Hear Me When the Sun Goes Down (3 page)

He’d said he was seeing to my needs, but I could feel his need there, burning as sharply as mine.  Rob pulled me closer, his hands smoothing over my body as if he needed to reassure himself I was still alive and whole.  I could relate, I wanted to touch him everywhere, feel the burn of his skin against mine.  His heart thumped madly, making me forget everything else but this stolen moment.  At least until I wound my leg around his waist to draw him closer and my stupid knee flared in protest. 

Rob let go of me at the gasp of pain that came with it, guessing what had happened from our positions.  “Is it bad?” he asked, his hand landing gently above my knee.

“Bad enough that I want to get it out even if I have to grab a steak knife and do it myself,” I said, mostly joking. 

“What about the rest of you?  Anything lingering beyond the knee?”  His thumb brushed across the scar
on my cheek and I leaned into his hand, pressing a kiss to the base of his thumb. 

“I should be asking you the same thing.”  My eyes flew to his chest, the ridge of a scar all too present under my light touch.  “When he picked up that poker…”  I swallowed back a thick lump of emotion.  “I was so scared, I really thought he was going to kill us all.”  Here I thought I’d run out of tears, but a few more sprang to the corners of my eyes, and Rob caught one with his thumb. 

“I know, I’m sorry.  I should’ve gotten you out of there.  I failed you.”

“It’s not your fault, you tried.  I’m the one that wouldn’t let you go without taking Bishop too.”

Rob wasn’t having any of it, his face hung heavy with regret as his hands framed my cheeks.  “It’s my job to keep you safe.”

“I’m safe now.”

“No thanks to me.”

I reached up to stroke his jaw, fingers trailing to feather over his lips.  “Shh, we don’t have much time.  I don’t know where else we can expect to be alone anymore.”  The thick stone walls of the lower levels afforded us some privacy, but the instant I’d be able to hear anyone approaching, they’d be sure to hear us as well. 

“Not in this bloody house, that’s for sure.  As much as it pains me, you know what we have to do.  You have to stop looking at me like that, or I won’t be able to do this.”

“I can’t help it.  I almost lost you.”

“I told you I’d never leave you again.  You calling me a liar?”  The corners of his mouth twitched higher.

I didn’t want to cave, but I couldn’t resist one of his rare smiles.  “You also said you’d see to my needs,” I reminded him, pulling him close to steal another kiss. 

“They’ll be here any minute,” he murmured against my lips, but it didn’t stop him from settling closer between my thighs, hands on my hips. 

“Then don’t waste it.”  We sank into another soul-searing kiss that had everything to do with healing in a way the doctor’s scalpel could never provide.  How
could I possibly hope to give this up with Jakob so close at hand?

The notion that
each second that ticked by could spell disaster lent an extra thrill to every touch as we did our best to devour each other in the short time we had together.  All too soon I could hear the footsteps out in the hall, and it took everything I had to shove him away, deliberately laying my hand on my wounded knee to jolt myself back to reality.

For Rob’s part, he was across the room in the blink of an eye, leaning against the wall by the time Winter’s hand closed around the doorknob.  It wasn’t hard to offer a strained smile to the doctor when he came in, more than one kind of pain behind my eyes. 

“Evening.” He spared a brief smile for each of us, going right to a cabinet to pull out a series of dangerous looking implements.  A distinguished looking gentleman with a touch of gray above his ears, he wore the typical long, white coat I remembered from my last visit.  “I understand you’ve a bullet in your knee?  Which one is it?”

“This one here,” I pointed, glad he was all business without the small talk.  I don’t think I could have managed chit chat yet.

“Right.”  Winter turned around with a syringe in hand, big enough to make me scoot back a few inches on the table.  “I’ll have to administer a local anesthetic.”

“If it’s all the same to you, I’d rather skip that part,” I said, unable to take my eyes off the needle.

His face crumpled into a frown.  “I don’t understand.  You don’t want any anesthesia?”

“That’s right.  Just get it over with, I can take it.”  I couldn’t trust anything in a syringe, especially from a man who worked for the same organization that Jakob had declared open season on less than an hour ago – an organization that had access to drugs that could kill a vampire in minutes, thanks to my blood.   

“You understand the process will be extremely painful.  Not only will I have to make an incision, I’ll have to clamp the wound open to keep your body from repairing while I dig the bullet out.  This is no quick thing like pulling off a bandage.”

“There’s nothing you can do to me that hasn’t already been done.”  That wasn’t strictly true, but I was reasonably sure I could deal with the surgery after the torture I’d endured at Volkov’s hands.  I took a long, steadying breath.  “Just do it.”

“If you say so.”  Winter’s face left no doubt he thought I was all kinds of crazy for even suggesting it, and it left him hesitant where I needed him to be bold.  He approached my knee first one way and then another, his hand shaking lightly as he brought the blade closer to my skin. 

“Oh
, for crying out loud.  Give me the scalpel already, I’ll make the cut,” I finally demanded, turning my palm up to him, but it was Rob who snatched the knife away.

“I’ll do it,” he grunted, slashing at my knee with quick precision.  The cut hardly hurt at all, but it was all I could to do keep from screaming as he inserted the prong things and pried it apart.  I can honestly say
I could never have managed it on my own, and in a weird way I was glad it was Rob causing me the pain, since I knew he’d get it over with as quickly as possible.  Still, I couldn’t watch the process, and when the tongs scraped against bone I gripped the table and squinched my eyes shut, the familiar mantra springing to mind. 
It’ll heal… it’ll heal… it’ll heal...

And then it was over, the clang of metal instruments dimly registering, as well as Rob’s great heaving breaths as he clamped a swath of gauze over the wound.  The burning sensation gradually
faded, and I opened my eyes to see we were all alone again, no sign of Winter anywhere.  I also noticed the metal table sported two new sets of indentations on either side of me from where I’d gripped the edges. 

“When did Winter leave?” I said softly, drawing in my first unlabored breath since he’d made the incision. 

“I dunno, I was a bit distracted.” Rob offered a half smile, dabbing at my knee with another piece of gauze, and I was relieved to see the wound already knitting together for the most part.  “You’ll need an ultrasound or an x-ray to see if I’ve gotten all the metal out, but I reckon Jenessa could be the one to handle that if you’d rather.  Should be enough to get you home without too much discomfort.”

I extended my leg gingerly at first, with growing confidence, finally laying my hand over the site with gentle pressure.  The deep pain was completely gone. 

“Where did you learn how to do that?”

“In the trenches,” he replied, dropping down to mop up the worst of the blood from the floor.  My clothes weren’t too badly splattered, but his shirt was ruined.  “Course none of it went so smooth for them as it did for you.  You’ve a lotta bottle, you know that?”

“Huh?”  My head tilted to one side, he’d lost me on that one. 

“You’re one brave lady,” he clarified, tossing the mess into the garbage.

“I don’t think bravery has anything to do with it.  It’s not like my knee healed up on account of any particular virtue of mine, it’s just one of the vampire perks.”  

“But it was brave of you to sit through it without so much as a peep, so learn to take a compliment, yeah?”  Rob offered me his hand, and I jumped down, wary at first, but my knee cooperated fine.  “You should have more blood, you’ve been th
rough a lot.”

For a split second, I thought he was offering, but we both knew what a bad idea that would be.  Besides, physically I was in pretty good shape, and after spending just this small amount of time alone with him, my psyche was well on the way to recharging as well. 

“I could say the same thing for you,” I pointed out.  “You’re the one who doesn’t have supernatural healing.  Are you sure you’re completely recovered from… what happened?”  I still couldn’t bring myself to spell out his actual injuries.

“I’m alright, Jakob’s blood fixed me up good.  Just another scar to add to the mix.”

My fingers found the pucker of flesh under his shirt.  I wanted to see how bad it was, but it would probably look kind of strange if anyone happened to walk in.  “Is there anything I can do to help that?” 

Rob was silent for long moments as my fingers undid one of the buttons and slid across the skin over his heart.  There were people moving around outside in the hall, shouts in the distance, the sounds of activity all around us.  Our haven was definitely compromised.  “Nah, it’s fine,” Rob shrugged it off, taking a step backwards to refasten the button, his face shuttering as we heard voices outside the door, probably Winter coming to check up on me. 

But it was Bishop who gave a single knock and poked his head in, not the doctor.  “Everything okay in here?”  He’d managed a change of clothes, looking more like his old self in dark jeans and a slim fitting shirt.   

“Yep, all better, thanks.  Remind me never to get shot again
.  It’s definitely not on my top ten list of fun things to do while visiting England.”

“I’ve been there,” Bishop returned with a rueful grin, looking up at Rob, noticing the smears of dried blood all over his hands and
the spattered shirt.  “You okay, Rob?”

“I’d better go wash up.  Keep an eye on her for me, and yell if everything starts to go pear shaped again, yeah?”

“She’s in good hands with me,” Bishop promised, and I could practically see Rob trying to work out if Bishop meant anything by it. 

“I’m safe
enough here, Jakob saw to that,” I reminded them both.  If anything, it was Jakob’s hands Rob should be worried about, not Bishop’s.  I was still slightly fuzzy on what Jakob expected in return for his assistance. 

“How are you?  Are you okay?” I asked Bishop once Rob slipped out.

“It wasn’t the best couple of days, but I’ve had worse.”

My jaw dropped.  “Please tell me you’re kidding.  You’ve been through something like that before?”

“I’ve spent most of my life going from one crisis to the next in service to the Order,” he shrugged.  “It’s been a long time since I’ve found myself in quite that position though.  Jakob showed up in the nick of time.”

“I’m sorry you got put into such an awful
situation because of me.”

“You didn’t make me do anything I didn’t want to, and I know you never wanted to hurt me.”

He sounded so certain of that.  Where was all the doubt that I’d compelled him into helping me in the first place?  “I’m still sorry you had to go through it, and I’m sorry about the people you lost.  How many did Jakob um…?”

“More than half,” Bishop replied morosely, his expression darkening.  “There were some out in the field, but too many of us were here when the summons came.  Too many died for no reason other than the fact that Volkov tweaked his temper.”

“I’m sorry.  You should’ve sent for me sooner.”

“I honestly didn’t think you could get him to change his mind.  I’ve seen him like this before… Usually he doesn’t stop until there’s no more blood left to spill.” 

I thought about the members of the Order I’d met on my visits to Vetis – they’d been nothing but nice to me, apart from the couple that did a number on Rob at Volkov’s bidding.  “What’s going to happen to the rest of you guys?  What happens now that Volkov’s out of the picture?”  I realized I had no idea if he’d been killed or taken away with that poker still sticking out of his chest as I’d ordered.  I decided it didn’t matter, I’d already avenged the pain he’d caused us.

“Jakob’s
declared the Order banished from Vetis lands.  The rest of us are packing up as we speak.”

“Holy cow, can he do that?” I gaped at him.

“He’s an
Ellri
, he can pretty much do whatever he wants.” 

“Does that mean you’re going too?” 

“I’m not completely sure what it means for me, right now,” Bishop admitted.  “Maybe this is a good time to go back to San Francisco and make a fresh start.”

He didn’t mean
with me, did he?  He’d said something about another chance at starting over before Aubrey interrupted us and brought Volkov down on our heads.  Was that what he’d come to talk to me about?  I chickened out of bringing any of that up though, going with a generically supportive stance.  “You said before that’s where you really wanted to be, working back on your home turf again.”

“It’s part of what I wanted,” he said softly.  “Listen, Anja… before all of this craziness happened, I was trying to talk to you.”