Chapter 5
When the vault opened on Friday morning, Darcy threw her arms around Jack, covering his haggard face with kisses.
He tightened his weak arms around her, burying his face in her sweet-smelling hair.
“It worked, Jack,” she said near his ear in a half-whisper, half-sob. “It worked.”
Yes, he thought, still holding on to her, but not yet ready to speak. In theory, it worked.
But the pain had been extreme, and his whole body was exhausted from the suppression.
For the entirety of his adult life, he’d always felt rejuvenated after a Pleine Lune shift.
Today, he felt like he’d been hit by a car.
It had been like dying, only not as merciful, every square inch of his body screaming in the most excruciating pain he’d ever experienced.
If Darcy’s goal in testing the shift suppressor on Jack had been to prove to him that she could be turned and live a normal life, suppressing her shift every month, this trial had closed the door on that possibility.
Not only was it inconceivable to imagine letting Darcy experience the sort of pain he’d just endured, Jack wasn’t sure if he himself would ever submit to it again.
He didn’t know how he’d survive it again, and he certainly wouldn’t risk Darcy’s safety by ever letting her try it.
“I have so many questions,” she said, her voice low but excited. “How did it feel? What needs to be changed or modified? Do you think it would be possible to have an EKG machine hooked up to your body next time, or—”
There won’t be a next time, he thought.
He leaned back, reaching up to cup her face in his hands, and lowered his lips to hers for a gentle kiss. When he drew back, his smile had faded, and her eyes searched his.
What, Jack? What is it?
He looked away from her sharply. He wasn’t ready to share his feelings with her yet, because he knew how hard she’d worked and how much she’d wanted her potion to succeed.
Releasing her face, he took her hand, pulling her toward the stairs.
“Jack?”
“I haven’t showered, slept in my own bed, or eaten in almost two days, Darcy. Can we talk in a little bit?”
“Of course,” she said, following him up the stairs, but he noticed the dip in her voice. “You shower and rest. I’ll make you some lunch, okay?”
Jack’s usual self would have teased her about showering with him, but he was too exhausted to contemplate sex with her right now, and the realization frightened him.
It was one of the most basic Roug urges: to hunt and to mate.
With the suppression of one, need he fear the elimination of the other?
He squeezed Darcy’s hand tighter as he pushed his code into the keypad at the top of the stairs and pulled her through the door into the garage.
“Jack…?” she asked softly, her voice tentative. “You’re so quiet. Are you okay?”
He glanced back at her as they neared the garage door, which he opened by pressing a button beside the stairs that led upstairs to her study. Careful not to maintain eye contact for more than a moment, he nodded, watching the garage door rise slowly, allowing sunlight to flood the dim room.
“I’m just tired,” he said, the need for a hot shower and sleep even bypassing his need for food. “We’ll talk in a little while, okay?”
And then, because his disappointment and exhaustion and fear were so extreme, he dropped her hand and walked back to the house on his own without looking back.
Darcy stayed rooted to a spot under the raised garage door and watched Jack’s body as he walked to the house and let himself inside.
His gait was unfamiliar to her, lacking the confident stride he generally employed.
He moved carefully, almost cautiously, like everything hurt.
His hands hung limply by his side, and his neck bent forward, as though weighted down.
Her heart twisted as she realized that his power of rejuvenation didn’t seem to be kicking in. If anything, it almost seemed as though he’d been stripped of it.
Oh god, what have I done? she thought, absentmindedly pressing the garage button and following him slowly to the house.
She took a quick inventory of his behavior.
The potion had suppressed the Pleine Lune shift, but it had obviously been incredibly painful for him to endure.
He’d passed out, but still writhed in pain.
And for the ensuing day and a half, he’d slept.
But instead of appearing rejuvenated now, he seemed to be more exhausted than ever.
Aside from the gentle, somewhat chaste kiss he’d given her, all he’d done was hold her hand.
After three days apart, she’d have expected him to rip off her clothes and take her on the floor of the vault, or at least drag her up to his bedroom.
But he’d released her hand and almost staggered to the house alone.
And even more troubling, he wouldn’t talk to her, either verbally or with his eyes, almost like he was avoiding her.
Her first words when he exited the vault had been “It worked,” but now she questioned that statement. Had it worked? At what price to Jack?
She looked down at her arm where goose bumps rose, despite the warm sun on her skin.
What if, in her quest to suppress his change and convince him to turn her, she had somehow modified his body in some terrible, irreversible way?
What if the potion had taken something away from him that she hadn’t foreseen?
Closing the front door behind her, Darcy shucked off her shoes and stepped into the living room barefoot just as the shower turned on upstairs, the water running through pipes over her head.
Her heart raced, and her hands started to sweat as she recognized something that she’d been unable to fully comprehend during her tunnel vision of research and formulas.
What if she’d hurt Jack in her blind ambition to convince him to turn her?
She swallowed uncomfortably, her hands shaking.
She was a scientist, and yet she’d made a very dangerous decision to administer the potion to him without figuring out another way to test it first. Her feelings for him, her desperation over their situation, were making her reckless, making her risk what she loved most of all in the world: Jack.
Suddenly, Darcy realized in a flash of consciousness that for most of her adult life, she’d held her own counsel and made her own decisions.
As a result, she’d had few regrets and even less contention.
But now, in the course of a few months, her inner GPS, her always reliable self-guidance, had been skewed.
Bracing her hands on the kitchen counter, she knew what she had to do.
She flicked her eyes to a notepad on the counter under the phone and slid it in front of her, pulling a pen out from a drawer beneath the counter.
She looked up at the ceiling, as if confirming that Jack would remain in the shower for some time, and because he was so incredibly exhausted, she was fairly certain he’d pass out in bed for a while before coming back downstairs.
She needed to take her fate into her own hands.
The note didn’t take long to write, and she grabbed her purse and keys off the counter, slipping into her shoes and heading back out the front door before Jack could realize that she’d gone.
As she started her car, her heart flip-flopped desperately. They’d already been separated for three days, and she was about to add many more days to the tally. She brushed away tears as she stepped on the gas and rounded Jack’s driveway, heading over the bridge and into the woods.
Somehow, she knew in her soul that Jack would be even less apt to discuss turning her now that he’d endured the pain and privation of the potion, and if Darcy showed up in human form on the equinox, she’d be torn apart.
She was left with no other choice.
It was time to go north.
An hour later, Darcy glanced over at Willow. They were a good forty miles away from Carlisle now, speeding farther and farther into Canada, and Willow had finally decided they were far enough away to call Amory.
“Hey, Brat,” she said, smiling as Amory answered.
Darcy couldn’t hear her brother’s muffled answer, but Willow chuckled softly. “You too.” She paused for a second, smiling at whatever Amory was saying.
“Hey,” she said, “I can’t make dinner tonight. No. Your sister wanted to head to Boston for a night. Mm-hmm.” She paused, shooting a grim glance at Darcy, but keeping her voice light. “Nope. Just a bunch of boring wedding stuff.”
As Willow continued her conversation with Amory, Darcy realized how grateful she was to have Willow by her side. As though she’d known Darcy was coming, Willow had been standing in the open front doorway as Darcy pulled into the driveway, dark eyes serious and worried with her hands on her hips.
As Darcy strode toward the house, Willow had nodded. “It’s time?”
Darcy lingered on the bottom porch step, looking up at her best friend. “You’re not going to stand in my way?”
Willow shook her head. “Would it do any good?”
“I’m going either way,” Darcy had stated, ascending the porch steps and pushing past Willow to jog upstairs. She was packing a bag when she heard Willow’s footfall in the hallway.
“I’m coming with you,” she said softly from behind Darcy.
“I know. But I wish you wouldn’t. Neither of us knows if you’ll make it out alive.”
“I will,” Willow insisted, stepping forward to place a comforting palm on Darcy’s back. “But you…”
Darcy swallowed the lump in her throat and turned from the duffel bag on her bed to face her friend. “The potion didn’t work right.”
Willow searched her face. “It didn’t suppress the shift?”
“It did,” said Darcy, sitting on the bed. “But it was…horrible. He was in terrible pain. Writhing, screaming in anguish for over twelve hours. Vomiting until all that remained was bile. And when he left the vault this morning, he was so haggard, Will. So defeated and exhausted. I just—I can’t…”