The Empath

by Bonnie Vanak

  His jaw went slack.

  From its fluffy pillow, he heard the dog she’d named Misha bark weakly in protest. Damn straight, dog, Nicolas agreed. I’d kill it, too.

  “You know the rules, Misha. Everything lives,” Maggie said softly. “Even roaches. I swore never to hurt another living thing. Ever.”

  Damn. This was going to be far harder than he’d ever imagined. How the hell could he turn this woman into a cocked weapon ready to kill Morphs when she was rescuing bugs?

  Nicolas drew in another deep breath, severed the connection so cleanly he could almost hear the snap. He dropped his head into the thick cushion of dead leaves and moss.

  He didn’t want to break away. Part of him wanted to remain. Comfort her. Enfold her in his strong embrace and never let go.

  Those emotions were his own, he thought grimly. Dangerous emotions but natural. Every male Draicon was born with the instinct to protect his mate. Even though his particular mate had no idea of his existence or that of his people. Their people.

  Minutes passed. Or was it hours? A familiar scent approached noiselessly. Moonlight gilded a pair of polished brown boots. Naked and vulnerable, he sat up to face his leader.

  “You look like crap,” Damian observed. The soft New Orleans drawl he’d acquired from a childhood in the bayou accented his words. “They came for you again because you were protecting us. Why do you insist on staying when you know you’re banished?”

  Nicolas made no reply. He knew Damian had smelled the death, heard the screams. He had sensed what happened.

  “Nicolas…one day one will kill you. If you stay,” Damian said gently.

  “I won’t abandon you, Dai. You need me. The pack needs me.” He grated out the words, locking gazes with the older male.

  As Damian’s beta, Nicolas was responsible for carrying out the leader’s orders. He was the pack’s best hunter. When the pack had been in danger of being eliminated by the Morphs, Nicolas had stepped in and taught them the best way to destroy the enemy. He had studied the Morphs’ weak spots and succeeded in destroying hundreds. Nicolas, the killing machine.

  He knew nothing else.

  Pale green eyes observed him silently. Damian waved his hands. A covered metal plate materialized on the ground before Nicolas. Nicolas sprang forward as Damian winced.

  “Dammit, you shouldn’t be doing this. Not in your condition. Don’t waste your energy.”

  His leader offered a rueful smile, dragged in a breath. Sweat glistened on his brow. With the flair of a gourmet chef, Damian whipped off the plate’s cover.

  “Voila. I knew you needed food. Or sex.” The pack leader regarded Nicolas with a level look. “But you know the rules.”

  No sex with pack females. Not for Nicolas, the banished. What irony. Damian often joked about Nicolas’s “harem,” the unmated, sexually experienced pack females eager to copulate with him. After a Morph fight, he’d pace before those presenting themselves to him. Dark eyes brooding, his muscular body tense and aggressive, he’d select one for the night. Then he’d claim her, using her sexual heat to restore his lost energy.

  Now no pack female could touch him.

  Salivating, Nicolas eyed the bloodied, raw meat. He shot a worried glance at Damian’s pale face, the flash of pain in his green eyes.

  “Wolf it down,” Damian advised, a half smile touching his mouth at the old joke.

  His hunger a live, writhing need, Nicolas hesitated. Trying to disguise his weakness before his leader, he couldn’t hold back his howling need for energy. Damian delicately turned his back. Grateful, Nicolas abandoned any pretense. Picking up the elk steak with his hands, he ripped into the meat. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he then replaced the cover. It clanged against the metal plate.

  “Thank you,” Nicolas managed to say.

  Stronger now, he used his magick to cover his nudity with jeans, a black T-shirt and boots. Damian turned. He sat on his haunches, silent.

  “Dai, you’re getting worse.” The matter-of-fact statement cloaked his concern.

  “I have time.” Damian’s cocky grin seemed forced. “Two months, maybe, at the rate my body is deteriorating….” He shrugged, glancing away.

  Two months and Damian would be dead? After the agony, the cancerlike disease racking his body with pain ate its way through his internal organs. Nicolas clenched his fists. Dammit. He had to find Maggie. Fast.

  “Dai…” His throat closed with emotion. Nicolas clamped a lid on his feelings and arranged a blank look on his face.

  Damian seemed to understand, for he waved a hand, dismissing the topic. Never one to complain, more concerned about the pack.

  “Tell me about Margaret.” The name slipped out in a soft slur. Mah-gah-rhett. “You made contact with her again. I can tell by your tears. Her emotions are yours, Nicolas. She was crying.” His sharp green gaze focused on dried tears streaking Nicolas’s cheeks.

  Nicolas scrubbed his face with a clenched fist. “The dog is dying.” Always the dog, as Maggie sought a logical solution to a problem caused by something not logical in the human world. Then, in private, the tears would flow, because she could not heal the animal she loved.

  “Ah. Her pet. Difficult.”

  “A friend. Not a pet. She can’t cure Misha. She’s trying to find the mutation in the cells. The Morphs infected the dog.”

  Damian rubbed the back of his neck absently. “A test of Margaret’s powers to draw her out. They’ve found her.”

  Nicolas drew in another breath, feeling his lungs expand with clean, pure air. The dog had been Maggie’s constant companion for five years. Serving as canine nurse, she also helped her calm the animals she treated.

  Now Misha was dying, succumbing to a new disease that baffled Maggie.

  The very same disease eating away at Damian’s insides.

  He felt an ache reverberate down to his very soul, his spirit crying out to be with hers. He threw back his head, feeling the beast emerge, the wolf howling to be released, and allowed to run. To avoid the pain. Find a dark place and seek comfort.

  He could not, just as he could not sever the tie between himself and Maggie.

  “She’s unaware of her true identity.” Nicolas stated it as fact. “I discovered that much by mind-bonding with her. Something happened when her parents died, and she blocked out all prior memories. She thinks she’s mortal, not Draicon. Convincing her will be difficult.”

  “You know your duty, Nicolas. You must mate with her soon and bring her home. Before the Morphs destroy her.”

  Damian stood, leaning his six-foot-tall body against a tree. Beneath the casual air lurked coiled tension, power. Ready to spring into action, if necessary. Their leader never released his guard. Or trusted easily, outside of his pack.

  “I know. I know the risks.” To him and to Maggie. “But if it means saving you…”

  “Forget me.” Damian made a slashing gesture. “It’s too late. But if she can heal our people when the Morphs infect them, that’s all that matters.”

  “I’ll get her here in time,” Nicolas said fiercely. “Don’t doubt it. Trust me.”

  Emotion flared in Damian’s eyes. “It’s not good for you to face this alone. You need our people.”

  Nicolas lifted his head, regarding him calmly. “You know that’s impossible. They blame me for what happened to Jamie. As they should. When I get Maggie, then I’ll return. Until then…”

  The casual lift of his shoulders hid his pain. For the good of the pack, Damian had banished him. Maggie was his way back to acceptance, back to the warmth and comfort of his family.

  Maggie was much more. Maggie was the weapon destined to vanquish Kane. Her healing touch could cure the dying Damian.

  “Do it,” Damian said softly. “Make her yours.” He watched Nicolas stand, and went to embrace him in the usual brotherly fashion, then pulled back.

  “I can’t touch you,” he said thickly.

  “I know,” Nicolas agreed. His scent would ma
rk Damian, whose word was law, but the pack would question. Whisper. Worry.

  “May the moon spirit guide and protect you on your journey,” his leader said in the formal blessing. “Stay safe, stay strong.”

  A thick lump rose in his throat. “Up yours,” Nicolas said cheerfully, hiding his emotions.

  Damian flashed another half grin. More pain knifed through Nicolas as he watched his friend slip into the woods, heading back home.

  Home for him no longer.

  He drew in another breath, began softly singing to himself and trotted in the opposite direction. Maggie, Maggie. He needed to get to Florida.

  Every day the danger of Maggie being exposed intensified. Visits to her veterinarian clinic resulted in calmer animals. Maggie had a special healing ability, like a horse whisperer. Only it wasn’t her voice.

  But her hands, her soothing touch.

  Maggie was an empath, born once every 100 years. She was their last hope. She belonged with the pack, her family.

  He’d mate with her, his hard male flesh sinking into her female softness, his warrior’s aggression sinking into her gentleness. Male and female, exchanging powers, becoming one. He’d perform his duty, then mold her into the warrior they needed to fight their enemy. And bring her home, even if she fought and kicked and screamed the whole way.

  She had no choice.

  Just like him.

  Chapter 2

  Maggie Sinclair forced herself to concentrate as she stared into the microscope for what seemed like the thousandth time.

  Still there. The ugly reality met her weary eyes. Blink, and the cells did not change. A physical impossibility, yet, she could not deny it. The cell samples were black, misshapen like oblong ink blotches.

  She had no idea what was killing her beloved Misha. All the academic research proved useless.

  X-rays had revealed a large mass in Misha’s stomach. Blood samples showed cell mutation similar to cancer.Yet not cancer.

  Maggie rubbed her reddened eyes, trying to contain the tears.

  Misha had been her true companion for five years. The long bouts of loneliness she’d felt vanished when she’d adopted the dog from a shelter. Misha had been an abused puppy, and came to her snarling and suspicious. Maggie won her trust and now the dog offered unconditional love and trust. Misha curled up on her lap after a tough day at the office, and licked her face. She was more than a pet. She was a friend.

  Twenty-four hours without sleep didn’t help. Last night Misha was restless. Maggie stayed up, stroking her whimpering pet. As with other animals she’d treated, her touch soothed.

  She’d dozed off, then awakened to the feeling of someone pounding a rail spike into her body. The pain subsided then vanished. Always seemed to happen after a difficult case. Since real sleep proved impossible, Maggie resigned herself to downing a fresh pot of Blue Mountain, and went back to work.

  Three weeks without answers. Three weeks of leaving her lucrative practice on the mainland to her partner, Mark Anderson, and holing up in the beach house on Estero Island like a sand hermit.

  Three weeks of drawing blood, testing samples, consulting journals, articles, Internet Web sites. Nothing. Not a clue.

  She didn’t dare show her findings to colleagues. This was too weird. Too… Witchy.

  I don’t believe in witches. I don’t. I don’t. I don’t.

  She believed in science, pure and simple. Logic. Nothing else.

  Late afternoon sunlight streamed into the improvised lab on the house’s second floor. Papers, charts and notes littered a long white table, along with beakers, syringes, test tubes and slides. On the cool tile floor, Misha slept fitfully.

  Maggie stared out the window. Sun-worshippers strolled at the gulf’s edge. Coconut palms ringing her beachfront home rustled in the wind. The burning blue sky promised another balmy afternoon in southwest Florida.

  Momentary envy filled her. Mindless of the air-condition-ing, she slid open the window to inhale the brine. She longed to be as insouciant as the tourists, nothing more to worry about than ruining their Birkenstocks in the saltwater.

  She couldn’t be insouciant. Whatever was killing Misha could kill other animals, maybe even humans. Maggie suspected she had discovered a new, dreadful disease. She couldn’t risk it spreading to others, or turning Misha over to become a lab experiment by others. So she had quarantined her pet in the beach house, determined to find answers for herself.

  Enough daydreaming. Back to work.

  She removed the slide from the microscope. Maggie took a drop of blood obtained from a healthy shih tzu at her practice. Using a Beral pipette, she added the blood to a fresh slide containing Misha’s infected cells. Maggie covered the slide, placed it under the microscope.

  Maggie fumbled for a tape recorder, clicked the record button as she bent over to peer into the microscope again.

  “The tumor lies in the submucosa, infiltrating the lamina propria. Cellular morphology not characteristic of known tumors. The nuclei are indistinguishable. No nestlike appearance as in the fibrovascular stroma.”

  A clatter sounded as Maggie dropped the instrument onto the scarred tabletop. The tape whirled, silently continuing to record her next words.

  “Oh my God!”

  Misha lifted her head, whined at the loud outburst. Maggie stepped back. Rubbed her eyes again. Oh God. It couldn’t be…surely she was exhausted, seeing things.

  Dread surfaced as she forced herself to examine the clump of cells. Bracing her hands on the table, she studied the sample.

  Blackened cells that had been separate, like individual drops of ink, bonded together as if pulled by invisible magnets. They surrounded the single drop of healthy blood, corralling it. Then absorbed it, sucking it into their mass. And grew.

  They spread, forming a giant singular cell. As her shocked gaze watched, the singular cell divided. And again.

  Cloning itself.

  Cells taken from Misha’s stomach tumor were growing exponentially and forming a new organism. Growing, spreading to the edges of the slide.

  It couldn’t be. Not happening. Somatic cells, even those mutated by cancer, couldn’t do this. Yet here it was, dividing and multiplying and growing to form…living tissue.

  With a cry of disgust, she grabbed the slide, dropped it into a beaker of alcohol. Maggie stared, watching the now clearly demarcated black mass sink down into the liquid.

  A sharp buzz made her cry out in alarm. Get a grip, Mags. Maggie sucked down a trembling breath. She covered the beaker with a towel and pasted on a shaky smile. Her sneakers thumped on the staircase as she headed for the door.

  It had better not be Mark. He had agreed to take over the whole caseload while she begged off six week’s leave. But he’d phoned, whining about the work piling up.

  Mark must never know how ill Misha was or he would insist on taking her pet and quarantining Misha at the office. She had to find answers herself. Misha would not be turned into a living experiment, poked and prodded by fascinated colleagues.

  Maggie looked out the door’s scope. A blond little girl in a pink shorts set clutched the handle of a small red wagon. The wagon held a steel cage containing a rabbit.

  Tammy Whittaker, seven, from next door. Tammy’s mother was a fussy, carefully groomed woman who insisted on calling Maggie “Miss Sinclair” instead of “Doctor.” Vets weren’t real doctors, she had said, sniffing that she couldn’t understand why anyone with a medical inclination would choose to treat filthy animals.

  Dropping the curtain, Maggie felt a flutter of alarm. She only wanted to be left alone to muse over this latest frightening find.

  The trilling buzz sounded again. With a sigh, she opened the door. Tammy Whittaker looked up at Maggie. Hope flickered in her huge brown eyes. “Hi, Dr. Sinclair. This is Herman, my rabbit.”

  “Honey, I’m awfully busy….”

  Tammy’s face screwed up. Her mouth wobbled precariously. “Herman’s hurt. Please, Dr. Sinclair, can you fix him? I have te
n dollars I saved from my allowance. My mother says she won’t waste money on a stupid rabbit.”

  The little girl’s woeful expression twisted Maggie’s heart. She went outside and picked up the cage containing the chocolate-colored rabbit.

  “Come on, Tammy. Let’s see what’s wrong with Herman.”

  Inside the spacious living room, Maggie set down the cage. She removed the large French lop from the cage and set him on the tiled floor. Herman weakly hopped. His back left leg flopped. Broken, probably.

  A terrible suspicion crested over Maggie. “Tammy, how did this happen?”

  Her gaze flicked away. “I forget to lock the door sometimes. He got out. Mom said he got his leg caught.”

  Maggie gnawed at her lower lip. Outside of her own dog, she hadn’t examined an animal in over two months. Doing so caused odd images to flash through her mind, as if she could envision the source of the animal’s injury. Feel its past and pain.

  Just an overactive imagination. It was only her great desire to heal, causing her to envision the injury’s source.

  Yet the fledgling ability had grown stronger over the past six months. Maggie had solved the problem by leaving the initial exams to Mark, in exchange for doing the clinic’s paperwork.

  “I thought your mother didn’t like animals.”

  Sniffling, Tammy explained her friend Bobby had given her Herman when his family moved away. “It was either me or Sally. Sally has a big yard with a fence, but she’s got a hamster. Mom didn’t want him, but Dad said I could keep him if Herman stayed in the cage. Please, can you make him better? He’s hurting.”

  Maggie gently stroked the quivering rabbit. Images poured through her mind like movie screen captions: Fear. Pain. Cage door open. Freedom. Good smells. Food nearby. White grass. Urge to void. Tall human. Screams. Pointed shoe. Hurt. Fear. Hide.

  Tammy’s mother had kicked it in a rage for the droppings on her immaculate white wool rug.

  Biting back a startled cry, she jerked her hand away. Maggie turned, hiding her reaction from Tammy.

  “Is Herman going to be okay?” Tammy asked.

  “He’ll be fine. I need to get the medicine to fix him.”