split second life-depending decisions. Her world had consisted of meetings and memos.

Jumping out of the car, Sam opened her door, undid her belt, grabbed his cellphone, and carried her away like a hero out of a fairy tale. “We need to not be here.”

“Too bad it wasn’t closer to dawn. The bodies would vanish with the sunlight.” She stared over his shoulder at the dead vampires.

He jogged away from the cars. “Doesn’t matter. In this city, they’ll do a minimal investigation because no humans were involved. However, it’s still better not to be here. They might want a scapegoat and sometimes they forget to give vampires cells with no windows. If you get what I mean.”

The jostling jarred her injuries. “Where are we going?” She gritted her teeth, trying not to cry out.

He crossed the street and entered the first alley available. Continuing to jog until he rounded the corner of the building, he set her on her feet, then pulled out his phone. “I’ll call for someone to pick us up.”

She leaned against the wall and sank to the ground, a hard lump forming in her chest. “The cops will look for you once they run your plates.” She never should have answered her master’s call, never downloaded those secured files, and never have come to Chicago.

“Damn, my phone is dead. Where’s yours?”

She shook her head. Her phone lay in the grass where she’d dropped it when she was shot. Tears burned behind her eyelids as she squeezed them shut.

Sam growled, the sound fierce and frustrated. He knelt by her and gently gathered her in his arms. “It’ll be okay, Clementine. I’ll take care of you.”

Good, it was about time someone did. She leaned her head on his shoulder. She would not cry. She would not cry. She kept repeating this litany as if it were a defensive spell, but the tears were close to winning.

“I see a motel down the block. It’s not five star, more like a shit hole, but they might not ask about my clothes or your blood, and they’ll have a phone in the room. I can take care of your bullet in there.”

Chapter 3

Sam ground his teeth at Clementine’s stubbornness and hovered around her in case she fell.

Blood soaked the back of her pink t-shirt and dripped, leaving a gruesome trail as she walked along the exterior balcony toward their motel room on the second floor. “You paid with cash like I told you?” She weaved on unsteady feet.

“Yes, ma’am.” He barely had enough money in his wallet to buy a soda now. “No credit card to track.” He reached out to grab her elbow, but she swatted his fingertips. Reflexively, he shook the sting away. “Playing tough and insisting on walking doesn’t get you brownie points if you pass out.”

He unlocked and opened their room door. The scent of cheap air freshener and stale sweat swept over him. He turned and sneezed.

“Bless you.”

He wiped his mouth. “Thanks.” Wasn’t there some supernatural law against vampires being polite?

“It smells odd in here.” She leaned against the door frame and pointed to the faded yellow bed. “Can you pull off the blanket?”

“We got what we paid for, a cheap-ass room. At least they don’t charge by the hour.” He winked and did as Clementine asked, then watched as she crawled onto their bed, lying on her stomach. “What can I do to help?” The deep red stain continued to spread under his scrutiny. “When Daedalus was staked, he didn’t bleed like this.”

She twisted around and whispered, “You were there?” With her blue eyes wide, she appeared very young, but vampires were experts at fooling people. Clementine could be five hundred years old, for all he knew. With a wig, Daedalus looked twenty, younger than Sugar. He chuckled at the memory and recalled the expression of horror on Sugar’s face. “It happened in my old apartment.”

“You’re one of the original Omegas?”

“You make it sound like a bad thing.” They’d had five pack members at the beginning, before Daedalus came and changed everything. Now they numbered in the triple digits and were called the Vasi. He pointed at her wound. “Can you bleed to death?”

She rolled back onto her stomach. “No, but I’ll need to feed before the blood lust takes over me. You have to remove the bullet.”

He grabbed the edge of her shirt and tore it open, exposing her back.

She hissed and glared at him over her shoulder. “I could have taken it off.”

Pasting mock surprise on his face, he laid a hand on his chest. “Where’s the fun in that?” Not waiting for her response, he went into the bathroom and washed off his pocketknife. A pair of tweezers would have been handy. And some gauze. He grabbed a face cloth instead. “Do I need to sterilize my knife or find some antiseptic?”

“I’m a vampire. Disease doesn’t plague us.”

He shrugged off her prickly tone, betting she was as gentle as the sound of her name on his lips. “Good, because I can’t provide either.” On his knees, he straddled her legs and leaned forward to examine her wound. He planted his palm between her shoulder blades.

“What–” She struggled under him. “What are you doing?”

“I don’t want you to move.” Using his shifter strength, he shoved her flat against the bed and wiped the blood away. “Stop wiggling so much. It’s distracting.”

“Not like you can do more damage.” Her words came out muffled.

“No, but you’re turning me on.”

She went limp, her breathing heavy and strained.

He couldn’t help but chuckle. This shitty day was getting better. Using the tip of the pocketknife, he gently probed her wound. “Tell me if it hurts.” The hole in her flesh was deep. It appeared as if her backbone had absorbed the impact of the bullet. Damn, vampires were tough.

A few years ago, he would have fainted at the idea of digging out bullets from damsels in distress. So much had changed since the small pack of omegas hired a Nosferatu warrior as a teacher.

Eric had become alpha of Chicago and married his high school crush, serious Robert fell in love with a slayer, of all things, and Tyler finally found the balls to ask Katrina to marry him.

And Daedalus stole Sugar’s heart.

Not that Sam had ever owned it. She was better off with the wealthy and powerful vampire. Safer. Sam just fucked everything up.

His heart didn’t belong to anyone but himself.

The knife clinked against metal and Clementine jerked.

He wiped the area clean to get a better visual. “The bullet’s entrenched, but I should be able to ease it out with a few simple cuts. This will hurt. Maybe I should call Daedalus first and have him knock you out with some Nosferatu mental voodoo.”

She laughed. A quiet, sorrowful sound that grabbed him low in the gut. “I can take the pain. I don’t need my master to hold my hand.”

There it was again. Master. The title irked him more than it should. From what little he knew of vampire society, most weren’t free. Their masters owned them, kept them under control, so the human population wouldn’t fear and hunt them like the old days. It had never occurred to Sam that Daedalus owned some. Bet the others didn’t think about it either.

Clementine clenched the sheets in her hands. “I’ll do my best not to scream.”

“Don’t worry. In this part of town, they’re used to it.”

As she twisted around to glare at him, he pried the bullet from her flesh and popped it out.

Eyes squeezed shut and mouth open in a silent scream exposing her delicate kitten-like fangs, she shuddered under his body.

His heart wrenched at the sight and a wave of nausea rocked him. He didn’t get off on pain. Though, he’d love to see that expression on her face once more, but this time in ecstasy, not agony. He shook his head. He could be a sick bastard sometimes.

Fresh blood pooled in her wound as she squirmed once more. “Get off me.” Her ass bucked against his cock, sending a jolt of lust straight to his balls.

He’d never had a vampire–odd, considering his low standards. As long as it was female and willing, he’d bed anyone once. Letting his fingers trail along her skin, he held her down a little longer. A small subliminal suggestion of what he could offer.

“Asshole.” She rolled him off with a sharp twist of her hips.

He fell next to her. “At your service.” Sticks and stones couldn’t break his bones, and name-calling wouldn’t hurt him.

Clutching her tattered shirt to her chest, she sat on the edge of the bed and dialed the room phone. “Master?”

Sam moaned and rested his forearm over his eyes. It was better for her to explain what happened. He didn’t need to hear more bitching from the Nosferatu.

“We’re at Motel Twelve by the park. Sam’s car wouldn’t start and I was too injured to walk.” She remained silent, listening. “My car was too damaged to drive.”

Squeezing his eyes tight, he kept quiet. God, he hadn’t even thought to take her car. It didn’t seem in that bad of condition. He peeked at her. She’d lied for him.

“Sam’s taking good care of me. The bullet is out and he’s offered to feed me.” She raised a questioning eyebrow at him.

He nodded, a little dumbfounded. Gratitude and shame knotted his chest, considering only a few minutes ago he’d been thinking of her as just a possible fuck.

“Okay, we’ll be here.” She hung up. “Daedalus will come as soon as he has Sugar settled at home.”

* * * *

What was with the human worship? It sounded like a party in the background as she’d spoken with her master. Someone else besides him could watch Sugar for the thirty minutes it would take to retrieve them. The room darkened as her vision tunneled. She gripped the edge of the bed and shook her head.

“Clementine?”

“Lightheaded.” She waved Sam’s hand away. His touch stirred too many unexplainable desires. They’d barely met, under terrible circumstances. However, her skin still tingled wherever he’d touched her.

Closing her eyes made the dizziness worse. How much blood had she lost? She glanced at Sam, who lounged on the bed in his torn clothes. “None of this fazes you, does it? The fighting, the running, the gunshots?”

He shrugged. “A few years ago, it would have. Life’s hard in the pack. It’s adapt or perish.” He eyed her as if trying to figure out what species of bug she belonged to. “Thanks for explaining things to Daedalus. We don’t get along too well. He’s not my biggest fan.”

A hot flush washed over her. From lack of blood or from his gratitude, she wasn’t sure. Drinking from him, pressed against his strong, muscled body, would be a fantasy come true. What female hadn’t dreamed of a wild shifter in bed?

Except when imagination and reality collided, all her hidden insecurities suddenly jumped out and did the conga. She was plain for a vampire: short brown hair, little boobs, too much junk-in-the-trunk. Not exactly a vixen of the night those stupid human movies portrayed.