Hunter's Salvation (33 page)

She searched the crowd for him, but it was a futile effort. She knew where he was—she just hoped that, in the chaos, nobody had seen him disappear into thin air. It was stifling hot, but she was freezing. Nerves and fear had turned her blood to ice, and she just couldn't get warm.

“He's gone.” She scrubbed her hands over her eyes. Everything felt so surreal. Unfinished. Even saying the words out loud didn't seem to make it connect. “He's gone.”

The ache in her heart spread, and she pressed her fist against her lips as the sobs struggled free from the knot in her chest. The echo of her mother's words came back to haunt her.
Is it worth it?

Jess just didn't know. Vax would have gotten Masters. Deep inside, she knew that. The sick, monstrous bastard was gone. But so was Vax, and she knew that ache was one more that she would have to live with every day. For the rest of her life. After only a couple of days, he had forced his way inside her heart, where she had sworn she'd never let anybody in. He'd done it anyway.

She hunched her shoulders, curling her body in. It didn't help. Grief spread, a physical pain that seemed to grow with every passing second.

There were some startled shouts. Downright shock. Quiet at first—Jess just blocked it out. But then it got louder and louder, and slowly she turned. This time, when her legs went out from under her, there was nobody there to catch her.

Inexplicably, the fire was practically extinguished. The charred, skeletal remains of the building were still smoking and dripping with water. It wasn't possible. Jess didn't know how it happened. A fire just didn't go that fast from a greedy monster that consumed everything to a smoky, smoldering mess of debris.

But as amazing as that was, it wasn't what held everybody's attention. What held their attention came stumbling out the door. Malachi first. There were some comical double takes as the firefighters who had tried to move Malachi back recognized him under the soot and smoke. He carried a limp, motionless body in his arms. The man Malachi held was so covered with ashes and soot, his flesh looked black.

Behind Malachi stood Kelsey. Her face was a painful, vivid shade of red, and her clothes were black.

Jess ran for them. Hands went to grab her and she shook them off, dodged those who would have blocked her way. She came to an abrupt stop, staring at Vax's face as numbness spread through her. She was afraid to ask. Afraid to let herself feel anything: hope, fear…anything.

“He's alive.” Kelsey said it in a soft, raspy voice. Her face was so red—even her eyelids looked red. Sunburned, almost. She weaved back and forth on her feet.

A couple of paramedics gathered around them, but Kelsey wouldn't leave Mal's side. She gave Jess a pleading look, but Jess never saw it. As paramedics took Vax from Malachi, Jess followed them. Their bodies blocked her from him, and she forced her way through, ignoring everything they said and did.

She had to see for herself. Had to.

She reached out and touched his wrist. Her eyes closed as she felt the strong, steady pulse under her fingers. Relief flooded her, swamping the tension and adrenaline that had been keeping her upright. She stood and tried to take a step away, letting the paramedics do their job.

Except she only made it two steps.

 

“T
HAT
wasn't exactly the kind of distraction I was looking for.”

Jess jumped as the voice came out of nowhere. She looked up and saw Kelsey standing by Vax's bed. Pain streaked through Jess's head and she winced, touching the tender laceration at the base of her skull. “Don't ever pass out in front of paramedics,” she warned. “They don't like it.”

A humorous smile appeared on Kelsey's lips. “I'll remember that. But while they were fussing over you two, it gave Mal and me a chance to slip away. Have you spoken with the police?”

Jess nodded. “Yeah. I don't know who you are or where you came from. I was supposed to be meeting a source, somebody who had leads on the recent kidnappings. Vax was supposed to meet me there, backup type of thing, but I couldn't find him when I got there.” She forced a smile. “I know how to fabricate a believable alibi.”

Then she looked down at her hands. “They won't tell me anything. Privacy, yadda yadda, and all.”

There was a look in the witch's eyes that Jess didn't like. Kelsey reached out and touched a hand to Vax's face. He had an ashen look to his skin, and he lay on the bed as still as death. So far Jess had been kicked out of the room four different times as various doctors examined him.

The last one had been a neurosurgeon, and he'd had a weird look in his eyes, his mouth set in a grim line as he left the exam room.

Jess had hoped that maybe Kelsey could tell her something, but apparently Jess was just going to be kept in the dark. Kelsey pressed fingertips to his temple. Vax never moved. Kelsey stood silent and still for a moment, but when she looked at Jess, the nasty little knot of dread in Jess's belly got worse.

“He'll be fine. Mostly.” Kelsey looked away evasively and turned as if she were going to leave.

“Don't you
dare
leave,” Jess snarled, reaching out and clamping a hand around the woman's wrist. She dug in her fingers. “What is going on? You know something. I can see it in your eyes.”

An unhappy smile curved Kelsey's lips. “Yeah,” she muttered, her voice flat, almost bitter. “Yeah, I know something. But you'll have to talk to him.”

“And where can I find him?”

Kelsey blinked. “Here?”

Glaring at her, Jess said, “It's not like he can
stay
here. When are you all going to get him out of here? Where are you taking him?”

The witch did a nervous little shuffle with her feet, her eyes looking everywhere but at Jess. Finally she turned to Jess and said, “He's not going anywhere. At least not until he can walk out of here on his own. And that will be a few days.”

“But…” Jess let go of Kelsey's wrist and looked back at Vax. “What's going on?” She reached out, skimming the tips of her fingers over his jawline. Just recently there had been a bruise. She'd put it on him. She'd seen the dark shadow of it. It had been gone in less than a day.

If he could heal that quickly, then how could they leave him in the hospital? More, if he could heal that quickly, why did he need to be in a hospital, and why wasn't he waking up? “I need to know what's going on.” Something was wrong. She felt it in her gut.

Shaking her head, Kelsey said, “No. You got questions? Yeah. Me, too. I've got a couple dozen questions easy. But I can't answer them for you.” She turned away, but then looked back at Jess. “Thank you for covering for the two of us. The last thing we need is to get pulled into an arson investigation. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go and strangle my husband.”

Kelsey hated leaving. She really did, but it was the only way. Kelsey focused on her husband and let the magick carry her away. Jess didn't look away from Vax again. Kelsey's heart broke a little, but she didn't have any certain answers for the other woman, and for all her suppositions, it wasn't her place to explain what she thought had happened while Vax was down in that fiery hellhole.

When Kelsey opened her eyes, she was back in a small, cramped hotel room. It wasn't a nice one, but it was close to the hospital and that was what counted. From the window, they could see the sprawling medical campus. Kelsey hated leaving Vax there. But she couldn't get him out without attracting a hell of a lot of attention, and after the fire, they couldn't risk it. They had to get a few Hunters out here, preferably some who had medical experience and the ability to blend in with mortal society.

“Strangle me for what?”

Rolling her eyes, Kelsey turned around and demanded, “Do you have to constantly eavesdrop?”

Malachi lifted a big shoulder. “No. I just enjoy it so.” He reached out and traced the upper curve of her lip. “Now, why are you strangling me this time?”

Curling her hand into a fist, Kelsey slugged him in his belly. It was a lot like hitting a brick wall, but it sure was therapeutic. “What the hell were you thinking, going in there?”

A red brow lifted. “I was thinking that my wife was in there. So was a man I consider a friend. Did you really think I'd just keep waiting outside where it was nice and safe?”

“And flame-free?” She curled her lip in a sneer. “Gee, how stupid of me, thinking it was best that you stay someplace where you weren't risking turning into a pile of ash.”

Jerking her against him, Malachi lowered his head and kissed her, quick and rough. “For once we agree.”

Lust and love warmed her body as she stared up at him. “You big jerk.”

“Hmmmm.” He kissed her again, slower this time, tracing her lips with his tongue before pushing it into her mouth. His hands skimmed down her sides and then he pressed them against her back, flattening them and aligning their bodies. She felt the hard, heavy ridge of his cock against her belly.

By the time he lifted his head this time, she was breathless and whimpering, ready to strip both of them naked and jump on him. She might have done it, too, but Malachi eased back just a little. “How is he?”

Unsure how to answer that, she shook her head. “I honestly don't know, Malachi.” Slowly, she turned in his arms. They would have to leave soon. They hadn't actually paid for the room. Malachi had shifted to mist and re-formed inside one of the vacant rooms and opened it from the inside. Kelsey was exhausted and would have loved some rest, but they couldn't stay.

Too many people had seen both of them, and there were going to be a lot of questions about the fire.

“Should we get him out?”

Kelsey sighed. She'd asked herself that question probably ten times now, and each time the answer was the same. She wanted to get Vax out of there, save him the hassle of a thousand questions, but too many people had seen him. The way he looked, he wasn't the kind of man people forgot about. If he disappeared, there was a good chance that his face would show up on a “wanted” list in connection with the fire.

That wouldn't be a good way to start his new life. Besides, he did need medical care.

“He's too sick to move right now,” she hedged. Part of her still hoped that she hadn't sensed what she had. Or, rather, a distinct emptiness. “He needs medical care.”

“Is there some reason you can't heal him? Or a reason he can't heal himself?”

Unhappy, Kelsey looked up at Malachi. “Yeah. There is.”

 

J
ESS
stared at their joined hands. He had a thousand little monitors hooked up to him, and she had gotten used to the monotonous beeping. Every so often, a nurse would come in, check the readouts, and leave, all without saying much of anything.

He'd had an EEG, a CT scan, an EKG, an MRI, and a PET scan. Jess didn't know what all of those tests were, or what they were for, but she had figured out one thing: The doctors saw some things on those tests that bothered them.

“You need to wake up.”

She looked at his face while she spoke, but there was no sign that he heard her. She swallowed around the knot in her throat and kept on talking. “I didn't want this, you know. I didn't want you getting involved. I didn't want anybody else getting hurt. I didn't….” Jess closed her eyes and whispered softly, “I didn't want to care about you.”

She thought back to the first time she had seen him and realized it hadn't been even a week. Five days. Five nights. One of those nights had been easily one of the best nights of her entire life. But that was it. A handful of days. Six days ago, she hadn't even known him, and now she couldn't imagine a world without him in it.

“Wake up.” She whispered it softly as tears fell down her cheeks. “I can't…Damn it, Vax. I can't lose somebody I love again. I don't care if you don't love me. I can deal with that. God knows I never set out to fall for you like this. You don't have to love me. You don't have to ever even see me again. You just have to live.”

Still no answer.

Jess lowered her head to the bed and cried quietly.

I
T
hurt his heart, watching her. Jess sat at his bedside, her head resting on the bed and her shoulders trembling as she sobbed. He could hear her crying. God help him, it hurt.

He was ready for this to be over. These weird dreams, these weird flashes, he just wanted all of it over. The strange dreams plaguing him weren't really dreams. Vax knew that, even though he didn't exactly understand how it was happening. His body was lying there practically lifeless. Try as he might, he couldn't make himself wake up.

He was stuck, completely stuck. He didn't know why, and he didn't know how to get
un
stuck. One thing was certain: Staying here like this, watching her cry, was going to break what little heart he had left. “You don't love me.” He spoke to Jess even though he knew she couldn't hear him.

“I think she does.”

There had been a time when the sound of that familiar voice would have made Vax either sick with guilt or sick with longing. Now it just filled him with a distant sense of regret. He turned and watched as Cora stepped up to his side. She stared at him with her pretty blue eyes, so sad.

He was hardly able to believe that she was there, standing in front of him—whole, healthy, and blissfully, completely human.

“I should have saved you,” he murmured as he reached out and brushed Cora's red-gold curls back from her face.

“Vax, you did save me. I knew what I had done—what I would have done. I wanted to stop. I couldn't. If you hadn't…” Her voice trailed off, and she paused. Closing her eyes, she whispered, “I couldn't have spent eternity dealing with that, Vax. You know that.”

“It was my fault—”

Cora pressed her fingers to his mouth. “No, darling. No, it's not your fault. It was just meant to happen this way.” She was silent for a moment. She combed the tips of her fingers through his hair the way she had done when they'd fallen in love and gotten married. She skimmed her fingers down the line of his jaw. “I loved you so much. I do not know if I ever told you just how much I loved you. You were my entire world.”

In a rusty voice, he murmured, “And you were mine.”

A bittersweet smile curled her lips. “I know. And I have been for too long. But not anymore.” She swallowed, and when she continued, her voice was halting and reluctant. “It is time to let me go, Vax. My time here is over. Let me go. Let me move on.”

“How?” Vax shook his head. “I don't know how.”

Cora smiled. “You can start by waking up. And tell her that you love her.” She looked at Jess and smiled. “I like her.” Then she was gone.

Tell her I love her.
Yeah, like he was going to do that.

 

S
HE
was dreaming.

Jess had to be dreaming. She could feel him playing with the ends of her hair, and she was terrified that if she moved, she would wake up. She'd find him lying still as death in that damned hospital bed, the monitors beeping away, tubes running every which way as they pumped food, liquids, and medicine into his system.

But she had to turn her head. She had to look at him. Slowly, she looked up. She braced herself, knowing she was going to wake up. But she didn't. Or maybe she really was awake. Maybe
he
really was awake.

“Oh, God.”

He smiled, a weak shadow of his real smile. “Do I look as bad as you do?”

She gave a watery laugh. “Worse.” Relief escaped in a harsh, painful sob, and she caught his hand, pressing it to her cheek. “I can't believe you're awake.”

“How long has it been?”

Jess swallowed. “A week.” A long, agonizing, painful week, when she thought she was going to go insane. “A very, very long week.”

His lashes drooped closed. “How long you been here?”

Jess just shrugged. She left only when the nurses threatened to kick her out. Then she'd make the forty-five minute drive back home, shower, crash for a couple of hours, and get up so that she could be back here again. After the first time home, she almost didn't go back.

The police tape hadn't stopped her from going inside, but the cops weren't overly pleased with her for doing so. Or with the story she fabricated. But they couldn't exactly prove otherwise. So the official report was that somebody broke into her house and threatened her about one of her ongoing investigations. She'd kept it nice and vague, and after repeating the same line over and over, the police finally eased up a little.

The windows were being repaired today, and sooner or later she was going to have a lot of cleaning up to do, but none of that mattered. Not a bit, not now.

“You need to go home and rest,” Vax said. His voice was hoarse and there was a distance in it that bothered her.

“I just…” She licked her lips and forced a smile. “I wanted to be here when you woke up.”

“You were.” He still had his eyes closed. “That was sweet of you.”

Sweet?
Something was wrong here. Something was off. He was right there, but Jess felt as though they were standing miles apart. “Vax…”

“You have a life to get back to, Jess. It's time you did.”

“A life?” she repeated.
A life—how in the hell am I supposed to do that?
Jess had kind of hoped…No. She wasn't even going to let herself think about what she had hoped for. It was so obviously not going to happen. She felt a little numb inside as she asked, “But what about you? You don't have family here. You've been pretty sick. You need someone with you.”

Now he opened his eyes. There was a cool, cynical smile on his lips as he said, “I don't need someone, Jess. I don't need anyone. Go on home now.”

Jess swallowed. Okay. That hurt. No, she hadn't expected forever or anything from him. Circumstances had thrown them together, and chances were, that was the only reason he'd shown any kind of interest in her. In the normal world, whatever that was, he wouldn't ever have wanted her. But, still—she had expected a little more than this cool dismissal. “Vax—”

“What?” His voice was hard and flat as he said, “What the hell do you want? Job's done. I'll heal up and go home. You go back to your life. Figure out whatever the hell you are going to do with the rest of it.”

“My life?” she repeated. Tears stung her eyes, and she stood up slowly. She was pissed. The hurt was still there, but now she was pissed. She wasn't sure exactly why, but pissed off and hurting was a lot better than just hurting. “You're going to heal up, go home, and I'm just supposed to get on with my life. You want to tell me how the hell I'm supposed to do that?”

“It's your life. You figure it out.”

Ouch.
Jess clenched her jaw. It was either that or start screaming at him. “You're a cold bastard, Vax. I hadn't realized that until now.”

“What do you want, Jess?” He gripped the neckline of the hospital gown and jerked. The snaps came free, and he let it fall to his lap. He looked down at his chest and started plucking off the tubes and probes attached to his body. The little pads for the EKG, the IV, all of them. The machines started beeping, and two nurses came rushing in. Vax gave them a steely glare and said, “Get out.”

They stopped dead in their tracks and looked at each other. Neither of them was as stupid as Jess: They did the smart thing and left. Jess tucked her hands into the back pockets of her jeans and stared at Vax. She gave him a catty smile and said, “Gee, can I help you with the catheter?”

He just stared at her. “What do you want?” He gave her a derisive, mocking smile and said, “Please don't tell me you were looking for some kind of happily-ever-after. It was sex, blondie. We had sex. No big deal.”

“You also nearly died.” Jess swallowed and turned her head. She didn't want him to see how close she was to crying. “You also saved my life. You made me a promise and you kept it. You also made me a promise and you broke it when you fucked me senseless and then used your damned magick on me to keep me asleep while you snuck off to go take care of things. Apparently I'm just a weak, helpless woman and I would have gotten in your way.”

“Jess—”

“Kiss my ass, Vax. I'm not done. You damn near died. I don't understand how that happened. Witches are supposed to heal fast, aren't they? But you almost fucking died! You went into that place knowing exactly what you were going to do, and if Kelsey hadn't saved your ass, you would have died.” She looked back at him. “You went in there,
knowing that
.”

“Hoping for it,” he said lazily. He shrugged and said, “So what? I've had a good run. Would have been a great way to go out, blaze of glory and all.”

“I don't believe that you want to die.” Jess shook her head and said it again. “I don't.” If he had wanted to die, he would have done just that. His injuries had been bad enough and he'd been weak enough from the smoke inhalation that if he'd wanted to die, he would have. Instead he had fought to live.

“I don't care if you believe it or not, blondie.” He closed his eyes. “Go on back to your life, Jess. It's done. Job over.”

Jess couldn't make herself leave. She didn't know why. She wasn't much into the pain scene, and God knew this was about as painful as things could get without any physical injury being inflicted. She felt as though he had ripped out her heart and wadded it up in his fist before stomping it into the ground. “Job over.”

“You keep repeating things. Do I need to talk louder, or what?” His lashes lifted, and he looked at her with flat eyes. “I came here to do a job. It's done. Why's that so hard for you to comprehend?” He studied her and then started to smirk. “I didn't figure you for the type to romanticize things, Jess. You've known me, what, a week?”

“Less.”

“Less. And there you are giving me moon eyes. You're wasting your time, baby. There's no star-crossed-lover deal going on here. No happily-ever-after. We had sex. We caught the bad guy. You didn't do too bad, either. Now it's done. It's over.” He closed his eyes again and shifted around a little on the bed. “Go home, Jessica.”

This time she did.

 

H
E
watched as she walked away. He could hear each soft footstep, and each one of them felt as if he were gouging a knife into his chest.

“Kind of harsh, weren't you?”

It was going to take some getting used to, not being able to sense her. Sense any magick. He glanced over his shoulder and watched as Kelsey separated herself from the shadows. “Why did you do that, Vax?” she asked softly. “And don't lie to me. Don't forget that I can feel what you're feeling.”

“She thinks she loves me,” he said quietly.

“You didn't lose your Empathy, Vax. You may not be a witch anymore, but you didn't lose that. You know how she felt.”

“I know she's convinced herself that she loves me. People do that, Kelsey. They go through hell, and then when it's over, they convince themselves of the strangest things. Women get raped and then blame themselves. Kids get beaten and they think they did something wrong—”

“And you two stopped a couple of killers and she fell in love with you. Just like you're falling in love with her. It's not the same thing, Vax. You know it.”

He tried to sit up, but he was still too weak. Instead, he found the button to raise the head of the bed, and jammed it. It worked too damn slow, but finally he could see into Kelsey's eyes without straining his neck. “What I know is that I'm not the man I was a week ago. I don't know who or what I am. But if she does love me, then she loves
that
man. I'm not him anymore.” He stared down at his hands and focused, but nothing happened.

No fire. Nothing.

“I'm not the same man.”

“Bullshit.” Kelsey said it firmly. She reached out and covered his hands with hers. “The magick didn't make you, Vax.
You
made you. All the things you've done with your life—the magick made them easier, but it was you who did them. It was you who saved lives. It was you who saved people. The magick was just your tool. It isn't you.”

He felt the heat emanating from her hands, and even though he couldn't feel the pulse and flow of magick anymore, he knew what she was doing. He tried to jerk away, but Kelsey tightened her hands. It was pathetic, realizing he wasn't strong enough right now to pull away from the skinny, mouthy witch. “I don't want healing.”

“Tough. I know you. You're going to sneak out of here the second you can walk, and you'll head home. I don't want you collapsing on the roadside, pal.” She stayed in front of him for a few minutes and finally the heat faded. She lingered there for a moment, staring at him. “I know this wasn't what you planned on. I don't know if you went in there with some weird suicide quest going on in your head, or what. I can't imagine what you're feeling right now, or what you're going to feel tomorrow or the day after. But you've got years left in front of you. That much I do know. And if you leave it like this with her, you're going to regret it. Every day. For the rest of your life.”