by Nell Stark
Stunned, I could say nothing. The news that Brenner was after Valentine specifically—that he wanted to assassinate her in order to complete a mass extermination of her kind—was beyond my comprehension. I had to stop him. But how did we put a halt to the juggernaut of a man who commanded legions and razed entire cities? Clutching at the table edge to steady myself, I struggled to pay attention to Constantine and Helen’s heated discussion. Brenner was a powerful alpha, true, but as long as the Consortium remained intact, I would have powerful allies.
“Just because he eliminated one grade of the Order,” Constantine said, “does not mean that he intends to do the same to the rest.”
Helen’s glance was scornful. “Do you honestly expect me to believe he will not come after each clan in turn? Especially given his success at Sybaris?”
“Perhaps. Or perhaps he will now use the threat of genocide as a bargaining chip.”
She bared her sharpened teeth. “Unacceptable, either way.”
In the ensuing pause, Constantine crossed his arms over his chest. “Give me a place on your tactical operations team.”
“Of course.” Helen stood. “In fact, I am going to have to insist that both of you remain in this building, under Consortium protection, for the foreseeable future.”
My stomach dropped. All summer, I had been looking forward to the moment when I would step across the threshold of our apartment, small and ramshackle though it was. Home. And now I wouldn’t see it for who knew how long.
Suddenly, I panicked. Had Helen been lying? She wasn’t going to keep me from Val, was she? I couldn’t, wouldn’t stand for that. Even if forbidden, I would find her. “I need to see Valentine now,” I said as evenly as I could around the lump forming in my throat.
Helen’s gaze bored into me, equal parts disdain and anger. I had seen the disdain many times before, but the anger was new. What had I done to incur it?
“You are only Brenner’s bargaining chip. Valentine is his target. She has also been secured.” She walked around the table and pulled open the door. “Do not forget the terms of our original agreement, Ms. Newland. You have not done an exemplary job of upholding them these past few months.”
As she swept out into the main chamber, she instructed Darren to take me to Val’s room, and I sighed in relief. Constantine lingered behind, regarding me curiously. “What was that about?”
I flashed back to the day on which I had persuaded Helen to help me to become a Were. Val and I had gone to her office. At first, she had refused her assistance. When she’d finally changed her mind, she had issued an ultimatum. If you promise to do everything in your power to keep her satisfied, I will do this.
Everything in my power. The words were a semantic minefield. Val had seen my desire to learn more about the other half of my psyche, to reach a deeper understanding with my panther-self. She had wanted that for me, had encouraged me to go to Telassar. But had I made the wrong decision? This summer had been difficult for her. Painful. Because of me.
The fierce longing for Val’s touch rose in me and I turned away from Constantine’s searching gaze. Whether I had erred or not, I was back now. I could be what she needed.
“A promise,” I said over my shoulder. “One that I’ve been remiss in keeping.”
*
I had never visited the fifth floor, so I didn’t know whether it had always been a maximum-security facility, or whether it had just recently been transformed into one. Darren shepherded me through the warren of hallways, locked doors featuring palm and retina scanners greeting us at every corridor junction. Each security measure added to the dread and anger that churned in my stomach. To finish what he had started, Balthasar Brenner needed to kill Valentine. I was never going to let him. High-tech gadgets were all well and good, but I wasn’t going to feel better until I could add my claws and teeth to the arsenal protecting Val.
The memory of Brenner looming over me in that café, his sneering fury targeted at me, triggered my panther’s rage. Mentally snarling and spitting, she made a furious bid for control, and I stumbled into Darren as I channeled my focus into subduing her.
“Whoa, whoa,” Darren said, catching me and holding me at arm’s length. “Jesus, even I can feel her pushing.”
I barely registered the pressure of his hands around my biceps, but my panther felt our constraint and thrashed even harder. Easy, easy. Not now. Soon, I promise, but he is strong and we have to be patient. To wait. The words were meaningless to her, but the emotions accompanying them slowly began to have an effect. When I was able to spare enough attention for my own body, I shrugged off Darren’s grip.
“You’re making it worse,” I said. “I’ve got this. Sorry.”
“She really wants out.” Darren was looking at me with grudging admiration, and I remembered just how easy it had been to force him to shift all those months ago when Helen had convinced Valentine to break up with me.
“It’s been a rough few weeks.” I felt my heart rate slow as the panther subsided into the dark reaches of my psyche. Once Val and I had reunited—once we had talked and made love, once she had taken her fill from me—I would go to the hunting grounds and allow my cat free rein.
Darren pointed to a door just a few feet away on the left. “Well, you made it. Room five-thirty-three.”
I didn’t thank him. I didn’t say good-bye. I took three quick steps to the door and knocked, holding my breath.
When it opened a few moments later, shock pushed the breath from my lungs. At long last, after so many days when I had thought I might never see her again, Valentine stood within arm’s length. She wore her standard summer fare—a tank top and cargo shorts—but the tank hung loosely over her torso and the shorts hung low on her hips. Her eyes carried a hint of bloodshot and her face was paler than it should have been. Oh, my God. What have I done?
As if on cue, she grew even whiter.
“Val,” I breathed, stepping forward into the room. She had let go of the door, and I closed it behind me. “Sweetheart…”
I didn’t know what to say, and I didn’t know why she wasn’t moving. Why wasn’t she pushing me against the wall, kissing me, allowing her hands to roam all over my body, loving me the way we both needed? Why was she standing stock-still, trembling?
She looked like she was in shock. Was this a surprise? Had Helen told her nothing—not even that I was safe and on my way home?
Finally, her hands closed around my waist. But she didn’t pull me close. She kept me at bay.
“Alexa.” Her eyes were dark and wild not in desire but in terror. “Please, you can’t be here. You have to go. Now.”
Chapter Sixteen
“Go?” I pushed against Val’s grip and her arms trembled even more violently. She was weak. I could break her hold if I had to. “What are you talking about, Val? I’ve been trying to get back for weeks. I need to be here. With you. God, I’ve missed you so much.”
But Val shook her head. “You’re in terrible danger. Baby, you have to—”
My temper snapped. “What could possibly be more dangerous than being the hostage of Balthasar Brenner?” I pulled her hands away from my waist, then stepped forward and crushed my body to hers. Every muscle in my shoulders relaxed as I surrendered to the perfect fit of us. “You’re not making any sense,” I said, tucking my head beneath her chin. “I love you.”
Her arms came around me then, pulling me even closer than I already was. “I love you,” she whispered raggedly against my ear. “I love you, Alexa. I was so damn worried.”
“I know. Me, too.” For a moment, I allowed myself to simply exist—to let all my fears and anxieties melt away in the shelter of Valentine’s arms. I had known from our very first date we were something special, though I had kept that conviction to myself until much later. Val was my soul mate. My one and only. I would fight through hell as many times as it took to return to her. But I hoped that now, after so much time apart, we could fight side by side, together. The way we were meant to.<
br />
With a sigh, I pushed back just enough to meet her wounded gaze. “Did Helen not tell you I was coming home?”
“Helen doesn’t trust me.” Her laugh was hollow. “She wants me to be the Missionary now. To be the thing that made me this way! And she knows I’ll have no part of it.”
Against my will, the memories cascaded through my brain: the Missionary draining his willing victims at the Circuit; the Missionary crouched over Devon Foster, her blood staining his lips; the Missionary savagely looming over Val as she lay broken on the floor of his apartment. My grip on her tightened.
“You’re not him,” I said, making my voice as soothing as I could. “You’ll never be him. Helen can’t force you to do anything.”
Val nodded. “Yeah,” she said, but I could tell she didn’t mean it. Despite wanting to. “I know.” She swallowed hard. “Anyway. The only news I’ve been getting is what Karma learns from Malcolm. She heard about the siege, but then we didn’t know anything more until yesterday, when you got to Marrakech. I thought you were still there. Safe.”
“Safe?” I looked at her incredulously. “He was hunting us, Val. This is the first time I’ve felt safe in weeks.”
“Helen didn’t tell you.” Her voice was flat but her eyes were anger-bright.
“Tell me what?” I took a deep breath to combat my rising frustration. “I’ve just come from her War Room. We talked about Brenner’s plans.” I raised my hands to cup Val’s face. “You’re the one in terrible danger, Val. He’s after you.”
“What I’m worried about has nothing to do with Brenner. Or hell, maybe it does. I don’t know.” She turned her head just enough to kiss one of my palms. “Let’s sit down, and I’ll explain.”
I didn’t want to sit down; I wanted her to take me to bed. But right now, whatever she was afraid of had overruled both her desire and her thirst. That fact alone frightened me enough to let her lead me to the far corner, where two chairs flanked a small table. I sat, but kept my hand on her knee. Her muscles quivered beneath my touch.
“New York isn’t safe for you. Or for any Were.” She threaded her fingers through mine and I could feel the clamminess of her palm against my knuckles. “There’s a pathogen. As far as I know, it only affects Weres. But it can be fatal.” Her hand tightened. “At least two people are dead. One of them is Gwendolyn.”
My pulse leapt and I worked to keep my breaths slow and steady. “Gwendolyn. The tiger, from the Circuit?”
“Yes. She died trying to break the Record.” Val shuddered, and I leaned in closer to her. “She couldn’t shift. I think—I think that’s what killed her.”
“But I thought you said it was some kind of pathogen?”
Val scrubbed her free hand through her hair, a familiar gesture of frustration. “My current theory—which is just a goddamn educated guess because everyone else is covering this whole thing up—is that the pathogen stops a Were from shifting. And not being able to shift is what eventually…kills.”
My panther growled as my anxiety rose, and I felt fortunate that she couldn’t understand Valentine’s words. “Helen is covering this up? Why?”
Val shrugged. “To stop a panic, probably. But I’m not sure that’s the only reason.” She tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. That simple, loving touch made my heart stutter in a surge of emotion.
“Do you see now? You can’t stay here, baby. It’s too dangerous. This is going to turn into an epidemic, and as far as I know, there isn’t a cure.”
I captured her hand and brought it to my lips. If I focused on her, I could ignore my own fear. “How many sick have you seen?”
“Personally? Four. But I’m sure there are more out there.”
“Still,” I said, “four hardly seems like an epidemic.”
Val’s jaw clenched. “When Gwendolyn died last week, there were at least two hundred people in that room with her. Who knows how this thing even spreads? I don’t know anything about it. If it’s respiratory, it’s already everywhere. Even if it isn’t, given the way our people share blood and sex and needles…” She pulled her hand away from mine and rubbed at her temples. “This is a fucking nightmare. You may already have been exposed!”
I blew out my breath on a long sigh. “I know you’re scared, Val. Frankly, so am I. But I’m not leaving you again. I never should have in the first place.”
“But—”
I put two fingers to her lips “Don’t push me away. Haven’t we already learned this lesson? That we’re so much stronger together than apart?”
“This is qualitatively different, and you know it.”
“It isn’t,” I said, determined to be even more obstinate than she was. “If I run, either Brenner will catch up with me, or this mystery disease will. Probably both. If I stay, we can limit my exposure to other Weres, and I can help you figure out what the hell is going on.”
I moved my fingers away from her mouth and readied myself for her tirade. But she sat silently staring—not at me, but through. Or maybe beyond.
“Before you make a final decision, there’s something else I have to tell you.” I watched her hands clench where they rested on her thighs. “A few days ago, I—I lost control. I attacked Karma.”
“Oh my God.” I leapt out of the chair and knelt before her, scanning her body for marks of injury even as my rational brain told me that if Karma had shifted, Val would be dead. “Did she hurt you?”
Val shook her head. “She knocked me out. She didn’t change. When I woke up, I was here.” She wouldn’t meet my eyes. “Clavier…he had me transfused.”
“Transfused?” I frowned in confusion. “But I thought you said she didn’t hurt you.”
“She didn’t.”
And then the words struck home. Clavier had given her blood. Someone else’s blood. Fury rose in me, sharp and blazing. The panther flexed, and if Clavier had been in the room, I would have let her come. Mine.
“He did this while you were unconscious?” When Val nodded, misery etched in every line of her face, I gripped her legs tightly. “That’s like rape, damn it!”
“That’s what I said when I woke up. That’s what it felt like. Feels like.” She looked away again, her jaw working. “He insisted that he had only done it for my own good—that without the blood, I would have been too dangerous. And maybe he’s right. I was…it felt like I was going crazy.”
“What does this mean?” What was happening in Val’s body? Would my blood still be able to keep the parasite in check? Or had Clavier jeopardized all of that? “For you? For us?”
“I don’t know.” Val’s whisper was agonized. “I don’t think anyone knows.”
In the ensuing silence, I battled back my rage by focusing on the possibilities. If my blood stopped being effective, the parasite would eventually complete its conquest of Val’s circulatory system. She would lapse into a brief coma and emerge from it a full vampire: stronger, faster, more ruthless. Unable to walk in the sunlight. Some believed that in the transition, a full vampire lost her soul.
I wanted to promise her that I’d never let that happen. I wanted to reassure her that receiving someone else’s blood hadn’t changed the potency of mine. It broke my heart to know I could do neither. But Val was acting as if this news would change the way I felt about her, and I couldn’t stand that. My love for her wasn’t attached to any conditions. When would she believe that?
“I love you,” I said. “And I am not leaving you, Valentine.” They were the only truths I had.
She stared at me for a few moments before burying her head in her hands. When her shoulders hitched, I rose to my feet and gently pulled at her wrists. She made a sound deep in her throat, and the sheer animal nature of it stirred my panther’s protective impulses alongside my own.
“Come lie down,” I said, tugging insistently until she stood. I maneuvered her until the backs of her legs were pressing against the bed, and then pushed on her tight shoulders. Obliging me, she stretched out on top of the comforter, one arm
thrown over her eyes. Her chest rose and fell rapidly, and the first thing I did when I slid into place next to her was to rest my palm against the fluttering skin over her heart. Her next breath sounded more like a sob.
I curled into her then, my face against her neck and my arms wrapped tightly around her. Val rarely cried, but she needed to right now, and I wished she would just let go of all the emotions that were strangling her like a vine choking a tree. Instead, she fought them, her body taut against me as she struggled to rein in her tears. I stayed still and quiet, doing nothing more than holding her and occasionally letting my lips skate across her pale skin, until she began to relax.
As her muscles loosened, I raised myself up on one elbow and pulled her arm away from her face. Her eyes were still shadowed by fear, but when I traced one cheekbone with my thumb, she smiled wanly.
“I’m—”
Not wanting her apology, I sealed my mouth to hers. The kiss was our first in weeks, and it seared my soul. Val felt it too, her fingers clutching at my shoulders as though she were drowning and I was her lifeline. In a way, that was true. But her need echoed mine, and I was determined to prove it in every way that I could. I lost myself in her mouth, remembering her fully in the dance of our tongues and the wet slide of our lips, and I didn’t pull away until I felt her tugging at the hem of my T-shirt. I trapped her body between my knees, then sat up and ripped off everything separating my breasts from hers. She followed me, the muscles in her stomach contracting as she kissed the skin I revealed.
Not to be outdone, I undressed her, my knuckles skimming over her torso as I divested her of first the shirt and then the sports bra beneath it. I sucked in my breath as Val’s full, beautiful breasts were freed. She gasped as I cupped them in my hands and lightly rubbed my thumbs over her nipples. They were the loveliest shade of dusky coral, and they hardened at my touch.
