Bonded by Blood

chapter TWO

MACKENZIE COULDN’T REMEMBER ever having a migraine this bad. Her temples pounded like mallets as blazing sunlight penetrated her eyelids. She rolled over, covered her head with her pillow, but the throbbing pulse continued over and over in her skull.

Oh God, she felt like puking.

She dragged herself from the bed toward the bathroom, sheets tangled around her, but she took only a few steps before her head began spinning even faster and her knees buckled. She expected to hit the floor, and weakly stretched out her hands, but somehow she fell onto the bed instead.

She must’ve slept again, drifting in and out of consciousness in an endless stream of time. Damp coldness touched her forehead and neck. It felt so good. Drops of liquid touched the back of her tongue and slid down her throat. The deafening pounding in her head receded beat by beat as the pain fibers loosened their grip from behind her eyes.

When she opened her lids, probably much later, the room was darker than before. But given the small amount of light filtering in through the margins of the closed blinds, she knew it was still daytime.

Hadn’t the blinds been open earlier? Stretching her arms up, she yawned and heard her shoulders crack. Was that migraine only a bad dream? She felt wonderfully refreshed now.

Several washcloths lay neatly folded on her nightstand and a glass of ice water sat on a coaster. That was strange. It wasn’t like Samantha to look after her like this. Her housemate kept strange hours and was rarely home lately.

She looked around but couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Everything looked the same and yet things felt…different. As though something had happened and she’d become aware of it after the fact. The little hairs on the nape of her neck prickled. Change hung invisibly in the air, like perfume lingering in an empty elevator.

How long had she slept? Glancing at her alarm clock, her jaw dropped.

What the…that couldn’t be right. Three o’clock?

She grabbed her cell phone and flipped it open.

A full day gone? She racked her brain for any detail, something that would remind her of how she’d spent the last twenty-four hours.

She remembered riding out to the lonely cemetery, but that’s where everything fogged. Crumbling headstones? Towering trees? Piles of leaves? Yes, she could almost feel them swirling around her legs, hear the wind rustling through branches.

She dug deep and massaged her scalp with her fingers, determined to loosen the memory. There had to be more. An almost faded feeling of dread and sadness wavered somewhere inside. And oddly enough, so did pleasure. She recalled taking a few pictures then…nothing. Could it all have been a dream?

She leaped from the bed, grabbed her camera and snapped the memory stick into the card reader of her computer. She sank into the chair and waited a few impatient moments for all the pictures to transfer. With a click, she opened her photo-editing software and sucked in a tentative breath. The first ones to pop up were of the old cemetery sign. Thank God, she hadn’t imagined riding out there. She blew the air from her lungs in a quick burst of relief.

One by one, she scrolled through the images then emailed them to her boss. Wow, they were pretty damn good. So why couldn’t she remember taking them?

She pinched her upper lip, massaged it between her thumb and forefinger, and rested her elbows on the top of the desk. There had to be a completely rational explanation. She paced around the room, then picked up her cell phone.

“Steve, yeah, it’s me. I just emailed you the pics I took of that location yesterday.”

She heard his fingers flying over the keyboard. “Got ’em.” He paused and she held her breath. Would he like them or would he hate them?

“Hey, nice work. Are the specs here somewhere, too?” He spoke slowly, as if he were concentrating on the pictures.

The specs? Did she even take any measurements or assess the surroundings? “Uh, not yet. I had the mother of all migraines and just now got the chance to send the pictures. I’ll get the specs to you as soon as I can.”

“You’re not sick, are you?” He was probably thankful they were talking on the phone. He had a major germ phobia.

“I don’t think so, but…I sort of blacked out yesterday. I don’t remember taking any of the photos I just sent you.”

“Well, let’s hope the pictures are good enough, then.” He clearly wasn’t concerned about her missing time. “Talked to Patsy at the production company. Turns out they’re considering shooting the film up in Vancouver instead. Something about an actual haunted cemetery.”

Crap. There went her bonus if they went to Canada. Steve talked about several other potential projects, but Mackenzie didn’t really listen. The zombie picture, backed by a major studio, was the only one that promised decent money up front.

Maybe she shouldn’t worry about her long-gone migraine and instead should think about how she was going to make her brother’s tuition payment and get the damn car fixed. Why did big expenses always seem to happen at the same time?

She examined her face in the bathroom mirror, lifted her chin and moved her head from side to side. No dark circles under her eyes, no tired lids. Just refreshed, as if she’d had a great night’s sleep. She reached into the top drawer and grabbed a handful of peanut M&M’s. A large unopened package of candy lay next to the opened one. When had she bought that?

She padded out to the bedroom door and cracked it an inch.

“Sam? You there?”

No answer. She waited a moment then called again. Nothing. The house was silent. What would her roommate be doing digging through her bathroom drawers? Had she eaten the candy, then felt guilty and bought more?

In one bite, she crammed the chocolate pieces into her mouth, turned back to the bathroom and stepped into the shower. Maybe she’d gotten sick and blacked out. Food poisoning? What had she eaten yesterday? Cold pizza?

As she shampooed her hair, her mind ran through the gamut of possibilities. At twenty-six, Mackenzie doubted she had Alzheimer’s like her mother, but losing an entire day with no recollection plucked at the tight order of her life.

She stretched her arms overhead and flexed her muscles. Her temples tingled, probably just remnants of the migraine, but the sensation wasn’t painful. It made her feel…happy? Content? How weird.

She rinsed off and debated hitting the gym, something she rarely felt like doing. With the photos emailed and no classes to teach at the art school, she had the rest of the day free. She should probably go visit her mother, but maybe she’d organize her bedroom closet instead.

Then it struck her. How the hell had she gotten home?

She turned the water off with a jarring crank of old pipes, grabbed a bath towel and ran down the stairs, dripping wet, almost slipping on the bottom step. She skidded through the kitchen and wrenched open the garage door.

Thank God. It was there. But a niggling feeling tugged at the back of her neck as she stared. Her bike was parked on Sam’s side of the garage.

What was going on? Had she lost her mind?

Organized to the point that her brother called her anal, she wasn’t used to feeling so out of control. Maybe she really was going a little crazy. Maybe she did need to see a doctor.

Water from her hair dripped down her back. She wrapped her head with the towel, genie-style, and imagined what Samantha would think if she walked in right now. She’d certainly think Mackenzie was nuts. Although Sam worked at a spa and wasn’t a stranger to seeing naked women’s bodies, she just hadn’t seen this particular one before.

Mackenzie had started back inside when she had a thought.

She approached the bike, opened one of the saddlebags, and sifted through the contents. Where was her tripod? Normally she kept it stored there. Less of a chance she’d forget to bring it on a shoot if she happened to need one. And she hadn’t seen the thing in her room, either.

She noticed her field notebook tucked on its side and flipped through the pages. There were no notes pertaining to the Bear Creek Pioneer Cemetery. No measurements, no sketches, nothing. What the hell happened? Had she forgotten to do them?

She wandered back inside and pressed a few buttons on the espresso maker next to the kitchen window. The high-pitched sound of the grinder echoed in the room and the air filled with the aroma of coffee beans. With a hand on her toweled head, she leaned over the sink to get a better view of her mother’s bird feeder hanging just outside the window overlooking the backyard. The thing was almost empty again. Stupid squirrels.

Her temples began to vibrate, the tingling suddenly replaced by a low buzzing hum. The migraine wasn’t coming back, was it? She put the heel of her hand to her forehead, pressing up on her eyebrows. No. Her head didn’t hurt. Just felt a little strange. She stretched on her tiptoes, reached into the cupboard on the other side of the window and grabbed a coffee cup.

Sweet Jesus.

The oath rang through her head, deep and hoarse. A man’s voice.

She spun around in confusion, the mug slipping from her fingers and clattering to the counter. Where did that come from?

I could just…damn…she’s so…

Words and sentence fragments tumbled into her head from elsewhere but it made no sense. God, what was happening to her? Was she really losing her mind?

“Hello? Sam?” Barely able to eke the words out, she knew her roommate was gone, but she called to her anyway, hoping Sam would answer, though the voice was clearly male. “Who’s there?”

She yanked the towel from her hair and wrapped it around herself in an attempt to cover up. Her heart hammered out a deafening staccato in her chest, while the atmosphere seemed to shift around her as if someone was near. She pulled a large knife from the cutting block, held her other palm to the hilt as she’d been taught and backed up until the edge of the countertop stopped her from going farther.

The words felt as if they had been projected into her head rather than spoken aloud. With the noise from the espresso machine, someone would need to shout for her to even hear them. And what she heard was crystal clear. It just didn’t make sense. She must be going crazy or—

Exquisite…so frightened…I wish…can she hear…

She ran into the dining room, pointing the blade out wildly in front of her. Her temples continued to vibrate and she rubbed her forehead with the back of her knife hand.

Oh God, was this it? Was this what had happened to her father when he disappeared all those years ago? And Stacy?

A surge of strangling heat started at her toes and rose upward, clutching at her chest and pythoning her airways. She could hardly breathe.

It couldn’t be. It couldn’t be happening. Good Lord, no.

Then, like the snap of an off-switch, the vibration in her head stopped. Gone.

Relief flooded over her and she dropped the knife on the dining room table. She drew in a few raspy breaths and the constricting panic disappeared, fading into a calm assurance that she was safe.

What happened to her father had nothing to do with this. She didn’t know why. She just knew.

Seconds ticked into minutes and her breath eventually evened out.

Although she didn’t hear the voice again, something tangible still called to her. A silent longing tugged at her heart as an ache settled into her bones.

Her lips throbbed, felt swollen, and she detected a slow rhythmic sensation in her head. Not painful, just strange. It didn’t seem to match that of her own heart doing cartwheels and clanging around her rib cage. The sound in her temples was steady and quietly reassuring.

Two heartbeats? Okay, think. Well, she knew she couldn’t be pregnant. It took a man as well as a body capable of carrying a child. Two things she didn’t have. No, definitely not pregnant.

What about the missing chunk of time? What if… She felt between her legs and rubbed her hands over her breasts. Nothing. She’d know if she’d had sex last night, especially since it had been ages. No, she was positive she hadn’t been with a man.

Could the migraine be coming back? What the hell was happening to her? She needed to seriously calm down and figure this out. There had to be a completely rational explanation for this…this…whatever this was.

Air. She needed fresh air. She flung open the French doors of the dining room, and a rush of coolness whispered over her damp skin and hair as she scanned the perimeter of her backyard. For what, she had no idea.

The dewy green of spring was everywhere and her cherry tree was starting to blossom. Ceramic pots on the patio waited to be filled with flowers, and a swallow swooped under the eaves, its beak filled with bits of dried grass. Everything seemed the same, normal, but she knew things weren’t.

She concentrated on the slow thumping beat in her head, rather than her racing heart and was startled to find that the more she focused on it, the more comforting it became. Gradually, the tempo of the two beats got closer together and eventually meshed into one.

One rhythm. One sound. One heartbeat.

She leaned against the doorjamb, her skin flushed hot, and for some crazy reason, she imagined the crush of a man’s muscular body against hers. She closed her eyes, wrapped her arms around her toweled body, and could almost feel the strong muscles of his shoulders moving beneath her hands. The musky fragrance of his passion in her lungs. Wetness surged between her legs as if her body were readying itself for him.

Her breath came in short bursts, and drawn to the backyard by an invisible thread, she stepped onto the patio. Like an electric charge, an unseen yet shimmering presence in the air, something called to her. She wanted to respond, to answer, but she didn’t know how.

Then, just as it had started, the second heartbeat was gone. Not a gradual fading, but a tearing away. A bandage ripped from a wound. She waited a few moments, but it was gone.

Shuffling back inside, she collapsed into a chair.

What the hell just happened?

She had to be losing it. Or going completely mental—as her mother’s British friend at the nursing home would say. Imaginary orgasmic sensations? Oh great, how would she explain that one to a doctor?

“Well, I was home alone, when I heard an imaginary guy talking to me, and then I almost had a real orgasm.”

Yeah, right. Can you say crazy? She forced herself to laugh, hoping to lighten her mood so she could think more clearly.

But there was something about the voice in her head that nagged at her. Like she should know it. Like she had heard it before. She racked her brain but came up with nothing.

And what about her missing day? What the heck was going on?

She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and pushed away from the table. No sense wasting time worrying or pondering. She would do what she always did—she’d either find some answers or she’d quit dwelling on things she had no control over and move on. She’d had a lot of practice with that.

After mopping up all the water she’d tracked in from her shower, she finished getting ready and jumped on the Triumph. Armed with a plan, she roared out of the garage.

T HIS CAN’T be happening. It’s just a Hill Country legend. An old Cantabrian myth. Not real.

Dom swung his silver Porsche away from the curb and followed the woman—Mackenzie—through her neighborhood and onto a major thoroughfare. With a bandanna on her head and two braided pigtails bouncing on her back, she handled the bike deftly. Where was her goddamn helmet?

Of course, he had heard the old stories told during the Feast of the Longest Day. But that was all they were. Stories. No one actually knew anyone who became telepathic and bonded through blood sharing. And certainly not with a human. It was just a tale about sex and love told by the elders late at night around the bonfires. A gothic romance causing girls to swoon and boys to snicker. No one thought it had any basis in reality.

But what else could it be? She clearly heard his thoughts and he had heard hers. If he hadn’t made that realization and shut his mind off to her, who knew what she would have done with that knife. There were stories of that, as well. And for God’s sake, they’d practically made love from a distance. His balls still ached.

After he had nursed her through the night and most of the day, when he was confident her condition had improved enough, he planned to drive out of her life. He didn’t have time for this. So why was he following her?

He really should turn around, head home. She looked fine now. But when he lifted his foot off the accelerator, a pain cut into his gut like a blunt knife. He needed to flick the turn signal, crank the steering wheel, but he couldn’t make himself do it. He rubbed a hand over his chest, which actually ached. When he pressed down on the pedal again and the vehicle moved a little closer, the pain faded away.

What the hell was going on? This seemed much more than just a sweetblood attraction. Alfonso had never mentioned any of this shit happening to him.

And where was she going? He didn’t dare probe her mind to find out. If things felt to her as they did to him, the sounds in her head might cause her to run off the road. Could she feel him, too, and just not understand the sensation? Unlike his thoughts, his presence was something he couldn’t block from her.

She turned the bike onto the freeway on-ramp and headed north. The aching pit in his gut expanded and he knew it was worry.

Then his phone rang. Santiago. The Region Commander.

And the pit stretched wider.

“Dom, how’d it go? Get it locked up with that woman?”

“A little too locked up, I’d say.”

She wove in and out of cars like a lunatic on that bike. It was the tail-end of rush hour and traffic was still heavy on the wet roadways.

“How so?” Santiago sounded apprehensive, like he was ready to get pissed off. “Wait. Are you in the car? At this hour?”

“Uh, yes.” Dom gritted his teeth, preparing himself for the inevitable verbal onslaught. “Remember when we talked last night and I told you the woman was dying? Lips turning blue? Vital signs weakening?”

“Don’t f*ckin’ tell me. Don’t you say it. I told you to just walk away.”

“Well, I didn’t.”

“And you—” Dom turned down the volume as his boss yelled.

He knew Santiago would freak out. What did he expect? Dom would be lucky not to be hauled in front of the Council. What he’d done this time was more than just a simple infraction.

Although she was five or six cars ahead of him, he could see the exposed skin on her back between her jacket and the low waistband of her jeans. Was everyone else on the road staring at the same tantalizing inch he was? White-knuckling it, he accelerated and the Porsche surged forward.

“Listen. She was going downhill fast and I thought she wouldn’t make it. It was a small amount. Just a couple drops of my blood. She appears to be doing fine now, so it worked. But there’s a little problem.”

“More than an illegal blood transfer? What could be worse than that, Dom? What in God’s name could possibly be worse?”

Mackenzie changed lanes, spraying an arc of standing water and causing the car behind her to slam on its brakes. What the hell was she doing riding a motorcycle with these road conditions anyway? He eased up on the gas and the Porsche downshifted automatically. Seeing an opening ahead, he cranked the wheel and accelerated into the next lane.

“In addition to a sudden lack of UV sensitivity, I am— She is— We’re telepathic.” There, he said it.

“You’re what?”

“I can hear her and she can hear me. Thank God I was able to set up a mental barrier when I realized she could hear my thoughts, but there was nothing I could do about her feeling my presence until I left.”

Santiago was uncharacteristically quiet.

“You still there?”

“You’re not shitting me, are you?”

“This isn’t a damn joke. I’d walk away right now and forget all about this mind-reading bullshit, but she’s still in danger.” That wasn’t the only reason he didn’t want to walk away, but he wasn’t about to tell Santiago about the stabbing feeling inside when he thought about leaving her. Hell, he didn’t understand it himself.

“Goddamn it. You never should’ve done it in the first place. You know better than to blood-share with a human. And now you put me in a position where I should report your actions to the Council. Then you’ll really be screwed. What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Whatever. Do what you need to do. Screw them.”

“At this rate, you’re going to be stuck up here forever. I thought you wanted to get back to one of the southern field offices. Where all the Darkblood action is.”

“She would’ve died without it.”

“Humans die every day. We can’t get involved in their affairs beyond just covert protection from Darkbloods.”

“Yes, well, they don’t die because of me.” Dom jabbed the climate control button and cranked the A/C, but the cold air did little to cool him off.

If Santiago launched into his standard lecture about there being billions of humans on this earth, but very few vampires, or that humans represent the grains of sand on a beach whereas the number of vampires could be sifted through your fingers, Dom was going to need another new phone. He’d been a Guardian almost as long as Santiago and he sure as hell didn’t need to hear another patronizing sermon outlining the concerns of the Council and reminding him what he should and shouldn’t do.

Santiago was silent for a few moments. “Where are you headed now?”

“She’s going back to the cemetery where she found me, if she gets there alive. She drives like a goddamn maniac.” His jaw ached from clenching it so tightly. “I think she’s trying to piece together why she blacked out. Her last memory is from there.”

“Did you sweep it yet?”

“No, and her scent is all over that place. When I brought her home, I took evasive measures and hid our trail. If the Darkbloods showed up at the cemetery last night, they wouldn’t have been able to follow us. But, if they’re slow and track me there tonight, her new scent will lead straight back to her house. I’ve got to do something to cover it up again.”

He eased up on the accelerator and concentrated on hanging back a little farther. It made him inexplicably nervous having her too far away.

“Seems a little excessive. Didn’t you use any scent neutralizing granules? They do an adequate job of absorbing the trace of a sweetblood.”

Dom choked back a few swearwords. Was he serious? “That carbon crap works only temporarily and only if the Darkblood forgets to breathe or has a sudden allergy attack.”

“Oh for chrissake, they’re effective enough. Why don’t you call someone for backup then, if you’re so worried about them tracking her? Who do you have on duty tonight?”

There weren’t many choices. They ran a lean operation.

“Foss.” But the thought of having the biggest man-whore in the Guardian ranks anywhere near the woman made him nauseous as hell.

“Hey, where the hell is that data? I’ve been waiting for you to upload it.”

Dom steeled his shoulders to prepare himself for Santiago’s inevitable reaction. “As soon as I can locate the phone I downloaded it to. I dropped it sometime after I was shot and because I floated so far downstream, the phone could be anywhere. And, most likely, it’s no longer functioning.” He should have searched for it immediately, but strangely enough, it hadn’t crossed his mind until now. “I’ll find it.”

Santiago let loose with a volley of foreign profanity Dom had never heard before. Yes, his boss definitely had a way with words.

“I’ll see if we can pick up its GPS signal. You’d better pray you find it. That mission cost us a lot. Stryker was hit after the two of you split up.”

Oh, shit. His new guy. “Is he okay? What happened?” He shouldn’t have allowed someone as inexperienced as Mitchell Stryker in the kill zone, but when they hacked into the Darkblood system, they’d been so focused on copying everything, he’d forgotten all about protocol.

“Yeah, you cut out on our conversation last night before I could tell you. He’s still in the clinic. Shot by a silvie, just like you were. But he didn’t hit pay dirt and run into a sweetblood.”

Clamping his teeth together, Dom’s pulse jackhammered behind his eyeballs. He took a couple of deep breaths and willed himself to calm down. He wanted to acquaint his boss with some of his own favorite swearwords, foreign and domestic, but biting Santiago’s head off would only anger him more and Dom needed him on his side. The Council could kick his ass to a really remote location if he wasn’t careful.

Then he’d be even farther from him. From the whole reason he joined the Agency.

In a scene he’d pictured in his mind every night for the past century, Dom visualized his hands around his neck, choking the air from stale lungs, before he crammed a stake into his black heart and spit on the ashes. Being a field team leader all the way up here was bad enough. Where else could they send him? Anchorage?

He mentally shook off those images and forced himself to think about Stryker. “What’s his prognosis? Will he be all right?” Mitchell was a good guy. A little over-eager, but he reminded Dom of himself when he first started with the Agency. He’d visit him when he finished tonight.

“He’ll be fine in a week or two. Bullet got him in the thigh. Staff tells me he’s been asking about you. So how’s the shoulder doing?”

Dom had actually forgotten all about it. Reaching a hand into the open collar of his shirt, he shrugged, half-expecting to feel a twinge, a pull, something. But he felt nothing. Even the skin of his shoulder was smooth, as if he’d never been shot. He kneaded the muscle a few times just to make sure. “Fine, I guess.”

“Sangre Dulce blood is very healing in addition to the incredible rush, right?” Santiago dropped his voice. “So how was it? I’ve only heard the stories. I still can’t believe you did a Stop and Release on a sweetblood in your condition. A goddamn S and R.” He whistled into the phone.

“You can’t imagine. Drinking from her was so…” He searched for the right word. Utterly exquisite and complete perfection came to mind. But these were private recollections and he didn’t want to share them. “Amazing.” Generic enough, he supposed.

“What’s up with you? I can’t remember when I’ve ever heard you so affected by a woman. Sure you didn’t prong her with the sharps and the blunt?”

“F*ck no. That’s the last thing on my mind.” Did he sound convincing?

Santiago’s laugh reflected his apparent disbelief. Guess not. Oh well, his boss could think what he wanted.

“Given just its taste, can you understand why there’s such a huge black market for the shit?”

“Unfortunately, yes, I can.” And that’s what worried him. Now that he knew what it was like, he didn’t want to be tempted again. It was one thing to wonder, but it was completely different to know for sure.