Unchained (Men in Chains Book 3) (20 page)

He held her close. She was crying in her fright and panting hard as she tightened her hold on him.

He sensed that he needed more of her blood, a lot more, which told him one of his wounds was mortal in nature. If he didn’t get feeling back in his lower limbs, he wouldn’t be able to heal it.

First things first.
Shayna, can you hear me? I’ve got to get feeling back in my legs. I’m bleeding badly now.

Yes, just give me a sec to calm down.
She trembled in his arms.

But after a long, difficult minute, she slowly released his neck and once more began moving her left arm around his back, inching across.

I think whatever it is, it’s lower down your spine.

He felt her hand, then nothing.

I’ve got it. It’s a dagger. Lev must have done this on his way out. Marius, can you heal from a spinal injury?

Yes, but there’s something else I have to know. I’ve been losing too much blood. The explosion might have done something even worse to me. I need to know if my legs are still there?

Marius!

Please look. I’ve got to know what I’m working with here.

Shayna crawled up his body to look over his shoulder, and kept crawling until she was bent over him.
Rock us back and forth. If your legs are there, I should be able to see them from the momentum.

Marius slowed down and, while still moving toward Cuba, he started the rocking motion.

I’m not seeing anything yet, rock more. That’s it.
Two more rocks, then she called out. “Marius, I can see them.” She switched back to telepathy.
Your legs are intact, but blood is trailing into the air.

Okay, next I need you to get the knife out of me. I can only stop the bleeding if I can feel the source.

But you’ll be in an enormous amount of pain. The explosion pitted your legs. Your boots are half gone.

Marius took three deep breaths.
I’ll be okay. Just pull out the blade.

He felt her calm herself and finally said,
Okay, I’ve got the handle. Ready?

Do it.

She told him what she was doing, step by step, until the blade was free.

He felt the result in increments as he sent his self-healing well into his spinal cord and second by second sealed up the wound. But the moment he restored the nerves, it was like a fire pouring into his lower extremities. He shouted a string of profanity, long and loud.

Shayna clung to him then pressed her wrist up to his face once more.

Again, he hurt her with a second desperate strike of his fangs, once more sucking hard. But each swallow eased him and powered him. Quill was right: Shayna was special.

Despite her blood, however, he now shook all over from the hit his body had taken and he kept losing altitude. At least the healing had started.

The next moment, however, he saw two vampires in flight, both big men—and they didn’t belong to Rumy.
Shayna, we’re in trouble. Incoming.

She shifted, an arm around his neck. Without thinking, she threw the blade she had in her hand, the one she’d taken out of his back, with surprising expertise. Immediately one of the men had a dagger in his neck and fell from the sky clutching at the blade.

The other reached Marius at almost the same time, but then suddenly he stopped midair, looking around. At first, Marius didn’t know what had happened until he realized that Shayna had made them both invisible.

He breathed a sigh of relief and kept flying.
Can you hold us in this invisible state?

For a little while. That was close.

You saved us. But Shayna, have you ever thrown a dagger before?

No, but I’ve watched you and I think the chains did something. I just sort of knew how to throw. How strange is that?

You’re amazing
was the only thing he could think to say. His mind had started winking out, but he took her arm once more and continued to drink from her while he worked at healing his body and at trying to support their altitude.

More than once Daniel’s men showed up, apparently following their trajectory, so he chose to drop them another forty feet. After that, he saw no more of the enemy.

He contacted Rumy again just as Cuba came into view.
I’ll be putting us down inside the system, one of the undeveloped back ends. But Shayna has us invisible and I want to keep it that way.
He told Rumy about his injuries.

I’m bringing in a healer. We’re five minutes away from your position.

Okay. Heading into the cavern now. And my mind is going.

I understand.

He flew slowly, while still taking Shayna’s blood. She’d grown very quiet, and the chain at his neck lay silent.

He’d put her through a lot.

He stopped drinking as he penetrated an uninhabited cavern. “Shayna, you can make us visible now.”

“K.” She was hardly audible, but when she released her power, he could feel the difference between the two states.

Rumy, where are you?

Almost there. I’ve got a bead on you.

Good, because I’m seeing spots.
He lay down on a patch of hard rock that was relatively flat and dry. He was in so much pain, he couldn’t think, but he held Shayna in his arms. She’d grown limp and something about that bothered him, but he couldn’t put enough thoughts together to know why.

A few seconds later Rumy stared down at him, but he wasn’t smiling. Instead he peeled Shayna away from him and spoke over his shoulder. “Shit, he drank too much. She’ll need a transfusion right away.”

Marius saw a couple of med techs, but he couldn’t make sense of what Rumy had said. He tried to say something, but Rumy put a hand on his shoulder. “Just lie quiet. We’ll take care of both of you. I’m taking you to my villa. You’ll be safe there.”

No one had ever seen Rumy’s villa, so that had to be impossible, which meant Marius was hallucinating.

The healer put her hand on Marius’s forehead and a wonderful sensation of peace flowed through him. He felt more hands lift him up. The next thing he knew he was on his back, on a stretcher, and moving in altered flight.

A wall of blackness descended, then nothing.

CHAPTER 9

Shayna had no idea where she was when she woke up. She lay in a bed, wearing a light-blue cotton gown she’d never seen before. But whose bed? And she had an IV attached to her arm that ran red. A transfusion?

She stared up at a beautiful ceiling made up of purple crystals. The room had three regular, Seattle-type walls, and only one of carved rock. This had to be a house built inside a large cavern, yet it still had a partially human feel.

She released a deep breath because the squared-up walls reminded her of her Seattle apartment. It felt so human that for the first time in the past two days, she almost felt at home.

The linens had a fresh smell as though they’d hung out on a line and dried in the air and the sunshine. So where was she? Heaven maybe.

Her last thought had been that she’d needed to warn Marius to stop taking her blood. While he’d been drinking from her in flight, she’d started feeling light-headed and dizzy. But he’d been half out of his mind with pain and his own blood loss. If he fell from the sky, they’d both be dead.

She also recalled having a serious doubt that he’d be able to make it to Cuba, then landing in a cave. He’d asked her to make them visible, but that was the last thing she could recall before she passed out.

Now she was here, but she had no idea where “here” was.

She lifted her arm, and the tubing that carried replacement blood into her body. So was this a medical facility? And whose blood was this? A vampire’s?

The dizziness returned accompanied by a boatload of fatigue. Marius wasn’t nearby—that much she could sense. She quickly reached for her blood-chain and breathed a huge sigh of relief when she found it intact. The bond held.

She tried to go back to sleep but couldn’t. She was too worried about Marius. Was he okay? Had he survived his injury?

She reached out for him.
Marius?

Shayna. Good. You’re okay. I’m here. They’re working on my legs.

How long have we been here?

A few hours.

And exactly where are we?

Rumy’s villa in the Como system, very private and more secure than any other place on earth. Daniel can’t get to us here.

Thank God.

I’m going to send someone to you.

Okay.

She honestly couldn’t manage more than that. A few minutes later, a woman showed up with a tray of food. She wore a woven gown of some kind and her dark-brown hair was drawn back in a twist. “Are you hungry?” She smiled when she asked.

Shayna put a hand to her stomach. “Starved.” She didn’t wait to be told but scooted up in bed, propping pillows behind her.

“I am always hungry after I’ve donated to a vampire.” She settled the tray over Shayna’s lap.

“You’re human?” Shayna was shocked.

“I’m a refugee out of the slave trade here in the vampire world. I’m originally from San Francisco, and yes, very human.” She glanced down at the tray. “But have some of this soup. It’s homemade with organic vegetables and you will feel a hundred percent better once you’ve eaten. I promise you.”

Shayna had so many questions, but that wasn’t exactly new. She lifted the spoon and dipped into what proved to be a thickened broth with beans and bits of ham, carrots, and celery. Her stomach growled, telling her to get on with it, the faster the better.

The first spoonful was like heaven, and she felt as though she hadn’t eaten for weeks instead of just a few hours. She had to work to calm the panic she felt.

When she’d settled down, she glanced up at the woman. “What’s your name?”

“Yvonne and you’re Shayna. I’ve been told that you’re in a grad program in anthropology and that you might have a few questions for me.”

Shayna’s brows rose as she took another spoonful of soup. Apparently, Yvonne had been warned. She smiled as she responded, “Only about a hundred.”

When Yvonne chuckled and said “Fire away,” Shayna knew she’d found a friend.

*   *   *

Marius hurt, especially in his lower extremities. Hours later and despite his own healing efforts and a team of specialists, he was still in pain.

Rumy had finally brought in a surgeon since the bomb that had exploded had planted shrapnel everywhere. Fortunately his trajectory and the way he’d held Shayna cradled in his arms had spared his upper torso as well as her body from injury.

But even his ass hurt.

Rumy stood nearby in an expensive black silk shirt, arms crossed over his chest. He grinned at Marius.

“What are you smiling about?”

“You’re alive, dammit, and you shouldn’t be.”

“Fuck off. I’m in pain.”

Rumy made a sad face. “Oh, poor powerful Marius.”

He didn’t exactly want sympathy, but Rumy was pissing him off.

The surgeon snapped on his gloves. “Roll onto your stomach and let’s get this shit out of you.”

At that, his lips curved. Though it hurt like hell, he did as he was told.

He spent the next hour trying not to wince, especially since a few bits were big and had gone in deep.

*   *   *

The human, Yvonne, had talked steadily with Shayna for hours. She’d long since finished her soup, but she’d heard enough to confirm yet again that she’d done the right thing in staying with Marius.

Yvonne had escaped from the Dark Cave system after eighteen months of sex slavery. Shortly afterward, Rumy had taken her in. She’d lived in the villa, deep in the Como cavern system, for over thirty years. But she didn’t look like she’d aged, which begged yet another question that Shayna needed to ask, unless the answer surfaced by itself. The woman appeared to be so peaceful.

“It took years to recover from what I went through in Daniel’s system, but now I have my children, three of them, and a vampire husband I’d never leave. He’s one of Rumy’s security detail here in the villa.”

Ah, that explained it. Yvonne was bonded to a vampire, and apparently that kind of proximity had an anti-aging effect on humans. Very interesting.

According to Yvonne, over two hundred people lived near the villa in what had grown to be a small village. The community had a central store and a park, and a school for all the kids—of which there were fifty now, of various ages. And all because Rumy had taken former slaves into the villa for rehabilitation. Many refugees had passed through, but a large number had fallen in love with different members of Rumy’s security outfit and made homes here.

Shayna thought the whole thing so fascinating that she wished she could spend a solid year doing fieldwork in the village. How much she would learn!

Yvonne had been near death when she’d arrived. “I was one of the few lucky ones. I would have been dead in a couple more days. I couldn’t keep anything down and our handlers loved to torture us repeatedly at that point, when we were of no use servicing the clientele. We’d then be used in betting pools to see how long we’d last. Bets would be placed up to the minute and various tortures were performed as part of the process. I’d just entered that horrible phase when one of the vampire guards snuck me out. I don’t know how he did it, but now I’m here, and we’re married.”

“So was he working undercover for Rumy, then, that the guard-now-your-husband actually took the risk to get you out?”

“Exactly. Rumy had him there to keep tabs on Daniel and his operation. But that was the last run he made. Rumy pulled him out for good after that, feeling it would be too much of a risk for him to return.” Her eyes twinkled as she smiled. “But I think the truth goes deeper. Rumy knew the guard loved me, so for his sake and mine, he brought the guard here to serve on the villa security team. Rumy is a gem if you haven’t figured it out by now.”