Wolfen (32 page)

“I am trying to make this right!”

A hard bang makes me retreat.

Another elicits a sharp pang of regret.

The third destroys any hope I might have had of getting a
chance to redeem myself.

I have no friends here. Not a single one. Not even him.

This creature, locked in a tomb of a cell, would rather
stay there and rot, than align himself with someone like me.

I want to tell Alpha that I fixed it, to convince him
somehow that I am not this evil, corrupt thing Klaus tried to make me into. But
he’s done listening. I can’t get through to him any more than I can stand up to
Klaus, or undo any of the horrible things he’s made me do. I can’t go back in
time and restore Alpha’s dignity.

It’s all just words.

BANG!

Meaningless after the fact.

BANG!

I’m a day too late to convince him I’m still a decent
human being.

BANG!

I’ve done too much to prove otherwise.

~

“Dee! We need you!”

Desiree wiped away her tears and hurried to her lab, where Frank
and a couple of his men were carrying a body her way. Nick wasn’t among them.
“My God, Dare! What happened?” Did that sound over the top?

“We found him in the baths.”

She hurried to open the door. “Clear that table and lay him
down on it. And get me more light.”

The men followed her instructions, while she washed her
hands. With only so many candles to light, it made for a lot of shadows, but
Desiree had one last headband-mounted electric flashlight. She put it on and
hobbled closer to Dare, checked his pulse, his breathing, and his pupils. Only
once she’d covered the basics did she examine the side of his head where blood
had matted his red hair. “This looks pretty deep, but he’s still breathing on
his own. That’s a good sign.”

“He got lucky,” one of the others remarked. She could never
remember his name—Mike? Mark?

“Or whoever hit him got cold feet.” Frank looked hard at
Desiree.

She didn’t rise to the bait. “I’ll need to stitch this up.
There’s a sewing kit over there. And get me some alcohol and bandages. You two,
I’ll need you to hold him down in case he wakes up.”

“What I’m wondering, is what he was doing in the baths all
on his own. He’s your security detail, right?”

Desiree briefly met Frank’s gaze. “I had to work late today.
He said he was going to the latrines. I figured he’d be back in a few minutes.”

“And what were you doing outside?”

If you must lie, do it with the truth.
Desiree
arranged the supplies next to Dare. She soaked a scrap of cloth with alcohol
and pressed it to the wound. Dare didn’t twitch. “It was a long day. I needed a
little fresh air. And then the Wolfen started going crazy in the tunnels and I
got scared, so I came back here.”

She cut away a patch of hair around Dare’s wound, with Frank
watching her every move.

“We’ll need to inform the boss,” he said.

“Go ahead.” She threaded a needle. “And while you’re at it,
get Arik.”

“Why? You got us now. We’ll keep an eye on you.”

That sounded like a threat.

Desiree straightened to cover up for her hesitation, and to
give her back a break before she started stitching. “Looks like he’s out cold,
but get ready to move fast, just in case.” They got into position, sitting and
lying across Dare’s body, then she leaned over him once more. The first jab of
the needle was the worst. Once she tugged the thread taut and pulled the edges
of the wound together, it got easier. Dare didn’t move the whole time she
worked on him.

The others picked up on it, too. “Why’s he not waking up?”

“His right pupil is larger than his left, and unresponsive.
He could have a concussion.” In which case, his unconsciousness could mean a
coma.

Frank pushed one of his men aside. “I’ll handle this. Go get
Klaus.”

“Almost done,” Desiree said as the man ran out. She pulled
the last stitch tight and knotted it off. “Hopefully the alcohol did its job. I
can dress the wound with honey to stave off infection. Beyond that, there’s
nothing more I can do.”

The men let go of Dare.

“You don’t seem too broken up about this,” Frank said.

“I’m your physician,” she replied, applying an even coat of
honey. Without proper pharmaceuticals, they were all back to ancient times.
Honey was the best wound dressing in the world. It never went bad, it kept the
wound from going putrid, and kept the bandages from sticking. Literally, the
most important medicine Desiree or anyone else had these days, and it was worth
its weight in gold. “I’m not supposed to be emotional while working.”

“Yeah, but he’s your guard. If it was me, I’d be wondering
who did this to ‘em.”

“Why do you assume someone did this to him? He could have
tripped and fallen.”

“Doubt it. Dare’s one of the most agile guys I’ve got. Real
cat-like. And then there’s this.” He tilted Dare’s hand into the light to show
her the bite impressions around his knuckles. They’d found him too soon; the
swelling and bruising hadn’t disguised them yet. “Smacks of foul play, if you
ask me.”

“Interesting theory,” Desiree muttered.

“You like that, do you? I’ve got one more for you. I think
you did it.”

She stared at him as if he’d just said something incredibly
stupid. “I’m going to let you think about that one for a second.”

“Oh, I did. Fact is, out of everyone in Haven, you had the
best reason to kill him. You hate him. And don’t try to play that off; we all
know it. It’s pretty obvious. People saw you two arguing just today. Mind
telling me what that was about?”

“He’s an asshole,” she answered shortly. “He treats me like
shit, so yeah, no, I don’t like him. But that’s a far cry from me trying to
kill him.”

“Is it?”

“Okay, I see I’ll have to walk you through this one. You
think I somehow managed to overpower a trained guard and bash him over the
head. Me. One-legged Desiree. Or, as Dare calls me, ‘Tripod.’”

“Stranger things have happened.”

Desiree rolled her eyes, and lowered herself into her chair.
No reason to wait standing up. Frank wouldn’t let her leave, anyway. Not until
Klaus stepped in and this matter got resolved to his satisfaction.

Frank was a killer Captain of the Guard—emphasis on
killer
.
He took his job seriously, and when something stuck in his craw, he went after
it like a dog with a bone. He never gave up. He was as close as Haven would
ever get to a true-blue, honest-to-goodness Sherlock Holmes, except he
preferred Cuban cigars to pipes, didn’t wear hats, and liked to use his AK-47
in place of a magnifying glass.

All of that added up to Desiree being in deep shit if he
unearthed anything concrete tying her to Dare’s assault. She wouldn’t put it
past him to compare bite marks.

“In any case,” Frank said, “I’ve got my men searching the
baths. If the killer left anything behind, they’ll find it.”

“Dare’s not dead,” she said.
Yet.

“Your point?”

“You’re not looking for a killer. You’re looking for an
attacker.”

“You think that technicality will make a difference with the
boss?”

Desiree shrugged. No one could predict what might set Klaus
off. He could take one look at Dare and have Frank whipped for dragging him out
of bed, or he could stage a full-blown witch hunt and turn Haven upside down
looking for the culprit. It really was a tossup with him.

They waited long, silent minutes for Klaus’ arrival. Arik
was right on his heels, but the other guards kept him outside when Klaus
entered. He managed to take in the scene and send Desiree a questioning look
before he was pushed out.

All she could do was shrug, and wasn’t even sure Arik had
seen it before Frank closed the door in his face.

Klaus looked Dare over, checked the wound, then made an
approving sound at Desiree’s handiwork. So far, so good.

“What do we know?” he asked when he was finished, and faced
Frank to receive his report.

Frank caught him up on what he knew; how he saw the unlit
torches and went to investigate, where they’d found Dare, the condition he was
in, the state of the baths. He was also sure to mention Desiree hadn’t been
inside the lab when they’d arrived.

Klaus asked a few clarifying questions, then thanked the men
and sent them outside. After the door closed, it was just Desiree and an
unconscious Dare trapped in a dimly lit room with fire, chemicals, and an
unstable Nazi dictator.

They got caught up in a staring contest so intense, lesser
creatures would have broken down and confessed all. Desiree held steady,
refusing to blink first.

It worked. Klaus took his glasses off to polish the lenses.
“What do you have to tell me?”

She shrugged. “No more than Frank already told you. I was
within sight of the lab the whole time. I saw them coming with Dare, and—”

“I mean about the Wolfen.”

Desiree blinked. The Wolfen? What was he talking about?

“Arik said you were separating the fluids,” he told her.
“What is your progress?”

What?
What the hell had he been thinking?

I have no friends here.

She opened her mouth to respond, then realized she had no idea
what to say. Her gaze instinctively went to the beaker by the fire; a rookie
mistake that good as told Klaus she was hiding something.
Shit.

He looked over his shoulder and found the glassware. The
temperature in her lab dropped to arctic levels. Very slowly, he bent over to
retrieve the result of her make-believe experiment in non-molecular fluid
separation. He paused when he hefted it, then held the beaker up to the light,
tilting it this way and that.

The contents had turned gelatinous.

What…?

Desiree scrambled for an explanation. “I…the convert venom
must have interacted with the fluids somehow.” Obviously. The blood had
congealed into a thin layer on the bottom, leaving the seminal fluid free of
contaminants at the top. Except, it was almost solid. “I swear, Klaus, I did
everything by the book. I had…”
Wait a minute…
“I had the beaker right
there”—she pointed to Dare—“I told the men to clear the table when they brought
him in. Someone must have put it too close to the fire.”
Brilliant!
“The
heat would have accelerated the chemical reaction.”

“Who?” he asked, and Desiree knew whoever she named would
die tonight. All she had to do was speak their name.

“I don’t know,” she said.

“You didn’t see it?”

“There was a man bleeding all over my lab. My first priority
was to deal with him. No, I didn’t see what happened to one particular beaker.”

“
Dat beaker
should have been your priority! Dat fos
de task I gave you!”

Desiree raised her chin. For once, his wrath was aimed at
someone else as much as her. “I will not let a man die because of an
experiment. What if it had been you who was hurt? Would you still want me to
make a glass of sperm my priority?”

“It fos
not
me. I am
not
some half-brained
troglodyte wis a gun.”

“Then call it an act of God—”

“
I AM GOD!
”

Desiree shrank back, hunching against a physical attack.

It didn’t come.

Frank knocked politely, and ducked his head inside. “Sir?
Everything in order?”

Klaus pulled himself together and smoothed his hair.
“Everysing is fine. Why are you interrupting?”

“Sir, one of my men found something in the baths.”

Desiree’s heart skipped a beat, and she risked a cautious
glance at Frank, who watched her in return.

“There’s a break in the tunnel wall,” he said. “It’s a
serious hole in our defenses.”

Silence hung for a few seconds as the news fully sank in.

Then Klaus thumped the beaker down onto the table beside
Desiree. His priorities had changed. “Show me,” he ordered, marching out after
Frank.

After a brief conversation outside, which Desiree assumed
included an allotment of orders and assignments, the guards split up and Arik
stepped into the lab.

“You okay?” he asked softly.

Desiree nodded, the movement too jerky to convey any
semblance of calm.

“What happened?”

She held up the beaker.

Arik scowled. “I meant with Dare.”

Right. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Arik blew a tired raspberry. “I’m supposed to watch you,” he
said. “Klaus gave the order himself. You are not to go anywhere without an
escort, and I’m supposed to make sure you do your job first and anything else
second.”

“Yeah, I figured he might.”

“He wants a do-over.”

“Yeah, I guess I knew that, too.” One last dose of ZX-127
left. Klaus would want to maximize its use. “It’s going to have to wait. The
subject
is in no shape to repeat the experiment.” It wasn’t technically a lie. Just
because he was aware and talking, didn’t mean he was fully recovered. Judging
by his voice, Alpha still had a ways to go. He could recover fully by sunrise,
but no one would be sure unless they opened his cell and checked on him.
Desiree would stall as long as possible, do whatever was necessary to make sure
she wasn’t the one sent to do it.

She looked over at Dare on the worktable. He’d need ‘round
the clock intensive care, hand-feeding, and washing. The thought of touching
him at all made her stomach clench, but she’d rather do that, than face Alpha
again.

Arik followed her gaze. “I’ll see if I can get one of the
women to care for him.”

“We need to get him out of the lab, anyway.” That table
wasn’t made to be used as a hospital bed.

“Then what?”

“What do you mean?” she asked, eyelids drooping. Would she
dream of Dare’s attempted rape, or of Alpha’s inevitable revenge tonight?