The Viper, page 14
Inclining her head, she said, “I swear.”
He touched her shoulder for a moment, the gentle contact at odds with his expression. And then he was gone, striding out of the open door.
She knew the instant the guards saw him. They started yelling and shooting. As Nadya began to tremble, she turned into herself even more, tucking her knees up to her chest as best she could, holding on to herself… trying to disappear—
The scream was that of a male, loud and deep.
Nadya squeezed her eyes shut under the hood. Kane’s death had finally come, and unlike before, now it was because of her, instead of in spite of her best efforts.
The shaking was so violent, she felt as though she were being torn apart, but it wasn’t fear. In the corner of the abandoned hunting cabin, in the dust and the aged disintegration of the place, she wept for everything that she had hoped for in her heart during all those hours of nursing Kane. She wept for all that he had suffered.
But mostly she wept because he’d almost made it out alive.
And whole.
The cruelty of some destinies was infinite.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Death stalked life, sure as if it were a fleet-footed predator.
Yeah, no shit, V thought. But come on. The whole maternal/fetal death thing for vampires was downright rude.
Stepping out of the subterranean tunnel and through the back of the training center’s supply closet, he had to turn sideways and squeeze his way along. A new delivery of printer paper had arrived and the stack of six Hammermill boxes was exactly not the kind of obstacle course he was looking to work out on. On the far side, he entered the office proper, and paused by the desk to light up a hand-rolled. Then he pushed open the glass door.
The facility’s main thoroughfare was a concrete corridor that ran from the escape hatch at one end to the parking area and the road out at the other. Branching off its broad pedestrian highway were all kinds of state-of-the-art, from the gym, locker, and weight-lifting rooms, to the shooting range, swimming pool, and classrooms.
And then there was his wedding gift to his shellan.
When he and his Jane had come out of the throat punches Fate had thrown at them, he had gained a kick-ass partner—and delivered to his brothers exactly the sort of on-site, dedicated doctor that they had long needed.
After all, Havers, the species’ healer, while clinically sound, was a fucking numpty who had a list as long as his arm of bad ideas. Like trying to kill the King and tossing his own sister out on her ass just before dawn for dating a human. And then there was the bow tie bullshit, and those tortoiseshell glasses. Who did he think he was, Clark Kent with a stethoscope?
Sure as shit he was able to leap to tall conclusions about a person’s worth faster than a speeding aristocrat.
So yes, the Brotherhood had needed a fine doctor. And V’s fine surgeon had needed a place to treat her patients with the best technology, and the right complement of rooms, and everything his Jane would ever need to do her job to the very best of her considerable ability.
V stopped, exhaled over his shoulder, and looked down a lineup of closed doors. There were a couple of exam rooms, an OR that was packed tighter than a toy box with equipment, and a number of recovery berths. And they had a staff now to go with it all. After he and Jane had designed and built out the spaces, she’d been joined by Manny Manello, M.D., her old boss out in the human world and V’s now brother-in-law, as well as Ehlena, Rehv’s mate, who was a nurse.
The brothers were lucky to have all of them.
Checking his watch, he was surprised the appointment had gone on as long as it had. But he had no experience with possibly-gestating-female-vampires, and that was something, thank God, he was going to stay in the dark about. Doc Jane, in her ghostly form, couldn’t have young, and besides, she was more interested in her work than rearing any kind of next generation.
Focusing on the first of the examination rooms, he couldn’t speculate about what was going on inside. He didn’t have to. The Jackal had been brought in about thirty minutes ago with his female to see if she was pregnant, and talk about no FOMO. V didn’t envy the guy in the slightest. You have this female you really care about, who’s the center of your world—and then the creator of the species throws a shit pie at you: Hey, you can service your female during her needing, and be the only thing that eases the suffering cravings, but the booby prize is you might knock her up and kill her.
Thanks, Mom, he thought as he ashed into the palm of his leather-gloved hand.
No wonder most couples, most of the time, just treated the fertile time with drugs nowadays—
The door opened and the Jackal came out. The guy was tall and trim, in the way aristocrats tended to be, all that fine breeding creating a body habitus that was attractive without being too muscled. And you could tell the guy and Rhage were related. The ocean blue eyes and the bone structure were the same—although the Jackal wasn’t permanently cheerful like Hollywood was.
Then again, few things outside the Times Square ball on New Year’s Rockin’ Eve were.
The former aristocrat stopped short. Cleared his throat like he was trying to control his emotions.
“Just spit it out.” V took another drag on his cigarette. “It’s a safe space here—I think that’s what they call it, right?”
V personally preferred unsafe spaces, but tomato/tomahtoes.
The Jackal waited until the door had completely eased shut behind him. “She’s not pregnant.”
“And you’re relieved, but don’t want her to know.”
“She was hoping to be with young.” The Jackal leaned back against the corridor’s concrete wall. “I mean, she really wants one, and you know, what else could I do? She went into her needing and…”
There was the temptation to point out to the guy that at least he had a good decade off from any further discussion on the subject, but V didn’t want to pile on. Besides, chances were good his sense of superiority, which came from never having to worry his mate would die on the birthing bed, would come through in anything he said.
“So.” The Jackal smoothed the front of the plaid work shirt he wore. “Thanks for coming down and meeting me.”
Somehow the guy made the jeans and that lumber-sexual shit look like something out of Butch’s couture-drobe. Then again, the Jackal had the posture of a prince, and that elevated even the most common of threads. Hell, you could probably throw a hazmat suit on him and it would look like something Tom Ford had put together.
“Is there something to eat around here?” the guy said. “I’m starved.”
“Yeah, come on.”
Closing his gloved hand around the ashes, V led the way down to the cafeteria. Even though the Brotherhood had suspended the training program for future soldiers, the mess hall was kept fully stocked—first, because the brothers needed fuel before and after workouts, and second, because Fritz needed something else to look after.
’Cuz running a five-star-hotel-standard private home occupied by the First Family, the brothers and fighters, their mates and young, as well as a dog and a cat, wasn’t enough on his plate.
As they came up to the breakroom, V held the door open. “After you.”
With an expression of wonder, the Jackal drifted into the tiled expanse of free vending machines, snacks, sodas, and candy like he’d never seen food before. There was also a serve-yourself counter with fresh fruit and other good-for-you’s that V always completely ignored. And a hot plate center that was currently not open for business.
As the other guy wandered around the calorie load, V poured himself a cup of hot coffee and grabbed a cruller. Parking himself in one of the dorm-decor armchairs, he snagged the remote off a coffee table and hit the volume on the TV in the corner. A crack-of-ass local news reporter was prattling along about God only knew what, but it was better than the silence.
A good ten minutes later, the Jackal came over with a tray laden with all kinds of munchie-crunchie. As he sat down, he seemed to deflate. Then again, he’d used a lot of energy in the last couple of nights, which explained the get-in-my-belly.
“Doc Jane told us that they used to not be able to test for pregnancy so early,” the male said as he cracked the top on some high-test Coke. “Amazing what medical science has done.”
“Yeah.”
The “ahhhhhhh” that came out of the guy after he threw back half the carbonation should have been used as an ad for the Real Thing.
“Your shellan was so good to her,” he said. “Afterwards, they were talking about Nyx setting up an Etsy store for Posie, her sister. I figured it was best to just leave them to it. What do I know about handmade jewelry, you know?”
Just get to the point, V thought as he polished off his cruller.
“Yeah,” he said.
Overhead, the news anchor started reporting on the burglary of an upstate store of some sort, a field reporter standing in the dark in front of a twenties-era mom-and-pop.
The Jackal continued to eat and talk, and V let him go, making random uh-huh sounds when there were pauses in the prattle. It was clear the guy was working off his anxiety, and hell, after V had lived with Rhage for as long as he had, he was used to being backdrop while someone sucked back five or six thousand calories.
But the entire time, he was wondering when the real reason for all this was going to be brought up—
“So have you?”
V stabbed his third butt out in a conveniently placed ashtray. “Sorry, what?”
“Found the new site of the prison camp.”
Finally, V thought as he sat forward in the padded chair.
“No, not yet.” And the guy must know this from his own half brother. “Actually, it might be worth going over this with you again. When you were in the prison camp, do you have any memory of the Command talking about where the new location was going to be? Or anybody discussing it? Like some of the guards, maybe?”
The question had been asked before, but you never knew what someone would recall out of the blue—and V was getting desperate.
Not in a good way.
The story of how the aristocrat had ended up in that cesspool had been a bummer. The Jackal had been framed for deflowering a virgin and sent up the proverbial river for life. Destiny had given him a way out, however, as well as one helluva jackpot in his female. But the shit he’d been through lingered—you could tell by the shadows in those baby blues.
“No, I’m sorry.” The Jackal stared across his tray of ultra-processed dopamine releasers. “I don’t remember that female talking about it—and I’ve been racking my mind. As you know, she and I had… well, we had a certain tie. But I didn’t spend much time with her.”
Certain tie = they’d had a son. Except that didn’t need to be said out loud, if the guy wasn’t comfortable remembering who his offspring’s mahmen had been. And who could blame him.
“It’s okay.” V took a sip of his coffee. “Maybe something will come to you later.”
Refocusing on the TV, he watched the reporter motion to the store behind him again and he had to wonder what had been stolen. Certainly not computer equipment. The business looked like the kind of place where receipts were still written out by hand and prices were punched into a cash register that didn’t require electricity.
V cleared his throat. “We just need some kind of break in the case, so to speak. Pardon my Columbo.”
“I want to be in if you find anything.”
Ah, V thought. So this was the why of the meeting.
When he didn’t respond, the Jackal tore the wrapper off a Snickers bar, but he didn’t bite the thing. He used it as a pointer, angling the chocolate-covered hangry-cillin at V. “Those males and females in there… I was one of them. They were the only people in my life for a very long time. I want to be part of their liberation.”
“You’ve mentioned this before.”
There was a pause, and then the Jackal said, “That’s not anywhere near an I’ll-call-you.”
“Will you look at the time.” V got to his feet with his coffee. “I’ll see you later.”
“I’ve earned the right to help with the evacuation.”
“Is that why you texted me? Like I’m a gatekeeper or something.”
“You’re the holdout. Everybody else wants me there.”
Oh, so there’d been a vote taken. Great.
“At this point”—V turned away—“I have absolutely no idea how we’re going to find the place. So it’s a moot fucking point.”
“I know who is a prisoner and who’s a guard. I know the way the place works.”
V glanced back. “Unfortunately, I think it’s going to be very obvious who is who and not because the latter are wearing uniforms. And you know the way the old place works. You don’t know shit about the new location, starting with where it is. You’re well-intended, but you’re untrained, unexperienced, and you have a son and now a shellan who need you. I get the loyalty, but I can’t get behind the risk assessment. Sorry.”
Leaving the male to sort the Cheetos from the Cheerios, V walked back out into the corridor before he said something he was going to feel slightly bad about—and then get really annoyed he was wasting any energy on regretting. Goddamn civilians. Always with the bright ideas.
But whatever, he was not about to jeopardize his own life or the lives of his brothers just to help the Jackal through his survivor’s guilt.
That was a burden the guy was going to have to put down on his own.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The element of surprise could work as one hell of a preemptive strike.
As Kane stepped free of the hunting cabin, he didn’t hesitate, not even for a second. He dematerialized directly onto the guard who’d just gotten out of the passenger seat, and he bit the bastard on the side of the face.
The instant he struck, the male screamed, and as Kane jerked back, he took the skin and meat of the cheek with him. Spitting everything out, he shoved the guard to the ground and jumped up onto the roof of the vehicle—just as the driver emerged from the interior.
A gun swung up and sent a bullet Kane’s way, but as he somersaulted over the other male’s head, he was a target missed. He landed hard in his borrowed boots, grabbed the guard’s head from behind, and yanked back. As balance was lost, more gunshots went off toward the sky, and Kane caught the wrist that controlled the weapon. With a vicious snap, he broke the forearm bones, and when the screaming started, he took that gun.
Pointed it at the male’s face.
And pulled the trigger.
The bullet went right through the forehead, and the body jerked, arms and legs flopping, mouth falling open, eyes wide and instantly sightless. He let the guard fall to the ground and jumped over the hood. For a split second, he couldn’t go any farther. The male he’d bitten had half a face, the bone structure eaten away under where his fangs had penetrated, the roots of the teeth exposed, the nose nothing but a pair of black holes. One eye was gone entirely, and the disintegration was spreading.
Kane turned back to the cabin and thought of the wolven.
“I won’t be gone long,” he called out to Nadya. “Stay where you are!”
“Kane?” There was a pause. “Kane!”
“No time, stay where you are!”
Jumping behind the wheel, he remembered what he’d seen the others do. He planted his foot on something down on the floor—the engine roared. That wasn’t right. He punched his foot into the other pedal. There was nothing. Locating the shifting rod, which was in the center between the seats, he found it frozen in place—until he punched at the pedals again. As the gear wand became freed, he wrenched it all the way back.
The car went forward.
Not what he wanted, but he made it work. Yanking the wheel around until it was tight to the left, he herky-jerked the car in a circle, heaving, ho’ing. Punching at the pedals. Lurching.
When he had a clear shot out the lane to the road, he ran over the driver as he shoved his boot into what made the car go. Skidding, slipping, drifting from side to side, he mostly kept on the twin paths that had been worn into the ground, and when he got to the paved double lanes they’d been on, he made a turn that was as close to ninety degrees as he could make it.
The glow in the east was gathering real momentum now, and he had to hold his arm up over his face to keep his eyes even partially open. As another vehicle came toward him, a horn sounded, loud as the kind that he remembered being on steam trains. His instinct was to wrench the wheel to the right, but he knew that he’d end up deep in the bushes and the trees—and he was still too close to the hunter’s cabin to ditch the vehicle. He held on tight and kept straight, inching over to make room, catching a quick glance at the furious human as they passed.
Glancing up to the little mirror mounted on the front window, he saw the other vehicle’s red lights keep going, that blaring noise getting cut off.
He kept going, too.
The burn of the sun’s first rays on his face and upper body made him remember being in the clinic’s bed, and the memories of Nadya made him focus through the pain. As he continued to surmount the road, as miles went beneath the wheels, he controlled things better, managing the speed and the steering with greater competence. Signs appeared off to the side, but he couldn’t read them because his bloodline had thought that the languages of humans were beneath his kind. They’d always had doggen for English translations.
As the sun’s rise grew even more relentless, his eyes began watering such that he could barely see, and wiping them repeatedly didn’t help. The only good news was that the guards would be under the same conditions he was.
And then he simply couldn’t go any farther.
Looking to either side of the road, he saw nothing but tree line, no glowing lights, no drives into the forested acreage. He extended his right foot as far as it could go, and the engine responded as he demanded, his speed increasing. As he rounded a bend and came to a straightaway, he closed his eyes, took a deep breath—
