Once Bitten, Twice Burned

CHAPTER FIVE

Sabine didn’t know where they were going. And as long as Ryder was getting her out of the pit that reeked of death, she didn’t care. Her heart slammed into her chest and her lungs heaved as she rushed to keep pace with Ryder.

The guy was fast. But then, he was a vampire. She figured superhuman speed must be part of his package. Not a bad package to have, once you looked past the whole blood-drinking and fangs bit. He pulled her hand, yanking her toward a metal door on the right, and then they were rushing into a narrow stairwell. She stumbled inside with him, and the door clanged shut behind them.

“How much longer are we—” she began but Ryder pushed her against the nearest wall and put his hand over her mouth, effectively cutting off her words. She stared up at him, too conscious of the loud drumming of her heart, the sound seeming to fill her ears.

“More guards,” he whispered the words against her left ear. Barely a breath of sound. She could have sworn she felt the light rasp of his tongue on the shell of her ear, and Sabine stiffened. Not with anger or disgust but with a sudden stab of desire that she hadn’t expected.

It was strange. Her body felt primed, too tense, aching, and it had felt that way ever since Ryder had taken her hand and pulled her off that exam table.

She hadn’t thought anyone would be coming to her rescue. Sabine certainly hadn’t expected a vampire with fierce eyes and bloodstained clothing to rush to her side.

But he had.

Maybe there was someone she could trust in this nightmare world, after all.

Ryder killed you. Wyatt’s words rang through her mind.

Um, and maybe not.

But she did remember Ryder trying to give her blood during that terrible encounter. He’d forced his blood into her mouth. Urged her to drink.

The vampire just confused her.

Footsteps thundered by outside.

“Since you want me to let those fools live”—another whisper against her, and, yes, this time she was sure that was a light lick of his tongue—“then we’ll play the game nice and softly.”

It wasn’t a game. It was life or death. Her life. His life.

She turned her head, pulling away a bit from that mouth and the tongue that was making her body tighten. Ryder—he was so big. Tall, dark, and dangerous—a description that definitely fit him.

He wasn’t like any man she’d ever met before. Mostly because she’d never met a guy with fangs and claws.

He’s a vampire. Not just some average guy. Admit that to yourself.

He was a vampire, and his mouth had just moved down to the curve of her throat.

Sabine couldn’t help it. Every single muscle in her body locked when she felt his lips on her throat. The muscles locked in fear and desire. She shook her head and he freed her mouth. “Don’t,” her own soft order.

His lips pressed against her throat. “I’m not taking a bite.”

Good. He’d better not be.

His head rose. His eyes met hers. “Unless you want me to . . .”

Heat pooled in her belly.

His nostrils widened a little bit, and he smiled. The fluorescent light above them revealed the brightness of his green eyes and the sharp points of his fangs. “Sometimes, the bite can feel good.”

She swallowed, then shoved against his shoulders. She wasn’t sure which one of them was more surprised when he staggered back. “And sometimes it can kill.” Wow, where had she gotten that kind of strength? She’d just shoved him a good four feet. His back had bumped into the metal banister. If the guards hadn’t drugged her, would she have been able to use that kind of strength on them before?

His gaze raked over her. “Remembered that part, did you?”

No. “Yes,” she lied at once, wondering how much she could get him to reveal. Her actual death part was still rather foggy for her.

He glanced toward the locked door, then his gaze rose up, scanning the stairs that led to the second floor. “I was starving. They hadn’t fed me in months.”

This was supposed to make her feel better? He’d actually attacked her. Hardly the start of some epic relationship.

“I tried to give you my blood,” he growled out. “If you’d just been able to take a few sips, you would’ve been okay.”

The image of his face—dark, desperate, Let her drink!—flashed suddenly through her mind, and Sabine sucked in a sharp gasp of air.

Maybe there was a reason she couldn’t remember those last moments before the fire. Maybe she didn’t want to remember.

“But it was all part of Wyatt’s experiment,” Ryder muttered. “He wanted you to die, so he could see you rise again.”

Goose bumps were on her arms. “I don’t understand any of this.”

He inclined his head toward the stairs. “The guards are gone. Come on, we need to go.”

She wanted to keep talking. He knew more about her, she realized that. The knowledge was in his eyes, in the way he glanced over her body. Phoenix. He’d called her that before. The only phoenix she knew was a mythical bird. She had to get Ryder to tell her more. To explain to her just what she was.

He was the key to so much, provided, of course, he didn’t kill her again.

Ryder had already headed up the stairs. She glanced at his wide back. Trusting him would be stupid. She wasn’t stupid. Most of her memories had come back, and, so, okay, she didn’t fully remember his attack on her. I don’t want to.

Sabine just wanted to get out of this crazy hell, and to do that, she had to follow the vampire.

Follow him, work with him. Trust him?

Her fingers curled around the metal stair railing. The stairs squeaked beneath her feet as she hurried and climbed up behind Ryder. For better or scary-as-hell worse, they were together now. Maybe they’d both manage to get out of that place alive.

Are vampires even alive?

She had so much to learn.

Wyatt took his time scanning the notes he’d made on Sabine. She’d recovered nearly all of her memories after just three days. Fairly fast, considering that she’d just been through her first rising. She had amazing potential.

Test Subject Twenty-Nine is showing remarkable recovery skills. He quickly jotted down that notation. He couldn’t wait to monitor her after the second rising.

Wyatt glanced down at his watch. Donaldson should be shooting her at any moment. He put the papers aside, not wanting to miss the experiment. His pace kicked up as he hurried toward the observation room adjacent to Twenty-Nine’s cell.

Think of her as Twenty-Nine. When he’d first brought her in, he’d been thinking of her as Sabine. An amateur mistake. He knew better. But when she’d first come in, she’d looked human.

They’re numbers. Subjects. Not people. Because he’d referred to both Sabine and Ryder by name, he’d noticed that his staff had started to refer to them that way, too.

You can’t see them as individuals. As men. As women.

That was a huge mistake. His father had taught him that. His father never saw the humanity in his subjects. They were numbers, not names.

The beings in his lab were test subjects. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Donaldson had hesitated when Richard gave him the order to shoot Subject Twenty-Nine. He’d hesitated because he’d started to see her as a woman, not the monster she was.

I’ll have to brief all the staff. Only numbers from now on. No names. The new recruits he had coming in would learn this lesson from the very start.

You were less likely to feel sorry for a number.

The door to the observation room slid open. “How is the test proceeding?” Richard began, then jerked to a stop when he realized two of his staff members were unconscious on the floor.

His gaze flew to the two-way mirror. The exam table was empty, but the room wasn’t. Donaldson stood, statue-still, in the middle of the room, with a gun pressed to his heart.

Son of a bitch.

Richard rushed forward and pressed the button for the alarm.

They’d just reached the top of the stairs when a shrill alarm pierced the air. Sabine clamped her lips closed to hold back her instinctive cry and pushed behind Ryder. But instead of opening the door that was just a few precious feet away, instead of getting them the hell out, he spun back around and caught her arms.

“Guards are coming,” he rasped.

Her eyes narrowed. She could almost hear the fast thud of footsteps. Wait, she did hear them.

His head jerked up. He looked to the left. The right.

Then his stare came back to her. “I can kill them all.” Said with absolute certainty.

Her heart clenched. She didn’t know these men and women. Maybe they were as screwed up as Dr. Richard Wyatt—every time she saw him, her skin crawled. But what if they weren’t? What if some of the guards truly didn’t understand all that was happening at Genesis? Was that even possible?

“Don’t,” she whispered.

Ryder shook his head. “That’s a mistake.” His gaze locked with hers. “But we’ll play it your way, for now.”

Then, instead of shoving open the door and getting out of the stairwell, he turned toward a grate behind them. He kicked out and the grate fell inward. “Get in,” he told her. “Crawl forward fifteen feet, take a left, then punch out the screen you’ll find in front of you.”

How did he know this stuff?

But she didn’t question him. She just hauled ass. Bending low, Sabine pushed into the entranceway. Some kind of air duct. She crawled forward even as she mentally kept up a hopeful refrain of No rats, no rats, no rats.

Like the rats were all she needed to worry about at Genesis.

Something grabbed her ankle and hauled her back. She didn’t cry out, but she bit down hard on her bottom lip as her hands slapped against the metal walls around her. There was nothing to hold on to as she was pulled back.

“I said fifteen feet,” Ryder growled at her. “Turn here.”

Oh yes. She turned. The air duct became even narrower. Sabine knew that Ryder’s broad shoulders must have been a tight fit, but she didn’t glance back. Her hands slapped against the grate. Before she pushed it down, she peeked through the narrow openings and gazed below her. No sign of the guards.

She shoved the grate down. It fell and landed on a desk. Barely waiting a second’s time, Sabine jumped right after it.

Her gaze swept the room. Heavy shelves. A big desk. No pictures. A lab coat hanging on a hook near the closed door.

Ryder landed behind her. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Jim Thomas isn’t going to be heading in here for a while.” His voice oozed confidence.

Glancing over her shoulder, Sabine demanded, “How do you know? What did you do to him?”

He offered her a wide grin. “I took a little bite out of him.”

“Did you kill him?”

His sigh was long and low. “No. Why do you always seem to think—”

“Because you killed me.” Her words froze him as he reached for the lab coat.

Ryder hesitated, then looked back at her. “Back to that, are we? I’ve told you they’d starved me.”

As far as excuses went . . .

“And I didn’t expect your taste.”

Um, come again?

He spun toward her. Actually, he was stalking toward her. She was still crouched on the desk. Sabine scrambled down. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, vampire.” She said the word deliberately, in order to remind herself of what he was.

Ryder rolled his eyes. Seriously. The guy rolled his eyes. “So what, now you’re gonna think like them? I’m not a person, just a thing?”

Shame burned her cheeks. “I—”

“Whatever,” he drawled, then lifted a brow as he said, “Phoenix.”

She just looked back at him.

He stopped in front of her. The desk was behind her, pressing lightly against the back of her thighs. Ryder’s intense gaze searched her face. “You don’t know, do you?”

She shook her head. “Is that . . . what I am?”

He put the lab coat down on the desk. His head cocked to the side. His gaze seemed to grow even brighter as it raked over her.

“I feel like I’ve been frozen for the last thousand years.”

Thousand? There was no way she’d heard that part right. Ryder couldn’t be that old.

Duh, Sabine. Vampire. He could definitely be that old.

“And when I tasted your blood, for the first time in so long, I felt warm again. You did that. Your blood . . . hell, it seemed to make me live again.”

She wasn’t sure what in the heck to say in response to that.

“You taste like spice. Heat and honey. Pleasure.” He leaned toward her. Her hands curved under the edge of the desk. “You taste like everything I had while I walked the earth as a man, everything I wanted, and I fucking crave you.”

His hand caught her chin. Tipped her face back up. “The bloodlust—the lust—consumed me when I tasted you. I didn’t have control. There wasn’t time for control. I needed you too much.”

She wet her lips. Her heartbeat was racing in her chest, the wild thunder echoing in her ears. The too-aware tension in her body seemed to be a normal occurrence when she was around him. “And now?”

The hunger in his eyes was her answer. Her fingers tightened around the edge of the desk. She was so far out of her element here. “Don’t eat me.” The words jumped from her because Ryder looked as if he wanted to devour her.

One blond brow rose even as his cheeks seemed to hollow, to sharpen with a predatory appearance she hadn’t noticed before. “So very tempting.”

The alarm was still ringing, muted since they were in the office, but she still heard it easily. “They’re looking for us.” So you don’t have time for a bite. Keep those teeth away from me.

“Let them look. The longer we stay in here, the more the guards will disperse as they break up and search the facility.”

His gaze had focused on her mouth.

Her own eyes kept dropping to his mouth, too, and it was only partially out of fear.

“I’m prepared now,” he told her. “I swear, I won’t ever lose control with you again. I give you my word.”

She didn’t exactly want to test that theory. And she didn’t exactly believe him. “Get me out of this place.”

His eyes rose. Met hers.

“Please,” she whispered.

He could do it. She knew he could. With his enhanced senses and his speed and strength, Ryder could get her to safety. He could easily avoid the guards, find the exit, and get her away from Genesis.

Only the guy wasn’t moving.

His mouth kicked up in the faintest of smiles. “What will you do for me, lovely Sabine, if I do?”

What? The guy was trying to barter over her freedom? Now?

“Perhaps a kiss,” he said. That smile of his was still there—still a bit predatory. “Surely that’s not so much to ask?”

No, not so much. Not in the big life-or-death grand scheme of things. Since she’d been expecting him to request a pint or two of blood, a kiss seemed fair enough. “Get me out, and I’ll give you the best kiss you’ve ever had.” An easy promise.

Ryder shook his head. “Give me the best kiss I’ve ever had . . .” Was there a taunt in his words? Yes, there was. “And then I’ll get you out of here.”

She didn’t have time for this crap. Her hands flew up. She grabbed his shirt front and fisted her fingers around the material. “Fine.” Then Sabine jerked the vamp toward her. His lips had parted in surprise. Didn’t think I’d do it, did you?

He should have known better than to challenge a New Orleans girl.

She pressed her mouth against his. Thrust her tongue past his lips. Back in high school, she’d been the first-base queen. Her too-protective older brother had made sure she didn’t get to round third base too much, but kissing . . . oh, she’d had plenty of practice on those hot Louisiana nights.

Ryder stiffened against her. She figured the guy hadn’t expected such a fast response from her. Good. She liked catching him off guard.

Her tongue licked across his lip, then slid back into his mouth. A growl built in his throat and his hands wrapped around her hips. Then his tongue was stroking hers. The kiss grew rougher, her heart beat even faster, and she stopped worrying so much about her perfect technique and just kissed him.

Hot. Wild. The kind of kiss that made her toes curl.

She sucked his tongue.

His hands jerked her hips toward him. Since she was on the desk, he was right between her legs, and there was no missing the thick bulge of his arousal. The vampire came with all the right equipment. So very right.

And big.

“We . . . have enough time . . .” He muttered the words as his mouth tore from hers.

Sabine blinked up at him. She wanted his mouth back on hers. He could kiss even better than her eleventh-grade boyfriend of choice, Leo Rouchoix. Leo the Lips . . . that had been his nickname back in high school.

Ryder’s hands went to her waist. To the top of her sweats.

Wait, hold up, he’d said they had enough time?

She grabbed his hands. “No.” Sabine shook her head, trying to shake away the lust. Trying to, and failing. “We’re getting out of here.” The alarm still beeped, and though Ryder seemed to think this room was a safe hiding spot, she didn’t want to risk being discovered right in the middle of sex.

Not that she was having sex with the vamp. Not on the desk. Not in the middle of their escape.

Just not.

A muscle flexed in his jaw. “Do you know how much I want you?”

Um, she could feel how much. Impressive. But the vamp needed to prioritize. “I gave you the kiss.”

His gaze dropped to her lips. No missing the heat in his green stare.

“Now you get us the hell out of here.”

His head tilted. He didn’t speak.

“Ryder . . .” They’d had a deal.

He lifted his hand. “The hallway outside is clear now. We can go.” Ryder stepped back.

Just like that. Her heart was about to burst out of her chest, and Ryder was suddenly as calm as you please. Well, hell.

Had he just been trying to distract her? Keep her quiet until the guards outside had left? He could have just said “Quiet” instead of asking for her kiss.

His finger smoothed over the line between her brows. “The kiss was more fun.”

Her heart froze. “You can read my mind.” Her voice emerged as a horrified whisper.

Those sensual lips of his—lips she could still feel against her own—quirked briefly. “No, love, not yours.”

Did that mean he could read the minds of others? She had to learn more about vampires. When she’d started to hear the whispers about them in New Orleans, about all of the supernatural creatures, she’d ignored most of the stories. Because most of them were BS. Huge exaggerations. Scary stories to frighten children.

But now, she sure needed to separate the fact from the fiction pronto.

“Your thoughts are easy enough to see on your face.” He picked up the white lab coat again. “Put this on. You’ll blend in better if we’re spotted.”

He turned away. Began digging in a nearby drawer. He pulled out another lab coat. Yanked it on.

Her fingers dug into the fabric. Not yours. That phrasing had been deliberate. She had to ask the question that had been burning through her. “What did you do to that guard downstairs?”

His back was to her, but she saw the sudden stiffness of his shoulders. “I stopped him from killing you.” Said quietly. He glanced over at her. “You’re welcome.”

She licked her lips. Dammit, she tasted him. “You made the guard turn that gun on himself. You were in his head, weren’t you?”

A slow nod.

“How did you—”

“I’d delay the escape for a fuck,” Ryder said, the hard words cutting like a knife, “but not to play Twenty Questions. It’s time for us to get the hell out of here.”

Her eyes narrowed.

He lifted his hand and offered it to her. “Unless you want to stay?”

She wasn’t taking that hand yet. “I want to make sure I’m not going to find myself suddenly aiming a gun at my own heart.” Because she’d seen the desperate fear in Donaldson’s gaze. Sabine didn’t want to wind up on the receiving end of whatever scary mojo Ryder was working.

When she’d been snatched by Wyatt and his psycho team, Sabine hadn’t exactly had time to pack her gris-gris. And her aunt Rya had worked so hard to create that satchel to protect Sabine. I could sure use its protection right about now.

Ryder stared at her. His eyes were so bright. His face tense.

“What?” Sabine muttered. “I think it’s a fair concern.” Especially considering the events she’d witnessed with her own eyes.

“If I could control you, your hand would be holding mine right now.” He said the words with an annoyed air. “I can’t get in your head. Not even with the blood I took.”

That was good, right?

“I tried to get into your head.”

She gulped.

“There was a wall of fire blocking your mind. It kept me out—is keeping me out. I’m betting it will keep every paranormal out.”

Her hands had fisted, the better to hide the faint tremble of her fingers.

“So I won’t be making you shove a gun at your own heart. I won’t be making you do anything that you don’t want to do.” He exhaled on a long sigh. “Now, can you take my hand?”

She headed toward him. Her shoulder brushed his arm. She forced her right hand to unclench, and she lifted it from the pocket. Her fingers touched his. A hot charge seemed to pulse from his skin to hers.

“Lead the way,” Sabine whispered.

Her fingers curled around his.

“Donaldson, drop the gun,” Richard barked as he rushed into the cell.

Donaldson dropped the gun. The other guards swarmed in, searching the area.

“They’re gone,” Donaldson gasped out. “Been gone . . .”

“And you just let them walk away?” Fury spiked within Richard. “You were supposed to shoot the woman, not free her.”

“I-I didn’t . . . The vampire came in. He let her go.”

Obviously. “While you just stood there.” The man actually was still just standing there. Richard waved his hand. “Get moving, Donaldson. We’re locking down the facility. We’re going to find them.” He turned away. “They won’t get out of Genesis.”

Richard had taken two steps before he realized Donaldson wasn’t moving. Richard glanced back over his shoulder. The guard stood frozen in the middle of the room. His eyes were wild, his face taut. Sweat covered him, but the man wasn’t stepping forward.

“Come along, Donaldson,” Richard snapped. He didn’t have time to waste coddling a guard. The man had been attacked. Yes, yes, traumatic, no doubt, but he was fine now. No injuries that Richard could see, except for the bandaged bite mark on Donaldson’s neck. The wound still appeared to be bleeding, judging by the way the red stain was spreading on the white cloth.

“Can’t,” Donaldson rasped. “Not until . . . Ryder’s back.”

What? Richard spun around. His gaze swept over the guard. Donaldson’s body was shaking, but the man was not so much as inching forward. “Come here, Donaldson.”

All of the other guards were dead silent.

Donaldson shook his head. “Can’t!” He shouted this time, his frustration breaking him. “I can’t move a step, not ’til Ryder gets back!”

Richard knew his own eyes were widening. He tried to school his expression even as excitement filled him. “Why would you follow his orders?”

The other guards were avid. Watching too much. Hearing too much. Richard waved them away. “Go join the others! I want a search of every room at Genesis!”

The guards hurried to comply. Richard waited until they were gone, then he asked again, “Why obey him? Did he threaten you? Your family?”

“He’s . . . in my head.” The horror of those words was reflected in Donaldson’s eyes. Eyes that appeared to be filling with tears.

Richard remembered the way Donaldson had stood when he first burst into the room. “He made you put the gun to your own chest, didn’t he?” Richard didn’t want to let the excitement get the better of him. He’d hoped this would be the case. For so long, he’d searched for a vampire who’d mastered this particular talent. His search had yielded no success, until now.

Donaldson nodded. “I could . . . feel him.” His hand lifted and his fingers rubbed against his temple. “It wasn’t me up here. Just him.”

Richard smiled. “It was the bite.” Smart vampire. The attacks on Donaldson and Thomas had been part of an escape strategy.

Jim Thomas . . . you attacked him because you knew he’d have access to the key cards. He was your ticket to freedom.

Richard realized he’d underestimated Ryder. He wouldn’t be making that mistake again.

Richard bent and picked up the discarded gun. “Do you still feel Ryder in your mind?”

Donaldson didn’t answer. But then, wasn’t that answer enough?

Richard glanced over his shoulder. They were alone. Donaldson deserved to hear this. “There are stories . . . some vampires are old enough, powerful enough, that they can actually control the minds of humans.”

He’d just thought that was a legend. He’d hoped it was truth, but had discovered no evidence to back up that particular power, until this moment.

“He’s controlling me,” Donaldson whispered. A tear streaked down his cheek. “Stop him!”

Oh, now that was the tricky part. “It’s the blood,” Richard said. With vampires, wasn’t it always? “He didn’t take control until he had your blood.” Otherwise, Ryder would have escaped sooner. He would have just taken control of the guards at any point and used them to do his bidding.

But though Ryder had killed a few guards when he’d first been contained at Genesis, the vampire hadn’t been allowed to get within biting distance of any Genesis personnel, not since those early, desperate weeks. And since he hadn’t been able to bite them . . . You couldn’t control them.

Until a fatal mistake had been made. Until Thomas and Donaldson had gotten within the vampire’s deadly reach.

During his time at Genesis, Richard knew that plenty of other vampires had tasted the guards. They’d had their blood—new guards often made foolish mistakes. They got too close to their prey. One nip of the teeth was enough to guarantee that they’d be better prepared in the future.

Those vampires had never been able to take over the minds of their prey.

Those vampires hadn’t been like Ryder.

What makes Ryder different? He had to find out. Ryder could very well be the vampire that he’d sought for so long.

The key.

The cure.

Richard’s fingers tightened on the gun. “You’re his puppet now. Whatever Ryder says, whatever he so much as thinks, you’ll be compelled to do.” Even turning against his own teammates. Hell, the guy would kill his own family if Ryder told him to do so. The proof was plain to see.

Donaldson had put a gun to his own chest.

Very, very interesting.

“Help me!” Donaldson begged. “If you find him, if you kill him, I’ll be free, right?”

Yes, he would be free then, but Richard shook his head. “I have no intention of killing Ryder.” What purpose would that serve?

The cure. He’d looked for a vampire like Ryder, searched since he was little more than a child.

Containment of Ryder would be priority one. They’d need more of his blood. Humans would have to be injected. More test subjects lined up and—

“Help me!” Ah, now Donaldson was shouting again.

It was hard to think when someone shouted like that.

Sighing, Richard lifted the gun. He fired. The bullet blasted into Donaldson’s chest, a direct hit to the heart. The man fell to the floor.

“Now you’re free,” Richard murmured. He stared dispassionately at the body. Donaldson had been dead from the minute Richard realized he was under Ryder’s control. Donaldson would have been a weakness for Genesis. Ryder would have manipulated the human. Used him to attack.

“Sorry, Donaldson.” Richard turned for the door. “But it’s for the good of science.”