Hunter's Salvation (23 page)

He jackknifed up into a sitting position and practically jumped out of bed, as though he couldn't stand to be still any more. “That man went to help a couple of kids, and he brought back a disease that killed more than a hundred people. My
family
. The only family I had ever known. Two Stars took me in and taught me how to control my gifts, but it was more than that. He gave me something I'd never had—a sense of history.” He strode over to the window, staring out the window. “He gave me all of that—and when he lay dying, I couldn't do anything to ease his suffering.”

She watched as he reached over his shoulder, touching his fingers to one feather. The tattoo lay just above his left shoulder blade. It was black, with ridged, raised lines—the ridges she had felt on his back during the night. “Two Stars had given me an eagle's feather—a sign of his affection for me. When the sickness spread through the village, I couldn't help heal any of them. My Healing gift has always been weak. But I could see the sickness. I saw it on him when he returned to the village that day, but I didn't realize what it was until it was too late. By then, warriors, women, and children had died. We had to burn everything, or more would die. I had to burn the gifts he gave me, including the feathers.”

Jess rose from the bed and walked over behind him. She wrapped her arms around his waist and pressed her cheek to his back. She felt another raised line, and she shifted until she could reach up and cover it with her hand. “You did them yourself. The first one for Two Stars.”

“For the only father I've ever known,” he corrected, his voice hollow. “Nineteen children died in the village—because I wasn't good enough to save them. The blue feathers are for the children. The other ones are for the friends I've lost.”

Jess closed her eyes. Dear God.

She hadn't counted them. Some were small; some were big. But there were dozens and dozens, possibly even more than a hundred. One in particular stood out in her mind, though. It lacked the smooth, delicate precision the other tattoos had. It was jerky, almost as if a child had scrawled it into Vax's flesh with a dull knife. She sought it out by touch, tracing it delicately. “And this one?”

The question had barely left her mouth when he pulled away. Suddenly remote and cool, he turned around and met her eyes. “That one is for my other failure.”

And then he grabbed his pants from the floor and left her alone in the room.

 

M
Y
other failure.

That sounded so…polite.

Failure didn't quite cover what had happened to Cora. He had failed to protect her. Failed to save her. The only thing he hadn't failed in had been her death. Oh, he had succeeded in that. He had killed her with his own hands, just like he had killed that man in Kansas City more than a century ago.

He hadn't choked the life out of her—no. He'd killed her by shoving a silver knife through her heart. He stood in the bathroom, staring at his reflection. All his strength, all his power—and in the end the only thing he could do for Cora was kill her.

“We can make it right, Vax. I know we can—you just have to help me.”

Slowly he lifted his hands and stared at them. They were trembling. They had shaken almost unbearably as he pushed the knife into Cora's chest. They had shaken so hard, it was a miracle he had been able to do it at all.

You do not have to do this,
Diego had told him repeatedly.

For a while, Vax had worked with Diego, a shape-shifter. The shifter had been a small, dark man who was deadly in both of his forms. He hadn't ever talked about his past, but there were rumors that he was descended from the Aztecs. Without even asking, Vax knew that Diego would have dealt with Cora—he would have ended her life swiftly and mercifully.

Vax hadn't let him, though. Ending her life would be the cross that Vax would bear for failing her. When Cora had disappeared, Vax had almost gone insane. It had taken nearly two weeks to find her, and by that time it was too late. The vampire that had kidnapped her had already Changed her. His taint had settled deep inside Cora, and the sweet, loving woman Vax had married had become feral. Little more than a killing machine.

Diego had tried to take the knife from Vax. Tried to send Vax away.

But if she was going to die because of his failure, then she'd die by his hand.

He could still remember the way she looked, hiding deep inside one of the numerous caves in the area around Carlsbad, in the Territory of New Mexico. There had been a miniscule fire flickering, giving him entirely too much light to see by.

He could have gone to his grave without seeing Cora like that. He would have gladly gouged his eyes out if it would undo the memory of how he had found her that night.

Blood had painted her mouth and chin a garish red. She'd fed sometime during the night, and by the looks of it, she'd drained whomever she'd fed from. Her lips were parted just enough for Vax to see the tips of newly emerged fangs.

She was alone in the cave.

Vax and Diego had already found the vampire that sired her. The feral had taken Cora from the bed she shared with her husband. He'd come silently one night while Diego and Vax were out Hunting, trailing after a rapist. The vampire had left but a torn nightgown and a few drops of blood and semen on the sheets.

Vax had hoped she'd survive the Change intact.

But after being raped by a feral vampire, sired by a feral vampire, Cora hadn't stood a chance.

With a hoarse cry, he spun away from the mirror, covering his face with his hands. It didn't block out the images, though. Didn't stop the memories from playing through his mind like a movie flashback.

It had been too much to hope that she wouldn't wake up.

As though she sensed his presence, her eyes had opened while he was still standing there, trying to make himself do what had to be done. She had leaped to her feet and rushed towards him, moving with inhuman speed. But she wasn't looking to hurt him. She had been crying.

“I knew you'd find me,” she had whispered as she kissed him on his chin, his neck, all over his face. “I knew you'd find me….”

“I'm sorry, Cora.” He reached up, brushing her hair back from her face. He loved playing with her hair, combing through the thick curls, fisting his hands in it as he kissed her.

“Sorry?” She started to ask him why, but then she looked over his shoulder. He knew she understood the minute she saw Diego.

Eyes wide with terror, Cora jerked away. She held her hands in front of her naked body, trying to ward him off. “Vax, please. You can't do this.”

He reached out, threading his hand through her red-gold curls one more time.

“Vax, please! You love me, remember?” As she pleaded with him, tears sparkled in her sky blue eyes. Her heart was racing—he could hear it.

“Yes. I do love you,” he murmured. “Shhhh…” He lowered his lips and kissed away the tears streaming down her cheeks.

“We can make it right, Vax. I know we can—you just have to help me.”

“I will.” He tipped up her chin and kissed her gently before guiding her head to his chest. He held her with one arm.

With the other, he drew the silver knife from his waist.
Am I really going to do this?

As though he were watching it happen to somebody else, he saw himself raise the knife. Watched as he drove it into Cora's smooth, silky back. She arched against him, screaming. A little puff of smoke escaped her lips, and the scream ended in abrupt silence.

“You did what you had to, my friend,” Diego whispered. “This is not your fault.”

Vax sat on the floor of the cave, holding his dead wife in his arms. “Yes, it is. I should have saved her.”

 

T
HE
ugly, misshapen tattoo on his back seemed to be throbbing. Fiery pain licked along his flesh, as though somebody had just branded him. He had a sour taste in his mouth, and acid burned its way up his throat.

His words from earlier echoed in his mind.

Failure.

He turned and looked at his reflection in the mirror. Over the past ninety-plus years, he had been approached by more Council emissaries than he could count. Rejoin the Hunters. Come to Excelsior and teach. Join the Council itself.

Each time, he had refused. They couldn't get a reason out of him. Nothing more than a flat refusal.

But they should know the answer.

Those who had mattered most to him in life had suffered and died, and he hadn't been able to do a fucking thing to save them.

Vax Matthews was a damned failure.

 

L
ESS
than an hour after he'd left so abruptly, he came back in her room. Jess had an apology on her lips, but after seeing the look on his face, it died. He didn't want to hear it, she could tell just by looking at him.

“Time to go,” he said. He grabbed her bag from the foot of the bed in one hand and with the other he closed his fingers around her upper arm and pulled her to the door. She gave the coffeepot a forlorn look and let him drag her out of the room.

Even though she'd actually gotten sleep, she was still so tired she felt stupid with it. She needed a little more caffeine, and now. But she didn't bother asking him to wait so she could pour a cup to go. He'd take off without her in a heartbeat, she knew it.

Why he was suddenly in such a hurry, she didn't know. It was close to ten in the morning and he was moving along like they had a plane to catch or something.

The hungry lover from last night was gone. She couldn't call him a gentle lover—her body ached too much to call him gentle. But it was the sweetest ache imaginable. She couldn't walk without remembering last night. In vivid detail.

She plodded along beside him down the dimly lit hall, trying not to think too much about her need for a caffeine fix. She almost lost that fight when she passed by the room right next to the elevator. Somebody was brewing coffee in there.

Vax slid her a look out of the corner of his eye. “I haven't checked out yet. You can get coffee downstairs while I do that. Stop scowling. You'll scare people.”

“I'm really going to scare people if I don't get caffeine soon.” She grumbled under her breath but followed him into the elevator.

She waited right by the doors and slid through them the second they started to open. Oh, yes. There was coffee. Hot, fresh, and strong enough to help clear up her fogged mind.

By the time she followed Vax out to the car, Jess felt human. She even relinquished the keys to her car and slid into the passenger seat without a complaint. As he took the driver's seat, she asked, “What do we do now?”

“Go back to Indianapolis. Find Dr. Frankenstein's lab. Destroy it.”

He said it as though he were ticking each item off some invisible list. He started the car and pulled out of the parking lot. He hit the road and headed north. A few minutes later they were heading east, back the way they'd come late last night.

Vax hadn't so much as looked at her.

Jess didn't feel the need to always fill silence with useless chatter, but this quiet was making her uneasy. Vax wasn't just being quiet. He wasn't just not looking at her. He'd shut himself off completely.

Shouldn't have said anything,
she thought dismally. Vax had started pulling back when she asked about the tatts on his back. She'd sensed it, seen the pain in his eyes, but instead of letting it go, she kept on pushing.

Then she had asked about
that
one, the big, ugly tatt that looked like it had been carved into his skin with a dull, rusty knife. There was a story behind that one that Jess wasn't sure she wanted to hear.

She felt like she was looking at a stranger and it hurt, because it was her own damn fault. If she had kept her mouth shut, maybe he wouldn't have pulled away so hard and fast.

There were a thousand other things she wanted to ask him, and a thousand things she wanted to say—almost all of them started with an apology that she knew he didn't want to hear. Instead, Jess just stared at the paper coffee cup. She finished off the rest of the coffee and put the cup in the console's holder.

“Any idea how we're going to find Frankenstein's lab?” she asked softly. She slouched down low in the leather seat and tucked her chin against her chest, exhausted and miserable.

“Yes.” He drove with just one hand. The other arm rested along the car door, his fingers strumming out a beat.