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The waves bumped under the pontoons. The plane felt to her like a toy powered by a rubber band. Her stomach began protesting against the motion.
Finally, Bree spotted the familiar red cross painted on a white tin box. She pulled it out from under the right-hand seat. “You’ll be okay,” she said a little too heartily. “I promise.”
“Oh, I’ll be fine.” He winked, as if to give her courage. It would have worked better if he hadn’t been as pale as death.
He had a nice face and sandy-brown hair. She knew the type—a little past his prime, a little overweight and a lot of good, kind heart. He looked as if he would have been happy sitting in a bar telling fishing stories to his buddies.
“You don’t need to worry about the plane, either,” he added. “It’s got the best lightweight bulletproofing money can buy.”
Bree’s hands stalled partway through unlatching the lid of the first aid kit. The plane didn’t look like anything special. Neither did Larson. Bulletproofing? What was he, a smuggler? That would explain why he seemed to be a pretty good shot once he finally decided to start shooting.
“I don’t want to know,” she replied, digging through the kit for scissors. She found some with rounded tips, made for cutting away clothing, and bent to slice through his blood-soaked pant leg. “I just want to get out of here with everyone alive.”
“I can get behind that.” He winced as she worked around his wound.
“At least they didn’t seem to be very good shots.”
“Don’t underestimate how hard it is to shoot a moving target in a stiff wind. They got me and they clipped you from a good distance. That’s better than you think.”
Bree didn’t want to think. She peeled away the cloth from his wound, exposing the bloody mess the bullet had made of his thigh. Stomach rolling, she turned away, searching in the kit for sterile pads. She wasn’t normally squeamish, but this was worse than anything she’d ever seen. Sweat trickled down her back.
She found a sterile pad and ripped open the pack. “I’m sorry if this hurts.”
“I’ve had worse.” Still, he sucked in his breath as she pressed down on his wound. He pushed her hand out of the way, and then pressed down twice as hard himself. It was a necessary evil. They had to stop the bleeding. Bree found a triangular bandage and tied the pad in place, knotting it tight but not so tight that the circulation would stop completely.
“Is there water on board?” she asked. “You need fluids.”
“Cockpit,” he ground out. “If you find anything stronger, bring that.”
Just then, Bree felt the plane lift from the water, a lurch as if she had leaped into the air herself. She grabbed the back of the seat, casting a glance at Jonathan. He was fine, his nose pressed to a tiny window. A typical boy, in love with anything that had a motor. She hoped he had no sense of just how much danger they’d been in.
Rising carefully, she shuffled forward between the seats. Mark was completely focused on the instrument panel and the scene below. That awareness of his presence rose again, and she made herself look out the cockpit window and not at him. Focus on what’s ahead of you. Don’t get distracted.
The view out the cockpit stopped her in her tracks. The scenery was breathtaking, a cluster of pine-covered islands scattered over silver-spangled ocean. The warmth of the sun through the glass touched her face, making her realize her skin was itchy with the salt of tears.
She raised her hand to wipe them away, but it was crusted with blood. Swallowing hard, Bree wiped it on her pant leg, which was already smeared, and then bent to scrounge around the floor for bottled water.
“How is he?” Mark demanded. Beneath his sunglasses, he looked even paler than Larson. Deathly pale. “I smell a lot of blood.”
Bree wrinkled her nose. She could smell it, too, but not enough to gauge quantity. Maybe that was a doctor thing. “Working on it. I’m looking for water.”
“Behind the copilot’s seat.” He caught her arm, reminding her that her shoulder was sore. “That’s your blood I can smell. Your elbow. It’s fresh.”
The way he said it sent a shiver through her, despite the warm sun streaming through the windows. She twisted to look, and vaguely remembered the bullet grazing her. Her sweater sleeve was soaked, but after Larson’s wound, it seemed trivial. “That’s nothing.”
“I’ll look at it when we land.” He turned back to the controls, his movements slow and deliberate, as if he were fighting to concentrate on one thing at a time. He must have been tired, too.
She moved to get the water and then paused, aching to satisfy her curiosity. “How did you know those men were on the beach?”
He didn’t answer right away, but finally relented when she didn’t move. “Better to ask how they knew we were coming.”
“I’d settle for that.” The answer was simple, no big surprise. Someone had betrayed her. Someone always did. That’s why she worked alone. The moment she didn’t...
“There was only one other person who knew I was leaving the island,” Mark said.
Bree turned to the back, where Larson lay. The man had been shot. The man had kind eyes, and up until that moment, she would have sworn Mark had trusted him. “So much for friends.”
The doctor stared out the cockpit window, not saying a word.
Chapter 5
Late that night, Mark stormed into the office he shared with two other part-time physicians at Redwood General Hospital. He slammed the door behind him, beyond frustrated. Larson wasn’t talking.
At first, it had been understandable because he was unconscious. The wound was serious, but Mark had tended to it and thankfully Larson would recover.
But once Larson was awake, he hadn’t talked because he was afraid. Someone had threatened his grandchildren. Someone he feared more than Mark—and that was saying something.
The phone rang. Mark snatched it up. “What?”
There was a beat of silence. “I see someone had their grumpy pills today.”
It was Faran Kenyon, werewolf and fellow member of the Horsemen.
“What?” Mark snapped again. He wasn’t in the mood for Kenyon’s antics. His skin itched like the devil. He’d been exposed to too much sun on the plane and now he looked pink. He’d already used half a tube of medicated cream and smelled like the victim of a bad diaper rash.
And the scent of blood on the plane had gotten to him badly. As a doctor, he was used to it, but Bree had been bleeding. The blood of strangers was one thing. The blood of a woman who had caught his notice was something else. Dangerous. Tantalizing.
“Next time you send a top-secret report to the captain, blind copy me,” Kenyon said, breaking through his thoughts. “Otherwise, all I get are bits and scraps. I heard about the damsel in distress showing up and you deciding to get her and a sick rug rat to town, but why the shoot-out in the bush?”
“I was tracked. I found a letter inside my cabin.”
“Who from? The health department?”
“The Knights of Vidon.”
Kenyon swore.
“Indeed,” Mark said with wry humor. “Vampire slayers apparently take no vacations. Therefore, I don’t get one, either. Unfortunately, the letter was from one of my longtime fans. It was a surprise. I haven’t heard from that family for a very long time.”
“Who?”
“Nicholas Ferrel. I knew the taste of his ancestor.”
“Creepy. How long ago was that?”
Mark sat down at the desk, and was greeted with stacks of files plastered with sticky notes. Sign this form. Initial that one. Complete another mountain of logs and charts. He shoved them aside with a sweep of his arm. “Five hundred thirty years, give or take.”
“And his descendant still holds a grudge? What in blazes did you do?”
“It was a different era. Listen, I’m sending some blood samples by courier. I’ve addressed them to you, but would you send them over to the lab when they arrive?”
“Sure. Anything I should know?”
“They’re for the boy. There’s something about his case that worries me. Redwood is just a small regional hospital. I want the Varney labs on it.”
The Varney Center in Los Angeles was the West Coast hub of the Company and the North American headquarters for the Horsemen. As well as the usual mountains of data intelligence, spy toys and black ops coffeemakers, it had an exceptional medical facility. There were few things that made Mark go weak in the knees, but those labs counted. The fact that he got to work there was one of the main reasons he had joined the Horsemen.
“Not to sound like the trolls in accounting, but he’s a human, right? Should we be using our resources for this?”
“Do I ever ask for favors?” He knew very well that the answer was negative.
Kenyon sighed. “Dare I ask why now?”
“The woman has insurance issues. If there’s a hassle, tell them to take it out of my pay.”
Kenyon was quiet for a moment. “If you’re that involved—”
“I’m not involved,” he said quickly. “I can’t figure out what’s wrong, and that frustrates me. I became a doctor for this kind of science.” Not to mention atonement for all the lives he’d taken.
Kenyon’s voice was cautious. “The boy’s really sick, isn’t he?”
“Maybe. Probably.” Closer examination had confirmed his earlier fears. Whatever was wrong was chronic and debilitating—almost certainly something in his blood. He could smell it. “But I don’t want to say anything until I’m absolutely certain. I don’t want to put his mother through any false alarms.”
He swiveled the chair around so that he could look out the window. All he got was a view of the parking lot, growing dim in the fading light. Besides sending a brief report to L.A., he’d spent hours treating Larson, then more time testing Jonathan and looking in on some other patients he had in long-term care. He’d lost track of time, and now the clock said it was after six in the evening.
A whole day back in the human world. He already missed the green of his island retreat, where he didn’t have to fight to wear a civilized mask. Where choices were easy.
“I have bad news,” Kenyon said. “You don’t get to hang around up there playing Dr. McGrumpy. The boss wants you in L.A.”
“Now?”
“Right now. He’s sending a plane to pick up Larson. Raphael got the copy of your statement.”
The boss. Raphael. “His timing is inconvenient.”
“Sorry. He wants you on the plane. He’s scooping up Larson’s family, bringing the whole lot of them in so that they’ll be safe. Then he’s going to question Larson again. He wants you present for that.”
We’ll see. Mark had never liked having his leash yanked, and thoroughly resented it now. “Then I need you to do one more thing. I want an ID on this woman. Her name is Bree. The boy’s name is Jonathan. He’s almost four years old.”
“Last name?”
“I don’t have one. I suppose Bree is short for something.”
“Uh-huh. Date of birth? Place of birth? Maybe a Swedish accent to give us a clue?”
Mark considered. “I’d say Californian.”
“Californians don’t have an accent.”
“They do if you’re Italian.” California hadn’t even been discovered when he was born in 1452. By the time Columbus sailed for the New World forty years later, Marco Farnese had been Undead for a decade. “Parlo la lingua del canto e della seduzione.” I speak the language of song and seduction.
Kenyon gave a short, dry laugh. “Right. Like I’d call you for phone sex. There’s something sad about an Italian vampire. All that great garlicky cuisine going to waste.”
Mark grunted. “Call me when you find something.”
“When is optimistic. Stick to if.”
“Nonsense. You’re a bloodhound.”
“I’m a werewolf. Hear me howl in dismay.”
Mark swiveled back to the desk and hung up the phone without saying goodbye. His mind was already racing ahead to what Kenyon might find out, and how that would connect with any of the other puzzle pieces.
Larson’s refusal to say who had frightened him so badly was a problem. Mark’s enemies had been close by—close enough to play mailman.
And why had Ferrel resurfaced now, after so many years? After generations? Mark had let down his guard enough to take a position at a hospital filled with vulnerable patients. If the Knights of Vidon found him on the island, how long would it be before they showed up here?
And that was only half his problem. There was Bree and the boy, with their own set of gun-toting maniacs. Whose enemies had been the ones shooting at them? His or hers?
Mark swore softly. Even if he was being summoned to Los Angeles, Mark had a responsibility to the boy and his mother. He couldn’t just dump them and go. At the very least, he had to get the boy into adequate care.
That didn’t mean he was involved with them in the warm-and-fuzzy sense. It was just that there were some occasions when he had to be a doctor first, and a vampire later.
Mark pushed back from the desk, trying not to see the paperwork glaring up at him. So much for a paperless world, where everything was digital. He swore every time he looked at the stack of files it was bigger. Worse, it didn’t care if he was a supernatural being of immense power. Growling never made bureaucracy run away.
He left the office, closing the door behind him. The corridor was narrow, painted the usual nondescript hospital-beige. A nurse in scrubs hurried by, giving him a nod and the professional half smile of someone with too much to do. He nodded back, then strode toward the ward where he’d left Bree and her son.
Like everything at Redwood General, the pediatrics area was small, but the staff made the most of it. It was the one place with bright colors. Mark found the kids’ TV room, where Bree waited with Jonathan. A swarm of cardboard bees covered the walls, smiling down at the tiny patients. Jonathan was playing on a giant red sea monster that doubled as a slide. Skinny arms flung wide, he scooted down the curve of it as Mark walked in.
It always fascinated Mark how even the sickest children still had the impulse to play, but healthy adults quickly forgot how.
They were the only ones in the room, and Mark saw Bree before she saw him. She was hunched over, her chin propped in her hands, watching a cartoon with the dull expression of the exhausted. Nevertheless, she’d angled her body so that she could still see her son. That vigilance of hers never, ever slipped.
As if she could sense his presence, she raised her head. She was disheveled, her eyes bruised with shock and fatigue. He’d bought a different jacket for her from the gift shop because her trench coat had been bloody. This one was ice-cream-pink and fuzzy—not something he guessed was her usual style—but it was all the store had. She’d pulled another pair of jeans from her backpack, and this pair had threadbare knees. The woman had nothing but the clothes on her back, and they were in sorry shape. And yet, she was lovely.
As their eyes met, hers widened, expectant. Mark’s chest squeezed, a half-forgotten feeling waking inside. It had been so long since someone had waited for him. It was something he’d never take for granted—to walk out of a room, and have it matter to someone if he ever walked back in. He’d lost the right to expect that from anyone long ago.
Yes, she was beautiful with her soft hair waving around her face, like a painting of an angel. Not the Christmas-card type, but the angels from his day, with swords and arrows and smiles that woke the sun and broke armies of war-proud kings. That kind of sweetness remade worlds.
And destroyed vampires like him. Innocents invited tragedy because, well, beasts would be beasts and angels would ultimately suffer. Mark tried to freeze his heart as he strode forward, but the bitter lesson of his memories melted like cobwebs in the wind. Hunger rose in his blood.
The corners of Bree’s mouth quirked up in a hesitant greeting. He was struck with yearning to kiss those wide, generous lips. He could tell they were warm, just like every part of her he’d already touched.
He squashed that thought before it took flight. A kiss would only end in complications. Neither of them needed that, especially when he might have to tell her she was going to lose her precious son. Please, no.
“Bree,” he said softly, sitting next to her in the row of molded plastic chairs.
“Mark.” Her hands twisted, fingers lacing and unlacing. “Or should I call you Doctor here?”
