Grant’s chair squeaked as he started to stand. “I’ll get you some coffee.”

“Thanks,” she muttered, “but my stomach isn’t playing nice today.” As if to bring her words home, a wave of nausea hit her hard enough to make her sway.

Grant scowled at her. “Have you eaten?”

“I don’t think I can.” Was she coming down with something? She couldn’t afford to be sick. Not now.

Not when Riker could be dying.

“I’m going to get you something.” Grant headed toward the door. “And don’t argue,” he added, when she opened her mouth to do exactly that.

Sighing with resignation, she refocused on the computer screen and clicked on a file labeled Fraser’s Notes. Dr. Fraser was a colleague, a vampire physiologist whose work in the field had led to major advancements in human medicine, including a cure for Type diabetes. But even among the ranks of his fellow scientists, his methods were considered questionable, and he’d recently come under fire by vampire-rights groups who claimed he was killing and torturing vampires unnecessarily.

Nicole rubbed her aching eyes as she scanned the documents in the file. Fraser had collated the medical stats of every female who had conceived in the lab and then compared the data against those who hadn’t become pregnant. Interestingly, the rate of conception in the lab was higher than that among vampires in the wild.

Fraser had concluded that being bound and forced to copulate increased the chances of conception, but he didn’t know exactly why that was.

Fraser was a f**king idiot.

A sharp, stabbing throb started up inside her head, and oh, yeah, she was on her way to Flu-ville. Maybe when Grant got back, he could get her some aspirin.

Nicole massaged her temples as she jotted down notes on a pad of paper. Only the females who had been fed blood taken from males on the night of the new moon had gotten pregnant, but not all who drank the blood had conceived.

Sweat bloomed on her forehead. Why was it so hot in here?

She wiped her brow and went back to the research, finding it curious that the females who got pregnant had also fought the hardest when they were taken into the breeding chamber. Fraser’s conclusion was that in their natural state, the females battled the males, causing a rise in hormones.

Nicole threw down the bullshit flag on that one.

It didn’t make sense. Rough play . . . perhaps dominance play might happen among animal species when the females were receptive to males, but the females in the lab weren’t “playing.” They were fighting for their lives. That wouldn’t happen in normal vampire society.

But then, normal vampire society saw a sadly pathetic birthrate.

Dammit. She was missing something important here. But her head was spinning, and the lights were dimming to the point where she was having a hard time seeing the screen.

“Nicole?” Bastien’s voice came from somewhere behind her. “Nicole.”

Something hit her like a full-body slam by a bus.

The floor. The floor had jumped up and struck her. She couldn’t see, and suddenly, she could barely breathe.

“Help! Someone help!” Bastien was closer, maybe even touching her shoulder.

She heard more raised voices, running footsteps, curses, and then someone picked her up. Words buzzed in her ear. She heard them but couldn’t comprehend them.

“It’s too late. Is it too late?” Grant’s voice, she thought.

“Shit.” Myne for sure.

“Hurry, dammit,” Grant insisted . “She’s dying.”

“Don’t let her die!” That, she was sure, was Bastien.

A massive explosion of pain blew every cell apart.

Dear God, it was as if every bone was breaking and every muscle fiber was stretching to its limit and then snapping. Agony such as she’d never known became her entire world, until mercifully, life as she knew it . . . ended.

Chapter 28

Myne rushed through the compound, the unconscious female limp in his arms. Grant had to hold Bastien back; the boy had gone nuts, full-blown, rabid, fangs-bared nuts, when Myne tried to take Nicole from the lab. Nothing Myne had said convinced Bastien that he wasn’t going to hurt Nicole.

The kid had been too far gone with protective instinct, like a dog standing near the body of its owner, defending even against the paramedics who had come to help.

Myne just hoped he could help. The silver fl ecks forming in Nicole’s eyes were a clear sign that she was in the middle of the change from human to vampire, but he’d never seen it happen so suddenly, and defi - nitely not after a full week of no symptoms. Usually, humans showed signs within hours after being introduced to the virus, and they were sick for weeks as their bodies changed over. Hell, it could take up to a month for the full transition.

Nicole appeared to be halfway there, and as far as he knew, she’d only been sick for hours. This could be bad. Real f**king bad.

His first instinct was to deliver her to Hunter, but before Riker had offered himself up to ShadowSpawn’s leader, he’d asked Myne to take care of Nicole. Myne would have refused, but how could he refuse a guy who had saved his life?

And who was on his way to certain death.

Shit.

He headed toward his quarters, but when he reached the door, he changed his mind. She needed the best shot at survival he could give her, and keeping her someplace strange was a piss-poor idea. Right now, she needed Riker, so he’d give her the next best thing.

He burst into Riker’s apartment and laid her carefully on the bed. She groaned and rolled onto her side, curling into a fetal position. She was burning up, her skin so hot that she wasn’t even sweating.

Sinking down onto the bed, he thumbed her upper lip and exposed her canines. Gently, he touched the tip of his finger to one. It jiggled under his touch, loosening as the vampire fang behind it grew in to replace the human tooth.

“Nicole? Can you hear me?”

She let out another groan, and her eyes flickered open. The green irises had clouded over, and the whites had turned red as the blood vessels inside them burst.

It was at this point that infected humans would, if left on their own, either die or rally enough to attack anything that moved in order to drink its blood. Few would survive if they found only animals. More would survive if they drank from humans. The best chance at survival was to drink from a vampire, and best of all was a born vampire’s powerful platelets.

This wasn’t something Myne was comfortable with. If Nicole survived, he’d forever be linked to her, when he’d never been linked to anyone but his brother. If she died, he’d have failed Riker, the only person he’d ever considered a friend.

Exhaling on a curse, he stripped her down to her bra and underwear, partly to help cool her down and partly because her body would change, and the clothing could restrict blood flow. Naked would be best, but he figured he could go that route later if needed.

He just hoped it wouldn’t come to that. If Nicole survived, she didn’t need to spend the rest of her life knowing he’d seen her naked. Although he wasn’t sure seeing her like this was any better. Her black bra cupped br**sts made to fit into a male’s palm, and her blue panties, while not the sexiest things he’d ever seen, covered a rounded bottom he’d admit to admiring every time he saw her in the jeans with the hole under the back pocket.

He’d always been an ass man, and Nicole had a spectacular one.

Myne tore his gaze away with another foul curse.

He wasn’t especially noble, didn’t even have to pretend to respect her modesty, but Riker was his friend, and Myne wasn’t going to ogle his only friend’s helpless female.

“Riker, you lucky bastard,” he muttered, as he put his wrist to his mouth and then ripped open the vein with his titanium teeth, cradled Nicole’s head in one hand, and put the wound to her mouth.

She reared back, swatting at him.

“Come on,” he urged her, but her struggles only got fiercer. She kneed him in the groin, and son of a bitch, that hurt.

He was done trying to be hands-off. No more Mr. Gentleman. He’d never been good at it anyway.

With a grunt, he fell on top of her and rolled them both so he was behind her, his legs clamped around her thighs, his arms pinning hers securely while he forced his wrist against her mouth.

Suddenly, she jerked and stopped fighting. Thank the spirit-gods. Her lips closed on his wrist, and she began to take dainty draws.

Excellent. Now he had to stay with her, feeding her when she needed blood, holding her when she went through agonizing changes. He just had to hope she wouldn’t demand his body as well as his blood. She was beautiful, passionate, intelligent . . . everything he’d ever wanted in a female.

She was also Riker’s. It didn’t matter that Riker wasn’t here. It wouldn’t matter if they never saw him again.

This was Riker’s female, whether he’d claimed her or not, and Myne would treat her that way.

And that meant keeping her alive and untouched.

“Drink,” he murmured into her ear.

Moaning, she wriggled closer to him, tucking herself into the curve of his body. He cursed as his body hardened, reacting to the awareness of a gorgeous female rubbing herself against him, and he cursed harder when his chest tightened with an even worse sensation: loneliness.

He shouldn’t be enjoying the feeling of closeness, of holding someone who didn’t belong to him, but damn, this felt good. He didn’t get to be with females often, not when his bite caused excruciating pain, and he definitely didn’t get to save a life . . . ever. Nicole was depending on him in order to survive, and he began to shake with the magnitude of it all.

Rike, he whispered to himself. If you come back and don’t mate this female before the next daybreak, I’ll kill you myself.

Of course, that was if Riker didn’t kill him first for getting a raging erection for his female.

Nicole was starving.

She rolled over, groaning at the aches and pains in her body. Geez, had she gone a few rounds in a boxing ring? If so, she’d lost the fight.

Riker’s earthy leather scent surrounded her, both comforting her and making her even hungrier. Her stomach growled, and deep inside, another hunger throbbed, a sexual one that pulsed hottest between her thighs.

The two needs tangled together, becoming one monstrous entity that demanded satisfaction. It was as if nine-tenths of her brain was operating only on instinct, and she had to struggle to get the remaining tenth to focus on rational thought.

Through a haze of hunger and lust, she reached for Riker, found him next to her. She opened her eyes but saw only pitch blackness. She should probably be afraid, but the rational sliver of brain was rapidly being swallowed by primitive compulsions. She wanted to climb on top of Riker, close her mouth over his throat, and—

“Ouch!” A needlelike stab of pain pricked her in the lip. She dabbed at the spot with her finger, felt the distinct warm stickiness of blood. She licked the puncture before touching the tip of her tongue to the sharp, pointed end of her canine tooth. Then the other.

Were those . . . oh, God, yes, they were.

She had fangs.

Her breath snagged in her throat. Her heart, which would have nearly doubled in size during her transformation, pounded erratically against a rib cage she knew had also expanded and grown an extra set of bones.

Holy shit, she was a vampire.

A confusing mix of emotions crashed over her in a violent wave: fear of the unknown, relief that she’d survived the transformation, and sorrow at severing the last link to humanity she had left. It didn’t matter that she’d had her eyes opened to the vampire world. She’d been born a human, but she’d die a vampire, and that was a difficult concept to grasp, especially as a fresh swell of hunger crushed her ability to think.

Need became a wicked jolt of pain that streaked from her belly to her teeth. Crying out, she curled in on herself. Hands came down on her, and suddenly, it was as if she knew exactly what to do.

She dove for Riker’s throat, clawing her way up his body. A guttural growl echoed in her ears. Hers? Was she actually growling?

“Your tongue,” he rasped. “Touch your tongue to the backs of your fangs.”

What was he babbling about? She didn’t care. She needed food. Hissing, she opened her mouth, ready to punch her fangs into anything that came within striking distance.

Fingers closed on her jaw, forcing her face up and squeezing hard enough to make her eyes sting.

“Your tongue,” he repeated sternly. “Do it, or you don’t eat.”

Food. She had to have food. Okay, wait, the tongue thing. Hastily, she probed the backs of her fangs, and there, just behind each, was a soft spot. She pressed inward and moaned as an erotic tingle spread along her teeth.

“Good girl,” he murmured, lying back and allowing her to pounce.

As if she’d been feeding like this her entire life, she struck, biting deep into flesh. The warm, heady rush of liquid filled her mouth and slid down her throat like silk. Her body jolted as if she’d plugged herself into an electric socket, and as her blood hunger began to ease, the other hunger swamped her.

It didn’t matter that Riker didn’t want her. Right now, all that mattered was satisfying the insane urges twisting up her insides.

Reaching between their bodies, she palmed the thick bulge behind his fly. He sucked air and arched up, pressing himself into her touch. A heartbeat later, he snarled a vile curse and shackled her wrist with his fingers.

“No.”

No? She whimpered, not understanding why he would deny her something she needed so badly that she couldn’t stop rocking her sex against his. The shifting, restless energy inside her demanded release. Demanded a merging of bodies and blood.