face was far too young for the fall of white hair that framed it, turned startlingly silver eyes up to her and scowled. “Get the hell away from me, human.”
Bane crouched down next to them and grabbed the man’s jaw. “Shut up and let her help you. What happened?”
“Little problem with a wolf who’d been forced to shift by a warlock. Oh, and the warlock crashed my bike first. Not a big deal.” Edge flinched when Ryan started to unbutton his shredded shirt to see his torso, and his hand shot out to grab her wrist. “I don’t need your help, I said.”
“Too bad. You’re going to get it anyway. Now take your hand off my wrist, or I’ll punch you right in this puncture wound,” she threatened, feeling something fiercer than her normal bedside manner was called for.
A hint of amusement gleamed in his silver gaze, but then he sighed and shook his head, turning his attention to Bane. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll heal. But Bane—you need to know. The necromancers are still here, or at least one of them. She walked right into Wolf Pack MC and dumped me there and told Carter Reynolds that I was a gift.”
Bane scowled at him. “Did Reynolds take her up on it?”
“Nope. We had a talk. The truce holds. The wolves want nothing to do with the Chamber, either, and Reynolds had the same reaction to a necromancer that we did. Since we were on the same page about all that, I almost asked him about joining up on the drug runs but figured that could wait for another day.”
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Meara knelt down on the other side of the injured vampire and put a hand on his shoulder, but he jerked away from her touch and would not look at her.
“I’m fine.”
“Warlocks? And drugs?” Ryan rocked back on her heels, shock and revulsion almost choking her. “You—you’re not just vampires, but you’re drug dealers?”
She glared at Bane, thoughts of the addicts she’d treated burning in her mind. “Tell me the truth.”
He said nothing, just stared at her, his face set in an expressionless mask.
“Tell me, damn you. Are you a drug dealer?”
His eyes flared red, and she flinched.
“Yes, Dr. St. Cloud,” he said, biting off each word. “We use the Vampire Motorcycle Club as a front to run drugs.”
Meara started to say something, but Bane sliced a hand through the air, cutting her off, still staring at Ryan. “Vampires and drug dealers. Fine crowd you’ve found yourself in, isn’t it?”
“Better vampire than drug dealer, any day of the week,” she said, ice freezing her veins. “If you’re sure he’ll heal on his own, then I’m out of here.”
She jumped to her feet and turned to go but found the dog blocking her way.
“Bite me or get out of my way, but I’m leaving. Now,” she told him, only belatedly realizing that the vampires in the room could take that as directed at them, too.
The dog fell to his side and rolled over, legs up in the air, tongue lolling out of one side of his mouth, and gave a gentle woof.
“He wants a belly rub,” Mrs. Cassidy ventured. “He likes you.”
“I like him, too, but I also want to wake up in my own bed and find that all of this was just a very bad dream,” Ryan said. “We can’t always get what we want, though, can we?”
She leapt over the dog and started running for the door. Movement blurred past her peripheral vision, and then Bane was in front of her, blocking her way.
“I’m sorry, Doctor, but I won’t let you leave me. Not like this.” His eyes blazed red, terrifying her, and then he leaned down until his face was inches from hers. In a lightning-quick move, his hand shot out and took hers. “Sleep now.”
As Ryan’s knees gave out, and she felt herself falling into the dark, she faintly heard first Meara’s voice and then the rumble of Bane’s response.
“She won’t forgive you for that, Brother.”
“I could never deserve her forgiveness. I may as well earn her hatred.”
Chapter Eighteen
Ryan woke up in a place that was decidedly not the kitchen she’d just run from. It looked, instead, like the armory of the militia in a scary movie.
The walls were bare brick, lined with shelves and racks, all of which held a dizzying array of weapons. There were guns, but not as many as she would have expected, given the feel of the