Page 68 of White Raven (Nevermore Duet #2)

“There was a decent chance I was an ambitious piece of shit before I met Conrad Stratford. Maybe more so before Reese was born. But after?” He shook his head.

“That kid saved my life. I wouldn’t say that it made me soft …

but before…I’d do plenty to get ahead. Now that I have that little shrimp, and his mom…

everything I’ll ever do will be to make sure they live. And live well.”

“I’m only after the same thing, Specter.

Kid or no kid. Truthfully…I’m still passionate about blood.

It’s ironic, I guess. Knowing what I am now, and that it’s always been such a key player in my life.

Maybe that’s what I’ve always found so fascinating about it.

Without blood…the balance is nothing. It’s our own personal army to keep organs working…

to fight off disease. To kill us…to feed us. It’s the breath of life.”

What an extraordinary kid. Even his scientific mind didn’t see past everything the way hers did. It was inspiring…how poetic that explanation alone was…and how effortless.

“So, what’s different about this blood? That you can tell?” He gestured at the slide with his glass.

“I fucked up,” she sighed, biting her lip. “Northwood is turning into something that may or may not kill her. I don’t know anything about hybrids. I don’t know if anyone survives. I’ve gotta fix it. This is all my fault.”

“So…are you saying that Rhaena Northwood is…”

“A werewolf. That’s exactly what I’m saying.” She took a deep swallow of her drink. “Look at this,” she said, scooting aside to give him a peek at the microscope.

He’d never seen cells like this in his life. While Sarah’s were what she liked to call ‘superheroes’, these were something more fierce, and vastly different. He would have liked to see what they looked like before her blood caused them to be this way.

“Unbelievable. It’s like they can’t decide whether to fight each other off or unite as a whole. And they’re fucking ravenous.” His mouth hung open as he watched them.

“I think that’s the problem. Her condition has done nothing but deteriorate. Where’s the blood left over from that night?”

Nick slid off of the stool and pulled an insulated lunch bag from his briefcase. As she pulled it out, she stared at the bag of blood as if remembering every horrific detail of the night he’d almost helped to end her life.

“You were so determined to put Athan in his place that night,” she snickered. “And me. I don’t know if I ever thanked you for that. We really fucked you up that night, and you still fought for my life. I’m sorry we did that to you.”

“I deserved it. But you still died.”

“I’m here, aren’t I?” she smiled, puncturing the bag with a needle, and drawing out a bit of the blood. “I wanted to kill you when I found out what you did, Nick…but I just want you to know. I wouldn’t have.”

“Are you sure about that?” he smiled, recalling the rage and promise of death in her eyes when they’d had him pissing himself in the bedroom.

“I wouldn’t have. I’d have never hurt your family. And neither would Athan.”

For what it was worth, he believed her. She added a couple of drops to the slide, and his eyes dropped to her open bag on the floor as it sat propped against the legs of the stool.

There was a file sticking out, corners bent from the rough use of her bag, and he reached down for them without thinking.

“Don’t,” she warned, glancing at him. “Your need to know has boundaries, dude.”

“I wanna help you,” he said, repositioning himself in the stool.

“You are. If you wanna help, then take this blood to Rhaena’s apartment.

I’ll write down the address. Take a prep kit with you and hook her up to this bag.

It looks like this old blood is the answer.

” She turned the knob on the side and adjusted the magnification, and he leaned in closer. “Here, look.”

It was like turning the heat down on a gas stove. Like dousing a raging inferno with ice water. The cells still remained strong—incredibly strong—but Sarah’s untainted blood from before her change was the warm blanket that settled the teething infant.

“You want me to call you? Let you know if it works?”

“No. Do what you have to do, and then make yourself scarce. I was never here, understand? Wren knows how to check in with me.”

“Wren…that was the girl you were looking for the night you bled out.”

She nodded.

“She’s safe. And well protected. I really don’t mean any offense, Nick…

but I have to keep my circle of people I trust at a really low number until I find out where Athan is.

Not only that…I feel like your wife might already be seeing the flashing neon light that says ‘alimony’ if you continue to help us out.

Our situation is just as dangerous as it was before.

I’m not putting your family at risk again. ”

“What about you?” he asked, watching her as she started cleaning up her makeshift station.

“I’ll be fine. Unlike our last enemy, I’m pretty sure this one wants me alive. But Athan might be a different story, and I’ll be damned if I let him take him from me.” She turned and pointed at the blood bag. “Do you have any more of that if one bag isn’t enough for her?”

“Yeah, I stored it.”

“You know that nobody can know you have that shit, right? If the big fish find out that I’ve been giving it away for medical miracles, I’m in the doghouse. And so are you.”

The complications of this girl’s life were astronomical for someone her age. Had that been his own daughter, it would have wrecked his soul to know she’d have to live this way forever.

“I’ve got your back, kid.”

“I’ve gotta go. Get that blood to Rhaena…quickly. Remind them not to come looking for me. Let them know I’ll reach out when it’s safe to. Be careful how much you say around badges. Got it?”

“I’ve got it.”

She shouldered her bag, and made for the back door, glancing over her shoulder as she opened it. “Thank your wife again for my second intrusion into your house.”

Nick grinned, shaking his head. “No need. Take care of yourself, St. James.”

She tightened her mouth and then disappeared, closing the door behind her.

Evie would be back with Reese any minute now.

He was sure to get an earful when she arrived.

Best to take the blow all at once, he reckoned.

Nick packed up his instruments and prepared to deliver the blood.

She might have his ass when he got back home in a couple of hours… but if it could save someone’s life…

She had the cab drop her a block down from the apartment. Good thing. It looked like Foley had a couple uniforms with him and they were leaving—with Foster.

“Vulture,” Sarah grumbled under her breath as she hid around a corner across the street and watched them.

It didn’t seem like they had taken anything, and she hoped they were satisfied with their lack of direction as to where she might be or where she’d go from here.

She waited about ten or so minutes before sneaking across the street and hiding out in the dark, under the cover of a broken streetlight.

Sarah focused her heightened hearing, singling out any sounds around her place.

Once she was satisfied it was empty, she scaled the back wall and slid into the unlocked window she’d once leapt from when she was sneaking around the cops.

They could be posted up and watching the place.

The last time that Foster had her way with her apartment, it had been trashed.

This time…it didn’t seem like anything was out of place.

Maybe they hadn’t been searching for much more than any sign that she’d been here.

Now, begged the question—where would they have taken him?

Sarah tried to recall every word of that phone call with John Allan.

“All your questions will be answered in due time. Though, you should know…you’ve held all the answers all along.”

“Cryptic, psycho dust bunny ,” she growled, growing frustrated. What answers had she had? And for how long? Was he even telling the truth?

Sarah scanned the apartment, careful to only turn the light on over the stove, so that it would be dim enough to seem like there was still no one here.

Poe’s cage sat empty, and her heart ached.

Her eyes caught a couple of feathers laying on his newspaper at the bottom of the cage, and she reflected back to Nell and her shop.

What reason would they have to kill her?

Did she know something? All they took were—

She shot her attention to the glass pane on the kitchen counter…

the only one they hadn’t stolen. If it was important enough to steal it from an old, helpless woman, then whatever answers John insisted she had, would have to show itself in this forgotten piece of literature…

right? She picked it up and held it beneath the stove light.

Damn, this was old. And in such pristine condition.

She picked every syllable apart. The handwriting, and the curls of each letter, trying to sort out differences.

Nell wouldn’t have anything in that room that wasn’t authentic.

“Only this, and nothing more…” Sarah whispered, narrowing her eyes.

“ I simply wish to see how your stories play out, little bird. Nothing more.”

“Nothing more…” She placed the frame down on the counter, and rushed over to the bookshelf, fetching the missing scrap of rolled parchment inside the glass vial where Athan had hidden her ring.

When she unrolled it, she compared it to the hunk of paper missing from the original piece.

It was indeed detached from this. Handwriting was exactly the same…

but she’d seen it before… where? She pictured Athan standing next to her, throwing his own theories from his detective brain.

“You’ve held the answers all along.”

The raven feathers in the blanket—a blanket that she’d carried everywhere, as the biggest comfort…likely a gift. A baby gift.

John Allan was a vampire. An old one. Maybe it was a gift from him . His only way to feel close to the daughter he thought he’d never know. But if that was true, then why send threatening messages to the front door of her house?

The messages.

She tore through her bag, pulling the file she’d been carrying, and holding the note from the gift box that was still inside the plastic baggie.

No identifiable prints…other than Ryan Sykes.

“Oh, my God.” She laid the note down next to the glass panel, and the unrolled scrap of paper. The handwriting…looked…the same. The same curl to the A’s. The same stubby shape to the capital letters. Unnecessary tails on different lines of the script. “Oh, my God …”

Sarah jerked Athan’s phone from her pocket, and pulled up the message John had texted—a message clearly left for her. Another clue. Another poem. Another piece of the puzzle.

“A fountain and a shrine,” she breathed, almost in disbelief. “The Poe House.” She dropped everything to the counter. “He took you to the Poe House!”

“Heaven doesn’t grant wings the color of nightshade. Tell me. Do you feel your bond?”

“The bond…” She could still feel it. That tether. That stronghold that kept them tied to each other’s lives. Her heart sank at the slight weakness of it. The raw bitterness to it that she could almost taste in her mouth. How far could they be to still speak through it?

Athan? Can you hear me?

There was nothing. Just emptiness, and the dreadful quiet of this apartment…the home they were building together.

If you can hear me…I’m coming for you. I know where you are.

Sarah scrambled through the space, throwing clothes, and necessities into a duffle bag.

Some were hers…some his. Wherever he was, she knew he’d need it.

He’d been taken with nothing more than the t-shirt, and jeans he’d been wearing.

She took his jacket. His keys. His cigarettes.

That lighter he flicked anytime he was peeved.

They’d talked about this place. This vacation.

This time together while solving one of the biggest mysteries of her life.

It was never supposed to be this way. Now it was a rescue mission, and likely somebody’s death sentence—but it wouldn’t be Athan Kane’s.

Sarah slung the bag across her body, leaving the valuable artifact behind to rot on the kitchen counter.

She jerked the window back open, looking out to make sure nobody was out there, and then leapt, landing on steady feet.

A far cry from the ankle-popping train wreck of an escape when she was still human and hanging from a drainpipe.

A few blocks down, she hailed a cab to the airport.

They’d likely be checking there next, if they hadn’t already.

She’d have to use every instinct she had, that they didn’t.

Driving would take too long. A bus would be even longer.

A train ride…no. Athan might not have that kind of time.

She’d take her chances and put up the fight she’d warned them about if they tried to stop her.

Sarah doubted the 12th would be in favor of her making another scene.

Foster might be a little harder to deal with. Time to check in with Wren.

“Hey, are you safe?”

“Yeah. Is this conversation? ”

“Yeah, I’m with Brandon over at Rhaena’s. Your boss is here. Said you sent him.”

“Is it working?”

“Don’t know yet. He just started. Any word?”

“No word, but I think I might have figured out where Athan is.”

“Shut up. Where?”

“I think they took him to the Poe Museum in Richmond. There’s more, but I want more proof before I make an ass out of myself. I’m heading to the airport. I need you to keep Foley and Foster off my tail. Can you ask Brandon if he’ll sweep up my footprints?”

“He said he will. Did you find Sykes?”

“No.”

“Sarah, you need a gun. I’ve been waiting for you to reach out. Foster thinks Sykes is some weird hybrid.”

Sarah’s skin itched, and she went still. “What? Wait… how? ”

“Born that way. At least that’s what she believes. And she thinks there’s more. She also thinks that Sykes is trying to figure out a way to get out from under whatever it is she’s doing for your dear old dad.”

“Jesus…I’ll have to get more details from you later. I’ll call you when I land.”

“Please be careful, Sarah. You don’t know what she’ll do.”

Sarah huffed a laugh. “No…she doesn’t know what I’ll do…if anything happens to him.”