Eternal Hunger rb-1 Page 2

  Sara winced. The question was a valid one in a situation like this, but the phrase “back in bed” was code for “Do you want him strapped down?” and there was nothing she wanted less in that moment. “No, he’s fine where he is. But I’m going to get a new mattress in here, and in the meantime I want you to check the room for anything else, anything that might be a problem, then look in on him every ten minutes and call me if there’s any change.”

  Jill nodded. “Sure thing, Dr. Donohue.”

  When the nurse left the room, Sara went to stand in front of the window, in Gray’s line of vision. She hoped he’d lift his gaze to hers for just a moment so she could connect with him. But when he did, the weight of his unhappiness read so loud and obvious in his steely gray eyes that Sara could barely keep her emotions in check. Her breath trembled as she leaned toward him, and she hated herself for it. “Just give me a little more time,” she whispered.

  His jaw twitched; then his mouth settled into a frown, and after a moment, he turned away and shut his eyes.

  Sara didn’t say another word, just turned and left the room. She headed straight for her office, to the tiny bathroom that was all her own. When she got there, she shut the door and turned on the cold water. What was she supposed to do? What did he expect her to do? Let him go? Let him die? Just give him the tools to kill himself and walk away? He was fucking kidding himself if he thought she was going to do that.

  Tears burned in her throat and she hauled back and smashed her fist against the bathroom door. Pain shot through her wrist, then up her forearm. It felt good for a moment—her anger was alive, and the sudden release of emotional pain felt almost druglike in its quickness. Was this the release-high some of her juvie patients got off on? she wondered before the pain suddenly jumped and intensified. Sucking air through her teeth, she stuck her throbbing hand under the faucet and let the frigid water numb her skin. She glanced at the door, made sure she hadn’t left an imprint.

  All she needed was more time. There would come a day, one day soon, if she could get her ass in gear, that she would get it right, and Gray would finally be released from the memories that haunted him. And hell, you’d be released from them too, wouldn’t you?

  The loud knock on her office door startled her, but pulled her back to reality. She quickly dried her hand, left the bathroom, and called, “Come in,” as she walked over to her desk and dropped into the black leather chair behind it. She eyed the four half-empty takeout cups scattered around the top of her messy desk, and ached for a hot cup of coffee.

  Dr. Peter Albert walked into the room with an expression of a man who was long on criticisms but short on patience.

  Sara didn’t wait for the middle-aged ward chief to ball her out. One second after he sat in the chair opposite her, she shook her head and said, “Amazing. It’s close to midnight, staff’s changing over, and yet the Dr. Albert spy contingent rolls on.”

  The man smiled dryly. “I would hope so. Who knows when or if I’d have heard about it from you.”

  He was right, but Sara didn’t say it. She didn’t have to. Pete had known her for four years now, and he’d come to expect certain things. Her honesty and loyalty were his when it came to every patient but one.

  She shrugged, tried to sound casual. “There’s nothing to worry about here. He’s fine. Nothing drastic went down.”

  Pete didn’t buy it. “Only because a nurse caught him before it did.”

  “It’s my fault. The sessions this week have been particularly brutal. He’s been bombarded by flashbacks of the fire—”

  “Get serious. That pile of Klonopin was more than a week in the making.”

  Sara sat up and grabbed one of the half-empty cups of coffee on her desk. “We’re getting so close, Pete. I can feel it. Isn’t that why you brought me on? To find the switch? Turn off traumatic memory for good?”

  “Yes, that’s why I hired you, and why the donors continue to throw money at the Neuro Psych department—it’s also why I allow you to have Gray here.” Tense lines formed around his mouth. “But if anyone finds out—”

  “No one’s going to find out,” Sara assured him, taking a sip of coffee. Ugh. Cold. She drank it anyway.

  “If Gray regains his ability to speak—”

  “He wouldn’t tell anyone. He wouldn’t want me to lose my job.”

  Pete’s brow lifted. “Even if you were the one preventing him from permanently checking out?”

  His words stopped her cold, because in truth, the possibly was a valid one.

  Pete was quiet, his gaze dropped from her eyes to her mouth and remained there a second too long before he said softly, “Listen, Sara. I’ve got to protect myself and this hospital.”

  “I understand that.”

  “Good, because I’ve decided to change Gray’s current situation.”

  “What does that mean?” A prick of fear moved through her.

  “I’m having him moved to lockdown.”

  “Hell no!” She slammed down her cup. “No, Pete. I won’t keep him in a cell, strapped to a bed, no group therapy. He’s already a prisoner.”

  “You’re not thinking clearly. You’re making choices based on emotion, not what’s right for Gray. I think maybe you should consider putting him under the care of another doctor—”

  Sara was adamant. “Not going to happen.”

  “Sara—”

  “If you make that change without my say-so, you can consider it my resignation.” Sara leaned toward him, her tone deadly serious. “And all of my research—every study on PTSD, every unpublished finding I have on memory pain in military vets, every question, every curiosity, every idea I have will go with me.”

  Worry etched Pete’s expression, and something beyond a professional loss. She knew he liked her, more than a boss should. And if she were anyone else, someone with a past that was free of tragedy and a future that offered clear possibilities, she might have given him a chance. After all, he was a decent guy, nice to look at. But she had nothing to offer anyone, not now—not yet.

  Sara stood, grabbed the stack of files from her desk. “I have to go. I have patients.”

  Pete stood as well. “If the truth gets out, I’m going to have to deny all knowledge. It’s your career that’ll be destroyed.”

  Sara nodded. “Understood.” Poor Pete, she mused. He was a good man, just not a brave one.

  Sara walked out of her office and didn’t stop until one of the nurses called to her from the nurse’s station. “Dr. Donohue?”

  “Yes?”

  “Tom Trainer’s calling for you again. It’s his fourth call tonight. I tried to tell him you weren’t available, but he insisted on holding.”

  Sara sighed. “He’s no longer a patient here. Tell him you’d be happy to recommend a doc outside the hospital, but I won’t be speaking to him now or ever.”

  The young woman nodded. “Okay.”

  Sara walked away from the nurse’s station. She needed to see Gray, see if he was all right and in the room she’d left him in. The hallway was quiet, with most of the patients asleep. She grabbed his chart from the wall and entered his room. When she saw him asleep on the dormitory-style bed, a single white sheet pushed down to his knees and no restraints at his wrists, she sighed with relief.

  She watched him for a few moments, the shaft of light from the hallway illuminating his pale face. Her little brother was twenty-seven in real time, but to Sara he still looked like the boy who used to chase her around the house pretending to be a hungry sister-eating dinosaur. Now he was as much a prisoner of the hospital as he was of his mind.

  Sara went over to the bed and sat down beside him, laid her perfectly smooth hand over one of his fire-ravaged ones. The fire she’d caused—the fire that had not only destroyed her family, but her brother’s mental and physical health, as well, the summer he’d turned eight.

  The fire she’d run from and come out unscathed.

  It took every ounce of self-control she had not to lie down besi
de him and weep against his shoulder. But she didn’t deserve his care, not until he could offer it to her himself. Because the truth was, no matter how hard she worked, she’d never truly atone for her sin until she brought her brother back to life.

  2

  In the indigo light of predawn, Alexander Roman rounded Hudson Street and came to halt on 11th, sniffing the bitter November air like the animal he’d become. Too many to choose from, he thought, his fangs elongating, vibrating as hunger gnawed at his belly. He’d tried it their way, his brothers. Every hour on the hour, they’d had him feed from the stock at RB Beef Company, one of the many businesses he and his brothers owned and operated in the city. But for Alexander, the desire to find another female, human or vampire, and sink his canines into the sweet spot below her breast, drink deep and long until her heart stopped, was impossibly strong.

  His father’s DNA had finally shown up, two hundred years after it had been rooted in his mother’s womb. Was this the kind of Pureblood male—the kind of paven his mother had been forced to lie with to create him? A rabid beast on a mission, pounding into her? If so, Alexander couldn’t help but understand her need to despise him.

  Delicate snowflakes fell around him, so white and pure until they hit the ground. The wind picked up and Alexander cocked his head to one side, the scent of blood assaulting his nostrils. Ahhhhh . . . It was human female, a delicacy, easy prey, something he’d rarely allowed himself to sample until the hunger had hit. Now the hunger ruled, and he was off, flying full speed down the snowy street, his fangs curling as his mouth watered.

  Then suddenly, halfway down the block, something halted him like a truck jerking on its breaks. Panting, he stood immobile on the sidewalk, an odd tingling sensation building in his fingertips. He shook his hands to get rid of it, then took off running again. But seconds later, midstride, he was hit by a rod of pain that stole the very breath from his lungs.

  What the fuck?

  His body began to shake and heat up as the pain traveled lightning quick up his wrists, forearms, biceps, and shoulders. Instinctively, he reached out for something to steady himself. His hand clamped around a thick metal pole and he pressed his body against the hard coolness as if it were his lover.

  What the hell is happening?

  First hunger, now pain.

  His head began to pulse like the bends of an accordion and he could feel his pupils shrink until all he could see were shadows. Panic erupted in his chest at the sudden, ugly blindness.

  Get home. Get the fuck home now!

  From behind him came the steady and familiar hum of the delivery truck that always passed by at this time. Alexander heard the catlike screech of brakes and a male voice call out, “Look at that asshole.”

  The yeasty stink of fresh bread filled the air, intermingling with the sound of shared laughter.

  “I haven’t been that hammered since the Mets won the play-offs,” another man said. “Careful there, buddy. Don’t piss yourself.”

  Blind as a wolf pup, his head pressed against the dirty metal, Alexander hissed, his fangs tingling with a need to strike. If you want to remain alive and intact, keep driving.

  “Sleep it off, buddy,” one of them called before hitting the accelerator.

  Something that felt like oil snaked down Alexander’s throat. It was thick and purposeful and heading for his lungs. Suddenly there was no air.

  No air in. No air out.

  The pressure was excruciating, and Alexander dropped to his knees, his hands locking on to either side of his head. This wasn’t another symptom of hunger. This was something altogether different.

  His ears felt stuffed with something . . . rags—rags that housed a hundred pissed-off flies. Panting to supply his aching lungs with even a whisper of breath, Alexander started crawling toward what he hoped were the brownstone’s stairs. He knew that most of the brownstones on this block had garden apartments. If he could reach one, he’d have the shelter he needed. Daybreak was near and he was fifteen blocks from home and four blocks from the tunnels.

  Daybreak.

  Something he’d never feared in all of his two hundred years. Not until this very moment.

  It should’ve been impossible, he thought, feeling the edge of the icy stone steps beneath his fingers. It was too soon, too early. But with every shock of pain, every instinct warning him to find shelter, he knew it was true. The change was upon him, and he had only minutes before the sun caught and seared him.

  As he scrambled clumsily down the steps, a quick wind picked up, sending a tornado of forgotten winter leaves whirling around him, their sharp, crackled edges stabbing at his sensitive skin. Like the tide rushing toward the shore, his vision came back—but in a binocularlike fashion, tunneled and unfocused. He squinted, caught sight of the minishelter before him. His muscles continued to tremble with small bone-aching seizures as he got to his feet and stumbled down the rest of the stairs and into the covered entryway of the brownstone’s garden apartment.

  He needed to get inside. He needed full protection.

  On his knees, huddled against the door, he reached up and gripped the handle, then cursed when he found it locked.

  What street is this? Where are the tunnels?

  Suddenly it hit, like a lightning bolt of fire, angry stabs of sunlight against his skin.

  Dawn.

  He glanced up. Above him, in the dome of sky, the protective shield of indigo had succumbed to the pale, dire streaks of a lavender and pink sunrise.

  Alexander cried out, turned and clawed at the door. With each fiery tear into his skin, his eyes watered, his nose ran, and he tried not to vomit with the acute, lethal pain of it.

  It all made sense now. The desperate hunger, the relentless pain. He was being sent through morpho before his time.

  One hundred years before his time.

  Mouth wide and fangs curled, he cried out into the sunrise, then collapsed in a heap against the door.

  Sara walked down West 11th toward her building, pulling her wool coat closed at the neck to keep out the frigid morning air. Exhaustion licked at her mind and her muscles, making her feel like a huge wimp. Fighting for Gray had become commonplace in her daily life, but last night’s episode had drained her will more than she cared to admit. She liked to think of herself as a hard-ass, someone who pushed herself and those around her until the answers revealed themselves—then on to the next mystery. But witnessing Gray’s potential suicide attempt had her wondering for the first time since med school if she might come out of this a failure, if her plan to go back home to Minnesota, return a well and happy Gray to their ever-hopeful mother, was an utterly bullshit objective.

  The flutters of a melancholy heart warned Sara that she was bordering on vulnerability, and she didn’t do vulnerable. Clearly, she needed sleep, a solid five hours to get rid of the weak-little-kitten vibe she was carrying around. Then she could go back to work—rethink and retool.

  She made her way down the brownstone steps, pulling out her ring of keys as she went. But at the bottom, she came to an abrupt halt, nearly colliding with something blocking the entryway to her garden apartment. Her heart stuttered, and sudden fear yanked her out of her exhaustion. Huddled against her doorway was a man.

  She turned her key chain again and palmed the pepper spray she’d had on there since moving to New York seven years ago. There was probably nothing in it but air now, but, what the hell, he didn’t know that. She flicked the nozzle to the on position with her thumb, then walked cautiously up to him. A thread of fear moved through her and she was glad it was daylight.

  The man’s face was turned toward her door, his large frame curled into a ball. As she crept closer, she noted that the triad of smells that normally emanated from the lost souls who found shelter at her door were absent.

  She leaned down and touched his shoulder. “Hey, buddy.”

  Nothing.

  Perfect. This was the last thing she needed today.

  She tried again. “Hey, it’s
really cold out here. Let me point you toward a shelter. There’s one a couple blocks down.”

  He didn’t move.

  Fuck. A quick fear implanted itself in her gut, one nurtured from years of living in the city and working in a profession of unpredictability. The man huddled at her door didn’t fit the profile of a homeless guy, and that made him not only strange, but potentially dangerous.

  She stared down at him, the cold morning wind blowing strands of her hair against her face. His clothes looked clean and expensive. Shoes, too. Maybe he was someone from her neighborhood, out partying—

  HELP ME ...

  The unspoken words slammed into Sara’s mind. Caught off guard, she stumbled back, but got only as far as the first step when a sudden, tortured cry erupted from the man, and his dark, closely shaved head dropped back, exposing his face for the first time.

  “Oh God. Oh ... oh, shit ...” Heart pounding, she stared at his ruggedly male face. On either cheek, two angry red welts—symbols of some kind—had been singed into his pale skin.

  “Who did this to you?” Sara uttered.

  He didn’t answer, just lay there, eyes closed, panting, openly suffering, back against the door. He was so huge. The width of his chest had to be twice the size of hers.

  She knew it was probably a stupid move, but she was a doctor and her concern trumped her fear. She dropped to her knees beside him and cupped his face. “You need an ambulance.”

  The man’s eyes shot open. Sara gasped, “Jesus!” Then she stared as severe, predatory merlot-colored orbs caught and held her gaze. She’d never seen anything so fierce or so beautiful in her life, and she just kept staring, transfixed as his full lips parted, then moved.

  He hissed something. Then again.

  She shook her head. “I don’t understand.”

  NO AMBULANCE.

  Sara’s hands flew to her ears. What the hell? His voice. It was inside her head. How was this happening? Exhaustion? Was it screwing with her mind?

  NO POLICE. NO AMBULANCE.