"Tara!" Rider shouted, breaking Carlos's hold before Carlos or Shabazz could intervene. His gun was raised in the blink of an eye, the barrel pointed at Yonnie's chest as Carlos and Shabazz shouted no, and a bullet tore through the air. Gone in a flash, Yonnie was mist. Rider unloaded the rest of his clip, blowing out sections of black marble wall that was behind where Yonnie had been.
"I'll kill that sonofabitch!" Rider shouted, and went to Tara's limp body. He dropped his weapon on the bed as Carlos and Shabazz rushed to her side. Rider swept her up, hugging her lifeless body to his chest. "It's not too late. Don't tell me that shit!"
Shabazz and Carlos put a hand on Rider's shoulder, but said noth�ing as they stared down at their Guardian brother.
"Carlos, man, if ever there was a time to work your shit...it would be now, brother." Shabazz's eyes glistened with empathy and he looked away when Carlos slowly shook his head.
"C'mon, baby, take a breath for me," Rider said, rocking her against him hard. "Take a vein, just wake up, sweetheart." He turned and looked at Carlos. "Make her wake up!" he yelled, becoming more frantic. Rider looked at Shabazz. "Ransack this joint and find a blood bottle so I can feed her! Just don't stand there looking at me! Do it!"
Shabazz kicked away the refuse of bottles beside the bed, and Car�los held Rider's wrist when he reached to yank his Bowie knife off his belt to slit a vein for her. Rider jerked his arm away and worked around Tara's body to slit his wrist, dribbling blood into her mouth. But the blood simply collected between her semiparted lips and ran down the sides of her face.
"She's gone, man," Carlos whispered, his voice hitching in his throat. "He took her too far and-"
"She's not gone!" Rider shouted, hugging Tara to him, tears streaming down his cheeks. He looked away from Carlos and buried his face in her hair, which had gone gray, stroking it roughly. "Not af�ter more than thirty years, she's immortal. A vampire. Tara's not gone, just sick. Help her, man... you're supposed to be a healer."
"Even I can't raise the dead," Carlos said quietly, closing his eyes and stooping down next to Rider. He briefly held Rider's bloodied wrist and sealed the self-inflicted wound. "I can't lay hands on her with Neteru silver in my veins... I'll torch her on impact during a healing. Marlene was normal, human, living tissue." Carlos looked at Rider, trying to make him understand, his tone faraway and broken. "She's vampire remains now. No spirit in her to absorb the silver... she'll go to ash in your arms like I'd touched her with daylight."
Shabazz yanked a black silk sheet from the bed and tried to cradle it around Tara. "Man... let me take her and cover her up," he said to Rider quietly. "She's been gone for over thirty years and you should remember her like this, beautiful. Don't torture your mind and watch the decay. C'mon, man, as your Guardian brother, I'm begging you."
"She's not gonna decay," Rider said, clutching Tara's body to him tighter, "because my baby isn't dead... just asleep." He kissed her forehead, which was beginning to wrinkle with age. "You just rest, sweetie, I'ma get somebody to help you. We'll find a good medic. You just hold on."
Carlos stood and backed away with Shabazz to allow Rider to grieve for a moment alone. He put a hand on Shabazz's shoulder and spoke in a low, reverent murmur to him.
"'Bazz, you have got to get her body out of his arms before the maggots and the grubs infest it... and before her flesh starts drop�ping off the bones. It'll take his mind."
Shabazz nodded and turned Black Beauty around to hold it by the barrel. "You wrap her up good in the sheet, and bring her ashes with us. At least that way the man can bury her under a prayer."
Rider's sobs were so painful that they brought tears to Carlos's eyes. Carlos nodded as Shabazz walked forward, and he looked away as Shabazz approached Rider from behind, then landed a gun butt blow to the back of Rider's skull.
Yonnie's gaze tore around the casino floor as he turned in a panic while seated in a red velvet padded slot-machine chair. The machine's roller was spinning, just like his head, and Yonnie soon glanced down to notice that he was fully clothed in a black designer suit with a crimson shirt. The roller within the slot slowed and came up 6-6-6 and then began ringing as it spilled endless gold coins into the catch tray.
"Seems like tonight is your lucky night," a smooth, deep male voice said beside him.
Still somewhat disoriented, Yonnie jerked his attention toward the voice coming from the chair beside him and then froze.
"Councilman Nuit..." Yonnie's eyes widened. "It was rumored that you were extinct," he whispered, but kept respect in his tone.
Nuit smiled and dragged his fingers through the coins in Yonnie's slot tray. "Rumors are deadly, but I have a proposition for you... since you now owe me."
Yonnie just stared at him.
"You were too weak to jettison yourself away from the Guardian's attack,n'est-ce pas? Who do you think pulled you from sure extinction and strengthened you again?"
Yonnie nodded and slowly closed his eyes with defeat, feeling
Nuit's cool breath waft near his throat. What Nuit could never fathom was he would have gladly taken that bullet. What was exis�tence worth now, without Tara? Eternity without her was his Hell.
"Your councilman is no more," Nuit crooned seductively. "He abandoned you and went into the Light, and yet he couldn't even heal your mate... who, from what I could see, even reached out for an�other man-a human-in her final breath. That is weakness, not power, Yolando. Such a travesty is beneath our species."
Yonnie fought the building moisture within his eyes and swallowed hard. Trapped, the only option was to negotiate his way out. "Then, what do you want me to do, sir?"
"Take a throne next to me, elevate yourself under a new leadership, and be my eyes and ears topside to assist against a Guardian team that has plagued our world. These are the same humans who betrayed you. Rivera stood there and watched Tara die in your arms, allowed your eternal mate to go into the Sea of Perpetual Agony, and will bury her remains on hallowed ground so that even the Vampire Council cannot raise her from the ashes again... all for the sake of their brother, Jack Rider. You were never one of them, and when it counted most, they left you. Tried to murder you. But I can lift your turn bans so you can make another mate."
Yonnie stared at Nuit, a quiet scheme roiling within him as he nod�ded faux agreement. Carlos had shown him a lot; Fallon Nuit was stronger at the moment, and there was no sense in getting his heart ripped out on the casino floor.
"Who's running council now as the new Chairman?" Yonnie asked, holding Nuit's smug gaze.
"Dante's son," Nuit said with a sly smile. "You know the leg�end... Cain."