“We’ll try together,” he said, his cooling fingers brushing mine as they curled around the hilt, too. “On the count of three. One. Two. Three.”
I pulled as hard as I could, as Bo did and, thankfully, the dagger’s tip sprang free of the wood behind Bo’s back and slipped out. I pitched it onto the floor and turned my attention to the stakes that protruded from Bo like pins from a pin cushion.
I began with the one in his knee. I could see that it was not embedded in the support beam, so I grabbed it and yanked, pulling it easily from Bo’s body. Blood began to flow from the open wound.
Of the three remaining stakes, I was dismayed to learn that only one was not stuck in the wood behind Bo. The one at his shoulder had caught the edge of the beam, but I could see the tip sticking out of Bo’s body. It was clearly not embedded.
Bo’s wide shoulders had saved him from being further pinned to the thick column.
After I’d pulled that one out, I looked once more at the other two stakes. I was afraid that the one in his thigh had gone through Bo’s bone to stick into the wood. The one in his side was stuck as well.
I noticed that the skin of Bo’s side was becoming less apparent as his injuries, coupled with the stress of the whole ordeal, burned through the blood he’d fed upon.
The poisonous coloring had not receded either, and I knew that wasn’t helping his condition. I knew I had to hurry.
“Bo, you’re going to have to help me with these last two, ok?”
Bo nodded his head feebly. His fingers dropped to the stake at his side. “On three.”
On the count of three, we tried to remove the dense piece of wood, but it didn’t budge.
“Let’s try again,” I suggested.
Bo shook his head this time. “I can’t. I’m losing blood too fast.”
“Then drink from me.”
Again, he shook his head. “No. The more blood you lose, the faster you’ll turn.”
I couldn’t help the pause. I couldn’t help the fact that Drew’s tortured face flitted through my head as he begged for us to kill him. He would rather have died than live as a vampire.
I shook my head against the thoughts. They had no place here now. My fate was sealed. Fear and regret couldn’t matter. They no longer held any sway.
“I don’t care. We have to get you out of here.”
“No, Ridley. It’s too fast.”
To my way of thinking at that moment, ever was too fast.
“What difference does it make?” Even as I asked the question, I felt a pang of sickening dread.
“Loving me has cost you so much. The least I can do is give you a few more days,” Bo said miserably.
Having a few more days of humanity felt like a stay of execution to me, but I couldn’t tell Bo that. He needed me and that was all that mattered.
“A few more days doesn’t matter. Here,” I said, picking the long thin knife up off the floor.
I stared at the blade, slick with Bo’s blood.
Giving my flesh to Bo, my blood to Bo, was quite different than purposely slicing my arm open with a sharp knife. Reluctantly, I looked back up at him. He was watching me, his eyes already turning that milky green in his disappearing face.
“Ridley, you don’t have to do this.”
“I know.”
Closing my eyes, I drew the razor-sharp edge across the tender skin of my wrist. I bit my lip against the sting of pain.
I opened my eyes to Bo’s pale ones watching me closely, hungrily. But behind the hunger was pain—the pain of what was to become of me, the pain of what he felt like his love had cost me, the pain of having little choice other than to drink from me, to take from me.
I straightened my spine and smiled. “Besides, this is the last time you’ll get to taste this human blood,” I said pluckily, determined to hide my distress from him.
I held my wrist to his lips. “Here, for old times’ sake.”
The battle waging inside Bo was plain to see. It was there in his tormented eyes, in his forlorn expression. But in the end, his thirst won out. His need. As his teeth pierced my skin, holding me tightly to him, I realized that I would soon know what that overwhelming hunger felt like. Soon, I’d require blood to live, too.
For the first time since she’d bitten me, I felt the fiery burn of Heather’s venom radiating from my neck down into my chest. It was killing off all that made me human, changing me forever, and now, forever had a much different meaning.
Pushing those thoughts aside, I closed my eyes on the world around me and concentrated on the feel of Bo’s soft lips and cool tongue as they moved against my skin.
Time does this funny thing where it sort of disappears when Bo’s feeding from me, so I don’t know how much had elapsed when he released my wrist. I felt myself sway and his hand slide around my waist to steady me. I felt my lips curve with the pleasure of being wrapped in his strong arms. For all of eternity, there was no place I’d rather be. But if Bo fulfilled his destiny, it was the one place eternity couldn’t offer.
********
That was the last memory I had before I ended up in the woods, running for my life, fleeing from the vampires. Now I was stuck in a hole in the forest with no one around to help me out.
All my senses reached out and took in my surroundings. I could still smell the dankness of the earth that enveloped me. I opened eyes I didn’t even remember closing and looked around. The darkness was almost complete. I could barely make out the mouth of the shaft into which I’d fallen.
I was cold and achy and I knew I was hurt. Probably very badly. Everything was throbbing dully, as if to the beat of my heart. But strangely, considering that it was my legs that had taken the brunt of my fall, it was my chest that hurt the worst.
It felt like everything behind my sternum was shriveling up and dying. It was excruciating, so painful in fact that I was amazed I was still conscious.
And my throat hurt, too. It burned like I’d sipped acid. My mouth was dry as cotton, but I swallowed what little saliva I had. It did nothing to relieve the discomfort. The fire persisted.
A familiar sound teased my ears. I stilled, listening as closely as I could. It was Bo’s voice, pouring over my raw senses like warm honey. He was calling my name, over and over. But he sounded far away, too far to be coming for me.
I tried to open my mouth to call out to him, but no words left my tongue. I felt something warm on my cheek and the walls of the shaft began to shake, dirt crumbling from the sides and sprinkling my face and hair. I felt the panic of the world falling in all around me as bigger chunks of earth started to come away from the sides of the tube.