Part 3 (1/2)
”Nope. We reproduce with the females of other species, but our offspring are always purebred Seminus males.”
Huh. Slake glanced over at Raze, who seemed extremely engrossed in opening a box of surgical masks. From this angle, Slake couldn't see Raze's personal symbol, but now he wanted to know what it was.
”And you guys are s.e.x demons,” he mused. Wasn't that curious. He'd never heard of s.e.x demons that went for their same gender, but he knew d.a.m.ned well he hadn't read Raze's signals wrong. He certainly hadn't read the kiss wrong. ”So . . . you do males too?”
”Dude.” Wraith cringed. ”f.u.c.k, no. Females only.”
”Really.” Slake looked over at Raze again, whose face had gone an interesting shade of red. ”No exceptions?”
The Harrowgate flashed open, and Wraith waved at the female wearing a lab coat with the name Gem st.i.tched onto the chest pocket in big loopy, multicolored swirls, her blue-streaked black hair pulled up in twin pigtails. ”Other males can partic.i.p.ate, but-”
”Slake, can I talk to you?” Raze ground out from between clenched teeth. ”Outside?”
”'S'okay,” Wraith said. ”I gotta catch Eidolon before he gets busy helping people and c.r.a.p. Later.”
The moment Wraith sauntered off, Raze grabbed Slake, and the next thing he knew, he was being dragged into the parking lot. The manhandling was something he'd normally beat the s.h.i.+t out of someone for, but as Raze threw him up against a concrete pillar and got in his face, all he wanted to do was kiss the guy. Continue what they'd started in the alley behind Thirst.
”No more questions,” Raze growled, the low, breathy sound rumbling through all of Slake's erogenous zones.
Then realization dawned. ”Your friends don't know, do they? They have no idea you're into males.”
Gold flecks, like sunlight glinting off a lake of emerald, glinted in Raze's eyes. ”What the f.u.c.k did I just say?”
In a quick motion, Slake gripped Raze's shoulders and spun him around so it was Raze's spine biting into the post. Before the incubus could recover, Slake covered his mouth with his own. Raze froze, his body taut, his teeth clenched behind lips as cold and unyielding as the pillar. Slake kept up the pressure for a few seconds, making it clear that he didn't give up easily.
Point made, he put his mouth to Raze's ear and whispered, ”Was that why you broke it off last night? Right when things were getting good?” Never mind that Slake had been about to do the same. ”Because you don't want anyone to know you're into guys?”
”It's a little more complicated than that.” Raze tried to shove Slake away, but he held his ground, pulling back only enough to look the guy in the eye. ”Actually, a lot more complicated.”
Slake understood that, since he wasn't exactly a typical, s.h.i.+ning example of his own species. ”Tell me.”
Raze snorted. ”You gonna share your trauma first? I didn't think so. So step off, a.s.shole.”
G.o.ds, this guy was hot when he was p.i.s.sed. Slake had never been one for angry s.e.x, but something about Raze made him want to tear off both of their clothes and make use of the hood on that new BMW behind them.
He was about to say as much when the hospital's sliding doors opened and two paramedics rushed out, heading for one of two black ambulances parked nearby. One, a blond guy with eerie silver eyes, shouted at Raze.
”It's Thirst,” he yelled. ”Some kind of explosion.”
Slake's heart skidded to a panicked stop in his chest. If Fayle had been injured or killed, he was in a s.h.i.+t-ton of trouble. The m.u.f.fled trill of a phone ringing jumpstarted his heart again, and then Raze had his cell to his ear.
”Yeah, s.h.i.+t, I'll be right there.” He pocketed the phone and tore away from Slake. ”I gotta go.”
”I'm going with you.”
”Whatever,” Raze said. ”But get in my way and I'll send you back here-in the back of that ambulance.”
Slake almost laughed. Almost. Because if Fayle was dead, being in the back of an ambulance would be far preferable to whatever punishment Dyre could come up with.
Raze had always prided himself on his ability to remain calm during a crisis. To put fear on the back burner when things were crazy. But as he leaped out of the Harrowgate next to Thirst with Slake on his heels, terror pumped through him. Images of his parents, torn apart by demons, flashed in his head, and he knew he'd see the same kind of trauma in the bombing victims. Victims who were his friends. Marsden, Lexi, Vladlena . . . Fayle.
Oh G.o.ds, no.
The acrid stench of death made him gag as he stepped over chunks of jagged debris, his palm sweating all over the handle of the medic bag he'd grabbed from UGH.
Chaos ruled the scene, chaos and charred bricks and twisted, mangled metal. Sirens and screams rent the air, which was thick with black, ashy smoke that stung his eyes and nostrils. New York City emergency responders scrambled to treat the humans who had been caught in the blast that had ripped apart both Thirst and the strictly human club that served as its front.
Nate, wasn't stupid, though, and he'd already deployed the mystics he kept on staff to alter human memories when needed. The last thing anyone wanted was a paramedic or cop coming across injured demons or discovering a vampire club in their own human backyard.
”d.a.m.n.” Slake's soft voice came from right next to Raze, but somehow it seemed distant, as if there was no place for anything here but screams.
”Come on,” he barked, sprinting toward Thirst's blast-warped side door.
A few feet away, one of the mystics, Jen, was doing her, These aren't the droids you're looking for thing to a firefighter who had been heading toward the same door, now visible to humans thanks to a failure in the concealment spell that kept the place hidden from human eyes.
Inside was . . . s.h.i.+t. Smoke clogged the air and soot covered the destroyed furniture, walls, and every piece of broken gla.s.s that littered the floor next to the bodies of the dead and injured.
Pained moans and cries for help spurred Raze into action. Heart pounding, he frantically searched the victims, hoping his friends weren't among them. Hoping Fayle wasn't among them. She generally avoided the club, preferring to collect the s.e.xual energy she needed to survive from quieter sources. But every once in a while, if she needed a quick fix, the club offered s.e.xual vibes in spades.
As he kneeled next to a goat-demon and pressed his palm against a spurting wound in the male's furry leg, he heard a female voice call out his name, and he gave a mental sigh of relief.
”Raze.” Fayle stood near the destroyed medic station, her face pale, but she was otherwise unharmed. ”I was in the apartment when I heard the blast. What can I do?”
She was useless around blood, fainting at the sight of anything more than a paper cut, but it was cool of her to offer. ”Go back to the apartment and wait for me. I'll be there as soon as I can.”
”What about me?” Slake called out from where he was crouched over one of the vampire waitresses, Ava, as she rested against a wall, her mangled arm held protectively against her chest. ”What do you need me to do?”
Raze eyed Slake, the bulge of weapons beneath his jacket, and wondered what the guy did for a living. Somehow, Raze suspected Slake was more likely to be the person who caused injuries than fixed them.
”Get Ava to Underworld General Clinic. All the walking wounded need to go there. We'll let the hospital handle the critical patients.” He increased pressure on his patient's wound while he used his other hand to gesture to his medic bag. ”And grab some triage tags and black flag any DRT you come across.”
”DRT?”
Right. Slake wouldn't understand the medical slang. ”Dead Right There. Deceased,” he clarified. ”Tag 'em as you come across them. It'll save medical personnel time.” And it would give Slake something useful to do while he searched for walking wounded to escort to the clinic.
Slake leaped into action as Raze turned back to his patient. ”Hey, buddy,” he said in his calmest medic voice. ”What's your name?”
”B-Blead.”
”Like bleed,” Raze said, keeping his tone light. The guy was going to be okay, but without Raze, he'd bleed out. ”What you're doing right now.”
”Funny . . . guy,” Blead gasped, his goatlike snout wrinkling as a wave of pain wracked him.
Quickly, Raze engaged his healing power to reduce the guy's bleeding. Energy surged through his arm, running along his dermoire in a pulsing tingle instead of a steady buzz. Son of a b.i.t.c.h, he was running low on juice after six busy hours at the hospital.
Instead of doing a full heal, he did a partial, enough to keep the guy alive until one of the uninjured staff members could escort Blead to one of Underworld General's facilities.
For the rest of the afternoon, he was forced to use his gift sparingly, moving from patient to patient to triage and heal the most severe and life-threatening injuries so that the other arriving UG medical staff could treat and transport to the hospital.
He hated triage. Always had. Every instinct in him screamed for him to heal his patients, to stay with them until he was confident they were out of danger. But ma.s.s casualty situations didn't allow for that, and he lost track of the number of times he had to pause for a few seconds to rein in his frustration.