But soon, even that wouldn’t help and Mischa would need to ingest blood—either bottled or straight from a source—in order to survive.
Mischa pulled a deep breath through her nose and closed her eyes. “What’s happening to me?” she whispered.
Hunter grabbed her hand and dropped to his knees at her side. “It’s natural, love. Stay calm.”
Her eyes flew to his. “It’s natural that I can not only smell human blood in this place, but that I want to drink it?”
“I didn’t have a choice,” he said in a low, urgent tone.
“You changed me.”
It hadn’t been a question. Harper closed her eyes. Oh, boy. This wasn’t going to go well.
Hunter gave a short nod. “I did. I didn’t have a choice,” he repeated.
“There’s always a choice.”
Hunter’s chin hit his chest, and Harper thought he must not like the tone of Mischa’s voice any more than she did. It was…defeated. Beat down. Mischa was a fighter. This wasn’t like her at all.
“Mischa, honey, I know this is a lot to take in, but you were going to die,” Harper said. “Hunter did what he had to do.”
Mischa shook her head. “No. He didn’t have to do it. It was my choice, and he took it from me.”
His head shot up. “Would you have chosen to die?” he hissed.
Tears filled her eyes. “We’ll never know, will we?”
He looked like he’d taken a bullet to the gut as he watched her pull her hand away from his.
“Mischa,” Harper tried again. “He didn’t want you to die. You don’t really hold that against him, can you?”
“Oh, she does,” Hunter murmured. “A small part of her actually thinks I would’ve done this eventually, even if she wasn’t near death, and whether she wanted it or not.”
“You promised you’d stay out of my thoughts!”
His eyes narrowed. “Not when they’re as crazy as they are right now.”
Harper sucked in a harsh breath. Shit, crazy was not a word that settled well with any woman. He might as well tell her to calm down while he’s at it, she thought. “Why would you think that, Misch?”
Her chin came up defensively. “He asked me to change for him last night. He told me he couldn’t bear the thought of me being so fragile. So human. I told him I needed time, but this is always what he wanted.”
He raked his fingers through his hair. “Of course I wanted you to change! Do you think I was looking forward to watching you die? Even if you hadn’t been shot tonight, you would’ve eventually died. That’s what humans do. But no matter how much I wanted you to change, I never would have forced it on you. The choice would’ve been yours.”
Mischa jackknifed up in bed and hurled a plastic dinner tray at him. “I wouldn’t have chosen this!” she shrieked. “Maybe I wanted to grow old. Maybe I wanted to have babies and grandbabies and a real family. Now I’ll never have that. You took my choice away.”
“You told me you loved me,” Hunter said, his voice shaky and thick. “You were with me. How did you plan on being with me and having babies and grandbabies? I could never give you children. You knew that going in.”
“It was never going to last. You and me…” she paused, shaking her head. “It was never going to work long-term. You would’ve pressured me to change. I would’ve left eventually.”
Harper wiped at her own suddenly wet cheeks. “You don’t know that, Mischa.”
Hunter’s jaw tightened. “She doesn’t know, but that’s what she’s thinking right now. And she’s working damn hard at convincing herself it’s true.”
“Stay out of my head!”
He started backing away, never breaking eye contact. “Gladly.”
The word was knife-point sharp, and even Harper winced at the sound of it. Mischa flinched visibly, but kept her chin high.
Harper and Mischa watched in silence as Hunter turned himself in to the containment cops. He even let them collar him and lead him away on that stick. When he was gone, Harper sat down on the end of Mischa’s bed.
“He loves you,” she said quietly. “When we got here…” she shook her head. “I’ve never seen anyone look that devastated. He really didn’t have a choice, Misch. He had to turn you. And you know what? I’m glad he did. If someone had asked me what to do at that point? I would’ve said to turn you. To bring you back, no matter what.”
Mischa dropped her head to her hands and her shoulders shook with silent tears. Harper gave her a moment to compose herself before asking, “Are you going to press charges?”
“No,” she whispered. “I don’t want him in jail. I just…I just need time. I need to figure this all out. I mean, the first time I let someone in and tried your whole ‘go with the flow’ thing, I wound up dead.”
Harper couldn’t hold back a little chuckle. “Yeah, maybe I should’ve clarified that going with the flow usually involves too many margaritas and a next-day walk of shame, carrying your panties in your purse. You just had to take it to the next level, huh?”
Mischa snorted. “Hey, you know me. I’ve never been one to half-ass anything.”
“Yep, you’re a full-ass kind of girl.”
She arched a brow. “Is that a fat joke?”
“If the ass fits.”
Before too long, they were sissy-fighting, trying to hold back fits of the kind of giggles they only got when emotions ran high and tense. The kind of hysterical giggles that kept them both from crying.
With a half-snore, half-snort, Riddick jerked awake, practically falling sideways out of his chair. He blinked at Harper sleepily. “What’d I miss?”
Harper and Mischa glanced at each other, then fell into a fit of laughter that had them leaning on each other for support and Harper gasping for breath.
As Harper knew it eventually would, Mischa’s laughter dissolved into gut-wrenching sobs. Harper just held her tighter and told her over and over again that everything would be fine.
It had to be.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
An hour or so later, Mischa was sleeping like…well, like the dead.
Harper was exhausted but couldn’t bring herself to drift off just yet. She was too busy enjoying a conversation with Riddick that didn’t involve high tensions and general angst—something she hadn’t had since their whole Vegas getaway dropped into a death spiral.
She was currently cuddled up in Riddick’s lap, which was way more comfortable than any piece of furniture she’d found in the hospital so far. And fortunately, while the lights were off in Mischa’s room so that she could sleep, the rest of the hospital’s power—and presumably the city’s power—had been restored shortly after Hunter left the building.
Mischa had explained the probable cause of the blackout, and Harper was still processing the full extent of Hunter’s power. She wondered if Mischa had inherited any of his, um, gifts when he turned her.
But that certainly wasn’t a subject she wanted to broach with Mischa today. Not when her emotions were so raw.
In other news, Riddick had taken her explanation of his dhampyre status surprisingly well. Knowing he wasn’t a freak of nature, that he’d been created with a decidedly non-evil purpose in mind, seemed to give him at least some measure of peace.
He’d also been somewhat surprised to learn that his father had genuinely loved his mother. Loved her, in fact, with a kind of fanatical devotion that was probably the result of the experiments Sentry had put him through. Harper had seen as much when she laid hands on him. His grief when he lost his wife sent him into a depression that made him a fantastically shitty father, not to mention a completely self-destructive prick.
“I have to find my sister.”
The reverence in his tone when he said the word sister made Harper smile. And, since she’d known he’d feel that way, she already had Leon and Lucas checking out a few potential leads. “Then it’s a good thing you just happen to know the best paranormal PI in the business, mister. But it’ll cost ya.”<
br />
He rested his forehead against hers and smiled. “I don’t have much money. How will I pay you?”
She slipped her fingers up under his shirt and spread them out over his chest. “I’m sure we can come to some kind of arrangement.”
They made out and groped like horny teenagers for a few minutes before Riddick pulled back. “Hey, wait a minute. Where’s Leon and your antidote?”
“I talked to him while you were sleeping. He should be on his way by now.”
She didn’t tell him that Leon was terrified of the dark and had called her in a blind (no pun intended) panic when the power went out. Tears were shed (his, not hers). She’d spent about ten minutes talking him down off the metaphorical ledge.
Riddick opened his mouth to say something, but was interrupted when her stomach let out an obscenely loud, gurgling yowl. It sounded like someone had stepped on a phlegmy alley cat. A demon-possessed, phlegmy alley cat. Yikes.
Riddick burst out laughing at her wide-eyed embarrassment and stood up, setting her on her feet. “I’ll go see if I can find some food before your stomach eats itself.”
“That’d be good,” she said, striving for nonchalance, but knowing full well that nonchalance was meaningless when her skin was most likely stewed-tomato red.
With one last quick kiss on the mouth, he wandered into the hall to forage for food. He hadn’t been gone a minute when Romeo limped into the room.
Harper raised a brow at him. “They’d probably give you crutches, you know. You don’t have to hobble around like that.”
He scoffed. “Crutches are for sissies.”
Mental eye roll. And people think women are vain.
He shifted uncomfortably in a way that didn’t look like it was related to his wound. “Harpy, I really am sorry for all of this. I had no idea everything would go so…wonky.”
Leave it to Romeo to sum up everything they’d been through with a word as innocuous as wonky. “I know you are, Romeo. It’s OK. I forgive you.”
His eyes lifted to hers and there was an almost childlike hope in them. “Really? You do?”
“Yeah. But you should probably go before Riddick gets back. I doubt he’ll ever forgive you.”
He winced. “True enough. Will you tell him I’m sorry?”
“Sure.”
Romeo grabbed her and engulfed her in a bear hug that practically squeezed the life out of her. “I’ll miss you, kid.”
On some level, Harper knew she’d miss him too. On the rest of her levels…yeah, not so much.
With a hand on the door, he turned back to her. “Oh, by the way, when Leon gets here, don’t let him give you the antidote.”
“Why not?”
His grin was toothy, charming, and vaguely evil. “’Cause I never gave you the cleaner killer.”
Her jaw dropped. “What? Then what the hell did you inject me with? I passed out, for God’s sake.”
“B-12 and a very mild sedative.” He shrugged. “I was bluffing.”
She knew she was gaping at him like a simpleton, so she forced her jaw closed and asked through clenched teeth, “Why?”
“I could never hurt you, Harpy. You’re as close to family as I’ve ever had.”
Romeo was the best liar in the world, but not even he could fake the sincerity in his tone. A lump started taking shape in her throat.
“Oh, and one more thing.”
He pulled something out of his pocket and tossed it to her. She caught it reflexively. Opening her palm, she saw her engagement ring, winking up at her in all its opulent glory.
“You left that at the hotel. There’s a chapel on the first floor of this hospital. I checked it out. You’ll like it.”
Her gaze lifted to his, and his grin dimmed. “Life’s too short.” His eyes shifted to Mischa’s sleeping form, then back to Harper. “And there’s no one on this planet more perfect for you than Riddick. So, you take old Romeo’s advice and slap the matrimonial leg shackles on that boy now, you hear? There’s no reason to wait.”
The lump in her throat filled out, and tears sprang to her eyes. “Damn it, Romeo, you make it impossible to hate you.”
He winked at her. “I love you too, kid.”
And with that, he limped out of her life once again.
Riddick returned a few minutes later with a family-sized bag of assorted snacks. He took one look at her face and asked, “What’d I miss?”
She held up her engagement ring. “I hear there’s a chapel on the main floor.”
His answering smile damn near stole her breath. She squealed when he dropped the bag of food, grabbed her, tossed her over his shoulder, and moved purposefully toward the door.
Mischa sprang out of bed and blew past them in a blur of vampire speed, dragging her IV pole behind her. “Well, what the hell are we waiting for?” she asked impatiently. “Let’s get married.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
The little chapel was exactly what Harper remembered from her vision.
The room was cozy by anyone’s standards, with only four rows of dark-stained oak pews on either side of the worn, red-velvet carpeted aisle, but the vaulted white-washed ceilings made it feel a lot bigger than it really was.
The little old man she’d seen in her vision, the one in the antique blue-gray suit, was Pastor Everett, the hospital chaplain. He was Lutheran, but he was very much a live-and-let-live kind of guy, so he was more than willing to perform a nice, non-denominational service for them.
It turned out that despite what movies and television would have you believe, hospitals didn’t hold many wedding ceremonies. Pastor Everett was so happy to perform the service he didn’t even question their disheveled, war-torn appearance. Nor did he question why a vampire dragging an IV pole behind her was asked to give the bride away.
Super cool guy, Pastor Everett.
Mischa placed Harper’s hand in Riddick’s. He grinned down at Harper, and even in a blood-stained t-shirt with an open gash across his forehead, he was still gorgeous enough to drive her pulse into a merry jig.
Harper wished she could look back on this day and say she remembered everything Pastor Everett said. But the only thing she was sure she’d remember forever was looking into Riddick’s eyes and grinning like an idiot until her face hurt.
Riddick had to nudge her when it was time to exchange rings. His was decidedly less fancy than hers, having been purchased in their hotel’s gift shop, but he had assured her the plain gold band suited him just fine.
A beaming Pastor Everett snapped his prayer book shut and joined their hands, raising them aloft. In a clear, authoritative voice designed for a much larger chapel, he said, “Those whom God hath joined, let no man put asunder.”
He cleared his throat and muttered, “Sorry. Couldn’t help but get God in there, I suppose.”
“Amen,” Riddick whispered, gazing deep into her eyes. Then he cupped her face in his hands and kissed her until her knees wobbled and the room spun.
They walked down the aisle as man and wife and were instantly engulfed in hugs from Mischa, Benny, and Leon. Over Mischa’s shoulder, she saw Lucas leaning against the door frame, arms crossed over his chest. His expression was…not exactly happy, but definitely not hostile, either. She imagined that was a victory, given their history.
Harper offered him a tentative smile. He winked at her and gave her a jaunty two-finger salute before disappearing from her sight.
As they made their way out of the church, Riddick said, “So, now that I’m your husband, do I get to know what your real name is?”
Harper groaned. She was hoping he’d forget that she’d legally changed her name to Harper. But she supposed he was right. He’d married her, after all. The least she could do was let him in on her most secret shame.
With a sigh, she said, “My mother swears she had a bad reaction to the epidural they gave her when she had me. She says that’s what made her name me…Destiny Sunshine.”
He blinked down at her, then let out a sharp
bark of laughter. “Seriously? Is that why you told me not to call you Sunshine when we first met?”
“Yep.”
He pondered that for a moment. “Well, Destiny isn’t really that bad.”
Her brows raised of their own volition. “Maybe not if you’re a stripper. And it’s certainly not a good idea for a fat kid to be named something so close to density.”
He cringed. “Point taken. So, we never speak of this again?”
“Please.”
“Fair enough, but you’ll still always be my Sunshine.” Wrapping an arm around her shoulders, he pulled her in close and whispered into her hair, “Where do you want to go on your honeymoon, Mrs. Riddick?”
Harper gazed down at her ring, then smiled up at him. “I want to go home. Take me home, Noah.”
Epilogue
One month later
Harper shut the bathroom door behind her and glanced at her watch. “Okay, we have two minutes. Spill.”
Mischa perched on the edge of the sofa in Harper’s office and reached up to adjust her nonexistent glasses. Seemed old habits were hard to break. Even for a vampire who now had super heightened eyesight. “Leon is doing a…good job as office manager.”
Harper smirked. “Bet that hurt to admit.”
She scowled. “I didn’t say he was doing as good a job as I did. He just doesn’t suck at it.”
“Well, that’s good, isn’t it? You prefer to be out in the field now anyway, right?”
Mischa agreed immediately. Since she’d been turned, sitting in the office seemed to make her edgy, restless. And her abundance of patience and newfound vampire strength made her a perfect fit for skip tracing, which pleased Harper to no end.
With Mischa handling the skip tracing, Harper and Riddick handling the investigative work, and Leon managing the office, Harper Hall Investigations was doing better than ever. She was sometimes even busy enough to throw the occasional freelance case to Benny. For the first time, Harper’s professional life was actually orderly and profitable.
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