Everafter Series 2 - Nevermore (21 page)

“We know there’s a pathogen out there. We know that it’s killed. We know that the Consortium is covering up its existence.” She stopped behind my chair and her fingers brushed my neck—to reassure either herself or me, I couldn’t tell. At her gentle touch, I closed my eyes. The panther purred.

“Let’s take a step back,” Karma said into the silence. “Helen and Malcolm have been distracted by the ADA’s inquiries into Consortium business practices for most of the past month. Without any warning, Brenner razes Sybaris and seizes Telassar in the space of a week. And now, Weres are dying mysteriously.”

I frowned at the logical conclusion. “A three-pronged attack, and not a coincidence?”

“Where my father is concerned,” said Sebastian, “it’s always best to assume the worst.”

“Both Helen and Malcolm are completely preoccupied by his movements,” said Karma. “Malcolm has encouraged me to investigate the disease, but his primary concern seems to be that Brenner will attempt a takeover here.”

“Here?” I was incredulous. “He can’t risk that kind of exposure.”

“What if this disease is a forerunner?” Sebastian said. “If it creates a large enough vacuum, he can waltz right in to power, virtually unopposed. By Malcolm, anyway.”

“Why only target Weres, then?” I asked. “It doesn’t make any sense. I got the distinct impression, after listening to him rant and rave, that he wants vampires out of the picture. Categorically.”

“At this point, I don’t care what he wants.” Val looked grim. “What I care about is that there’s some kind of pathogen out there and we still know virtually nothing about it.” She scrubbed a hand through her hair. “I don’t think it’s airborne, but I can’t be sure, and I’ve been worse than useless since Helen put me under house arrest. If I could get to my lab, I’d have at least a little more information. I put in a call to my friend who is running tests on Shade’s blood, but he hasn’t gotten back to me yet.”

“It’s definitely spreading,” Sebastian said. “Especially among the hardcore user crowd.”

“Two of Malcolm’s lieutenants fell ill last week,” Karma added. “But they don’t fit that profile.”

“The rumors are spreading even faster than whatever this thing
is,” Sebastian said. “Luna has been emptier by the night.”

“Rumors?” I asked.

“My people have heard it compared to HIV on several occasions.” He bared his teeth in a mirthless smile. “So much for stopping a panic.”

My pulse spiked and the panther instinctively shoved at the boundaries of my psyche. I turned in my chair and met Val’s troubled gaze. “Is there any truth to that analogy?”

“Yes and no.” She began to pace again. “It’s probably transmitted in the same ways as HIV. And I suspect that, like HIV, the pathogen itself isn’t fatal. But unlike HIV, this doesn’t seem to be an immune disorder. My best guess at this point is that what killed Gwendolyn, for example, was…well, the tiger.”

Karma leaned forward, clearly alarmed. “Her other half killed her?”

“She couldn’t make the change,” said Sebastian. “But she couldn’t stop it, either.”

Karma reacted by speaking several words in a language I didn’t recognize. They didn’t sound good. I reached for Val’s hand and squeezed tightly.

“That must have been a terrible way to die.”

“The next full moon is a few weeks away.” Karma’s voice wavered. “What will happen to the ones who are infected? Will they also die?”

Silence greeted her question. I imagined what it would be like—feeling the full glory of the moon as it rose above the horizon and pulled at my blood, wanting nothing more than to surrender to the wild beauty of the hunt…only to be blocked, over and over, from obeying its insistent call.

Torture. It would be torture.

“I don’t know,” Val said angrily. “God damn it, I don’t know.”

We were interrupted by a knock at the door, and as Karma got up to answer it, I drew Val’s hand to my lips. Pressing a gentle kiss in each space between her knuckles, I willed her to focus on me, alive and well. On us, back together again. As frightening as this illness was, especially on top of everything else, I felt confident that I would be safe. I didn’t inject drugs, and I certainly wasn’t sleeping with anyone except Valentine.

“Sebastian Brenner.” A familiar voice reverberated off the close walls, and I looked up to the sight of Darren and another member of Helen’s guard, the vampire who had accompanied them both to the Missionary’s loft, so many months ago. The one who, I suspected, had set fire to the place afterward. He was looking at Sebastian, who lounged in his chair, feet propped insouciantly on the table.

“This can’t be good,” Val muttered, moving even closer to me.

“We are under orders to detain you.” The vampire wore a gun clipped to the waist of his dark jeans, and I wondered whether its chambers were filled with bullets or tranquilizer darts.

“To detain me?” More quickly than my eyes could follow, Sebastian was on his feet, his knees bent as though poised to flee. Or fight. Across the room, Karma tensed. “On whose orders, exactly?”

“Mine.” Helen stepped into view behind her crony and rested a hand on his shoulder. He moved aside just enough for her to enter the room, but his gaze never left Sebastian.

“Unsurprising.” Sebastian cocked his head, and I could almost hear the debate that raged between him and his wolf. To strike out? To escape? To yield?

“On what grounds?” Karma asked, outrage seeping into her voice.

Helen didn’t so much as spare her a glance. “Suspected sedition.”

Sebastian’s devil-may-care smile hid a snarl. “You’re an idiot. And this is an act of desperation. In my case, the apple landed quite far from the tree.”

I didn’t particularly like him, but in that moment, my respect for him increased tenfold. It was refreshing to hear someone stand up to Helen. And I had no doubt that evidence of any involvement in his father’s activities didn’t exist. Helen was running scared. So was Malcolm, if he had signed off on what essentially qualified as internment.

“Are you going to come quietly?” said the vampire, palm poised above his gun. “Or not?”

Sebastian widened his eyes dramatically. “My, my, you do seem eager to put that weapon to use. I’d better not give you an excuse.” When he reached the doors, Darren cuffed his hands behind his back. I wondered whether he felt torn in his loyalties.

Sebastian glanced over one shoulder, the fake smile still plastered to his lips. “Feel free to come visit me at camp,” he said sarcastically before turning back to his captors. “All right, gentlemen.
Arbeit macht frei
, eh?”

They marched him down the hall, but as the echoes of their passage faded, Helen remained behind. Her gaze traveled over my body like a forced caress, and I struggled not to shudder. Finally, she turned the spotlight of her attention away from me and onto Val.

“You’re looking better, Valentine,” she said, her tone mocking.

Val ignored the bait. “Where will you hold him?”

“You are blowing this out of proportion, as usual.” Helen smoothed the front of her gray blazer. “We just want to ask him a few questions.”

Her patronizing tone made my panther lash her tail. Karma was struggling, too—I could tell from the white-knuckled grip that she had on the back of the nearest chair. But if she was able to sense our unrest, Helen was totally unfazed by it. She glanced at her watch, then back at Val.

“Be safe.”

And then she was gone.

As soon as the door closed, Karma collapsed into her chair. “I need to talk to Malcolm,” she said. “Now.” But her shoulders trembled, and she made no move to get up.

“Do you think Helen’s acting alone?” I asked. “Or would he sign off on detaining Sebastian?”

Karma looked up, poised to answer…and froze.

“What?” I said, frowning. “What is it?” When she didn’t move, I turned to Val, only to watch the blood drain from her face. She even wavered on her feet, as though she might faint.

“Oh God,” she choked out. “No.”

And that’s when I felt it—the tickle against my nose, familiar from the aftermath of a jog on a cold winter’s day. When I reached up to brush the moisture away, the side of my index finger came away red.

Red. I stared at it, first in confusion and then in disbelief. My nose was bleeding. How could my nose be bleeding? I had only returned to New York three days ago. I hadn’t engaged in risky behaviors. I was sick, but it didn’t make any sense.

I had been confident in my invulnerability. I had promised Val that everything would be fine. And now, when the next full moon rose into the sky, the power of its tidal forces would rip me apart. I would die. I knew it.

Deep inside my mind, the panther howled in fury.

valentine

Chapter Eighteen

If Alexa hadn’t been sleeping in our bed after taking a mild sedative, I would have torn the room apart in fury. Instead, I sequestered myself in the Consortium’s gym and hammered at a heavy bag until sweat sluiced down my face like tears and every muscle burned. My brain was a storm of anguish and fear. I couldn’t think, but I had to. I had to figure out a way to find a cure.

How had she gotten sick? If the pathogen were airborne, Karma and Sebastian would have come down with it weeks ago. Had Brenner somehow infected her with it in Africa? But she hadn’t been drugged or even unconscious—only imprisoned.

I stopped my frenzied dance around the bag and held it in place as my breathing began to slow. On the edge of tears, I rested my forehead against my gloved hands. Why had I let her convince me that she was safe? My instincts had known better. I should have found a way for her to escape. Or better yet, we could have escaped together…

Together.
I pushed off the bag as the horrifying epiphany lanced through me. Over the past few days, we had been together in every way possible. We had made love more times than I could count, and Alexa, determined to satisfy my desperate thirst, had urged me to drink from her repeatedly.

There was only one logical conclusion. She had gotten it from me. I had been the one to make her sick.

All of the fight went out of me, and I sank to the floor. Beyond thought, I stared into the abyss of despair that had opened in my brain. Ever since I’d been turned, I had been nothing but a danger to her. No matter what she did to try to change that fact, or how often she tried to deny it, the truth continued to slap us both in the face. And now, that truth was going to kill her.

“Val!” I raised my head at the sound of Karma’s voice bouncing off the cement walls. She hurried across the room. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you. Are you—”

Cutting herself off, she stopped a few feet away and watched as I got to my feet. She didn’t make a move to touch me. I was in no mood for comfort. Beneath the despair, anger churned sluggishly, awaiting its chance to burst into the open.

“I made her sick,” I said without preamble. “I did. Me.”

Karma took a step backward, every muscle taut as the fear washed through her. I didn’t think it was possible to feel worse, but that simple gesture of rejection made my gut churn.

“What are you talking about?”

“It’s the only explanation that makes sense.” I kept my eyes on the wall past her shoulder, so I wouldn’t have to see the incrimination on her face. “This thing isn’t airborne, or you’d be sick. And Alexa doesn’t shoot up. The only person she’s been sleeping with is me.”

“But vampires haven’t been falling ill. You haven’t demonstrated any of the symptoms, have you?”

I shook my head. “Vampires must be able to carry it.”

The doubt didn’t leave Karma’s face. “Even so. How did
you
get infected?”

There was only one logical answer, and its implications made me want to scream. “The transfusion. Has to be.” My thoughts were spiraling into binary. Either Clavier had infected me on purpose, or he had not. The answer didn’t really matter. The only thing that mattered now was Alexa. And she was sick because of me.

“Oh, Val.”

She crossed the gap between us and grasped my shoulders. “We are not giving up. Do you hear me?”

Her eyes were beautiful—chocolate flecked with gold. I let the conviction in them anchor me against the nihilistic winds of my own despair.

“In our meeting, you said something about lab results. Can I help you get them?”

Her resolve set my panic temporarily at bay. She was right. There was something I could do. Right now. I could be proactive, instead of continuing to wait for Sean to send along the results. “I’ll make a call.”

“Good,” she said, her hands falling away from me. I leaned against the wall and dialed Sean’s extension at the lab, praying that he had chosen to work late tonight.

“Hi, Sean,” I said, certain that my voice betrayed my gratitude at hearing his. “It’s Val.”

“Val, hey. We’ve missed you. Are you hanging in there?” Like the rest of my lab, Sean thought that I’d had to leave suddenly because of a family emergency. Which wasn’t all that far from the truth, now.

“Yeah. Hanging in. Actually…remember those tests I asked you to run last week? The results would be handy right about now.”

“You have good timing,” Sean said. “I just got them back a few hours ago. Was about to e-mail them to you. I’m sorry they took so long to come in—I had to run them on the DL, and it’s been a busy week.”

“I understand.” I tried to keep my tone light. “And thanks again.”

“Sure thing. Hurry back, Val.”

I glanced at Karma as I ended the call on my phone and tapped over to my mailbox. “He’s going to e-mail what he’s got.”

She nodded, bent over her own PDA. “And they’re holding Sebastian in the cells on level two. Along with several of his siblings?” Karma was staring at the screen as though she couldn’t believe what she was reading.

I frowned at the implications. “Jesus. Do you think they’ve rounded up every one of Brenner’s whelps who lives in the city?”

“As collateral.” Karma’s eyes were troubled. “Every piece of correspondence I’m reading has Malcolm’s digital signature on it alongside Helen’s, but I don’t like it.”

“Do you think they’ll stop us if we try to visit him?”