4 Blood Pact (41 page)

Celluci tossed the curl of hair back off his face and led the way out of the lab. “Fucking right,” he growled.

As they disappeared down the hall, the door to the storeroom slowly swung open and, coughing, Dr. Burke stumbled out into the lab.

“Now that,” she declared, “was a most edi . . . fying evening. Who says eaves. . . droppers never hear anything good?” She wiped her streaming eyes and nose on her sleeve and picked her way carefully through the smoke and debris toward the door.

From the sound of it, Marjory Nelson’s daughter and her companions had problems of their own. Problems that could easily be used to convince them that Dr. Aline Burke might be better left alone, that her involvement in this whole sordid affair was nothing more than chance.

Donald was dead. She didn’t want Donald to be dead, but upon consideration there wasn’t anything she could do about it. Why should she suffer just because Donald was dead?

Catherine was dead, too, and therefore a convenient, nonprotesting scapegoat.

“I had no idea what was going on, your honor.” She started to giggle and gagged instead. Whatever chemicals were burning were undeniably toxic. “Go ahead, burn!” she commanded. “Let’s give Catherine and her friends a fine Viking send-off and in the proshess . . .” A fit of coughing doubled her over. She staggered to the isolation box and sagged against it, stomach heaving.

“And in the proshess,” she repeated when she’d caught her breath and swallowed a mouthful of bile, “destroy as much evidence as possible. A little vampiric blackmail, a little—what’s the word?—con . . . fla . . . gration and I’ll be out of this with no major career damage done.” Her flame-bordered reflection appeared smugly satisfied and she smiled down at it, patting herself on the cheek. The box was becoming warm to the touch and the skin of her face and hands was beginning to tighten in the growing heat. Time to go.

Head lowered to avoid the worst of the smoke now billowing down from the ceiling, coughing almost continually, she started for the door, lifting her feet with alcohol exaggerated caution over bodies and parts of bodies.

Then she spotted the disk. Spilled half out of Catherine’s lab coat pocket, very blue against the bloodstained white, it could contain only one thing: the copies of the tests made that afternoon on the vampire. What else would be important enough for Catherine to carry around with her?

Only this afternoon. Seems so long ago.
With one hand resting against the end of the isolation box, her balance not being exactly stable, Dr. Burke bent to pick it up. It didn’t seem to be damaged. Having been sheltered in the curve of Catherine’s body, it didn’t even seem to be very hot. She shoved it into her own pocket, suddenly realizing that not only would she come out of this with her career essentially undamaged, but with information the scientific community would award high honors for.

A few simple experiments,
she thought, grinning broadly,
and that Nobel prize is
. . .

One of the oxygen tanks had remained amazingly undamaged after the earlier explosion had flung it out into the lab. It had lain, partially under the far side of the isolation box, safely away from the main heat of the fire. But temperatures were rising. The plastic valve finally began to melt. The metal collar below it expanded a very, very small amount. It was enough.

The blast slammed Dr. Burke to the floor where she watched in horror as a giant, invisible hand lifted the isolation box and dropped it to fall, impossibly slowly, across her legs. She heard bones shatter, felt the pain a moment later, and slid into darkness.

When the light returned, it was the orange-red of the approaching fire and almost no time had passed. She couldn’t feel what was left of her legs.

“That’s all right. Don’t need legs.”

Catherine’s extended hand had begun to sizzle.

“Don’t need legs. Need to get out of here.” The isolation box was on its side. The curve would give her a little room. If she could just push against it, she could pull her legs free and crawl out of the room. Crawl away from the flames. She didn’t need legs.

Dragging herself up into a sitting position, she shoved at the box. Nestled on an uneven surface, it rocked. Something squelched beneath it but that didn’t matter.

The flames were licking at the sleeve of Catherine’s lab coat. Over the stink of chemical-laden smoke, came the smell of roasting pork.

Swallowing saliva, she pounded at the box.

It rocked again.

The latch that number nine had partially turned, gave way.

The lid fell open, knocking Dr. Burke back to the floor as it rose into the air on silent hinges, spilling the body thrown up against it by the explosion out onto her lap.

The naked, empty shell of Donald Li rolled once and came to rest in the circle of her arms, his head tucked back so that it seemed his face stared up into hers.

The flames stopped the screaming when they finally came.

 

“Christ on crutches!” Detective Fergusson ducked behind his car as the explosion flung pieces of burning wood and heated metal out into the street. “Next time I investigate drunken confessions in the fucking morning!” Snatching up his radio, he ignored the panicked shouts of the approaching security guards and called in the fire with a calm professionalism he was far from feeling.

“. . .
and
an ambulance!”

He thought he could hear screaming. He hoped like hell he was wrong.

“Now what.”

“It’s just after two. I need to feed. In about an hour, if she’s still alive, I need to feed her. And then I need to get her back to Toronto before dawn.”

“Why Toronto? Why can’t she just stay here?”

Henry sank down onto the end of the bed. His head felt almost too heavy to lift. “Because if she changes, I need to have her in a place I know is secure.” He waved a weary, bloodstained arm at the apartment. “This isn’t. And if she. . . if she . . .”

“Dies,” Celluci said emotionlessly, staring down at Vicki’s unconscious form. He felt as though the world had skewed a few degrees sideways and he had no choice but to try to keep his balance on the slope.

“Yes.” Henry matched the detective’s lack of expression. If the facade cracked now, it would sweep them all away. “If she dies, I’ll need to dispose of the body. I’ll need to be in a city I know in order to do that.”

“Dispose of the body?”

“Her death is going to be a little difficult to explain if I don’t, don’t you think? There’ll be an autopsy, an inquest, and questions you don’t have the answer to will be asked.”

“So she just disappears . . .”

“Yes. Yet another unsolved mystery.”

“And I’ll have to act as though I have no idea if she’s dead or alive.”

Henry lifted his head and allowed a hint of power to touch his voice. “Mourn her as dead, Detective.”

Celluci didn’t bother to pretend that he misunderstood. He jerked his gaze from Vicki and recklessly met the vampire’s eyes. “Mourn her regardless? Fuck you. You tell me what happens, Fitzroy. If she disappears because she’s dead, I’ll mourn her. If she disappears into the night with you, I’ll . . .” A muscle jumped in his jaw. “I’ll miss her like I’d miss a part of myself but I won’t mourn her if she isn’t any more dead than you are.”

Since they’d found her dying in the lab, Henry had been measuring time by Vicki’s heartbeat. He let three go by while he studied Mike Celluci’s soul. “You really mean that,” he said at last. He found it difficult to believe. Found it impossible not to believe.

“Yeah.” The word caught in Celluci’s throat. “I really mean it.” He swallowed and fought for control. Then his eyes widened. “What do you mean, you have to feed?”

“You should know what means by now.”

“On who?”

“I could hunt.” Except that he was so incredibly tired. The night had already lasted longer than any night he could remember. It seemed a pity to hunt when there was. . . He allowed the power to rise a little more.

“Stop it. I know what you’re trying.” With an ef fort, Celluci wrenched his gaze away and back to the woman on the bed. She was still alive. All that really mattered was keeping her that way. He’d made that decision back in the lab. He’d stand by it now. “If it includes anything but sucking blood, you can fucking well order takeout.”

Astounded by the offer, Henry felt his brows rise. “It needn’t include anything but sucking blood, Detective. It’s not nourishment I need so much as refueling.”

“All right, then.” Celluci shrugged out of his jacket, dropping it carefully inside out so as not to stain the carpet, and began to roll up his sleeve. “Wrist, right?”

“Yes.” Henry shook his head, wonder and respect about equally mixed in his voice. “You know, in four and a half centuries, I’ve never met a man quite like you. In spite of everything, you offer me your blood?”

“Yeah. In spite of everything.” With one last look at Vicki, he turned and lowered himself onto the end of the bed. “At the risk of offending, after what went down tonight,” he sighed, “this doesn’t seem like much. Besides, I’m doing it for her. Right now, as far as I’m concerned, you’re just a primitive branch of the Red Cross. Get on with it.”

Henry lifted the offered arm, then looked up at Celluci, his eyes dark, the smallest hint of a smile brushing against the outside comers of his lips. “You know, it’s a shame there’s so much between us, Detective.”

Celluci felt the heat and tossed the curl of hair back off his forehead. “Don’t press your luck, you undead son of a bitch.”

 

As he carried her out the door, her life still balanced on the razor’s edge, Henry paused. “Doesn’t it gnaw at you,” he asked at last, unable to leave with knowing, “that at the end she chose me?”

Celluci reached out and gently tucked her glasses into the pocket of her coat. Her purse and her suitcase had already been loaded in Henry’s car.

“She didn’t choose you,” he said, stepping back and rubbing at the bandage on his wrist. “She chose the one chance she had to live. I refuse to feel bad about that.”

“She could still die.”

“See that she doesn’t.”

A thousand thoughts between one faltering heartbeat and the next. “I’ll do my best.”

Celluci nodded, acknowledging truth; then he bent forward and kissed her gently on lips that felt less warm than they had.

“Good-bye, Vicki.”

And there wasn’t anything more he could say.

 

He dealt with Detective Fergusson. Explained Vicki had had a bit of a breakdown, perfectly understandable under the circumstances, and gone back to Toronto with a friend. “I’ll let her know what happened . . .”

He dealt with the contents of her mother’s apartment, calling an estate auctioneer and putting everything in his hands. “Just sell it. The money goes to the lawyer until the will clears probate, so what’s the problem.”

He dealt with Mr. Delgado.

“I saw her leave in his car; through my window.” The old man looked up at him and shook his head. “What happened?”

Just for a moment, Celluci wanted to tell him—just for a moment, because he desperately needed to tell somebody. Fortunately, the moment passed. “There’s an old saying, Mr. Delgado, ‘if you love something, let it go.”

“I know this saying. I read it on a T-shirt once. It’s bullshit, if you’ll excuse my language.” His head continued to shake like it was the only moving part of an ancient clockwork. “So she made her choice.”

“We all made a choice.”

He dealt with driving back to Toronto not knowing. He wouldn’t call Fitzroy. He’d bent as far as he could. Let Fitzroy call him.

He dealt with the message when it finally came and thanked God he only had to deal with Fitzroy’s voice on the machine. Even that was disturbing enough. He tried to be happy she was still alive. Tried very hard. Almost managed it.

He found out what was happening next by accident. He hadn’t intended to walk by her apartment. It was stupid. Ghoulish. He knew she wasn’t there. He’d gone in once, the night he’d arrived from Kingston, cleared out his stuff, and without knowing why, had taken a picture of the two of them that he hated off her dresser. When he got home, he shoved it up on the shelf in his hall closet and never looked at it again. But he had it.

“Hey, Sarge.” A slender shadow detached itself from the broad base of the old chestnut tree and sauntered out onto the sidewalk. “There’s no point in going in, her stuff’s all gone. New tenants coming next week, I expect.”

“What are you doing here, Tony?”

The young man shrugged. “I was dropping off the key and I saw you coming around the comer, so I figured I’d wait. Save me a trip later. I got a message for you.”

“A message,” he repeated, because he couldn’t ask who from.

“Yeah. Henry said I was to tell you that you were one of the most honorable men he ever met and that he wished things could’ve been different.”