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The third guard chuckled. “I know. I’m gonna need a new shirt.”
Rumy’s voice drew Claire’s attention as he addressed his men. “Aw, you three babies need some Band-Aids? Want me to kiss your boo-boos, make them better?” His medical team moved in, as well as several more guards.
One of the initial guards grinned. “Would you, boss? I’d feel so much better.” But he had a chunk missing from his forearm, which he held away from him. Blood had formed a pool on the carpet.
Great. Just what she needed to be looking at.
Rumy jerked his thumb in the direction of the hall. “Stay at your posts, ass**les. Let the medics take care of Lucian.”
Claire stared at Rumy, still shocked by all that had just happened. Between seeing Daniel again so soon and now having Lucian devolving into blood-madness, she wasn’t sure how much more she could take.
Meeting her gaze, he smiled and shrugged. “What can I say? We’re vampires. But please don’t worry. My men will be fine in about half an hour and the doc here will give Lucian something to calm him down, at least a little. And of course we’ll get someone in here to clean things up. You okay, though? None of this is very pretty, is it?”
Claire shifted to look at Lucian once more. “I don’t know where to begin. He was fine, then the madness returned so fast and he slipped back into this terrible state.”
“If it’s any consolation, my experience has been that what he’s about to go through right now, over the next few hours, will be the worst of it. He’ll have minor bouts later, now and then, but usually a major crisis will help put him on the road to full recovery.”
Claire didn’t know what to think. She was reminded yet again that this was a wildly different world.
Lucian pulled against the restraints, his back arching off the bed. His fangs still protruded as he snarled at the medical staff. His arms were now tightly secured in the restraints. The setup was a far cry from the chains that had held him captive in Daniel’s prison, but Claire hated to see him bound like this again.
One of the medics removed Lucian’s boots, then went to work cutting off his clothes in order to make him more comfortable. When the doctor gave him the shot, he settled down a little, but to Claire’s mind not all that much.
Once a sheet lay over the lower half of his body, Claire moved to stand at the foot of the bed. Rumy joined her, his gaze fixed on Lucian.
She glanced at Rumy, who’d never looked more solemn. “He’s the best of us, you know. He saved his brothers when he was only fifteen and helped them escape Daniel’s compound where they’d all been tortured since they were little. From that time, despite what happened to him, he’s worked for the four centuries of his life trying to make our world a better place, trying to keep the traffickers, of all kinds, from making the serious inroads they have.
“But he gets little enough credit. Of course having Daniel Briggs for a father has always made the average resident suspicious of him, and of his brothers.”
“I know that he’s an honorable man.” She touched her chain. “These don’t lie and I feel it with every breath he takes.” Another reason her desire for him seemed ever-present. She liked the vampire.
She then told Rumy what had happened, especially about seeing Zoey.
“Jesus,” he murmured. “That must have been horrifying for you.”
She put a hand over her stomach and pressed her fingers to her lips. Her throat grew tight all over again. “It was, but she’s alive. Only how are we supposed to exchange the extinction weapon for her?”
Rumy put his arm around her shoulders and gave a squeeze. “Don’t think about that. The important thing is, she’s alive. Later, once you’ve found the weapon, you and Lucian can figure out the next step.”
She turned back to Lucian, who had started to thrash once more. Whatever medication had been given to him clearly wasn’t a cure. She felt the agony he suffered even though he’d received a strong dose of her blood. “What can I do for him?”
“Not much. It’s the recovery process, sort of like withdrawal. He has to get through it, and he will.”
“How much longer will it take?”
Rumy shook his head. “I don’t know. Another day maybe.”
She could live with that.
Taking a deep breath, as deep as she could get, she placed a request. “Would you please have your housekeeping staff bring me a basin of cool water and a stack of fresh washcloths?”
“Of course.” He glanced at her with a warm light in his eye. “And what about you? What can I do for you?”
She smiled suddenly. “A mojito, the best one your bar makes, preferably something with sage and honey. I’m partial to sage especially.”
“I’ll bring you a pitcher.”
She sighed. “Sounds like a plan.”
He chuckled and drew his phone from his pocket. He repeated her orders to his staff, then held the phone to his shirt. “How about dinner? I know you’re not hungry now, but you have some hours yet to get through.”
“That’s probably wise.”
“Italian, say in four hours?”
“Perfect.”
He spoke once more into the phone. When he hung up, he said, “I’ll be back with your drinks.”
Not long after Rumy left, the doctor repeated essentially what Rumy had told her, especially that she needed to be alert and patient. Beyond that, Lucian would return to normal in a few hours; this would be the worst of it, followed by less significant episodes over the next few nights.
The team left shortly after so that she was once again alone with Lucian. She sat at the table, watching the vampire moaning and at times crying out. She would be in for a long night.
A few minutes later, however, Rumy returned with a suede wingback chair just for her and stationed it near Lucian’s side of the bed. Another waiter brought in a side table, covered it with maroon linen, and with a flourish set a silver tray down that bore a pitcher of what smelled like heaven, along with a tall glass of ice.
He poured the first mojito and garnished it with thin cucumber slices. She sipped, leaned back in her chair, and tried to let go of the nightmare that had, in the past few hours, become her life.
When the basin and clean washcloths arrived, she left the comfort of the chair and her drink, and dipped a cloth in the water.
Lucian now rocked his head from side to side, his eyes squeezed shut.
Lucian. She thought maybe speaking to him telepathically might help.
