4
I CLAMPED MY HAND OVER MY MOUTH TO KEEP MYSELF from screaming.
Matthias didn’t scream either, but dark, pained snarls came from deep in his throat as Meyers searched inside his gut.
“It’s here somewhere. I know it.”
“I’m going to kill you, you f*cking maggot.” Matthias’s words were barely understandable.
“Shh. It will only hurt more if you keep struggling.”
Vomit rose in my throat but I choked it back as hot tears slid down my cheeks. I couldn’t move. I felt powerless to do anything to help him. All I could do was stand by and watch this horrific attack.
“Here,” Meyers said after a torturous wait. “I think I have it.”
He pulled out his hand, dark and wet nearly to the elbow, dripping with Matthias’s blood. Matthias buckled over, gasping.
“Nearly thirty years,” Meyers mused. He pulled a handkerchief out from his pocket and wiped off the small metal object he held in his bloody hand. Then he held it up to the light enough for me to see that it was a key.
I found it hard to believe that Matthias had kept the key to Kristoff’s secret prison hidden inside his body, but he had. And Meyers had just ripped it out.
Meyers thrust his chin toward the thugs. “Let him go.”
“You will regret this,” Matthias said, pained words, as he collapsed to his knees on the pavement.
“I’d kill you myself, but I get the strange feeling that your brother will likely want to do it himself.”
With the steel-toed tip of his boot, one of the thugs kicked Matthias in his shoulder, knocking him backward. Then, without another word, they left. Moments later there was the squeal of tires as a black car in the shadows drove out of the parking lot.
Shaking, I finally left my hiding spot, my breath coming in gasps. I quickly made it over to where Matthias lay on the ground unmoving.
I didn’t want to look at his wound but I forced myself to. It was horrible, a big gaping hole pouring blood. But there was more than torn skin and blood; I could see the glisten of his intestines as well. I gagged, clamping my hand over my mouth.
“That bad?” His voice was so weak I could barely hear it.
“Worse.” It was difficult to breathe. “My God, why didn’t you fight them?”
“I was fighting them. I’m not quite as fit as I was a—a week ago.”
“Why not? What’s wrong with you?”
He finally opened his eyes. They seemed even paler gray in the moonlight than they normally did. “Your blood is what’s wrong with me.”
I shook my head. “It didn’t kill you.”
“No, it didn’t. I was immortal. The ritual . . . my brother’s ritual . . . it was all that allowed me to survive the Nightshade. But the . . . poison stripped that away. I’m not immortal anymore. I’ve been weakened for the past week—it’s what kept me from finding you sooner. My strength . . . it’s nearly gone completely.”
I felt cold. “What are you saying?”
He looked at me. “I’m dying. I can feel it deep inside of me. I have days left, if that.”
“You’re dying? How is that possible?”
“Your blood stripped away my immortality. I’m now no more able to cheat death than any other of my kind.”
I felt stunned—was what he was saying true? He’d lived for four centuries. And now he was dying. Because of my blood.
It was a Nightshade success story. And it made me feel like hell that I was responsible for the pain he was going through right now.
He watched me through half-closed eyes. “Does the thought of my death upset you?”
I sucked in a shaky breath, trying to compose myself. “Not nearly as much as the sight of your internal organs spilling out on the pavement.” Anyone else—anyone human—would already be dead from an injury this bad. “Shouldn’t you have started healing by now?”
His expression was tense. “This injury . . . it’s too severe for me to heal as I normally would.”
“What does that mean? Can you bleed to death?”
“Yes, I believe so.”
I’d normally look at Matthias as a threat, not a potential victim. But here he lay, his life spilling out of him, his immortality a thing of the past. I didn’t want to feel empathy for him, but I did anyway. “You need to tell me how to save Declan.”
He laughed at that, before the sound was cut off with a groan. “As my life spills out on the ground with only you to witness the end of me, your thoughts are with your soon to be uncontrollable dhampyr lover.”
I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment. I didn’t believe what was happening to Declan was because of him simply being a dhampyr. His serum was to blame for his violent outburst earlier. But ... I could be wrong. All I knew was Matthias couldn’t die. He knew too much. And that information was very valuable to me.
I touched Matthias’s shoulder, glancing again at his horrible wound. “You said you know how to help him.”
“I do. And if I die right now, you’ll never find out how.” It sounded like a threat.
I crossed my arms, trying to stop my hands from shaking. “Do you want me to call an ambulance?”
His grin looked more like a grimace. “Human hospitals can’t help me.”
I craned my neck, but no one was around. It felt as if the entire world was asleep or that it had abandoned us. “Then what can I do?”
“Come closer . . .”
I frowned before leaning over toward him. He raked his hand into my long black hair and drew me even closer so he could whisper in my ear. “Blood.”
I jerked back from him. “What?”
“I need blood. It will help me heal. You need to help me, Jillian.”
I scrambled up to my feet, noting that the spiderweblike indication of his hunger had quickly appeared on his face and his gray irises had turned black. Matthias needed a victim—that’s what he was asking for. Since he couldn’t sink his fangs into me to get healthy again, he was willing to see other people.
At the moment he was too mortally injured and bleeding out onto the pavement of the motel’s parking lot to help himself. The dark puddle he lay in was growing with each minute that passed. He couldn’t find the blood he needed without my assistance.
“I don’t have much time left.” His voice had grown weaker. “Help me, Jillian. And I will help you.”
A steady flow of tears stung my eyes but I squeezed them back as I tried to figure this out. There weren’t very many answers to this particular problem. In fact, there was only one.
My entire body felt tense. “Promise me that you won’t kill anyone.”
“I’ll try.”
“Not good enough.”
He sighed and it was shaky. “You don’t understand what it’s like, Jillian. How the hunger takes us over. I’m normally very well fed in all aspects of my life, but right now, I’m not sure. Once I taste blood I might not be able to stop.”
Fresh anger flowed through me at his words. “Couldn’t you just lie to me? Couldn’t you just say you won’t kill anyone? I thought you said you wanted my help.”
Where the hell was Declan? He’d know what to do right now.
But he wasn’t here. I was on my own with a dying vampire on my hands and on my conscience.
If I truly believed the world would be better off without him in it, I’d let him die right here. I wasn’t a total pushover. I wasn’t pro-life when it came to vampires, that’s for damn sure. But Matthias wasn’t just any vampire. And he also knew—or claimed to know—how I could help Declan.
“They took my key,” he whispered as I drew closer again.
“Keeping it in your gut was an interesting hiding place.” I glanced down at his injury and winced. “You might want to invest in a safe-deposit box next time.”
“There won’t be a next time. My brother will be awakened very soon.” There was so much pain in his voice. “You don’t understand what this means. The risk of one human life tonight is nothing compared to countless lives in the future if I can’t stop him.”
If he killed someone tonight, could I live with myself that I’d helped him?
I’d heard enough about Kristoff to make me fear what he would do when he was released from the prison Matthias had trapped him in decades ago. He was a monster, a sociopath, someone who shouldn’t be allowed to live—that is, if he wasn’t already immortal. Matthias had locked him away because he’d had no other choice. And now Kristoff was going to be released so he could pick up where he’d left off.
And if Matthias was being truthful and what had happened with Declan was only the beginning of a horrible downslide into becoming more like a monster dhamp than one who could be reasoned with, one who couldn’t be controlled by any serum or drug—
He was frustrating, aggravating, challenging—but there was something about Declan that I knew I couldn’t lose.
I had to stop overthinking this. There was no time. There was only one answer that I could wrap my head around right now. It didn’t mean it was a good one.
“Fine.” The word came out like a sob. “Tell me what I need to do.”
He forced himself up to a sitting position, holding his intestines in with his right hand. His abdomen was a ragged ruin of flesh and blood. His handsome face had paled more than I thought possible considering how white he was to start with, and the dark circles under his eyes had only grown darker. His blond hair was streaked with his blood. His eyes black. His cheekbones and jawline were covered in those scary-looking thin dark veins. He looked like an angel of death.
“Get me to a human with blood flowing through their veins. Anyone will do.”
I didn’t think. I just moved. I helped him to his feet and his weight slumped against me, almost knocking me over.
He groaned. “Please hurry. Right now, your blood is nearly impossible to resist. This time I know it would kill me in seconds.”
I gritted my teeth as I half pulled, half dragged him across the lot back to the motel. “I’ll keep it in mind for the future.”
“There,” he said after a minute.
I looked forward to see there was a motel door he was pointing at. It was on the side opposite to mine. I figured that there were only a few occupied rooms in the cheap motel and the rooms on either side of my room were currently empty. It was the only explanation for no police banging on the door after Declan had made like a rock star and trashed the place.
“There’s someone in there?” I asked.
“A woman. Alone.”
A chill shot down my spine. “Please don’t kill her, Matthias.”
“Go back to your room. You don’t need to see this.”
Before I could say another word, he knocked on the door, much as he’d done to mine earlier. I half hoped she wouldn’t answer it. What sane single woman opened her motel room door in the dead of the night? Then again, this wasn’t exactly a prime location for the sane.
After a few moments, the door creaked open.
“What the hell do you want?” the woman said. She was a bleached blonde who’d hit her prime of beauty at least twenty years ago. Her eyes bugged as she took in the terrifying sight in front of her. “Wait a minute—no—”
She went to slam the door shut, but Matthias blocked it.
“Look at me,” he said.
She whimpered with fear, but then looked at him and he captured her immediately in his gaze.
“I will try to make this as easy as I can on you. Is my influence working?”
“Yes.” The tremble in her voice had vanished.
“Matthias—” I began.
“I said for you to go.” He shot a look at me, and then pushed the woman inside her room, slamming the door behind him.
He was going to kill her.
Do as he said and go, I thought.
But I didn’t do that. I couldn’t. Instead, I moved to the window. The drapes were open a crack. This time I was the Peeping Tom.
The woman staggered backward, not taking her eyes off Matthias. He looked more demon than angel now. In the light of her room his veins were easily visible and now appeared to cover most of his face. His eyes were as black as death. His cheekbones had sunken in, giving his face a skull-like appearance.
He reached out a bloody hand to her, while keeping the other tight against his split-open gut, and swept the brassy blond hair off her shoulders. Then he grabbed the edge of her leopard print teddy and pulled it down over her shoulder till it was low enough to expose a large, sagging breast. He did the same to the other side. The trashy garment fell to the floor, leaving her completely naked.
“Jesus,” I hissed under my breath, gripping the edge of the window. I could barely breathe. I shouldn’t be here, watching this. I felt sickened and afraid, but I couldn’t turn away.
Matthias didn’t waste any more time. He bent over and sank his fangs into her throat and red blood slid down to her shoulder as he began to feed. I half expected the woman to fight, but of course, she couldn’t. His bite had paralyzed her and her arms hung slackly at her sides. However, her head was turned toward me and I could see the expression on her face. It disturbed me as much as anything else I’d witnessed tonight.
She looked orgasmic.
My hands trembled and felt cold despite the heat of the night, so I rubbed them together. I knew I had to wait there. I had to make sure he stopped before he killed her. Another glance in the window showed that he now had her limp, naked body pinned on her bed, her legs spread, his hand sliding down the length of her.
The whole scenario made the memory of what had happened to me in Matthias’s chambers come back vividly. Other than the blood-drinking it wasn’t that far off. I hadn’t been afraid when I was in his bed. His influence worked to make everything seem okay, even desirable, even when it wasn’t.
After another minute, I sank down to the ground, covered my face with my hands, and started to sob.
Weak and pathetic. Yeah, I know. It had been a difficult couple of weeks.
I jumped nearly out of my skin when the door opened a few minutes later and Matthias emerged. The veins were gone from his face and his eyes had returned to their regular color, but his mouth was smeared with blood. He wiped the back of his right sleeve over his lips as he continued to hold his stomach with his left hand.
“She’s still alive,” he said. “She’ll be weakened for a while, but she’ll recover. I promise.”
I got shakily to my feet and looked in the window. The victim was in bed, the sheets pulled up to her chin. Her chest moved so I could tell she was still breathing. He didn’t hurt her. He’d drank enough blood to fix himself and then he’d tucked her into bed and left.
I was surprised. Truly, completely surprised. Relief moved through me so quickly it nearly made me dizzy.
“Good.” I turned away from him and walked back to my motel room. He was behind me, and without asking permission, he entered behind me and closed the door. I tensed. “Matthias, I want you to leave.”
Before he said anything, his knees buckled and he sank to the floor, his eyes rolling back into his head.
Shit.
I waited for a moment for him to wake up, but he didn’t. I worried that the woman’s blood hadn’t been enough. I crouched next to him and pulled at his hand so I could see his bloody wound.
I ran into the bathroom, and my hands were trembling violently as I wet a towel, then returned to kneel beside him so I could clean the wound a bit to check how severe it was. I braced myself for the worst. It wasn’t nearly as bad as it had been before. I watched in disbelief as the skin a couple inches above his navel knit together like magic over the next couple of minutes.
I’d watched Declan heal like this before, knife and gunshot wounds that needed to be cleaned and taken care of before they had a chance to properly heal. The speed was nearly the same, but the results were very different. While Declan retained a scar to show where the injury had been, a raised reddish pink patch of hardened skin before it faded with additional time, Matthias’s skin healed flawlessly. Not a single mark remained after ten minutes had gone by of the injury that had almost introduced his internal organs to the cold, hard pavement.
I rubbed the damp towel over where the wound had been only minutes before, then touched the healed flesh with my fingertips just to prove I wasn’t imagining things.
“A little lower, please. And feel free to kiss it better.”
I yanked my hand back. Matthias watched me with half-lidded eyes and a pained smile stretching across his face.
“I’ll pass, thanks.”
His amusement faded. Even though he’d been healed from this injury, it didn’t change anything. He believed he was going to die soon from drinking my blood a week ago, and I had no proof that he was wrong about that.
“You look worried about me,” he said.
I swallowed hard and turned away from him. “You think so?”
“Yes.”
I wanted to argue, but I couldn’t find the strength. I had cared if he lived or died tonight, and I couldn’t simply say it was only because of the information he had about Declan.
Maybe I was more softhearted than I gave myself credit for.
“You thought I was going to kill that woman,” he said.
I bit my bottom lip. “I thought it was a distinct possibility. I mean, you are a vampire.”
“I could have killed her easily. But her death wouldn’t have made any difference in strength to me. I took what blood I needed and that was all.”
“So getting her naked first was just personal preference?”
He raised a pale eyebrow. “Keeping watch, were you? I never would have guessed you were a voyeur, Jillian.”
I hated that he was able to make me blush. “I guess I don’t understand how biting someone’s neck requires them to show their tits and ass.”
“No.” He began to push himself slowly up to his feet. “You wouldn’t understand.”
I watched him warily. “So make me understand.”
“Bare skin allows me to feed better. After all, I don’t just feed on blood. At my age, I can feed on a human’s sexual energy as well, which I could tell at a glance she had in spades. I needed all the help I could get.” He smiled. “I really wouldn’t worry. I think she enjoyed herself. And when she wakes, she’ll remember nothing from the incident. No damage done. Is it still sick to you now that I’ve explained it?”
My face felt tight. “I don’t know.”
“Now I’d like to use your shower to clean myself up.” His smile widened. “You’re welcome to join me if you like. I may not be able to drink your blood, but I can still feed off your desire.”
I stood up and moved back from him, feeling that I’d been a bit too friendly with the former vampire king and given him the wrong impression. “Listen, Matthias. Let’s get one thing straight here. What happened between us—well, it was completely fake. It was no different from what just happened with you and your random blood donor just now. The only difference is you didn’t do me the courtesy of letting me forget about it.”
His amused expression held. “Of course, whatever you say. Now, your shower?”
“If I say no, will you leave?”
“You make an excellent point.” Without another word he walked to the bathroom and closed the door behind him. I heard the water turn on a moment later.
To say my feelings toward the former vampire king were conflicted would be a vast understatement. My current emotions included dislike and discomfort, as well as grudging admiration that he’d managed to survive being gutted enough to be a cocky a*shole about it. I didn’t know what else to do other than stand there awkwardly and wait for him to be done.
Declan returned before the shower turned off. The door swung open slowly and he seemed surprised to see me standing there.
I tensed the moment I saw him. It felt as if he’d been gone a day, not just a couple of hours. “Where did you go?”
“I—I needed time to clear my head. I wasn’t thinking straight before.”
No shit. I exhaled shakily, hating that I felt fear at seeing him again. “And now?”
“I’m better. Whatever that was—it passed. It took a while.”
I grabbed his hands so I could see them closer. His knuckles were red and it looked as if they’d recently healed from a more serious injury. I looked up at him. “Punching somebody?”
“Something. A wall. Concrete.”
“Did it help?”
“A little. Although the wall might disagree.” He glanced at the bed and at the damage he’d done to this wall earlier. His face showed strain. “I’m so sorry.”
I shook my head. “Don’t be sorry. It’s okay.”
His brows were drawn closely together and he studied the floor. “How can you say that? I could have hurt you.”
“You didn’t. And you wouldn’t.” I believed it. I didn’t care what Matthias had told me, Declan wasn’t like that. This was an isolated incident only.
“Nothing like that’s ever happened to me before. But . . .”
“But what?”
“I’ve felt that rising violence inside me in the past, but it was something I could control. Distant. Fleeting. There was no control for me earlier.”
The water in the bathroom turned off a moment later and Declan’s head whipped in that direction.
“Who’s here?” he asked sharply.
Damn. I’d forgotten about the showering vampire king for a blissful moment.