The men dropped the coffin and quickly left, slamming the door behind them. Doc Jenkins patted Angelina’s shoulder.
“He’s too late. She’s gone,” Katie whispered.
An enraged, ear-splitting roar erupted from within the coffin.
Hearing Angelina’s sobs and an unfamiliar voice say that he’d arrived too late to save Diana, Sebastian roared in denial and burst free from the coffin. Splinters shot out in every direction as the wooden box shattered.
Standing amidst the remains of the coffin, he searched the room for Diana. His gaze swept past a man in a white, threadbare doctor’s jacket, past a desk, past empty beds, then came to an abrupt halt at a curtain partially obstructing his view of the only patient. He took a step closer and flung the curtain aside.
Angelina rocked on her knees beside the bed. Shaking from the sobs racking her body, she didn’t even acknowledge his presence. The sweet scent of Diana’s blood was so faint, he had to strain to separate it from the stench of medicines and antiseptics and fear permeating the air. Straining his ears, he sought some sign of life from the frail body lying in the bed but heard not a wisp of a breath over Angelina’s blubbering.
He glowered at her until she stood, then brought his face close to hers and growled. “Stop crying. You hear me? Don’t you dare give up on her.”
A whimper drew his attention to the nurse standing on the other side of Diana’s bed. Her hand trembled, making the sheet clutched in it flutter above Diana’s face.
“What the hell are you doing,” he snarled.
The woman reeked of fear, a foul, pungent odor that made his stomach roil. Her hand twitched. Her wide eyes darted from him to the doctor, then back to him.
“I-I…” Crimson tears pooled in her eyes. She blinked until they spilled over her cheeks. “N-no pulse.”
“Drop it.” He flexed his fingers against the pain of his nails growing. Before she could cover Diana’s face, before she could utter those two words again, he bellowed, “Now!”
The sheet fluttered from her hands as she crumpled to the floor in a dead faint. Tossing a chair out of his way, Sebastian leapt across the room and caught the sheet a hairsbreadth away from Diana’s face.
“She’s gone, Sebastian.” Angelina sobbed and buried her face in her hands. “I heard her take her last breath. Our Diana’s dead.”
“She is not dead,” he stated, his voice, burning glare and clenched fists daring anyone to disagree.
“Then save her. Bring her back to me.” Angelina pried open one of his fists and pressed Diana’s wrist in his hand. “Like Mina brought back Dracula, you bring her back to me.”
Sebastian refused to acknowledge that his soul mate’s heart no longer beat. How could it not when his own pounded in his ears? He leaned over and kissed her lips. “Come back to me, Diana.”
When her breath failed to touch his lips, he howled in denial. “She has so little blood,” he breathed. They were one. Their hearts would either beat as one or he would join her in death. A tear burned a path down his cheek. Swiping it away, he licked the blood from the back of his hand and vowed he would not shed one more bloody tear. Diana needed every drop he had to give. “Mina help us, it’s the only way.”
Yanking the sheet from her body, he hissed. Gaping wounds marred nearly every inch of Diana’s arms and legs. After he eased her out of the gray hospital gown, he discovered that more covered her torso. Thick, black thread sealed some, but others oozed with pus.
He tossed the sheet to Angelina. “Rip off a long strip.” After shedding his clothes, he gingerly climbed onto the bed and lifted Diana’s left wrist to his mouth. Sinking his teeth into her pale skin, he tore open her artery. Seeing through a crimson haze of tears, he hesitated when a miniscule drop of blood slid down her arm. When he opened the artery on his right wrist, his blood spurted out onto the pristine sheets.
Moving so quickly his hands blurred before his eyes, he pressed his open vein to hers then, using his mouth and other hand, bound their wrists together. Then waited.
And prayed to God, the angels, Mina, Dracula and all who might hear. He focused on her lungs, her heart, their connected wrists. The tale of Mina’s miracle rang in his ears. How she’d bound herself to her fallen love and begged the angels above for mercy. How a light brighter than that of the sun shone down upon them, filling her with warmth, peace and hope. How Dracula’s vein had felt as if it were suckling on hers, drawing in more and more of her blood to replenish his.
“Please,” he whispered, gazing down on the face that had bewitched him from that first night by the lake. “Don’t leave me.”
Sebastian saw no light, felt no warmth or peace. Diana’s cold, limp wrist pressed against his. His lungs seized. He’d lost her. When he opened his mouth to curse the angels and anyone else responsible for taking Diana, he felt her vein adhere to his, felt her heart stutter. His blood surged through his veins to his wrist, left his body with every beat of his heart and flowed into Diana’s. He allowed his tears free rein when Diana’s blue lips turned pink.
“When I pass out, you must keep us together. And don’t touch the bindings. Do you hear me? No matter what happens, we must stay together,” he said, never taking his eyes from those lips.
He slid beneath the sheets and drew Diana into his arms. They had to be united. Completely. But his fear that he still might fail left him impotent. Closing his eyes, he envisioned her naked, teasing him as he undressed in the cottage, moaning as she watched him wash her in the shower and drawing his hips down to hers as she accepted him for what he was. Nothing worked.
And then he saw her as he did that first night, dancing naked in the moonlight, running into his arms. Recalling the feel of her body slamming into him, then melting against his chest when he captured her lips, desire stirred.
With a relieved sigh, he nudged the head of his cock between her nether lips. His breath hitched when instead of being engulfed in her heat, he felt as if he’d just dipped himself into a cool pool of stagnant water. He thrust deeper. A wave of dizziness from his blood loss hit him. Lowering his lips to Diana’s, he struggled to remain conscious.
They were together again. Nothing else mattered. If this failed, they would at least die together. Bound as they were always meant to be.
“You want me to what?” Frank sputtered, spraying the ancient map and Damien’s face with coffee.
Damien scowled and grabbed the lace doily on the arm of the chair. He gently blotted the drops off the already bleeding ink. “Do you have any idea how old this map is?”
“No, but I do know that my mother will have your head for ruining her great-grandmother’s doily.” Frank leaned back in the chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “Ink and coffee. Ruined.”
“Your mother and daughter need this map more than some wisp of lace.” Damien tossed the doily across the table.
“I won’t do it.”
Damien ran his hands through his hair. “It’s the only way, Frank.”
“It’s suicide. From what you’ve told me, if I drop you into the center of the city, they’ll have you bled dry before you hit the ground.” He swiped his hand across the table, sending the map and doily to the floor.
“Frank!” Damien leapt up, tossed the map back onto the table, then bent to retrieve the doily. He turned the delicate strip of lace over and over in his hand, then tenderly folded it and stuck it in the pocket over his heart. He turned to Frank. “I know it’s risky, but if we do this right, if you dangle me out of reach until every damn one of them is there, then by the time I hit the ground, you’ll have Angelina and Diana out of there.”
Frank hung his head and dropped back down into the chair. “I never believed until today that you loved my mother, you know? All these years, all those executions, simply because I refused to believe a vampire could have any reason to want my mother except as a blood bank. My God, I even killed my own brother.”
Damien shook his head. “You didn’t know.”
�
��What have I done? How many children are orphans because of my own jealousy?” Frank rubbed the back of his neck, then stilled. “Did my brother have children?”
Damien hung his head. “He had a little girl.”
Frank pounded the table with his fist. “I should be the one dropped. I deserve to die, not you.”
Grasping Frank’s shoulder, Damien squeezed. “Thanks for offering, but they don’t want human blood, Frank. They want vampire blood.”
“Then transform me.” He raised his head, his eyes wide. “Give me your blood.”
“It wouldn’t work. Your scent wouldn’t be strong enough to draw them all, if any. Even if it could work, I could never do that to Angelina. How could I look her in the eyes knowing that I’d sacrificed her only living son rather than myself?” He went back to his seat and smoothed out the map. “No, Frank, this is the only way.”
Frank leaned across the table and grabbed Damien’s arm. “A bag. We could fill a bag with some of your blood.”
“No, Frank.”
“We’ll poke a hole, let some drip down.”
“Frank!”
“What? It could work. They’d definitely smell it.” He dug his fingers into Damien’s arm. “Goddamnit, at least consider it!”
Damien scowled. “They’d know, Frank. They may be mad, but they’re not stupid. Some wouldn’t even bother to show up for a small bag of blood. The first bite and the ground would get more than them.”
Frank slumped back in his chair. “Ironic, isn’t it, Damien? I spent my whole life trying to kill you and failing. And now? All I want to do is find a way to keep you alive and I can’t do that.”
“But you can save your mother and daughter, Frank. Now let’s get this rescue on the road. Get me some more coffee. We have a long day ahead of us and I’m not used to being up at this hour.” He watched the man he’d once feared drag his feet as he left the room.
“Damien?”
Damien turned. Tomas, his wounds already healing, sat on the couch glaring at him.
“Are you crazy? You’re going to let him drop you on Fentmore, in the middle of the city?”
Damien shrugged. “Angelina’s my soul mate, Tomas. Her life is more important to me than my own.”
“But if you’re dead—”
“If I’m dead there’s at least some chance we will meet again in another lifetime. Go back to sleep, Tomas. We’ll need your help tonight.”
“Sebastian’s already there, you know,” Tomas mumbled as he snuggled back down into the cushions.
“He’s on Fentmore?” Damien strode over to the couch.
“Yup. The fool thought I was dead.” He yawned and rolled over. “They’re bonding the ancient way.”
Damien grabbed Tomas’ shoulder and rolled him onto his back. “The ancient way? Why the hell would he do that?”
“What’s the big deal? All of the ancient ones bonded with their human mates that way.”
“And most of them died, Tomas. Most of them bled to death and were buried still tied to each other. You know that.” Damien shut his eyes, searching for Sebastian, but Tomas’ finger poking his chest broke his concentration.
“I think the two thousand years you’ve lived since your days in school have fogged your memory, Damien. They died because both their bodies didn’t really need to take in the other’s blood. Not so with Sebastian and Diana. She was already dead, bled nearly dry—”
Grabbing Tomas’ arms, Damien raised him until their eyes were level.
Tomas’ eyes flew open. “Put me down, Damien.”
“Explain what the hell you’re talking about,” he uttered, his voice deadly.
“Well, I didn’t get all of it, because Sebastian kinda vanished from my mind in the middle.” He watched Damien’s rage escalate and rushed on. “But I’m sure he’s okay. He’s in some sort of hospital. Outside the city.”
Damien dropped Tomas back down to the couch and strode to the table. He returned to couch, the map crushed in his fist. “There is no hospital outside of the city. There’s nothing but wilderness around it.”
“Ah, well, it seems that an awful lot has gone on over there you elders don’t know about.” Tomas leapt over the back of the couch when Damien advanced. “Okay. Shit! Get a grip.”
“I’ll get a grip on your neck if you don’t tell me what the hell you’re talking about.” Damien soared over the couch and pinned his nephew against the wall. “Talk, Tomas. And don’t stop until you’ve told me everything you know about Fentmore.”
“Okay. Okay. You elders all blocked that place from your minds. Sure, you had the Slashers dropped down in the center of the city, but you always had us young ones fly the helicopters. And never more than a few times, warning us to wipe the memory from our minds and block out the maddening cries for blood. We had to promise when we returned not to talk about it so that we wouldn’t open any vampire’s mind to the cries. Well, some went when there was a full moon, some saw a different place than the—”
“Different?”
“Yeah. Marek told me right before he,” he nodded toward the kitchen, “killed him. Marek said a wall surrounded the city. Olympia used to tell him frightening bedtime stories about the island. So when he returned, he said she’d lied, because it wasn’t all that bad. He’d seen a town on the other side of the wall, so it couldn’t be like she’d said.”
“A town? You mean the Slashers built a wall and a town? That’s impossible.” Damien started to turn away, chuckling. “Marek was pulling your leg.”
Tomas grabbed his arm and jerked him around. “Marek didn’t lie. He said the Slashers were in the city. This town had others in it. It was night, but he saw women with babies, kids playing in a park and even farms.”
“Did Sebastian know about this?” Damien couldn’t believe word of these changes hadn’t leaked out.
“If he did, he didn’t hear about it from me. I swore to Marek I wouldn’t tell anyone that he’d talked. He was afraid you and the elders would punish him. Can you imagine if Tobias heard someone talked?” He let out a long whistle.
“Go on, Tomas. What else do you know?”
“Well, I did tell Diego, you know, because he’s been my best friend for, oh, years and—”
“Just get to the point, Tomas.”
“Diego flew Sebastian in this morning, so I guess he went right to the town instead of the city. Well, Sebastian yelled some sort of goodbye to me, like I was already dead. I set him straight and gave him a piece of my mind about not coming to save me. Then, bam! He floods me with info. Diana’s dead. Ancient bonding. Hospital. Doctor. Nurse. Diana dead. He shouted that about twenty times.”
“Diana’s dead?”
They both turned. Frank stood on the other side of the couch. The cup of black coffee tilted forward in his loosening grip, its steaming contents pouring onto the cushion below.
Damien rushed to him. “No, Frank. She can’t be. Angelina would have sent me some kind of word.” He grabbed the cup and looked down at the dark stain on the couch. “When she gets back here, we’re going to have a lot of explaining to do.”
“Maybe she didn’t send word because she’s dead too,” Frank mumbled, turning away.
“Oh no. I definitely picked up that Angelina was fine. Just freaked out about Diana being dead and all—” Tomas clamped his mouth shut when Damien bared his fangs. “But Sebastian’s giving her his blood.”
“And probably killing himself in the process,” Damien muttered, draping his arm across Frank’s slumped shoulders. “Frank, Sebastian won’t let her die. He’ll give her his last drop before he lets that happen.”
Frank shuddered. “If she’s already dead, how could she suck—?”
“Ancient bonding, man.” Tomas leapt across the couch and flung his arm over Damien’s from the other side of Frank.
Frank looked at the vampires standing on either side of him. “You’re both consoling me as if I’ve never killed your kind. You’re better men than I could ever hope to
be. So how does this bonding help Diana suck?”
“Sebastian tied his open vein to hers,” Tomas said, making the motion of biting into one of his wrists, then holding it to the other.
“Tied?”
“This way, when he passes out from loss of blood, his vein remains on hers,” Damien answered, a chill at the implications running down his spine. “The old ones believed their blood would pass back and forth until it had completely merged, making them one with their mates.”
“Right. We’re talking big-time romance, Frank,” Tomas said, grinning.
“Except Diana supposedly has hardly any blood. Which means it will all flow into her, probably take all day. We heal during the day. By dusk, Sebastian’s vein will have closed.” Damien stared at the two men and waited for what he said to sink in.
Frank grasped his meaning first. “Before enough flows back into his body?”
Tomas’ grin vanished.
“Then she would live and he would die,” Frank mumbled.
“It doesn’t quite work that way,” Damien explained. “If he dies, then his blood will be useless to her. Ancient Bondings are where you humans got all those fallacies about vampires only living as long as the one who transformed them lives. The Ancient Bonding created one entity of two people. Each couple’s blood is unique. Ancient Bonding is no longer acceptable because, for some reason, when one of the bonded mates died, the other quickly followed.”
“And Sebastian knows this,” Frank asked.
Damien raised a brow and looked at Tomas.
Tomas grimaced. “I guess that’s what he meant by their hearts would either beat as one or he would join her in death.”
“Do you all commit suicide so casually?” Frank gasped.
“Only for our soul mates, Frank.” Damien tried to smile, but failed.
“He’s counting on us getting there in time,” Tomas said. “He said you knew what to do.”
“Then let’s get moving. If I understand you two,” Frank said, moving out from under their arms, “I don’t have to use Damien as bait.”
Damien nodded.
Frank glanced at the clock. “Well, we’ve got three hours ‘til dusk.”
Undeniable Page 29
