Allegiance (The Penton Vampire Legacy) (7 page)

Robin knelt next to him and looked over her shoulder. “Help us. He needs to touch as many of the bricks as he can. Don’t talk to him. Anybody got a sheet of paper and a pencil?”

Cage glanced over at Mirren, who wore that uneasy expression he only got around Hannah. Mirren was all about what he could see and touch and punch the shit out of. Stuff like visions totally freaked him out. If anybody in Penton scared Mirren, it was little Hannah in the midst of a premonition.

He flinched when Cage touched his arm. “I can help them here. Maybe you could check in with Aidan and Krys. On the off chance the colonel wants to talk security, you probably need to be there.” It was doubtful that Colonel Rick Thomas would want to do anything more tonight than mourn the loss of his son, but the possibility gave Mirren a graceful way out if things were about to get weird with Nik. Make that
weirder
. “You could probably take Nik’s SUV and we can walk back.”

Mirren glanced down the hill at the vehicle, no doubt wondering whether he might get psychic germs from driving it. “Good thinking, but I’ll walk to the clinic and take Aidan and Krys home in the Bronco.”

He didn’t waste time, his long legs eating up the distance down the hill before Cage could respond.

With Mirren making his way north toward the clinic, Cage walked to the back side of the wall structure. Earlier he’d spotted the clipboard from the job site on the ground near the extra bricks, and, sure enough, there was a pen attached. He flipped the pages to turn blank sides up, clipped them back in, and handed it to Robin.

“Thanks.” She touched Nik’s arm and held the clipboard in front of him. He nodded and tossed another brick aside.

They worked another thirty minutes. Robin would hand a brick to Nik; he’d hold it for two seconds, or four, or half a minute, sometimes with his eyes closed. Then he’d hand the brick to Cage, who’d set it aside and wait for the next one while Nik took the clipboard and sketched furiously.

Finally, Nik stared at the last sketch a few seconds before thrusting the clipboard at Robin, struggling to his feet and lurching behind the building. Where, by the sound of it, he was retching his guts out.

“You need to help him?” Cage asked Robin. Whatever kind of abilities Nik had, he paid a physical price for them.

“No, he’ll need to sleep it off. He hasn’t done this in a while.” She scooted next to Cage and held out the clipboard. “You might need more light to study these, but he gets images off things he touches—things that happened in the past. Here’s what he got from your bricks.”

The top drawing was an amazing likeness of Max Jeffries, laughing. “This is Max,” Cage said, “the other Ranger living in Penton. Rob was his best mate.”

Several drawings appeared to be from the brick manufacturer. Another one showed Mark, and another showed Rob himself, looking happy and very much alive. There was a scathe member Cage didn’t know well, but the guy was bonded to Mirren.

He flipped to the last drawing, an image of a wild feline—a mountain lion, maybe, or a jaguar. There was no context, so it was hard to tell how large it was.

He held it up to Robin. “What does this mean?”

Before she could answer, Nik stepped back around the corner, looking like death’s last victim. “If you don’t recognize it, I’d say it means Penton has a shape-shifter you don’t know about.”

  
CHAPTER 6
  

M
elissa sat hunched on the sofa of the community house she shared with Mirren and Glory—and, after tonight, a couple of new Ranger members from the Omega Force project. They needed people, especially feeders, but she was tired of new faces.

The noise of a car engine reached her from the street, and she tugged back the ugly light-blocking black curtains that Will had installed in all the community houses. He claimed it was to prevent the vampires from frying in case any of them got stuck upstairs, away from the safe spaces, during daylight hours—but she’d overheard him assuring Mirren the fabric was both fireproof and bulletproof. So much for rebuilding without the shadow of danger hovering over them.

The car passed without stopping; she recognized the driver as Shawn Nicholls, one of the vampires who’d come into Penton just before everything fell apart. Both Shawn and Britta Eriksen had been bonded to Will, but Melissa knew virtually nothing about them except that both she and Shawn fed from Glory because Mirren wouldn’t let another man near his mate.

Damn it. There had been a time when no one moved to Penton without Melissa Calvert taking the time to invite them to lunch or introduce them around town so they’d feel at home. Aidan teased her about “snooping,” but she’d always thought of it as friendly interrogation. She knew everybody, and everybody knew her. She had enjoyed being seen as a direct link to Aidan. She liked it that people would come to her in order to get an issue or problem in front of him. And she liked helping people settle into life in Penton, especially the new human familiars.

She’d learned a lot about people in those lunches at the no-longer-standing Penton café, and she thought she’d been a big part of why Penton worked so well. People were friendly and open, and it started with her.

No more lunches for her now. At least not unless they involved a vein at 3:00 a.m. She didn’t want to feel bitter about what had happened to her, but she didn’t know where she fit in anymore. She was no longer Aidan’s fam. No longer Krys’s daytime help at the clinic.

No longer Mark’s wife, at least not technically.

Where are they?
Krys had called from the clinic to tell her about Mark’s injury and assure her it wasn’t life-threatening. Still, Melissa wanted to see him for herself. She knew him better than anyone; just by watching him get out of the car and walk to the community house across the street, she’d be able to tell where he hurt and how badly. She knew his facial expressions better than her own: the way he’d grit his teeth, suck in a breath, and turn his head to the side with his eyes closed if something hurt; the way his mouth would quirk up on the left side two times—never once, never more than twice—just before he burst into laughter.

Old habits, and all that.

From her perch, she could also see the community house at the head of Cotton Street. She’d know when Cage came home from the accident site and know that he, too, was safe. Melissa no longer took a single day for granted. She’d learned the hard way that monumental change could take place in a heartbeat.

She thought she’d seen Cage earlier, but it had been Fen coming out of the house. He’d sat on the porch for a while, then walked down Cotton Street toward the old mill. She watched him until he turned the corner, and she thought about calling Aidan.

She was probably being paranoid, but Fen was one more person she didn’t know. And after the last nine months, that meant more people she didn’t trust. In Penton, trust was now a rare commodity. She resented like hell what had been done to her town; she resented all the bad things that kept happening to people she cared about.

And she, Melissa Calvert, former familiar of Aidan Murphy and wife of Mark Calvert, sat here with fangs, at midnight, afraid, not sure who she was anymore. Cage, Aidan, Krys—they all kept telling her she wasn’t a monster, that she was still the woman she’d always been.

They were right on one count; she wasn’t a monster. She’d been around too many kind and honorable vampires to believe that lie.

But she had changed. She’d turned from a naively fearless human into a cowardly, fanged night crawler, like those big, stretchy worms she’d dug up as a kid to use as fishing bait.

The worms were slow, rubbery creatures that instinctively hid from anything that came too near, seeking out the comfort of earthy darkness in which to burrow and hide. That was her. What Melissa Calvert had become. Or had reverted back to—just like when she’d been Melissa Williamson, before meeting Aidan. The young woman who had gravitated to abusive relationships like iron filings to a magnet. The woman who sank so deeply into her mother’s trap of depression that she couldn’t climb out and thought a bottle of pills was her only escape.

Aidan had saved her that time. Turned her into a new person. And Mark had completed her.

Now, she felt the depression threatening to take her down again, and damn it, she didn’t want to resurrect Melissa Williamson. She didn’t want to wallow in a paralysis of sadness and fear. She didn’t want to be a blind, light-fearing night crawler that could function only in mental darkness.

Cage had been the light that tried to lead her out of it after Matthias took her, but she didn’t want to rely on him again. Or on anybody but herself.

Another hour passed, and finally, just before midnight, Mirren’s Bronco stopped in front of Aidan and Krys’s house. A wave of relief washed through Melissa when Mark slid out of the backseat; her tense shoulders released, a shaky breath escaped. He had a bandage on his left temple, but no other visible injuries.

Her relief died a quick death, though, as she watched Mark walk up the sidewalk. His movements were slow and stiff, and he half-pulled himself up the short set of steps to the porch by grasping the side rail.

She recognized the gait. Chronic back pain had turned him into a heavy user of oxy 80, which led to a string of petty thefts when the doctors cut him off and he needed money for black-market buys. Then heroin, cheap and plentiful on the streets of Atlanta, had claimed him. None of it helped him move any better; it simply made him care less.

Melissa swallowed down the dark thoughts that threatened to overwhelm her. She stood up once she saw Aidan, Mirren, and Max getting back into the Bronco, leaving Krys behind. Krys was a doctor, but she might not know all of Mark’s history. Melissa could help.

She walked out of the house without stopping to think about what she was doing. Otherwise, she’d chicken out. Since she’d been turned, Mark had made her feel guilty with his need, his love, his patience. He would wait for her, he said. He’d love her when she was ready. They’d try again, as soon as she felt comfortable feeding from him.

Instead, she had turned away. She’d turned to Cage out of fear. She’d broken Mark’s heart, even though she’d done it for both of them.

Oh, Mark would be honorable. He’d try to make it work. She loved him so much her heart felt big and ungainly behind her ribcage, as if it might swell and burst whenever she saw him. But eventually he’d reject her, and as selfish as it would seem to everyone else, she had to protect her own heart and walk away before he had the chance. She couldn’t survive his rejection.

Krys stepped out the front door and onto the porch, closing the door behind her before Melissa cleared the stairs. “I’m glad you’re here. Mark needs sleep, but his medical records were stored in the part of the clinic that burned.” She sat on the top step and slid over for Melissa to sit beside her. “I know about his problem with heroin, but it started with painkillers, didn’t it? He injured his back again. Wasn’t that his problem before—his back?”

Melissa stared out at the street. She knew Mark’s story as well as she knew her own. “He was a financial analyst—did you know that?”

Krys nodded. “He told me a little of his story when I first came to Penton. There was an accident, right?”

“Multiple spinal fractures, courtesy of a drunk driver.” Melissa traced the edge of the step with the toe of her sandal, stopping when she remembered Mark had surprised her with those sandals one time after a business trip to Birmingham for Aidan. He’d thought they were sexy. She should take them off before going inside. If she went inside. “The doctors couldn’t do much for him, and they were afraid surgery would make it worse.”

“So he tried to kill the pain instead. It happens a lot.” Krys sighed. “I just shot him up with enough morphine to take off the worst edge of the pain; I was afraid to give him more. Maybe he’ll be able to sleep, though. I’ll see if Glory can stay with him during the daytime and get someone else to run the kitchen. Aidan’s finding a substitute feeder in the meantime. We’ll reassess tomorrow night.”

Melissa slipped out of the sandals and set them aside. “What about Max? He’s just got Cage and Hannah to feed, and he could stay here during the day.”

“He’s also got the new guy, Fen.” Krys looked at Melissa’s bare feet and started to say something. Finally, she just shook her head. “Plus, I think Max will want to take Rob’s body home, so we’re going to be short on feeders. How are you doing?”

Krys had always been too perceptive for her own good, but she was Melissa’s best friend now that Mark no longer held that title. “I’m fine.”

Her friend didn’t answer, and again Melissa could practically hear her biting her tongue. “Go ahead. Say whatever you want to.”

“Why are you here, Mel?”

Talk about a loaded question. Why was she saddled with this strange new life? Why was she still in Penton? Or why was she sitting here on the porch of the house where Mark lived, unable to stay away from him?

Melissa figured she knew which “why” Krys was after. “I thought you might need Mark’s medical history, and I could tell you what you needed to know. Probably more than he can.”

“Uh-huh.”

Melissa sighed. When Krys had been agonizing over her relationship with Aidan, Melissa had given her friend a lot of tough love; she suspected she was about to get a shot of her own treatment handed back to her. She waved her hand in a rolling motion. “Go ahead.”

“Here’s what I think.” Krys turned sideways on the step to face Melissa. “Deep inside, you still love Mark, but you don’t know your limits yet and he scares you. Cage, on the other hand, is safe.”

Melissa laughed; talk about being off base. “Cage Reynolds is not safe. The man was a soldier for hire, for God’s sake. You should hear some of the stories Fen was telling last night about their years as mercenaries in Nicaragua.” She paused, hesitant to say what she hadn’t even told Cage. “Besides, I’m not with Cage. I’m not going to be.”

Krys smiled. “You have no idea how glad I am to hear you say that.” She leaned back against the top step, propping on her elbows. “Don’t get me wrong. I like Cage a lot, and I know Aidan does, too. Even Mirren. But . . .”

“I know.” Melissa stared down the block at Cage’s house, wondering when she’d get to tell him all of this and how he would take it. Wondering if she’d be disappointed if he didn’t care. She had no idea how the man felt. “I’ve watched you and Aidan together, and Mirren and Glory. I just don’t have that kind of connection with Cage.

“I held onto him after I was turned for the exact reason you said, out of fear. But whatever that bond-mate reaction is that vampires get? I don’t have it, and I don’t think he does, either.”

“Have you told Mark that?”

Melissa shook her head, opened her mouth to respond, but realized she didn’t know what to say.

“You’ll figure it out.” Krys threw an arm around her shoulders and hugged her. “Speaking of Cage, I’m going down the block to meet his Irish buddy. Aidan wants my take on Fen.”

“I’m not sure they’re buddies at all. I am sure Fen Patrick is kind of a sleazoid with the one-liners.” Melissa was relieved to veer the subject away from her love life. “I don’t much like him, but it might just be because he tries so hard to be charming. It feels desperate.”

Krys nodded. “Yeah, but if he’s starving—and Aidan said he was really thin—he probably is desperate. He wants to find a place here.”

Maybe, but Melissa still didn’t like his vibe. “Meet him and see what you think. He left the house a while back, walking down toward the old mill. I don’t know if he’s back yet, so you might have to wait.”