A Hunger So Wild

Elijah’s voice broke the weighted silence. “They were experiments,” he said, reading the writing on the wal . “See how they have them divided up by weight and gender, then again by these letters: A, B, and C.”

“Here.” Raze entered the room with what looked like a makeup case in one hand. He set it down on the table and released the catch, revealing a variety of vials.

“We need to get that to Grace,” Vash said.

Syre pushed to his feet. “Grace needs help.”

Vash walked to Elijah and handed him Phineas’s ID card. “Raze knows a laboratory scientist in Chicago. I bet she could help us narrow down our choices to the best in the field.”

“That’s a dead end,” Raze said vehemently. “I banged her and left. I doubt she’d be too charitable to my coming around again with my hand out.

It’d be…messy.”

Syre didn’t point out that banging and leaving lovers was par for the course with Raze. Instead he said, “Go to her with your dick out. You know how to get what we need out of her.”

“There’s got to be another way,” the captain insisted. “We can put out a cal to the minions. There are bound to be some who have ties we can pul .”

The strength of Raze’s protests didn’t escape his notice, but Syre chose not to delve into the reason for it now. “We don’t have time to stumble around in the dark, and a recommendation from someone you know personal y and intimately is a damn sight more responsible than a fucking Google search. See to it.”

A muscle ticced in Raze’s jaw. “Yes, Commander.”

“Phineas,” Elijah said softly, his attention on the ID card. He looked up and raked the room with a narrowed, searching gaze. “What the hel was that vampress into? Mortals, vampires, Sentinels…nothing was off-limits for her.”

Syre’s arms crossed. “What are the chances that Phineas isn’t dead?”

Elijah barked out a humorless laugh. “No way. He and Adrian were like this.” He crossed his fingers, then glanced at the suitcase on the floor.

“Phineas was coming back from a trip to the Navajo Lake outpost. He stopped in Hurricane, Utah, to feed his lycans and was ambushed by a nest of wraiths. Whoever the hel that Vashti-wannabe was, she must’ve had a setup there, too. And after Phineas was taken out, she grabbed his shit and bailed.”

“Perhaps. At this point we can’t rule anything out.”

“Right.” The Alpha’s gaze was hard. “Because it’s more believable that Sentinels and vampires are working together than it is for a group of minions to fal off the deep end.”

Syre conceded the point. The majority of minions succumbed to madness—mortals weren’t designed to live without their souls.

A piercing, inhuman scream shattered the moment. Everyone charged downstairs, reaching the first floor as a series of gunshots reverberated through the house.

Crash stood over the sprawled body of the wraith-turned-minion. His gun was in one hand and his other was pressed over a bloody wound on his biceps. “He went nuts and lunged for me.”

The minion who’d briefly recovered lay dead on the floor, his features reverted to the haunted, sunken look of a wraith. Even as they watched, the man disintegrated into an oil slick.

Rage burned through Syre, igniting a vicious bloodlust. It was quite clear now why Adrian had risked Lindsay the way he had—he couldn’t afford to give up even a drop of his blood, not when al evidence pointed to it being a component of a cure for the Wraith Virus.

Syre glanced at the Alpha. Lindsay was the key to Adrian, Elijah was the key to Lindsay, and Vashti was the key to Elijah. The means he required to save his people was within his grasp, and he didn’t have any qualms about using it.

CHAPTER 18

Adrian exited his private plane first, then held out a hand to assist Lindsay down the short steps.

“Wow,” she said. “It’s definitely cooler here in Ontario.”

Soon she wouldn’t notice such things. Every day the vampirism in her blood took greater and greater hold, and every day he was relieved to find her soul pure and intact. It seemed Shadoe’s soul had indeed been enough of a sacrifice, leaving Lindsay’s unmarred by the curse of the Fal en.

Although he had doubts that the Creator paid any attention to him anymore, Adrian stil offered up his gratitude for the miracle of her.

With his hand at her back, he steered her toward the Mitchel Aeronautics hangar Siobhán was using as her home base. They stepped through a slender parting between the massive hangar doors, then headed to the stairs that led down into the subterranean storage areas. The eerie quiet they descended into was very much at odds with his last visit. Then, the screams of the maddened infected minions had been damn near deafening. He’d since had the rooms soundproofed to preserve the sanity of the Sentinels who worked there.

“Captain.”

He turned to face a doorway he’d just passed. “Siobhán. It’s good to see you.”

The petite brunette stepped out with a smile for Lindsay and a quick nod of greeting for him, but her eyes went immediately to the carrier in his hand. “What have you brought for me?”

“What you asked for.” He passed it over.

“Come with me,” she said, running a hand through her cropped hair, which was stil damp and fresh smel ing from a recent shower. As was her usual, she wore urban camouflage pants with Army-issue jungle boots and a plain black T-shirt. The hard-edged attire did little to toughen her appearance. She was tiny and appeared delicate, a ruse that had blindsided too many of her opponents to count.

He fol owed her and Lindsay down the hal and into a laboratory outfitted with the best equipment his considerable fortune could buy. Freezers and glass-fronted refrigeration units lined the wal s, while microscopes, notepads, and laptops covered the metal tables in the center.

Siobhán cleared space on the nearest tabletop with a sweep of her hand and set the cooler down. She smiled when she opened it and read the label on the blood bag. “Wish I could’ve been there when Raguel gave this up. And you got a sample from Vashti, too! You’l have to tel me al about that.”

“Certainly, although I expect you have information to share with me as wel .” Adrian pul ed out a metal stool for Lindsay and stood behind her.

“Where’s everyone else?”

“The others are in the infirmary or out in the field.” The Sentinel moved to the closest refrigerator and put the two bags inside. “I wanted us to have some privacy when I talked to you about my latest discoveries.”

“Oh?”

Lindsay reached for his hand and linked her fingers with his.

Siobhán returned and leaned a hip in to the edge of the table. She was flushed and bright eyed, almost glowing. He’d never seen her look so… happy. “I ran tests using the various samples that were sent to me over the last few days. Lycan blood, for the most part, has no effect.”

“For the most part?”

“There was one sample that was anomalous. When I tested it, it caused a violent reaction. The virus became unstable very quickly. Had I been testing with a live subject, the subject would have expired.”

“What sample was this?”

“The Alpha’s.”

Lindsay’s hand tightened on his. “Elijah’s? Why?”

“I’l have to run more tests to be certain, but I believe it’s because the virus was created with his blood or blood similar to it. I’m trying to ascertain whether Elijah has a unique genetic anomaly or if it’s common to Alphas in particular.” Siobhán crossed her arms. “Unfortunately, I can’t get a hold of Reese to get more samples.”

Adrian thought back to the last time he’d heard from Reese, the Sentinel in charge of the Alphas. The dominant lycans had been segregated from the others to prevent revolt, and they were used for assignments requiring the utmost stealth, ones in which a lone hunter was the best offense.

“I haven’t spoken to him in about three months, but he checks in regularly and reports no trouble.”

“Do you scan the reports personal y?”

“No, I delegate to my second.”

“So it was Phineas’s job, then Jason’s, and now Damien handles it?”

“Correct.”

She nodded. “I would suggest you speak with Reese directly, Captain. One donor wouldn’t be enough for the size of the outbreak we’re dealing with unless they synthesized the identified protein. They’d need a lot of Alpha blood to pul that off. I’m talking about countless pints of blood and a considerable length of research and development time.”

“I don’t understand,” Lindsay said. “If there are genetic markers that identify Alphas, why was Elijah placed under observation first? There shouldn’t have been any question as to what he was, if a simple blood test could prove it.”

“This is al news to me,” Adrian said quietly, while inside his thoughts were raging. How could something so vital and elementary have escaped their notice for so long? He was afraid it was impossible, which led to even darker thoughts. Lindsay had been abducted from Angels’ Point by someone with wings and delivered to Syre, who’d Changed her. From that incident, he’d known it was possible that one of his Sentinels had become a saboteur, but this… This spoke of a conspiracy of breadth and far-reaching consequence. “Have you ever been to Alaska, neshama?”

“No.”

“Wel , we’l be changing that tomorrow.”

“Captain?”

He looked at Siobhán. “Yes?”

“There’s something else.” She took a deep breath. “I’ve fal en in love with a vampire.”

As the hotel room door shut behind them, Vash tossed her bag on the bed and shot a worried glance at Elijah’s leg. “How are you healing?”

“I’m fine.” He offered her an easy, heartbreaking smile. “Good as new.”

She nodded, but worry knotted her stomach. Like most lycans, he hated flying, and his discomfort had rubbed her raw over the short flight to West Virginia. She’d barely paid attention to the town of Huntington as she drove through it on the way to their lodging. Her thoughts were firmly on the events of the day and how dependent her equanimity had become on Elijah’s wel -being. Once she’d made up her mind to keep him, everything had changed. She now had something to lose, something she couldn’t bear to lose. What was building between them was too new, too rare, too precious with al its myriad possibilities. The chal enges, the joys— “Vashti.” He came to her, sliding his hands into her hair and cupping her head. “It was a broken leg. It happens.”

She caught him by the belt loops and yanked him closer. “I saw you get pul ed into that room and the door shut…I panicked. I’ve never felt anything like that in my life. The sheer terror. I had to fight my way to get to you and every second felt like an hour. And when I got there and saw the gun in her hand, everything froze…I could barely think—”

“Shh…” He pressed his lips to her forehead. “It’s okay.”

“No. No, damn it, it’s not okay. I don’t want to feel like this. It’s too much.”

“Yes, it is. Scary as hel .”

“You don’t sound scared,” she accused. “You don’t act like it.”

“I fight to keep a lid on it.” His voice was low and soothing. “I knew what you are…who you are…when I took you on. If I tie you down to keep you safe, I’l lose you. And since I can’t lose you, I’m working on dealing with it.”

That his words so closely mirrored hers was soothing, but it wasn’t an answer. It didn’t fix what was aching inside her chest. “I’m not as strong as you. I don’t want to let you out of my sight.”

He nuzzled against her and she leaned into him, her knees weakening with his tenderness. “Because you’ve already let someone out of your sight once and you lost him. I can imagine it’s tough to take that leap again.”

“This wasn’t supposed to happen. I’m not supposed to feel this way again. I had my shot. I had Char. It’s not supposed to happen a second time.”

Pul ing back, Elijah watched her with those verdant hunter’s eyes. Cool and assessing. “What’s not supposed to happen?”

“You. This. Us.” She squeezed her eyes shut to block out the way he was looking at her. Butterflies were having a field day in her stomach. The anxiety was kil ing her. “Shit. Why can’t the sex be enough? Why did al this other stuff have to get in the way?”

He tilted her head back and sealed his mouth over hers. The first lick of his tongue drove her mad, goaded her to push up onto her tiptoes and capture him with soft suction. His groan rippled through her, inciting the fiercest hunger. Her desire was always smoldering, ready to combust with the slightest provocation.

Vash took his mouth with savage greed, her tongue stroking deep. Her hands shoved up beneath his shirt, seeking and finding his warm, rough satin skin. Her fingers dug into the muscles bracketing his spine, pul ing him hard against her so that nothing came between them but their clothes.

His rumbling laugh vibrated against her tender breasts. “You’re definitely trying to screw me to death.”

“I want you,” she muttered, while kissing along his jaw and throat.

“Good.”

She shoved his shirt up and buried her face in the light dusting of hair on his chest, breathing in the hardworking scent of his skin. Her tongue found the flat disk of a nipple and teased it, worrying it with fluttering strokes.

“Fuck, that feels good,” he said hoarsely, lifting his arms to pul his shirt off.

Dropping to her knees, she yanked open his fly with frantic fingers.