“Learn to shut a door, dragon,” I grumbled, rolling onto my side. “It’s hot in here.”
“The door is shut,” Cole murmured. “Should I lower the thermostat?”
I popped awake to find him stretched out beside me. Naked. No, not naked. He wore a pair of loose, jersey shorts that left little to the imagination.
Gah.
His eyes aren’t down there, Luce.
“Hey.” I withdrew to hide my morning breath from him, and then I remembered—charun. He could smell me across the house, let alone across the pillow we seemed to be sharing. To be on the safe side, I curled my fingers into my palms to keep them from roaming his body. “Now I see why I was all hot and bothered.”
Sweat plastered my pajama shirt to my skin, and my shorts were twisted from tossing and turning.
Concern raked furrows across his brow. “How do you feel?”
“Hungry.” I laughed until I caught his expression. “Why? What’s wrong?”
Muscles fluttered along his jaw as his molars grated together. The words he’d almost spoken didn’t have a chance. They were ground to dust.
“Talk to me.” I wriggled closer. “What’s got you riled up so early?”
“You had a seizure.” Cole placed his hand on my cheek. “You were unconscious for almost a full minute.”
“I don’t remember . . . ” I gripped his wrist and noticed the lack of pain. He must have removed the glass from my palms while I slept. “Does that mean I’ve caught what Jay Lambert has?” I jerked back, struggling to put space between us like it mattered when he had slept with me. “You shouldn’t be so close if I’m contagious.”
“You’re not sick.” He hooked his arms around my waist and hauled me against his chest. “Our conversation triggered you, and you . . . went away.”
“I don’t remember.” I curled my hands between us to keep from reaching for him. “What set me off?”
“I’m not sure I should remind you.” His sigh rustled my hair. “You might have the same reaction.”
“Okay.” I tipped back my head and searched his face. The grief I found there pinched my heart. “You saw what happened. You can make the call. I trust you.”
“Then let me shield you from this for a while longer,” he said, voice raw. “Let me keep you while I can.”
There was no point in telling him he could have me for as long as he wanted me. Neither of us had any idea how long that might be. And I had no doubt he was aware I was his for the asking. He had always known.
Conquest must be pressing against the cracks, widening them, for me to have blacked out, but I felt no different.
Actually, after searching myself for new fissures, I had to admit I felt more whole today than I had in months.
Whatever happened last night, it must not have been all bad if I woke with a firmer grasp on myself.
“Are you both decent?” Wu called through the door. “I would like to check on Luce.”
“We’re decent.” I buried my face against Cole and couldn’t resist the urge to press a kiss over his heart. “Come on in.”
Cole didn’t growl as Wu entered the bedroom. That struck me as odd. Really odd. Downright unprecedented. This was his den, and I was his . . . I was his. Full stop. And yet he let Wu enter without so much as curling his lip.
Lifting my head, about to demand an answer, I intercepted the grim look they exchanged. It was only slightly less scary than the truce they must have forged while I was inspecting the backs of my eyelids.
“Okay.” Glancing between them, I pushed into a seated position. “You guys are freaking me out.”
“We’ve decided not to revisit the events of last night,” Cole told him, sitting up beside me. “I think it’s for the best.”
Playing devil’s advocate or genuinely curious, I couldn’t tell, but Wu studied me. “You’re sure you don’t want to know?”
“Yes?” Chilled despite my sweat-dampened shirt, I rubbed my arms to warm them. “I don’t remember what happened, but it’s nothing good if you guys are this spooked.”
“I possess sensitive information as well.” A politician couldn’t have been vaguer with campaign promises. Wu was slick. “Would you like me to withhold that too?”
Walking on eggshells wasn’t great for morale, but I had to remain functional. I had Dad to look after, a case to solve, and a sibling rivalry to survive. “Will it impact my ability to do my job?”
“No,” he said, after some thought. “We can proceed.”
“All right.” I dropped my hands then linked my fingers in my lap. “As long as that remains true, keep it to yourself. The second it compromises me, tell me. Make whatever arrangements you deem necessary, but I expect you to hit me with the truth stick. Even if it knocks me out again.”
Lips mashed into a bloodless line, Wu nodded once. “As you wish.”
Unnerved by their good behavior, I swung my legs over the edge of the bed. “I’m going to forage for breakfast.” I slipped on a pair of house shoes good for preventing splinters as I crossed the pier. “After that, we need to touch base with Santiago and find out what’s happening inside that hospital.”
“I updated the coterie on your condition a few hours ago.” Cole leaned over and slapped his palm on the nightstand. “He said to give you this.”
“A tablet.” Feeling around the topmost edge, I found the power button and woke it. “Is it just me, or does he have a million of these now? Amazon must have been bundling them.”
The screen flickered to life, and up popped a video chat app. Three seconds later, Santiago’s pinched face filled the screen. Distracted, he didn’t speak but typed on a keyboard angled across his knees.
“I don’t get it. He’s not saying anything.” I looked to Cole for answers. “Is this a recording? Can we fast forward?”
“Give me a minute, damn it.” Santiago glared at me. “Brilliance takes time.” More keys clacked, more time slipped past. “Open the White Horse app on the home screen.”
“Okay.” The logo I would have known anywhere, but it didn’t hurt that I had seen him use the app when he hacked the black phone Wu gave me. I tapped it then sucked in a breath. “Where are the rest of them?”
Several tabs had opened at once, but the topmost one showed the room Wu and I had broken out of last night. Almost three dozen people had been corralled in there while the hospital figured out what to do with potential carriers. I counted less than a third remaining, and the brutal black and white feed cast their pallor in a ghoulish light.
“As best I can tell, a baker’s dozen are residents in ICU. The rest . . . ”
“They’re dead?” I shifted the windows until I had a split screen view that made Santiago easier to see. “From symptomatic to dead within twenty-four hours?”
“Seventy-two,” he corrected me.
“What?” I whipped my head toward Cole. “I was out for forty-eight hours?”
“Yes.” He glared at Santiago, who stared back unrepentant. “We were going to update you after breakfast.”
“You’re still you, aren’t you?” The question, coming from Santiago, was as good as a fit of hysterics from a normal person. I must have really worried him. All of them. “I can’t smell you through the screen, but you don’t look like you’ve got a hard-on for world domination all of a sudden.”
“I’m still me.” I smothered my grin before he spotted it. “The forty-eight-hour nap explains why I woke up feeling so refreshed.”
The glare Cole turned on Wu would have withered a lesser charun to a husk on the spot.
Wu returned the look with teeth, an open-ended invitation Cole had only to accept.
Santiago, unable to see them, grunted. “The good news is, this means quarantine is over.”
“You three represent multiple species of charun,” Thom said, his voice muffled in the background. “Since none of you showed any signs of infection, it’s safe for us to assume we have an immunity to the virus.”
“Is it a virus?” I heard myself ask.
“The way it’s transmitted leads me to believe it is, yes.” Thom’s face appeared over Santiago’s shoulder. “I’m on my way to the morgue. A few of the bodies have been released for autopsy. I’m going to see what I can learn.”
Already dreading the answer, I still had to know. “How is Jay Lambert?”
“Alive.” Santiago peered at another screen as though double-checking himself. “He’s recovering.”
“Patient zero,” I sighed. “Does this mean he’s developed immunity from the virus?”
“We’ll find out soon enough.” Thom leaned closer. “He’s being kept in isolation, but we need to pay him a visit. Any hope of creating a vaccine depends on us getting a viable blood sample.”
“We’ll go.” I let the guys in the room determine which we I meant and returned my attention to Santiago. “Have you pinned down what happened to the other floaters?”
“Charun found them,” he chimed in. “They were taken to secure facilities.”
“How did you manage that?” I aimed the question at Wu. “Do you have something to share with the rest of the class?”
“An aquatic species of charun located the first body. Diorte. They’re scavengers. They were drawn to what at first appeared to be an easy meal, but the meat smelled wrong. One of their elders called Kapoor, and he had the body collected.” He shrugged. “The elders offered their assistance to make the waters safe for their offspring. They’re the ones who located the second and third corpses, but they found Jean Ashford too late. The teenagers were already in the water, and the Diorte shied away from human contact. They updated us as the situation progressed, but the damage was already done.”
“Two things.” I held up a finger. “Offspring? How is it their elders knew to contact Kapoor, which means they’re beholden to the NSB, and yet they have children?”
“Otillians are the most resistant to the NSB’s methods.” Tube-ties for females and snip-snips for males. That’s what he meant. “Our scientists pioneered IUDs as a secondary means of compliance.”
For which I was grateful. I wasn’t a fan of invasive procedures. Or hospitals. Or doctors.
“There are other species with similar, regenerative capabilities. Their bodies repair what is perceived as damage over time and they become fertile again.” He returned to the matter at hand. “The Diorte cull their own periodically since they reproduce at will. They’re long-lived, and they see the chance to procreate as a fair trade.”
Exchanging their lives for their children’s. What parent wouldn’t make that sacrifice?
“Their size is a factor too,” Cole said quietly. “There are only so many adults that can shelter in the same body of water. The pods would outgrow the rivers and lakes where they live, making them impossible to hide, if restrictions on their numbers and sizes weren’t enforced.”
All this made me question how old these elders could be unless they were celibate. Or unless someone else made the sacrifice, if one was required, so their offspring had an anchor to their past.
Adding a second finger to the first, I wiggled them. “Does this mean demi charun are also immune?” Wu didn’t answer. “Has anyone checked on Kapoor?” His grimace told me all I needed to know. “Nice, Wu. Real nice. You’re saying my boss might have kicked the bucket during my first week on the job, and no one noticed. This isn’t building my confidence in the taskforce.”
“He would have reached out if he required assistance.” Wu sounded certain, but his hand reached for his phone. “He’s aware of what we’re doing. He would have seen the news coverage and made the connection. He wouldn’t have risked himself or his team if he had any reason to assume he had been exposed to a contagion.”
“Except you just said charun reclaimed the body. Without a human there to conveniently get infected and die, how would he know to be wary? If he’s the only demi on his team, and the others don’t get sick, he might think it’s the flu.”
“Charun can’t catch the flu,” Wu informed me.
I leveled my best cop stare on him. “You know what I mean.”
Cole interrupted before either of us blinked. “Are you sure it’s safe for you two to return to the hospital?”
“Santiago?” The security feed was our biggest concern. We didn’t need people making connections between our previous visit—and subsequent disappearance—and this one. “Can you make us disappear?”
“Already done,” he sighed, disgusted with my lack of faith.
“That leaves us with the witnesses we interrogated, and they’re all dead, in ICU, or confined.” I checked with Cole. “We shouldn’t run into anyone who might recognize us if we go straight to Lambert’s room then leave.”
“Okay.” He stood and selected a fresh uniform from his closet. “I’ll drive.”
“I’m her partner.” Wu kept his tone this side of civil. “I can protect her.”
A headache blossomed behind my right eye. “No one is questioning your ability to protect me.”
“I am,” Santiago volunteered.
“Not helping,” I sing-songed.
A frown gathered on his brow. “Who said anything about being helpful?”
Massaging my temple did zero good. “I bet the other coteries don’t talk smack to the cadre.”
“The other coteries are sheep,” Santiago bit out sharply. “We were sheep.”
“I have never been a sheep,” Thom said, affronted. “Sheep are prey, and not worth hunting. Their meat is fair, but their fur gets stuck in my teeth for days.”
Putting aside the fact this tomcat could take down sheep, I had to diffuse the situation. “I shouldn’t have joked about that.” I set the tablet on the mattress. “Sometimes I forget the others don’t have what we do. The sarcasm doesn’t come across how it’s meant.”
“We’re family,” Thom supplied, his glare daring Santiago to disagree.
“We’re something all right,” he grumbled, which was better than an outright denial.
From the moment I met them, I had no doubt they functioned as a cohesive unit. I was the odd man out, and I was working to get in their good graces. So, yes, I saw them as a family cobbled together in order to survive. They protected each other, provided for each other, and stuck together no matter what fresh hell Conquest dragged them through. That kind of bond couldn’t be broken. The best I could hope for was that it might be expanded by one more link.
War bound her coterie with blood, but I had yet to meet Famine’s chosen. Death was also a mystery. I had suspicions about what we would encounter when she breached, but I didn’t want to think too hard about them. I had my hands full with animated corpses and potential zombie viruses without adding a heaping helping of tomorrow’s fear onto today’s plate.
“I’m proud of the lives you’ve built for yourselves,” I told them. “I’m proud of the work you do, the people you’ve become.” Security might be a mercenary business, but it hadn’t escaped my notice that when given the chance to start their own business, they had monetized helping others. Sometimes for far less gain than the expense to them. “I don’t want you to hold back. I want you to be honest with me. I want us to work, and that means you all help keep me in line.”
“You should get dressed.” Wu reached over and turned off the tablet. “They’re old enough to know you meant no harm. Your apology was more than sufficient.”
“These bonds are what keeps the coterie steady.” Cole covered my hand with his where it rested on the blacked-out screen. “Luce is finding her way, and so are we. Her instincts are good, particularly where Miller is concerned. If she feels she owes them an apology after a misstep, show her the courtesy of allowing them to accept.”
“She’s coddling them.” Wu transferred his scowl onto me. “They aren’t human. They aren’t fragile. They’re predators, killers. They don’t need you to hold their hands or kiss their boo-boos.”
“They’re my friends.”
“You heard them.” Cole searched my face. “We’re family.”
Uncertain if he meant the words for me or Wu, I clung to them all the same. Dad was all I had left in this world now that I had alienated the Rixtons. Maggie was coterie, and I considered her family. Portia and the guys were a melting pot, and I was happy to dissolve into their ranks if they would have me.
Wu exited the room then returned with a box he passed to me. “You’ll be needing these.”
“New boots.” I rubbed a thumb across the label. “I’ll try not to lose this pair the first time I wear them.”
Crooking his lips, he backed out onto the pier. “I’ll leave you to dress.”
Uniform tucked under his arm, Cole shut the door behind him. “I’ll dress in the corner.” He turned his back to me. “Let me know when I can turn around.”
The room was large, it had to be to accommodate a man built like Cole, but he didn’t give me a chance to get far before his shorts hit the floor.
A strangled noise clawed up my throat, and it didn’t cut off until he glanced over his shoulder at me. And smiled.
“You—” Heat swept up my neck and stung in my cheeks. “You.”
If ogling his bare ass was wrong, then noticing the muscular indents in the curve of each cheek was worse, but that didn’t stop me from staring.
“Take a picture.” Making no move to cover himself, he chuckled. “It’ll last longer.”
“I’ll do that.” Given permission, I fumbled around the bed until I palmed my phone and used burst mode to make sure I got at least one picture that wasn’t blurred. “Thanks.”
The red painting his cheeks when I called his bluff was precious, but as much as I wanted to cross to him and press a kiss to the underside of his jaw, I wasn’t dumb enough to get that close to so much naked Cole. Until he initiated, I was keeping my hands to myself.
With the exhibition over, Cole started dressing in an economical fashion that still had me salivating as I watched from the corner of my eye. And if I noticed him watching me right back while I stripped off my PJs and donned my suit, I behaved. Mostly. Okay, so maybe I never wore thongs to work, but it’s not like I’d ever had a reason to scintillate in polyester, either. And if he bit off a pained groan when I accidentally dropped my bra and had to bend down to pick it up, well, I’m sure blue was a lovely color on him. It would complement his eyes.