The Nightlife: London (Urban Fantasy Romance) (The Nightlife Series) (16 page)

Ivan squinted at him suspiciously.  “She must change to
heal.  Look.”  He pulled up his t-shirt to show off his hairy chest, not so
much as a single bullet wound or scar.  “The change, it makes us new again.
Like a rebirth.”

“Fuck.”  Aaron shook his head.

Michelle watched him, wisely keeping her mouth shut.  Her
eyes spoke of warning, but there was no way around the truth.

“What?”  Ivan watched him too.  Talk about sitting in the
hot seat.  “Is she strong enough to change yet?”

“I don't know. She looked pretty good when we left.  She was
eating up a storm.”

Ivan nodded and smiled.  “That’ll do it.  She just needs
enough strength to change … and change back.”

Though intelligent, and a generally decent guy, Ivan’s lack
of advance planning struck Aaron as ridiculous.  If Katya had to eat to gain
strength to change to wolf, then what the hell was she going to eat to gather
the strength to change back?  Who was she going to eat?

Ivan looked at him sincerely with a warm smile.  “Thank you
for bringing her home.  Once she changes into her wolf, she’ll be fine.  You
honored your promise.”  He clasped Aaron’s hand and arm in a brotherly shake.

“Well, you see, I did honor my promise, and I did help her
heal … She’s mostly healed already.”

“How?”

“Um, I did it.”

Ivan looked at him, a growl on his lips and a flare of
malice in his eyes. “What did you do?”

* * * *

After hearing Aaron’s tale in all its sordid detail, Ivan
was thoroughly disgusted with him and Michelle both.  “I told you to take care
of her!  That doesn’t include rape!”

Michelle put her hand on Ivan’s shoulder.  “He was following
Urvashi’s council.  He did the best he could and he saved her life.  We both
saved her life.  It was not rape.”

Ivan’s fists were balled up, ready to swing.  Michelle
leaned forward into his face, leaving herself wide open to him.  “Go ahead, hit
me.  If it will make you feel better.”

Ivan punched the back headrest and knocked the front passenger
seat all the way forward.  The cab driver swerved and started cursing up a
storm.

Ivan growled, “Let me off here.”  He jumped out of the
still-moving vehicle a block away from the apartment with his finger jabbed at
Aaron in a parting warning.  “You better … Oh fuck it!”   He took off walking
fast, straight for the apartment.  Aaron had never seen him so mad he couldn’t
articulate what he wanted to say.

Aaron reassured the cab driver.  “If he broke it we’ll pay
for it.  Don’t worry.”

“Don’t worry?  Fucking wanker!”

Michelle threw two fifties into his lap.  “That’s your tip. 
Get us to the Knightsbridge hotel in the next twenty minutes, and you’ll earn
another hundred, on top of your cab fare.”

Aaron had almost forgotten to worry about the sunrise, but
Michelle was all too aware of its proximity.  The cab driver quit grumbling and
turned off towards their hotel.

“Do you think they’ll forgive me?”  Aaron didn’t even want
to look Michelle in the eyes, he felt like a complete dirtbag.

“Is not important.  You did what you had to.”  She comforted
him with her hand on his lap, curling her fingers in his.

Although she was right, Aaron suspected he may have gone too
far.

* * * *

A loud banging on the hotel suite door rattled Aaron awake
just before sunset.  Definitely too early to get up.  SLAM, SLAM, SLAM.  “Open
the door you bloody wanker or I swear I’ll cut your prick off when I find you!”

He considered answering, might not be wise.

“Fuck it.”  Better to face Katya now rather than let her
sneak up on him later.

The moment he unlocked the deadbolt, Katya burst in the
door, shoving him back.  “You, and your devil’s teeth!”  She pointed a pistol
in his face.  “I should have killed you the first day.”

“Look, I’m too tired for this shit.  I didn’t know you could
heal if you changed to a wolf.  I did the best I could under the
circumstances.”

“I couldn’t change you idiot!  I was too weak!”

“Great, so I saved your ass, and now you’re here to shoot
me.  That makes sense.”

“You hooked me, you son of a bitch.  I’ve been going mad all
day long thinking of one thing!  You!  I told you not to bite me!  I begged you
not to bite me!  And you did it on purpose, I know you did!”  Tears streamed down
her face, and her gun hand wavered so bad he thought she might shoot him
accidentally.

He snatched the gun away and tossed it across the room. 
“Stop it!”

A solid left hook nailed him in the jaw, snapping his head
sideways. 
Girl could hit
.  She came at him in a flurry, right, left,
right, left.  He dodged and slapped her hands away, but she was strong – and
fast.  The knee to the groin dropped him.

Groaning with that puky gut-groin pain, he tackled her legs
and brought her down.  The girl was a brawler, and she fought hard.  But he was
pissed now, and not in the mood to get hit anymore.

He pinned her on her back, his hips between her legs, and
her hands held above her head.  “Stop fighting me, Katya!  I am not your
enemy.  I saved your life.”

Sobbing and bawling, still struggling to break free, she
screamed in his face.  “I don’t want to be your bloodslave!  I don’t want to be
your pet chew-toy!  I don’t want to suck your dick and run your errands and die
alone, a drained carcass with a fucking smile on my face.  You did this to me
on purpose.  You didn’t have to claim my life to save me!”

All he could do was hold her.  He couldn’t even deny her
accusations.  Deep down, he knew he had claimed her.  It had been unavoidable. 
He had made love to her almost non-stop for seventy two hours, biting her over
and over.

How could he not claim her as bloodslave?

It was an ingrained instinct, natural as his beating heart. 
Michelle had taught him to never, ever bite women more than two minutes, and
never more than twice.  Michelle knew how easily a person could be claimed,
hooked on her bite.  But Aaron abandoned all caution trying to save Katya’s
life.  He couldn’t even count how many times he bit her, or for how long.  She
was his now, for life, for better or worse.

“I didn’t know any other way, Katya.  I did what I had to.” 
He let go of her hands and hugged her tight, squeezing her warm, wonderful body
that had once been so frail and weak, but now held a mass of power and
vitality.  She reeked as if she had rolled in the hay with a whole pack of wet
dogs.  And he couldn’t help but notice the wound on her chest was nothing but
fresh skin.  No scar and no scab.

She had already done it, changed to wolf and back again. 
She didn’t need his help anymore, not for healing, but she did need something
else.

His bite.

“I don’t want you near me with your fucking teeth, but it’s
all I can think about!”  She sobbed and beat at his shoulders as he held her. 
He wished he could take it all back and undo the damage.  But it couldn’t be
undone.  Bloodslaves were life-long addicts, if they lived for long.

There was only one thing to do.  He bit her.  In seconds,
her sobs and flailing arms became sighs and intimate caresses.  His teeth
worked their magic, dumping the world’s most powerful drug into her
bloodstream, alleviating her withdrawals, and gifting her an intensely sexual
euphoria.

They hugged for a time, and he eventually let go his bite. 
Though she may not realize it, he didn’t actually feed from her.  He only sunk
his teeth in to let his venom saturate into her body.

“Is this the rest of my life?  Is your face the one I will
wake up to every day of my life?”  Her tears started again.  He hated seeing
her cry.  Such a strong woman shouldn’t cry.  It was so wrong.

“You brought breakfast in bed?  How nice.”  Michelle leaned
over the corner of the hotel bed, grinning broadly with all her teeth.

“Oh god no.  I can’t do this, I just can’t.”  Katya pushed
him to let her up.

Aaron stood and pulled Katya off the floor.  She seemed
slightly more reasonable now that her needs were taken care of.

Michelle licked her lips.  “One little bite, an aperitif?”

“No, I am not your bloody aperitif.  I’m not the main
course.  I’m not anything.”

Michelle sat up on the bed, butt-ass naked, absolute zero
modesty.  Aaron was already getting hard just looking at her.  Plans for a threesome
swirled through his imagination, erasing all of the potential pitfalls of such
a relationship.

{{Open the door.  I am here.}}  Urvashi’s abrupt intrusion
into his mind startled him.

“Shit.”  He didn’t even know she had left Russia, let alone
arrived in London.

Without scanning to see who might be with her, he opened the
door wearing nothing but his boxer shorts.  There stood Urvashi, with Ivan,
both of them grinning and staring at Michelle over his shoulder.  His naked
lover grinned right back at them and didn’t bother to cover herself.

Aaron was beginning to suspect Michelle had set her sights
on Ivan with plans to tame a wolf of her own.  She had surely caught his eye. 
Ivan couldn’t stop staring at her, with the hungry look of a carnivore.

That would surely be a mistake to avoid, taking two wolves into
their household.

Urvashi shook her head.  “Please put some clothes on.  We
need Ivan to pay attention.”

Ivan’s eyes never left Michelle, but he snickered.  “She
does not seem to mind, and I have no complaints.”

Katya had regained some of her composure.  She waved her
hand in front of Ivan’s face.  “I’m right here.  Can you see anything beyond
the blonde piece of ass?  Come on, we need Ivan’s big head, not the little
one.”

“Both my heads are big.”  He laughed in Katya’s face.  It
was good to see the cheerful Ivan, rather than the Russian Bear Ivan ready to
maim and kill.

Aaron decided some clothes were in order.  He grabbed a
t-shirt for himself and one for Michelle.  She took full advantage of her
audience to slowly, sensually slide that t-shirt down over her outstretched
hands and jiggling breasts.  It reached all way down to the very edge of her
ass.  Just short enough to flash everyone with shaved pussy.

Ivan pulled his eyes away from Michelle long enough to give Aaron
a measure of scrutiny.  The Russian glanced at Katya, and then back at Aaron,
doing some sort of mental calculation.  “I’m not too sure yet if I should thank
you, but Katya is alive, and you did your best to help her.”

Aaron nodded to Ivan and watched something unspoken pass
between the wolves.  Katya looked down and away, as though ashamed, or avoiding
Ivan’s gaze.

“Listen, we don’t have time for drama.”  Urvashi took a
second to collect everyone in the room with her no-bullshit severity.  “Two
members of Katya’s pack died in an explosion.  Dmitri and his security forces
knew we were coming.  We were betrayed.”

Urvashi’s eyes slid towards Katya who looked like she was
about to start crying again.  Aaron hated seeing her cry.  Aaron shook his
head.  “It wasn’t her fault.  If you need someone to blame, look to Dmitri and
his bloodslave.”

Urvashi glared at Aaron for his defense of Katya.  “There is
much you do not know, and little time to share it with you.  We must leave
soon, no later than tomorrow.  Dmitri will die.  We will take him down.”  She
looked at Ivan and Katya in turn.  “This is not about your vendetta, though I
understand how you feel.  I will explain the full details in Moscow, where I
can show you what he’s been doing.  His actions cannot go unchecked.  I tried
diplomacy.  I tried to buy him off.  Dmitri will not be deterred, and for that,
we must kill him.”

“What the hell is he doing?”  Aaron was so tired of being
led around with all this secretive half information.

“He’s synthesizing vampire’s venom and planning to mass
produce it.”

“Oh my god.”  Katya’s hand went to her mouth.  She looked
horrified.

Aaron puzzled it over for a moment.  “So, he’s a drug dealer
designing a new drug?”

“Yes.  But this is vampire’s venom.  Imagine entire nations
of bloodslaves, in thrall to Dmitri.  Ask Katya how she feels about your
venom.  Ask her what it was like to go without your bite today while you
slept.”

Katya’s eyes burned with hatred for Urvashi.  Katya was not one
to have her issues aired in public.  As she opened her mouth to protest, Michelle
interrupted.  “This cannot be allowed.  We must kill Dmitri, and any of his
laboratory workers, his secretaries and assistants, anyone who might have
learned the formula or the methods of creating this drug.  This is a crime
against humanity.”

They all just stared at her.  Michelle.  Of all people, no one
expected her to be so vehemently opposed, so passionate about this issue.  She
stared back at them boldly, wearing nothing but a black t-shirt, naked from the
waist down.  “I know what happens to bloodslaves, I have seen it too many
times.”  Her eyes went to Aaron and then Katya.  “Dmitri must be stopped at all
costs.”

Katya nodded in agreement with Michelle.  For the first time
ever these two women saw eye to eye on an issue. 
Somebody get a camera and
capture this moment
.

Ivan slumped down in a recliner and leaned his head to the
side to ogle Michelle’s naked ass.  The television came on suddenly, startling
everyone in the room with a loud, obnoxious commercial for used cars.  Urvashi
looked at the device as if it was possessed by a demon and she would smash it
back into the seventh level of hell.

Aaron pointed to Ivan’s leg.  “You’re sitting on the TV remote.” 
Ivan found the remote beside him and studied the hundred or so buttons.

Aaron looked up and froze in position at the face of a
blonde woman on the six-o-clock news.  “That’s her!  That’s the woman who was
with Jamison when he bought the pistol!  I recognize her.”  Aaron snatched the
remote away from Ivan to keep him from shutting it off.

The television screen split in half to show a dark-haired
female reporter holding a microphone on the left side, and a recent photograph
of the blonde woman on the right.  “Today a woman was found dead in her home in
Esher.  She reportedly committed suicide with a lethal overdose of pain
medication.  From her handwritten note, police officials are fairly certain
Laura Robbins took her own life.”

The reporter shuffled papers on her desk and continued.  “Ms.
Robbins claimed she could no longer stand to live day to day with the knowledge
she would soon waste away and die from cancer.  Friends and relatives stated
that Laura had refused to undergo the recommended chemotherapy treatments as
she was told by doctors that her cancer was inoperable and therapy would only
prolong the inevitable.”

The reporter flipped pages again.  “Investigators say there
is slim chance of foul play in this case, because Ms. Robbins also indicated
her wishes to donate half of her estate, valued at three point five million
pounds, to a local cancer research facility.”

Cancer.  Suicide.  Why?  Why would Jamison attach himself to
a woman dying of cancer?  Because of her money?  Then it clicked.  “Michelle, where
is the autopsy report for the bank teller?”

Michelle pointed.  “In the dresser.”

Aaron grabbed the file from the drawer and flipped through
the pages until he found what he was looking for, the murdered woman’s medical
history.  His finger tapped the pages.  “Cancer.  She had cancer too.  That’s
why Jamison was spending time at the hospital.”  He looked up at Michelle, and
then at everyone else.  “Jamison wasn’t a cold-blooded killer.  He wasn’t
running loose on the streets of England slaughtering innocents.”

Katya’s face went ashen.  “Culling the herd.”

“Yep.  Jamison was hunting for the weak and diseased.  The
ones who were going to die anyway.”

“But she was still healthy when she killed herself.  She
didn’t look sick to you did she?”  Katya appealed to Aaron with desperation in
her eyes.  “Did she really kill herself because of the cancer?”  Katya’s face
presented a question for which she did not want the answer.

“Laura couldn’t live without Jamison.  She was his
bloodslave.”  Michelle delivered the brutal truth to Katya mercilessly.

“Oh my god.”  She looked at Aaron as if he was the devil
born in human form.  “I’m going to be sick.”  Katya shoved past everyone and
headed straight for the door.

“Wait.”  Aaron grabbed at her arm but she shook him off. 

“Don’t touch me!  Don’t ever touch me again!”  And she was
gone.

He stood there looking at everyone, sick to his stomach,
sick with Katya’s distress, sick with the weight of the situation on his
shoulders.

Urvashi watched him silently, judging with her eyes. 
Michelle’s look held sympathy.  She had loved and lost many bloodslaves, and
for that reason she had lectured Aaron endlessly to never put a human being in
such a position.

Ivan’s eyes were cold with accusation.  “Well, are you just
going to stand there?”

Aaron was at a loss.

Ivan pointed his finger at the door.  “This is your doing. 
Go out there and get her.  She is angry, hurt, but she should not be alone in
this.  Go to her.”