that a car accident probably wouldn’t kill her. And this Leonius sounds pretty twisted. He might enjoy torturing and tormenting her, along with anyone else he could, before taking her.”
“The more I hear about this animal, the less I like,” Teddy muttered, staring at Stephanie with troubled eyes, no doubt still contemplating that some madman wanted to use the child as a broodmare.
“Where’s Anders?” Harper asked suddenly.
“He was watching over you with me,” Teddy informed him. “Just before you woke up, he left. In fact, I think it was the sound of the door closing that woke you.”
As if having heard his name, the door to the bedroom suddenly opened, and Anders entered, phone in hand. His gaze skated over Harper, flickering as he noted that he was up and about, and then the immortal handed his cell phone wordlessly to Mirabeau.
They all fell silent, simply listening. Not that there was much to hear. Mirabeau said, “Hello,” and then listened briefly, said “Yes, Lucian,” and hung up.
“Well?” Teddy asked as she handed the phone back to Anders.
“We’re to switch to feeding them blood. It’s faster than the IVs. Lucian wants Stephanie and Drina back on their feet as quickly as possible,” she said grimly, standing to move to the cooler and retrieve two bags of blood. Pausing then, she glanced to Tiny apologetically, and added, “And he wants you turned by nightfall.”
Tiny frowned. “But Jackie wanted to be here for it, and she and Vincent won’t be here for another couple days.”
“I know. I’m sorry,” she said regretfully.
Tiny sighed and nodded. He took one of the bags from her, but as she moved up beside Drina’s bed, asked, “Did he say why?”
“He wants us all at top speed as quickly as possible and prepared for anything,” Mirabeau answered, bending over Drina. She opened the unconscious woman’s mouth and massaged her upper gums to force her fangs out. The moment they slid down, Mirabeau popped the bag onto them.
“Hold this for me,” she said to Harper, and when he reached out to hold the bag in place, Mirabeau turned, took the other bag back from Tiny, swung toward Stephanie, and then paused, a blank look covering her face. Stephanie didn’t have fangs.
“Will she swallow it if you pour it down her throat?” Tiny asked, seeming to recognize the problem.
“I don’t know,” Mirabeau admitted on a sigh.
Tiny hesitated, but then shrugged and moved around to the other side of Stephanie’s bed. Sitting on the edge, he slid an arm under her neck, raising her so that her head draped over his arm. Using his free hand, he then caught her jaw and pulled it open before glancing to Mirabeau. “From what I understand, she won’t choke or drown from it. Even if it gets in her lungs, the nanos will probably retrieve it to use. You may as well try.”
Mirabeau hesitated, but then nodded and stepped forward. She held the bag over Stephanie’s open mouth and stabbed at it quickly with one fingernail. Blood immediately began to gush out.
Drina had a serious case of dry mouth. It felt like she’d gone to sleep with glue in her mouth. A most unpleasant sensation, she decided, smacking her lips together with a grimace and rolling over in bed only to bump up against something hard.
Opening her eyes, she stared blearily at the wide dark expanse before her, slow to recognize it as a man’s chest in a dark shirt.
“You’re awake.”
That mumble from above her head made her lean back slightly and peer up to find Harper lying facing her on his side. He was looking sleepily down at her, and the relief on his face was obvious. Her head was nearly tucked under his chin, or probably had been when she’d first rolled over, she realized, and smiled at him.
“Hi,” Drina said, and frowned at the sound that croaked out of her parched throat.
“You need more blood.” He rolled away and sat up, then stood and moved around the bed and out of sight. Drina had to shift onto her back to follow him with her eyes as he moved to a set of coolers by the window. He opened one, retrieved a bag of blood, and returned, but, when she realized they were in her room, she turned her attention to the bed beside her own.
Seeing Stephanie sleeping in the next bed, she half sat up, whispering with confusion, “What are you doing in here?”
“You don’t remember the accident?” Harper asked, sinking to sit next to her on the mattress.
Drina opened her mouth to say no, but paused as memory came crashing in. She sucked in a breath as horror washed over her in the wake of the memories, and then fell back on the bed with a guttural sound, her eyes running briefly over Harper to be sure he was wholly intact, and then to Stephanie again. She looked fine. Unmarked and pink-cheeked, her breathing even.
“She’ll probably wake up soon too,” Harper murmured, offering Drina the bag of blood he’d retrieved.
Drina sat up and shifted up the bed to lean against the headboard, then accepted the blood.
“What happened to the brakes?” she asked, recalling Stephanie’s saying something about them just before the accident.
Harper waited until she popped the bag of blood to her fangs before saying grimly, “The brake lines were cut.”
Drina frowned around the bag in her mouth.
“There’s some worry it’s Leonius playing nasty games before he tries to take Stephanie,” he admitted. “So everyone’s on high alert. Lucian wants you and Stephanie on your feet and Tiny turned as quickly as possible. He called Alessandro and Edward and asked them to bring their mates and come help out till the turn is done,” he added, and then seeing her confusion, explained, “Edward and Alessandro are the other two immortals who came in answer to the ad Teddy and a friend of Elvi’s named Mabel, put in the Toronto papers for a vampire mate for her.”
Drina immediately nodded. Harper had told her how he’d landed in Port Henry during their twenty-four hours in Toronto. While she hadn’t recognized the names when he’d mentioned them a moment ago, she knew who the men were and knew that they’d become good friends to Harper this last year and a half.
“Alessandro, Edward, and their mates arrived a few minutes ago,” Harper informed her. “Teddy, Tiny, and Mirabeau went downstairs with Anders to greet them and coordinate everything. Until then, we’d been feeding you and Stephanie bag after bag of blood, trying to rush you through the healing. They were administering it intravenously before that.”
Drina grimaced, suddenly understanding the dry mouth. The slower the blood entered the body, the slower the healing was, but it was also less painful. When the blood was fed through the fangs bag after bag, it hit the system fast and sent the nanos into a frenzy of healing that hurt like hell. She’d probably been screaming her head off until the worst of the healing was done.
She turned and glanced toward Stephanie again.
“They were pouring it down her throat,” Harper said quietly. “It seemed to work just as well.”
Drina nodded and pulled the now-empty bag off her fangs.
“Do you want another?” Harper asked, getting up.
“No.” Drina smiled wryly. “I think I’m probably good for blood, but water would be nice.”
He leaned to the side at once and picked up a glass of the clear liquid from the bedside table.
“Thank you,” she murmured, accepting it. Drina was very happy to see that her hand didn’t tremble as she raised the glass to her lips. She wasn’t suffering any lingering weakness. At least she didn’t appear to be, she thought as she drank half the water down in one go. Drina paused to breathe and smile at him, and then downed the rest of the glass before handing it back.
Harper set it on the table, then reached out to slide his hand into the hair at the back of her neck and pulled her forward to press his forehead to hers. “I’m sorry.”
Drina nodded solemnly, bumping her forehead on his nose as she did. “You should be. You should have spun the wheel so your side of the car took the impact and saved Stephanie and me all this.”
Harper pulled back with amazement. “Crap, I didn’t think of that.”
“Idiot,” Drina chided, rolling her eyes. “Honestly! I was joking. I wouldn’t have wanted that any more than you wanted my getting injured to occur. This wasn’t your fault. And we’re all fine. That’s the important thing.”
A small smile tugged at his lips, and Harper suddenly leaned forward to kiss her. Afraid her breath was less
