“Bleeding . . .” He passed out and I dropped the phone. Jodi shouted for him. I left the phone on the floor, her voice calling his name. My stomach twisted with hunger, begging for food. I was shaky, needing to eat, but no time now. I had covered Rick’s wounds, but the pool of blood was still spreading. I stepped back, looking him over, searching for bleeders I had missed, and spotted it. Blood pumped from his arm to the floor, arterial bright.
Kneeling again, I gripped his torn T-shirt and ripped upward, exposing his right shoulder, revealing the tattoos that had been hidden there. Around his right bicep was a circlet of something that looked like barbed wire, but was twisted vines with claws and talons interspersed throughout. Recurved big-cat claws and raptor talons, some with small drops of blood on them.
I leaned over and tore his left sleeve, exposing the tat there. I rocked back, my fingertips barely touching him. Cold chills raced up my arms. On his left shoulder, from collarbone down his pectoral and around his entire upper arm was a more intricate tat. Much more intricate.
“Lion,” he murmured, unexpectedly awake. He focused on my face, his eyes bleary. “I saw a lion. Half man . . . half cat.”
“Yeah,” I whispered.
“I like lions,” he said.
The tattoos that I had noticed before, the black points that looked vaguely clawlike as they peeked from his left sleeve, were panther claws. The tattoo was tlvdatsi, a mountain lion. And behind the staring, predator face peeked a smaller cat face, pointed ears, curious and somehow amused, lips pulled up in a snarl to reveal predator teeth. A bobcat. My first two beasts. On Rick’s shoulder.
CHAPTER 24
You should have come when I asked
Multiple emergency sirens sounded in the distance, each distinctive—several cop cars, at least one ambulance. Jodi had stopped yelling for Rick, though the line was still open and some of the siren sounds came through the cell, proving that Jodi was one of the cops nearing, tearing down Privateer Boulevard. Getting close.
“You’re in danger,” he mumbled. “From the vamps. I have to help you. . . .”
He seemed to know he was talking to me, so I nodded, tying an upholstered arm cover and a second drapery tie-back around his arm, the fibers deep in the wound, slowing the bleeding. I rose, standing over him, my feet to either side, his blood pooled beneath and in my thin-soled shoes, squishing with every shift of weight. Blood had soaked into my pants, wicking up like thin fingers. It was under my nails, in the creases of my hands, splattered up my arms. The bleeding at his chest had almost stopped, though I had a feeling it wasn’t because of my great bandages, but because he was nearly bled out. He looked half dead, yet was still breathing.
The cops were nearly here. I had to decide. Go or stay? If they found me with a bleeding cop, I was in trouble. If I took off and Rick remembered that I was here, I was in trouble. If Jodi had heard me while I applied dressings, I was in trouble. If I had left prints somewhere, I was in trouble. I wiped my fingerprints off of his phone, but people touched things all the time that they didn’t remember. No matter what I did, I wasn’t going to get the big meal I needed anytime soon. My stomach growled hard, cramping. I was light-headed. Blue lights flashed through the trees and bushes that covered the windows, growing closer. Decide! I told myself.
Beast does not run, Beast said to me, miffed that I hadn’t figured that out myself.
“Yeah,” I muttered. “Right.” I picked up the phone and spoke into it. “Anyone there?”
“Who is this?” Jodi demanded over the sound of sirens.
“Jane Yellowrock. Who is this? Jodi?”
“What are you doing on this call?”
“Saving a man’s life. What are you doing on it?”
“Stay put,” she said, all business, her tone cop-demanding.
Beast bristled. “Not going anywhere,” I said. Beast huffed with insult. “I see the lights. I’m going to the front door. Tell them not to shoot me.”
Jodi gave a creditable snarl and Beast went silent at the sound.
I stepped to the door and pushed open the screen, standing in the doorway with my hands raised high, open palms visible, if they could see them beneath the blood. The first two cars swept down the short cul-de-sac and swung into the drive. The next car and ambulance bumped into the yard, tires sinking into loamy soil, headlights bouncing up and down, over me. The car doors opened, revealing cops drawing weapons. Beast snarled in warning.
“Do not fire,” Jodi shouted, tumbling from her unmarked. “Repeat, do not fire! Don’t move, Yellowrock. Keep your hands where we can see them.” Like that hadn’t occurred to me.
Jodi and her shadow, Herbert, reached the small porch, Herbert’s hand on his gun butt, eagerness in his eyes. “He’s inside,” I said. “I did what I could for him but he’s in bad shape.”
Jodi pushed past me. Herbert said, “Looks to me like you mighta put him there.” Jodi cursed, I assumed at the sight of Rick. I stepped aside for two stout EMTs and their stretcher.
“He needs blood,” I said, my arms still overhead. “You guys carry units in this state?”