The Dark Side (23 page)

Finally I heard footsteps approaching.

“Ashley, the time is nearing,” Marco said quietly. “I will need your help.”

I burrowed harder against Dan’s chest, not wanting to lift my head and see Rhianna lying on the bed. Or to see what happened next.

Dan’s arms loosened around me. “Ash.”

I shook my head. “I can’t.”

“Yes, you can. Ash, Rhi needs you now.”

My eyes felt like I’d been crying acid and my throat wasn’t much better. “I can’t help her.”

“Yes, you can. You can help her with her life now. Help her through this change. She’ll need you.”

Yeah and if she had the same reaction I’d had initially to becoming a wolf then the kindest thing I could do for her would be to help her find a patch of sunshine to walk into. Not that Dan was going to allow me to do any such thing.

Still, if I could help Rhi then I had to. I owed her.

I peeled myself away from Dan, brushing my cheeks with my hands and blinking as the light hit my swollen eyes.

First order of the day was to splash something on my face. The cool water didn’t take away the taste of tears in my mouth or the sting of salt in my eyes but it did make me feel slightly more alive.

I came back to the bed, forcing myself to look at Rhi.

She was dead.

There was no two ways about it. She didn’t look like she was asleep; she looked dead. I’d seen enough bodies in my life to know the difference.

At least Rhi wasn’t broken or maimed, if you discounted the stained bandage still wrapped around her neck. Dr. Samuels came through the door, joining Marco by the bed, his expression grave.

“What now?” I said to Marco.

“We have a few more minutes,” he said. “She’ll wake with the sun.”

I’d never understood that. Vampires were creatures of the night, the sun was their enemy. It seemed ridiculous that their change was tied to the one thing guaranteed to kill them.

But no one had ever said this had to make sense. The viruses weren’t simple diseases. No other disease did what these did. Changed you completely. There was something more at work than the physical, something deeper. I’d never been comfortable with the word magic but it was beyond natural. How else was it that the light of the full moon called me to be a wolf and the rising sun would seal the change in Rhianna that would doom her to darkness?

“Do not look so sad,
cara
,” Marco said. “She will adjust.”

“Her family has suffered enough.
She’s
suffered enough.”

“Some would say her suffering is about to end forever.”

“I think we’ll just have to agree to differ.” I smoothed Rhianna’s hair into place. The ticking of the clock seemed to fill the room.

I met Marco’s gaze. “Once she wakes, you’ll try and make the link with her?”

Marco nodded, beckoning Dan to stand on the opposite side of the bed to me. “Be ready, she may resist.” He took up position again near Rhi’s head, standing close to Dan. “Doctor, it would be safest if you left now.”

Samuels nodded and left us alone after reminding Marco that there was blood in the small bar fridge in the corner of the room.

The clock ticked on and we waited. My stomach rolled and twisted with each breath. Only willpower kept me standing—kept me in the room. Every part of me wanted to flee.

Then, as the waiting seemed to fill the room like a weight, pressing down on us all, Rhi’s eyes snapped open.

I flinched backward, unnerved despite myself. Then leaned forward. “Rhi?”

Blue eyes stared up at me with a blank expression. Then slowly they filled with rage.

“Rhi?”

With a snarl, she sprang, hands groping for my throat. Dan managed to grab her as I stumbled backward. I crashed into the wall behind me, unable to stop the momentum of the instinctive leap I’d taken to avoid the attack. The impact knocked the wind from me. I slid to the floor trying to suck in air with lungs that wouldn’t obey.

“Do your thing, Marco.” Dan snarled. “Fast.” His arms tightened around the furiously struggling Rhianna.

“Turn her to me,” Marco said. Dan twisted and Rhianna made a hissing sound of fury as Marco came into her view.

“Blood of my line, heed me.”

Marco’s voice was low and intense as I hauled myself to my feet, still wincing as I tried to breathe deep.

Rhianna hissed again and Marco spoke. “Heed me.”

His only answer was a shriek of fury. Rhianna lashed out with one hand, her nails scoring down his face.

“I take it that means she’s not of your lineage?” I said, leaning on the bed as Marco retreated a few steps.

“
Si
,” he snapped, eyes still on Rhianna. “Hold her still, Agent Gibson.”

“Easier said than done.” Dan said through gritted teeth. He shifted his grip, trying to pin Rhianna’s hands to her body. She snapped her head back and only his lightning reflexes saved her from connecting with his nose. He winced as he tightened his grip and changed position.

I felt a rumble in the back of my throat as I reacted to the threat to Dan. “Perhaps it would be easier if we got her back on the bed,” I said. “You and I can hold her, Dan. Then Marco can try whatever it is he needs to try next.”

“Actually, it will be easier this way,” Marco said. He had removed his jacket and was calmly rolling back the cuff of his right sleeve. There was blood on his face and drops splattered onto the snowy expanse of cotton of his shirt like shredded rose petals. His eyes stayed on Rhianna, assessing.

I moved nearer, eliciting another shriek as Rhianna tried to twist toward me. The rage boiling from her eyes was shocking.

This wasn’t Rhianna. There was nothing of the girl I’d known behind the snarl of hate. It was all animal, intent on inflicting harm. She hissed, a wordless sound of enmity that made the hairs on the back of my neck rise. Not least because for the first time, I could see the fangs that hadn’t been there when she’d taken her last breath.

“Come around behind me, Ashley,” Marco said softly.

“What are you going to do?”

“Provoke her.”

That didn’t sound like such a good plan to me, but he was the expert.

I did as he asked, moving warily, ready to help Dan if he needed it. Sweat beaded Dan’s forehead—holding a newly risen vampire down by sheer force couldn’t be easy.

Marco muttered something in Italian, something curt and brutal sounding. Then he stepped close, holding out his wrist. “You want to hurt something?” he said to Rhianna. “Hurt me.”

Another hissing, snarling wordless protest rose from Rhianna, but then she struck, lightning fast, burying those newly minted fangs deep into the flesh of Marco’s wrist. So deep, pain twisted his face.

Rhi’s throat worked as she swallowed greedily, sucking down Marco’s blood like she was starving for it. Drops splashed down her chin, the deep red looking unreal in the fluorescent lights. As she drank, color started to fill her cheeks but the ferocious look in her eyes didn’t change.

She still looked wild. Feral.

Predatory.

After a minute or so Marco said, “Enough.”

Rhianna took another defiant swallow. This time it was Marco who hissed in pain. Then he wrenched his wrist free with a wet tearing sound that made me want to throw up.

“Now what?” I asked as he clutched his wrist to his chest, blood spilling down his shirt.

“Now we see whose blood is stronger.”

I looked at his arm in concern. “Do you need something for that?”

He shook his head. “No, it will heal soon enough.” His gaze was fastened on Rhianna’s face. I wasn’t sure what he was looking for but after a few moments he smiled. “Now we shall try this again.”

He stepped closer to her, dropping his arm so I got a fleeting glimpse of his wrist and saw the wound had already scabbed over like it had been there for days.

Wolves heal fast too but not that fast. We have to change forms. More than once for most things.

“Blood of my blood,” Marco said softly. “Look at me.”

The snarl on Rhianna’s face disappeared and her blue eyes locked with his.

“
Si
.” His voice was a soft croon. “
Si
, look at me. Let me in.”

Let me in?
I flinched. What exactly was he trying to do? I looked at Dan and saw the same wariness in his eyes as he turned his head away from Marco, not wanting to get caught in whatever the hell it was that Marco was weaving.

“
Si
. Look at me.” The croon sounded a little strained but Marco didn’t move from his stance. “See me. Good. Come to me.”

There was a sudden sensation of electricity in the air—a snap like lightning striking in the distance—and then just as suddenly, it disappeared and Rhianna went limp in Dan’s arms.

“I have her now,” Marco said. “Put her back on the bed.”

Dan obeyed with a look of relief, laying Rhi down carefully. Her eyes were open but peaceful, the rage and fury gone.

“What did you do to her?” I said quietly to Marco.

“I established a bond. I think.”

“You think?” I looked from him back to Rhianna. “What if you’re wrong?”

“She is quiet for now, yes? So I am probably right.”

He sounded confident but I noticed he was watching Rhianna not me.

“Can all Old Ones do that?”

“It is something that comes with age, but it does not always work.”

“Now you tell us.”

“It had to be tried. She would have hurt herself. And perhaps us.”

“How long can you keep her like that?” Dan said from the other side of the bed where he stood, one hand rubbing at his neck and shoulders. He looked wrecked.

“She needs to feed, then she will come back to herself over the next day or so,” Marco said. “I think I can keep her calm until then.”

“So she belongs to you now?” I didn’t understand exactly what he’d done. Something like a thrall or something that meant the bond a vampire had with their sire—and through them—the head of their lineage had been transferred to Marco?

“I am not entirely sure,” Marco said. “She feels...different. Whatever they have done to the virus made it difficult. I’m not sure what would happen if someone of her lineage tried to take her from me.”

Oh, wonderful. But then again, given the government wanted to lock Rhianna up, it was unlikely anyone would be challenging Marco’s control any time soon.

“Should we feed her?” My eyes strayed to the fridge in the corner of the room where the doctor had put the blood packs hours ago.

“
Si
.” Marco went to the fridge and opened it, looking at the contents. “This is manufactured,” he said, holding up a pack to the light with a frown.

“It’s what a lot of vamps drink,” Dan said. “Given her circumstances, I don’t think it’s wise to let her get a taste for real human blood.”

“Real blood is best for the young ones.”

“She’ll just have to make do,” Dan said. He crossed to Marco and took the pack out of his hands, laying it on top of the fridge as he opened the long cardboard box the doctor had also left. He withdrew a fleshy color tube that looked like it was made of rubber or foam.

“What’s that?”

“Feeding tube,” Dan said.

“Can’t she just drink it from a glass or something?”

“It is easiest for the young ones to bite,” Marco said. “It calms them.”

“Just like a wolf’s first hunt,” Dan said as he slid the blood pack into the tube with an ease that spoke of experience. “This warms the blood and gives them something to bite into.”

It looked ridiculous. Like someone had chopped the arm off a flesh-colored store dummy and rubberized it. Surely biting rubber couldn’t be satisfying? But what did I know?

Dan passed the pack to Marco. “You can do the honors.”

“How do you know about feeding new vampires?” I said as I watched Marco approach Rhianna and coax her to sit up.

Dan came over to sit beside me. “They teach us in the Taskforce. We come across new vamps every so often. Easier to use one of these than have someone get bitten.”

“I guess.” The conversation was making me feel vaguely nauseated. Which was dumb, given that I’d eaten fresh raw deer my first night as a werewolf and bitten the throats out of two vampires since then.

Rhianna’s hands closed around the feeding tube. I turned away as she sank her fangs into it, sucking greedily.

“I’ll go get Dr. Samuels,” Dan said. “See if he can clear her for transport.”

“What about her parents? Can we tell them Rhi will be okay?”

He shook his head. “Not yet.”

“When?”

“I can’t promise anything.”

He was halfway to the door when Rhianna suddenly gagged and dropped the feeding tube, clawing at her throat.

I turned to glare at Marco. “What the hell?”

“Get the doctor. She is not reacting well to the blood,” Marco snapped.

Understatement of the year. Rhianna gasped frantically, sounding half-choked. Raw red blisters bloomed around her mouth. If the outside looked like that, what the hell was happening inside her throat?

I heard Dan calling down the hallway for help as if he was speaking through a fog. Everything sounded wobbly and far away as I stared at the sores breaking out and marring the whiteness of Rhi’s skin.

“Help her,” I said to Marco.

“There’s nothing I can do,” he said. “Her body needs to process this. It will heal.”

“How do you know?” Rhianna wasn’t a normal vampire...that much was clear. Marco couldn’t predict what was going to happen with any certainty, even if he liked to think he was in control of the situation.

“Can’t you tell her to go to sleep or something?” I added desperately as Rhi’s sounds of pains redoubled. She retched violently and started vomiting blood. The thick sticky redness splashed over the pale blue hospital covers. Some of it splashed on my hands. It looked like someone had been slaughtered on the bed. Too much blood.

More than she’d drunk.

Marco lunged toward her, grabbing her shoulders. I froze, not knowing whether to help him or go find the doctor. Before I could decide, footsteps pounded down the hallway and the door flew open.

“Keep her under control we don’t need anyone else getting bitten.” I said to Marco before someone hustled me out of the room and slammed the door behind me.