“Before you argue with him,” Neal added, “think about what sort of life you’d have out there. Juliana Jones is dead. You’ll have to use a new name, establish a new identity, start over from scratch. You’d have to seriously alter your appearance as well, or you’d risk exposure every time you went to an art show or tried to sell a painting.”
“I’m not that well-known,” I snapped.
Shamaras inclined his head. “Eric Locke was.”
“So I stay here and work for you.” I looked at Neal. “As what? I can’t cook. I could help Esme look after the priceless objets d’art, I suppose, but really, how often do they need dusting?”
“You can serve as my tresora,” the vampire said. “It is the most logical solution. You already wear my mark.”
By mark he meant the black cameo I’d had tattooed on my shoulder blade, which at the time I had no idea would destroy my life. Humans who served the Darkyn — Shamaras’s people, who were immortal and like vampires, depended on human blood to live — wore the mark. It had convinced Eric Locke that I might be worthy enough to sell to Shamaras in exchange for some of his blood. It had kept me from being charged with Eric’s murder, but then it had gotten me shot a second time when I’d posed as Shamaras’s tresora. As soon as I had enough cash, I was having the damn thing lasered off me.
“No, thanks.” I looked at Neal and suddenly knew I couldn’t take any more of this. Not for another day. “Actually, all I need is a ride to the bus station, and enough money to buy a ticket to Seattle. I can do the rest myself.”
He frowned. “What’s in Seattle?”
“It’s as far away from you and him as I can get without having to apply for Canadian citizenship.” I stood and waited, but neither of them moved. “What?”
Shamaras folded his hands. “We have not been entirely honest with you, Juliana. We were . . . waiting. Hoping.”
“For?”
Neal put aside his drink and stood up. “The injuries Eric inflicted on you were more severe than we led you to believe. When we found you that night, you were almost dead.”
“Okay. So I’m really, really lucky.” And a great liar, too.
“It wasn’t luck.” He looked at the Persian carpet under our feet. “It was Marco’s blood. We used it to heal your injuries.”
“I appreciate your honesty,” I said, trying not to shudder, “but you could have kept details like that to yourself.”
“It’s why you can’t leave.” His brown eyes shifted up. “Your weight loss and lack of appetite indicates that we may have used too much.”
I thought about it for a minute. “Are you HIV-positive or something, Marco?”
“No, I cannot be stricken by human diseases,” Shamaras said as Neal came to me. “But large amounts of my blood is poisonous to humans.”
He had saved my life by poisoning me?
Neal read my expression and took hold of my hand. “We don’t know for sure yet. Marco’s blood should have killed you months ago, but you’ve only begun showing symptoms now.”
Great. I was dying slower than the other victims. Hooray for me.
“There’s a Kyn doctor coming here to see you tomorrow,” Neal said, putting his arm around my waist. “She’s going to test your blood and see if it's causing your illness, and if there is anything that can be done to reverse the process.”
“I could go to a hospital right now,” I suggested, and then shot down the idea before they could. “But they might recognize me.”
Shamaras came to stand on my other side and took my other hand. “The human doctors will not know what to do. They are not aware of my kind or the curse upon us.”
“It’s not a curse,” Neal said. “Your blood is different, that’s all.”
I felt suspended between them, so paralyzed inside that I was unable to move or think straight. It might have been the mind-controlling hyacinth, or the contrast between Neal’s warm arm and Marco’s cool fingers. Finding out they might have accidentally poisoned me definitely played a part.
“Please stop holding me,” I said, and when they stepped back, I could breathe again. “I’ll be in my room.”
#
I stayed in my room, and I expected Neal to check on me, which he did. If he had said anything to me, I probably would have beaten him unconscious with my bare fists, but he only looked in and left again.
I sat by the window and stared out at the night for a long time, putting together and taking apart everything that had happened to me since I’d met Eric Locke. It actually went back further than him, back to my childhood, when an old man had saved me from drowning and died in the process. The old man had been Lencho, Shamaras’s tresora, tattooed with a black cameo on his chest.
The tattoo I’d copied onto my own shoulder years later. The tattoo Eric must have noticed when we’d made love, I realized, which explained his subsequent psycho behavior.
I got up and walked out into the hall, following it to a staircase. Esme had told me that the kitchen was on the second floor of the villa, and after a few wrong turns I found it. It looked like the sort of place a big, smiling Italian woman would happily spend her life in, cooking up army-size meals in the big aluminum pots to feed to her family of forty. I spotted a couple of knife blocks in one corner of the white tiled counter, and helped myself to the longest and sharpest blade. The light of dawn made it flash as I took it out of the slot.
“Put down the knife, my dear.”
“You’re supposed to be in your coffin, aren’t you?” I tested the edge of the blade, hissed and pulled back a sliced fingertip. “That’s sharp. Why do you have sharp knives? You don’t eat.”
“I do not sleep in a coffin, either.” His hands came around me and took the knife out of mine. “I will not allow you to hurt yourself.”
I turned and looked up into the beautiful immortal face. “But you’re fine with poisoning me.”
“Juliana.” He felt my legs buckling before I did and swung me up into his arms. From there he carried me out, up the stairs and down to his end of the hallway.
Neal opened the bedroom doors. “Should I call the suzerain?”
“Not yet.” Shamaras put me on his bed, which was much larger and nicer than mine. The sunlight hurt my eyes, and I made a wimpy sound. “Close the curtains, Neal.”
I didn’t remember much of the next eighteen hours. I felt Neal and Shamaras on either side of me, lying next to me in the bed, but they were speaking in Italian, and my head hurt so much I couldn’t open my eyes. The sun came in and settled on my brow, burning a nice big hole through it. Time dragged out the torture but sped through the day. At one point Neal carried me to a bathroom and stood with me under a lukewarm shower that made me feel as if I might shake myself to pieces. Gentle hands stripped me out of my freezing-wet clothes and dried me with a warm, sinfully soft towel.
Everything went away and left me in the dark.
Her hand on my forehead stirred me, but the needle in my arm brought me fully awake. I looked up into a curtain of curly chestnut hair hanging around a pretty, frowning face.
“Welcome back,” she said. “Are you feeling all right?”
“No,” I said honestly. “You the vampire doctor?”
She grinned. “That’s me. I’m Alex Keller.” She used her stethoscope to check my heart and then took my temperature from my ear. “How long have you been dodging sleep and food?”
I shrugged and winced as the motion jogged my aching head. “Couple of months.”
She straightened and wrote something on a pad. Another woman, one I knew because she was a vampire and she had once arrested me for killing Eric, appeared beside Dr. Keller.
“Is she changing?” Detective Samantha Brown asked. “Or dying?”
“I have to run some tests, but I’d pick door number one.”
“Changing into what?” I wanted to know.
“Lucan has been calling me every five minutes.” Samantha scowled as her cell phone played the perky theme to The Ente
rtainer. “And if he changes my ring tone one more time, I’m kicking his ass up and down A1A.”
“I want to watch,” the doctor said.
“Changing into what?” I shouted the first two words and whimpered the third.
Both women looked down at me, surprised.
“One of us,” Dr. Keller said. “I’m sorry, didn’t Marco explain the situation to you?”
Marco was going to, as soon as I hauled myself out of his bed. I got as far as my feet over the side before Alex grabbed me.
“You don’t want to do that right now, sweetie. You’re really weak.” She tucked me back in like a fussy mother and sent Samantha to get Shamaras. “Marco infected you with his blood, and it looks like you’re making the physical change from human to Darkyn. I guess you know enough about us to be upset by the prospect. I went through the same thing myself. But as disgusting as it seems, it’s better than dying. You’ll get used to the fangs and the lousy diet. You and Marco will bond, and fall in love, and have a great relationship, and–”
“No, we won't,” I said. “Marco is gay. Neal is his lover.”
Alex stared at me for a minute. “Oh, hell.”
“Yeah. Pretty much.” I closed my eyes.
Alex Keller finished examining me by prodding my stomach and asking me a lot of questions about what I ate, how often I threw up, that sort of thing. After I recounted my lousy eating habits since killing Eric, she checked the roof of my mouth with a pen light and then the tip of her finger. It felt sore, but she seemed puzzled by my lack of ‘apertures,” whatever they were. Finally she finished making her notes and tucked the pad into her jacket pocket.
“I’ll run a blood test to be sure, Ms. Jones, but it appears that you’re in the very early stages of transition,” Dr. Keller said. “It usually takes three to seven days, but your change isn’t progressing properly. It seems to be stalling.”
Shamaras and Neal came to the edge of the bed. “What will happen to her if she does not improve, Lady Alexandra?”
“She’s caught between two very different physical states,” the doctor said. “The changes in her gastric system are making it impossible for her to eat human food. At the same time, the lack of progress with the change makes her incapable of feeding like us. I’ll try a transfusion, see if that helps, but Marco, she has to finish the process or it will kill her.”
I finally understood what she meant. I wasn’t poisoned.
I was starving to death.
#
Alex Keller hooked me up to a unit of whole blood and sat with me until it was gone. She told me more about the Kyn and their way of bonding to the humans they changed. Some humans like Alex herself became the vampire’s sygkenis, or life companion. It sounded bizarre, especially the idea of never being able to break up or leave the vampire who bonded emotionally and physically with you, but since it wasn’t happening to me I wasn’t worried.
My body seemed to suck up the blood in record time, but as soon as she removed the needle I felt sick. She helped me to the bathroom and stood by while I puked myself into the dry heaves.
“Giving me transfusions won’t work,” I said after I washed my face and brushed my teeth. “Right?”
“I wish I knew. Your body seems to be rejecting everything.” She pressed a hand to my head. “At least your fever’s gone down a bit. Although with all that blood, you should be glowing and bouncing around here like a pink neon bunny on crack.”
I braced myself against the counter as I expected the dizziness to return, but it didn’t. “Can you give me something I can take to make it quick?”
It took a minute for her to understand. “Sorry, I never went to the Dr. Kevorkian school of medicine.”
She helped me back to bed, and I argued with her every step of the way.
“I’ve caused enough trouble for Marco and Neal,” I said. “They don’t want me here, and they really don’t need me puking all over the villa.” When that didn’t seem to sway her, I added, “It isn’t Marco’s fault. He was only trying to heal my wounds. I sure as hell don’t want them to watch me die.”
“Marco shouldn’t have been playing doctor with you.” Alex stopped and drew away from me. “Wait a minute. You were wounded? Marco didn’t drink your blood, or make you drink his?”
“You’re gonna make me puke again,” I warned.
“I’m serious, Jules.”
I sat down on the edge of the bed and sighed before I launched into the confusing tale of how I’d met Shamaras. Once I’d finished filling her in, I added, “He never bit me, and I never bit him. Neal used some of his blood to close my open wounds. From the way he described it, like liquid vampire bandage or something. That was it.”
“You’ve never kissed or had sex with Marco, right?” When I nodded, she peered at me. “But the rest of us did.”
My jaw dropped into my lap. “You went to bed with Marco?”
“No, not with Marco. With our guys. Jema, Sam, Nick — they’re all modern human women who were sexually involved with their vampires before they made the change. So was I. Well, technically I was sort of in a coma at the time, but Michael and I almost did it. Maybe that’s why I didn’t change right away.” She paced around the room. “I can’t believe it. It’s not just exchanging blood. It’s got to be the body fluids, too. So if you have sex with Marco–”
“Only one problem with that,” I said, “Marco is gay, remember?”
“To save your life?” She made a breezy gesture. “Honey, he can make the sacrifice for once.”
“No.” Before she could reply, I stood up. “From what you’ve told me, this bonding thing is for life, and you guys don’t die. I’m not hanging myself around Marco’s neck for all eternity.” However much I wanted to. “I can’t do that to him or Neal.”
“You’re more forgiving than I am,” Alex said. “All right, listen. There aren’t many female Kyn out there, and Marco’s not the only game in town. Most of the male Kyn would eviscerate whole armies for the chance to have a sygkenis. How do you feel about meeting some new guys?”
I wanted Marco and Neal, but I’d have to settle for someone else. I thought of all the armed men I’d been introduced to at Lucan’s nightclub, the one time I’d pretended to be Shamaras’s tresora. Many of them had been scary-looking, but I remembered some nice faces. I didn’t want to pick out the guy I had to live with forever, but it beat the slow, painful death option.
I squelched all my doubts and asked, “Will you and Detective Brown help me?”
“Are you kidding?” Alex grinned. “I’m already making a list of prospective hunks in my head. Let’s get you dressed and head over to Lucan’s place.”
#
Alex and Samantha told Shamaras that they were taking me to Infusion in order to get better treatment for my condition. Alex was nice enough not to offer too many details. Neal offered to accompany us, but I squashed that idea mercilessly.
“You can’t be in a room filled with Kyn without turning into a babbling idiot, remember?” I smiled to soften the sting and stood on my toes to kiss his cheek. “Don’t worry. Alex knows what she’s doing.” I hoped.
Shamaras escorted us out to the black limo that had brought Alex and Samantha to the villa, and directed Lucan’s driver to take us downtown. Before I climbed in, he put his hands on my cheeks and kissed my forehead. “You are certain that you do not wish me to come with you?”
Oh, the replies I could have made to that question. “I’m positive.”
“I will see you soon,” he promised.
The midnight hour arrived at Infusion along with us. Unlike the last time I'd visited, the club was open to the public, although a good portion of them were standing outside waiting for admission. Some of them protested loudly when Alex, Sam and I were welcomed like visiting royalty, until the bouncer turned his stern face toward them and glowered.
"Why does she get in?" one girl with spiked burgundy hair and glow-in-the-dark fangs at front of the line demanded. She pointed a
t the plain white blouse and blue silk skirt Alex had convinced me to wear. "She's not even goth."
"Give me a few more days," I said to her.
Suzerain Lucan appeared an instant after we stepped inside and grabbed Samantha, kissing her before she could get a word out. He lifted his head only after she slapped his arm. He grinned at Alex. “My lady.” The smile vanished when he caught sight of me. "Aren't you dead?"
I decided he wasn’t quite as scary as I’d thought. "Not yet."
"We need to talk." Samantha steered him away from us, while Alex guided me toward the private elevator.
“Are you sure about this?” I asked the doctor.
“No, but it beats sitting around the villa and waiting for you to die of starvation.”
She didn't take me to the penthouse, where I had gone with Lucan's human servant on my last visit. We stopped instead at the third floor.
"Most of the jardin in service live or work here," Alex said as we walked down toward a big open work out room. "I don't know many of their names, but they're a friendly bunch."
The friendly bunch were clustered around two unfriendly-looking, half-naked Kyn males dancing around a big circle and swiping swords at each other. No one spoke a word or made a sound, which made it seem even more unreal.
One of the men noticed us and said something quiet in Spanish. The two men stopped fighting and put down their swords. The entire group then turned and bowed.
"Cut it out," Alex said to them. "We just stopped in to say hello. This is Juliana."
Every man looked at me, breathed in, and smiled. The air slowly filled with the scent of flowers, fruit, and green things growing in the sunlight.
"She's not food," Alex continued. "She's in transition."
The hungry smiles changed to expressions of surprise, shock, and intense curiosity.
"May we inquire as to who her lord is, my lady?" one of the men asked.
"She doesn't have a lord yet," Alex said. "We're hoping to find one for her."
The men looked at each other and at me, and the scents they were shedding deepened and made the air hotter.