Chapter Twenty-Five
Nicolae closed his eyes. And now the shunning would begin.
“Your humanness means you and your brother can have hemophilia.” Dr. Parthen’s voice was higher in pitch. She seemed excited about this.
Nicolae didn’t know what hemophilia was, but it didn’t sound like anything to get excited about—not for him, at least. Although whatever the ailment, it was distracting everyone from Vasile and him being half-breeds. That part was good. Although maybe his humanness didn’t matter here. Dr. Parthen was human, after all, and so was Hadley.
“Well done, Toni.” Dr. Jess gave her a small bow of his head.
Beaming, Dr. Parthen picked up the clipboard and wrote swiftly on it. “I’m prescribing the Lazăr brothers a clotting promoter.”
Hadley nodded. “I’ll start them on it right away.”
Another woman came inside. Her hair wasn’t light and wasn’t black. She was attractive enough, but she was nothing.
“Thanks for coming, Zerenity,” Dr. Parthen greeted her. Putting away the clipboard, the doctor spoke to him. “Even though I’m going to give you medicine to help you, Nicolae, I agree with Dr. Jess. You should take in the blood of one of our community donors.” She gestured at the brown-haired woman. “I’d like you to feed on Zerenity here.”
Her? But she was nothing. Nicolae slid his attention right back over to Hadley. It was her perfume saturating his brain and blood with pleasure, her aroma that was sending sensations swirling from his lungs, into his belly, down to his crotch. “No.” He pointed at Hadley. “Feed. Her.”
“Oh, my.” Hadley laughed, the sound coming out in chugging pockets of air, as if it wasn’t a laugh at all. “Haah, haah, haah.”
Nicolae’s face burned. Maybe it did matter that he was a half-breed.
Dr. Parthen’s mouth curled upward into a slight smile. “I know her, but I’m sorry. Hadley isn’t a donor.”
What is all this talk of donors? Nicolae’s eyes found the tender spot on Hadley’s throat where her heartbeat fluttered. The burn inside him to sink his sharp teeth into Hadley’s sweet artery and drink her down was volcanic. His fangs stretched down farther with a longing ache, and his hunting vision snapped into place: little squares of hyper-clarity where Hadley was the focal point of the center square, everything about her crisp and clear.
He growled low. The inside of his veins itched and the emptiness in his belly yawned wider. He felt the rings round his pupils start to spin. “Her.”
* * *
The smile Hadley pasted onto her face was forced and stiff and hurt her cheeks, and…good God. Did she have a tattoo printed across her forehead, wrong men, please apply here, or some other phrase which would explain why this kind of crap kept happening to her?
In the little over two weeks since her bombed-out date with Amza the plumber, she’d gone out with Shanelon—boring—Ruarc—arrogant—Istvan—a total mama’s boy—Ninza—obsessed with football—Cavan—clueless about women—and Llawell—still hung up on his dead wife, Candace, who he talked about the whole date, and since Candace had been killed by Videon—the sadist who’d kidnapped Hadley and so regularly took up residence in her worst nightmares—Hadley begged off with a migraine real quick.
And now this scruffy manure-shoveler was getting his shorts in a knot over her. All right, so maybe that was too harsh and unfair, but she was so sick of these wrong men, and this guy was the worst yet. A savage who’d been raised on the side of a mountain. Grime behind his ears and in the creases of his wrists, roughly callused hands, and hair that looked like a dog had slept on it—he’d probably never seen the light of civilization. Clearly, no one had taught him manners. Like, hey, it’s impolite to stare.
Hadley was used to dealing with a lot of gawking from the men around here—Thomal once told her she exuded some kind of magnetic essence—but this guy’s stare wasn’t the appreciative or enthralled type she was accustomed to seeing. It was too intense. Too hungry. Too much.
Too damned rude.
And hadn’t anyone ever taught this guy to respond when spoken to?
Zerenity just said, “Look, pal, I know I’m not your favorite pick here, but you need to get some blood in you.”
And Mountain Boy still wouldn’t look at the donor.
“Hey!” Zerenity snapped her fingers in front of his face.
Mountain Boy finally switched his gaze over to Zerenity. He peered at her like she confused him.
“It’s either me or no blood at all,” Zerenity warned. “So let’s go.” She stuck her arm toward him, her wrist pointed upward toward his mouth.
Mountain Boy glanced at the arm Zerenity had volunteered, then returned his focus to Hadley.
She took a step back and shook her head.
His lips screwed tight. He sighed, but then grabbed Zerenity by the wrist.
“Wait a moment,” Dr. Jess tried. But—
It was too late. Mountain Boy was already using his grip on Zerenity’s wrist to yank her forward. He lunged off his pillow, his other hand clamping around the back of her neck, and latched onto her throat with a bite hard enough to flex up all the muscles in his face.
Zerenity screamed.
Mountain Boy released Zerenity at once, but not, evidently, because of her scream. “Abominabil,” he hissed, spewing blood from his mouth. It sprayed all over Zerenity’s face.
“You jerk!” Blushing furiously, Zerenity slapped Mountain Boy across the face.
His head jolted to the side.
Hadley’s heart and lungs stopped.
Dr. Jess lifted a hand. “Everyone, stop. Please.”
Mountain Boy came back around, his eyes spread wide. “She putrid,” he told Dr. Jess, pointing at Zerenity. “Blood spoilt.”
“Fuck you!” Zerenity pressed her palm over the twin puncture marks on her throat.
Hadley gaped at the blood seeping between Zerenity’s fingers. An animal. Worse than a savage, this man was a low, base animal.
Vasile watched the scene from beneath scowling black brows. He was as crude-looking and uncouth as his brother.
“Zerenity, please,” Dr. Jess said in a calm voice. “Nicolae didn’t mean anything by what just happened. He’s not used to the taste of the hormones in your blood, is all, and also this is how these men feed on their own donors. You have to teach him how we do—”
“The hell if I’m teaching this penis-head anything,” Zerenity snapped. “Let another donor take him on.” She stomped out.
After the noisy pounding of Zerenity’s strides faded down the hall, Dr. Jess cleared his throat. “Well. Perhaps Ruxandra is available to—”
“Hold on a minute,” Toni cut in. “You’re saying these men always feed like that? So forcefully?”
“Yes,” Dr. Jess said carefully.
“How else do they treat their women?”
Dr. Jess tipped his head a little. “From what I’ve observed, not particularly well. But now that I know their women don’t have hormones, I understand why this is the case.”
Toni’s brows lowered. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“It’s difficult to explain. It’s as if…their women aren’t women to them.”
“What are they, then?” Toni’s tone was sharp. “Things?”
“Please, try to understand, Toni, this is a biological construct, not a social one. The Vârcolac male needs the scent of female hormones around to activate certain areas of his brain. Without this scent, his mating instincts—the fierce desire to protect his woman, for example, or the urge to procreate—will remain inactive. Plus other important drives. In fact, Breen told me that Nicolae was shocked when he found out Dev is a bonded male—he even said it was impossible. I’d warrant Nicolae and his generation have never bonded, not if the only women they’ve ever been exposed to are hormone-less ones. I wouldn’t be surprised if these men have a very limited understanding of male-female relationships, and perhaps little to no knowledge of sex.”
Hadley lifted her eyebrows. A man, any man, not knowing about sex? Hah, she’d believe that when she saw it.
Toni turned to Nicolae, a thoughtful look on her face. “I’m sorry to ask this of you, Nicolae, but”—she gave him an encouraging smile—“do you know about sex?”
Mountain Boy’s forehead scrunched, then cleared. “Ah. Sex…yes. Yes. Seen things on TV.” Mountain Boy’s storm-gray eyes latched onto Hadley’s lips. “Kissing.”
Hadley ground down on her teeth, fighting back the urge to shout, Quit staring at me, you cabbagehead!
“Yes.” Toni nodded. “And?”
Mountain Boy’s forehead scrunched again.
Toni exchanged a look with Dr. Jess.
Uncertainty washed over Mountain Boy’s expression. “Not kissing?”
“No, there’s kissing,” Toni assured him, patting his arm.
And here he goes again. Back to staring. “Then why,” Hadley asked, “does this guy keep reacting to me? To the point where he even attacked you, Dr. Jess? If the manly side of him is dormant, then he shouldn’t be doing that.”
“Well.” Dr. Jess offered her a kind and patient smile. “There’s always been something different about you, Hadley.”