forged metal. That is, of course, after I separated the shapeshifter proteins and such from the plasma.”
“Is it ready for use?” Paige asked.
Reluctantly, Daniels scooted away from her side of the car and replied, “Not yet. We should be able to start our first trials after I iron out a few more wrinkles.”
“What sort of wrinkles?”
“The sort that transfers properties of the metal to the recipient along with the shapeshifter properties you so desperately want, no matter how many times I tell you the entire process is too dangerous to be considered.”
“Gotchya,” Paige said as she reached for the radio dial.
They drove north on I-435 until it changed into I-29 about halfway to St. Joseph. Cole savored the fresh air that blew in through the window to wash away the lingering stenches of Half Breed and the gunk that attracted them. Before long Paige pulled to a stop outside a quiet, three-story hotel advertising satellite TV and an indoor swimming pool.
“I see you guys spring for the nice places when
“Yeah,” Paige sighed. “It’s a huge conspiracy. I’ll check on you in a while.”
Cole followed her with cases hanging from both shoulders, under his arms, and in both hands. Like any good pack mule, he kept his head down and his feet shuffling until he was told to stop. When he looked up again, he was in a room that smelled like air-conditioning and deodorizer. Compared to how he’d spent the earlier part of his night, it was a little whiff of heaven. On that same train of thought, he noticed something else about the room. “There’s only one bed.”
“Yeah. It’s all they had. Find my medical kit and pile the rest wherever you want.”
The medical kit was a large tackle box that had been modified to hold all manner of goodies in little compartments divided among the main container and two upper trays. By the time Cole had set everything else down, Paige already had the kit open and was selecting several different items from her collection.
“Take your pants off,” she said.
Cole stopped right where he was. “No dinner first?”
“If you want to bleed some more, crack a few jokes while I patch myself up. That scratch on your leg looked pretty bad, so I thought I’d start there.”
The scratch she’d mentioned had gotten bad enough to cause most of that leg to go numb below the knee. The feeling returned quickly enough when she started poking him. “Why don’t I just go clean it up first while you—”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” Paige grumbled. “You must be the only man to think twice after a woman tells him to strip. I must really look like shit.”
“No,” Cole said as he watched her peel off the cotton button-down shirt she’d thrown on in order to look a bit more presentable to the front desk clerk. “It’s not that.”
Technically speaking, Paige should have looked a lot worse than she did. Her clothes were stuck to her skin thanks to all the dirt, sweat, and blood they had absorbed at the campground, and her face was tired and dirty. But somehow she managed to make him forget about all of that just by dropping her voice a little and raising an eyebrow. “All right, then. You want me to go first?”
“Sure,” he said. “Go right ahead.”
She lifted one leg and crossed it over her knee. From there, she eased the boot from that foot and daintily lowered it to the floor. “You next.”
Sighing, Cole unbuckled his belt, pulled open his jeans and shimmied out of them.
Within seconds after Paige’s eyes dropped down below his waist, she started laughing. “Are those rabbits?”
It was useless for Cole to try and hide them from her, but he couldn’t bring himself to look at the cartoon bunnies plastered all over his boxers. “They were on sale.”
“Oh no they weren’t! The ugly stripes and polka dots go on sale. The solid colors go on sale. Those cute ones are always more. You paid extra for those!”
“I’m bleeding, you know. Weren’t you going to help me?”
Tugging at the leg of his boxers, she giggled, “And it looks like there’s a whole little garden on there too. Is that a carrot?”
“Yowza! Watch where you’re reaching, woman!”
Paige’s hands may have drifted a bit too close to the carrot printed over the fly of his boxers, but she wasn’t so quick to move it. “What other critters have you got hiding in there?”
“You’re about to find out if you’re not careful.”
Leaning in close only caused her hand to drift a bit higher up. “I haven’t been careful all night. Why start now?”
Cole was wounded, bleeding, and more tired than he thought he could be without passing out. He was also close enough to smell the natural scent of Paige’s skin and feel her hair brush against the side of his face. Pulling in half a breath of her was more than enough to push his mouth against her lips and for him to grab hold of her with both arms.
Paige let out a soft, sighing groan as she pushed him onto the bed and took the kiss to a whole other level. Her lips parted and she teased him with her tongue as she swung her leg over and straddled him. The instant that leg fell into place, it brushed against the wound that ran down the length of his calf.
“Oh my God,” Cole gasped. “You’re gonna have to get off of me.”
Tracing her fingers down his chest, she was about to say something when she snapped her attention to his leg. “Oh no! I’m sorry,” she said as she climbed off. “Does that hurt?”
Every part of his body wanted to tell her he was fine and that she should hop aboard to pick up right where they’d left off. Well, some parts more than others. As he tried to move his leg, he grunted, “Yes. It does.”
“Let me just fix you up and we can get back to business.”
“That would be…that sounds…I mean…yes. That sounds good.”
Paige had already gotten up to head for the bathroom. When she came out, she tossed a few towels to him and said, “Clean off that wound first.”
He pressed the towel against his leg, but found that most of the blood had already hardened into a sticky crust. Rather than tear the coating off and create a gruesome mess, he wiped away as much as he could from around the wound. When he looked up again, he was just in time to watch Paige trade her filthy T-shirt for a fresher sleeveless version.
Noticing he was watching, she walked over to him and said, “Good enough. Now hand me that turkey baster.”
In one of the top trays of the kit, he saw several long plastic tubes filled with clear liquid, sealed with plastic caps at one end and rubber bulbs at the other. “Which one?” he asked.
“The one with the stuff to keep you from turning into a Half Breed.” Since Cole hadn’t reached for any of the tubes, she added, “One of the ones marked HB. It doesn’t look like you got hurt bad enough to have a serious problem, but better safe than sorry.”
He grabbed one of those tubes and handed it to her. She popped off the cap and squirted some of the clear blue fluid onto his wound. The stuff might have looked like windshield wiper solution, but soaked in with a cool touch. Paige emptied the rest of the large baster on every open wound both she and Cole had. The treatment left them looking like they’d been in a wet T-shirt contest, which Cole didn’t mind one bit. It all soaked in or evaporated within a couple minutes.
“Now hand me the epidermic paste.”
“What?”
“The tube near the bottom of the kit.”
Cole found the tube and handed it over. He wasn’t quite sure what the stuff was and didn’t think to ask her about it, since Paige was slowly lowering herself onto her knees in front of him. She took the tube from him, popped it open, and looked up with a sly grin on her face.
“Are you ready for this?” she whispered.
“Oh God, yes.”
Reaching out with one hand to brush her fingers and thumb along the side of his wound, she asked, “Are you sure?”
