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The kitchen table groaned beneath their combined weight. Her body jerked spasmodically beneath his as the fever surged higher and her system reacted violently to the high temperatures.
Ryder held her sweat-drenched head in his hands, trying to keep her from doing too much harm. Long minutes passed before she quieted, her body limp beneath his, her skin slightly cooler thanks to the chill sweat bathing it.
Her eyelids opened a crack, but her eyes were unfocused. Her lips moved as if she was speaking, but only unintelligible murmurs broke the silence of the night.
She was alive.
He told himself that it didn’t matter how or why. Only that she was.
Easing off her body now that she was peaceful, he released the pressure bandage high on her chest—the more manageable of the two wounds, although normally dangerous enough to have been fatal. Beneath the bandage, fresh skin closed the formerly ragged exit wound. No blood escaped. He applied a fresh bandage, making sure it was snug against the healing injury. The damage in the area of her liver had yet to completely heal, but it was on its way. He cleaned it, dressed it, and replaced the pressure bandage.
Fearful that another round of spasms would collapse the table, he carried her to his bed, where he left her only long enough to get a basin of ice water and a towel to bathe her heated skin. He had been doing that for a few hours already in the hope of bringing down her temperature.
So far, it hadn’t worked. But nothing had helped him after he’d been bitten. The fever had run its course until the transformation completed. Until he had woken as a vampire, lusting for blood.
He tried to recall what might have happened, whether in all the turmoil of the failed raid he had done something, anything, that could have turned her. Had someone else turned her in his moment of weakness?
Nothing came to mind. Nothing except the fact that there had been blood everywhere, that somehow his blood had contaminated her.
Which left him here, caring for her as her body warred with itself. Fearing that the fevers might still take her. Afraid that if she was at death’s door again, he might not be able to let her go.
He’d barely been able to do it the first time.
An hour passed and the spasms seized her once more. As before, he restrained her gently, but she was stronger this time. So strong he had to allow the demon to emerge in order to tame her. The heat of his body bathed hers, which seemed almost cold in comparison to that of the beast. His demon strength subdued her. Held her pinned gently to the bed as she bucked. When she calmed, her eyes opened and she focused on his face. His demon face.
“Ryder. What happened?” Her voice was weak.
He cradled her cheek, her skin still amazingly warm. “I don’t know, darlin’.”
“Feel. . .weird,” she said. “Cold.” As she said that, she yanked at his shirt and begged, “Make me warm. Por favor.”
Everything in her system was off kilter, but if his body heat would bring her some relief, he was all for it. He covered her body with his, offering up the demon’s heat to soothe her.
She wrapped her arms around him and buried her head against his chest, her teeth chattering. “Cold. Why am I so cold?”
He enveloped her in his arms, brought every inch of their bodies into close contact. Her trembling gradually lessened. She had slipped into a peaceful rest. Beneath his body, the even thrum of her heart beat strongly. Her breath, regular and with more vitality, chilled his demon-heated skin.
He brushed a stray lock of hair from her face and kissed her forehead. Lying beside her, he settled down to rest and await the next round of spasms.
***
THE SMELL OF DAWN BLOWING in on a morning breeze roused him from the bed. An empty bed.
He had been exhausted from a night of keeping Diana in check. It had barely been an hour ago that her temperature had plummeted and calm truly claimed her.
At the foot of the bed were the bandages he had applied the night before.
He rushed in a blast of vamp speed through the doors of his bedroom to the balcony beyond.
Diana stood there, buck-naked. Not a mark of violence marred her body, only the heart-and-knife tattoo on her right shoulder and the pale white line of the long-healed scar along her ribs. She faced the east, waiting for the morning sun.
“What are you doing?”
“What am I, Ryder?” She was too composed for his liking.
He searched for an explanation, but none came.
With a burst of speed almost as fast as his own, she stood in front of him. She cupped his cheek, her palm cold. She ran her thumb along the edge of his fangs. “Am I like this? Did you break your promise?”
“Never.” He grasped her arms, but she shrugged out of his embrace and returned to the edge of the balcony, where she once again faced the east.
The first shimmer of sunlight broke over the horizon and the demon within him cowered, urged him to retreat, but he couldn’t. Pulling back the beast, he resumed his human form and approached her. Laying a gentle hand on her shoulder, the chill of her skin greeted him. Cooler than human? he wondered, or was his imagination playing games with him?
“Diana?” He needed her to believe that he had kept his word.
I know, came quickly in his mind. “But that still doesn’t explain this.” She motioned to her unmarred body. “I should be dead.”
He couldn’t argue with that. “I don’t know what happened.”
His skin tingled as the sun rose higher and sunlight bathed the balcony. A little brighter and his skin would burn.
“Go, Ryder.”
“Diana,” he pleaded, wanting her with him, out of the sun’s harming rays.
“Go,” she repeated, more strongly this time. “I need some time alone.”
He was afraid of what would happen to her when the sun fully rose, but she obviously wasn’t going to budge.
So you’ll just let her fry? his demon voice asked as he walked away. He gritted his teeth and closed his eyes against the vision of a pile of shriveled muscle and bone.
He turned at the french doors and waited, ready to pull her in. But nothing happened as the sun rose. The rays colored the balcony with bright light and she raised her arms to the sky and let the sun’s brilliant glow wash over her. Her body fit and whole. Her skin golden with light. With life.
His demon woke as did the human, wanting her like never before.
But as she faced him, he knew she was all business this morning. The warrior had a mission and nothing was going to get in the way.
***
ADIC HERNANDEZ HAD called Sebastian to tell him Diana was missing. If he heard from her, he was to tell her to check in. Although it hadn’t been said, Diana knew what lay behind those words; She was being sought as a suspect for the botched raid.
How many dead agents? she wondered. She had only vague recollections of what had happened to the two agents with her and of Alex, wounded and near death inside the apartment.
David? Her gut knotted with guilt. She had failed him much as she had failed Sylvia. Maybe even failed herself, she thought as she looked at her body once more and noted the flawless skin. Flesh unmarred by the violence of the night before.
Ryder had promised and, in her heart, she trusted that he had kept that promise. But her brain . . . Her brain was telling her everything had gone wrong. With the raid. With Ryder.
She finished dressing in the jeans and shirt Melissa had been kind enough to lend her. They were a size apart, with Melissa being slightly taller and thinner. The pants were long and tight on her curves. The button-down shirt, with its fuller cut, fit just fine. She slipped on her ankle and shoulder holsters. Someone had laundered her FBI windbreaker, but she couldn’t run around the city wearing that. Especially if whoever had shot her was on the lookout for her. In Ryder’s closet she found a black leather blazer. Big on her, but perfect for hiding the bulge of the gun beneath her arm.
She stepped into the living room where he waited.
“What do you plan to do?”
“There’s only one person who could have done this—Hank Rupert.”
“How do you know?”
She shrugged. “I just know. Now I have to prove it.”
“Do you need me to—”
She held up her hand to silence him. “It’s not that I don’t appreciate all you’ve done so far, but this I have to do alone.”
Alone. A familiar word with her, Ryder thought. He said nothing else as she walked to the door.
Once there, she paused. “I . . . I have to go. You understand, right?”
He did. He understood her honor, her determination, the strength of her loyalty to her friends and partner. What he didn’t understand was where he would stand after her mission. “Will you be back?”
The answer, when it came, was not unexpected.
“I don’t know.”
