I pinched my eyebrows. “Then why isn’t it beating?”
“It is.” His voice rose in pitch. “Her pulse is at a half a beat per minute. And it’s weak because that wound isn’t healing. Neil’s blood would help in this case, but even his reserves are gone.”
Neil Foster had been a comrade until he’d met his death on a mission months ago. He’d been a great soldier, but more importantly, he was the only vampire we knew whose blood had healing properties.
“At that heart rate, she’ll be brain dead,” I said. However, I wasn’t a doctor, so I really didn’t know what I was saying.
“Not as a vampire, but she has slipped into a coma, and that’s a good thing. Time might heal the injury as her system tries to recover, and it will give me time to find a solution. I thought Sam’s blood would do the trick, but as you can see, it hasn’t done much. As a temporary fix, I’m going to stitch the wound. Since I don’t have Neil’s blood, Steven’s blood has some healing properties, but his is not as strong as Neil’s. When will Steven be here?”
As vampires, our genetic makeup would eventually dissolve the stitches before our skin knitted back together.
“I’ll check.” Before I did, I traipsed over to her bedside, leaned over, and kissed her on the lips, wishing I were that prince in Snow White who woke his love with one kiss. “Please don’t die on me, angel. I need you so badly. I haven’t even begun to show you how great our lives will be together.” I kissed along her jaw to her ear. “I love you.” As tears slid down my face, I pulled out my phone and dialed Hollings.
“What’s Steven’s ETA?” My voice was shaky.
“We have a problem,” Hollings said. “Steven and Jonah are gone. They’re not in their cells. We checked the building, and there are no signs of anyone breaking in or breaking out. It’s as though the two of them teleported.”
No vampire could teleport. Steven had to have used something seriously compelling for the guards to open the doors, but I didn’t care how he’d gotten out.
“I’m not sending out a search team,” I said. “My gut is telling me the minute I do is the minute Edmund attacks.” That was Edmund’s mode of operation. He’d done it once before. He’d made us believe he was at one location only to be on base, where he had blown up buildings and kidnapped Jo.
“I got this handled,” Hollings said. “How’s Jo?”
“Not good. Keep me posted.” I hung up.
“I heard,” Dr. Vieira said. “I can keep using Sam’s blood. His seems to kick up her heartbeat a little at least. He’s lying down, resting from the first round. He should be ready to do another round soon.”
Soon was too long. “If Sam’s blood is barely working on her, then Steven’s might not, either. Give her my blood.”
He regarded me. “Webb, I’ve been testing blood, DNA, and our genetic makeup for many, many years. I know what your blood is capable of as well as the entire military team of vampires on this base. Again, since Neil isn’t alive, I need her father’s blood. Sam just hasn’t matured enough yet as a vampire for us to know if his blood will have healing properties. So unless you know of someone who I don’t, I’m sorry.”
I clenched my jaw. I didn’t want to hear how sorry he was. I wanted him to fix Jo. “She’s my life, Damon. I can’t lose her.”
He came up to me and rested a hand on my shoulder. “Webb, I know.” His was voice thin.
“What about Tripp?” I asked. “He has a touch that calms people. Try his blood.”
Dr. Vieira fiddled with the heart monitor. “I’ve been down that road with him. His wolf lineage helps him heal faster, but I’ve tested his blood, knowing that wolf blood has healing properties. But in large part, he’s more vampire than wolf.”
As though a gust of wind had knocked me over, Tripp’s cousin, Crysta, popped into my head. “Crysta. Tripp’s cousin. She’s pure wolf. Try her blood.”
“I thought she left town,” Dr. Vieira said.
“Let me check.” I got on my phone and called Tripp.
9
Webb
I blinked several times to keep my eyes open as I sat at Jo’s bedside. Hours had passed. The day turned to night. Tripp had finally gotten in contact with Crysta, but she’d been on a plane and had to find her way back here. Even then, we weren’t sure if her blood could help Jo.
I felt as though I was being hit from all sides, and more than anything, I wanted to ditch the military and take a long-ass vacation. After things settled with Jo, I would make it my first priority to get the evidence we needed to clear the commander. Then he could take the helm again and deal with Nicki, who I hadn’t attempted to interrogate, Mr. Jackson, who was laid up in a civilian hospital, and the Secretary of the Navy’s dead son, who barely looked human, and more importantly, find a way to get the CIA out of our business.
I yawned.
The only comforting news was that Jo’s heart was still beating at a half a beat per minute. Sam had given her another round of his blood over an hour ago, but there had been no change in Jo’s condition, not even her heart rate. As vampires, our hearts beat between five and twenty beats per minute, depending on when we turned vampire. Considering Jo was less than a year in vampire age, her heart rate should have been somewhere in the range of ten to twenty beats per minute.
Footsteps padded in. I lifted my tired eyes.
“Crysta should be here within the hour,” Tripp said. “Why don’t you go get a shower? Then catch a quick nap. You look like shit. I’ll stay with her.”
“Any word on where the commander is?” I asked. “Or did he check in?”
“No. Hollings has a team out searching. We’ll find him.” Tripp’s tone wasn’t convincing.
Maybe Steven and Jonah went on the hunt for Edmund. That was the only logical reason in my mind as to why Steven would break out unless someone broke them out and kidnapped them.
Tripp sat down in a chair on the other side of Jo’s bed. “Go. I’ll call you if anything changes around here.”
I pushed to my tired feet. “Thank you.” My throat burned. I not only needed a shower, but at least a liter of blood. I’d had hunger pangs for the last two hours but hadn’t wanted to move. I kissed Jo on the lips then left.
The lab was quiet save for a machine or two humming. Dr. Vieira was studying a computer screen, and Sam was on his phone, listening to the caller on the other end.
Dr. Vieira glanced up at my approach. “I’ve been wracking my brain as to why her wound won’t close. A doctor I studied under had one case where his vampire patient had the same problem. After he’d gotten injured, his wounds wouldn’t heal. In reading the case study, the doctor came to the conclusion that since the patient had been stabbed multiple times in the same area, the injury would take longer to heal.”
I tilted my head, holding my breath. She had been stabbed by my sister in the same area not that long ago. “So she’ll be fine?”
He kept reading the screen. “Maybe. This was just one case study. However, the doctor further concluded that some vampires don’t heal as quickly because of their DNA.” He lifted his tired gaze. “So I suspect that blood with healing properties would speed up Jo’s recovery.”
We had to find her father.
Sam ventured over with his phone in hand. “That was Ben. His father is awake. He had a mild heart attack. Plus, the smoke inhalation didn’t help. But we may have a problem.”
We always had problems.
“Mr. Jackson is mumbling about Nicki and fangs, and the ER doctor is questioning what drugs Mr. Jackson might have taken. According to the doctor, Mr. Jackson’s dilated pupils indicate drug use.”
“Someone compelled him,” Dr. Vieira said, returning to his computer screen.
“Nicki,” I said through a growl.
What a fucking day!
“Do you want me to head over to the hospital and see what’s up?” Sam asked.
I scratched my neck. “No. Call Ben and tell him to bring his father here.” The only pers
on who could un-compel Mr. Jackson was the person who’d put him in that state of mind. “After I get Nicki to pull him out, then you can erase whatever she planted in his head.”
Sam had the ability to wipe out someone’s entire memory or one memory at a time if he knew what that memory was.
Sam walked away, tapping the screen of his phone.
“I’m going to shower. Crysta should be here soon.” I stalked out.
The brisk night air swept over me as I trudged through the woods, my booted feet sinking into the dirt and leaves. I tried to clear my mind, listening to the crickets singing and an owl hooting. The dense trees and thicket reminded me of when I’d chased Jo through the woods the night she’d been rescued from her boating accident. Man, that was a night I would never forget. I laughed at the memory of how she’d been hanging upside down from a tree. She’d been caught in one of the traps we’d set all over the wooded part of the base. She’d managed to get free and had been about to jump down when I’d caught her.
A little girl’s voice carried on the breeze, jarring me from my memory. I stopped and listened as I sharpened my vision, scanning my house that lay ahead.
“Mander, where’s my mommy?”
Abbey? The commander? In a flash, I was walking through my front door.
Abbey ran and jumped into my arms. “I want my mommy.” Tears filled her bright-blue eyes.
I held her as she rested her head on my shoulder. So many questions bombarded me, but those could wait.
The light from the side table glowed, highlighting two tired vampires. Steven sat on the couch, and Jonah was on the chair opposite him.
I pinned a glare on Steven.
His eyes shuddered between green and silver. “What’s wrong?”
“Jo is in a coma, and—”
He tore out of the house.
With a relieved sigh, I dropped onto the couch with Abbey in my lap. I should’ve run out with him, but I couldn’t leave Jonah in my house or with Abbey. After all, Jonah had been and could still be Edmund’s right-hand man.
Abbey snuggled into me as she closed her eyes. Within a minute, she was breathing heavily. Man, I would have given anything to shut my eyes, but if I did, I might not wake up for a month.
The oversized chair Jonah was sitting in seemed too small for his large build. The last time I’d seen Jonah was when we captured him during one of our raids. At that time, he’d been defiant and rabid, which was understandable as an enemy. Yet as he sat with one leg crossed over the other, he gave me the impression that he was a friend and not a foe.
“So, talk,” I said. “Tell me why you and Steven aren’t in jail and how you got out.” Warmth traveled through my body as my eyes grew heavy.
He pointed a large finger at Abbey. “Her mom dropped her off with Steven’s attorney with a note that said she was getting revenge and that Edmund needs to die for killing her husband. Once Steven got the message, he compelled every guardian in the building into releasing him. And before we walked out, he erased the footage on the security cameras. I knew he was powerful, but he compelled two and three guards at a time.”
Sam could do just that, but I hadn’t been aware that Steven could. It didn’t matter. “So you busted out. Then what?”
“We got Abbey from Mr. Rose’s house. Steven didn’t think she was safe, and he wants to stop Rachel.”
“How does Rachel know where Edmund is?” We didn’t even know that.
“I’m not sure,” he said.
I gently untangled Abbey and placed her head on the pillow next to me. Then I pushed to my feet and stalked into the kitchen to grab some much-needed blood. I desperately wanted a shower, but my hygiene could wait. I had to get back to Jo. After I sated my hunger, I collected Abbey.
“Come on,” I said to Jonah. “We’re going to the infirmary.”
10
Jo
Rolling green hills spanned out beneath the snowcapped mountains in the distance that climbed high into the sky. Stars twinkled above, bright and large, as I played with the blades of wet grass at my side. I tried to lift my head, but I couldn’t move. I felt as though I was glued to the earth. The scent of fire lingered from somewhere. I darted my gaze to the right then left, but I couldn’t see anything. I tried again to sit up, and when I did, a large black paw stepped on my chest. I screamed. The agony of pain took my breath away.
A panther came into view, staring down at me with topaz-colored eyes beaming in the darkness. Then another figure appeared—an old man draped in a red robe with a gold sash around his neck. He too seemed to glow in the dark. The panther heeled on my left, and the old man kneeled on my right.
His warm hand grasped mine. “Child, do you remember me?”
I swung my gaze from the panther to the old man, who had black hair, a slender build, and silver eyes that glinted. “I do, but I don’t know your name.”
He smiled. “I’m your grandfather. I’ve been watching over you.”
I pinched my eyebrows together. “Where am I? Where’s my dad? My brother?”
“Shh,” he said. “You’ll see them soon enough. You need to heal. I want you to rest.”
“What happened?” I sifted through my brain but was drawing a blank.
He placed a hand on my heart, and an energy like no other filled me, swirling around as though his hand was inside me, massaging my heart. “You were severely injured.” He pressed down on my chest.
I coughed up blood.
“Serapis,” he said to the panther.
Before I knew what was happening, the panther was licking the blood from my face. When he was finished, he sat on his haunches, his golden-yellow eyes appraising.
The old man, or I should say my grandfather, helped me to a sitting position. “Better?”
I inhaled deeply, the scent of honeysuckle tickling my nose. “I can breathe again.”
“Good. Now listen carefully. You must be more calculating and cautious of your enemy. You must not jump into battle without thinking. I cannot save you again. Listen to your father. Heed his direction, and whatever you do, do not, I repeat, do not allow Edmund Rain to live.”
“But he won’t die, no matter what we do.” My voice cracked as my body hummed to life.
“He will, and he will die by your hand. I must go.” He floated to a standing position.
“Wait. Why must he die?”
My grandfather swept his hand through the air, the act propelling me to my feet. “He will continue to cause death and destruction for both humans and vampires, and in the process, his daughter, Abbey, will die. If the vampire population is to survive and grow, she is the only natural-born female vampire who will be able to conceive.”
“But if Edmund dies, Abbey won’t have his blood to turn vampire when she becomes a teenager.”
“She’s naturally and slowly changing into a vampire as we speak. Her change will be complete when she turns sixteen. No paternal blood is needed for Abbey. Now make sure Edmund dies.” My grandfather waved a hand at Serapis. “Time to go.”
“No,” I said. “I need you by my side.”
“You don’t need me, child. You need the ones who love you who are alive.” He spoke as though I would never see him again.
I felt empty and sad as he and Serapis trekked down the rolling hills toward the mountainside. As their bodies blurred, my chest tightened, my body shook, and I began coughing. A loud beep pounded in my ears among the many voices screaming in the distance. I opened my eyes, squinting at the glaring light that burned my pupils.
“Jo! Jo! Jo!” So many voices were calling me.
“Angel.”
“Webb?” Tears shot forward at the sound of his deep, husky voice, a voice I wanted to hear over and over again. But the tears quickly dried as I heaved and coughed until blood dribbled out of my mouth and onto the white sheet.
Someone began wiping my face. “Everyone, get out,” Dr. Vieira ordered.
“I am not leaving.” Webb’s voice was close to my ear.<
br />
I blinked to orient my vision, but my stomach heaved again, and again, more blood spilled out.
“Neither am I,” my dad chimed in.
Dr. Vieira placed a cup at my mouth. “Drink.”
I sipped on ice water. The liquid slid down and cooled my insides, erasing the sandpaper feeling. My vision slowly sharpened. My head jerked right as my hand reached out to Webb. He leaned in to kiss me on the forehead. My lips quivered, my body shook, and my mind scrambled to make sense of how I got there.
Webb’s cobalt-blue eyes, the ones that always sucked me in, glossed over. “I am so fucking glad you didn’t die.”
I gripped his trembling hand as my eyes adjusted to the bright lights overhead. I slowly gauged my surroundings. A machine beeped from somewhere behind me, and a brief memory flashed of my time in a human hospital thanks to my foster dad, who had stabbed me not once, but twice. Suddenly, the pain from that night melded into the searing, burning pain of the dagger that Nicki had embedded in my chest.
I gasped as anger swished in my stomach, causing my fangs to drop and my eyes to flash vampire.
Dr. Vieira adjusted the IV bag full of blood. “You need to rest.”
I needed to kill Nicki. “Where’s Nicki?” I threw the sheets off me as I swung my legs over the side of the bed.
Webb blocked me before tucking my legs back under the covers. “As Doc said, you need to rest.”
I needed to exact revenge once and for all.
“Revenge will come in time,” Dad said from the bottom of my bed.
“Dad?” My mind was a bowl of mush. “Wait. Why aren’t you in jail?”
Sam squeezed my toes. “Nicki is sitting in a jail cell in the prison building.”
On the Edge of Infinity (A Vampire SEAL Novel Book 5) Page 8
