Alex’s hand was pressed tightly over the bul et hole in his side, but blood stil flowed between his fingers.
Merek grabbed Alex’s free arm, hoisted him up, and hauled both of them to their feet. “Keep pressure on that wound.”
Will do. The voice was a bare whisper in his mind. Stil , it meant the boy was conscious and aware of his surroundings. That helped. Marginal y.
I’m bleeding pretty badly. You’re slashed up. The vampires can track the scent of our blood.
“They can?” Merek didn’t bother swearing. Gregor was stil out there, and that thought alone sent ice flowing through his veins.
Luca said so. It’s how he tracked me down the day my dad disappeared and Smith’s men were hunting me.
Shit. He wished that was a skil Luca possessed personal y and not a purview of the entire vampire race, but he couldn’t take the chance of assuming these vampires couldn’t track them the same way. This sounded like just the kind of thing the Vampire Conclave would want kept secret from other Magickal races.
Alex staggered with every step, his legs giving out from under him as his bones broke and reformed over and over again, transitioning between the half-shift and human forms and back again. Spittle-laced gurgles of agony spil ed from the boy’s mouth.
He tensed against Merek, trying to pul away, but not strong enough to do so. Get Chloe out of here!
“Not leaving you,” Merek grunted.
Shaking his head, Alex again tried unsuccessful y to escape Merek’s hold. She can’t die because . . . of me. Not . . . another one.
He didn’t know what that meant, and at the moment, he didn’t give a flying rat’s ass.
“Sorry, son. Not happening. I won’t do it.” He paused to fire at the sound of movement behind them. A vampiric hiss answered him. “She wouldn’t leave without you, anyway.”
Fuck! The wolfish face snapped its jaw, fangs dripping as he bared them. Then the facial bones broke, the muzzle retracting, and Alex’s human face surfaced. He choked on a breath, sagging against Merek’s side.
“Concentrate on getting to the car.”
“I’m with you,” he rasped. Pushing forward one unsteady step at a time, he took as much of his weight off of Merek as possible while keeping hold of him for balance. The boy’s jaw clenched on a groan of pain, his face set in grim lines, but he kept moving.
Merek’s respect for the kid doubled, but he focused on keeping them moving. Blood dripped steadily down his arm, the wound weakening the muscles and making them burn with a ferocity that made him want to howl. The adrenaline rush wasn’t enough to overcome the pain of it, but he gritted his teeth and rocked Alex and himself forward.
He hitched the boy higher, trying not to lose his grip. A low snarl of warning vibrated from the boy’s chest.
Merek was already swinging his weapon around, squeezing the trigger when Gregor and a woman who moved with the competence of a trained operative came within range.
His bul ets hit, but though the vampire staggered, he kept coming. The woman dove for the ground, rol ing away while she fired off shots with both her weapon and her magic. Both missed, but the percussive force of her spel sent Merek and Alex staggering backward. The smile on Gregor’s face as he advanced had that same anticipation he’d worn before; this time the eyes flashed ful red. Merek squeezed the trigger again.
The distinctive click of an empty weapon sounded from his pistol. He dropped it, lifting his hand to send a blast into the bloodsucker that he knew wouldn’t have enough effect. Merek moved in front of Alex, spreading his fingers and feeling his exhausted power gather more slowly than the vampire could move.
The whine of a car accelerating cut through Merek’s mind, and then the SUV plowed into Gregor and sent him flying. Brakes squealed as Chloe pul ed up beside them. The doors whipped open, and her eyes were wide and wild. Her knuckles were white on the steering wheel, and Ophelia hunched on the dashboard, hissing.
Merek stuffed Alex in the backseat, then shoved Chloe over in the front seat, slammed both doors shut with what was left of his own magic, and hit the accelerator. “Everyone stay down!”
His words were al but lost as the rear window shattered from a flying bul et.
“Chloe, wil you keep your head down?”
“No! I’m going to help Alex.” She flipped down the console between the front seats and squirmed through the narrow opening, maneuvering onto her knees on the floorboard behind the passenger seat.
“Ophelia, get off the damn dashboard,” Merek barked. Chloe heard a smal thump and assumed her familiar had obeyed.
She flinched as another spray of bul ets hit the car. The dul slap of metal hitting metal made her insides freeze with terror. Gods, don’t let them hit anything important. She rocked sideways, slamming her chin into the door as Merek swerved hard. The tires squealed, spinning for purchase before they raced down a bumpy road.
Alex lay sprawled across the backseat, one hand pressed to his side while the other held tight to the back of the bench seat. The werewolf, at least, was strong enough to hold himself in place as the SUV swung around tight turns and switchbacks in the road. His eyes were pinched closed, a muscle ticked in his clenched jaw, and his normal y tanned face was ashen.
There was blood everywhere.
Al over the floor, Alex’s naked body, pooling on the leather seat. Seeping into her jeans. Chloe felt the color leech out of her face. This was why she’d gone into pharmaceutical research rather than into practicing medicine. The stench of blood, the blank eyes of hurt, dying people. It reminded her too much of her mother.
A shudder ripped through her, but she shook herself, forced those memories into the deepest, darkest corner of her soul and locked them in tight. Alex needed her now. Her fears from that day would not be al owed to take someone else from her.
“Let me see, Alex.” She tugged his hand away from his side to get a better look at what she was dealing with.
“It’s silver,” he gasped, his body twitching and writhing. “Gods, it burns. It’s like my insides are on fire.
Help me, Chloe. Please, help me.” The pleading in those green eyes gripped her insides tight. Memories of him rushed at her: a gap-toothed little boy, a stringy adolescent, and as he was now, almost ful -grown, but just as beloved.
Silver. Oh, gods. The bul et hadn’t hit a vital organ or he’d be dead already, but the wound didn’t look good. The flesh around the entry was charred and beginning to fester. The speed of werewolf healing meant the al ergic reaction to silver also intensified. She tried to keep her voice reassuring as she spoke to her godson. “I’l help you, honey. Just hang in there.”
“You’re going to have to take the bul et out before it dissolves into his bloodstream,” Merek boomed from the front seat, meeting her gaze briefly in the rearview mirror.
“I know,” she shouted back over the wind. “I’m getting the first aid kit.” And a lantern for some light. She pressed Alex’s hand back over the wound, and he choked on a groan.
Merek seemed to have found them a straight road to speed down, but trying to remove a silver bul et from a werewolf was tricky even under ideal conditions. These were not ideal conditions.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
Shoving herself up on shaky legs that weren’t helped at al by the moving vehicle, she tried to ease over Alex and into the back of the packed SUV. The various crates and bags were a tumbled mess littered with shattered glass. She tried to remember which ones held which items. After a few minutes of frantic searching, she came up with the smal lantern Merek had given her to sleep with.
Where was the fucking first aid kit? Chloe wanted to snarl, but knew it wouldn’t help. Wind rushed through the broken window, the cold air chil ing her to the bone. Her fingers felt stiff with it as she fumbled through another crate of camping equipment, but she ignored the slight discomfort. It was nothing compared to what Alex was going through.