Tainted Blood (Hell's Belle Book 2) (21 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY

The first thing I saw when I pulled up in the front of Babe's was a smashed in front door. I stomped through the mess of wood. Splinters scraped at my pants, poking through to my legs. Max was right behind me, negotiating his way through the debris with Frankie hoisted over his shoulder.

Through the glow of the streetlights outside, I saw Dog holding court in the middle of the bar, her tailless butt wagging furiously. I crouched down and gave her a little love. She licked my nose.

"What the hell happened?" My voice shot through the eerily quiet bar. Chuck popped his head up from behind the bar.

"Oh thank God it's you!" he said, his voice wavering.

"Chuck?" I gave Dog one more scratch under the chin and stood, eyeing the Beta-Vamp suspiciously. He could have he busted his way into my bar. "What's going on here?"

Max laid Frankie out on a table. "Do you know who did this?" he asked Chuck.

Chuck, still behind the bar, shook his head. "I don't know who it was. But I was outside the bar when it happened."

"Where?" I asked, wondering if he had a good vantage point.

"I was hiding behind a car parked out front," he said.

"Did you see anything?" I asked.

He looked pained. "Kind of."

I eyed the door that lead up to the apartment. "Any idea if they are still in the building?"

"I don't think so." Chuck gave Dog a nod. "This...is she a dog? Anyway, she grew about 10 sizes larger and paced around drooling and growling. One of them tried shooting but I don't know where the bullet landed and she wasn't hit. She lunged for them and they hightailed it out of here. I almost didn't get myself back behind the car in time."

"Good Dog." I scratched her behind the ears. She looked quite proud of herself. "They? As in more than one?"

"I don't know. I don't know." Poor Chuck was close to hyperventilating.

"It's okay, Chuck. Calm down. As long as there is no threat remaining in the building, we're okay. I can take care of Frankie."

I marched over to Frankie, who was sprawled out on the table. I fumbled for the pill bottle that held the spelled ashes when a stiff, cold wind from the wide open door hit my face.

"I got to get him away from the door. The wind is going to blow the ashes all over the place."

"Where?" Max asked.

"Maybe we should do this upstairs," I said.

Max grabbed Frankie under the arms, yanked him off the table and then dragged him across the bar. When he got to the door that led to the apartment, he heaved Frankie up over his shoulder.

He turned and looked at me expectantly. "Can you unlock the door?"

"It should be unlocked," I said.

Max shook his head and grumbled that I was crazy to keep my doors unlocked in a "crime-soaked city," and I'd get myself killed.

"I can hear you, Max. Vampire hearing, remember?" I said wearily.

He ignored me and yanked open the door, his feet heavy on the stairs up to the apartment.

"Do you have any plywood?" Chuck asked quietly. "I could cover up the hole until you get the door replaced."

"That's sweet of you, thank you. There's some in the hallway going out to the patio." I pointed towards the back room. Babe had saved the plywood used to cover the window smashed out by the psycho vampire Marcello.

Chuck tried to vault over the bar, but he kind of landed like a seal, stomach on the bar, feet up on the air. He rolled the rest of the way over it. Betas weren't like regular vamps at all.

"Hammer and nails?" he asked as if nothing happened.

"Basement. There's an electric screwdriver on the workbench, and a box of screws somewhere in the same vicinity. Go through the bulkhead doors on the patio."

Chuck took off to start the home improvement project, leaving me alone in the bar. The lights were off, but shadows cast from the streetlights played on the walls. In the dim light, I almost missed that one shadow was actually our new resident bar ghost.

"Do you need something, Howie?" I called out, hoping that my nickname for Lovecraft would irk the hell out of him.

The air around me dropped an additional 10 degrees, making it damn cold. I shivered. "I know who it was," he whispered, my ear almost icing over.

"You know who what was?" I asked, steeling myself for another icy blast.

"I know who destroyed your door," he said with a giggle. "I saw the whole thing."

"Are you going to tell me or just gloat about it?" I snapped, rubbing my arm. Damn thing was still sore.

Howie snickered again. "I guess you really want to know."

"You know what, I don't even give a shit. And if you're going to be useless, find a new place to haunt. You aren't earning your keep."

His form flicked around the room angrily. "I won't leave."

"Then I'll have to remove you with a priest," I snarled. I was not going to let a ghost bully me.

That seemed to settle him down. "Fine. I'll tell you. It was a woman. A beautiful woman."

"Kittie?" I asked. "Did she look kind of cheap Goth, with long black dreadlocks?"

"Oh no, she was older. But beautiful. A classic. Long hair, pretty face."

"And this beautiful older woman smashed the door in?" I questioned his veracity.

"Oh yes. Beautiful but deadly. Not unlike you." He giggled again, and opened his eyes mischievously. "She had a man with her."

"What about the man?" I played along for a minute, knowing it was Bertrand. "Older man?"

"Oh yes."

"Graying hair?" I continued.

"Very warm indeed!"

"Kind of good-looking?" I shivered a bit at complimenting the demon.

"Oh no, now you're cold. Icy cold."

"Wait, not good-looking?"

"Definitely not. This one was ugly as the devil himself." Howie lit a phantom cigarette and took a drag.

"So it wasn't Bertrand?"

His face clouded over. "Bertrand? Oh no. Not him."

I considered that for a moment. Sounded random. Hopefully some concert demons didn't make it this far east.

"And Nina," Howie sing-songed, "they were in uniform."

He hummed a few chords of the old Army song "Caissons Go Rolling Along" before disappearing with a flourish.

"Found the stuff!" Chuck came in from the back, dragging a stack of plywood. "Who you talking to?"

"That's great, Chuck, thanks!" I said, ignoring his question. I started up the stairs, taking them two at a time with Dog at my heels.

I burst into the apartment.

"He's in here, on the couch," Max called from the living room. Frankie's lanky frame was sprawled out on Babe's sofa, his head lolling back and forth on a throw pillow. He was still knocked out, but was restless. He'd wake up soon.

"Want me to cuff him?" Max looked warily at Frankie's twitching body.

"Won't help once he comes to," I said as I dug the pill bottle out of my jacket pocket before peeling it off and dropping it on the armchair. The SWAT letters were grey from the filth of the tunnel. My stakes and holster followed. "He'll easily break the cuffs."

"Can you do it while he's out?" Max asked.

"I don't know. This didn't come with instructions."

I squeezed the pill bottle tighter and whispered. "Casper. Casper! You around?"

I felt a small jolt in my head, like an electric shock, and then I felt Casper's presence.

"I'm here, I'm here!" He was out of breath.

"What have you been up to?"

"Keeping tabs on that exorcism."

"Are you nuts? You could have..."

"But I didn't!"

"That was reckless," I scolded, knowing it would do no good. I was haunted by a stubborn, teenaged ghost. Recklessness was part of his adolescent makeup.

Max was looking at me oddly, like fascination mixed with confusion topped off with annoyance.

"Max, are you okay?" I asked.

"I just..." he said, squirming. "I still can't get used to the ghost-in-you thing."

"Maybe you should leave the room then," I offered bitterly. His discomfort with our abilities was tiresome. He was one of us now. To still consider us weirdoes was hypocritical.

"Are we doing this?" Casper asked, turning my head so I looked away from Max and down at Frankie.

"Will it work if he's staked?"

"Don't know. It didn't come with instructions." He repeated what I said to Max. We were spending way too much time together.

"I think we need to take it out and let him come to, just in case."

"O-kaaaay," Casper said, not really agreeing with me.

"We'll hit him fast and hard with the spell, before he even gets a chance to move," I reasoned.

"Pissed off, rabid full vampire and all?" Casper wasn't convinced this was the way to do it.

"Can you guarantee that the potion will work while Frankie's staked?"

Casper remained silent.

"Then you have to trust me on this one. We can't afford for this not to work."

"I just hope he doesn't look at you and see lunch," Casper said, relaxing into my body. Right after I dosed Frankie with the ashes, Casper needed to take over fast to do the spell work.

"On three?" Max asked.

I hovered over Frankie's body and nodded. Then I started the count. "One, two..."

On three, I wiggled the stake out of Frankie's body and tossed it on the floor.

"It's show time!" Casper did his best Jack Nicholson-as-The-Joker impression. I fumbled with the lid of the pill bottle.

"Damn child-proof caps," I swore as I tried pressing and prying the bottle open. Frankie made a few small moaning sounds.

"Nina, I think you need to hurry it up a bit," Max warned.

"I'm trying," I snapped at him. The pressure of getting the lid off fast made it a near-impossible feat to accomplish.

Frankie's eyes snapped open. He lay completely still on the couch, only his eyes darting around, taking in his surroundings. Then his body lifted from the couch and crossed the room like a projectile missile, putting distance between us.

"Get out of here, Nina," Frankie growled, dropping to one knee. He was lucid, but barely, and clearly in pain. "I don't have much longer."

"We got this, Frankie." I took a tentative step towards him. "We have a spell."

"It won't work."

"We have to try." I inched forward a little more and Frankie jumped back up to his feet.

"Oh shit," Casper panicked, forcing my adrenaline to surge. I winced as my fangs pushed through my gums. But with my canines sharp, I bit the impossible lid right off the bottle. Problem solved.

Max lunged and bear-hugged Frankie from behind.

"I can't hold him long," Max shouted as Frankie started to struggle. Max's eyes flashed angry, and his forearms and biceps twitched and flexed. He was headed towards Berserker territory. There was a good chance he'd lose his grip if he transitioned.

I poured out the contents of the pill bottle into my cupped hand. One more step and I was just inches away from Frankie, who was gnashing his teeth, his weakening body struggling against Max's strengthening one.

"Now Casper!" I screamed.

Frankie dropped whatever psychic trick he used to shield me from our binding. Without those in place, I was weaker, too, and the stress of the whole thing winded me.

Casper pulled forward, taking over my body. His mix of Spanish and Latin streamed in the room. For a second, I froze, overcome by the bizarreness of it all. It was my breathless voice, but it wasn't me saying the words. I closed my eyes and shook it off. Then I drew my cupped hand to my mouth and, after Casper pushed out the final words of the spell, I blew the ashes into Frankie's face. I jumped back and steeled myself for any possible outcome.

Frankie inhaled the ashes and immediately choked. Max was holding onto Frankie but growing larger and larger, clearly past the Berserker point of no return. He released his bear hug when his muscled body ripped out of his clothes. I caught Frankie mid-drop before he hit the floor. With a roar of pain mixed with testosterone-fueled aggression, Max sprinted out of the apartment, his footfalls heavy as he fled down the stairs. I heard the snap of wood breaking, not one but two doors, from the force of Max smashing through them. Chuck yelled in fear and shock, and then frustration that his makeshift door was destroyed.

Just another night at Babe's On the Sunnyside.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

"
N-N-N-Nina?" Chuck called up the stairs, stuttering. "I think the Incredible Hulk just broke your door. Again."

"I know, Chuck. Trust me, I know!" I called back to him, my own voice uneven. I cleared my throat.

"Should we go find him?" Casper asked.

I shook my head, exhausted. "I don't think so."

I still didn't know if Frankie was going to make it, and I couldn't reign in a Berserker on my own.

Frankie and I were slumped on the floor, and I cradled his head in my lap.

"Come on, Frankie," I muttered while I stroked his hair. "Wake up, dammit. Be okay."

But it was like Frankie was cast in stone, his skin cold, his face waxy like a corpse.

"Casper," I whispered.

"Yeah?" His voice was low too.

"I don't think we did it." I bit on my lower lip to stop it from trembling.

"Don't say that," Casper scolded gently. "We don't know how this shit works. Did you expect him to be all like hey, YOLO! Maybe this is like after an operation, in the recovery room."

"Stop," I said bitterly. "The last thing I want to feel right now is hope."

"What the hell is wrong with you, girl? All we have is hope."

"You're too young to understand," I dismissed him.

"Shut up with that crap." Casper's voice rose, his hackles up. "I'm dead, remember. If a dead guy can still have hope, you sure as hell can too."

The kid had moxie, I'd give him that. "Not fair to play the dead card."

"Bitch please, that's the only card I have left," Casper said without missing a beat.

I almost laughed in spite of myself. I leaned back against the bottom of sofa, tilting my head so it rested on a seat cushion. I heard Chuck come up the stairs. He stopped at the open door and knocked.

"Hello?" he called out.

"In here, Chuck," I raised an arm and waved, and then remembered he needed an invitation. "Come on in."

"How is he?" Chuck asked as he shuffled into the apartment. Then he peeked over the top of the sofa apprehensively.

"Don't know," I said, pressing my hand against Frankie's forehead. Dog had followed Chuck up the stairs and she licked at Frankie's pale face.

"Um. Who were you talking to?" he asked as he looked around the apartment, bewildered.

"A ghost," I smiled. I forgot Chuck had no idea I had Casper. "I can see and communicate with spirits. I have one ghost that kind of follows me around."

"Follows you around?" Casper harrumphed.

"Okay, okay, not follows me around but...well, he's like my spirit guide."

"That's better." I felt Casper's smile down to my toes.

"Wow. Ghosts?" Chuck was awestruck. "They’re real?"

"As real as vampires."

Chuck shrugged. "Who knew?"

"Is this dude serious?" Casper was indignant.

"Oh relax, would you?" I held back a laugh.

Some supernaturals were ignorant of others. Betas in particular tended to be awfully ignorant, moving in tight-knit groups with very little contact outside of their nest.

"Are you talking to me?" Chuck looked confused again.

"No, sorry. To the ghost."

"Oh." He considered it. "This is weird. Will I get used to it?"

"Probably not."

His shrug told me he accepted it. "Tell the ghost sorry if I offended."

"He can hear you," I said. "You just can't hear him."

"Of course," he said sheepishly. "Tell him I'm sorry about that too."

"Sure, Chuck." There was no point in correcting him. "I'll let him know."

"So, what now?" Chuck sat down on the couch. Dog joined him on the sofa. She was smitten with the Beta. He absently scratched her behind the ears.

"I don't really know. Anyone ever survive the blood poisoning?"

He looked sad and exhausted. "Not yet."

"I'm sorry for what happened to your friends," I stammered, not really knowing what to say.

"Yeah, thanks," Chuck said. "I think your friend is going to pull through. He looks better, don't you think?"

"Yeah? You think?" I took another look at Frankie. Was his skin losing its funeral home pallor?

"And he hasn't exploded, so that's a good sign," Chuck tried helpfully.

"He has a good point," Casper said.

"Yes, I suppose he does," I sighed.

"Who does?" asked Chuck. "Oh wait. Ghost?" 

I nodded.

"He's a little slow on the uptake," Casper scoffed.

"Shut up." I tried covering up the words with a cough. Chuck gave me an odd look but said nothing.

A quick, involuntary twitch came from Frankie, and I jerked back in surprise. "Did he just...?"

"I think he did!" Casper banged around my head in excitement.

"Ow! Take it easy in there!" I gave my head a fierce shake to drive my point home.

"Is that the...?" Chuck started and I cut him off with a curt nod.

Frankie moved again, and this time a small groan escaped from him.

"What did that sound like to you?" I asked Chuck. He had more experience with infected vampires. "Did that sound like a...you know...like he's about to...?"

"About to blow?" Chuck finished for me. "No. That sound is more like a gag. His sound was a groan, definitely."

I wasn't sure if parsing the difference between a grunt and a groan was useful, but Chuck didn't seem at all alarmed by the now multiple groans coming from Frankie.

"Bloody hell!" Frankie's groans finally formed words.

"Frankie? Are you okay? Do you feel okay?" My voice was calm, but I mentally prepared myself to scramble out of the way, just in case.

"Don't know," Frankie was drowsy. "I think I have a headache. I haven't had one of those in a few hundred years."

I released my breath with a small laugh. Frankie was back.

Casper, of course, was celebrating like a loon. "Don't nobody mess with this witch. Kapow!"

"Come on, Frankie, let's get you to bed or on the couch or something." I tried to shimmy out from under him.

"Not yet." He reached his arms around and held onto my hips to keep me steady. "I just want to stay like this for a minute."

Casper's extended "aaawwww" echoed in my head. I shook my head violently until he shut up.

Chuck sat up, his hope renewed by Frankie's recovery. "Does this mean you can...?"

I nodded. "How much potion should we make?"

Chuck's excitement fizzled. "There are too many of us."

"What do you mean?" I planted my hands on the floor to stabilize myself so I could turn and look at Chuck. But Frankie placed them back on his forehead, so I was left craning my neck. Casper snickered.

"You would have to do that spell on each person. That'll be impossible. Since they're...you know."

"There are more sick?" Frankie interrupted.

"I'll explain later, but I think we found Patient Zero," I said. "Chuck, do you think you can get them into a large, closed-off space?"

"Already done. The ones we could find and catch anyway, which was most of them. I expect the ones we couldn't—" Chuck shivered. "We have them quarantined in a barn."

"Is the barn secure?" Frankie's eyes were still closed, but his voice sounded stronger.

"Kind of," Chuck replied.

"Kind of?" Frankie echoed, making a face.

"Well, the door is chained. And we're patching up any holes they make as fast as we can."

"Chuck's in way over his head," Casper sighed.

"No joke," I agreed.

"Ghost again?" Chuck looked around the room, like he was hoping to spot Casper.

"I didn't know Casper was here!" Frankie brightened.

"You didn't think I could pull that witchy shit off by myself, did you?"

Frankie gave my hands a squeeze. "I am never surprised by your capabilities, love. You have more than you think."

Heat creeped up my neck and settled into my face, turning me a nice shade of crimson.

"So what do we do?" Chuck asked anxiously.

"Well, we need Max to run the op, so we have to wait until he's safely back to...well, Max," I sighed. Hopefully he'd be able to power down pretty fast.

"What about Dr. O?" Frankie asked.

I bit my lip and for a split second, considered lying. But Frankie was my partner. Lies between us weren't a good idea. "We don't know, Frankie. He ran into a problem with the DoD and now we can't find him."

"We can't find Babe, either," Casper added pointedly.

"And Babe too," I said, and then added feebly, "but she is on vacation."

"Shouldn't we find them first?"

I shook my head. "No time, Frankie. Chuck's nest is being targeted by a guy bringing in a tainted blood supply. We need to nail this guy and cure the sick vampires. What if he's bringing the blood to other nests? And the sick Betas are a time bomb."

"Who's the guy?" Frankie asked.

"Someone called Jackson," I shrugged. "Name familiar to you?"

"He's kind of regular-looking," Chuck chimed in. "Light brown hair, not tall but not short. Medium build."

"In other words, not someone you'd remember," I sighed.

Frankie shook his head. "I can't be sure yet. Everything is still...hazy."

"It's cool, Frankie. We'll just take this one epic disaster at a time, right?" I smiled.

"But Dr. O and Babe. We can't just leave that," Frankie said.

"Maybe Father Dougherty is up for a little searching." The priest was Catholic, but there was a Druid in there that he called on from time to time. I realized we'd need both parts of him.

"At least we'd be doing something." Frankie sounded exhausted.

"Casper and I need to get cracking on the spell. We're going to need a lot of ash."

Frankie shifted to his elbows, slowing getting up. "I think I need to crash out a bit, if that's alright with you?"  

"Of course. Use the bedroom. It'll be more comfortable than out here, with us banging around." I helped guide him to a sitting position.

"And probably less dangerous," Casper scoffed. "You and fire, not exactly good together."

"I'm ignoring you," I said to the ghost, getting to my feet. Chuck looked at me oddly. Again. You'd think he'd get it by this point.

I helped Frankie to his feet and brought him to the spare bedroom, pushing the clothes and other detritus off the bed and onto the floor.

"You really shouldn't have gone to any trouble," he said sarcastically, stretching out on top of the quilt.

"You gave me a hell of a scare," I sat down beside him. "What happened?"

"Damned if I know, Nina."

"Was it the Superman Building? I know we tried to be careful, but damn Frankie, there was a lot of blood."

"Could have been, but I'm not sure." Frankie stared at the ceiling, avoiding my eyes.

"Frankie, I know this is awkward, but we have to talk about it." I bit the bullet. "Acting like embarrassed teenagers isn't going to help anyone. You almost died."

"That night, when I left to go to the tunnel...to feed. There was someone, maybe it was this Jackson guy. I don't know. But I know you felt me," Frankie said as he grabbed my hand and finally looked me in the eye. "I was being foolish, Nina. Jealous. I wanted you to feel what I felt whenever I see you with..."

His voice trailed off and he looked away again, but didn't drop my hand.

"I'm sorry, Frankie."

He squeezed my hand. "You have nothing to be sorry about, love. This is my problem. My fault."

"It's not entirely you. I should have—"

"Should have what?" he said, interrupting me. A small bitter laugh escaped from him. "Should have fallen in love with the old vampire? You have every right to live your life however you like. And with whomever you want."

I didn't know what to say. We spent more time together than most married couples.

He closed his eyes and smiled. "Thank you for not giving up on me."

I sat there for a minute, looking at my pale, exhausted partner as he drifted off to sleep. The thought of losing him shattered me. We came too damn close this time.

I rested my head on his chest. There was no heartbeat. His rib cage didn't expand and contract. He was lifeless, but he was one of the most vital people I knew. I never considered for a minute that he would feel like I couldn't love him because he was a vampire. In fact, I loved him because he was a vampire.