"I have to do this for everyone who's been infected or will be infected," I told Revel, turning to look at her as Nix slid the needle into the soft spot of my inner elbow. "I can't shoot another teenage girl in the face, Revel."
"I feel you," she whispered, putting a hand on Ziff's back to keep him from launching himself at Nix. "I feel you." Nix drew my blood and then grabbed a second syringe from his bag, doing the same to himself. "Where are you planning on taking us tonight? If you think you're gonna try something shady, be aware that HASR doesn't like to lose employees. If I go missing, they'll come looking for your ass."
"Calm it down, fox," he growled at her, lifting the scissors to his shoulder and cutting off a small piece of his fur and the accompanying skin. Nix snarled as he did so, blood welling up from the cut, as if the ragged thing was an actual part of his body. "If I wanted to kill you, I'd just snap your neck right now and toss you aside with the trash."
"You're walking an awfully fine line right now," Revel warned, two sharp white teeth showing against the red of her lipstick. "Keep disrespecting me and see what happens."
"Nix, can you shut the fuck up?" I asked as I fluffed my tails forward and gasped when he grabbed a handful of them.
"Just part of the transaction," he told me, cutting off a hunk of white fur with his weird bone scissors. As I watched, he braided the long strands of my hair into the piece he'd cut from his own. And then, he cut that in half, too.
"Next time you're going to grab me, let me know first," I said, and I did not like the way that came out. Far too flirty. Revel rolled her eyes and shook her head. Don't think she'd expected any of this when she'd flown out from Japan, and I felt like shit about that. My life had become ridiculously complicated in a very short period of time.
Nix dug through his bag and pulled out ... two metal earrings? He affixed the bits of fur to them and then stabbed one through his own lobe. It was a very feral looking thing, like his fur, and at odds with his suit. But I liked it.
"Put it on," he said, and as I reached up, he added, "but be careful. Once it's in, it doesn't come out unless one of us is dead."
I paused for a moment with the bloody, furry thing to my left ear and then made peace with the fact that my fashion sense was going to be fucked until Mikhail or someone else in RADOPA managed to kill Nix Locklear. Hell, maybe it would even be me?
"The terms of this contract," Nix began as he pulled out a bundle of sage and lit it. It was fucking trippy, seeing this dude who looked like Christian fucking Grey wielding Native American techniques like it was the most natural thing in the world. "Are that you'll allow me to commit a non-invasive study with access to you and your person twenty-four hours a day—"
"Twenty," I said, because I had to shit, sleep, and fuck like everybody else, right? I was not letting Nix squeeze this through without noticing technicalities.
He wrinkled his nose at me as he washed my body in the smoke of the sage.
Syringes and sage.
What a weirdo.
"The terms of this contract permit me to commit a non-invasive study with access to you and your person twenty-two hours a day"—I gritted my teeth, but let him keep going—"and guarantees your cooperation for the length of the study which, according to our purposes, is as long as it takes to find a cure. And I agree that in that time period, you'll come to no harm from me nor anyone else if I can reasonably prevent it. Do you agree to these terms, Miss Hunt?"
"I agree," I said as Nix flicked the sage onto the floor near my feet and handed over the syringe of his blood. Did not take a genius to figure out what he wanted me to do with it.
"I agree as well," he said, and then he slid the needle of my blood into his arm.
Blood really was the vessel of the soul, wasn't it? If I hadn't believed it before, I hadn't much choice now.
Later that night, I'd get to see exactly how important blood really was.
"Diseases?" I asked, even though I was sure I knew the answer to that question. "Aren't you worried about me having any?"
"My employer's given me all the answers I need," Nix said, shooting himself up with the needle and then using a small biohazard bag from his briefcase to wrap it up after. He just stood there and looked at me as I gaped at him.
"Your employer doesn't know shit about me," I said and Nix smirked.
"She thought you might say that. Well, how's this for proof? She knows you lost your virginity at age fifteen because you were self-conscious of your small breasts." Nix dropped his eyes to my chest, and I narrowed my eyes. "I quite enjoy the look of them though, I must say."
"That doesn't prove shit," I said as I stared at the syringe and wondered what the fuck I was getting myself into. Ziff shrieked his anger, and I flicked my eyes over to Revel Jones, her orange tails fluffing behind her, one ear turned to the side and flattened against her skull in a show of frustration.
Could I imagine her naked and covered in scraggly hair, leaking goo and blood all over the place, throwing herself at me like a rabid dog? Could I imagine lifting a gun and killing one of my own kind?
I shoved the syringe into my arm and depressed the plunger.
"Should I also know you fucked the alpha wolf the other day? Or that your favorite pair of knickers is a purple thong with bells on it? How about that your father is fucking a kitsune from the Tokyo World Earth, and has three new children with her that you've never met?"
I felt my face blanch, but I didn't even get the chance to respond because I heard the gates sliding open out front.
Son. Of. A. Bitch.
All this fancy security wasn't worth a damn if people kept finding ways to breach it.
When I opened the door though, it was easy to see how this particular person hadn't past the gates.
It was Mikhail fucking Ravena.
"Do you have a goddamn death wish?!" he screamed at me as he stepped inside and slammed the door behind him.
"Well, hello, Mika," Nix teased, leaning his elbows back against my counter and smiling like a ... well, like a tricksy coyote. "Feels good to have your essence running through my veins; it's been so damn long. Miss Hunt here seems to be carrying a heavy dose of it, however. Interesting, that, seeing you choose a woman after a century of being alone."
"So damn long?" I asked as Mik stood there with his nostrils flared, and then flicked his gaze up to Revel. He didn't even look at Nix, making me wonder what the hell their previous relationship had been all about.
"What the fuck is she doing here?"
“I'm here to bring Thea over to my side of the rainbow, if you catch my drift." Revel smiled; Mik did not.
"What the fuck are you doing messing around with this piece of shit? He's never made a deal in his life that hasn't gone sour. Thea, for fuck's sake ..." Mik dragged his fingers through his hair and closed his sapphire eyes. "I'm really struggling with you here. I'm putting my reputation, my job, and my life on the line for you."
"I never asked you to do any of that," I said as my vampire boss took a step back from me. Didn't keep me from taking in a huge whiff of his scent, like lotus blossoms and jasmine. Why the hell did he smell so damn good? I mean, not that I hadn't had a crush before, but holy shit. Just that one sniff was enough to pebble my nipples into hard points, send a rush of heat flooding into my core.
Clearly Mik noticed, his pupils widening as he realized I was wearing his shirt.
Uh-oh.
That was a serious vampire trigger right there.
"Why is he here?" he asked me, lifting his face up to stare at his mortal enemy.
"I could ask the same of you," I said, but I already had a pretty good idea about why. "News from RADOPA?"
"I tried to call you, but you weren't answering," he whispered, lifting up both hands to put them on the sides of his head, like he had a serious migraine. "When I started on my way over, I didn't expect you to feel you making yet another magical bond. Thea, you don't have your powers right now so you can't possibly understand the gravity of what you've just done—with Nix or with the alpha."