“Yeah.”
“Don’t be afraid to use it.” The doctor sounded almost cheerful now, smiling.
“Right. Sir.”
“You’re supposed to have her back here by the end of the week, Major, don’t forget.” And there, now, finally, was the knife-edge of a threat under the smile.
Jake felt something whither inside himself, some small kernel of hope. “We won’t let you down, sir.”
“Glad to hear it. Check back in tomorrow, Major. Have a pleasant rest of the night.”
The connection cut out, screen going blank.
Jake sighed and closed the lid, reached up to massage his eyes. Little starbursts of color blossomed behind them – for now. The blurring was worse by the minute. If he let it go another hour, he’d be crawling around the room on his hands and knees, helpless as a baby. Ramirez would have to administer his injection, and she didn’t strike him as the sort of person who’d be gentle about it.
As if reading his thoughts, she said, “What was that?”
He dropped his hands and stood up, going to the fridge in the kitchenette. “What was what?” he asked over his shoulder.
Their injections were kept in labeled plastic boxes in the vegetable crisper, nice and cold. Jake found his box and set it out on the counter, fumbling a little against the condensation-slick sides with shaking fingers as he worked the latch.
“You hesitated,” she said, chair legs scraping the floor as she stood.
Jake grimaced, in part because he heard her footfalls moving toward him and he didn’t want her any closer, but also because holy Jesus his head was starting to hurt.
“Something really did happen,” she said, pulling up beside him. “You had a run-in with the target.” Not a question.
The syringes, cold from the fridge and now fogged with warm air, slid like fresh-caught fish through his fingertips. He fumbled one twice, teeth gritted, vision beginning to swim. The first ring of black was creeping in around the edges, his window of sight starting to tunnel.
“Good grief,” she muttered. “Here.” She plucked the syringe from his hand.
“No–” he tried to protest, but her other hand was on his shoulder, steering him back toward the table.
“You can’t even see.” She pushed him down into the chair she’d vacated. “You’re gonna stab yourself through the arm. Where’s a tourniquet? Oh, there’s one on the fridge.”
Jake subsided into the chair, shoulders slumping, feeling inept and defeated as his vision dimmed and Ramirez bustled around. She tied off his arm, swabbed him with an alcohol wipe. “Hold still,” she murmured, and then came the bite of the needle, the warmth and relief.
His vision cleared almost at once, the pain in his head receding.
“Thank you,” he said, and Ramirez hummed acknowledgement, moving to put everything back in its place.
He thought maybe she would let her earlier question – well, assumption, really – drop, but no such luck.
“You didn’t answer,” she called from the fridge.
He sighed. “How much do you know about our target?”
She let the fridge slap shut and leaned her shoulder against it, arms folded, completely unimpressed with his evasion. “What they told us during our briefing. She’s strong. Powerful. Volatile. That we shouldn’t turn our backs on her and she’s got a guard dog who’s not afraid to drop bodies.” Her gaze narrowed. “But you know something else, don’t you?”
He clenched his jaw and stared her down.
It didn’t work. “You know, if a team leader fails to share valuable intel with his team, that’s putting the whole op in jeopardy. I know you’re not doing that.” An accusation. A challenge.
“Maybe I am. You don’t know me.”
“No, but I know your record, and it’s spotless. You’re keeping something to yourself, and you’re a good leader, so you’re not out to sabotage us all. You’re having second thoughts.” She smiled a fraction when she said it, pleased that she’d figured him out. “Why?”
Jake held her gaze stubbornly for a long moment, and then caved, glancing away, exhaling tiredly through his nose. He’d never before been the one to back down first in a game of chicken; but he guessed he wasn’t the same man he’d been then. The Major Treadwell who’d sacrificed himself for his unit had died in a desert inferno; the blind man who’d crawled back, who’d been given a second chance and the leadership of this hackneyed team, wasn’t so unwaveringly sure of himself.
“I had an encounter with her in the diner,” he admitted. “She spilled coffee on me – it was an accident, but it burned my hand all to be damned. But. Then. She touched my arm and she…I don’t know how she did it, but the burn healed. Right there.” He lifted his unblemished right hand. “I ought to be red and blistered, and I’m fine.” He shook his head. “They told us she was powerful, and that she could control fire – crazy comic book shit, right? – but they didn’t tell us she could heal people, too.”
When he glanced back, Ramirez had her brows furrowed. “Maybe they didn’t know.”
“Maybe,” he agreed. “And maybe they don’t know anything. You read the same file I did. In all the records of Ruby Russell and Rooster Palmer hurting people, were any of the victims civilians?”
She looked up toward the ceiling, chewing on the inside of her cheek, thinking. “I dunno.”
“Well, I do. And they weren’t. The only people they’ve ever harmed were trying to apprehend them.”
Her gaze snapped back to him, sharper than before. “So what are you saying?”
“I don’t know yet. I’ll let you know when I do.”
18
Sasha
Smell was his strongest sense, and that was what returned to him first as he swam up out of the darkness, becoming aware that he was alive, and that he felt really, really terrible. Sasha dragged a ragged breath in through his mouth and smelled sweat, and urine – his own – and the sickly-sweet tang of chemicals mingling with the two; his body trying to get rid of the drug they’d used to put him under. But under those scents he detected metal, and fresh paint; bleach and lemon-scented disinfectant; rubbing alcohol, and latex gloves. And humans. Lots and lots of humans.
He tried to open his eyes and they were crusted shut.
Opened his mouth and his lips pulled apart like half-dried, peeling paint, his tongue thick and coated.
He could hear voices, indistinct murmurs, and the hum and swish and beep of machines. The distant thump of doors opening and closing.
There was something…something…
He finally got his eyes open a crack and recoiled from the bright light above him, growling brokenly in the back of his throat.
“He’s awake,” a man’s voice said, and shoes shuffled across slick tile floors.
There was a cool slab beneath him, and cuffs pinning his wrists, and ankles, and torso to it.
Two things hit him all at once, blasting through the last of the drug’s fog: One: he was in a lab. He knew because he’d been in one before.
And two: there was a vampire here. Somewhere near. And he wasn’t one that Sasha had ever scented before.
He opened his eyes, not caring that they watered beneath the assault of the light. Opened his lungs and nostrils, sucked in air, trying to take in as much of his surroundings as possible.
A young man in a white lab coat approached him and he growled, a low, deep, constant rumble.
The young man hesitated, eyes widening. “Um…doctor?”
A second man stepped forward, this one older, more confident. An unremarkable man with glasses and gray hair, a pleasant smile.
“Hello, Sasha,” he said. “My name’s Doctor Talbot.”
Sasha bared his teeth, opened his mouth, and snarled.
The doctor chuckled.
Something tugged at the crook of his elbow – a needle. He had an IV. And Dr. Talbot’s hand was on the line, pressing the button there.
Oh, Sasha thought, as the room tilted. More drugs. Sending him back under.