Chapter 11

 

 

Kyle’s deep voice awoke me from what had been a surprisingly restful sleep. “Wake up, kids! It’s almost show time.”

I peeled my eyes open to see Ryder staring at me. Had he been awake watching me? Creepy or cute? Hmm … little bit of both. I sat up, pretty sure that my gothic makeup had officially dripped all over my face and I now looked like a half dead zombie.

Ryder sat up as well. “How far out until the hospital drop?” he asked as I fiddled in my bag for my toothbrush.

“About three miles out. I got a text from Sanctum. They’re in place.”

And just like that my stomach scrunched with nerves. Brushing my teeth quickly in the tiny sink, I decided it was best not to try and find a mirror. Adjusting my nose ring, and running my hands through my hair would have to count as “getting ready.”

After Ryder brushed his teeth, he opened the small fridge and passed around some bottles of blood. “Drink up. We need to look as normal as possible if this is going to go down.”

I guzzled the blood and then we all made sure our contacts were in. Kyle and Ryder still looked way too gorgeous to be normal humans, but hopefully they would pass for really hot models that happened to have side jobs truck driving.

It could happen.

As Kyle maneuvered through the streets, which was easy with the huge lanes here, we all kept an eye out for University Medical Centre, which was the hospital in this region that handled blood for the Hives. The moment the distinctive building came into view, I shrugged on my Cellway vest and settled myself in near the back of our rig. No need to draw attention to the clown makeup goth girl. I’d let the boys handle any security.

Part one of our plan went off without a hitch. Sam had detailed maps explaining the back entrance and how we get to the loading docks. Besides two rent-a-cops on the entrance gate, we had no one stop us and soon we were pulling up to the large, industrial space. Kyle swung himself out of the rig and took some time to chat with whomever worked these docks. Ryder let him go, waiting for the signal to start unloading.

Kyle’s blond head popped in through the now open back door. “All set, let’s unload the bottles.” Ryder got out straight away, but I knew I was to remain hidden, although I might have snuck over to peer out the window. My eyes were immediately drawn to the five men standing on the edge of the dock. They were wearing white lab coats, and three of them had glasses. They looked very much like Becca in her science lab glory, but I recognized at least four of them as Sanctum people. Not that there was anything immediately obvious, but I knew some of their faces, and I also recognized the way they moved. Ash did not move in the same way as humans, they were more like jungle cats. Not to mention they were all gorgeous.

They prowled. Took control. Sat at the top of their jungle abode and disdainfully stared down at everything rushing past them. It was also how I knew at least one of those five was a human, an actual lab person who would probably, unknowingly, help to add this cure to all Hive blood.

I could hear them chatting through the window. “All the humans are here, in the back area,” a Sanctum male said. “We’ll give them the flu shot and then the bus ships them out in four hours.”

The humans were going to be injected with a version of the cure – under the pretense of a vaccine to keep them healthy – which would reproduce in their blood, and as long as they were fed on within the next month or so, the vampire would get a full dose. The bottled blood was going to be the time-consuming part. The donated blood was stored in bags in the refrigerators. Each of those bags was used to fill the UV bottles, which were then delivered to the Hives. Apparently it took a full day for them to distribute the blood into the bottles with special machinery. The bottles were then sealed, a process which mixed the cure and blood cells together, before going into the refrigerated containers and onto private jets which dispatched to all the Hives.

It was a huge job. But there was no other option.

Ryder and Kyle were offloading the wooden pallets from the back of the rig. There were hundreds of pallet crates, and within each was a thousand cure-laced bottles.

The human was right there in the midst, unknowingly helping us take down the vamps. Sanctum wore game faces, but they were excited, I could tell. They wanted us to take out the vampires.

A few hours later the last box was dropped onto the back dock area and we were done with our part of this plan. Ryder opened the door and got back into the captain’s chair.

“Everything is in place,” he said, starting the rig. “Sanctum have full control of the blood bank area. They’ve been here for a few days learning the ropes. They won’t make any mistakes. The cure will be reaching the Hives within the next day or two.”

I nodded, my breath catching in my chest. I was already sick of this cloak and dagger, hide Charlie in the back of the van bullshit. I wanted my life back.

Kyle got in and shut the door firmly. “They’re going to text when it’s all done. They have six more members in the labs, and will work through the night to get the blood into every single bottle.”

“Did the other guys run into any trouble?” I asked, wishing I had a phone to get updates and stuff on. Sort of felt naked without technology in my hands.

Ryder shook his head. “Nah, they’re all good. Few checkpoints, but each looking for you. Sanctum was in place, as promised, at the Californian hospital.”

The rig was on the road again, back in downtown Dallas. “So now we just lay low and wait for the shit to hit the fan, right?”

Somehow it all seemed too easy, like we should be fighting and stabbing vampires in the neck with cure-filled syringes.

Ryder laughed. “Yes, we now have to wait. We’ll head back to Portland and prepare ourselves for war.”

He dialed a number then and put it on speaker. It rang a few times before a familiar voice answered.

“Talk to me, Ryder,” Lincoln said, voice hard.

“Plan is in place. E.T.A forty-eight hours. You?”

“Files in action. Cities around the globe on standby, everything looking rosy on our end. Will inform you if anything new arises. Waiting on bottle delivery now.”

They weren’t exactly speaking in code. I understood exactly what was being said. The army was already heading to the Hive towns. They were going to be on standby for the possible fallout of the cure.

Lincoln continued: “All members have darts filled with liquid from a Dr. Leander. None will escape.”

The boys exchanged a few more words before ending the secure call.

Ryder looked pleased. “Everything is in place. Lincoln has used the files to ensure silence from men with power. They have multiple teams in all cities and are loaded down with cure. Becca made sure to send them all her extra. We are as ready as we’ll ever be.”

Okay. Wow. He got a lot more than me from that conversation. But it was all good news. Settling in to the couch, preparing for a long drive home, I sent out as many positive thoughts as I could. This had to work.

 

The next two days went by agonizingly slow. Everything was in place. The UV resistant bottles were on their way to the Hives; human donors had arrived already at most places. Everything was perfect. A little too perfect.

“So there has been no chatter on the network?” I asked Sam for the hundredth time. “Nothing to indicate that the vampires know about our plan?”

He glared, before running a hand through his dark hair. It was getting long; he needed a cut. “No, there’s still nothing. Normal chatter. Nothing in code. So far we’re good.”

The seven of us were camped out in another safe house. Not in Portland. There were still mass searches going on for me there, but in the nearby Salem area, about an hour’s drive away. We’d been spending our time playing cards and obsessively checking the online updates.

“Blood just hit Canada,” Markus called, leaning back and stretching out his long body. He’d been in that chair all day. “And Florida has theirs now.”

Sanctum were updating us via the untraceable cells. So far eighty percent of shipments had arrived today.

Sam sat a little straighter in his chair then, his fingers flying across the keyboard.

“What’s happening?” I leaned forward, unable to stop myself from asking.

“Vampire celebrations underway in Chicago. Ash enforcers there said the blood and donors are out in force, and that vampires are indulging themselves.”

I exchanged a smile with Kyle. Awesome, this was exactly what we hoped would happen. New blood days were almost always a celebration. The blood was the freshest, and they had new donors to ravage. The old blood was distributed to ash and the freshest was for vampires.

Fuckers.

Becca had assured me that the cure didn’t hurt ash, because they were born and not made. She’d tested it on donated blood from the boys, which meant all the ash in the compounds were going to be okay. They just had to wait it out.

“Blood hit Mexico twenty minutes ago,” Jared said. “Their celebrations are underway too.”

I had to get to my feet and start pacing. This was too much for me to handle. It was happening. Shit. This was actually happening. What would go down when the first vampire began to turn human? Would they figure it out right away or think he was a fluke? Oh God. I was going to be sick with nerves.

A knock at the door had all of us on high alert. Our location was completely secret. Sam had set the safe house up, and so far we’d done all our communicating via secure cell phones. Our internet signal was pinged and directed all around the world so that no one could trace it. Well, no one below Sam’s level of hacking.

So who the hell was knocking on the door? Ryder didn’t hesitate. Weapon locked and loaded, expression hard, he strode to the entrance. There was a peephole, which he used for a few seconds, before raising his brows to me and opening the door.

A Viking stepped through, and I was already running. My dad, mom, Becca, and Jayden were standing in the doorway. I crashed into the open arms of my father. We had never hugged, not like this. He might have only been my sire on paper, but in my heart he was my real dad. I squeezed him even tighter, thankful to him for keeping my mom safe this whole time. His scent was not familiar to me, but I felt comforted by the citrus and fresh autumn aroma that covered me now. Every girl needed a dad, whether he was blood or not. I had already chosen him as my father.

We had to get to know each other more, but hopefully there would be time for that. Stepping back, I was crushed into a hug between my mom and Jayden. Tears pricked my eyes. A part of me had wondered if I’d ever see them again.

They let me go and I turned to Becca. “Come here, girl.” I opened my arms and she smiled shyly before jumping into them.

I gave her a quick hug and then Sam was there. She threw her arms around him, and his face softened as they hugged.

“I told you to stay put,” he growled as he pulled back.

She smirked. “Nice to see you too.”

He scowled before ushering everyone inside.

Carter gave Ryder a nod. “I went back to Alaska looking for you. I found some signs of fresh tracks around the safe house these kids were in. Didn’t like it. So I brought them with me.”

Sam and I shared a look. Would the humans have known I was in Alaska? WTF. They must have people on the inside looking into my trail. CIA maybe. Shit, this was bad. This is why we were so cautious about spreading the word of the “cure takedown vamp plan” with humans. They had big mouths.

“It’s probably nothing,” Ryder assured me.

Before I could answer, I had a muscular, fine-ass BAFF in my face. “Bitch, I’ve been here five minutes and you haven’t said a word. How about, ‘Damn, Jayden your fingernails look busted. Why? Oh that’s right, you’ve been up for forty-eight hours packaging the cure.’” He crossed his arms and Oliver and I began slowly walking toward him.

Jayden was a sensitive flower and needed to be tended too. “Awww.” I picked up his hands and inspected the chipped nails and blisters. “Poor baby. Manicure, on me, when this shit dies down,” I said, and was rewarded with a broad smile.

Oliver stepped forward then and I was completely forgotten. That enforcer was very good at distracting him. My mom looked me up and down. I had ditched the gothic getup, but my hair was still short. “You’ve grown up, Charlie bear.”

Why do parents feel the need to call you by your childhood name in front of your boyfriend? And grown up? Hah. The understatement of my life. She had no idea what I had been through and I would never tell her. So I simply nodded, my smile weak but genuine.

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” I said, pulling her close for another hug.

“Shit!” Kyle’s curse echoed around the room. He looked up from the computer perched on his lap and my gut dropped when I saw his face. Something very, very bad had happened.

Ryder and I practically crashed into Sam, all of us fighting to get over to Kyle.

“What is it?” Ryder demanded.

“Those motherfuckers.” Kyle was still swearing, and I was about to crack him over the head when he spun the laptop in our direction. It took me about five minutes to wrap my head around what I was seeing. I recognized the images, but my brain was having trouble processing.

Holy shit! We had been expecting some backlash. Lives did hang in the balance when it was anything to do with vampires … but this, this was so much worse.

The video footage was image after image of vampires spilling out onto the streets as the sun was setting in New York. They were attacking humans. Killing them, turning them, drinking from them, destroying homes and buildings, causing damage for the sake of causing damage. Shit! What was happening? Had some started to turn to human already, and the rest went crazy? Were they going to take out as many as they could before the cure kicked in?

Ryder’s jaw was clenched. “Three hours.”

“Huh?” My brain was still processing the video.

Ryder turned to everyone in the room. “The sun goes down in Portland in three hours.”

Well … fuck. Maybe I wasn’t getting out of this alive. Because you bet your ass if the vampires were coming for the people of Portland, I was going to be there to stop them.

“It’s a one-hour drive, so we have two hours to suit up and make a plan.”

Jayden offered up an idea. “Let’s burn that damn place to the ground.”

Personally, I’d love to see the Hive burn, but Carter shook his head. “No. They’ll be on high alert. Snipers in every window. We won’t get close enough to the Hive. The vampires may not be trained like ash, but they are strong and have an arsenal that would put the Marines to shame. You won’t get within five hundred feet without losing your head. Not now. They’re expecting it.”

Fuck. Not to mention our ash buddies were still inside.

I met his gaze. “Then what?”

He started to pace. “I’m guessing eighty percent of them were in the celebration of new blood and feeders. They will be cured, eventually. The other twenty percent won’t go down without major bloodshed. Lock down the humans, martial law, curfew, the whole bit. Then we go in and fight them old-school. Like the culling, give them everything we got.”

Kyle spoke up again, his eyes trained to a second laptop he had open. “Vampires have warnings going out to all the Hives now. Looks like this bitch is gonna get ugly.”

I swallowed roughly. “Did any of them get cured?” Please tell me that my father was right, that at least eighty percent were knocked out. Vampire numbers were nothing on humans, so we’d have a chance if a good lot ingested the cure.

Kyle typed a few times, and finally glanced my way. “I’ve interrupted the alerts for now. They think they’re sending it out into the world, but it’s just staying on their particular server.” He paused, seeming to be choosing his words. “Sanctum is updating me; they believe that a good percentage of the vampires, in all Hives, have partaken of the cure blood. In some places the change to human is already kicking in. Thankfully, by the time they’ve fully changed back to human, the majority will have taken the cure.”

He flicked his head across to Becca, standing in Sam’s shadow, who had barely stepped two foot from her. “Whatever you put in the cure serum to speed up the process is really working. In fact, it’s much faster than we anticipated, which is why New York is already going crazy. Their celebrations started a few hours ago, and already vampires are showing signs of humanity.”

Becca paled, stepping around Sam to see the footage better. “Crap! I’m sorry. I thought it would be better to get the cure acting straight away on them all. I thought I’d calculated the right amount of time so that no one would notice until all had time to drink.”

She looked devastated, her eyes running across the footage again and again. Stepping over, I took her hand. “This is not your fault. This is war, girl, and there are always casualties in war. We’re trying our best to free humans from the control of these assholes. We have to stay strong now, and go and do our best to save them all.”

Ryder’s cell rang then, and all of us fell silent as he answered it on speaker.

“Ryder here. Talk to me.”

Blue Eye’s voice came through loud and clear. “Red alert, Ryder. The cure is working, but as we suspected the small numbers who did not drink, or noticed early, are out on the streets trying to turn humans. Build their numbers back up.” He sounded harried, but not crazy pissed or anything.

“We saw the New York footage,” Ryder said. “We’re about to suit up and hit Portland Hive before they can get to the humans.”

“I’m on my way there too. I already have men stationed there, on standby. The other Hive cities are quiet so far, and I have people in place to handle any that get out of control. The international ones have required me to call on their local law enforcement. All have been more than willing to help. Hopefully when the dust settles, the Hives will no longer be there. I’ll check in with you over the next few hours, but for now, things are as good as we could expect. Head to Portland if you feel you must. I’ll see you there.”

He hung up before any of us could say another word, but a small sliver of hope flickered in my belly. It had worked, sort of. Most of the vampires were being cured right now, and the Special Forces were going to try and contain and cure the others.

“He’s right,” Kyle said. I could see the New York footage had changed again. There were SWAT and Special Forces all over the streets, their fatigue and camo gear distinctive. Shouts and fighting. Vampires were still trying to rip the humans to pieces, but the moment they stopped to feed, they were shot up with AT20 and the cure.

Carter was already striding toward the door. I dashed across and stopped him. “You can’t come with us, Dad. You’re a vampire. No one will tell the difference now between good and bad vamps. You’ll be targeted.”

Silver eyes swirled crazily, and I had to look away. Too easy to fall into those mesmerizing depths and I needed a clear head for this argument. “Charlie, sweetheart, I want to be cured. I want a human lifetime with your mother … and you. I want us to be a family. I’m not afraid of the cure, and if you think I’m letting you go out there without me, you’re sadly mistaken.”

Well, shit, when he put it like that…

“No, you stay here and keep Mom, Jayden, and Becca safe.”

He narrowed his eyes on me and I returned the gesture. I knew we looked similar, and I wondered how much of his virus blood had actually shaped me during my development in the womb. Like he was actually my blood father in some ways, after all.

“Sweetheart,” my mom said, interrupting our epic stare-off. “I would feel much better if Carter was there to keep an eye on you. We’ll be safe here. There are no vampires in this area, and there’s no reason for them to leave Portland. They’re trying to take their city back.”

I huffed, crossing my arms over my chest. “Fine, you can come, I guess.”

Markus snorted then, and that set off a chain reaction of chuckles from the rest of the enforcers. Even Carter cracked a smile, before hugging me again.

“Thank you for the permission, daughter.”

“Uh, and I’ll be coming too, BAFF, unless you want to throw down ash style right now.” Jayden had untangled himself from Oliver long enough to hear about him staying behind. “You and Oliver are my family. Not to mention the rest of these meatheads. I’ll be there keeping your backs safe. Don’t even try to stop me.”

I sighed again. “Can’t keep you assholes safe, nope. No one listens to Charlie.”

Jayden gave me the perfect single raised eyebrow. He was an expert at the WTF expression. “How about you stay here, girlfriend. I’d like to know you’re safe for once, instead of gallivanting around like you’re bulletproof and shit.”

That shut me right up, until I saw Ryder open his mouth and I swung around to him. “Don’t even think about it. I’m going! This is my fight. I’m the cure for a reason.”

“Well, in that case ….” Becca stepped forward, but before she could say more, everyone in the room let out a resounding, “NO!”

She dropped back onto the couch. “Fair enough,” she said, scowling at all of us. Which honestly looked so adorable on her bespectacled face.

There was no more arguing. It looked like everyone besides my mom and Becca were hitting the city. I had a brief thought for Tessa, and hoped Lincoln had stashed her somewhere really safe. Preferably not in any Hive cities.

Ryder was all business now. “Okay then, time to suit up. We need full gear, plus the cure weapons and extra darts.” He was already in his black enforcer gear, weapons practically dripping off him.

So freakin’ hot. Give me a man with a big gun any day. Actually, just give me Ryder. He was way more than I could handle, and would keep me on my toes forever.

When I reached his side, he captured my hand and I lifted my head so he could press his lips to mine. The moment I tasted him my legs went weak and my heart started fluttering. He caught me around the waist, and for so many moments I was lost in everything that was Ryder. The strength, goodness, and warrior personality was one part; the other was the way he treated me, how he stared into my eyes like I was the only one in the world. The intensity he loved me with was breathtaking, and I would never be ready to give it up.

“We’ll have our forever, Ryder,” I said, pulling back slightly, our faces so close I could see every facet of silver and black in his eyes. “I love you.”

With a low growl he pressed his lips to mine and we were kissing again, and it was only when more than one throat cleared that I realized the rest of our group was standing around us, geared up and ready to go. I didn’t even blush when we pulled away from each other. No regrets. Hope they enjoyed the show, because there would be many more in the future.

It took me about five minutes to gather my shit, hug my mom and Becca goodbye, and then we were out the door and into two vehicles. Not as horrible as beige POS, but still plain, non-descript sedans. It was late afternoon and we were in a race to beat the sun.

“Do we have extra cure in the trunk?” I asked Ryder. I was in the passenger seat, no need to worry about rambunctious cure hunting humans today. The radio had informed us that all humans, unless those specifically trained to handle this type of situation, were on lockdown. Homes and offices were being barricaded, and armed forces were gathering in the streets. Curfew was in effect, no one was allowed outside during night hours.

During our drive the boys all got lots of updates. Kyle was still blocking off alerts from other Hives, and Lincoln continued to confirm that the cure was working. In some Hives we had a 95% cure rate. New York had been one of the lowest at 70%.

“We should be good here, right? I mean Lucas is sort of in charge, and we already wiped out so many of their numbers in the last battle,” I said into the silent car. “Right?”

Carter leaned forward; he was in the seat behind Ryder. “Don’t underestimate Portland. Have you heard from Lucas?”

I had to shake my head. Despite repeated attempts to contact him, no messages seemed to be going through.

Carter didn’t say any more, but we all knew what he was thinking. Portland vampires hated me and the enforcers, and they had most likely killed Lucas and brought in reinforcements to their Hive. They would have been ready for war, even before the cure started making the rounds. Great. As if we weren’t in enough danger, we were heading for the town filled with vampires who had nothing but vengeance on their minds.