Текст книги "Burning Blood"
Автор книги: Pepper winters
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Chapter Eleven
I PRESSED AGAINST THE CHEAP WOODEN door as the doctors turned calm into chaos. In the time it took to cross the threshold into the honeymoon suite in the nearest accommodation, they’d already placed Lucien on the king-sized bed—leaving him splayed out like a corpse ready for burial—and tore around in unison, preparing for surgery.
Whisper pressed against me, equally horrified as the older doctor—a man with silver-brown hair and black-framed glasses—swept the phone, complimentary notebook, pen, and handy guide of what to do around town straight off the desk with a single swipe.
“Help me drag it under the main chandelier,” he barked at his colleague. “It’s the brightest light in this gloomy place.”
The other doctor—a slightly younger man with dark blond hair that’d been cropped close to his skull—dumped his heavy medical bag and went to help.
Together, they dragged the large oak desk into the middle of the room, shoving aside the cream linen couch and glass-topped coffee table.
“I’ll grab the towels,” the blond doctor said, vanishing into the bathroom.
The other doctor completely ignored me and Whisper, busily dragging the coffee table to the head of the desk and dumping both bags onto it. Without a word, he pulled out a green surgical sheet, flattened it out, then started layering it with wickedly sharp implements.
I staggered against the door as my headache pressed from all directions.
Whisper nudged me, his golden eyes brimming with fear. I reached to pet him—and stopped breathing. Red. Everywhere. Lucien’s blood on my fingers, beneath my nails, up my wrists.
The image slingshotted me back to the awful drive here—
My bloody hands gripped the steering wheel as I drove through countryside hell. Blood covered every inch of my fingers. His blood. Blood from stabbing him, threatening him, hurting him to save his life.
He’s alive.
He won’t die.
Drive faster.
Gritting my teeth against the ice-picks in my skull, I made the mistake of looking in the rearview mirror.
Marcus and his guards followed not far behind.
He’d allowed the doctors to gather Lucien from the driveway, carry him to one of the G-wagons, and hadn’t said a word as they’d clambered into the backseat. He’d even waved politely as I’d begged a very reluctant Whisper to jump into the front seat and pleaded with my broken system to stay awake long enough to drive us the hell away from here.
My gaze shifted from being hunted by Marcus to the two doctors who sat on either side of Lucien. He’d been propped up, head lolling, entire body slack and lifeless. Neither doctor asked what was going on, why Lucien was so hurt, or why there was a jungle cat in the front seat.
They just took turns holding cotton pads to Lucien’s bleeding chest, all while arranging an IV line and snarling at me to drive smoothly so they could get it in his vein—
The memory shattered, dumping me back into the honeymoon suite as the two doctors placed a very dead-looking Lucien onto the towel-draped desk.
His legs dangled off one end, his arms loose and splayed over the sides. The silver around his wrists made him appear as if he truly was an escaped convict, still wearing the handcuffs.
He didn’t move as the blond doctor grabbed a pair of scissors and cut off his blood-soaked shirt. The shock of congealing crimson all over his chest sent a flood of sickness into my mouth.
I grabbed my raindrop pendant.
It triggered another memory—
The rain had stopped, leaving the world wet.
My foot pressed harder on the accelerator, even though I had no idea where I was going. All I knew was Marcus was chasing us and Lucien was dying—
“There.” One of the doctors appeared through the middle of the seats. “Stop there. His vitals are slowing and we can’t afford to wait.”
Up ahead, a thatched house with old bones and storybook charm sat prim and proper behind a manicured hedge and apple trees. It looked as if it’d been growing out of the countryside for centuries with its whitewashed walls and sagging dark timber.
The home looked so tiny after the majesty of Cinderkeep but big enough to house multiple rooms—ten to be exact, according to the hand-painted sign welcoming weary travellers to spend a few nights in Misty Meadows B&B.
“It’s not public enough,” I gasped around the pain in my head. “We need to be around people, so they don’t try to take Lucien—”
“It’s either there or he dies,” the doctor cut in.
Whisper hissed, sending the man hurtling into the backseat. Every instinct told me to keep driving. To never stop until I’d gotten Lucien far, far away from this place. Preferably out of England. But...what would be the point if his heart gave out?
“Ready?”
The daydream ended, dumping me back into the nightmare.
“Ready.” The older doctor nodded, holding a scalpel above Lucien’s wound. An IV line looped from his vein to a bag of liquid hanging from a tasselled floor lamp. His naked chest was now orange from iodine, and the metal disc over his heart looked sinister and sore. The doctors peered at it as if they’d never seen anything like it.
Dismissing it in favour of the open wound, they inhaled sharply.
“I’ll tidy up the wound, and you prepare to suture.” Both doctors leaned over Lucien, headtorches firmly in place thanks to dusk falling outside and romantic, gloomy lighting inside.
Lucien didn’t twitch as the knife touched his skin.
I almost threw up, clamping a hand over my mouth.
“Wound has no debris,” the blond doctor muttered. “It looks okay to close.”
Whisper shot forward as fresh blood oozed from Lucien’s chest, trickling down his ribcage. The panther snarled and the doctors immediately backed away from the table, leaving Lucien vulnerable and that much closer to death.
“Whisper,” I choked, stumbling sideways to the little bench meant for luggage. “Come here.” My knees gave out as the panther looked between me and his unconscious master before slinking back to me and pressing his muscular bulk against my thigh.
Gritting my teeth so I wouldn’t throw up, I placed both of my blood-soaked hands onto his shoulders and focused all my willpower on not passing out. Rain dripped off me onto the carpet and reality fragmented again as the first stitch was drawn through Lucien’s flesh—
The stout, round-faced woman with a blue-rinsed corkscrew perm almost fell over as we entered Misty Meadows B&B. Her gaze flew from me carrying two medical bags, the doctors carrying Lucien, and Whisper as he prowled behind them, his tail stiff and fangs glinting.
One of the doctors had slung his beige overcoat over Lucien, trying to hide all the blood, but wasn’t entirely successful, seeing as he’d gotten red handprints on it. The woman might not realise Lucien currently bled all over her overly patterned carpet, but she definitely realised there was a panther in her parlour.
Clutching the reception desk, her eyes popped wide. “I-I don’t allow pets.”
“Just give us the biggest, brightest suite you have. Immediately,” the older doctor barked.
The carpet had so many swirls and colours in it, it made me feel faint, and the scent of potpourri would’ve made me sneeze if my senses weren’t so broken.
“Do you have any other guests?” Marcus demanded, spinning me around as he burst into the B&B like a king returning to his castle.
I hated him for following us.
How exactly were we supposed to escape if he never let us out of his sight?
“N-No,” the woman stuttered, brushing down her knitted pink jumper. “Not at the moment. The previous couple checked out this morning.”
“How convenient.” Throwing down a black credit card, Marcus said smoothly, “I’m buying each room for the night.” He smiled with a hint of flirting, successfully hiding his evil heart. “I’m so sorry to impose like this but my son is hurt.” He pointed in Lucien’s direction. “We can’t afford the time it would take to travel to a hospital. Our company doctors are well equipped to tend to him. But they need to do it now.”
She gulped. “What happened?”
“He got hurt in an accident.” Marcus played the tragic father so well that if I didn’t have first-hand accounts of how he’d tortured Lucien, I’d believe his terror at his ‘son’s’ condition.
“H-How?” the woman asked, shaking and wary but not so afraid that she couldn’t run Marcus’s credit card through her machine and charge him whatever rate she felt like.
“Circus accident.” Marcus sniffed. “The panther is part of the troop.” Leaning forward, he took his credit card back with a grin. “He’s house-trained and won’t hurt a fly. You don’t mind if he stays here too, do you? Actually, I’ll tell you what.” Passing her the card again, he added syrupy sweet. “Charge me another ten thousand for the inconvenience. Call it gratitude for being so accommodating and...for keeping this just between us.”
I wanted to scream at the woman to call the police.
To beg her to summon a thousand witnesses but she just returned Marcus’s smile and ran his credit card again. She passed it back, along with a tray of keys. “It just so happens that I’ve been meaning to visit my sister in the county over. Might just be the perfect time to go.”
“I think that’s a wonderful idea.” Marcus grinned, running his fingers over the wooden tags. “Which is the biggest room?”
“Dewdrop.” The woman plucked a key and held it up. “It’s the honeymoon suite.”
“Thank you.” Marcus took the key, and tossed it at me.
I fumbled to catch it, juggling my rucksack, the two doctors’ bags, and a seriously bad case of tunnel vision.
Grabbing my elbow, he dragged me toward the narrow, whitewashed stairs.
Once we were far enough away from the woman, he hissed under his breath, “If he dies, you’ll take his place. If you run, I’ll kill the cat. If you call anyone, I’ll hunt down your loved ones and make them pay. If you do anything to jeopardise what I’ve worked so fucking hard to achieve, I will ensure every loss will be taken from you as slowly and as painfully as possible, got it?”
Wrenching me to a stop, he forced a tight smile even as his eyes churned with hate. “Just because I’ve allowed you this little adventure, doesn’t mean he’s free. Every inch of this place is surrounded. He can’t get out and no one can get in. You’ll soon learn that you don’t have to be in Cinderkeep to be trapped.”
Stepping away a little, he sucked in a cleansing breath and grinned. “Have a good rest, Rook, and make sure Lucien wakes soon. I’ll be waiting.”
Chapter Twelve
I WOKE TO SOMEONE TAPPING MY CHEEK.
My eyes flew open, clear and focused, locking onto the older doctor who risked his life to rouse me. Straining over Whisper, his body was as far away from the grumbling panther as he could get, his fingertips barely grazing me.
Licking my lips, I went to sit upright, only to find every muscle had seized from fainting in wet clothes. A whimper escaped as I rallied my strength and pushed upright, shrugging out of the soggy rucksack still clinging to my shoulders.
Whisper took my sounds of pain as a battle cry. Launching himself to his paws, he snarled at the doctor.
The man backed up, almost tripping in his haste.
“It’s okay.” I held up my hand to stop him. “He won’t hurt you.”
“I’m afraid I don’t believe you.” Eyeing Whisper, the doctor cleared his throat and stood next to the desk that was now covered in bloody towels but...empty.
Leaping to my feet, I wobbled on the spot. “Where is he? Is he okay? Where did they take him?!”
The doctor’s face softened. “He’s fine.” Arching his chin at the bed crowned in soft light from the two bedside lights shaped like pinecones, he sniffed. “Well, he’s alive. I think fine is probably an exaggeration.”
The blond doctor came out of the bathroom, drying his hands with meticulous attention. His short hair looked damp with sweat, his white smock smeared with blood that wasn’t his.
His eyes flicked nervously to the panther pressed tight against my legs, vibrating with lethal intent. Both men seemed as weary and as wired as I felt but they were suddenly the most incredible people I’d ever met in my life.
I wanted to throw my arms around them and hug them in gratitude.
“So...he’s not in danger anymore?” I stepped toward the bed, drawn to Lucien who lay unmoving beneath the covers. The lavender quilt had been drawn to his waist, leaving his bare chest on display, bound tightly with fresh white gauze. That awful metal disc peeked out, inhuman and sadistic.
“He’s stable and that’s all we can do in a situation like this,” the blond doctor said, tossing the hand towel onto the littered desk. Leaning his backside against it, he crossed his arms and focused on me. “We’ve done our part as physicians. We didn’t fight when we were accosted at the hospital—we were commanded to come and we did. We didn’t refuse to do our duty in saving someone’s life, despite everything we’ve seen. However...this is the part where you give us answers.”
“Easy, easy.” The older doctor scowled. “She’s just woken up after being unconscious.” Eyeing me, he added, “You were out cold for almost three hours. Are you feeling okay?”
“Wait. Three hours?”
“Who are you?” the blond doctor cut in again. “Who’s he? What the hell is going on?”
Whisper’s growl increased in volume, his tail lashing left and right. I stepped forward, placing a calming hand on the panther’s prickly scruff. “My name is Rook Snowdon and he’s Lucien Ashfall. As for what’s going on...it’s hard to explain. He’s been imprisoned for twenty years, and I was taken almost seven weeks ago.”
“You mean...” The older doctor lost his standoffishness, his shoulders sagging. “You were stolen? You’re not here of your own free will?”
I just nodded as my eyes returned to Lucien. “We need to leave. Before it’s too late.”
“We’re free to go once we’ve finished,” the older doctor said. “A guard is stationed outside the door and popped in to check how surgery went. But you...” He shrugged. “He said you two had to wait until arrangements could be made. What does that mean? What arrangements? What exactly is going on?”
I glanced at Lucien again. The need to go to his side was a visceral yearning. I needed to touch him—to feel his unnatural heat and know that he was still alive.
Another bash of vertigo had me staggering sideways.
The older doctor came bravely toward me. Gritting his teeth, he ignored Whisper’s warning growl and cupped my elbow. “Come, let’s get you sitting down.”
I let him guide me to the linen couch they’d pushed aside to make way for their temporary operating theatre. Sitting down with me, he ran his hand from my elbow to my wrist.
I tried to pull away but he pressed two fingers against the paper-thin skin on the underside of my wrist and stared at the floor.
“What are you—?”
“Hush.” He closed his eyes. “I’m checking your pulse.”
Awkward silence fell as Whisper decided that despite his dislike of these men, I wasn’t in any immediate danger, and padded toward Lucien. Leaping onto the bed, the giant cat stepped nimbly over his unconscious master and lay down like a shadow.
“Your heartbeat is a little irregular,” the doctor finally said, letting me go. “Are you okay? Any chest pain? Shortness of breath? Have you passed out like that before?” He glanced at his colleague. “Grab the blood pressure cuff.”
The blond doctor kept a wary eye on Whisper and pushed off the desk. Rummaging in one of the bags, he found what he was looking for and headed toward us.
He passed it over, watching me closely.
“I’m not sick.” I shook my head, my fingers straying—just like they always did—to my necklace whenever I spoke of my highly inconvenient condition. “I get vasovagal syncope, thanks to something that happened in the past.”
“Ah.” The doctor nodded, wrapping the pressure cuff around my arm and pumping it. “Have you found a treatment that works?”
“Not yet.” I let my necklace go, placing my hand in my lap. “But once I’ve passed out, I wake refreshed. I’m fine now.”
“You still have a headache though.” He studied me closely. “I can see it in your eyes.”
Rubbing my temple with my free hand, I admitted, “It can linger or build again. Depending on if I’m still dealing with the stress that knocked me out in the first place.”
Releasing the cuff, he read the numbers. “You’re running a little low. Not alarmingly so, but enough to explain the fainting.”
I just nodded.
“I have some electrolytes in my bag. I’ll give you some.”
“Thank you.” I sat taller and pushed the conversation away from me. “So...” Glancing at Lucien, I shivered—partly from my wet dress and partly from fear of him surviving the night. “He’ll be okay now, right? He’s no longer in danger?”
“Depends on what exactly is going on,” the blond doctor cut in. “What’s that implant in his chest? What are the vascular access ports for? Why does that other guy have power of attorney over his living situation and what the hell is with the cat?!”
“Calm down, Harry,” the older doctor muttered. “Look at the poor thing. Does she seem like she has those answers? Besides.” Patting my hand, he added kindly, “Even if she does know...that sort of information can get someone into a lot of trouble.” Standing, he started packing everything away. “We’ve done what was asked of us. We’ve kept him alive. And in answer to your question—” He turned to look at me. “Yes, he should be okay. As long as he rests.”
“But he coughed up so much blood...”
“He most likely had pulmonary contusions which would explain the bloody sputum.” The doctor smiled gently. “It’s nothing too serious, and his oxygen saturation is stable. We’ve sewn up the wound, which wasn’t particularly deep or complicated. His leg is merely bruised, not broken, and the cuts on his neck have been disinfected. He’s not at any risk. However, someone needs to monitor him while he recovers from substantial blood loss. If we were in a hospital, I would’ve ordered a blood transfusion but...here we are.”
Standing, I shifted toward Lucien. Whisper’s glowing golden eyes watched the doctors’ every move, his claws unsheathing on the covers as if he wanted to rake them into pieces. “When he wakes, will he be able to run?” I asked quietly.
“Run?” The blond doctor—Harry—scoffed. “What do you want him to do? Enter a triathlon?”
I narrowed my eyes. “I want him to be strong enough to escape.”
“Escape from what exactly?”
“Unfortunately,” the older doctor said with a warning glance at his colleague. “He’ll be extremely weak when he wakes. He’ll most likely have significant chest pain and definitely shouldn’t be moved in case he worsens. At this point, he needs bed rest. Possibly for up to a week.”
“A week?” My voice turned shrill. “But he has to get free tonight.” Pointing at the dark sky and twinkling stars past the window, I balled my hands. “If he doesn’t run tonight then Marcus will have him back in Cinderkeep by tomorrow.”
“The moment we’ve been released, we’ll call the police,” the older doctor said, shooting a look at the door as if the guard could hear through the wood. “They took our phones and we tried the bed and breakfast landline, but it’s been disconnected. I won’t let you suffer whatever’s going on. However, it’s safer for us and our families if we call once we’ve been dismissed.”
“You’re being too soft-hearted, Roger.” Harry huffed. “The moment we step out of that door, we should forget about all of this. They made us sign an NDA. And didn’t you just finish telling me that knowledge leads to consequences? I agree. I suddenly don’t want to know a damn thing. I just want to go home to my wife and baby daughter and forget this ever happened.”
Whisper suddenly chuffed and leapt to his feet, making the bed rock. His whiskers flared as he sniffed Lucien, sneezing from a noseful of astringent antiseptic.
“Eh, do you think you could get the cat off our patient?” Harry seethed. “If that creature is the reason our patient dies, don’t blame us. As far as sterile environments go this was terrible and that beast is making it ten times worse.”
“Whisper,” I scolded, darting around the pushed-aside furniture. “Get off him. You’re—”
“That beast will tear you—” Lucien coughed, convulsing beneath the lavender quilt. “Into pieces before you can even open the door.” He sucked in a breath and raised his head. “So I’d be nice if I were you.”
Both doctors froze and me?
I ran.
Choking on a sob, I flew across the room and flung myself onto the bed. Shoving aside the huge panther as if he were a tiny tabby, I buried my face against Lucien’s neck and wound my arms around him like a python.
He smelled all wrong.
He was cold for the first time since I’d met him.
But he felt so, so good.
“Be careful of his wound!”
I didn’t care which doctor reprimanded me. Nothing else mattered but feeling his imprisoned heart against my own, finding out for myself that he truly was alive and awake and okay.
“You’re not dead,” I mumbled into his throat, squeezing him tighter.
A guttural grunt escaped him as I hugged him as fiercely as I’d longed to do for weeks. I took full advantage of him being bedbound—unable to push me away.
His body jerked as if he wanted to stop me, but another quiet groan escaped him as I pressed a kiss to his chin before burrowing into the crux of his throat. “I’m so glad you’re not dead.”
“That could change very quickly with how badly you’re choking me.” His arm swept up unsteadily, hovering over my shoulder. “Rook...let me go.”
“I can’t.” Tears rolled, no doubt splashing onto his neck and tickling him. “Let me hold you for a little longer.”
His breath stuttered, his bandaged chest rising beneath me as if I’d hurt him all over again. The metal disc flared red as his heart quickened. Sucking in a shallow gasp, his back arched with pain.
“No.” Pulling away a little, horror filled me that even here—even away from Cinderkeep and surrounded by strangers who’d fought to save his life—no one could stop Marcus from monitoring Lucien’s heartrate or punishing him the moment it strayed over a certain line.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—” I went to push off him. To climb far away and stop causing him discomfort, but his hand came down. With a gentleness that felt terrible as well as tender, he cupped the back of my head and pulled me hard against him.
My elbows gave out, collapsing me on top of him.
He groaned in fresh misery.
“I’m sorry! So sorry!” I fought his hold even as he kept me trapped. “Let me go. If your pulse stays high, he’ll keep hurting you! What the hell is he thinking punishing you when you’re on death’s door? He’s an idiot. A complete dumbass who deserves to—”
“Quiet,” he panted, bracing through the burn of the metal disc. “You’re still incredibly noisy.” His fingers stroked my hair. Awkward and uncertain as if he’d never given this level of intimacy to someone before. “I don’t care about Marcus. And you attacked me, remember? I’ll say when you can leave.”
I froze as he nuzzled me. “Your closeness helps my pain. So...help.”
I shivered as his fingers sifted through my hair, claiming me and controlling me at the same time. Cool, quivery pleasure welled from my chest, spreading everywhere—filling me with chilled champagne bubbles. Relief kept building and building, cresting like a wave, glittering with frost and crystals.
The coldness felt distantly familiar.
Friendly...
I reached for it—
Lucien’s touch turned possessive and all those quivery feelings morphed into something cold and sharp and vicious. I gasped as the bubbles spun into a blizzard—surging upward, outward—an icy blast exploding so fast my vision flashed white.
Lucien sucked in a breath as if someone had punched him.
His fingers clenched in my hair.
And then...pain.
The worst I’d ever felt.
Pain, pain, PAIN.
“What—?” His voice broke. “What did you just—” He groaned as the metal disc over his heart flickered red, then...stopped.
The heat in his body flared, chasing the grey pallor from his skin as it warmed his blood and brought him back to the world of the living. I sucked in a breath as his warmth soaked into me, thawing the frigid agony around my heart, yanking me from the blizzard and halting the pain.
Relief rendered me useless.
I surrendered entirely to him, flopping over his chest.
He went rigid, even as his hand skated from my hair, to my nape, to my shoulders. Exquisitely gentle, his fingers settled on the small of my back, drawing barely-there circles in the damp fabric of my dress. “Are you okay?”
Sucking in a deep breath, I pushed away.
He let me go, his eyes searching mine as I sat upright.
And I fell all over again. Not physically...but in a way I couldn’t explain. I felt something deep, deep inside me, tugging me, warning me never to be apart from him.
The longer we stared, the more the compulsion grew.
A quiet, bone-deep certainty as if the universe whispered in my ear, ‘This one. He’s the one. The one you were made for.’
Lucien’s jaw tightened, his gaze darkening as he tracked every emotion flickering across my face. “Rook?” His gruff voice landed somewhere aching in my chest—
A warm, raspy tongue yanked me out of the spell.
Doctors. Surgery. Blood—
God, what am I doing?
We had to leave.
Right now.
“We have to go.” I wiped my cheek from Whisper’s lick. “Marcus will be back soon, and our chances of escaping are rapidly running out.”
Lucien never looked away from me as I scrambled off the bed. With a grimace, he shifted and propped himself up on his elbows, his bare chest roped with muscles and gauze. “You’re seriously going to act as if nothing just happened?” His eyebrows knitted together. “What was that?”
Throwing a glance at the doctors behind me—who kindly acted as if they weren’t eavesdropping—I shrugged. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You felt different.” His forehead furrowed, not buying my lies. “I felt you.” He tapped his chest. “In here. I felt a rush of coldness and—”
“You’re imagining things,” I cut in, fear sliding down my back. “We—”
“I’m not imagining anything.” Lowering his voice so the doctors couldn’t hear, he breathed, “Your presence has always been able to ease my discomfort, but this time, I actually feel...better.” He sat up. “The fire is gone. You took away all my pain. How?”
I scrambled for answers I didn’t have.
I panicked for explanations that would make sense but...
Whisper officially reached the end of his patience.
And pounced.
