The dinghy bumped up against the yacht, and Cally didn’t wait to be invited. She was up on her feet and leaping for the ladder, ignoring Ryan’s yell to be careful. The rungs were wet and her hand slipped, but she clung on with sheer grit, and climbed.
“Gabe still awake?” she asked the thrall at the top of the ladder.
“Yeah.”
Shit. That meant Antoine would be too.“Where is he?”
“In the dive room.”
“Take me there.”
The thrall hesitated, eyeing the ladder like he had responsibilities, then nodded. Cally followed, her jaw clenched. Yes, she was ordering thralls around like they were hers, but that could wait. She needed to get to Antoine. To Gabe. Before he did something dumb.
The thrall led her down through two decks, with narrow corridors, low ceilings, and white walls. Not the teak decking and glossy wood paneling she’d expected, but this was the technical space, industrial and utilitarian. As they walked, the ship’s engines fired up, and the deck vibrated beneath her feet. Yet there was little of the pitch and yaw she’d experienced on the trawler; Gabe’s boat glided through the water.
He waited outside a bulkhead door, radiating disapproval, dressed as usual in perfectly pressed chinos and a silk shirt. “You don’t need to see this, Cally.”
“See what? What have you done?” She pushed past him, reaching for the door’s long handle.
“Don’t open that,” he said urgently, and her hand hesitated at his tone.
Cally gave him a look, then peered through the viewport in the bulkhead door. The room beyond was utilitarian and sparse. Fluorescent strips buzzed stark light across racks for dive tanks and wetsuits, most of them empty. And illuminated the carnage within.
She gasped, a hand covering her mouth, then turned away. “You goddamn idiot, Gabe. Itoldyou that wouldn’t work.”
He stubbornly crossed his arms, his shirt stretching taut over his biceps. “I’ve seen feral vampires before. Have you?”
“Antoine isn’t a normal vampire, damn it. He’s…”Bonded to me, and me alone.She sighed. “I need to get in there. I’m the only one who can feed him.”
Gabe blinked in surprise. “In there? Hell no. He’ll rip you apart.”
“Like that poor bastard you threw in there with him?”
Gabe had the decency to look uncomfortable.
“Dammit, Gabe. Why did you have to let him out? I could’ve fed him while he was…” Cally shook her head. “So what now? You must know you can’t keep throwing himchattel.” She poured all her disdain into the word. “What choice do we have but to open this door and let me in?”
“That’s still not going to happen. Bonded or not, Antoine will kill you. He’s not in control, he doesn’t know who he is.”
Cally huffed in frustration. “Do you still have tranq darts left?”
“Yeah, we have a few. But he’ll be on us as soon as we open the door.”
She bit at her lip. “He’ll sleep soon, right?”
Gabe tilted his head to one side, considering. “Feral, he’s both more resistant to the sun, and less able to consciously fight it. So yeah, an hour, maybe two, and he’ll be out. But he’ll wake as soon as he scents blood.”
“So we wait until he’s asleep, open the door, shoot him full of tranq darts, and close it again. Wait for them to do their thing, then I go in and feed him.”
“How?”
“I’ll figure it out. Open a vein and drip it into his mouth?”Antoine’s always refused to feed from my wrist.
Gabe nodded slowly. “I suppose that could work.”
“That’s what we’ll do, then.” Cally leveled him with a look. “You got any morechattelon board?”
“No. I only brought one.” He pressed his lips together. “It’s usually enough.”
