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“Brother, don’t.”
“Need…to see.”
Truth held up his hand; it looked like something from a medical textbook where they’d dissected a hand down to ligaments so the student could see how things attach and work. Wicked’s cheek looked just as dissected except there were glimpses inside his mouth. If he’d thought to explore with his tongue he’d have felt the holes.
Wicked reached toward me, and I held the phone up for him. He wrapped his hand around my wrist, bringing the phone where he needed it. I watched his eyes as he looked at himself. They were so determined at first, and then he saw and the horror of it filled his eyes, drained the blue away to leave only gray behind like rain swallowing a summer sky until you forget that there will ever be another sunny day.
27
Fortune left toget the doctor and Kaazim came into the room before the door closed, which meant that I was back to three bodyguards, with everything that was happening in St. Louis right now. But even three bodyguards couldn’t save me from the emotional shit.
I was left with Wicked’s hand around my wrist while he took a very thorough look at what the holy water had done to his face. I wanted to just give him my phone, but his hand around my wrist moved it where he wanted it, so I couldn’t get any distance, not physically or emotionally. I had to stand there and see the first tear trail down his face.
“Wicked,” I said.
He looked at me. The tears were leaving faint pinkish trails on his skin because of the touch of blood in all vampire tears. My throat was tight, my eyes burned, but I didn’t blink. I held my eyes as wide open as possible. I would not add my tears to this moment; it was his moment, not mine.
He let go of my wrist. “You can’t heal this.”
“Jean-Claude thinks I can,” I said, and talking must have moved my eyes, because the tears started down my face.
“How can theardeurheal us?” Truth asked.
I glanced over at him, and I’ll admit it was easier facing him thanhis brother, as long as I didn’t look down at his hand where he was holding it up so it didn’t touch anything for long. If I couldn’t heal him, they’d need to do something to keep the hand elevated.
“I have never heard of theardeurbeing able to heal before you, Anita,” Kaazim said.
“It’s not just theardeur,” I said, putting my phone back in my pocket. I pressed the back of my hand against my cheeks to wipe the tears without looking like I was wiping at tears. It was stupid because everyone in the room knew I’d been crying.
“If it was just theardeuron its own, you’re right, but I had already inherited the ability to heal with sex from Raina, the late lupa of the local werewolves. Theardeursort of combined with it and made it more powerful.”
There was a knock on the door. I expected it to be the doctor and Fortune, but though Echo opened the door it was two blonds who stepped through. Ru was still wearing the oversized sweatshirt and jeans from the airport, but he was standing up straight, going from maybe my height to every inch of his five foot seven. He was also smiling, the sulky teenager persona gone like magic.
Rodina came at his shoulder, almost the same height, her blond hair long enough to curl around her head as opposed to his short hair cut too close to know if it would curl or not. It actually didn’t curl, but I only knew that because he’d grown it out once. She’d taken time to change since the airport because the black-on-black tactical gear would have been noticed. The new black windbreakers that we’d gotten for our security hid the weapons, but she still would have made airport security call the cops.
“Funny how you just keep collecting sex magic,” Rodina said, her voice holding that unpleasant whining tease she did so well.
“If all I could do was sex magic, I’d have been dead years ago.”
“Sister, we talked about this,” Ru said.
She stalked past him into the room. “He wants me to be nicer to you. He enjoys being here in St. Louis with you, our new queen.”
“I offered to let you travel internationally to check on some of the other vampire groups to see what they’re doing now that they don’t have the Mother of All Darkness and the old vampire council to keep them in line.”
“My brother and I work together,” she said.
“So because he won’t go, you stay here and blame me that you’re bored.”
“Ru followed Rodrigo and me for over a thousand years with no complaints until he met you. You haven’t even fucked him and he’s already pussy-whipped.” She sounded disgusted.
“Ru followed you because even he was afraid of Rodrigo. He was afraid of what his own brother would do to him if he tried to have a life of his own.”
“I never knew what a coward Ru was until Rodrigo died,” she said.
“Dina,” Ru said, and he sounded shocked.
“If you wanted to go off on your own, you should have stood up to us and demanded it,” she said.
