The Deadliest Bite (28 page)

“How long?” I asked as I burst inside without even knocking. With any other guy I’d have worried about interrupting something a little bent but, as expected, I found my Spirit Guide reading the latest issue of
Model Railroader
and chowing down on peanuts.

He sat up like he wasn’t that surprised to see me. “Until what?” he asked.

“What’s our window until it’s too late for Hanzi? Do I need to try to wake Vayl up somehow, or wil it hold until sundown? Can you at least tel me that?”

He shook his head and looked toward the window. Whose curtains were closed. Which was when I realized he hadn’t been reading the magazine or eating the peanuts when I’d burst into the room. He’d been staring at those ugly beige window treatments.

“What?” I demanded.

“I was about to come see you,” he admitted. He stood so straight I felt like an officer about to begin inspection. “I just got word from our scout. He’s discovered a route to one of the most far-flung gates in Lucifer’s domain. We have a very narrow window until the fence guardians catch his scent and come to investigate. As soon as Vayl rises we’re leaving.” He’d muttered most of this information over my right shoulder, like a TV crew was maybe standing behind me. Now he dropped his eyes to mine. “I’m sorry, Jasmine. There’s no time to help Hanzi. It’s al about you now.” I wrapped both my hands around the despair threatening to choke the breath out of me and said,

“Look. We can do both. What if we grabbed Hanzi before the accident and took him into hel with us? What better way to show him his potential future than to sink him straight to the pit with a couple of pitiless assassins and an Eldhayr warrior who can show him the best way out?” As Raoul hesitated I rushed on. “You know his chances of survival there are slim to none anyway; it’s not like we’d be vacationing in the Wine Country or something. At least this way there’s a better chance he’l choose the good fight. Plus Vayl gets to save his kid.
And
I don’t have to spend the rest of my life walking under a thundercloud of guilt for denying him that chance. What do you say?” I realized I was clasping my hands in front of me like a little kid begging for a double dip of chocolate/vanil a twist before the ice cream van passes her by.

Raoul nodded. “I need to check with a few people. But I believe that could work.”

“Yes! I would make you do cheerleader kicks with me, but I can tel you’d pul a hamstring or something.” So I hugged him which, as soon as I was done, I realized he’d dealt with about as suavely as a sixth grader. As I watched the blush fade from his cheeks I made a mental note, which my inner librarian dutiful y filed away:
Next time… do the kicks
. I said, “Okay, do me a favor then.

Tel the crew there’s been a change of plan. We’re camping out here until further notice.” He sat up straighter. “What are you going to do?”

“I’ve figured out how to get me and Vayl to Hanzi without driving.” His eyes gleamed. “I hoped you would. Do you want some company?” I shook my head. “Your hands are pretty tied on this one, Raoul. I don’t want to take you to a place where you’l be too tempted to break the Eminent’s edict. Especial y when you’re already in hot water over us.” As his face fel I said, “You guard the troops, okay? No tel ing what kind of trouble they’l manage to get themselves into if left to their own devices. As soon as Vayl and I get back with Hanzi, we’re jumping to hel . Then I’m gonna need you like crazy.” He nodded resolutely. “This is true. I’l see you when the kid is safe, then. Be careful. And remember, some surprises are nice ones.”

I tilted my head at him, but when he didn’t elaborate I said, “Okay,” as I backed out of his room.

With a whole day ahead of me and zero sleep behind, I skipped back to the room for some shut-eye. Jack had gobbled his breakfast and settled into one of the chairs for his morning nap.

“Seriously?” I asked him. When he nodded I said, “Okay, but wake me up if you need to take a dump. We don’t want another fiasco like we had in that Motel 6.” I made a few more preparations for the night ahead. And when I was satisfied I’d done al I could I shed my clothes, curled up under the covers beside Vayl’s tent, and snoozed until his whoop of indrawn breath brought me to my feet. I might’ve been stark naked, but I held Grief in one hand and my bolo in the other, so I
felt
at least half dressed. I also could’ve kicked myself for reacting so violently to the sound of him waking to life for yet another evening. I should be used to it by now. I had been, back at his house. Which proved how much this mission had frayed my last nerve. Not a comforting way to start out what could be the most important night of your life.

Especial y when I looked down. Shit! Another nosebleed had left my chin, my neck, and the front third of my torso caked in half-dried flakes of blood. I supposed I should be grateful that I hadn’t ruined one of my favorite T-shirts. But I just felt… tired. I touched my nostrils. Stil damp from Brude’s latest onslaught.
Go ahead, you fucker. Try me. I’m not going down without a fight
.

I considered throwing my weapons on the bed while I cleaned up, but Jack had decided that if Vayl and I weren’t going to sleep there it was fair game for him. He’d spread out across the middle of the dingy mattress and was blinking up at me sleepily while Astral stared at both of us from the perch she’d found on the ancient TV set. So I set the lethals on the dresser and, before I hit the bathroom, took one more minute to set up supper for the bottomless pit.

“How hungry is the poopmeister?” I asked Jack as I dug into our luggage for his food supply. He bounced to his feet, making the bed creak so alarmingly I wondered if I was going to have to rescue him from the rubble of its col apse. But it held up at least long enough for him to leap to the floor and claim his food, which he chomped happily, pausing only to smile up at Vayl after he’d emerged from his tent and come to give me a good-evening hug. Which he delayed when he saw the state I’d risen in. He shook his head.

“I hope, more than anything, that tonight sees an end to your pain,” he said as he pul ed me into his arms, dried blood and al . When I thought about it, that was real y saying something.

“That was very cool of you to say, considering,” I replied. I shivered inside his arms. “You’re cold.”

“I have not yet eaten.”

“Mmmm.” I led him to the shower, underneath the spray, let him rub my skin to its usual pasty paleness. And al the while his lips brushed my neck, nipped at my skin. Eventual y my shivers had nothing to do with temperature.

I said, “What you said earlier, about eating. Maybe it’s not such a bad idea for you to take from me once in a while after al . I mean, the last time we joined we didn’t even trade fluids. It was just—

emotional.”

“I know.” He set the soap in the dispenser and pul ed me in until it felt as if every inch of my skin was touching every bit of his. “I have a feeling our journey toward a new
otherness
cannot be derailed, but only delayed. And even that may not continue for as long as we had hoped.”

“Then we might as wel enjoy the ride,” I murmured as I stroked his broad, muscular back. “I was just wondering, though. If this al works out, I’m definitely going to want a shower after we get back.

What do you think about three in twenty-four hours? Too much?” He considered the question as his hands drew erotic circles down my sides to my hips and back up again. Final y he said, “Wel , they do say that cleanliness is next to godliness. And, considering our vocations, that cannot hurt.”

“You’re just saying that because you like to get wet with me.” His grin made my heart go pit-a-pat just like in romance novels. Or so I’ve heard. He said, “That, also, is quite true.”

I turned in his arms, waiting until he’d clasped his hands across my stomach before I said,

“We’ve got to exploit every advantage. Especial y since I’ve got a big night planned for you. So give me that soap and let’s get dirty, uh, I mean clean.”

We used up most of the soap. Al of the hot water. And every bit of strength in our legs. By the time we left the shower our kneecaps were no firmer than spaghetti noodles. We helped each other dress in colors so dark we’d have lost each other inside a movie theater, and then col apsed on our homemade bed for five minutes of recovery time.

At which point I told him about our change in plans. He leaped off the bed. “What are we doing here, then? We should have left the moment I rose!”

“About that,” I said. “I figured out a way for us to get to Hanzi. I even tried it out to make sure it would al work earlier today. I’l show you soon. The point is, your kid isn’t going to be at that location or on that motorcycle for another”—I checked my watch—“fortyfive minutes. We don’t have time, no.

But we have to take it. Raoul told me that, for some reason, the only time it’s okay to grab the kid is right before the accident. He’s got to see something happen there before we take him to hel , or the deal is nul and void. So ‘patience’ is the word of the day, okay?” Vayl kissed me so thoroughly I almost forgot we had important items on our to-do list. When he lifted his head he said, “You are a wonder.”

“I try.” My lopsided smile told him to cut out the sil y compliments, they were just too far over the top.

He touched the spot where I’d taped a piece of gauze underneath my right breast. I checked to make sure it didn’t show through the thick cotton of my front-pocket pul over as he asked, “Did I hurt you?”

I brushed my palm against his cheek. “A little. It’s teeth in skin, babe. You know it’s got to. But the pleasure is so intense. I can stil feel the tingle in my toes. And the bubbles are stil popping in my brain. You get me high in a way that leaves me permanently powerful. Even after the crash. How does it feel for you?”

He caressed my lips, studying them so closely I would’ve thought his next step was to re-create the image on canvas if he hadn’t started talking again. He said, “When I taste you, when I am inside of you, and you surround me, then I am no longer alone.” He stopped. Stared into my eyes. And I suddenly understood the significance behind the looks he’d been giving me since before I realized how he felt for me. He’d been trying to tel me how lonely he’d been. Al those years, searching for his sons. It hadn’t mattered who he’d touched, whose blood he’d swal owed. He’d never truly connected with anyone in al that time. He’d been isolated, like a TB carrier stuck in quarantine, until he’d met me. And now he was about to risk losing that forever.

I wrapped myself around him until my arms and legs ached. Only then did I say, “I know a little bit about these things, Vayl. People have choices, even after death. I promise, I wil always choose you.”

He pul ed back so he could look into my face. “Not Matt? He may be waiting for you in paradise, you know. He may be standing behind the pearly gates holding a beach umbrel a in one hand and a margarita in the other.”

I jumped to my feet. “I was real y going to do this later. Afterward? But no, now real y seems…” I rushed to my suitcase. It didn’t take much digging. I knew right where I’d packed the box because I’d checked on it every day since to make sure it hadn’t disappeared.

I came back to Vayl, who looked like a male model the way he sat in front of his sleeping tent, one leg stretched out in front of him, the other bent at the knee so it could prop up his arm. I said,

“God, you’re gorgeous. Have I ever told you that? Don’t let it go to your head. Egotistical vampires are the worst. Here.” I shoved the box into his free hand. “This is for you.” Which was such a stupid thing to say, but I was suddenly, incredibly nervous.

I sat on my knees in front of him, trying not to twirl my curls nervously as he unwrapped the classy blue paper and pul ed out the black velvet box. When he opened it he went al Vampere on me and I couldn’t tel at al what he was thinking behind his stil -as-death features. So I began to babble.

“You said I could give you a ring. Remember? In Marrakech? So I asked Sterling to make me one for you, to sort of match Cirilai, which is why it’s gold. I went for a semi-plain band because you don’t seem the gemmy type to me. I mean, when I met you, you were wearing Cirilai around your neck, so… did I guess right?” When he didn’t answer I rushed on. “The runes on both sides are, wel , he wouldn’t explain exactly how he did it. But my blood is in there. Not literal y. That seemed a little too Angelina Jolie/Bil y Bob Thornton–esque to me. But it was part of the spel that burned the runes into the band, inside and out, see? Which was how he said that some of my essence melded with the ring. When you wear it I’l be literal y wrapped around you. Does that make sense to you? Are you ever going to speak, or am I just going to keep yapping like one of those annoying diva dogs?

Vayl?” By now my voice had risen about three octaves, Stewie Griffin style.

When he final y looked up, Vayl’s eyes had gone the honey gold I associated with his deepest feelings for me. The amber flecks mixed with green sparks to steal my breath, so that for a second I felt that time had stopped, and nothing existed beyond the love showering me from those wide, wondering eyes. “I have never before held such a treasure,” he said, his voice so low I had to lean forward to make sure I didn’t miss a word.

I sighed and felt the lurch as my world decided to keep spinning. “That was such the right thing to say.” I took the ring from his square-tipped fingers and slipped it onto his left hand, watching his face as he registered the fact that I’d mimicked the same moves a bride would’ve made. He watched the ring slide over his knuckle and snug into the space just above his palm, made a fist to assure himself it fit wel , then looked up at me again.

“You have made me a gloriously happy man today, my
pretera
.” I leaned forward and kissed him, tasting him ful y, the way he’d taught me to, breathing in his scent, his maleness, his rising desire. I murmured, “That’s my job, you know. The assassin thing is just a sideline.”