Aidan shot Ethan a quelling look.
“Energy,” Ethan finished with a glance at Dana. “You didn’t tell me you were low on energy.”
But Dana was pretty sure he had intended to say blood. “Aidan?” she asked, picking her way over the vampires’ bodies. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” he said with a faint smile.
Clearly he wasn’t fine. But she forgave him the lie. He was trying to ease her fears.
Heather offered Dana a hand to steady her as she stepped over the splayed legs of the vampires. “Immortals like Aidan heal others by taking the wounds into their own bodies, which heal at an amazingly accelerated rate. When Aidan is at full strength and does that, he heals so swiftly that the wounds don’t have time to afflict him. But when he pushes himself and his gift too far, whatever wound he’s attempting to heal on the other person will open on his own body.”
Dana stared up at him. Aidan had healed her hand earlier by taking the wound into himself? She had caused him physical pain?
Aidan glared at Heather. “Why did you tell her that? Now she won’t want me to heal her if she’s injured.”
Heather shrugged. “Well, that’s kind of a good thing, right? I mean, if she cares about you enough that she doesn’t want to cause you pain, then maybe she’ll be able to get past all of this.” She motioned to the corpses and the blood-splattered walls and floor.
Aidan sighed.
Ethan sent him a look of sympathy. “Been a hell of a night, hasn’t it?”
He nodded.
Heather squeezed Dana’s hand. “Why don’t we go sit in your bedroom for a bit and catch our breath while the boys clean up this mess?”
Dana nodded but pulled her hand from Heather’s as they came abreast of Aidan. Wrapping her arms around him, she hugged him tight.
“Dana,” he protested, holding his arms away from her.
“I don’t care about the blood,” she mumbled into his cold, damp shirt, fighting tears all of a sudden.
Her visions had always come true before. And Aidan had been decapitated in the last one. Seeing that cut open along his jawline had reminded her that he could’ve died tonight, that he would’ve died if— “It’s okay.” Aidan closed his arms around her and rested his chin on her hair. “I’m okay, Dana. We both are.”
She nodded, probably smearing blood all over her face, but she didn’t care. She had come very close to losing him tonight.
“And I you,” he murmured, his voice hoarse.
Aidan gave Dana a last squeeze, then gently set her away from him.
Her hazel eyes held tears when she raised them to meet his.
How he loved her. He had been reading her thoughts ever since the battle had begun. And when she had recalled her vision just now, she hadn’t been relieved upon realizing she had survived the battle herself. She had been relieved that he had survived, that he had not been decapitated, that he hadn’t been taken from her.
He looked to Heather. He didn’t know what Heather saw in his face. But she nodded. Moving forward, she wrapped an arm around Dana’s shoulders.
“Did I mention that the vampires all responded to dumbass, too?” she asked conversationally.
“No.”
“Every single one of them,” Heather told her as she guided her out of the bathroom.
“Next time I’ll have to try knucklehead,” Dana joked wearily.
Heather gave her shoulders a squeeze and lowered her voice. “I know this is a lot to take in, Dana. I just learned about all this myself last year and totally freaked when I found out.”
“You did?” Dana asked.
Heather nodded. “But immortals are good guys. And Aidan is one of the best. He wouldn’t hesitate to give his life to protect his brethren. And he wouldn’t hesitate to give his life to protect you.”
Dana motioned to the carnage marring her hallway. “Is that a possibility? I mean, does this sort of thing happen often?”
“No, of course not,” Heather countered, then winced. “Well… Okay. I don’t want to lie to you. It’s been happening more than usual in recent years. There’s kind of been a lot going on in the Immortal Guardians’ world lately. Mercenaries trying to create a race of supersoldiers. Gershom’s evil ass sending vampires to attack military bases. And—”
“Heather.” Ethan interrupted his wife. “I don’t think you’re helping, honey.”
She grimaced. “Well, I’m trying. I love Aidan. He’s been good to us. And I like Dana.”
“You just met me,” Dana pointed out.
“Yes, but you’re smart.”
She raised a brow. “And you know that because…?”
Heather grinned. “Because you care about Aidan. And you’re brave, too. When all hell broke loose, you didn’t scream and pee your pants or curl up in a ball and whimper.”
Dana’s lips twitched. “Or run two steps, then trip and fall down like women do in horror movies?”
Heather laughed. “Exactly. Instead, you kicked ass and took names.”
Dana smiled. “Those names being numbnuts and dumbass?”
Aidan laughed, as did the others.
The two women entered Dana’s bedroom.
“Wow,” Heather said. “Vampires sure can make a mess, can’t they?”
“Yes,” Dana agreed morosely.
“Don’t worry. It’ll all be as good as new soon.”
“I can’t stop shaking,” Dana confessed in a hushed voice.
“That’s normal,” Heather assured her. “I used to shake after every battle when I first started hunting vampires, but I eventually got used to it. When I saw how close a vamp had come to cutting Ethan’s throat though…”
“Wow. You’re shaking as badly as I am.”
“Yeah. Don’t tell Ethan.”
“Can’t he pretty much hear everything we’re saying?”
“Yes. But he loves me, so he’s going to pretend he can’t. Right, sweetie?”
“Right,” Ethan said with a smile as he examined the bodies shriveling up in the bathroom and out in the hallway. “Should I call Chris?”
Aidan sighed. “Yes. Only he can clean up a mess this big. And I want Dana’s home and business to be exactly the way they were before the vampires attacked.”
“What about her neighbors?”
Aidan took a moment to listen. “The woman next door is out of town. And the elderly couple down the street fell asleep with their TV blaring and didn’t hear a thing.”
Ethan took out his cell phone and dialed network headquarters.
“Reordon,” Aidan heard Chris answer.
“It’s Ethan. We need you to send a cleanup crew over to Dana’s home.”
As Ethan gave Chris an abbreviated breakdown of the battle they had just fought, Aidan crouched down beside the sedated vamp and touched his temple.
The vamp’s thoughts and memories were cloudy from the drug and jumbled up by madness. It took Aidan several minutes to sort through it all and find the information he sought.
When he did, he swore.
Ethan ended the call and pocketed his phone. “What?”
We have a problem, Aidan told Ethan telepathically so Heather wouldn’t hear him.