Into the Light (The Admiral's Elite Book 2) (17 page)

Tipping her head, she eyed him curiously. “What do you mean ‘vibe’?”

His tone changed, he looked away again. “You’ve been getting stronger. Uh, I thought you might have picked up on something since you’re…” He stopped, hoping she would understand without him having to say the word again.

Realization dawned and Becca’s expression darkened. “Since I’m a witch?”

He regarded her grimly. Personal feelings aside, he had to think of their mission. And if she had a set of barely tapped abilities that could help them, then it was his duty to push her to use them.

“Why did you call me that?” Becca didn’t rant or scream. She was pragmatic about the whole thing. “Does my sight make me a witch?”

“It’s an old term. We don’t really have one for your type now.” It was hard to keep his hands to himself. He wanted so badly to stroke her face, to bring her comfort and not make her feel like he was using her to forward Black’s agenda.

She managed a weak smirk. “My type. It’s okay.” She held up a hand when he started to object. “I’m not offended.” She frowned in thought, “I’m just, I don’t know. Witch is so not how I thought of myself.” Then, running a hand along the side of her head, she winced and probed more tenderly. “I’m getting stronger?” She gave him a look, her disbelief obvious. “You think so?”

Michael glossed over the physical weakness Becca was suffering. “I don’t know if it’s how much you’ve been working with it or the blood, but you’ve been powerful with your abilities.” He watched her face fall at his mention of her blood ingestion. “I didn’t mean to bring that up. I know you don’t like to think about drinking blood.”

They’d avoided speaking about the whole thing in much detail. She took on a decidedly green hue whenever they got too far down the line. Truth be told, he’d used her aversion to keep her from asking too much. Michael didn’t want her to know. He didn’t want her to know how close her blood consumption had brought her to being like him; how close he’d come once to doing the unthinkable. All it would have taken was a bite from him.

He’d refrained from turning her into a vampire, even when it would have made her healing faster and less uncertain. God knew there had been moments during those three days when they’d been shut in his room together with only Ryan allowed near the door with blood deliveries. There had been moments when he thought he would lose her, when he thought he had. The temptation to turn her had been unbearable. The only thing that prevented him from being selfish, from turning her even if it meant she would hate him forever but he would know she still lived, was the fact that
she
didn’t want it. How could he say that he loved her if he ignored that? How could he turn her into a thing he hated. Doomed her to serving the admiral for an eternity?

And so, he had pumped himself and her full of enough blood to fill two live humans. That amount was beyond what any other had taken in without being bitten and turned. Mixed with her not quite human nature and they had virgin territory.

Her heart was picking up again. “Michael,” she put a hand on his where it lay in his lap, “it’s time you told me what happened.” Her pulse slowed, her reaching for him was subconscious. His vampire gloated.

His eyes searched hers. He kept his features decidedly even. A half a century of wearing a mask served him well. “They had given up on you in the hospital; there wasn’t anything they could do for you.” A picture of her burned body superimposed itself over the one in front of him. “I took you out of there and brought you back to the estate. I knew how to heal you, and I did.”

“I knew all that.” She squeezed his fingers, encouraging. “What I want to know is how much?” Her throat worked convulsively. “How much blood did I drink?” Touching him was the only thing keeping her from panicking, he could sense that she was on the edge.

“A lot,” he told her flatly. “Why does it matter?”

“Because I want to know. If I’m stuck like this, if it never wears off, how close am I to being like you? To being a vampire?” She touched her temple and flinched.

Michael worried she had a concussion and turned to the side, hiding the flare of his nostrils as he sniffed again to rule out internal bleeding.

On cue, the door opened and Ryan threw himself in behind the wheel with an angry grunt. Gabrielle was slower, yet equally furious as she climbed into the passenger seat and crossed her arms. The brief illumination of the dome light before the door closed showed eyes red from crying and a face covered in red, bloody streaks.

The four rode back to the motel in silence, all lost in their own thoughts. None of them noticed the figure that stepped out from the trees into the clearing as they pulled away.

The man-shaped being stood still and unseen, his form all but hidden by the long, dark coat he wore. Thin lips pulled back, a full set of pointed teeth shone in the faint dirty orange glow radiating from his flesh. Grinning wickedly, he roughed his black leather-clad palms together. These four were strong, their emotions raw. They were perfect. The blonde one had already given him enough to secure his place on this plane, he no longer needed the windigo to lure them to him. Having tasted two of them, he could find them again.

Chapter 18

Gabrielle wanted to stay under the hot water forever. She sat down, hugging her knees to her chest and let the water run over her shoulders while she stared at the gray water-stained ring halfway up the edge of the tub. If it were any other day she would have refused to even touch the dirty tub. This wasn’t any other day.

Since that first night in the woods, when she’d cut across the trail, nothing had been right. The rotting smell had been vampire all right. Different than Michael and Admiral Black but definitely vampire, there had been enough of them over the years of all different varieties for her to recognize it. She was becoming a connoisseur. Soon she’d be able to pick the region where they originated by the particular smell of dirt and minerals permeating their bodies. A sommelier of the undead, was that a thing?

No, this one’s smell was different, earthy and powerful. There was no smell of decay like that thing she saw in the woods that night; no rot, only earth and energy. Then there was the fact that it controlled her, took her over. It drew her for hours through woods, mud and over rocks, leading her on some chase she could never remember when she woke in a different part of town, filthy and exhausted. Always with a sense of loss and grief strong enough to send her running back to the motel, to check on Ryan, fearing the worst. Fearing she’d lost another one. And now she was seeing things. Well, not
things
.
Him
. She was seeing glimpses of a ghost from her past. Out of the corner of her eye, on the edge of a crowd, turning a corner on the street, he was there for only a second. But when she followed, he was gone. She hadn’t gone out since that first morning, avoiding the inescapable sighting. Avoiding facing the guilt head on. She knew she deserved it, except she wasn’t strong enough to face his ghost and hear him condemn her. And she couldn’t handle Ryan hearing it. Loyalty was everything to him. What would he think of her leaving her unit alone and vulnerable? Of letting them die while she lived?

Ryan. He meant more to her than she thought, more than she was intending when she’d started things with him. Waking with that sense of loss brought to mind the heartrending pain she’d felt when she lost the last man she allowed herself to love. Never again, she had vowed that day in Northern Africa after she buried her entire unit with her own hands. And now, despite her efforts to avoid it, it had happened. The fear of his loss had her pulling away as fast as she could. She couldn’t survive pain like that again.

Knuckles on the white pre-fab door had her on her feet at once. “Gabs?”

Swallowing first, she breathed once, then twice. He already thought she was losing it. So did she. Better to be thought a cold bitch than seen as weak. She had to do this. It was the only way for her. “Yes.” It was a challenge, not a question.

“Uh, Michael called. He wanted us to meet for dinner. To talk about today.”

The hesitation in his voice, his inability to hide his hurt was hard to ignore. Calling forth the last she’d seen of her lost love, the mound of sand she’d shoveled atop the shallow graves she’d dug with her own hands in the Algerian desert helped her to find strength where she thought she had none. “Fine. Give me a few minutes.”

Long pause. He was deciding whether or not to say something. Probably wanting to talk about the state she’d been in when she passed out on that rock and he found her. Nerves jolted her stomach and she doubted she would eat this night. Footsteps moved away on the thin carpet over concrete and she felt her shoulders fall.

“It’s for the best,” she muttered to herself, not believing a word. Some day she would have the satisfaction of destroying the creature who had taken her unit and her lover that day and only then could she ask forgiveness of their ghosts. Until then, she had no right to happiness, to Ryan.

“Shouldn’t we call him?” Becca smoothed the black fabric ending at her knee while she sat on the edge of the bed, waiting. “I mean, you did yell at him in front of his peers. Shouldn’t we be doing some damage control?”

A growl rolled out of the bathroom where Michael was finishing getting ready. His hair took longer than hers did. Becca snorted at her lover’s one vanity. She either threw hers in a ponytail when it was still wet or brushed it out and let it air dry. Michael’s, however, was thick and took longer to dry, plus he had to use gel to get it just right. The effect was drop dead sexy waves that fell in all the right spots. She was pondering teasing him when he stepped out, the look in his eye sending thoughts of teasing and smoothing Detective Salvo’s feelings into retreat. The black shirt was open at the neck, revealing the divot at the base of his pale throat that led to his smooth chest. Tucked into black trousers that accented his lean waist and finished with freshly shined Italian shoes and topped with a pewter belt buckle, he looked delicious. His lips curved when he saw the way she sucked in her breath and followed him with her eyes.

Becca sat up straighter, she knew they needed to be outside to meet the others soon. Running her hand over her skirt again, she considered staying in. No deal. They had to meet with the others, brainstorm, and then get back so Michael could have his evening rundown with Admiral Black. It was a necessity of this life. Not one of the perks, but this life had brought her Michael, and for that gift she could handle some inconvenient check-ins from the road.

Michael’s long strides brought him to within inches of where she sat. She slid her fingers under her legs lest they take on a will of their own and start something.

“Now that he’s had time to cool down he’ll figure out what I did.” He slipped his hands into his pockets and looked down at her, shirtsleeves rolled up partway exposed his lean forearms.

She stared up at him, watching a wave of hair fall forward over his forehead. Her teeth clenched her lower lip. “He who?”

“Detective Salvo,” Michael said softly, the blue in his eyes giving way to the growing black pupils. “He’s smart. He’ll figure out I was distracting him. He and his fellow officers will have a bitch fest about us over a few beers tonight.”

The sheer presence of Michael was enough to get her started. Throw in the fact that he was
trying
to tempt her and that her blood reacted to his nearness and Becca was fighting a losing battle. “And you’re okay with that? With them thinking you’re an ass when it suits you?” She started to think of positions that wouldn’t mess up her hair too badly. Feeling her give up the fight, her body heated up another notch. It knew what was in store and the craving was beyond fighting.

“Yes. I want him to know that he’s outranked.” A hint of fang showed when he ran his tongue over his lip. “Especially when I see him going after something of mine.”

Becca stood up, bringing her face even with his chest. Her hand reached out to touch his firm skin, starting at his abs and running up to his chest. Pushing off, she tilted her head up to see him. Flecks of blue were less visible as the black bled over and the vampire inside him fought to be free. She knew that meant fast and hard, their usual flavor. Her pulse quickened in anticipation. “Yours?” There was a hint of a challenge to her tone. Screw her hair, she’d do it again gladly.

His growl rolled out and arms of iron trapped her against his chest. When his lips met hers they were insistent. Nerves had been strained all day. Both wanted a release. Becca’s tongue traced his lip and she flicked it against his fangs, being careful not to prick herself. A drop of blood would throw him over the edge the state he was in and then they’d never make dinner. Though as her blood pressure came up, Becca cared less and less about dinner or who might be waiting for them.