Darkness Chosen: Into The Shadow Part 20

Bracing herself, she rose and went to the sink, leaned against it, and looked into her own haunted eyes.

Shead tasted his blood . . . and been transported. It had happened before, in his tent in the Himalayas, but only briefly.

This time shead seen, smelled, felt that dream, that vision. Shead lived in his skin, and what had occurred had been her nightmare. Shead bounced down a cliff and hit the rocks, and suffered horrible internal injuries. She should have . . . no, he should have died a slow, painful death.

He hadnat.

She s.h.i.+vered.

But he had suffered. She knew that now. He had suffered in a myriad of horrible ways. Yet he had survived to save her life, and if she didnat move, didnat push her own shock aside and deal with the situation now, he would die on her floor. Even Warlord deserved better than that.

That snake man out there wasnat the only one of those things. They had to escape.

She splashed cold water on her face, brushed her teeth, and went out.

Warlord was on his feet. He had managed to wrestle his way into his trousers, and now he fought with the fastenings.

"First let me look at the bite again."

"Itas fine." His complexion was gray; his pupils were pinpoints.

"I can see that." A little more gently, she pushed at him. "Let me look. It needs to be bandaged. Youare dripping blood on the floor." She pointed at the pool by his feet.

"I suppose. Just donat touch it again." He lowered his pants.

She wiped the wound clean with the gauze. "The bloodas washed it out. I canat see any more of the venom." She pressed another gauze pad over the bite, taped it in place, and glanced up at his white-knuckled grip on the bedpost. "You have to fight whateveras in your system."

He looked down at her. Red, painful blisters spotted his cheek, one eye was sealed shut, and a fine sheen of sweat covered his forehead. Yet the hand he reached out to her was steady, and he stroked her cheek as if she were the one who needed rea.s.surance. "Donat worry. Iall hang in there long enough to get you onto the plane and to safety."

"I didnat mean . . ." But shead told him she was saving him because he was her best bet for safety.

Did he believe that?

Did she?

He tugged up his pants.

She helped him with the zipper and the belt, then pushed him into a chair and shone her reading light on his face.

Carefully she cleaned the dirt out of the wounds. "This one eye should be okay. How about the other one? Can you open it?"

"No. But the eyeball didnat take a direct hit. Thereas a chance Iall retain my sight."

He was so calm. So sure of himself.

He continued, "I called ahead. Theyare getting the plane ready. We have to get to the airfield and head toward the mountains."

"Iall order a car." She started to lift the phone, then paused. Hotels had operators, and phone conversations were not always private.

She paged Dika, then helped him on with his shoes and socks.

A soft knock sounded on the door. She looked through the peephole.

It was the maid. She was smiling, nodding. "Miss Karen," she called. "I brought the bottle of wine you requested." She held up a bottle for Karen, and anyone else who was watching, to see.

Karen let her in.

As Dika took in the messa"the scattered DVDs, the smooth, jewel-colored tail of the snake protruding from beneath the comforter, the man in the chaira"her smile disappeared. "What happened?"

"We were attacked."

Dika lifted her chin at Warlord. "Is this the man you were afraid of?"

"Yes, but he saved my life."

"Again," Warlord interjected.

"You took your payment last time," Karen snapped.

"So in return youare saving his life?" Dika looked him up and down. "Handsome devil. I can see why you might."

"You told me to trust my instincts. In this case, my instincts tell me to get him out of here without anyone seeing. Fast." Karen waited, wondering if Dika would mock her.

Instead, the soft, smiling maid was gone, replaced by a hard-faced, determined, and intelligent woman. "Right. Give me five minutes. Iall be back." She left.

Karen pulled two water bottles out of the refrigerator and started to hand him one.

He shook in a hard burst, and gave off a flash of fever so hot she felt it where she stood.

For the first time she took a breath, and realized how inadequate she was to this task. She didnat know anything more than basic first aid. She wasnat capable of fighting demons who turned into beasts. She placed the bottle against his neck, hoping to cool him, and said, "Iam a normal, sensible woman who is good at planning chocolate buffets and dealing with flower arrangement emergencies. How am I going to help you now?"

"Sensible, yes." He took the bottle, opened the cap, and drank. "But you are anything but normal. You can build a hotel, beat up a man, survive a trek through the Himalayas. Right now I canat think of anyone Iad rather have at my side."

She didnat want his tributea"but it touched her heart. "Drink it all," she said tartly. "Itall flush the venom through."

As he drank, he was grinning, and he reminded her of someone. Someone she liked.

Oh, yeah. He reminded her of Rick Wilder.

"Iave got survival gear on the plane," he said. "With the stuff youave got in your backpack, weall be okay."

"Did you go through everything I own?" She drank, too, grimly aware that she had also taken in a few fatal drops of the poison . . . and a few frightening drops of his blood.

"Right after your little conversation on the patio." He nodded toward her sliding door.

She jerked the bottle away, spilling water down her front. "Dika? You heard us?" Head heard every word shead said? About him? About her? About her fears?

Even now, sick as he was, he watched her, smiling. "Dika was very helpful. If she hadnat convinced you to stay, I would have had to take stern measures."

"d.a.m.n you to h.e.l.l. I should walk out right now and leave you to the vultures."

Taking her wrist, he kissed it. "Itas too late for that. Even if I die from thisa"and I maya" somehow I would come back for you."

"s.h.i.+t kicker." She paced from one window to another and twitched the curtains aside to look out.

What was wrong with her that his confession both flattered and compelled her? Why, of all the men in the world, was she in thrall to Warlord?

Dika hurried toward Karenas cottage, pus.h.i.+ng her housekeeping cart ahead of her.

A year ago, when Karen found employment at Aqua Horizon Spa and Inn, Dika had arrived from her people with a missiona"to make sure Karen Sonnet remained safe and the prophecy could be fulfilled.

Now the Varinskis had struck suddenly, viciously, and Dika had to get Karen and Wilder out.

She rapped on the door, and in her perfect maidas voice she sang out, "Iall clean up that spilled wine now, Miss Karen."

"Come in, Dika; we appreciate your doing this." Karen sounded as pleasant as Dika. The bright girl completely understood the reason for subterfuge.

Dika closed the door behind her and locked it. She opened the side of the cart and said to Wilder, "Get in."

Wilder nodded and stood slowly, moving as if his joints ached.

Karen saw his disability and cursed color-fully, in a variety of languages.

So. The girl might not like him, but she couldnat stand to see him in pain.

Wrapping her arm around his waist, Karen helped him fold himself up and in. Dika loaded Karenas bags on top of him, closed it up, and Dika and Karen and their hidden pa.s.senger headed out the door.

Karen helped Dika pusha"Wilder weighed a ton, and the wheels sank into the gravel pathsa"and they chatted lightly as they walked, for all intents and purposes two women who worked at the spa and were friends.

Yet Dikaas skin crawled. They were out there, the Varinskis, moving in for the kill. . . .

Dika, Karen, and Wilder reached the parking lot without incident.

Karen looked at the brightly lit entrance of the Aqua Horizon Spa and Inn, then at the white laundry van as it pulled up. She looked down at her hands as she clenched them into fists over and over. She faced the danger, and she feared the trial.

Dika couldnat help her with her fear, but she could help her take the next step down the road.

Two men jumped out and lifted the cart into the back of the van.

"These are my people, the Rom, my tribe. They will get you to the airfield." Dika placed her hand flat on Karenas head. "Blessings, luck, and strength be with you."

Karen hugged her, jumped in, and waved as they peeled across the asphalt and into the darkness.

Dika turned back toward safety. Toward the brightly lit entrance to the lobby.

Yet as she walked, the sense of being watched grew. She slid her knife from up her sleeve. She glanced behind her. Strained to listen. Her steps got shorter and faster. She almost reached the doorsa"and someone stepped out of the bushes. Or, rather, something.

Pointed ears spouted from the top of its head. Fur covered its neck and cheeks, yet its nose and eyes and body were definitely human.

He was what the Rom feareda"the new and evil Varinski curse, a being who straddled the line between predator and human.

"You shouldnat have done that." He spoke slowly, as if words were hard for him.

Dikaas only safety was inside. She stepped sideways. "Excuse me, please." She tried to go around.

He moved in front of her, half grinning. "I said you shouldnat have done that."

"I need to go in."

"Weare going to get them anyway . . . and now Iam going to get you." He sprang at her, fangs bared.

With a swift slash of her knife she cut his face.

He howled in agony.

She darted toward the entrance.

As the automatic doors opened, she shrieked with all the force of her lungs.

She saw the bell captain look up in horror. Saw the manager on duty start around the check-in desk.

Then the beast caught her in his claws. His fangs gashed her neck. And while she screamed, he ripped her to shreds on the pristine sidewalk of the Aqua Horizon Spa and Inn.

Chapter Twenty-three.

As the van sped down the road and dawn tinged the sky with the purest, lightest blue, Karen opened the cart and helped Warlord climb out.

He moved with excruciating slowness. "Itas the venom." The ceiling was low; he bent to avoid b.u.mping his head. "I feel as if Iam one hundred years old." He shot her a hard look. "Are you feeling any effects?"

"My fingertips are tingling as if theyave got frostbite."

He took her hands, turned them palms up, examined the skin, took her fingers into the curl of his. "Youare doing really well."

"I didnat get much."

"You saved my life."

The guy was running a fever, had probably lost an eye, could scarcely move, and he was worried about her. He was warming her. Physically. Emotionally. "So now weare even," she said. "No obligation on either side."

"I saved your life. You saved mine." He smiled. "But I tied you up. So for us to be even, you should tie me up."

"I will." She yanked her hands free. "And throw you off a cliff."