by J. R. Ward
Her healer disappeared into the bathroom and the door shut most of the way—but not completely. A shaft of light pierced through into the stall of the falling water and she saw clearly his white-coated arm reach in, turn a handle, and call forth the warm rain.
Clothes were removed. All of them.
And then there was a brief glimpse of glorious flesh as he stepped under the spray and closed the glass partition. As the auditory rhythm of the water changed, she knew his naked form was breaking up the free fall.
What did he look like, sluiced with water, slick and warm and so very male?
Pushing herself up off the pillows, she leaned to the side . . . and leaned a little more . . . and leaned more still until she was all but hanging off....
Ah, yeeees. His body was in profile, but she saw plenty: Carved with musculature, his chest and arms were heavy over tight hips and long, powerful legs. A dusting of dark hair sat upon his pectorals and formed a line that went o’er his abdomen and down, down . . . so far down....
Damn it, she could not see enough, and her curiosity was too desperate and driving to ignore.
What did his sex look like? Feel like . . .
With a curse, she awkwardly shuffled herself around so that she was on the end of the bed. Angling her head, she made the very best of the limited exposure of that crack in the doorway. But as she had moved, so had he, and he was now facing away from her, his back and his . . . lower body . . .
She swallowed hard and stretched upward to see even more. As he unwrapped the cleansing bar, water streamed across his shoulder blades and rivered o’er his spine, flowing onto his buttocks and the backs of his thighs. And then his hand appeared on the nape of his neck, the frothy suds he had called up in his palms going the way of the water as he washed his body.
“Turn about . . .” she whispered. “Let me see all of you. . . .”
The desire for her eyes to get greater access only increased as his soapy ministrations went below his waist. Lifting one leg, and then the other, his hands were tragically efficient as they went o’er his thighs and calves.
She knew when he tended to his sex. Because his head fell back and his hips curled up tight.
He was thinking of her. She was sure of it.
And then he spun around.
It happened so fast that as their eyes met, both of them recoiled.
Even though she had been caught and then some, she shambled back against the pillows, and resumed her former position, restraightening the blankets he had been so careful with. With her face aflame, she wanted to hide—
A sharp squeak echoed through the room, and she glanced up. He had burst forth from the bathroom, the shower left open and running, soap still clinging to his abdominals and dripping from off . . .
His sex was a magnificent shock. Standing out from his body, the rod of him was hard and thick and proud.
“You . . .”
He said something further, but she was too captivated to care, too enthralled to notice. Deep within her, a wellspring was released, her sex swelling and preparing itself to accept him.
“Payne,” he demanded, covering himself with his hands.
Instantly, she was ashamed and put her palms to her hot cheeks. “Verily, I am sorry I spied upon you.”
Her human gripped the edge of the doorway. “Not that . . .” He shook his head as if to clear it. “Are you aware of what you were doing?”
She had to laugh. “Yes. Believe in this, my healer—I was totally aware of what I was regarding so thoroughly.”
“You were sitting up, Payne. You were up on your knees at the end of the bed.”
Her heart stopped. Surely she could not have heard him right.
Surely.
As Payne frowned, Manny lurched forward—and then realized he was really fucking naked. Which was a condition that occurred when a guy didn’t just have his ass in the breeze, but was totally and completely, ball-numbingly erect as he pulled a birthday suit. Reaching into the bathroom, he snagged a towel, wrapped it around his hips, and then went over to the bed.
“I . . . no, you must be wrong,” Payne said. “I couldn’t have—”
“You did—”
“I had merely stretched upon—”
“How did you get to the end of the bed, then. And how did you get back where you are?”
Her eyes went to the short footboard, confusion drawing her brows in tight. “I do not know. I was . . . watching you and you were all I knew.”
The man in him was astounded and . . . strangely transformed. To be wanted that much by someone like her?
But then the physician in him took over. “Here, let me see what’s doing, okay?”
He untucked the sheets and blanket from the end of the bed and rolled them up to the tops of her thighs. Using his finger, he ran it across the sole of her pretty foot.
He expected it to twitch. It didn’t.
“Anything?” he said.
When she shook her head, he repeated on the other side. Then he moved higher, wrapping his palms around her slender ankles. “Anything?”
Her eyes were tragic as they met his. “I feel nothing. And I do not understand what you think you saw.”
He moved higher, to her calves. “You were on your knees. I swear to it.”
Higher still, to her taut thighs.
Nothing.
Christ, he thought. She had to have had some control over her legs. There was no other explanation. Unless . . . he’d been seeing things.
“I do not understand,” she repeated.
Neither did he, but he was going to damn well figure it out. “I’m going to go review your scans. I’ll be right back.”
Out in the exam room, he got some help from the nurse and accessed Payne’s medical record via the computer. With practiced efficiency, he went through everything: vitals, exam notes, X-rays—he even found the stuff he’d done to her at St. Francis, which was a surprise. He hadn’t a clue how they’d gotten access to that original MRI—he’d erased the file nearly as soon as it had gone into the medical center’s system. But he was glad to see it again, that was for sure.
When he was finished, he sat back in the chair, and the band of coldness that shot across his shoulder blades reminded him he was in nothing but a towel.
Kind of explained that nurse’s walleyed look when he’d spoken with her.
“What the hell,” he muttered, staring at the latest X-ray.
Her spine was perfectly in order, the vertebrae lined up nice and square, their ghostly glow against the black background giving him a perfect snapshot of what was going on down her back.
Everything, from the medical record to the exam he’d just given her on the bed, suggested that his original conclusion upon seeing her again was the correct one: He’d done the best technical work of his life, but the spinal cord had been irreparably damaged and that was that.
And abruptly, he remembered the expression on Goldberg’s face as it had become obvious that the difference between night and day had escaped his notice.
Rubbing his eyes, he wondered if he was, yet again, going crazy. He knew what he’d seen, however. . . . Didn’t he?
And then it dawned on him.
Twisting around, he looked to the ceiling. Sure enough, all the way up in the corner there was a pod attached to a panel. Which meant the security camera inside could see every square inch of the place.
Had to be one in the recovery room. Had to be.
Getting to his feet, he went over to the door and peered out into the corridor, hoping that nice blond nurse was somewhere to be found. “Hello?”
His voice echoed down the hall, but there was no reply, so he had no choice except to barefoot it around. Without an instinct as to which way to head, he choose “right” and walked fast. At all of the doors, he knocked and then tried to open them. Most were locked, but those that weren’t revealed . . . classrooms. And more classrooms. And a huge, professional-size gym.
When he got to
one marked WEIGHT ROOM, he heard the pounding of someone trying to break a treadmill with some Nikes and decided to keep going. He was a half-naked human in a world of vampires, and somehow he doubted that nurse would be marathoning it if she were on duty.
Besides, going by how hard and heavy that footfall was? He was liable to open up a can of whoop-ass, instead of just a door—and whereas he was suicidal enough to fight anything that rode up on him, this was about helping Payne, not his ego or his boxing skills.
Doubling back, he headed in the opposite direction. Knocking. Opening when he could. The farther he went, the less classroom-y it was and the more police-station-interrogation-y shit became. Down at the far end, there was a massive door that was right out of the movies, with its reinforced, bolted panels.
Outside world, he thought.
Going right up to it, he threw his weight against the bar, and—surprise! He burst out into the parking garage, where his Porsche was parked at the curb.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
His eyes snapped over to a blacked-out Escalade: windows, rims, grille, everything was tinted. Standing next to it was the guy he’d seen that first night, the one he’d thought he’d recognized . . .
“I’ve seen you somewhere,” Manny said as the door shut behind him.
From his pocket, the vampire took out a baseball cap and put it on. Red Sox. Of course, given the Boston accent.
Although the big question was, how in the hell did a vampire end up sounding like he was from Southie?
“Nice Jesus piece,” the guy muttered, glancing at Manny’s cross. “Are you looking for your clothes?”
Manny rolled his eyes. “Yeah. Someone stole them.”
“So they could impersonate a doctor?”
“Maybe it’s your Halloween—how the fuck do I know?”
From under the dark blue brim, a smile cranked into place, revealing a cap on one of his front teeth . . . as well as a set of fangs.
As Manny’s brain cramped, the conclusion it struggled with was unassailable : He’d been a human once, this guy. And how did that happen?
“Do yourself a favor,” the male said. “Stop thinking, go back to the clinic, and get dressed before Vishous shows up.”
“I know I’ve seen you, and eventually I’m going to put it all together. But whatever—right now, I need access to the feeds from the security cameras down here.”
That snarky half smile evaporated. “And why the hell is that.”
“Because my patient just sat herself up—and I’m not talking about her raising her torso off the damn pillows. I wasn’t there when she did it and I need to see how it happened.”
Red Sox seemed to stop breathing. “What . . . I’m sorry. What the fuck are you saying.”
“Do I need to reenact it in charades or some shit?”
“I’ll pass on that—I so don’t need you on your knees in front of me with only a towel on.”
“Which makes two of us.”
“Wait, are you serious?”
“Yeah. I’m really not interested in blowing you, either.”
There was a pause. And then the bastard barked out a laugh. “You’ve got a smart mouth on you, I’ll give you that—and yeah, I can help you, but you got to get your clothes on, my man. V catches you like that around his sister and you’re going to need to operate on your own legs.”
As the guy started to walk back to the door, Manny put it together. It wasn’t from the hospital. “St. Patrick’s. That’s where I’ve seen you. You sit in the back pews during the midnight Masses alone, and you always wear that hat.”
The guy threw open the entrance and stood to the side. No telling where his eyes were because of that brim, but Manny was willing to bet they weren’t on him.
“Don’t know what you’re talking about, buddy.”
Bull. Shit, Manny thought.
TWENTY-FOUR
Welcome to the New World.
As Xcor stepped out into the night, everything was different: The smell was not of the woods around his castle, but a city’s musk of smog and sewer, and the sounds were not of distant deer soft-footing about the underbrush, but of cars and sirens and shouted talk.
“Verily, Throe, you have found us stellar accommodations,” he drawled.
“The estate should be ready tomorrow.”
“And am I to think it shall be an improvement?” He glanced back at the row house they’d spent the day holed up in. “Or will you surprise us with even lesser grandeur.”
“You will find it more than suitable. I assure you.”
In truth, considering all the variables of getting them over here, the vampire had done a superb job. They had had to take two overnight flights to ensure that no daylight problems occurred, and once they finally arrived in this Caldwell, Throe had somehow arranged everything: That decrepit house nevertheless had a solid basement, and there had been a doggen to serve them meals. The permanent solution to their residence had yet to make its appearance, but it was likely going to be what they needed.
“It had better be out of this urban filth.”
“Worry not. I know your preferences.”
Xcor did not like being in cities. Humans were stupid cows, but a stampede with no brains was more dangerous than one with intelligence—you could never predict the clueless. Although there was one benefit: He wanted to case the city before announcing his arrival to the Brotherhood and his “king,” and there was no greater proximity than the one they had.
The house was in the thick of the downtown.
“We walk this way,” he said, striding off, his band of bastards falling into formation behind him.
Caldwell, New York, would no doubt offer few revelations. As he had learned from both olden times and this well-lit present, cities at night were all the same, regardless of geography: The people out were not the plodding law abiders, but the truants and misfits and malcontents. And sure enough, as they progressed block by block, he saw humans sitting on the pavement in their own excrement, or packs of scum striding with aggression, or seedy females seeking even seedier males.
None thought to take on his group of six strong backs, however—and he almost wished they would. A fight would burn off their energy—although with luck, they would come upon the enemy and face a worthy opponent for the first time in two decades.
As he and his males turned a corner, they came upon a human infestation: Several barlike establishments set on either side of the road were lit up brightly and had lines of half-dressed people waiting to get into their confines. He could not read the signs that o’erhung the openings, but the way the men and women stamped their feet and twitched and talked, it was obvious that temporary oblivion waited on the far side of their hapless patience.
He was of a mind to slaughter them all, and he became acutely aware of his scythe: The weapon was at rest upon his back, folded in two, nestled in its harness and hidden under his floor-length leather duster.
To keep it in its place, he mollified the blade with the promise of slayers.
“I’m hungry,” Zypher said. Characteristically, the male was not talking about food, and his timing was not a mistake: The cue for sex was in the lineup of human females they walked past. Indeed, the women presented themselves for using, painted eyes locking on the males they mistakenly believed were of their race.
Well, locking on the faces of the males who were other than Xcor. Him they took one look at and glanced away with alacrity.
“Later,” he said. “I shall see that you get what you need.”
Although he doubted he would partake, he was well aware that his soldiers required sustenance of the fucking variety, and he was more than willing to grant it—fighters fought better if they were serviced; he had learned that long ago. And who knew, mayhap he would take something himself if his eye was caught—assuming she could get past what he looked like. Then again, that was what they made money for. Many was the time he had paid for females to put up with his be
ing within their sex. ’Twas far better than forcing them to submit, which he hadn’t the stomach for—though he would admit such weakness to no one.
Such dalliances would not be until the end of the night, however. First, they needed to survey their new environment.
After they passed through the choked thicket of clubs, they came out into precisely what he had hoped to find . . . utter urban emptiness : whole blocks of buildings that were unoccupied for the evening, or perhaps even longer; roads that were bereft of traffic; alleys that were dark and cloistered with good space to fight in.
The enemy would be herein. He just knew it: The one affinity among both parties to the war was secrecy. And here, fights could happen with less fear of interruption.
With his body itching for a conflict and the sounds of the heels of his band of bastards behind him, Xcor smiled into the night. This was going to be—
Rounding yet another corner, he halted. A block up on the left, there was a gaggle of black-and-white cars parked in a loose circle around the opening of an alley . . . rather as if they were a necklace about the throat of a female. He couldn’t read the patterns on the doors, but the blue lights atop their roofs told him they were human police.
Inhaling, he caught the scent of death.
Fairly recent killing, he decided, but not as juicy as an immediate one.
“Humans,” he sneered. “If only they were more efficient and would kill each other off completely.”
“Aye,” someone agreed.
“Onward,” he demanded, proceeding forth.
As they stalked by the crime scene, Xcor looked into the alley. Human men with queasy expressions and fidgety hands stood around a large box of some kind, as if they expected something to jump out at any moment and seize them by the cocks with a taloned grip.
How typical. Vampires would be delving in and dominating—at least, any vampire worth his nature. Humans only seemed to find their mettle when the Omega interceded, however.
Standing over a cardboard box that was stained through in places and big enough to fit a refrigerator in, José de la Cruz flicked his flashlight on and ran the beam over another mutilated body. It was hard to get much of an impression of the corpse, given that gravity had done its job and sucked the victim down into a tangle of limbs, but the savagely shaved-off hair and the gouged patch on the upper arm suggested that this was number two for his team.
