by Alisha Rai
“Let him do this. He might be right. She’s going to die if he doesn’t.”
On shaky legs, Jules stood. Erik returned his head to Carrie’s wrist, resuming his feeding.
She couldn’t find fault with the passion and determination Erik was displaying. After all, that was what had saved her life. Besides, she was also part Shadow now. Wasn’t he right? Wasn’t it better that she was alive like this than dead as a human?
They watched the girl, all of them. Erik bandaged Carrie’s wrist with gauze before standing. His face was focused, as if he could will the girl to live and thrive.
Carrie gave one breath. Another.
They weren’t the same as before. These were harsher, as if Carrie was struggling to choke air past a foreign obstacle in her lungs. Her breath was coming in shallow rasps, wheezing past her lips.
Not quite a death rattle. But very close.
Erik took a step back, his head shaking. His eyes were wide and wild. “It didn’t work.”
“We don’t know that yet,” James said.
“No. It didn’t work. She’s still going to die.” Anguish was written in every line of his face and body. “All this time. All this time I’ve been hoarding what’s in me, and it cannot even save this innocent. Dear God.” His voice broke on the last word. He pivoted and left the room, running as if the hounds of hell were after him.
“Erik!” Jules started to go after him, but James grasped her arm.
“Stay with the girl. I’ll get him.”
“No, I can go. It’s not light out, there could be Shadows…”
“Jules.”
She looked at him. He shook his head. “I can handle Shadows. Trust me.”
It went against her grain to sit here in safety while someone else braved the bad outdoors. “I don’t want you in danger.”
“Tough. That’s part of what we talked about, remember? Let me take some of your load.” Worry darkened his eyes. “Besides, if Carrie should… I know it’s not by much, but you know her better than me. Someone who knows her should be with her.”
In case Carrie died. Smart man. Nothing else could have convinced her to let him go in her stead. A person shouldn’t pass away with only a stranger for company.
Jules nodded, her throat feeling like someone had shoved a golf ball down it. “Yeah. Okay. Be careful and hurry back. Here, don’t go unarmed.” She gave him her knife and gun.
“I will be careful.” He accepted the weapons, gave her a kiss on the forehead and squeezed her hand.
The room felt empty after he left. Jules returned to sit at Carrie’s side. She felt like a pressure cooker, bubbling over with all of the emotions rattling inside of her. The unease that came with depending on someone else. Grief for the dying Carrie, worry for Erik and James.
She smoothed Carrie’s hair back from her sweaty forehead. “I’ve let too many people in, Carrie.”
Of course, the girl didn’t respond. So Jules bowed her head and tried to remember the few prayers she knew.
Chapter Nineteen
Tracking the larger man was easy. All James had to do was follow the impressions Erik had created in the dew-soaked ground. He wished he had brought his flashlight, but his eyes were adjusted enough to allow him to see around him.
Being outside at a time when Shadows could still be roaming wasn’t something he was thrilled about. But having Jules wandering out here was a far more stressful proposition.
He hadn’t been bullshitting her. He did think it was important for Carrie to have someone who knew her, however vaguely, by her side should she not make it. Yet he couldn’t deny a chauvinistic urge to spare Jules any danger he could. She may have racked up a greater headcount than him, but he was capable enough.
James’s lips curved in a humorless smile. This journey had done wonders for his self-confidence, if nothing else.
Still, he hated being so far from the house. He kept glancing behind him, more than a little disturbed when it vanished from view. Jules’s gun was in one hand, her knife in the other.
Erik couldn’t wait for sunlight to go running out into the fields?
No. He got that the guy was upset. He would be empathetic, damn it. If nothing else, he could take comfort in knowing Jules and Carrie were safe.
He finally found the other man sitting amidst the overgrown crops. His shoulders were hunched. James approached him from behind, making sure to step loudly. He wasn’t ready to find out what happened when the hybrid was startled.
“Hey.”
No response.
“Hey. Erik?”
Nothing.
Chilled, he walked around the man. There was something small and bloody in his hands, a couple drops of red around his mouth. James swallowed back his nausea when he identified the dead rabbit in Erik’s lap. “Ah. Sorry. I didn’t realize you needed to…feed. I’ll just… I’ll wait for you at the house.”
“I didn’t need to feed.”
Could have fooled him.
“I wanted to get the taste of Carrie out of my mouth.”
James rocked back on his heels. “Oh.”
“It didn’t work. I can still…taste her. She’s in there. In me.” The flat monotone was not reassuring.
“I know. It’s okay.”
“It is not okay.”
“You did what you had to do.” It didn’t appear as though this would be a simple case of fetching Erik. James sank to the ground, checking to make sure the safety was off on his gun. The wind caressed his cheek. He hated the sensation, but he bore it.
“I had a dog,” Erik said.
If that was a weird thing to say, he wouldn’t be the one to point it out. “Did you?”
“Yes. I wonder what happened to it.”
“You could ask Jules. She may know. Maybe you can get him back.”
“No. I wouldn’t be able to be around an animal now. The scent of blood is constantly tempting me. Carrie’s blood has been tempting me for a year. It smelled so good. And I’ve taken it now.”
“To help her. You took it to help her.”
“I enjoyed it.” The admission hung between them, suspended by the explosive emotion in Erik. The man covered his face with his hands. A sob came from his chest. “I loved it. It slid down my throat and I had to tear myself away from drinking her dry. I haven’t felt such pleasure in years.”
James licked his lips. “It sounds like you had an unconscious bodily response. That sort of thing happens to all of us, in different degrees.”
“It happens to animals.” His voice broke. “I told myself, when they starved and beat me, when they locked me in that cage with my own filth, I told myself if I didn’t submit, if I fought them, that meant I wasn’t an animal.”
James wished he knew what to say. He needed a psychiatrist here, damn it. “You aren’t an animal.”
“I am. I never felt like one, until now.”
“You are a victim of what those people did to you.”
Erik’s teeth gleamed. “They didn’t make me bite her. I took that child’s blood. I took it and I savored it, and I cannot even comfort myself with the knowledge that it saved her life.”
James recognized the stubborn guilt and self-condemnation in the man’s face. “Even if you felt some incidental physiological pleasure from her blood, that doesn’t make you an animal. When you snapped at me, that, that was animalistic instinct. This? You intended to do it. You were doing it for her benefit. Your brain was in control, and your reasoning was, as I said, sound. The very fact that you’re agonizing over it means that you’re more human than not.”
“Everything you say sounds logical. I wish I could believe it.” Erik placed the rabbit on the ground tenderly and started to dig a hole, all of his attention seemingly focused on the task. “I can remember how easy it was to care for people before. I buried all those feelings, cut that part of myself out.”
“No one can turn feelings off like that.”
“I thought I could. Then Jules came, and with h
er the memories of our friendship. I thought I could still keep myself separate. But with Carrie…this fear and self-loathing and guilt and caring for the girl are soul-destroying. I do not know if I can bear it.”
James checked himself from rubbing at the scars on his arm. It occasionally ached for no real reason. “Sometimes, when something awful happens, it helps to pretend that everything’s normal for short periods of time. That you’re normal. And if you do that often enough, it just…becomes your reality.”
The noise Erik made was neither agreement nor denial. James hoped he had listened. No one knew better than him how to fake normalcy. He glanced up at the sky and got to his feet. “Dawn’ll be here soon. I think we ought to head back. We’ve tempted fate long enough.”
Erik put the dead rabbit inside of the small grave he had created and covered it with the loose soil, patting the dirt down. “Is Carrie…?”
“Not yet. Not when I had left. You should be there. With her. That’s important.”
“She would not know.”
“But you would. It’s far more painful to be a survivor than a victim. You don’t want to live with any more guilt than you already have.”
Erik hesitated, but finally rose to his towering height, wiping his hands on his pants. They started off in the direction they’d come from. “Carrie was—is fond of me. I do not know why. I had already been broken when she was captured.”
“From what Jules said, it sounded like you did everything you could to protect her. She would have been dead long ago if you hadn’t been there, wouldn’t she have?”
He didn’t respond, but James wasn’t surprised. Erik’s hair shirt was too thick to agree to anything that would exculpate him. “Don’t let those doctors win, Erik. Your body does not make up the whole of your humanity.”
Silver eyes captured his. The hybrid gave a single, sharp nod. “I will keep this in mind. I cannot agree, not yet. But I will remember it.”
“That’s good. You should.”
“You are surprisingly wise.”
“Eh.”
“I hated you, you realize. For coming after Jules when no one saved me. Surely only an animal would rather his old friend die than have her be rescued simply because he was not.”
“You know that Jules looked for you, right? That the only reason she was in that town when she was captured was because of you?”
At that Erik frowned.
James shook his head. “I see she didn’t tell you. One rumor. She heard one rumor you had headed off to Cheyenne Mountain, and she took off like a bullet without even thinking about her own safety. That’s how much she cared. If she could have rescued you sooner, she would have moved Heaven and Earth to do so.”
The larger man’s chest was rising and falling. “Ah. It seems I owe both of you an apology.”
“Jules maybe. I resented you too, so we’re even.”
“Why on earth would you be resentful of me?” Erik asked.
James gave an awkward shrug. “Because I fell in love with Jules within about ten minutes of speaking with her. And I guess I kind of equated you with a tie keeping her away from me. Like there was no way she would leave that state—even though I knew she hated being around those memories of her past—without knowing what had become of you. And later on, when she put herself on the line for you in Cheyenne, I guess I blamed you again.”
“There was never anything romantic between me and Jules. She was barely a couple of years older than Carrie when I found her.”
“Yeah, I get that,” James said, very uncomfortable now that the attention had turned to his emotions. “I’m working on the anger.”
“I guess I’ll try to as well.”
He shot the older man a sideways glance. “Well. Okay.”
Erik’s jaw worked. “I am…truly happy Jules did not suffer as I did. I would not wish what happened to me on anyone, especially not someone I cared for once.”
They walked in silence for a couple of moments. The sky was lightening, the dark of the night fading into the blue of predawn.
“What are your intentions?” Erik asked abruptly.
Talk about a curve ball. A flush worked its way up James’s cheek. “Oh. Ah. Well, probably marriage. Eventually, that is. I figure we should probably live together for a bit— What’s wrong?”
He thought maybe the other man was having a fit when he bent over, his shoulders shaking. It was only when he straightened that James saw that he was…laughing? A very rusty, silent laugh to be sure, but a laugh nonetheless. He finally managed to control himself. “I meant…in regards to me. What are your intentions in regards to me?”
“I don’t want to marry you?” James ventured.
Erik rubbed his hand over his face, but it didn’t erase the lingering amusement. “I’m asking if you’re going to take me in by force. Or attempt to.”
“Take you in? Take you in where? Back to Raven?”
Erik nodded.
“I think we both know I probably couldn’t take you anywhere you didn’t want to go. Me, yeah, I’m headed back to Raven, and I think Jules is too.” He didn’t mention Carrie. Everything depended on when she…
Yeah.
They walked a few more feet. The house came into view, and James breathed a silent sigh of relief. Until he saw that the back door stood ajar.
James stopped, a chill running down his spine. He would never, ever, ever, have left that house, with Jules inside, and forgotten to close the door. Can’t compromise the cocoon.
“James.” The urgency in Erik’s voice caught his attention. The man had stopped a few steps behind him, his gaze locked on the house. His nostrils flared as he inhaled. “Someone’s—” Recognition flashed across his face. He took a step forward, and pain contorted his expression. He fell to the ground, writhing.
“Erik.” James ran back and dropped to his knees next to him. Was he having a seizure? Some sort of reaction?
His heart stopped when he realized the hybrid was clutching at the collar around his neck. “Crap,” James whispered. “Crap, crap, crap.”
Silver eyes were locked on his, filled with pain and fear. Erik’s mouth moved. No words came out, but James could read the message his lips were conveying. The only way Erik’s collar could be activated was if a controller tuned to its frequency was switched on and somewhere in their vicinity.
Here. Someone is here.
Chapter Twenty
This shouldn’t be happening. Jules was supposed to have been safe in there. James had closed her up tight, certain she’d be okay.
Someone was inside that house, right now, James knew it. Someone who had no qualms about hurting people. Hurting Jules. Torturing Jules. An unarmed Jules. Panic soared. He glanced down at the knife and gun in his hands. She’d given him her weapons. She was defenseless. Carrie was comatose. Erik was writhing at his feet.
What the fuck. Was he supposed to be the hero?
Because he was no one’s hero.
The urge to burrow, to disappear, was raging inside of him. His breathing turned to pants as adrenaline sped through his system.
You’re going back on your promise already?
No. James blinked furiously. That was right. He had promised her. Promised he’d be by her side, that he’d have her back. He couldn’t let her down.
Small. Deep. Breaths. The only thing stopping you is your own brain.
He inhaled, trying to slow his heart and think past the fight-or-flight hormones racing through him.
He could do this. For Jules, he’d do anything. He was capable, goddamn it. He’d made a trek that other men had to do in groups of a dozen or more, battled monsters, sweet-talked hermits, and had a fuzzy moment with a hybrid super soldier. He could handle some puny humans.
Think it through. Make a plan. Stay calm.
Checking for anyone posted outside the perimeter may be smart, but he feared too much for who was inside with Jules. Likewise, he could go stock up on more weapons from his car, but that would take too
much time as well. He’d manage with what he had.
He handed Erik the knife, though the other man’s shaking hand barely closed around its hilt. “Keep this,” he whispered. “I’m sorry, I need the gun. I’ll come for you as soon as I can.”
Erik’s eyes were streaming with tears, and he couldn’t speak, but he managed a nod.
Everyone was relying on him. He couldn’t let them down.
James licked his lips and headed to the house. With each stealthy step he took, his heart slowed even more, his breathing evening out until he was certain no one would hear it.
Eyes on the endgame.
Jules was so focused on willing Carrie to live, she didn’t realize anyone had returned to the house until she heard a footfall outside the room. She turned to face the door, expecting James or Erik.
She was not expecting the large man who stood in the doorway. Tears of grief forgotten, she lurched up from the bed, facing the new threat. He held a semiautomatic, and it was trained on her.
Fear was understandable. Panic was okay too. She took both of those energy-sucking emotions and shoved them aside, to be dealt with later. Her heart instantly slowed. Her head cleared. Fight. Survive.
Ay cabrón, why had she given both her weapons to James?
The guard from the lab. The big, smelly one. Fletcher? Was the second guard here as well? Was there a veritable army standing outside?
No, no, don’t think about what could be outside. Outside was where James was, and judging by the uncontrollable burst of panic that accompanied the thought of him in danger, she wouldn’t be able to worry about him and keep enough of her much-needed wits to handle this guy.
He smiled, revealing missing teeth. “Hello, sugar. Miss me?”
“Sure. I have a lack of extremely smelly friends.”
His smile slipped. “You bitch. Do you have any idea how long it took us to get free from those handcuffs? You and I have a score to settle.”
“So you came all this way for revenge?” Was tackling him a possibility? No. No way to manage that and have Carrie, who was on the bed between them, remain unharmed. He’d shoot them both before she’d get the weapon away from him.
