Ashes to Ashes-Blood Ties 3 (33 page)

It didn't absolve Jacob Seymour of all the sins he'd committed, but it did explain them a bit. It also explained why Cyrus was so desperate for affection from any female at all, regardless of whether she was willing to love him in return, or was even capable of doing so.

Our eyes met. His were red, from unshed tears. "The only women who ever loved me were taken from me. Once by fate, the rest by my father. I can't forgive him that."

"You shouldn't have to." I wanted badly to tell him how much I'd loved him, but it would have been a lie.

"You didn't love me." Even though he was now on the opposite side of the blood tie, my emotions were still transparent to Cyrus. "But I believe you wanted to."

"I did." I couldn't hold back my tears. Not over this. "I did."

"If it makes you feel any better, it's a credit to your character that you couldn't." He smiled a little, but it faded quickly. "I know that now."

"You hated me for it." I leaned my forehead against his. Our lips were so close to touching. My mouth went dry. I touched my tongue to my lips, and he was on top of me, smothering my mouth and crushing my body beneath his.

I still do
. But his thought was swallowed up in a tidal wave of longing and… fear?

Cyrus leaned back and gave a curt nod to the door. "The last time I did this, your

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boyfriend beat me up."

"He's not my boyfriend." I paused at the sound of the door in the living room closing.

"And I don't want to talk about it."

I did, just not to Cyrus.
It's just a kiss
, I projected to Nathan through the blood tie. The cold that met my thought from the other end forced a tangible shiver down my spine.

"Forget him, Carrie." Cyrus's arms tightened around my back. "You've given him so many chances."

"What is it to you how many chances I give him?" I snapped, pulling away.

"It doesn't mean anything to me." There wasn't malice in his words. "I know you're mine, whether I want you or not."

"What's that supposed to mean?" This was a side of him I hadn't missed, the possessive, arrogant side.

He sat up, but not beside me. "Let's look at this reasonably. After I attacked you, when you knew I was a monster, you sought me out."

"Because of the blood tie," I reminded him.

"Fair enough." He shrugged. "After that, when you needed help with Nathan, you turned to me."

"I needed your pet to undo what she'd done to him." He sighed. "You're rationalizing. In the end, you kept coming back to me. Even to kill me, you wanted it to be between us alone."

He was right. There was no arguing that. When something concerned Cyrus, I wanted to be the only one involved. Whether I was fighting him or rescuing him.

"I'm not laying claim to you, Carrie." His elegant hands kneaded my shoulders. "But it seems you've already laid claim to me."

I turned and leaned into him when he curved his body around me. "But you let me."

"I did." His lips brushed my jaw, my ear. His mouth came to rest on my throat, the opposite side from where the scar of his first attack still marked me. "I suppose it's meant to be, then."

His fangs pricked my skin, threatening to break through and asking permission all at once.

"What about Mouse?" I asked, stopping him.

"What about Nathan?" he retorted, lifting his mouth. "There is a part of me that is still in the desert with her. While I was there, a part of me was still with you."

"I seem to have a gift for falling in love with men who are in love with their pasts." My admission seemed to freeze him in place. I didn't apologize for it or explain it away. I'd been in denial for far too long.

He faltered a little when he tried to speak, cleared his throat, then started over. "Well, that may be true. But I'm no fool. I know who's here now."

In the past, I might have looked for a trick or a trap in his words. Now, they brought tears of relief to my eyes.

This time, when he asked me if I loved him, I could say the words without fear of what I would become.

Chapter Eighteen: Crash

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"Get them inside and get them restrained!"

The words came to Max as through water, garbled and hard to decode. When he understood them, he struggled. Nothing held him down, but something definitely pinned him from the sides. Canvas, if his eyes weren't fooling him.

"Bella!" He thrashed in his hammocklike prison, but he couldn't quite get his arms free.

"Bella!"

"We've got her. You're going to be okay." A pale face peered over the edge of the litter.

"What's your name?"

"She's pregnant. Is she okay? She's pregnant." He closed his eyes, willing himself to focus on the noise around him. If he could just hear her voice… "Bella!"

"She's fine. What's your name?" the medic repeated. What the hell had happened? Where was he? What were these people doing?

The car.
Rolling down the embankment. Blood. Everywhere, there had been blood.
Oh, God, he wasn't with the paramedics, was he?

They could put him in the hospital, sedate him, stick him in a nice, sunny room with an eastern exposure…

"I'm allergic to sunlight!" he shouted, finally freeing his hand to reach for the face before him. "I can't be in the daylight!"

The woman's face twisted into a demonic vision. Max had never been so happy to see something so nightmarish in his entire life.

"We know," she said with curt efficiency. "What's your name?"

"Max Harrison. I'm—" He'd almost blurted, "I'm Movement."
That would have been
smooth
.

What the vampire said next was music to his ears. "Max Harrison, by authority of the Voluntary Vampire Extinction Movement, I'm placing you under arrest."

"I'm Movement." He gave a tired laugh. It was increasingly difficult to stay awake. "When there was one."

"What?" The woman's pale face went paler. "What did you say?"

"Leave him alone, he's not in any shape for interrogation," another voice admonished.

"Get him into the van."

"Bella. Where's Bella?" Max's stomach turned. Why wouldn't they tell him anything? "I need her. I need to see Bella."

"You will," the male vampire assured him. "You will." Something pricked Max's arm. Sleepy warmth spread through his veins, and everything went dark.

When Max woke again, he was in a hospital bed. He started, scanning the room frantically for a window. When he didn't find one, fragmented memories came back to him. He was with Movement. He was fine.

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He tried to sit up. His arms were tied to the bed rails.

With a frustrated groan, he tugged futilely at his restraints. Leather. Not too shabby. Nothing he couldn't break free from on a good day, but this was definitely not a good day.

"Anybody out there?" No one answered his call. "Hey, can somebody hear me?"

"I hear ya, I hear ya." Heavy footsteps thudded toward the bed. Max turned his head. The vampire who stalked toward him probably weighed in at three hundred and fifty pounds of intimidating bulk stacked seven feet tall. His bushy red beard and beady black eyes looked more suited to a plaid shirt and overalls than the white doctor's coat he wore.

"Paul Bunyan?" Max said before he could stop himself. The doctor didn't find it very humorous. "What do ya need? Keep in mind, I ain't lettin'

you up, not 'til your Movement cred is established."

"Bella," Max wheezed. His chest ached with uncertainty. "Where is she?"

"She's over there." Dr. Lumberjack indicated a curtained-off cubicle not far from where Max lay. Fluorescent lights within cast ominous shadows of large medical machines. At least Max could hear the steady beeping of a heart monitor. "Is she okay?"

"She's fine. We've got her sedated to keep her from moving around and opening her stitches, but she's gonna pull through."

"And the baby?" He wet his lips. "I mean, you knew she was pregnant?"

"We figured it out." The doctor raised an eyebrow "Got a personal stake in it?"

"What do you think?" Max snapped. Then he softened. "I'm just looking out for her."

"The baby is fine. We did an ultrasound for her file. Do you wanna see?" Before Max could answer, Dr. Bunyan flipped open a chart.

The picture he held over Max's face didn't look like anything at all, at first. Just a weird swoop of grayish lines against blue-black. Only when the doctor tapped the printout and said, "That's the kid, right there," did Max understand what he was seeing. Within a dark area shaped like a jelly bean was a grayish object that bore an uncanny resemblance to a shrimp.

"That's the baby?" Max asked, looking from the image long enough to see the doctor nod. Max's chest constricted as if his ribs were in a vise. "That's… amazing."

"Is there something you wanna tell us?" the doctor asked, whisking the picture into the chart.

Max shook his head. "I told you everything I know." The big man grunted in disbelief, but let the subject drop.

"Can I see her?" The fact she hadn't spoken yet troubled Max. He didn't think there was a sedative on earth that would shut her up.

"Sorry can't let you up yet." The doctor tapped the chart in his hands cheerfully. "Well let you know when your Movement cred checks out, and then we'll talk. But you can push this button—" he pressed a plastic control into Max's palm "—if you want to talk to someone before then."

"You mean if I want to spill something about the baby?" Max narrowed his eyes at him.

"Not necessarily." Whistling, the doctor walked away. The sound of a door closing echoed in the space. Max was alone. "Bella?" he whispered. When she didn't answer, he dropped his head to the pillow and stared at the exposed pipes on the ceiling.

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He had no idea how long he'd been asleep when Bella woke him.