Blurred Memories (18 page)

She looked at him, expecting
to find support; after all, he had fought demons on his own—with
Blake—for years, maybe even more than that, without the support of
a hierarchy, joining units he found on his way and leaving them
again after a few days or weeks. The only reason they had stayed
with the squad for so long—Kate was acutely aware of it—was because
of Kate herself. But Marc remained as calm and impassible as he had
in the office, a simple observer while Kate had argued with Daniel
and tried to get him to see reason.

“
You don’t mean that,” was
all he said before stepping out of the elevator again.

Kate was startled enough by
his reaction—or rather, his lack of reaction—that she failed to get
out, and the doors started to close again before she finally moved.
She raised a hand to stop the closing doors and followed Marc,
joining him just as he reached their room. She swiped the card in
the lock, and Marc opened the door for her. Kate inclined her head
in an absent thank you when she passed him, her mind churning and
trying to figure out what was going on with Marc.

The previous night he had
seemed to agree that they had to do something about the prisoners.
Now, he appeared untouched by Daniel’s revelation that their orders
were to close the breach and nothing more. She sat on the bed and
watched him approach, noticing that he didn’t quite meet her eyes;
he hadn’t done so in hours, not since he had woken her and Blake
after spending the entire night…where? What had he been doing? Who
had he been with? When she had last seen him, he had been about to
talk to Jen. What had she told him?

“
There’s something you’re
not telling us,” she said, her voice remaining even despite the
betrayal she couldn’t help feeling. “You’ve got something in mind,
don’t you?”

When Marc looked away, it
was as good as an admission.

Kate took his hand and
linked their fingers together, waiting until he finally looked at
her.

“
Tell me,” she asked
quietly. “I want to know.”

* * * *

Marc had made up his mind
not to tell anyone who wasn’t part of the mission. It was his
decision; he knew what the risks were and accepted them. That was
why he hadn’t tried to sugarcoat anything when he had asked
Simon.

But when Kate sat down on
the edge of the bed and looked up at him with those clear eyes, all
he could think of was how devastated she had been when Blake had
been taken from them without warning. He couldn’t do that to her
again. He still didn’t want her to come along and risk her life,
but he could tell her about it. Just as long as she made a promise
to him first.

“
You can’t tell Daniel,” he
said softly as he sat next to her.

Her eyebrows rose, and he
could already tell she was about to object. Despite her ramblings
in the hallway, her loyalty to the squad was only second to her
loyalty to Daniel himself.

“
Do it as a favor to me,”
Marc said. They were still holding hands, and he cradled hers
between both of his. “I don’t want it to turn in a contest of wills
between Daniel and me. Because if it comes to that, I’ll win. And
he really won’t like the way I do.”

Kate grimaced, and Marc was
sure she knew what he meant. When Daniel had been struggling with
his new life as a vampire, Kate had understood that Marc—his
Sire—was the one person who could help Daniel; the one person who
could force him to drink as much blood as he needed despite his
reticence.

“
All right,” she said
slowly. “As long as it doesn’t endanger anyone.”

He squeezed her hand gently.
“There
are
risks, I won’t deny it. But both Simon and Jen
understand that, and they’ve accepted the possible
fallout.”

“
Simon and…Jen?” Kate
repeated, sounding only a little more surprised than reproachful.
“What can you possibly…”

He could see the moment when
she understood. Her fingers tightened around his, and her mouth
fell open. She was smart; he had always liked that about
her.

“
Yes. We’re going to the
other side. Jen will show us to the prison. Simon will disable
whatever magic prevents us from closing the breach, and I’ll
release as many prisoners as I can.”

Freeing all of the prisoners
was his goal, but even one might help—one, to make up for his
failure to save Blake.

Kate remained silent for a
while, and as the surprise drained from her face, determination
slowly replaced it.

“
I’m coming,” she said at
last.

She wasn’t asking, Marc
noticed at once. Her decision was made, and she was merely letting
him know. Unfortunately, that wasn’t how it worked.

Leaning forward, he pressed
a soft kiss to her lips in apology before he said, “You can’t, I’m
sorry.”

She shook her head, and he
knew she would argue with him until she was blue in the face, so he
explained right away.

“
Simon will throw a shield
over us. A glamour, he called it. He doesn’t think he can cover
more than three people so we—”

“
He’s done a glamour to
hide a lot more than three people,” Kate protested before he could
finish. “He’s much stronger than that.”

“
He is,” Marc conceded.
“Here. He’s not sure his magic will be as strong on the other side.
He’s not even sure magic works the same way there. Jen said it’s
sometimes different. He might be able to disguise more than three
people, but he doesn’t want to take that risk.”

Marc had made sure to plant
that thought in Simon’s mind until Simon had all but been convinced
a three-person limit was his own idea, but Marc wasn’t about to
admit that now.

“
But…” Kate shook her head,
dismay written on her features. “What if you need help? What if Jen
is lying and betrays you
again
? What if you can’t come back
here for some reason and—”

“
Come back?”

Marc and Kate both started
and turned at once toward the strident words. Blake stood a few
feet away, a hand pressed to the wall like he needed
support.

“
Come back from where?” he
asked, a little too loudly, and it sounded as though he already
knew the answer to his own question. “And why,
why
would you
go anywhere with Jen?”

Marc’s throat tightened when
no good answer presented itself. This wasn’t good. Not good at
all.

* * * *

Kate didn’t know whether to
be relieved or sorry that her shoe-in-the-door trick had allowed
Blake to sneak up on them like this. On the one hand, if Marc
really intended to do this, Blake had to know—she was convinced of
it. In Blake’s fragile state, Marc unexpectedly running off with
Jen had the potential to shatter Blake’s mind again. This, however,
was not the way she would have chosen to tell him about Marc’s
plan.

Her fingers were still
entwined with Marc’s. She gave them a squeeze before letting go and
standing to approach Blake. Marc was only a step behind
her.

“
Calm down,” she said in
what she hoped was a soothing tone; it was hard to tell when she
herself was upset. “Blake, please, just listen to him
explain.”

She turned an encouraging
look toward Marc, but before he could say a word, Blake spoke
again.

“
I don’t want to listen. I
don’t want to hear any of it. I know why he’d do something so
stupid. The same reason as always. Those damn Pacts
and—”

“
No.”

That one word, in Marc’s
low, deep voice, seemed to bounce off the walls of the bedroom and
reverberate all around them. Blake had told Kate about the Pacts
and Marc’s belief that vampires had a grander purpose in protecting
humans. She had thought it was noble—she still did—but she would
never have believed Marc would go to the demon dimension for that
reason. It was much simpler. Why couldn’t Blake see it?

She brushed the back of her
hand over Blake’s arm, trying to soothe him, whether with touch or
words.

“
That’s not why he’s doing
it, Blake. Don’t you see?”

But Blake was staring at
her, his expression blank. As for Marc, rather than explaining, he
was standing there, sullen and silent.

Kate wanted to roll her eyes
at both of them. They were hopeless. Honestly, sometimes she
wondered how they had managed before she met them.

“
Oh for—” Swallowing a
curse, Kate shook her head and said through gritted teeth, “He
wants to do this because that’s the place where you were hurt.
Those are the demons who hurt you, and they’re hurting other people
the same way.
That
’s why he wants to go there. For you. To
avenge you.” She turned a frown toward Marc. “Am I anywhere
close?”

Marc blinked before looking
at Kate. He still didn’t say anything, but at least he gave a stiff
nod.

In response, Blake snorted.
“Right. Avenge me. Because it’ll make me feel so much better when
you get killed or…or…”

His Adam’s apple bobbed up
and down and he didn’t finish, but his meaning was quite clear.
Kate continued to stroke his arm, though he barely seemed to
notice.

“
I’m not going to get
myself killed,” Marc said quietly. “And yes, I do think it’ll make
you feel better to know that they can’t hurt you anymore. Not ever
again.”

“
It’ll make
me
feel
better?” Blake snorted. “No. It’ll make
you
feel better for
not coming for me when I was in that prison. And I’m telling you: I
don’t want you to go. I don’t
need
you to go.”

Kate’s heart felt like a
steel fist was tightening around it. Her eyes filled with tears.
Couldn’t Marc hear the same pain—the same fear—that she heard in
Blake’s words? Couldn’t he sense Blake’s true meaning as clearly as
she could?

I don’t need you to
go
, was what he said, but to Kate it sounded like,
I need
you not to go
. They’d been asking him to tell them what he
needed from them for so long, and here it was—if Marc would only
listen. But when Kate blinked the tears away and looked at Marc, he
seemed less than convinced.

“
I just think,” he started,
but Blake interrupted him immediately.

“
I’ll show you,” Blake
said, his words shaking just like his fingers did on the buttons of
his own shirt. “You don’t have to do it. I’m fine. I’ll prove it to
you.”

Kate wished she didn’t know
how he planned to make his point.

Chapter 16

“
I’ll prove it to you,”
Blake said again, and for all the determination that filled his
words, Marc couldn’t fathom what he meant by that.

He started to understand
soon enough.

Blake’s shirt fell first.
Next, in one fluid movement, Blake whipped his t-shirt over his
head. Already his hands—his shaky hands—were dropping to the
fastenings of his pants.

“
You’re going to fuck me,”
he continued in an undertone. “And I’ll prove to you I’m better
now.”

Marc’s throat tightened, and
he started to raise his hand to still Blake, but he couldn’t make
himself complete the gesture when he didn’t how his touch would be
received.

“
You don’t have to do
that,” he said urgently. “Blake, you don’t have anything to prove.
Not to me and not to anyone else.”

He glanced at Kate for help,
but she was watching Blake intently, and she didn’t
notice.

“
Maybe I want to prove it
to myself,” Blake said, and now the gleam in his eyes was pure
defiance.

It felt like having the old
Blake back, and a surge of something not unlike joy swept through
Marc. He had been waiting for a long time to see his Childe return
to his old ways again. At the same time, though, Marc couldn’t
quite believe it; or rather, he wouldn’t let himself believe. Too
often, he had wanted to see progress in Blake’s mental state, only
to be proved wrong with one more relapse; every time, the shattered
hope tore at his heart a little more.

Blake stepped out of his
clothes and pushed them away with his foot. He stood there for a
few seconds, hands at his sides and his semi-hard cock twitching to
life, then started to reach for Marc.

“
No,” Marc said, pulling
away even when every fiber of his being was clamoring for Blake’s
touch.

“
Are you saying you do not
want to fuck me?” Blake asked, each word enunciated with cool
precision.

Marc glanced at Kate again.
She still hadn’t said anything, and Marc couldn’t begin to make
sense of her expression, or of her tangled scent. For that matter,
he wasn’t sure what
he
felt, except for the fear that this
would end with another shattering setback for Blake.

“
I do want you,” Marc said
slowly. “But not like this. Not when you’re just trying to make a
point.”

“
When, then?” Blake’s eyes
were burning with an angry fire. “When you’re locked in a demon
cell? Will it be all right to show you I feel better,
then?”