The Merzetti Effect (A Vampire Romance) (26 page)

“Not that I am aware of.”

“Then I guess we can eliminate any possible psychic plundering on my part.”

“Not necessarily.”

His brows drew together again in that frown that made him look so fiercely intent. And sexy, dammit. It was all she could do not to put a hand to his forehead to smooth that crease away. A sweet ache filled her heart at the idea of soothing away his cares.

She blinked the image away. “What do you mean?”

“I can’t guard my dreams. Nor can I necessarily remember them.”

Oh, shit. “And I crawled into your bed and possibly into your head, even though I was sleeping myself?”

“It seems the most likely explanation available to us.”

He was right. Dammit, why hadn’t the possibility occurred to her? “Ah, I see we subscribe to Charles Peirce’s theory of abduction.”

If he detected her sarcasm, he must have recognized it for the defensive mechanism it was.

He smiled. “I would not be much of a scientist if I did not reason to the best explanation, would I?”

“So this isn’t real? It’s just something I plucked from your head while we were sleeping?”

His lips firmed into a straight line. “It has to be. We exchanged no blood, and you are not a vampire.”

Dear God, she wanted to disappear into a crack in the floor. She’d stripped the symptoms of blood-bonding from his mind, then recreated them. How pathetic was that? Was she that far gone on him?

Yes.
God help her
, yes.

She’d been deeply attracted to him from first sight‌—‌okay, second sight, since he was just a blur in the alley on first sight. And her reliance on him had naturally grown after having been stranded in his alien world. And it was more than just reliance that had grown in the last weeks. Somehow, he’d slid right in under her radar, old world values and all.

But, dammit, he clearly did not return the sentiment. She’d joked about not needing to read his mind because all men shared the same thoughts, but hadn’t she read those very thoughts in his mind? Pure, simple, sexual lust, coupled with a blood lust.

She drew a deep breath, expelled it. Inhaled again. God, give me strength.

“Okay, then I change my mind. I’ll go to this safe house Eli found for me. And I want to go as soon as possible.”

Delano stood abruptly, sending his chair rocketing across the room. He should be starting the delicate task of inserting the Merzetti Effect gene‌—‌or what he was 85 percent sure was the ME gene‌—‌into the plasmids, where they would multiply happily. But dammit all to hell, he couldn’t do it. His hands shook, his palms were damp, and his mind refused to focus.

It was the thirst, of course. How could he be expected to concentrate when the need to feed swelled relentlessly every hour? It had been years‌—‌decades, probably‌—‌since he’d gone more than a day without at least a modest infusion. He just wasn’t used to this kind of deprivation.

Yeah, right, that was it. It had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that upstairs, Ainsley was preparing to take her leave.

Leaving him, dammit!

No, leaving
here
, not leaving
him
.

With Eli.

Per my orders. So Eli could keep her safe.

Eli with the aw-shucks-Matthew-McConaughey smile, whatever the hell that was.

His right hand tightened around the positive displacement pipette he held until the instrument snapped. He opened his fist to see the microsyringe tip had embedded itself in his palm. Cursing, he strode to a nearby sink. Dropping the ruined pipette on the counter, he removed the micro tip from his flesh, hit the taps and shoved his hand under the flowing water.

Idiot.

He peeled off the latex glove and let the water flow over his bare hand. Good thing he’d conceded he was too distracted tonight to do the transfer as he’d planned, or he’d have a serious needlestick incident to worry about. Belatedly, he noticed the slight pink tinge to the water circling the drain, and cursed again. That’s all he needed, to lose even a few drops of blood while he was forced to fast.

Shutting off the tap with his elbow, he grabbed a clean towel and wrapped it around his hand.

Please!

Delano’s head jerked up, nostrils flaring.

Ainsley!

His gaze swept the room, even as he realized she couldn’t possibly have gotten into the lab without his knowing. No, she was upstairs still, in the foyer. Poised to leave, not wanting to go…

He leapt across the room and hit the intercom. “Eli, wait! Don’t leave yet. I’m coming up.”

Without waiting for an acknowledgement, he raced for the stairwell. Seconds later, he burst into the penthouse, his fingers automatically keying in the sequence to prevent the alarm from sounding.

“Delano?” called Eli from the foyer.

Christ, they were almost out the door.

Rage, hot and unreasoning, flooded his brain, his chest, his muscles. Moving at a speed he knew they would perceive as only a blur, he crossed the intervening space and snatched Ainsley’s bag from Eli’s shoulder.

Eli reacted instinctively, shoving Ainsley behind him and drawing his pistol in one smooth motion.

Delano found himself looking down the barrel of a SIG .40 caliber automatic, but he turned away from it to search Ainsley’s face. Her eyes, a blaze of violet-blue emotion, locked on his.

Yes!

The lone word sounded in his mind, as strong and as heartfelt as her earlier plea.

“Dammit, Delano, you almost gave me a heart attack.”

Delano was vaguely aware of Eli reholstering his pistol. “She’s not going anywhere.”

“You’re kidding, right?” Eli looked from Delano to Ainsley and back to Delano again. “Delano, we agreed the safe house was the best course of action.”

Delano’s anger took another bump. Hands fisted, he fought to keep his breathing regular, to expel the rage eating at his self-control. This was
Eli
, for God’s sake. His friend. A friend who was merely trying to carry out the orders he’d been given.

Breathe deep, let it out. Again. Air in, murderous impulse out.
When he’d mastered himself, he announced, “She stays with me.”

“Oh, for the love of Pete!” Eli exclaimed. “Can no one around here stick to a simple plan?
Your
plan, I might remind you. This is the only way we can be certain she’ll be safe.” Eli grasped Ainsley’s elbow, maneuvering her toward the door again.

At the sight of Eli’s hand on Ainsley, Delano’s tenuous grip on control snapped. With a snarl, he lunged for Eli, pinning the other man against the wall with one hand around his throat.

“Del!” Ainsley cried.

Eli’s hands came up to grip Delano’s hand, trying to pry open his grip. “Get … the hell … off me!”

“Nobody touches her.” Delano tightened his grip remorselessly. “Nobody takes her from me.”

Eli’s face was red now, his eyes starting to distend. He beat at Delano’s arm and head with savage blows, but Delano was beyond feeling it. What he did feel was the bone-deep, total-body need to feed, together with a powerful need to punish. The combination was dizzying. Growling, he dropped his jaw and let his canines erupt.

“Stop it! My God, you’re killing him! Delano, let him go!”

Through a haze of blood-lust, he felt Ainsley tugging at his arm and heard her agonized pleas. And he heard something else in her voice.
Unadulterated horror.

Suddenly, he saw what he was doing. He held Eli suspended a good four inches off the ground, and his friend’s struggles were weakening by the second. And oh, shit, Eli’d been beating him with the butt of his gun. A gun he could have used very effectively in his own defense.

Jesus, God, what had he done?

“Shit.” He eased Eli down until his feet met the floor again, taking the gun from his now lax grip. “I’m sorry. Eli, I’m so sorry.”

Eli started to fall forward. Delano would have caught him, but Ainsley stepped between them, catching Eli and easing him to the tiled floor.

“God, you’ve crushed his airway!”

Delano bent to help her stretch a coughing Eli on the floor. Thankfully, he was regaining his color quickly. “His airway’s fine,” he said gruffly. Which it probably was, give or take some potential cartilage fracture.

Ainsley fingers flew down the shirt she was wearing. Without a thought for modesty, she peeled it off, rolled it into a tube and slid it under Eli’s neck, her attention focused completely on her patient. “Eli? Can you hear me? Are you all right?”

Eli responded with a cough, followed by a string of pungent curses that bore testimony to his soldiering days.

“Well, that’s reassuring,” she said. “No stridor, no muffled voice.”

Delano frowned, thinking about other potential injuries. “The vascular structures are more vulnerable than the airway with this type of manual strangulation.”

“Yeah?” Eli coughed again. “Coulda fooled my airway a minute ago. Now help me up.”

Delano helped Ainsley ease Eli up to a sitting position, braced against the wall.

“I am so sorry, my friend.” Delano handed Eli’s pistol back to him. “I don’t know what to say, except that you should have used that weapon the way it was intended. You’d have been completely justified.”

“Damn right I should have.” Eli wiped the gun on his pants before slipping it back into its shoulder holster. “On the other hand, looks like I did a pretty good job with the butt end.” He gestured to the left side of Delano’s head. “You oughta get a look at yourself.”

Delano lifted a hand to probe his scalp. It came away covered in blood from several lacerations. Shit. More blood loss. Well, he had no one to blame but himself.

He grimaced. “Fortunately, I’ll be handsome as ever come tomorrow night, whereas you will no doubt have some colorful bruises.”

“That sucks. I won’t even be able to say, ‘You should see the other guy.’”

Delano laughed and Eli joined in.

Ainsley made an exasperated sound. “It’s not funny, Eli Grayson.” She turned to glare at Delano. “Nor will it be funny if he develops delayed airway troubles later tonight.”

Delano sobered. “She’s right. We need to get you to hospital for some soft tissue scans.”

Eli waved him off. “I’m fine.”

“You’re
asymptomatic
,” Ainsley corrected. “That could change in the next hours.”

“And if it does, trust me, I’ll call 911 myself. But until and unless my status changes, I have no intention of visiting the ER.”

Ainsley turned to Delano. “Delano?”

He shrugged. “He’s a nurse. It’s his call.”

“Thanks, buddy.” Eli extended a hand, which Delano grasped to haul him up to his feet. “Now, if it’s not too much to ask, would you mind explaining what the hell happened here? I thought we were agreed it was best for everyone if Ainsley went to the safe house.”

Delano sighed heavily. “We did.”

“Then what happened? What changed?”

Delano rolled back his sleeve and thrust his arm toward them. “This.”

Ainsley’s heart slammed in her chest, but it wasn’t fear that made her pulse hammer. It was exultation, so fierce that it stopped the breath in her lungs; a dark, savage delight flooding her neurochemical system. For there, on the inside of his elbow, were three raised dots in the form of a perfect equilateral triangle.

Yes
, came Delano’s voice.
You are mine and I am yours.

Her eyes widened as she realized his lips had not moved.

“A little uticaria?” Beside her, Eli snorted, although the effect was somewhat spoiled when his snort turned into a cough. “That’s supposed to flip some switch in my head to make this whole soap opera comprehensible?”

“Show him your arm, Ainsley.”

Ainsley, who still had not recovered her shirt, extended her own left arm.

Eli caught her arm and examined the dots. “Well, I’ll be damned. Matching his-’n-hers hives.” He released her arm. “I presume this is something more than a curiosity for the medical journals?”

She glanced at Delano, who bent to scoop her shirt off the floor. He shook it out and handed it to her, catching her eye as she took the garment from him.

Let me field this.

There it was again! Not precisely a voice sounding inside her head. More like her own thoughts, only not hers.
His
. In
her
head.