The werewolf laughed, then said, “Where you should’ve gone yesterday, Fiumicino,” confirming Raphael’s suspicion.
Raphael’s heart stopped. “Why?”
“Because it was your fault we supposedly didn’t ship one of yesterday’s loads and Tancredi made me pay for it.” Rico lowered the collar of his winter jacket and revealed a patch of skin raw and bloody.
Raphael had a hard time following the werewolf’s train of thought. “I thought you were sending me straight into a trap.”
“Of course I was, but that’s beside the point,” Rico continued. “I promised my suppliers a token of my appreciation for dealing directly with me without Tancredi being the wiser. You were my gift that never showed up—”
The tender was pushed sideways by a wave. “I drove ahead and waited for you on the dock for hours. I had everything ready to—” Rico swore and slammed the wheel with his hand, as he steadied himself. Right away, another wave unbalanced him.
Raphael jumped on the floor, but he didn’t lose contact with Luisa. “How did you find us?”
“How do you think I did, clever boy?” The werewolf shrugged, then spat into the water. “You forget I have friends in all the right places. I only had to ask for a copy of your entry log at RYS, where I discovered your father’s address, and a note about the Controller finding you at that barge all those years ago. Your father’s address is now a supermarket, so I drove to the barge and you were stupid enough to be there.”
“Why are we going to Fiumicino?” Raphael knew why, but felt Luisa responding to his touch and needed to distract Rico.
“The vampires didn’t appreciate being denied young blood, but they know it isn’t in their best interest to out me before my alpha. They are making business behind his back as well. So, this morning, they called Tancredi, complaining about a whole shipment of V that went to waste because you didn’t show up. After a long and thorough session of whipping imparted by one of Tancredi’s guards, I was ordered to go and meet the vampires tonight and appease them any way I could. But before letting me go, Tancredi stepped into the room to say, ‘If you find your little brother, good for you. Otherwise, don’t bother coming back after you’ve dealt with the nest.’ So you see, it was imperative I found you. Her, just an added bonus.” Rico swayed, but grabbed the wheel and steadied himself.
“Please, let her go.” Raphael raised his head above the tender’s edge and saw they were approaching the mouth of the Tiber and the city of Fiumicino.
Rico snorted.
Another wave hit the tender. Rico almost lost control of the wheel.
This time, Raphael was pushed to the side. “Free her. No one will ever know. You never told Tancredi about her, and Luisa won’t say a peep for sure. You know that.” Raphael kept talking, saying the first thing that came to mind. The majority of what he was saying was aimed at Luisa anyway. He wanted to let her know she should save herself any way she could. There wasn’t time to plan anything. The sun was setting ahead of them, and by the time they reached the vampire nest the bloodsuckers would be awake and hungry.
Rico wasn’t listening to Raphael though. The werewolf was mumbling to himself. “I don’t have any use for her in any case. She’s good for nothing. Too ugly to bed, and too incompetent for anything else. All she had going for her was that she was in the right place to pass along some drugs to those losers at the shelter, and you ruined that for me too.” For no apparent reason, he started laughing. “You two caused so much trouble to me that you deserve what’s coming next.”
The noise from another boat’s engine reached Raphael’s ears above the din of their own. Looking up at Rico’s back, Raphael drew his knees up to his waist, then thrust his legs outward to hit the werewolf. But having sat in the same position for too long, his body didn’t respond as expected and Raphael barely reached the man’s ankles.
Rico turned, eyes red-shot and mouth frozen in a snarl. “You, little piece of—” The rest of the werewolf’s insult was lost to Raphael, because he lowered his fist on Raphael’s head.
The blow momentarily incapacitated Raphael, but he refused to pass out, too worried of what would happen to Luisa if he wasn’t conscious. When he saw the syringe in Rico’s hand, he tried to move but the needle pierced the skin on his neck before he could react.
“Luisa—” Blackness folded over him like a heavy blanket and Raphael drifted away, cursing Rico all the way to the gates of Hades.
Chapter Twenty
Raphael came around to warmth, dim illumination, and soft chatting. Without opening his eyes, he stretched slowly, arching his spine over something that felt very much like a firm mattress.
“Raphael?” Luisa’s sweet voice intruded in his thoughts and he smiled, but when he tried to move his head dizziness overcame him.
“Come here, baby.” Disoriented and half-convinced he was back at the barge, or maybe dreaming, he reached out and found her. His smile broadened when his wandering hand met her arm and it felt solid. “Luisa, I missed you so much.” He decided they must be at the barge, Luisa stretched out on the bed of rose petals he had prepared for her. “I need you...” He shuddered and wound his other arm around Luisa to pull her closer to him.
“Raphael?” Luisa’s voice was but a whisper.
Even in his addled state, he heard the hesitance in the way she had called him, as if she was blushing. He tried to open his eyes, but at first he could only see white fuzz dancing around unfocused shapes, and another bout of dizziness overwhelmed him.
“Okay, that’s it, Romeo. You have an unwilling audience. Detach your tentacles from her, for Jupiter’s Beard.”
At the booming, male foreign voice, Raphael’s heart jumped against his ribcage. The startle helped him focus though, and a moment later his sight was back. The first thing he saw was Luisa, sitting straight by his side and very much blushing. They were on a bed—a hospital bed, in a hospital room. And they weren’t alone. Five men stood by the wall opposite the bed. “What the—?”
Luisa tugged at his arm. “Hi.” She smiled, making her blush even more evident.
“Hi, baby.” He looked over her shoulder to give their audience a better look.
The five men looked back at him, all of them wearing several degrees of amusement on their faces. Raphael couldn’t help but groan when he saw Quintilius and the Controller among them. The two men were the ones grinning the most. The other three he had never met before. One of them had a set of truncated, black wings he let trail down to the floor.
The sight was surreal, and for a moment Raphael wondered if he was dreaming and experiencing one of those freakish occurrences when one would dream in a dream. It had happened to him once or twice. He hadn’t liked it a bit then, and he had a feeling he wouldn’t like it now. But Luisa tentatively brushed his arm with her small fingers and he blinked.
“What do you want from us?” He knew he should have started by asking what had happened while he was unconscious, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out the general picture, and that those men were the reason why he wasn’t dead.
“I don’t know, maybe a big, heartfelt thanks for saving you?” The bulky man with a scar on his face similar to Angel’s detached himself from the wall. He was the one who had talked earlier, and despite his severe outward appearance he sounded like he was joking.
“It’s okay. He went through a lot,” Quintilius said in an equally light tone and an increasingly bigger smile.
Raphael couldn’t help but think that the werewolf was being particularly understanding, given the way he had disappeared from the alpha’s life without a word of explanation.
The Controller spoke next. “Raphael, you’re safe now.” The colossal demon’s eyes were a deep green and he too smiled at him.
More than anything else in the world he wanted to believe them, but life had taught Raphael time and again he could never lower his guard. So he shored himself up on his elbows, stared at the five, and said, “Whatever it is you have in mind, you wo
n’t take her away from me.” He pulled Luisa closer to him. “I’ll fight you if necessary, but you won’t separate us.”
“Raphael—” Luisa tried to get his attention by pulling at his scrubs, but he kept his eyes on the men.
Quintilius sighed, while the demon shook his head with an amused expression and folded his arms before him.
“I like him already.” The man with the scar chuckled and stepped to the footboard of the bed. “The cub’s half starving and almost dead, and he’s already talking of getting into a fight.”
Raphael straightened and sat against the headboard, then pressed his hand over Luisa’s back. He made a show to relax his stance, crossing his legs under the blanket. “Try me.”
The man’s eyes widened before he exploded in a sonorous laugh, one hand over his stomach, the other on the edge of the footboard. “I can’t believe the balls on this one.”
The slimmer of the three—a man who exuded power but moved gracefully—closed the gap and slammed a hand over the other’s shoulder, then said, “This scrap of a street urchin sounds exactly like you, Marcus.”
“Hmm. Do you think so? I was never this scrawny though.” The bulky one, Marcus, kept laughing, then he tilted his head to the side. “I’m glad to see you’re much better already, kid.” He turned to his friend. “What do you think, Greek, do you have space at your party for two more guests tonight?”
The slim man caressed the blond stubble on his jaw. “The ladies have been cooking the whole day and part of the night. It would be a shame if all that food would go to waste. Plus, I heard something good is brewing for those two cubs. If they let us help them.”
Raphael was used to brutality. He understood cruelty. Anything less than pure meanness aimed at him and he didn’t know what to do with it. As it had happened during his stint at Quintilius’s. He finally looked down at Luisa who had kept tugging at his scrubs sleeve. “What’s going on?”
Her green eyes were lit with joy. A sight that melted him and made him wish for some privacy. “Everything’s all right, baby,” she said. “They are good people. You already know the Controller and the alpha—” With her chin she pointed at the other three, standing nearby. “Raphael, meet Marcus Aurelius, Alexander Drako, and Samuel.”
The burly man first, then the slim blond—whose name sounded quite familiar to Raphael—and finally the angel bowed when Luisa called their names.
“A pleasure to finally meet you, young man. You gave us quite the scare, but you’ll be fine in no time and we couldn’t be happier,” the angel, Samuel, said.
Taken aback by the man’s kindness, Raphael remained silent.
“We’re so grateful for everything you’ve done for us today,” Luisa said and squeezed Raphael’s hand.
“Thank you—” Raphael started.
“It’s okay. I know you need time to realize everything’s fine.” The Controller walked to the door. “Raphael, like I said, you and Luisa are safe. For now just stay put, and know that it’s not our intention to separate you two.” He slapped the doorframe once and was out of the room.
“The doctor’s coming to check on you. We’ll wait outside.” Quintilius waved at him, but Raphael stopped him.
“Wait—”
Quintilius expectantly waited for him to say something.
“The werewolf who kidnapped us, what happened to him?”
“We sent him to Regina Coeli and you won’t hear from him ever again, I promise.”
“The people I worked for… they might be looking for me. Their alpha is powerful—”
“You forget I’m kind of a big name too.” Quintilius laughed. “I’ll deal with Tancredi myself. Let me worry about him and just recover from all of this.” He brought two fingers to his temple in a mock salute, then followed the demon outside.
In a slow procession, the other three passed before the bed to give him words of reassurance. Then they exited as well, leaving Raphael and Luisa alone.
He felt Luisa chuckling against him, but stopped when he gave her a stare. “Okay, give me the short version.”
“They saved us.” She curled closer, those big eyes of hers locked on him.
He rolled his and smiled. “That’s been established.” He was helpless before the power of her eyes on him, and he had the feeling she already knew. “And the long of it?” He lowered his lips to her forehead and gave her a small peck.
“They were at Wolf’s Haven when the manager discovered I was gone and offered to search for me. They went to talk to Laura and discovered about you. From there, they went to the Den of Rejects first and to the barge later, where they discovered we had been abducted. They followed Rico to Fiumicino and saved us.”
Touched by the tale, Raphael could only say, “That was quite decent of them.”
Luisa smiled. “They’re great people and I think we should listen to what they want to propose to us.”
“And what would that be?”
“They were saying—”
A knock on the door interrupted Luisa. A doctor and two nurses entered.
“Good evening, Raphael. I am the doctor who admitted you.” The doctor patted Raphael’s hand, then asked the nurses to take Raphael’s blood pressure and temperature. Meanwhile, he took out a tablet and raised his glasses to his forehead to read out loud the results from Raphael’s analyses. “All considering, and giving that you were poisoned with a small dose of curare, your vitals are surprisingly good.”
“What is it?” Raphael had maybe heard of that poison once, but couldn’t remember anything about it at the moment.
The doctor slid his glasses back down to the ridge of his nose to look at Raphael and Luisa, and cleared his throat. “Basically, curare, even at small doses like the one you were exposed to, has the power to paralyze you. Its most terrifying aspect is that usually the victim is fully conscious the whole time—”
“I wasn’t. I have no clue what happened after Rico pinched me with that needle. I felt the prick, then I went down. And that’s it. I slept like the dead.”
The doctor nodded. “There were traces of opiate in your blood—” He hesitated, letting the sentence end in a question.
Raphael felt his temper rise, then realized the doctor was only doing his job. “I don’t do drugs. Never did.”
Visibly relieved, the doctor continued, “My guess is that the curare was mixed with enough opiate to make you slip into a deep slumber while you were paralyzed.”
“Why?” Being paralyzed and fully conscious sounded something out of a horror story. Rico would have never passed on an opportunity like that when it came to making someone suffer. Especially when the subject was Raphael.
The doctor slightly shrugged. “Well, I heard the latest fashion in the vampire world is to try drugs through their feeders. Since they metabolize drugs at such a rate they don’t feel any buzz from their consumption, they might experience something if they ingest blood from drugged donors. But it’s just a rumor.” He seemed to think about it a moment longer, then moved the glasses out of the way for a moment to read something on the chart. “In any case, it wasn’t enough to send you into a full coma. It was also fortunate that the full moon is several days away. That dosage would have been enough to inflict severe damage to your wolf.” He passed his hand over the tablet in a swiping motion. “Just recently, we have discovered that using curare to kill werewolves has become the poison of choice among vampires and sadly werewolves as well.”
Raphael couldn’t help but shiver and noticed the doctor was clearly uncomfortable when he said, “Once the wolf is dead, the poison disappears from the beast’s system. Then the werewolf becomes ill and dies a slow and painful dead.”
Raphael felt Luisa clutch his arm with her shaking hand. He placed his over hers and steadied it. “It seems I was quite lucky then.”
The doctor nodded, then went on explaining the meaning of every number on his analyses chart and concluded, “The gentlemen outside vouched for you, and they promised me they will per
sonally escort you back a week from now to have your bloodwork done. Given that and the fact that you are one strong werewolf and otherwise in perfect health, I have no problems releasing you tonight.”
Raphael found himself saying a choked, “Thanks.”
“My pleasure. Truly.” The doctor scribbled something on the tablet with a stylus, then looked back at Raphael. “You should take it easy for the next few days. Although the percentage of poison that entered your system was minimal, we didn’t know what you had ingested prior and we still had to pump your stomach dry. And there’s also the opiate to deal with. Having said so, you’ll be fine as long as you’ll rest and hydrate yourself.” He paused and gave first Raphael a smile, then tilted his chin at Luisa. “I’m sure your personal nurse will take very good care of you.”
“I won’t let him do anything stupid,” Luisa said.
“Good.” Then the doctor read Luisa her analyses. “Given your low iron level, I strongly suggest that you take supplements.”
One of the nurses immediately produced a small plastic bottle from her scrub and handed it to Luisa.
“See you both next week,” the doctor said, putting his tablet away and heading toward the door.
Soon, Raphael and Luisa were back alone.
“Are you ready to get out of here?” Luisa asked.
“If you are with me—” He pulled her closer for a kiss, his hands cupping the back of her head and her neck. “Always.”
A loud knock on the door made the two of them jump up, and Raphael swore.
The one called Marcus peeked inside. “Dress up. We’re leaving.”
“What happens now?” Raphael whispered into Luisa’s mouth.
“We live.” She gave him a soft kiss, then angled her face away and looked at him. “Happily ever after.”
Epilogue
Sitting on the edge of the fountain, Raphael took his sketchpad and black pencil from his messenger bag. The Fairy House in front of him, he raised the pencil up to his eye for a mental measurement of the building’s proportion, then started drawing in earnest.
Raphael (The Immortal Youth Book 1) Page 22
