She breathed a wet laugh.
“I’m super disappointed about that, by the way. All the vampire movies make it out like you get all sparkly, and irresistible and shit. Women just throw themselves at you, you know? And here I am, same old chump with a broken nose.”
“Please. Like you ever had trouble attracting women.”
He shifted, his breath warm against the top of her head. “Couldn’t attract you.”
“Oh no. You did.” She patted his chest…and let her hand linger, over the hard swell of muscle. “I was just. You know. Denying myself. Trying to be a badass.”
He laughed softly, and it rustled her hair. “Total badass. Stone cold. And hot. You know what I mean.”
“Yeah.”
Silence descended, but not the awful kind. Trina breathed deep the smell of rural night and the faint, lingering traces of Lanny’s cologne. Listened to his heart thump steadily against her ear. Strong. Healthy. She hadn’t had a chance to marvel properly yet, and she regretted that, closing her eyes now and thanking every higher power that existed for the gift he’d been given.
Nikita said it was a burden, and she agreed with his reasoning, but at this moment, listening to Lanny’s lungs work, forever was a miracle.
“I’m gonna say something,” he said, “and I want you to at least consider it before you shoot me down.”
“If it’s about sex, it won’t take that much convincing.”
He chuckled, but it was hollow. “Nah. Not yet. And definitely not in your dad’s house.”
She pressed a smile into his shirt…one that faded. She could feel the heaviness gathering again, the relentless forward movement of danger and responsibility.
“Now that I am what I am,” he went on, growing serious, “I figure it’s only fair that I help Nik do…whatever he’s gotta do to get Sasha back.”
She could see where this was going, and sat up, fixing him with a look. “Lanny.”
“I mean,” he continued, “what good are superpowers if you don’t do super things? Right? Apparently I’m almost indestructible now.” He grinned. Sideways and wry. “So I’m not worried about me. But–”
“Don’t say it,” she warned, pulse accelerating.
“No, hear me out, okay? You’re a badass. We’ve established that. But you’re not a…like us.”
“Say ‘vampire,’ Lanny, it’s what you are now. And also, kiss my ass, you’re not leaving me behind.”
His expression hardened. “We’ve got no idea what we’re walking into down there.”
“Which is why there’s safety in numbers.”
“You’re–”
“Weak?” she guessed, jaw clenched now, breathing hard.
“Human,” he said, almost patiently. “You’re human, babe. You’re also important enough that I don’t want to drag you into a firefight if I don’t have to.”
“Drag me? Drag me? This is my family. I dragged you in the first place.”
“Yeah, well…”
“Do you think I’m not scared? I’m terrified,” she said, and she was, stomach roiling with fear. “I have to look at what we’re about to do one step at a time, or else I might throw up I’m so scared. We – our fucked up little A-Team – are staging a rescue from a government facility we don’t know anything about…except for the fact they have Wallachian princes – Vlad the goddamn Impaler – in a meat locker somewhere. At the very best, we’re looking at getting arrested. And I can’t think about the worst. I just can’t.
“I’m scared, Lanny. We all are. But I will not hide under the bed while you guys risk your lives. If you’re in a firefight, who do you want at your six, huh?”
He swallowed, throat moving. “You. Always you. You know that. But these aren’t drug dealers. They’re not even murder suspects.”
She took a deep breath and forced herself to let it out slow. “I know.”
They studied one another.
“You wouldn’t have to, though,” he said.
“But I do,” she insisted. “Because it’s the right thing to do.”
“That runs in the family, huh?”
“I guess so.”
“It’s annoying as shit.”
She smiled. “Duly noted.”
His hand moved up from her shoulder, slid into place at the back of her neck. She couldn’t get over how warm he was. Anyone in literature who had ever called vampires the undead had been badly misinformed. They were very much alive, maybe even more so than mortals, with pulses, and heartbeats, and body heat. They were just…undying, she guessed.
Lanny stroked the nape of her neck with careful fingertips, like he was still learning his new strength, and pulled her in.
She went willingly, lips already parted in anticipation when he kissed her. The kiss was careful, too, but sweet. His tongue–
“Am I interrupting?” someone asked, and Trina had heard that voice enough times now to know the Romanian accent straight away.
She pulled back from Lanny with a wry smile, hand still resting over his heart. “Hi, Val.”
Lanny, by contrast, jerked like he’d been shocked, eyes popping wide. “Jesus, what–? Is that–? Aw, fuck.”
Valerian stood in the grass at the foot of the stairs, arms loosely folded, chuckling quietly. “Good evening, detectives.”
“Fuck,” Lanny said again, angry this time.
“Oh,” Valerian said, his show of innocence so theatrically false it almost made Trina want to smile. She hadn’t learned much about this prince, but she knew for damn sure that he was a showman. “Were you going to? And I…oh. How inopportune of me. I can just go over there and wait.” He pointed off into the night. “I’ll just leave you–”
“Val,” Trina said. “What’s up? You’ve got intel?”
He rolled his shoulders, sable cloak settling with a little flutter that was somehow royal. Alexei held himself like royalty, but it was an imitation of things he’d seen his father do decades before; the movements of a child who’d been told he was special, and destined for great things. Val carried himself like someone who’d had to prove he was royalty – most likely again and again.
“Indeed I do,” he said, more serious now. “I have…” He made a face. “An ally, it would seem. She’s told me what she can about the facility.”
“Okay, great.” Trina fished her phone from her pocket. “Will your voice show up if I record it? I want to be able to play this back for the others.”
“I haven’t the faintest idea.”
“Well, let’s try it, and–”
“He is here, you know.”
She froze, thumb hovering over the Record button on the app.
“Sasha,” Val explained. “I scented another wolf, and, well, I obviously can’t see him. Or visit him, strangely enough. They must be lining his cell with silver so I can’t get through.”
Trina swallowed. “Cell?”
“One can only assume.” He shrugged. “Annabel has said she would try to speak with him. If they’ll allow it.”
“Okay, that’s…” Her heart was pounding, she realized. Lanny laid a comforting hand on her thigh, patted it, before he got to his feet. “What do you think they want with him?”
Val tilted his head side to side. “I don’t know, exactly. I can guess. The Institute seems to think my brother holds the keys to everything from cancer research to prosthetic limb technology. Wolves and vampires are inextricably linked. I can think of all sorts of reasons for wanting to study a wolf – and a rather infamous one at that.”
During his speech, Lanny had moved down the steps and now stood beside the prince. When Val stopped talking, Lanny chopped a hand through him. The projection jumped and flickered like an old newsreel, before settling again, the image closing in smoke-like tendrils until it once again looked like a corporeal man stood at the base of the stairs.
Val turned his head and shot Lanny a withering look. “Really?”
“I just wanted to be sure,” Lanny said, shrugging, unbothered by the other’s glare.
Trina tapped her nails against her phone case. “Alright. How about that intel now?”
27
The Ingraham Institute
He slept. He didn’t know for how long, but eventually, awareness returned. First in the muffled flashes of dreams, and then the painful battle for outright consciousness.