“Liv!” Cole snapped at me and I looked at him. “Don’t think about that, not yet.”
It was hardly the reassurance I was looking for but seeing as no one else had any words of comfort for me, I took it and held it to me as I sat. We waited and waited and eventually a doctor came out and asked to speak to Mr. Sinclair’s daughter.
Cole and Devon both raised their eyebrows at that, but how else was I supposed to be his next of kin?
He spoke to me rapidly in French with Lincoln at my side, asking the questions I was incapable of asking…except for one.
“Can I see him?” I interrupted the doctor who was going through a long-winded explanation of what they did to him in surgery.
“Uh, yes, of course,” he said. “Just you,” he added as Lincoln stepped forward to join me. I nodded reassuringly at him and with a look at Cole that broke my heart as he looked back in sorrow, I followed the doctor to Cade.
Thirty-six hours later he was still unconscious and my anxiety that he would never wake up was keeping everyone well away from me. Even my husband was reluctant to join me on my bedside vigil.
I twiddled with the small, flat disc made from Faerie Silver that Corinne had handed off to me without undergoing any kind of trial. Queenly perk, she had said, but I wondered if there was more to it than that.
He stirred next to me and my eyes went back to his face, my hand gripping his tightly. I had the curtains pulled tightly closed against the sunlight and he opened his eyes and looked at me through the gloom.
“Where am I?” he rasped, and I handed him a glass of water.
“The hotel,” I said. As soon as I was able, after we had checked into the hotel, I went back to him and Astralled him out of the hospital and into bed in my suite. I was sure there was all kinds of Hell breaking loose by his absence, but he couldn’t wake up there. He just couldn’t.
“What happened?” he said after gulping down the whole glass of water. He put his hand to his head as he turned to plant his feet on the floor. He wobbled unsteadily as he got to his feet and I grabbed onto him. He turned instinctively towards me and dropped his new fangs to his utmost horror and bit me without further ado. He pulled back after a few moments and looked at me with such revulsion it nearly made me cry.
“You turned me?” he spits out, stepping back and stumbling in his still weakened state.
“You need human blood,” I said to him, but he put his hands up to stop me coming any closer.
“What did you do?” he asked me in disbelief as he raised his hand to his fangs, pri
cking his finger.
“You were shot, Cade. You were dying. I had to,” I explained quickly and desperately. “I couldn’t let you die.”
“No,” he said shaking his head. “No! I told you ‘No!’”
“I’m sorry, Cade,” I said. “I know I went against your wishes, but I saved you. You were dying,” I said again, my desperation turning into fear. Fear that he was going to turn from me, fear that he wasn’t going to accept this.
“Saved me?” he spit out. “You didn’t save me, Liv. You doomed me. I trusted you and you did the one thing that I didn’t want you to do.”
“Doomed you?” I repeated in disbelief. “No, Cade. I saved you. If I hadn’t you would be dead. Don’t you see?”
He shook his head at me, disgust and loathing etched on his face. “You should have let me die,” he said, before he turned from me with great effort, cutting himself off from me.
I finish up my tale of woe, hoping that CK grasps the fact that Cade hates me and wants nothing to do with me.
“I see,” he says. Again, I wait for more, but there is no more. He is processing it and I leave him to it.
Fortunately, we land at Heathrow shortly thereafter and we disembark in silence. Cole is attached to me like a barnacle and I appreciate the support. He wasn’t mad with me after what I did, just hurt, as was Devon. But once I explained to them both that there was no love or lust, even, between me and Cade they started to come around. Once they saw Cade’s reaction to his turning and his distance from me, they grew to accept it even more. I am hoping the same can be said for CK.
“I understand,” CK says suddenly as we get into the waiting car.
“You do?” I ask, surprised.
“Yes,” he sighs. “I know you, Aefre. I know that you couldn’t let him die. You did the only thing that you could to save him.” He takes my hand and just like that all is forgiven. I suppose under the circumstances of him being gone and wondering if I would ever come back for him, not to mention he now has me almost right where he wants me, he is not going to do anything to mess it up.
“Thank you,” I say and smile at him. He returns it. Slightly forced, but I can live with that.
“So, where is he now?” he asks.