Ash (18 page)

“What the hell?” Jayden
looked half dead. Ryder and Kyle might have brought me home early from the club,
but Jayden and Tessa had stayed out with their men.

“Open the damn door!”

It was Ryder.

I flung the door open and
he stepped inside and slammed it behind him.

“The Quorum is on their
way.” His words were short and sharp. “They want another blood test after the
culling and what happened at the club. They don’t trust Lucas.”

My eyes went wide and
Jayden looked confused. I hadn’t told him about the direct descendent thing.
Not because I didn’t trust him, but because there wasn’t really anything to
say. No one knew what I was, they just knew I wasn’t normal.

“What do I do?”

Would it be so bad for
the Quorum to find out I was directly linked to an Original? No one had really explained
the end results for me if everyone found out. But since Ryder looked worried
and usually nothing fazed that man, there was definitely room for me to start
stressing.

Ryder tilted his head to
the side, exposing his neck. “Bite me,” he declared.

Heck yes! I mean … what?

I raised one eyebrow as
Jayden looked at me, grinning. Okay, I’m not gonna lie, I had fantasized about
Ryder saying those exact words, but not in front of Jayden. And not in response
to the stupid Quorum. I hadn’t fed directly off anyone before and now really didn’t
seem like the right time to start – the freakin’ Quorum was on its way. I closed
my mouth abruptly, trying to figure out what he was on about. “You want me to …
bite you? Why?”

Ryder grabbed my hand and
pulled me closer to him. “Feed from me and then from Jayden, and when they take
your blood it will be a diluted mix. It’s the only chance we have.”

Holy. Shit. Was it man-candy
Monday?

Realizing there wasn’t
time to ponder this, I slipped one hand behind Ryder’s neck and stood on my
tiptoes as instinct kicked in and my fangs slid from my upper gums. I had about
a thousand-percent more control over my fangs now than when I first turned, but
right at this moment they wanted Ryder. As I leaned in, I barely even noticed
that Jayden turned and left the room, giving me privacy. My nose grazed against
Ryder – Mmm, he smelled so good. I lightly scraped my fangs against his neck,
but paused. I had never fed from a living person. Would I hurt him? Would warm
blood be gross?

His hands clamped down on
my hips. “Do it, I want you to.”

That was all I needed to
hear. I sank my teeth into his deliciously plump vein and his warm blood
trickled into my mouth. We both moaned at the same time. He tasted like
cinnamon and copper. Holy shit – bottled blood was like old ass compared to
this. Ryder’s blood was potent and warm, filled with power and energy. It was
like hitting an electrical socket and frying a thousand volts through me, but
instead of pain all I got was the huge boost of power.

I gulped greedily as his
hands tightened on my hips. I lost sense of time completely, but still sort of
knew that he let me feed from him for an extended period.

Finally he halted me.
“Stop, Charlie.”

I pulled away gasping, feeling
his warmth in my body, and the burning of my cheeks. I knew they would be
bright red.  When I met Ryder’s eyes I could see desire flashing there.

A bang on the door ripped
me from my trance.

Ryder silently grabbed my
arm and pulled me into Jayden’s room. My best friend was ready.

“Bite me, bitch – but you
better tell me everything later,” he whispered softly. I nodded and sank into
his neck without any of the sensuality that I’d reserved for Ryder. It was more
uncomfortable without the intimacy. Let’s just say I was much more aware that I
was feeding on another person. After a few big gulps, I pulled off.

Ryder nodded and handed me
a type-O blood bottle.

“Answer the door,” he
murmured as he slipped inside of Jayden’s closet. For some reason he did not
want the Quorum to know he was here.

I chugged the bottle,
throwing it in the trash as I crossed the space to answer the door. As I opened
the door, strong vampire energy flooded through the entrance and I almost took
a step back. A group of very pissed, very powerful looking vampires stood
before me. My eyes catalogued them, wondering if I was about to find out how
strong the Quorum really was.

“Hello, Charlene, we
require your presence in the medical wing,” one of them told me with a gritty
voice. It took me a second, but I realized that I knew his distinct voice. This
was the vampire who had spoken with Ryder outside of the medical wing when I
was first brought in, who told him I would be treated like every other ash and
join in the culling. He was tall, with slicked black hair and a bent hooked
nose. He must have been an ugly mofo before the virus, because even with all
the smoothing out he was still fugly as hell.

I acted dumb. “Okay.
What’s this about?”

“Just a routine blood
test.”

Damn liar. 

Where was Lucas? There
were – I quickly counted in my head – nine of the members here, but no Lucas.
“Wow, the entire Quorum accompanying me to a routine blood test. I must be
pretty important,” I mused out loud. I couldn’t act too dumb.

I stepped out and they
closed rank behind me, boxing me in.

Ugly sneered at me as we
walked together. “We just want to see with our own eyes that the test is done
properly. Your…
talents
… don’t seem to line up with your lineage.”

I tried to slow my heart
rate, knowing they could sense it. “Whatever.” I shrugged. I was getting good
at feigning disinterest. But in my head I was all
fuck-fuck-fuck
. My
damn unicorn blood better not shoot rainbows when they looked at it, or I had a
feeling I was a dead woman.

I was led to a medical
room, where a male doctor I had never seen was waiting in a lab coat with a
needle kit before him.

“How many doctors does the
Hive need? You guys heal,” I said in the sweetest voice I could muster.

One of the Quorum members
smiled, a woman with reddish hair. “She’s bright.”

Another Quorum member
scowled at me. “They aren’t just doctors, they’re also scientists. The humans allow
a small number of vampires to be privately educated. We have a highly
contagious virus that the humans aren’t keen to catch. Now sit down.”

I sat down in the red
leather padded chair and hoped that my resting bitch face was on. These people
were really starting to annoy me. No more words were spoken at the
scientist
pinned my arm down and jabbed it with a needle. I had forgotten the affect my blood
had on them until the aroma hit the air and they all stiffened.

“Why do you think her
blood is so tempting?” one of them asked as his fangs extended onto his lower
lip.

 The scientist holding
the tube of my blood shook his head as if to clear his own lusting thoughts. “I
don’t know, but I’m about to find out.”

“Maybe because she is the
first female ash,” another Quorum member offered.

The ugly one shook his
head, that crooked nose looking even more bent in the fluorescent lighting down
here. “No, I think there is more to it. When will the results be ready?”

The scientist placed the
tube into a glass cylinder compartment inside a machine.

“About eight hours.”

Ugly turned his dark,
silver eyes on me. “You may go. Don’t leave your apartment today. All right?”

House arrest. Awesome.

I nodded. Would it kill
them to get cable in the Hive? At least then I could at least spend the hours
until my doom with some good TV viewing. I’d choose those badass brothers from
Supernatural
.
The door opened and an ash was there to collect me.

What? No Quorum escort
back to my room?

As I followed the ash
wordlessly down the hall, the severity of the situation began to press down on
me. What if it didn’t work? What would happen when my blood showed that my
father was an Original? Would they kill me? I needed to talk to Ryder, he would
know what to expect from this.

The ash dumped me at my
door and left without a word. I’ll bet that he thought the Quorum warning was
more than enough to keep me from wandering during the next eight hours. Little
did he know, I was most probably going to be running for my life, and a little
rule breaking would be the least of my worries.

I crashed into my
apartment, closing the door tightly behind me. I scented that Jayden was here,
but Ryder’s spiciness was missing.

Jayden strode out of his
bedroom, bottle of blood in hand. “Girl! What the actual fuck is going on? They
had your shit searched while you were gone. You need to tell me everything and
you need to do it now.”

He drained his bottle
before throwing it in the trash and basically kicking my ass across to our
couch. I interrupted his next little hissy fit.

“Where’s Ryder? I’m
pretty sure I’m in a crap-ton of trouble and I have no idea what the hell I’m
supposed to do now.”

I was not sitting around
waiting for them to kill me. No freakin’ way. Still, there weren’t many options
for me. I might never have wanted to be an ash and live in the Hive, but there
was no life left for me in the human world. They feared my kind, and I would be
hunted by the government. If these tests went badly, I was going to end up with
nowhere to escape.

“He did that growly,
sexy-as-sin thing, then took off just after you were escorted out by the
Night
of the Living Dead
crew. He hasn’t come back yet.”

I could tell by the way
Jayden had me pinned with his dark eyes, and the hand on my shoulder, that he
was not letting me leave until I told him everything. I just had to hope this
knowledge wouldn’t come back to bite him.

“They did some tests when
I first turned, trying to figure out how the hell there was a female ash.
Apparently they had some odd results. They believe my father was an Original.”

I had just thrown it out
there, and Jayden was surprisingly calm about it. So either he didn’t know the
stories or he wasn’t worried. Maybe it wasn’t a big deal. His perfectly shaped
brows drew together as he seemed to contemplate my words further. “Closely descended
from an Original is not a huge deal, but sired directly is … I thought all the
Originals were dead.”

He was starting to
understand now, understand the trouble I was in.

“What else was wrong with
your blood, Charlie?”

I swallowed loudly,
working hard to try and clear the lump in my throat so I could talk. “I wasn’t
showing the standard blood work of an ash, and yet it wasn’t vampire blood
either. The lab technician was confused, said she was going to run more tests,
but I haven’t heard from her or Lucas since then.”

Lucas or Ryder, I needed
one of those big bastards. Someone needed to tell me what level of freak-the-fuck-out
I needed to be having.

Jayden rubbed a hand over
his eyes, looking confused. “So if you’re not an ash or vamp, what the hell are
you?”

I pulled myself from his
grip and began to pace the room. “I have no idea. What is there beside ash or
vampire? I’m definitely not human.”

Jayden fluttered those
crazy long lashes. “I wouldn’t worry about that right now. Let’s deal with
problem number one – you being a direct descendant of an Original. The Originals
were all murdered for fear of them being too powerful.”

I stopped and looked up
at him. “So …  if they find out?”

Anger began rise up in me.
I did not just fight my way through the culling to be killed by some old-ass Quorum
bitches. Jayden got to his feet, crossed the room and grabbed my hand.

“Then we run. I don’t
have a family anymore. Never really did. You’re my family now. I will go with
you and we will figure it out.”

Emotion tightened my
throat. It was a sweet offer. It wasn’t logical or practical, of course. We
wouldn’t be able to get jobs because of what we were. And no jobs meant no
food, no blood, and no place to call home. Still, I really appreciated his
loyalty. A light tap came at the door. I moved instantly, hoping like hell it
was Lucas or Ryder. As I flung open the door I was shocked to see Blake,
Tessa’s feeder boyfriend.

“Umm, it’s not a good
time,” I told him.

Ignoring this, he pushed
past me and shut the door behind him. Umm, excuse me? “Come right on in,” I
muttered.

“Lucas sent me,” he said
quietly. Okay, in that case I would tolerate his presence.

“Does he have a message
for me?” I urged in my most hurried voice, whispers of bitchy leaking through –
this vamp asshole was chomping on my best friend. I wasn’t a fan of him.

Blake glared at me, which
looked odd on his pretty, cherub face. “I love Tessa, you don’t have to worry
about me hurting her.”

A sound left my voice,
somewhere between a snarl and a gag. “You love her? Please, you barely know
her.”