Worth Dying For (7 page)

The nurse came in, giving Amber the diversion she needed. “Please, get him out of here,” she begged.

The woman glanced at Amber’s face and obviously didn’t like what she saw. She gave David a look that would curdle milk and pulled him from the bed by a less than gentle hand on his arm. The fact he was being shoved towards the door didn’t stop him talking. Amber heard one last, rushed sentence echoing down the hallways before his annoying voice drifted away.

“Work on remembering what happened after he saved you, okay?”

But she couldn’t remember anything—and definitely not some freak of a giant who leapt through trees and defied gravity. Okay, so David didn’t want to admit to being a coward, but why come up with some bullshit excuse? She was injured, not terminally stupid. Why in hell had he thought she’d believe him?

Amber knew she’d get the truth out of him eventually, when she was well again and back on her feet. And then, David had some explaining to do—and it had better make a damn sight more sense than the crap he’d just filled her ears with.

Chapter Four

Bane moved back along the ledge under the window to Amber’s room. The nurse hadn’t seen him as she’d dragged David out.

David
. Even the thought of his name made Bane savagely angry and the wall lost a huge clump of smooth mortar as a result. The idiot would get them both killed if he didn’t shut up. Solomon had called earlier, not long after Bane had watched the rescue helicopter leave the island, warning him word had got back to Katerina about his heroics.

“What the fuck were you thinking?” Solomon had asked in his typical blunt fashion. “You know any exposure puts us all at risk.”

“I didn’t have time to think. I just acted. Don’t you ever have a weak moment?”

Bane had grimaced as he waited for the answer. Solomon’s only weak moment in either of his lives had been when he had allowed himself to be seduced by the beautiful vamp who created him. Alexandra had picked wisely. She’d been looking for a mate when she took Solomon, and the young Marine had proved himself a perfect match. Solomon relished the power and immortality almost more than she did, and they’d been together ever since that day forty years earlier.

“Fuck weak,” Solomon barked back.

Bane had laughed, enjoying the banter with his comrade. The Fratia hadn’t called on their services in a long time. “I’ll rectify my error but I’m sure the woman won’t be a problem. She took a blow to the head and doesn’t remember me.”

“What about the guy?”

“He could complicate matters.”

“Katerina will be pleased. The only thing staying her hand now is that the old man won’t give the go ahead for any action until it becomes absolutely necessary. The guy hasn’t revealed anything too damaging to the press—yet.”

“And I intend to silence him up before he does. If he knows I can find him anytime I want to, it might encourage him to keep quiet.”

Solomon laughed. “Damn Bane. You picked one hell of a woman to piss off in Katerina.”

“She was born pissed off.”

“Well, now she’s looking for any excuse to punish you for leaving her.”

 
“Then why drag up some ancient law that is never enforced to do so? Why not take it out on me and leave the girl alone?”

Solomon laughed again. “Where’s the fun in that? She knows as well as I do that you don’t give a damn what happens to you anymore, but you’ve exposed a weakness—one she is going to exploit. The woman you saved seems to be the key. Jealousy can be a powerful motivation.”

Solomon had warned that he would give Bane as much time as he could to sort things out himself, but if the order came to act, he would move fast—and it would be best if Bane didn’t get in the way. Bane resisted the urge to remind Solomon that he would be no easy conquest and left the island as soon as the call had ended.

He hadn’t needed to track her far once he’d swum across to the mainland. The small community hospital seemed the logical place to take her. From there, he caught her scent, locating her room easily when he stalked the hospital grounds.

Bane had checked on Amber through the night. She’d fallen into the dreamless sleep of those who thought they were safe and the worst was over. Guilt at putting her in a far greater danger than she could ever imagine gnawed away at him. He’d acted in good conscience—he couldn’t just watch her die on the island.

But he’d done no more than sign her death warrant.

Maintaining his vigil until the first light of dawn sent him to find shelter in the shadows, Bane had leapt the clearing to land in a tall oak beside her window. He’d tolerate the sun later if he had to. His shroud would offer some protection and the burns would heal in time provided he didn’t stay exposed for too long. But he didn’t plan on staying anywhere long. His only chance of saving her, if such action became necessary, would mean thinking and acting fast.

David’s visit had unsettled her but the knowledge that she didn’t remember anything of her ordeal didn’t reassure Bane. Amber would still die if Katerina had her way.

His unease increased after David left. Bane whiled away the morning watching a crowd of journalists gather at the entrance to the hospital. After listening to the conversations going on in Amber’s room, he knew she would be leaving in a few hours and that David would be coming to collect her. He had to be the responsible for the swarm of media waiting for her. The fool had probably called them himself. Their chances of survival were deteriorating by the second. David’s time was running out and if Bane couldn’t stop it, Amber’s would be gone too.

As if activated by his train of thought, the phone in his pocket vibrated, alerting him to an incoming call. He didn’t need to answer it to know what he would hear.

Solomon spoke only once. “The order has been issued.”

Bane didn’t have time to mutter a thanks for the warning before the line went dead. Solomon had put himself at great personal risk. The Fratia de Sange expected total obedience and loyalty. Any infraction—including defying them—would be punished severely.

His chance to stop the situation from escalating had disappeared, thanks to David’s stupidity. Bane’s hands twitched anew with the now familiar urge to kill him. Venom flooded his mouth as his teeth descended and a low growl tore from his throat. The almost overwhelming desire to bleed David dry stopped Bane’s rage cold. He could never allow that side of him to surface again, no matter how satisfying this particular human’s death would be. Besides, the longer both targets stayed alive, the fewer hunters there would be to focus solely on Amber.

Sounds of an argument in her room drew his attention to the source of his troubles. She refused to leave through the main door despite David’s pleas. “Forget it. I can call Richard to pick me up,” she said.

“Okay, we’ll avoid the press this time. I guess it will heighten the interest some if you are hard to find.” David prowled the room, snapping his fingers repeatedly as if hoping the rapid tempo he was splitting the air with would help speed things up.

The doctor signing Amber’s medical charts handed her a box of medicine, going over the instructions with her, before asking if she felt ready to leave. Her grateful smile satisfied him and then he turned to David, all of his earlier kindness wiped from the doctor’s face.

“You—get the hell out of my hospital.”

David didn’t argue. The colour left his face before rushing back to pool in bright red spots on his cheeks. He couldn’t hold the doctor’s gaze. David turned to Amber as he side-stepped towards the door. “Uh, I’ll meet you out back in a minute, okay?”

Bane slipped from his hiding place to follow David, using the trees as a bridge from Amber’s window to the parking lot. David came into view and crossed the sun-baked tarmac to a light blue sedan. After tossing a small overnight bag onto the back seat, he drove the car over to the exit. David left it unlocked while he ran back inside the hospital to get Amber, and for once, Bane was grateful for his predictable stupidity. The dark shadow cast by the building covered most of the area, providing Bane with the cover he needed to get into the trunk. If he was discovered hiding then he would have to deal with it but for the time being, the trunk offered a perfect solution to the problem of keeping out of the sun whilst keeping tabs on her.

The darkness inside the compartment did nothing to impair his vision but he couldn’t see beyond the metal shell. The sound of shoes tapping along the hard hospital floors gave him warning that two people were approaching the exit. Amber’s voice filtered through all the other noises, getting louder the closer they got, her irritation at David evident. The car’s doors opened and the vehicle shook as they seemed to throw themselves down into the seats. The snap of seatbelts, followed by the spark of the ignition, echoed throughout the vehicle, jarringly loud to Bane’s ears. He rolled backwards when David applied the gas and Bane braced himself against the frame so they wouldn’t hear him being thrown around behind them.

He closed his eyes and slowed his breathing to keep the acrid petrol fumes from burning his nose and mouth. He would sleep if he had the time. Like many of his breed, he could depend on all of his senses to alert him to any danger. Even the smallest rise in temperature would drag him from his slumber. No attackers would come during daylight hours anyway. They had the same weaknesses as he did.

His hearing locked onto the rhythm of Amber’s heartbeat, and Bane allowed the sound to become a part of him. Any change in the tempo would rouse him. Focusing on the soft thump drowned out the noise of the car and their incessant bickering.

He woke when the tension level inside the cabin of the car had multiplied for no apparent reason. The decrease in traffic noise told him they were no longer in the city.

“I didn’t agree to this David.” Stress, distrust and weariness were evident in her tone and Bane wondered why she would choose to be around a man she obviously had no desire to be near.

 
“They wouldn’t have discharged you unless you had someone with you. You take my bed and I’ll crash on the sofa. I don’t want you alone tonight.”

“Your concern is touching. It’s a shame you weren’t so worried about me when you paddled away in the dinghy.”

“I’ve explained about that,” David said, his voice seeming louder as the street noise diminished. Bane felt the vibrations from the car’s engine bouncing back towards him and a sudden build-up of pressure in his ears and guessed they’d driven inside a building. Seconds later, the vehicle stopped and they got out and walked away.

Waiting until he heard elevator doors close, cutting off the sound of their voices, Bane placed the flat of his hand against the trunk’s lock and gave it a hard tap. The lid flew open and he caught it seconds before it slammed into the glass on the back window. The sedan’s alarm screeched to life, propelling Bane into action. He forced the trunk shut using the same brute strength with which he’d opened it and disappeared into a dark corner. David stepped from the elevator minutes later, frowning at the car from across the lot as he disabled the alarm without checking to see what had caused it.

“It’s always going off on its own,” he explained to someone behind him in the elevator that Bane couldn’t see and assumed was Amber.

The elevator departed again and the echo chamber of the stairway helped Bane track them to the top floor. Waiting until he heard a door close behind them, he made his way into the hall. Two residences shared the landing but their scent told him which one he needed to watch.

The service hatch above his head leading to the loft opened with a hard shove, then he reached up to grasp the edges and pull his body up into the space. Satisfied he could get to her in split seconds if necessary, Bane settled against the heating vent leading down into David’s apartment and waited.

* * * *

Amber awoke with a jolt. How long had she slept? She groaned when she looked at the clock and saw she’d only been out for a few hours. Sleeping in a strange bed had always been a problem for her—and that was without the added pressure of knowing the one she was in was David’s. She should have put her foot down earlier and insisted that he take her home but she’d been too exhausted to protest much. She could barely keep her eyes open now. Amber rolled over, turning an unfamiliar pillow that smelt all wrong over to the cool side. She let her head flop onto it, determined to force herself back to sleep, when a sudden noise from the living room scared her upright in the bed.

Gurgling—was that what she could hear? Was David choking? She threw back the covers and placed a foot on the floor, about to go check he was okay.

“I wouldn’t go out there if I were you,” a male voice said, from somewhere in the darkness hugging the edges of the room.

Amber spun towards the sound with a scream, turning so fast she lost her balance and landed in a heap next to the bed. Whoever had spoken cast a massive shadow against the wall beside the door. Before she could move, a gentle but unyielding hand on her breastbone forced her flat onto her back.

 
“Stay down and shut your eyes.”

The low, commanding voice vibrated through her ribcage and made her heart clench in fear again.

“Please don’t hurt me,” Amber begged, barely able to force the whisper from her constricted throat.