CHAPTER TWELVE

 

 

RAYNA NOBLE

 

Rayna heard a commotion downstairs, so she set down the Jane Austen book she was reading. She raced down the hall to the stairs. When she reached the living room, she saw Brand placing an unconscious Jonathan on the sofa. Jonathan bled from a chest wound.

“Jenkins!” Brand yelled. “Call nine-one-one!”

“What happened?” Rayna asked.

“He got shot with an arrow. He passed out. We need to get him to the hospital. Where’s Jenkins?”

Rayna approached and knelt before Jonathan. She pulled his shirt open a bit to examine the wound. “This is deep.”

“He played it tough at first, but it caught up with him. He needs a doctor. Don’t poke around the wound. Apply pressure. We have to stop the bleeding. Esther! Tell Kelly we’re taking him to the hospital.”

Rayna frowned and looked at Brand. “Esther?”

“She’s a ghost. You can’t see her, but she helps us all the time. She’s part of the team.”

“Is she here now?” Rayna asked, looking around.

“No, she popped over to see Kelly. Where the hell is Jenkins? Did he make the call?”

“Jonathan won’t need a doctor,” Rayna said. “I can handle this. It’s just a flesh wound, and since it missed his heart, it’s something I can handle.”

Jenkins entered the room. “Did someone call for me?”

Rayna nodded. “Yes, bring me a pot of hot water and a towel.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Jenkins left for the kitchen.

Rayna ripped Jonathan’s shirt to open it wider and prodded around the wound. Blood oozed from the injury.

“No offense,” Brand said, “but I really think we should get him to the hospital. I’m pretty sure he should have left the arrow alone since he seemed mostly okay until he pulled it out.”

“He might not have lost as much blood, but this is a serious injury no matter how you look at it.”

Jenkins returned with a pot of water and a towel. He handed them to Rayna.

“Thank you, Jenkins. Now can you bring me a large glass of cold water?”

Jenkins nodded and disappeared.

She dipped the towel into the pot of water then set about wiping the blood from Jonathan’s chest. She glanced over at Brand. “What you see next may disgust you.”

“Takes a lot to gross me out, darlin’.”

“If you say so,” she said. She turned back to Jonathan, leaned over him, and licked at his wound.

“What the hell are you doing?” Brand asked.

She pulled up some saliva and let it drip directly into the wound. Then she resumed licking and sucking at it. She spit blood into the pot of water then went right back to dribbling saliva and licking even more. The blood slowed.

She pinched the wound closed then shut her eyes and drew a deep breath through her nose. She let the air slowly escape from her lips. Another deep breath. Let it out.

Brand stared at her as if she were an alien Gray clad in pink spandex getting out of a flying saucer carrying a Stratocaster and Elvis sunglasses while dancing to the Macarena.

While she breathed, Jenkins returned with the glass of ice water. He set a coaster on the end table then placed the glass on top of it. He stepped back to watch.

Rayna kept up the deep breathing for a time then opened her eyes. Her irises shifted from deep green to a dark orange. When she drew the next breath and let it out, steam erupted from her lips.

Finally she turned back to Jonathan and blew flame onto his wound. The flesh sizzled. Jonathan flinched but she held him in place. She blew more fire then closed her eyes and sighed. Tendrils of smoke poured from her mouth. Now when she opened her eyes, they were green again. She reached for the water and took a mouthful. She swished it around inside her mouth then spit it into the pot.

The next drink she swallowed. She waited a moment then drained the glass quickly.

Brand stared in awe, and she went back to dripping saliva on the now blackened flesh.

“What is that strange bird doing?” Esther asked.

Brand spun toward her. “I didn’t see you pop in.”

“What’s she doing?”

“Hell if I know,” Brand said.

“Is that the ghost?” Rayna asked.

“Yeah.”

“Tell her Jonathan is going to be all right. His chest will hurt for a few days but he’s fine. We’ll want to let him sleep for a while, though.”

“She’s not deaf,” Brand said.

“How the hell did she heal him? He’s immune to magic!”

“Good point,” Brand said. “What kind of magic did you use there?”

Rayna laughed. “It’s not magic.”

“So you’re like your uncle, and you’re really not human?”

“We’re human but we’re . . . different.”

“No shit.”

“Does that bother you?”

Brand shook his head. “Can’t say as it does.”

“And the ghost?”

Brand looked at Esther. “That bother you?”

“Tell her that since she saved Jonathan, she’s pretty damn nifty if you ask me.”

“She thinks you’re cool,” Brand said.

“I’m going to tell Kelly that Jonathan is okay,” Esther said.

Brand nodded. “You do that.”

Jenkins sighed. “I hope I can get the blood out of the sofa.”

Rayna nodded. “Do your best. If it doesn’t come out, we’ll buy a new one.”

 

KELLY CHAN

 

Esther popped back to see me before Graham came out of the office. “You’re still here?” she asked.

“We’re almost ready to go. How is Jonathan?”

“He’s fine.”

“Fine?”

“Turns out the Noble family is hiding a big secret.”

“Really?”

“That Rayna bird spit into Jonathan’s wound then breathed fire on it.”

“She cauterized it? What? With her breath? Or did she use some kind of tool?”

“When I say she breathed fire, I mean she literally blew fire. Flames coming out of her mouth!”

I looked around to make sure nobody would see me talking to nothing. “Like Godzilla in those awful movies Jonathan watches?”

“Yes. Like a dragon. She asked Brand if it bothered him, but you know Brand.”

“I’m sure he thought it was hot, if you’ll pardon the pun. Did she have an explanation?”

“Said something about how they’re human but different.”

“That makes sense. Okay, Esther, I have a theory, and since Jonathan is out of commission at the moment, I’ll run it past you.”

“I’m not a scientist.”

“Just tell me if this makes sense.”

“None of it makes sense to me.”

“From what I’ve been able to learn from what the Marshall Clan said, the Marshalls and the Nobles came here through the Dragon Gate.”

“The flaming gate in the tunnels under DGI?”

I nodded. “They must have been on the other side of it, in another world or another dimension or something. They opened it and came through. I mentioned this to Jonathan the other night, and he thought I must have misunderstood what they said because there was no way anything could come through the Dragon Gate. But I know Thomas said they came through the gate. It would explain why they dress like refugees from a Renaissance festival. It would explain their weapons. And it would explain, to some degree, Rayna breathing fire.”

“If you say so.”

“Does it make sense to you?”

“Kelly, none of this makes sense to me. I just think those Marshall people are dangerous. Can’t you just bump them all off so we can go home?”

“Just like that?”

“Why not?”

“Because something more is going on here.”

“So? That’s not our problem. We were hired to protect Graham and Rayna. If you kill the Marshall Clan, they’re safe. Right?”

I considered that. In the old days, I’d have been more than happy to just go kill them all. These days, as much as I enjoy killing, I’ve also found that life is worth preserving when possible. I see it every day in the women I train at the dojo. I could go kill the guys who beat them, but that wouldn’t solve anything. By training the women and helping them find their confidence again, they can handle the assholes who beat them if those assholes show up again. Sometimes killing wasn’t the best choice.

I couldn’t believe I was thinking that, but there you go.

“Kelly?” Esther said, waving her hands in front of my face.

“Sorry, I was just thinking.”

“Well? Can you go kill them and end this now?”

“I could if I knew where they were, but I don’t know if that’s the right answer here.”

“They killed Rayna’s parents, and they shot Jonathan. That’s enough reason for me.”

“They also ruined one of my shirts.”

“See? That makes it personal,” Esther said.

I laughed. “You want me to kill them for ruining my shirt?”

“I don’t care why you do it; just do it.”

“Listen to yourself, Esther.”

“I want to go home. I don’t like this job.”

I heard the phone ring in Graham’s office. I could hear his voice, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying. Esther kept talking too.

“Time out, Esther,” I said. “We accepted the job, so we need to see it through. The job is to protect Graham and Rayna. It’s not to kill the Marshall Clan, though I admit that would be fun, and that’s part of why I wanted to come along, but still, that is not the mission.”

Graham exited the office. “Your friend was shot with an arrow,” he said. “He’s going to be all right, but maybe we should go check on him.”

“See? You could have interrupted him,” Esther said and popped away.

“Let’s go,” I said.

“Were you talking to someone a second ago?” he asked.

I pulled out my phone and held it up. “Just checking in with Diane at the dojo. No worries.”

 

JONATHAN SHADE

 

I woke up with a dull pain and tightness in my chest, but hey, at least I woke up. When my world went black, I thought that might have been all she wrote.

Someone had moved me inside the mansion and upstairs to a bed. Why wasn’t I in a hospital? I grunted with pain as I tried to sit up in the darkness. Rain pattered against the window, and I hoped it wouldn’t turn to snow.

“You’re awake?” Esther’s voice. “Don’t try to get up, Jonathan. Lie back. I’ll get Kelly.”

I touched my chest, which hurt. There was some kind of bandage covering the wound.

A moment later, the door opened and some light spilled in, which wasn’t too bad, but then Kelly flipped the switch, and bright light flooded the room. I shielded my eyes.

“Jesus!” I said. “Can the light be dimmed?”

“Good to see you’re alive,” Kelly said.

“Seriously, that light is killing me.”

“Deal with it.” She sat on the edge of the bed. Esther appeared near the window.

“What time is it?” I asked.

“A little after two in the morning.” She pushed me back. “You need to rest.”

“What happened?”

“You were an idiot.”

“I—”

“Brand told me all about your little fight with two Marshall brothers. He said the first guy you killed in self-defense, but the second guy you flat executed.”

“He tried to kill us. He was going to come back. So yeah, I killed him. It would be stupid to allow an enemy to live who’s tried to kill you once and threatened to do it again.”

“A few months ago, you wouldn’t have killed him. You had Brand with you. You could have captured him and held him. Questioned him. Arrested him. Something.”

“I can’t believe you’re giving me shit for killing someone. You of all people. Really?”

“You haven’t been yourself lately.”

“I’ve never been more myself.”

“You’re not the man I knew.”

“Whatever. Is everyone all right?”

“Everyone is fine. No more attacks. Lucas dropped off his kids this evening, but by kids, I mean they’re in their early twenties. I was expecting little kids, not two college girls.”

“Well, they won’t be underfoot, then.”

“True enough. What the hell happened to you?”

“I got shot.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I really don’t,” I lied.

Part of me wanted to tell her what I’d been through so she would understand, but to do that would be to admit that I’d failed a few months back and my failure had cost her, Brand, and Darla their lives. I could still see them dying in my dreams. I could still feel the loss. Yes, I’d found a way to save them, but in so doing, I was afraid I’d lost the part of me that Kelly liked and respected.

“Fine,” she said. “Go to sleep.”

“Can I go to the bathroom first?”

“I don’t think you should be up and about yet.”

“And I don’t want to be known as a man who wets the bed.”

She almost smiled. I wanted to be the man she remembered, but that guy was gone. I could find shadows of him, but that’s about it. I liked being strong, though I didn’t feel especially strong at that moment. Getting shot tends to take the wind out of your sails. Go figure.

“I’ll help you up.”

“I think I can do it.”

She rose and stood ready to catch me. I sat up, grimacing a bit with the pain, then pushed myself to my feet. I didn’t feel dizzy, so that was good. I was glad to see I was wearing underwear.

“You okay?” she asked.

“I’m good.” I padded out of the room and down the hall to the bathroom. When I returned to the bedroom a few minutes later, I was relieved to see that Kelly and Esther had left.

I sat on the bed and spent the next twenty minutes listening to the rain, and trying to remember the man I’d been before. What was so good about him anyway? I was stronger and faster. If I were her, I’d much prefer the new me. The new me could take better care of himself, well, if you give me a mulligan for the arrow injury. I stretched out and went to sleep. My dreams were filled with the images of Kelly and Brand exploding and drenching me in their blood.

Again.