The Thief

by J. R. Ward

  After she had slipped and the contact at her throat had been broken, he had immediately realized what he'd done in his feeding-crazed state. Licking the wound closed in a clandestine manner, he had been too horrified with himself to tell her everything--and now, he was up here with a pit in his stomach and a pain in his heart.

  Why in hell had he thought they could go on without her knowing? Fates...why had he assumed all would be well? For one, he was going to live centuries longer than her. How could he explain his not aging as she grew older? Indeed, he was going to look as though he were in his late twenties until about a decade before he died--and the same would be true of his cousins.

  And then there was the feeding issue. He would have to take the vein of a female vampire on a regular basis--and now that he was healthy, he was liable to react like this.

  He wanted Marisol, not anyone else. So he was bound to come at her as he had tonight, starved, demanding...and taking her vein.

  Oh, and as for daylight? It was fine for him to play that bullshit night owl card up to a point. But how about when the seasons changed and there were over fourteen hours of daylight? Sixteen? What was he going to do when, on some nice summer afternoon, his female wanted to go for a picnic? How was he going to handle that?

  Other than bursting into flames in front of her, that was.

  "Assail?"

  Closing his eyes, his entire body stooped at the sound of her voice. "Marisol...my love."

  "I think you need to tell me what's going on here."

  After the longest time, when he could see no other way about things, he said in a hoarse voice, "I agree. Unfortunately."

  FORTY-TWO

  As the mobile surgical unit rumbled through the streets of downtown, heading for the bridge to Caldwell's other side, Jane went into one of the overhead compartments and took out a clean sheet. Flipping the soft white fabric free of its folds, she laid it across the body and then pulled things up so that the civilian's face and head were covered. Then she took a seat next to Vishous.

  When he reached over and clasped her hand, she looked at him. "I didn't know how to bring him back."

  "His heart couldn't take it. There was nothing else you could have done."

  "I know."

  "Come here."

  V pulled her into him and she leaned on his strength, his big body catching her. In her head, she reviewed everything in sequence, from her arriving and making the assessment to the transfer onto the table...to the chest compression...the defibrillator...the drug protocol.

  "Did he have any identification on him?" she asked.

  "Q?" V called out. "Did you find ID?"

  "Yeah, I got it," Qhuinn said from behind the wheel. "No one I recognized so I texted it to Saxton."

  Jane spoke up. "I want to talk to the family. When they're found, I want to be the one who's there for them."

  "You got it," V said.

  Qhuinn glanced over his shoulder. "ETA at Havers's is about twenty minutes."

  "I texted them we were on the way," Jane muttered. "But should we call, too?"

  V shook his head. "Let's just take a breather. They know we're coming."

  "All right." She exhaled her sadness. "God, that's someone's son. Maybe mate. I just...I really hate to lose a patient."

  "That's why you're such an amazing doctor."

  As she stared at the body, she started to frame what she was going to tell the next of kin, trying out a couple of different approaches. Typically, family members needed to know two things: namely, that everything possible had been done, and that the suffering had been kept to a minimum--

  V's fingertip under her chin brought her eyes to his.

  "You know how tight I am with Butch, right?" he said. "How that cop is like..."

  "You are brothers, the two of you." She smiled a little. "You couldn't be closer."

  "When we were in that alley the other night, and Butch was injured"--V cleared his throat--"and I couldn't get to him? I was terrified that he was dying. And then you were there--and as I watched you take off to go treat him, I thought..."

  There was a long pause, those diamond eyes searching her face. "I thought there was no one else in the world, and that included myself, who I would rather have taking care of him. I trust you that much. I believe in you that much."

  Jane found herself blinking away tears. "You have the best ways of saying I love you."

  "Nah." He stroked her face with his gloved hand. "I speak sixteen languages, true. And even with all those words, sometimes I don't know how to put what's in here"--he touched the center of his chest--"out to you right."

  "I think you do just fine--"

  Out of the corner of her eye, something moved and she glanced over to the treatment table.

  Probably just a shift from the surgical unit hitting a bump.

  She refocused on V. "When we arrive at Havers's, we need to go with the body to the morgue. I think it's important to just--I don't know, I want to see him there safely." On that note, she leaned around her mate. "Hey, Qhuinn? Has Saxton gotten back to you--"

  The sound that percolated through the RV was like that of a pneumonia patient gasping for oxygen, the rattling a combination of loose fluid in the lungs and bronchial tubes that were clogged.

  And then the dead body sat up with the sheet over its face.

  "He's alive!" she barked as she jumped forward and went to pull the cloth away. "You're awake--"

  Everything went into slow motion: her hand reaching out to the sheet and pulling it back, the cover dropping, the face...the gruesome, distorted face exposed.

  And swiveling toward her like that of an owl, the neck vertebrae snapping one by one.

  Jane screamed.

  * * *

  --

  As the dead patient sat up and looked over at his mate, Vishous's brain, great and powerful though it was, took a second or two to catch the fuck up with reality:

  1. That thing wasn't alive. Whatever it was, it was still dead.

  2. This wasn't no Weekend at Bernie's, chillin'-with-the-stiff comedy sketch. What might have once been a stand-up guy now had pupil-less white eyes and fangs that were dropping down like it was ready to attack.

  Annnnd 3. There were oxygen tanks in here and the engine ran on diesel. So V couldn't use a gun, not unless he wanted to run the risk of blowing them all sky high.

  "Qhuinn! Stop!" V shouted.

  But the brother was already stomping on the brakes because of Jane's scream, everything jerking forward from momentum--and that included the dead male.

  As the corpse's torso slammed back down to the exam table, Vishous put himself in front of Jane, shoving her away.

  "Get out of here," V hissed. "I don't want to worry about you."

  "You don't have to, remember?"

  The patient had been tied down at the waist and the ankles for transport, the chest band having been left free so they could work on him. And this was a bene. That dead sonofabitch made like he was going to come at V--only to find that he was stuck.

  An unholy screech came out of that throat, and then the thing was tearing at the binds that kept it in place.

  Just as Qhuinn jumped into the back with his guns drawn.

  "No bullets!" V yelled. "No fucking bullets! Oxygen!"

  Before Vishous could marshal an attack, those heavy, nylon straps got torn off and that corpse came at him like something out of Evil Dead, head shaking back and forth a million times a second, the body moving all wrong as if its joints were frozen.

  As V got pile-driven toward the back doors, he wrenched around and caught the latch, releasing the lever so that he and the patient fell out of the surgical unit onto the snow together.

  The thing landed on top of him, and talk about strong. The kid had been built okay when he'd been alive, but whatever this shit was had given him superhero powers: V couldn't hold off the attack long enough to get his daggers out--or a gun, now that they were free of the van.

 
That snarling face was way too close for comfort, those jaws snapping, the teeth clapping together like in its head it was already tasting V's brains after it made an egg cup of his skull. And goddamn, a foul stench came out of its mouth, as if it were already rotting from the inside out, the digestive tract spoiling, the organs liquefying, the bones the only thing that stayed.

  Enter Qhuinn the Magnificent.

  All at once, V got a reprieve, and for a split second, he had no fucking clue why. But then he saw Qhuinn's arms around the chest, the brother's face grimacing as he hauled back with all of his strength.

  The dead guy went crazy, letting out another of those howls, and he thrashed that head around, trying to bite at Qhuinn's face.

  V instantly knew that was a bad idea. "Don't let him get you with his teeth!"

  Qhuinn shifted his grip, slapping one of his palms on the patient's forehead and pulling back to expose the throat.

  Fucking perfect.

  Except as V went to unholster both his daggers, something entered his head and would not leave.

  He bit off his lead-lined glove, unleashing his curse.

  "Release!" he ordered Qhuinn.

  When the brother didn't comply, V nearly slapped the guy. "Fucking let him go!"

  Qhuinn caught the gist, and still hesitated, but then the thing nearly got him as it jerked its head and teeth forward to bite.

  "On three!" Qhuinn hollered over the snarling and the screeching. "One, two--three!"

  The brother went hands-free, jumping out of range.

  And Vishous hit the chest of the patient with a nuclear defibrillator, his glowing palm going right on the sternum--

  The shrill noise was so loud, V went deaf--and talk about your shakedowns. The body of the patient slapped, flapped, kicked, bucked--and took Vishous along for the ride; the energy exchange forming a lock between the body and V's palm.

  Just when he thought his arm was going to be ripped out of its socket, there was a pop, like a balloon, and the patient was no more, a soft rain of particles falling on V. But that wasn't what he focused on. An entity seemed to escape into the night--and it was a shadow.

  Or a part of one of those entities.

  Something had transferred to the civilian during the earlier attack. And either it killed the kid, or was harbored within him to be released when the second "death" came.

  In the silence that followed, there was nothing but his and Qhuinn's harsh breathing in the cold air.

  "What the fuck was that?" Qhuinn asked.

  As Jane appeared beside them, Vishous stripped off his leather jacket, his movements jerky and uncoordinated. The second his left sleeve was down, he wrenched his arm around, and his heart started to beat hard.

  Looking at his skin, he measured the angry red stripe that the shadow he'd fought before had left in his flesh.

  Had the wound faded? It seemed like it had faded. Did that mean he was safe?

  Or had some of that gotten into him?

  Jane knew exactly what was going through his mind, even if Qhuinn didn't. She leaned down and discreetly inspected things.

  "It's definitely improved," she whispered. "I can tell. I remember exactly what it looked like."

  A cell phone went off. Ringer, not a text.

  With his brain jammed up, Vishous looked around in confusion--but then Qhuinn took out his own phone and answered it.

  "Hey, Sax. You did--okay. His brother's with Havers at the clinic? Right, well, we're on the far side of the bridge." The brother's mismatched blue and green eyes swung around and locked on V's. "But we've had a little...there's been...let's call it a complication."

  FORTY-THREE

  "Did you use again?"

  As Marisol asked the question, Assail's brain couldn't understand what she was asking, and as if she recognized this, she came a little farther into the bathroom and lowered her voice.

  "Is that what you need to tell me?"

  If only that was it, he thought.

  I am not what you think I am. I am other from you. I look as though I am a human, and you have loved me as though I am, but I--

  "Oy! Assail! Marisol!"

  The urgent voice shouting up the stairs was not the kind of thing you ignored: It was Ehric, and there was fear behind that tone.

  Instantly, Assail reached into the nearest cupboard and took out a loaded gun. "What?"

  "Mrs. Carvalho! She fainted!"

  Marisol bolted for the stairs, and Assail did likewise--until he was halfway down and realized he was naked. Doubling back, he took a robe and pulled it on--and out of habit, he kept his gun in his palm.

  When he got down to the kitchen, the first thing he saw by the table were the plastic soles of Mrs. Carvalho's house slippers. The bottoms had a pattern of daisies to give grip, and they were scuffed and a little dirty.

  She would not like for them to be showing, he thought stupidly, as he came around and got on his knees.

  Marisol was already down beside her grandmother and speaking urgently to the woman. "Vovo?"

  She switched in and out of Spanish, her words tripping and falling over each other, a terrified stampede escaping and trampling those who were weak in the pack.

  "What happened?" Assail demanded.

  Ehric shook his head. "We were cooking at the stove. She was sitting here. We heard her make a sound, and then she fell from the chair."

  "Call Dr. Manello--"

  Ehric ripped out his phone and backed away, and Assail touched Marisol on the shoulder. When she looked at him, he said softly, "We shall have the doctor come. Right away."

  Marisol blinked back tears. "We can't take her to the hospital. Not a normal hospital. We can't...she's not here legally. I can't run the risk of her getting deported."

  "Do not worry. I will take care of everything."

  As Marisol refocused on her grandmother, Ehric approached and spoke into Assail's ear. "Dr. Manello is sending the nurse immediately. He is going to have to drive to the house as Doc Jane is evidently tied up--"

  The knock on the back door was sharp, and a female voice called out, "It's Ehlena."

  Evale and Markcus both lunged forward to let her in, and the nurse didn't waste time. She came around the far side of the table and put a duffel bag down.

  "Hi, Marisol," she said. "What is your grandmother's name?"

  "Mrs. Carvalho." Marisol patted the hand she was holding so tightly. "Right, Vovo, that is your name."

  "Does she have any medical conditions I need to know about?" the nurse asked as she took out a blood-pressure cuff and a stethoscope.

  "No, none," Marisol replied.

  "Is she on any medication?" When Marisol shook her head, the nurse said, "Has she been sick lately?"

  "No. She's very healthy..."

  Assail stepped back and stood with his cousins and Markcus. The nurse worked efficiently, but she didn't give a lot away. Her face remained composed as she continued to ask questions, and Marisol had to sit back to give her room to work.

  "You're saying she was recently in a car for a long time?" Ehlena said. "Does she have a history of blood clots...?"

  * * *

  --

  Sola was trying to stay present, and respond appropriately to the medical questions, and support her grandmother--but she kept slipping back to the past...to finding her mother drunk on various floors.

  Some had been carpeted. Others had had tile. One had wood.

  No, two had had wood.

  She remembered them in a series of snapshots, and they came with smells, too--all of which were bad. Alcoholics did not generally smell good, whether it was vomit, body odor, or breath that reflected not only the last quart of tequila consumed, but also their body's decomposition and malfunctioning.

  Her grandmother had never once been drunk. Had never not showed up when she'd said she would be somewhere. Had never raised a hand in anger or cursed a young girl for her mere existence. She had never tried to commit suicide only to have Sola knock pills
from her hand. Had never disappeared for days at a time, leaving no money behind for food. Had never even overslept.

  So seeing her grandmother down like this was stringing Sola between the two extremes she had grown up with, and it was hard not to break down and pray through her tears.

  On that note, she looked over the table at Evale--because his were the first eyes she happened to meet. "Go to her bedroom. Her rosary is on her Bible. Will you bring it up here?"

  "What is a rosary?" the guy asked even as he started for the cellar door.

  "A necklace of beads with a cross. You'll see it there."

  She refocused on her grandmother. The nurse was flashing a penlight into first the right then the left eye.

  "What do you think is going on?" Sola asked. "Can you tell me anything?"

  "Dr. Manello is on his way. I'm just triaging at this point--her pulse is weak, her pressure is low, and I think we're going to want to do some blood work. He's better with humans than I am."

  Sola shook her head at that last one. "So you don't know what's caused this?"

  "We need more information." Ehlena smiled at her patient. "But you're awake, and that's a really good sign. Does anything hurt, Mrs. Carvalho? Do you have a headache? Any pains in your calves?"

  The shake of the head for "no" was slow in coming, but it was firm.

  "Can you squeeze my fingers?" the nurse said as she put two against one palm. "You can? Good. How about on this side? Good. How many fingers am I holding up. Three? Perfect. You're passing all my tests, Mrs. Carvalho."

  "Here is the rotisserie."

  As Evale held out the chain with its well-worn beads, Sola didn't bother to correct him. "Thank you. Thank you so much--"

  An alarm sounded, shrill and painful to the ear, and everybody jumped.

  "The stove--damn it!" Assail ran across and turned off something that had started to burn on the cooktop. "Ehric--open the door. We have to get the heat and smoke out."

  From the corner of her eye, Sola watched the men get dishtowels and wave them under the alarm, and the silence, when it came, was a relief, but not an improvement on the real situation.

  That was only happening if her grandmother sat up, got herself to her feet, and started yelling at people for leaving those potatoes on way too long.

  Ehlena got to her feet. "I'm just going to call Dr. Manello--he's coming as fast as he can. Will you excuse me?"

  Sola nodded at the nurse, who went over in the corner, put a cell phone to her ear, and spoke quietly.