Shrouded in Darkness (Shrouded Series) (29 page)

He’d been praying like he’d never been praying in his entire life. Jaw clenched, he watched the last drop disappear, then retracted the needle and set the syringe on the table in front of him. He grabbed a square gauze and wrapped his arm. It was done.

Now he needed to wait.

He heard the soft click of the lab door behind him. Casually, he pulled his sleeve down to his wrist, hiding the bandage and tape around his arm. Just as casually, he dropped the syringe into the wastebasket beneath the table by his feet.

He turned. Margot. She’d slipped on a jacket and gloves. Foundation covered her neck and facial features, while sunglasses hid her eyes. Times like now, he was hard pressed to imagine Miracell running through her veins beneath all that make-up and clothing.

Damn, but he loved her. His throat tightened. This wasn’t something fleeting. What he felt for Margot was more than passion, more than a simple infatuation. It had substance. If things weren’t so messed up, he’d have asked her to marry him. Children, a house, growing old together—he’d want it all. But only with Margot. Maybe, just maybe, it might happen if God or fate had a compassionate hand. And of course, if he could convince Margot he was worth the risk.

“So?”

Jake sensed her trepidation even from where he stood. He knew exactly what she was asking, but the lie caught on his tongue.

She took a hesitant step forward. “Have you...”

“Tomorrow. I’ll know for sure tomorrow.” It was the truth.

Margot hurried over and slipped her arms around his waist and rested a cheek against his chest. “That’s fantastic!” She tightened her hold around his waist. “Oh, Jake. I knew you’d do it. I just knew it!”

“Whoa.” He pulled back and tapped his finger lightly against her nose. Her excitement, her unbelievable faith in him, made Jake feel that much more of a jerk for deceiving her. “It’s not a done deal yet.”

She backed up and tugged at his hands, urging him along with her. “Well, you’ve more than earned a break. How about you pack it in for the night, and I give you a little something for all that hard work?”

The suggestive tone and the deep, husky throb of her voice did amazing things to his body, particular one area below his belt.

“And in exchange, how about I give you a big something?” He teased, letting her lead him from the lab.

“I’m counting on it!”

He smiled. He loved her humor; he loved everything about her.

They reached the house but not without a few delays. He hadn’t been able to resist one or two deep, passionate kisses on the way. What sane man could?

Margot closed and locked the front door behind them, while Jake rubbed at his hands. He shivered. Even though he knew the house was warm, he couldn’t get rid of the chill. It went too deep, seeping past his skin and muscle to scrape across the bone.

He glanced down the lit hall. Suddenly, the walls, the ceiling, the floor tilted, then wavered as if a thick, heat wave coiled from the ground. Frowning, he blinked and found everything normal. Strange. This was nothing like his previous attacks.

“Is something wrong?”

“I’m fine.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.” Jake grinned down at her, wiping the concern from her upturned features.

He caught her hand, entwined his fingers between hers and urged her toward his bedroom. He took two steps and felt the floor buck beneath him or was it just his legs giving out beneath him? He couldn’t tell. His body felt disconnected from his mind as his peripheral vision blurred, then blackened. He shook his head again, which was a mistake. Another dizzy spell, far worse than the last, crashed against his skull.

He faltered and felt Margot’s clasp on his hand tighten.

“Jake?”

He glanced down at Margot. He didn’t think he could pass this off as nothing. “I think I’m in trouble.”

“What’s wrong?”

Jake heard the alarm in her voice but couldn’t respond. He felt the attack coming this time, like some huge tidal wave ready to explode against the shore. Absolutely nothing could stop it. Dropping his hand from hers, he reeled down the hall to his room.

The attack hit him sooner than he wanted. Hard. The pain, savage, all pervasive, cut through his chest, slashing into his insides and limbs. The power of it snatched the breath from his lungs.

He stumbled at the room’s threshold and latched onto the doorframe before he fell flat on his face. He saw the bed just ten feet away, but somehow the distance felt like miles. If he could just get across the floor without falling...

“Jake!”

He tried to answer, tried to let Margot know he’d heard, but he couldn’t open his mouth, couldn’t even form a syllable. His jaw felt sutured shut.

“Jake!”

Whimpering, he pushed off the doorframe and lunged for the bed, hoping like hell he didn’t crack his skull against the floor before he got there. He hit the mattress face down, twisted sideways, and curled into a ball in an effort to ward off the pain. He didn’t think he’d ride through this attack. Not this time.

Margot watched in horror as Jake convulsed on the bed. She rushed over and touched his shoulder. The heat of his skin seared through the fabric of his shirt and into her palm. He burned with fever. Knowing she needed to get his temperature down and quickly, she fled the bedroom and came back with several cold, wet towels.

Jake was still curled up on his side but had stopped shaking. His sudden stillness pulled her into a panic. Swallowing down a hysterical sob, she hurried over to the bed and stared down at his chest. She saw movement. Thank God. He’d passed out. At least that’s what she hoped. She couldn’t really tell.

This was insane. How could she help someone she couldn’t even see?

After easing Jake onto his back, she unbuttoned his shirt and struggled to get his arms out of the sleeves. As she pulled the material from beneath his body, a seam ripped at the shoulder. Swearing under her breath, she crumbled the garment in one hand and tossed it on the chair against the wall. That’s when she noticed the bandage. Frowning, she groped across the bed for Jake’s hand and slid a palm up over his forearm until she reached the gauze at his elbow.

“No!”

Margot dropped down on the edge of the bed. She didn’t want to believe it, but the evidence was undeniable. Jake had injected himself with the antidote. The crazy fool. He’d done it without talking to her first. Tears of anger and fear welled in her eyes.

Why hadn’t he talked to her? Didn’t he trust her enough? Did he think she was incapable of the truth? That she couldn’t handle the possibility of his death?

The idea that Jake might not live through the night shot her off the bed and onto her feet. No. She wouldn’t think that way.

Instead, she needed to concentrate on getting his fever down. Granted it might not do a damn thing, but doing nothing wasn’t an option.

She couldn’t call for an ambulance. Even if the police, the media or the general chaos Jake would cause at the hospital weren’t factors enough, his condition, something beyond any doctor’s scope of experience would set all records.

After she rushed to the kitchen, she came back with a bucket of ice. Stepping into the room, she almost dropped the copper pot on the floor at the high keening coming from Jake. Shivers raced up her arms and spine as she watched him wreathing on the bed.

So much pain. She bit down hard on her lip. If he kept this up, he was liable to get hurt. She might have no other option but to tie him down.

Margot placed the bucket on the nightstand, and dropped a handful of ice into an already damp towel. She bundled the cubes up inside and placed it across Jake’s brow. She did the same with another towel and dabbed his shoulders, chest and stomach.

Slipping her fingers beneath his wig, she pulled the thing off and flung it on the chair with his shirt.

She hadn’t a clue when the quaking subsided. Minutes, hours all blurred into one. Searching blindly across the bed, she found Jake’s wrist and a pulse, steady against her fingers, but she didn’t have the medical background to read anything into it other than he was alive. Knowing she couldn’t do much more than she already had, Margot, too tired to battle with her clothes, left them on and crawled in bed with Jake. She slid up behind him, rested a cheek against his naked back, and wrapped an arm around his waist.

Every person who had held any great meaning in her life was dead—except Jake. But that might change in the morning. Oh please, God, don’t take him from me, not when I just found him.

Exhaustion forced her lids closed. Seconds later, she snapped them back open. She felt like she’d wiped her eyes against Marmaduke’s fur and overdosed on cough medicine. As the clock down stairs chimed two, then three, Margot battled against falling asleep, but time and her bone-weary body were too tenacious and sleep eventually won.

Margot woke up to silence, light and warmth. She found herself still curled up behind Jake with an arm flung over his middle.

For several long moments, she didn’t move, too surprised to do anything but stare.

Slipping her arm from around his waist, she eased backward and placed a trembling palm across the muscle and sinew of Jake’s back. The warmth of his skin seeped into her palm. The feel of his flesh against her own wasn’t what amazed her, but rather the way the morning light touched his back, which illuminated the texture of his skin, the fine pores and hairs, the indentations across a strong spine. This wasn’t foundation, make-up, camouflage, or what have you. It was real and undeniably visible flesh.

“Jake.”

He sighed but didn’t stir.

“Jake!”

Jerking up onto an elbow, she pulled on his shoulder. He grunted a response and buried his head deeper into his pillow.

“You’ve got to see this!”

She dug her nails into his shoulder and put all her weight into shaking him.

Jack-knifing into a sitting position, Jake grabbed his head with one hand and frowned down at her. “What?”

Margot smiled, loving the way he looked—sleepy, grumpy, but most importantly healthy.

“Look!”

She whipped the top sheet off both of them and found herself momentarily diverted at the sight of his naked chest. He looked good. Long legs encased in low slung, faded jeans, narrow hips, a flat belly free of excess fat, and a chest thick with muscle.

Nothing about him was effeminate. Especially when it came to what rested below his waist.

Jake thrust both hands in front of him, rotating his wrists back and forth as he stared at them.

“Do you know that this means?” he whispered in awe.

“A miracle.”

“Yeah...”

“How are you feeling?”

He flexed his fingers and rolled his shoulders. “My joints are a little stiff, and there’s a bit of tenderness to my muscles, but everything feels like it’s functioning.”

Abruptly, Jake swiveled and pushed her deep into the mattress with the warmth and hardness of his body. He kissed each curve and corner of her lips with his own, slowly, softly. Drawing back, he looked down at her with a crooked grin on his face. And his eyes. Oh, my. They were a beautiful blue, the color of an ocean with the morning sun shimmering across its surface. Margot thought she’d never see their color.

“It worked.” He laughed, a deep rumble of pure pleasure. “Who would have thought?”

He kissed her again, this time hard and quick, and then rubbed a thumb along her lower lip. “You look a little smeared.”

Margot touched her face and looked down at her palm where foundation clung to the tips of her fingers. She smiled ruefully. “I feel a little smeared.”

With the flats of his hands on either side of her, Jake pushed off the bed.

“Come on!” She watched Jake’s backside with interest as he rummaged in the dresser drawer.

“Why?”

“You have to ask ‘why’?” he asked in obvious amazement as he dashed to the closet and grabbed a shirt from the hanger. After he stuffed both arms into the sleeves, he paused and lifted his brows. “Because we have important things to do! We’ve got to get that antidote inside you.” Grabbing her hand, Jake hauled her from the bed and playfully smacked her on her butt. “And the time isn’t any better than now.”

“And here I thought you were going to get a little frisky on me.”

“Oh, believe me. I will. The minute you’re back to your old self, I’ll be on you like superglue. And that’s a promise.”

Margot cocked a brow and rubbed her bottom. She loved that grin of his. “Then let’s get going, lazybones!”

That afternoon, Jake, his legs stretched out in front of him as he sat in one of the chairs, watched Margot move restlessly from one place to another in her office. She stopped at the window, and the only reason he knew that was because she’d slipped on a thick velour housecoat after her shower.

He was so proud of her. She’d been so brave, even though he suspected she must have been terrified from the moment they’d stepped into the lab. But she hadn’t been the only one terrified. He’d been hovering over her since the moment he’d injected Miracell’s antidote into her system.

Jake knew she was hurting. Maybe not half as bad as he’d experienced because his own system had been so tenuous, but the pain still lingered. He watched helplessly as she suffered through it silently. At first she’d wanted to lie down, but she’d found the lack of movement only exasperated the pain. Then she’d taken a cold shower to ease the burning. While now, she’d grown restless, pacing first the kitchen and now this room.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked suddenly, hurt and reproach in her voice. “Why did you go ahead and test the antidote on yourself before coming to me? I thought we’d had an agreement.”

“‘You’ had the agreement.”

“And you didn’t, because you couldn’t trust me.”

He rubbed at the bridge of his nose even though prepared for this. “That’s not true. I trust you.”

“Do you? Do you really?” The drape fluttered, and she moved to the other side of the window. “I don’t know if that’s the truth.”