“Can I get you anything?” the nurse asked me.
“I don’t think so,” I said.
“Actually,” Aurora began. “Do you have some paper and a pen or pencil I could borrow?”
The nurse pulled some paper from the back of her clipboard and handed Aurora her pencil. “Push the button if you need anything else, dear,” the nurse said. “You should try and get some rest. You’ve had a long day.” I nodded my thanks as she took her clipboard and left the room. Aurora sat next to me on the bed again, pulling the patient tray on wheels over toward us.
“Are you sure you don’t need anything?” I asked her, resting my arm over her shoulders. “I could ask the nurse to bring you a bag of O Negative.”
A small laugh escaped her lips, and my heart reacted to the sound of it. “Don’t think I haven’t already considered it.”
I chuckled and gave her shoulders a squeeze as she began scribbling determinedly on the paper. It only took a moment before I could tell that she was drawing a face.
“Is that ...” My voice trailed off in disbelief.
“One of the vamps who got away tonight,” she answered for me. “I saw their faces.”
I gave an impressed whistle and watched as she continued drawing. It didn’t take long before she had completed sketches of two different vampires. It was strange seeing the faces of the ones who were responsible for Wes’s death. I recognized the suffocating feeling rising in me as I thought about Wes again. The guys and I should have spent the last week harassing him about who was going to be the best man at his up-and-coming wedding, not writing a dedication to our long-lost friend and manager for our album booklet.
“Trey?” Aurora asked, her concerned voice calling me out of my thoughts.
I shook my head, realizing the heart monitor was racing a little. “I’m okay,” I told her, taking a deep breath. “I’m just glad you got one of these guys. That’s all.”
Her gaze was sympathetic. “Me, too.” Aurora’s phone buzzed, and she pulled it from her pocket. She stared at the screen for a long minute, her face hardening as she read a text.
“Who is it?” I asked.
“Damir.”
Seriously? I’d expected Antonio to get in touch, or maybe even that vamp cop who’d been at the scene of the accident, but Damir? “What does he want?” I asked, not sure if I wanted to hear the answer. Aurora slid off the bed, getting to her feet. She started pacing back and forth slowly. “Whatever it is, we’ll figure it out,” I added.
“I have to stand before the Emissary tomorrow night,” she said in frustration.
“Okay ...” I was trying to decide what that meant when she continued.
“I took the life of another vampire. Right or wrong, I have to answer for my actions.”
“They’ll have to understand what happened. You can explain about the other two vampires who obviously want us dead. Well, want me dead at least.”
“Damir won’t care. He has his agenda, and nothing else matters.”
“You mean he wants you for himself,” I said slowly.
Aurora’s footsteps paused, and she looked up at me. “It doesn’t matter what he wants. I want you.”
“I know,” I said, motioning for her to come closer. She stepped up to the bed again and took my right hand in hers, closing her eyes and kissing it softly. “We’ll deal with Damir,” I said. “I’m not worried about him.” For a second she looked like she might tell me I should be, but if she was thinking it she didn’t say it.
Chapter 13
Aurora
“YOU SHOULD TRY TO get some sleep,” I said to Trey, touching his cheek. “You need to rest, especially if you’re serious about shooting that video in a few days.”
“I am serious,” he said as I climbed up onto the bed next to him again. “You weren’t serious about having Dr. Vampire see me about my shoulder, were you?”
I had to stifle a grin at that. “Last I heard Mark’s out of town until next week,” I said. Trey pretended not to be nearly as relieved by that news as he was, and I snuggled up next to him, leaning my head on his good shoulder and settling in for a long night. I knew better than to think I was actually going to get any sleep, but Trey managed to doze off after just a few minutes. He was completely exhausted. I lay there listening to his deep, steady breathing. I’d come too close to losing him tonight. After everything I was doing to try and keep him safe, it had all come down to a car chase. I’d never get the image of him slumped over the steering wheel with blood dripping from his face out of my head. There were still five nights until the full moon. That meant five more nights that something else could go wrong. The universe seemed determined to keep Trey and I apart. Maybe that’s what I deserved for disrupting the natural order of things. But Trey didn’t deserve any of this. I thought about the vampire I’d killed tonight in order to protect him. Maybe I should have been feeling remorseful over taking another vampire’s life. That’s probably what the Emissary would want to see from me tomorrow night.
Remorse.
But the truth was, I wouldn’t hesitate to do it again if it meant keeping Trey safe. The same vampires were responsible for killing Wes, and that had been bad enough. I’d seen Trey go through hell that day, and I had never wanted to see him like that ever again. Now Trey was lying here in a hospital bed with wires attached to him and tubes coming out of his arm, his shoulder having been ripped from its socket.
I’d taken out one of the vampires tonight, which meant the other two were still out there. But the real question was more than just why they were after us. It was who they were working for. I recalled the thought I glimpsed from one of the vamps as they’d been climbing in their SUV.
She won’t be happy the human survived.
I still couldn’t imagine who she was. Trey and I hadn’t hurt anyone by being together. Sure, there were obviously vampires who weren’t happy about our relationship, but we hadn’t actually hurt anyone. What reason had we given someone to want us dead? Whoever it was, she was determined enough to have sent her band of thugs after Trey not just once, but twice. Wes had paid the price the first time. Tonight, they had almost succeeded.
I was starting to believe she –whoever she was – was willing to cause a considerable amount of collateral damage to get what she wanted. I turned my head and gazed at Trey as he slept. His face was twisted up now, his eyes flitting back and forth beneath the lids. His heart rate quickened and so did his breathing. He was having a nightmare, probably reliving the day’s events. I sent soothing images into his mind, trying to calm him. Eventually, my images won out and he relaxed again, sleeping peacefully. I reached up and gently brushed his cheek with my fingers, feeling the day old stubble there. Even in his sleep he leaned into my touch, moaning softly. Things had been so much simpler before he came along. Being alone is easy. Going through the motions and living life on a level ranked somewhere just below content is easy. I would know. I’d done it for years. Caring is hard. Loving is hard. That’s when things get complicated.
I loved Trey. I loved the woman I was becoming because of him.
The only thing I wanted in that moment was to guarantee his safety. I thought about what I’d projected into Trey’s mind earlier and about him being safe in this hospital. We’d spent almost every minute together since Wes’s death, living in fear that the vampires responsible might come back and try to finish the job. We were right about that. I’d managed to save Trey this time, but I couldn’t be sure that I’d be able to do it again. Maybe I’d been foolish to think that I could protect him to begin with. But tonight, one thing had changed. I had my first clue.
If I was going to do this, it had to be now. It had to be tonight while Trey was getting the celebrity treatment from the doctors and nurses in this hospital. They knew every change in his heartbeat. He wasn’t going to get safer than this. I carefully slid off the bed, not wanting to disturb him. Planting a soft kiss on his forehead, I whispered “I love you” and quietly slipped out of the room with my sketches
in hand. I tried not to look like a woman with a plan as I made my way through the halls of the hospital toward the exit.
When I got to Club Sanguin, I went straight to Daryl, a bouncer who’d worked at the club for the last year. I handed him my sketches and watched his face for a sign of recognition as he glanced at them.
“I don’t know these two,” he said. “Are you sure they’re from the area?”
I sighed. “No. I was just hoping.”
He handed me back the sketches. “Why do you need to find them so bad anyway?” he asked.
“They tried to kill me tonight.”
The only sign of surprise on Daryl’s face was a little twitch of his eyebrow. “Glad to see they weren’t successful,” he said. “I’ll keep an eye out for you.”
I smiled. “Thanks.” Then I went inside the club and went straight to the bar. It had been a long night already, and it was only going to get longer. I wasn’t going to face it without some blood. I ordered a drink and finished it right there, ignoring the amused look on the bartender’s face. The blood was rejuvenating, coursing through me like electricity. It was just the jolt of energy and clarity I needed. I took my sketches and headed into the upper level of the club where the tables were. Vamps were sitting with their drinks and watching the dancing on the level below. I started on one end and went from table to table, showing the sketches and asking if anyone recognized the vamps in them.
I took full advantage of my chosen ability for the month by mentally reaching out to every vamp I spoke with. If someone had been lying in their answer I would have known it. Somehow, that only made things more hopeless when I reached the last table and still hadn’t learned a thing about our attackers. Maybe they really weren’t from this area. That would explain why no one knew them. I’d known it was a shot in the dark coming here tonight, but I hadn’t gone to all this trouble and left Trey alone for nothing. I would at least talk to every vamp in the club before I left. It took me half an hour to push through all the vamps on the dance floor and show them the sketches. Not one single vamp could tell me anything I needed to know. I ended up back at the bar, slamming my sketches down and running my hand through my hair in frustration.
“You look like you could use another,” the bartender said. I looked up to find that he’d set another drink down in front of me. It was identical to the one I’d ordered before. “This one’s on the house.”
I couldn’t help the smile that spread across my face. “Thank you,” I said. “It’s been one of those nights.” I downed the second drink just as quickly as I had the first.
The bartender just stood there, watching me as he wiped down a glass. “Better?” he asked when I’d finished.
“Getting there.” Then I saw his gaze fall on my sketches. He reached over and lifted the top one in his hands, glancing at the one below it. “These guys friends of yours?” he asked.
I let out a humorless laugh and shook my head. “Not exactly.”
“That’s good to hear. You don’t seem the type to run in their crowd.”
It took me a second to comprehend the underlying tone in his comment. “Wait, do you know them?”
“They’re not friends of mine, either,” he clarified. “I used to see them around, though – not here – but back when I was tending bar in Miami.”
“Do you know their names?” I asked, feeling the faintest ray of hope.
He shook his head apologetically. “Never caught their names. There was another guy they used to run with, too.”
I leaned over the bar and took the pencil out of his front shirt pocket and flipped one of my sketches over, drawing a rough sketch of the third vampire on the back. The one I’d killed tonight. I turned it around so he could take a good look at it.
The bartender looked impressed, nodding. “That’s him all right.”
“Thanks for the chat,” I said, gathering up my sketches. “And the drink.”
“You with the police or something?” he asked.
“No,” I said, grinning. “But they should pay me commission. I’m doing their job for them.”
So my trip to Club Sanguin hadn’t been a complete waste of time after all. The vampires were from Miami. It stood to reason that she would probably be from Miami, too. These vamps were smart. Smart enough not to hit the local blood bar while they were cruising around town trying to kill people.
Chapter 14
Aurora
WHEN TREY OPENED HIS eyes the next morning, I was sitting at his bedside. After leaving the Club last night I’d swung by my place and got my car before going back to the hospital. I’d let myself back into his room quietly, regretting for a moment that I’d left him alone like that. If it were that easy to get into his room, anyone could have done it. My worries quickly subsided when I caught sight of his peaceful face as he slept. The green line on the monitor at his bedside was still dancing up and down, and I closed the door behind me and made my way over to the hospital bed. When he woke up, I told him everything that had happened. He didn’t seem that surprised to learn that I’d snuck out of the hospital and ventured to Club Sanguin, and he was glad to hear that I’d at least made some progress in identifying our attackers, though we still had a long way to go.
The rest of the day at the hospital consisted mostly of nurses coming in and out to either check on Trey or to deliver the assortment of gifts that were flooding in from local media outlets and concerned fans. By early afternoon, his hospital room was quickly filling up with flowers, stuffed animals, and the usual get-well gifts, but it was the unconventional ones that Trey loved. For example, more than one fan attached songwriting notebooks with their flower arrangements, with hand written letters in the front of the notebooks expressing their concern for Trey and encouraging him to write songs about his near-death experience. Others sent chocolates and candies, some even including treats for Cowboy who was, no doubt, traumatized by Trey’s sudden absence for the night. Trey even received two inflatable guitars, which he kept referring to as his ‘air guitars.’ One fan sent a Paper Jamz guitar and amplifier along with a vase of flowers. Trey laid the toy guitar across his lap and strummed it with his good hand. When he caught me smiling at him from my chair, he raised his eyebrows innocently.
“What?” he asked. “My fans obviously figured out that this is the only way I’m going to be playing a guitar for a while. Look, one-handed.”
The nurses were having way too much fun delivering the gifts and giving Trey a hard time about all the attention he was getting. One even warned him about the sugar coma that would surely follow if he ate all the sweets he was collecting. What she didn’t know was that Trey already had a plan for that. When we got the good news that the heart monitor could come off and the IV could come out, he sweet-talked a nurse into bringing him a pair of blue scrubs so he could lose the hospital gown he’d been wearing and the plan was set into motion. While he changed, I called O’Shea, Jonas and Chase and filled them in.
“The guys are on their way,” I told Trey as he adjusted the sling on his arm.
“Great. Thanks.” Then he grinned up at me. “What do you think about my new look?” he asked, referring to his scrubs.
“The color really brings out your eyes.”
He waggled his eyebrows, making me laugh. The nurses who had supplied the scrubs and freed him from the restraints of the monitors and the tubes, were about to leave the room, but Trey stopped them.
“I’m going to be getting out of here in a few hours,” he said to them. “I know there are some kids in this hospital that could use this stuff more than I can.” He gestured with a sweep of his hand to all the gifts in the room. “What do you say? Can you help us out?” The irresistible smile he threw their way after the speech was completely unnecessary.
“I’m game,” the one conceded immediately.
“Yeah, on one condition,” the other said. “You’ll be going from room to room in a wheelchair.” Trey must have looked like he was about to argue, so she continued w
ithout giving him the chance. “You’re on some pretty heavy pain medication for your shoulder, and you’re still a patient here until Dr. Hyatt signs off on your release. If you want our help, those are the rules. Deal?”
Trey smiled in defeat. “Deal.”
When the guys arrived, Trey gave them the details of his plan, and the nurses left the room for a moment to get something they said would help us execute it. I made myself useful and separated the cards and notes fans had written to Trey from the flowers and gifts and set them aside for him to keep. When the nurses returned, they were equipped with a wheelchair and an empty cleaning cart.
Trey frowned at the wheelchair but did as he was told and sat down in it while the rest of us loaded the cleaning cart with flowers and gifts. O’Shea insisted on pushing Trey around and Jonas and Chase were in charge of pushing the cleaning cart. I walked alongside Trey and O’Shea, and the nurses led the way in front of us as we made our way down the long hallway toward the pediatric ward.
We drew some confused and curious looks from doctors and other hospital personnel as we passed, but Chase and Jonas nodded casually and tossed out friendly greetings that somehow silenced any questions. When we reached the right part of the hospital, Trey started knocking on doors and handing out flowers and treats to the kids who were regular inhabitants. The nurses were introducing Trey and the guys as the band Catalyst, but most of the kids who were older than ten recognized them all anyway.
Much to the nurses surprise, O’Shea was informing all of the kids and their parents that the band was taking over the hospital cafeteria at five o’clock for an impromptu performance.
In response to one nurse’s questioning look, Trey just said, “You have no part in the takeover. You can claim total ignorance.” He winked, and the nurse just rolled her eyes at him and smiled.
The looks on the children’s faces as the guys posed for pictures and handed out gifts was priceless. As I watched, I couldn’t help but recognize just how easy it was for Trey to steal away some time to be so selfless, even in the midst of all the chaos going on in our lives. I briefly wondered if he was so good at it because his life is often chaotic, vampires or not, but I knew better. This was just Trey. Leave it to him and the guys to turn a bad situation around like this and really make a difference. I’d never known anyone else who could do that the way they were at this moment. It was almost enough to make me forget that I had to meet with the Emissary tonight. Almost. I was going to have to ask Trey to stay behind with Antonio while I went to be judged by his Royal Highness Damir and his minions. Trey wasn’t going to like that one bit, but I couldn’t risk taking him along with me. It wasn’t worth it.
Immortals And Melodies (Blood And Guitars #2) Page 7
