“Oh, thank God,” he mumbled as he saw V’s mate standing in the basement hallway.
As Doc Jane entered and closed things behind herself, he backed up—or rather tripped over his bare feet and fell on his ass. Landing in a heap, he knew he was a total mess.
And going by the expression on the doctor’s face, she rather agreed. “Knock me out,” he mumbled. “Do it first so you won’t have to deal with me. I’m worried I’m dangerous. I can’t . . . think . . .”
Doc Jane’s mouth started to move, and Boone was instantly transported back to his sire’s Fade Ceremony, someone standing in front of him, communicating in what was theoretically English, but which made no sense to him whatsoever.
What did make sense?
The fact that V’s female put her old-fashioned doctor’s bag down.
Retrieved from it a syringe and a small clear bottle with a rubber top. And then promptly loaded some kind of drug into the belly of the needle.
As she knelt beside him, she said, “Roll up your sleeve for me?”
Roll. Up. Sleeve.
Got it, he thought.
He tore the thing off from the shoulder and threw it somewhere. Holding out his bare arm, he watched as she rubbed an alcohol square in a circle on his bicep and then poked him a good one.
Boone opened up his mouth to thank her.
But the shit was fast-acting. For real.
* * *
Helania’s body was a rope and the hormones flooding her system were angry hands on either end, twisting, twisting . . . pulling . . . until surely the fibers that made up her corporeal form would snap. Facedown on the tile, she was on fire from the inside out, nothing relieving her of the agony, the sawing need, the clawing, useless desire.
She had no idea where Boone was. But he had left her as she’d told him to.
At this point, she wasn’t even sure where she was.
Forcing her lids open, everything was blurry, so she blinked until a small sink became semi-apparent. Bathroom. She was in the bathroom.
Rolling onto her back, she felt a draft as her belly was exposed to the air. There was no corresponding cool place for her shoulders, though. The furnace inside her body had heated the tiles on the floor.
Relief, there had to be . . . some relief.
Again on her stomach. Now on her side. Legs straight. Legs up. One leg down and the other up. Shoulders flat, shoulders curved.
Nothing helped. But that was the nature of the needing. How could she possibly have missed the signs? Restlessness. Being too hot. Bacon and chocolate at that diner, both of which she ordinarily never had an interest in.
The fact that, for the first time in her life, she’d had sex without really knowing the other person for very long. Her uncharacteristic boldness now made so much sense. It had been a prodromal to this fertile time.
When had her last needing been? She could not recall.
Oh, God, Boone. She would have warned him to stay away if she’d been thinking more clearly, if she had caught the signs—
The cool breeze came from out of nowhere, as if someone had opened a window and let some of the outdoor air in. Except she had no windows to open—
Lifting her head, she looked up and did not understand what she was seeing. But it appeared as though a female angel had come and covered her in a white cloud. Wait . . . unless it was just a sheet?
“Hi,” the angel said. “I’m Doc Jane. I’m here to help you.”
Helania blinked a couple of times to see if the vision before her changed. Nope. Still a female angel with short blond hair, dark green eyes, and . . . a pair of blue doctor’s scrubs for clothes?
Giving up on trying to make sense of it all, she let her head fall back down to the tile. “Help . . . me . . .”
“I’m going to check your vitals, and then we’ll see about taking care of you with some meds, is this okay with you?”
Meds? And what kind of angel talked about vital signs? Besides, if she’d gone unto the Fade, she was now dead for an eternity, so all that was a moot point.
As another blast of heat churned through her, Helania moaned and abruptly didn’t care what the plan was. Anything was better than