The Blood Alchemist (The Final Formula Series, Book 2) (26 page)

My rage boiled over. “Why? Why are you so loyal to these twisted assholes?”

James didn’t answer. He just stared back at the burning building.

“I’m standing in thirty degree weather, in a T-shirt and underwear because of them. They impaled Rowan with I don’t know how many quarrels.”

James turned and headed back toward the house.

“They killed Lydia in cold blood,” I whispered, keenly aware of Rowan standing beside me.

James stopped, but didn’t turn to face me.

I closed the distance between us and lay a hand on his back. “And they’ve always treated you like crap. You, the best of them. They’re not worthy to lick the ground you walk on.”

He exhaled and bowed his head.

“Come on. You don’t need them anymore. You have a new family.”

He turned to look at me with solemn green eyes, then glanced at where Brian and Henry lay. “Okay.” He turned and started for the truck.

I followed, trying to figure out why I felt so guilty.

James opened the driver’s-side door and I got in, scooting to the middle. I was relieved to see the keys in the ignition. Finally, something had gone our way.

Rowan climbed in the passenger side and slammed the door behind him. He reached for his seatbelt, and I caught a glimpse of his bloody wrist.

“How’s the bleeding?” I asked.

“It’s stopped.” He rubbed his wrist against his pant leg, cleaning away the blood. When he showed it to me again, only a dark red dent remained where the hole had been.

“Damn,” I whispered. “I knew you healed fast, but…wow.”

Rowan grunted and leaned back in his seat. He might heal fast, but I suspected it came at a price.

James fired up the engine, and I turned my attention to the heater controls. “It’ll be so nice to have some heat.” I held my hands in front of the vent, wishing the truck would heat up more quickly.

“Why aren’t you—either of you—dressed?” Rowan asked.

“Can we discuss that later?” I gripped the dashboard as James hit a pothole.

“Do you have a seatbelt?”

The truck bounced again as James drove faster than he should. I hadn’t realized how the road wrapped around the cabin, but with the building ablaze, it was much easier to see it through the trees.

“I haven’t had a chance to—”

“Down!” James grabbed the back of my head and shoved my face into my knees. Glass shattered, and he jerked the wheel to the side.

I sat up and, through the cracked windshield, saw George standing in the middle of the road. He had a pistol in hand and took aim at the truck.

James jerked the wheel again.

“Rowan!” I reached for him, but he was already bent forward.

The passenger window shattered. A puff of stuffing exploded from the seatback where Rowan had just been resting. Too close. Much too close.

The truck bounced hard enough to throw both Rowan and me to the floor. I’d definitely get a seatbelt lecture later.

Branches scraped the side of the cab, one slapping through Rowan’s open window before James returned the truck to the road.

I carefully climbed back onto the seat and peeked out the back glass. In the faint glow of the taillights and burning cabin, I could see George still standing in the road. He raised the gun again and I ducked, but no shot ricocheted through the cab. When I chanced another look back, he had doubled over, vomiting.

I turned and slumped on the seat beside James. “Well, you’ll be happy to know that brother number three is accounted for.”

“Are you okay?” James ignored my quip.

“Yeah. Rowan?”

“I’m fine.” He climbed back up on the seat. He reached for his belt.

“No need to put that on,” James said.

“Why?” Rowan asked.

“The gas gauge is falling. He shot the tank.”

“Shouldn’t that have blown us up?” I asked.

“That’s just a Hollywood effect.”

I grunted and leaned over to check. The little orange needle was visibly falling toward the big red E.

“Shit,” I muttered. The heater wasn’t even blowing hot air yet.

“Hang on. I’m going to pick up some speed so we can coast as far as possible.”

The next few minutes rattled loose every filling in my head. When the engine died, James managed to coast another quarter mile. If we’d had a paved road, he would have done better, but the rutted dirt road slowed us down fast.

We came to a stop only a few miles from the cabin.

James released the steering wheel and slumped in the seat. “They’ll come after us. Unless I go back to them.”

“Even if I let you,” Rowan said, “that wouldn’t stop them from coming after Addie and me. And I don’t think we’d get very far.”

I stared at the snow-covered landscape beyond the cracked windshield. The bullet hole was dead center. The bastard had been aiming at me.

“Then what? We walk?” James asked.

“I saw another cabin on our way here,” I said. “We can’t be far from it. Maybe we’ll find something there to get that collar off you.”

He straightened in his seat. “Yes. Then I can defend you.”

“Exactly.” And maybe the other place would have a phone—and heat. “Let’s get moving. My formula will only incapacitate your brothers for twelve hours—if that.” It hadn’t slowed George down as much as I’d like.

“Your formula?” Rowan asked.

I didn’t get to answer.

“Let’s get moving.” James opened his door and slid out. A cold blast of air took his place.

I really missed being warm.

Chapter
20

T
he cabin was further away than I remembered. How far, I couldn’t say. After a quarter mile, I drifted in a haze of pain, following James’s voice as he encouraged me to keep up. I wanted to ask him why he held up so well. He was bare chested and barefoot with Rowan’s arm slung across his shoulder. James might be dead, but his hellhound blood gave his body a semblance of life. He felt pain and hunger, and his skin was warm to the touch. I expected the cold to affect him as it did me. He was either really tough or that wasn’t the case.

“I can make it,” Rowan said. “Help her.”

The pair continued to argue, and I followed the sound of their voices. Rowan was injured. I was fine, just cold. I wanted to insist that James help him, but I forgot why.

I remembered moonlight on the snow when we found the cabin and James breaking a window to get in. I couldn’t feel the carpet beneath my frozen feet, but that didn’t stop me from sinking down on it as soon as I stepped through the door. I’d go find a heat source in a few minutes, or at least a blanket, but for now, just finding this cabin was enough.

Something soft tickled my face, and I turned my head, wiggling my nose to relieve the itch. I was so pleasantly warm, I didn’t want to move.

I lay on a bed with a large fuzzy bolster on one side and on the other….

“Addie?” Rowan’s voice was soft in the darkness.

Ah, a dream then. One of the nice ones. I rolled onto my side, toward him, and my questing hand found his bare chest in the darkness. His skin was so warm. Fire Elements tended to have a higher internal temperature, I remembered. I sighed, finding his shoulder with my cheek.

The blankets had shifted down with the movement, and I shivered in the cold air. He raised his arm, pulling up the covers and draping them over me, then he shifted the bolster closer.

I sighed and drifted into other dreams.

I woke to find myself staring into the glowing green eyes of a hellhound. James lifted his head from the pillow we shared, his tongue rolling out in a doggie grin.

“Hey, Fido,” I whispered, my voice a little rough. I tried to puzzle out what series of events had led to this moment. I remember his brothers, the burning cabin, the truck—

Movement against my back froze any further thought I might have had. My dream from the night before came back to me.

James hopped down off the bed, his paws hitting the floor with a loud thump.

“Addie?” Rowan mumbled from behind me.

I sat up with a gasp, scooting away from him. It hadn’t been a dream. I scooted too far in my confusion and teetered on the edge of the bed.

James’s hands on my shoulders steadied me. “Easy.” A smile colored his voice.

I didn’t turn to look at him, my attention on the other man in my bed.

Rowan sat up and raked a hand through his tousled auburn hair. He wasn’t wearing a shirt, and the movement did nice things to the muscles of his arm and chest. No evidence of the quarrel holes remained.

“You had hypothermia,” he told me.

“Rowan’s power returned, and he got that collar off me,” James said, wrapping a sheet around his waist.

“Ah.” My mind finally started to catch on. They’d sandwiched me between them to warm me. I rubbed a hand over my face. “Hypothermia, good. Because, if it was some kind of weird ménage a trois, I was disturbed that you were furry.”

“That’s the only thing that disturbed you?”

I swatted at him, but he eluded me and then caught me in a hug. I relaxed, hugging him back, so relieved to have regained his friendship.

“You scared me, Ad,” he whispered against my hair.

“Sorry.”

The bed creaked, and I glanced over to watch Rowan get to his feet. It surprised me that he’d stripped down to his underwear: a snug pair of boxer briefs. He turned his back on us and bent to retrieve his pants. I really should look away.

“I’m guessing no electricity?” I asked James, forcing my eyes away from Rowan.

“No. There’s an old truck in the lean-to out back. I thought I’d see if I can get it running.”

“Sounds good. You might want to bundle up.”

He shrugged.

“The cold really doesn’t bother you does it?”

“I’m dead. Why would it?” He turned away, but he did take my advice and started rummaging through a chest of drawers. I guess he was in one of those moods.

I slid to the side of the bed. “Anything in there for me?” I walked over to join him.

“Where
are
your clothes?” Rowan looked up from buttoning his shirt.

“George took them.”

“Why?”

Something in Rowan’s tone made me look over at him. He was frowning and even from across the room, I could see the orange encircling his pupils.

“He was just a little over-zealous in his potion search.” I turned back to James. He had an armload of clothes.

“How long was I out?” I asked him.

“A few hours.”

“Okay. Good. Your brothers should still be ill, but we need to get out of here.”

“What’s wrong with them?” Rowan asked.

“Addie’s potion gave them the shits,” James answered.

I snorted. “Nice summation, but it wasn’t a potion.” I turned back to Rowan. “Alchemy was out, so I tried something more mundane.”

“I’m going to go dress, then get started on that truck,” James cut in.

“Okay. Be careful.”

“Of course.” He offered a half-hearted smile and left the room.

I frowned after him a moment, but decided to puzzle out his attitude later. Right now, I needed some clothes, preferably something lined in fleece.

I turned to the dresser and started rummaging through the drawers. The bed creaked behind me, and I suspected Rowan had sat down to pull on his shoes.

“It’s all men’s clothes,” I said.

“How’d you get James’s brothers to drink your pseudo potion?”

“They thought it was the Final Formula.”

“Morons.”

“I call them the Idiot Brothers for a reason.” I stopped digging through the drawer. “I had no idea what they were capable of,” I finished in a whisper. I shoved the drawer closed with more force than needed. “I’m going to see if there are any other bedrooms.”

I hurried out without waiting for an answer. I didn’t see James in the main room. He must have already gone out. I crossed to the opposite door and opened it. The room might have once been a bedroom, but it wasn’t anymore. The small space had been turned into a workshop. Judging by the all too familiar press and containers of gunpowder, it was used for reloading bullets.

I stepped into the room and the scent of oil and gunpowder took me back to those months I’d spent working in the Huntsman Gun Shop. When I’d spent my time making bullets that now took the lives of innocents, like Lydia. Bullets I was helpless to counter.

I stopped beside the press, running my fingers along the cold metal. Once James got that truck working, we’d head back to Cincinnati. Then what? I couldn’t make burn salve; I couldn’t make any antidote; I couldn’t even make Rowan more of his remedy. If we didn’t catch Frank soon, the magical would continue to die, and eventually he’d tire of the small targets and go after the Elements. And I was completely helpless to stop any of it.

My surroundings blurred, and I sank to my knees on the cold hardwood.

What was I going to do? How could I fix all these problems, so many of which I’d helped create? Without alchemy, what was I?

I hugged myself and tried to come up with an answer. I was a master alchemist, the best of the best. I’d found the Final Formula, the Elixir of Life. In the entire history of human existence, no one had ever managed that.

And that accomplishment meant absolutely nothing.

I lowered my head. There had to be something. Some reason I existed.

“Addie?” Rowan’s hand settled on my shoulder and I jumped.

I released my ribs and covered my face with my hands. Why did he always have to see me at my worst? Every good deed I attempted backfired, every bad deed came screaming back to me.

“Talk to me?” He knelt beside me, and his hand moved from my shoulder to the small of my back. He probably meant it as a soothing gesture, but I hated that he’d caught me wallowing in pity, and shifted away from him.

“Please talk to me?” He didn’t try to touch me again. “You’re scaring me.”

I shook my head, wishing he would give up and go away. Let me wallow in private.

“Did…” He hesitated. “Did they rape you?”

The question took me completely by surprise. I dropped my hand and turned to stare at him. His forehead bunched in concern, but the fire blazing in his eyes was anger.

“No.” I found my voice. “No.”

“Then what is it?” His tone softened.

“Why do you even need to ask? It’s everything.” I fisted my hands as the despair turned to rage. “Absolutely everything.” My dark past, my failing potions, the deaths by my bullets, and how I failed him at every turn. I wanted to scream my rage at the sky, but when I tipped my head back, I closed my eyes instead. I sucked in a deep breath, trying to find control.

I’d told myself I wouldn’t cry anymore, and I meant it. There was nothing left to do but brace myself to finally hit bottom. After all, I couldn’t fall forever.

“I can’t fix
everything
,” he said.

I looked him in the eye. “It’s not your place to.” I held his gaze for one long moment, then pushed myself to my feet. My joints had stiffened in just that short time. We might be indoors, but it was still an unheated building. My teeth would be chattering soon.