Chapter 14
Confirmation
Since it was after hours, Rhyne entered the hospital via the emergency room doors and went directly to the small, partitioned office where a night nurse sat behind a computer. She glanced up at him through the glass.
“Yes, sir?”
“I need to see Norris, please. He works in the lab.” Rhyne mentally cursed himself.
After all this time he and the guys had been paying the man to slip them those emptied blood bags, he still didn’t know Norris’s last name.
Partly because the lab tech didn’t wear a name tag like Grace did, or a lab coat with his name stitched above the breast pocket.
Rhyne spotted the woman’s badge hanging from a lanyard around her neck.
He’d never seen Norris with a lanyard, but it would explain why he didn’t know the man’s full name.
Luckily, the nurse didn’t find his request unusual.
She got on the phone, apparently to call the lab.
After exchanging a few words, she hung up and addressed Rhyne.
“He’s on his way.”
“Thank you.” Instead of taking a seat, he went over to the water fountain and got a drink. A casual glance around the waiting room revealed a single woman engrossed in her phone over in the corner.
The rear doors leading into the triage area swung open, and Norris hurried out. Spotting Rhyne, he hurried over to him.
“I thought it might be you. I ran the ID on that blood bag first thing after I got here. You’re not going to believe this.” The man spoke in a low tone, but he couldn’t contain his excitement.
Rhyne figured he’d beat the guy to the punchline. “The donor works here at the hospital. Her name is Grace Lockhart, and she works in the admissions office.”
Norris’s head jerked back as he stared at Rhyne in shock. “How did…”
Taking the guy by the arm, Rhyne led him over to the far end of the waiting room where they could have some privacy. “Listen,” he whispered, not hiding the urgency in his voice. “What I’m going to tell you, nobody else knows. Nobody. Least of all, Grace.”
Norris’s eyebrow lifted, silently questioning why Rhyne would casually use her first name, but he remained mum.
“By sheer chance, one of my roommates met her at the grocery store. He liked the way she smelled, so he hunted her down here.”
“Wait.” Norris held up a hand. “He hunted her down?”
Rhyne ignored the question. “Somehow, he managed to get a taste of her.” He indicated his hand. “He didn’t hurt her, but the taste of her blood…changed him…the same way it changed me.”
Norris’s face paled considerably as his eyes widened in fear. “Changed you h-how? Was it because of her blood in that blood bag?”
Rhyne noticed the man’s gaze focusing on his mouth and shook his head. “Norris, forget about what you’ve seen on TV and in the movies. A lot of that, hell, almost all of what you see is made up crap. It’s all fictitious.”
“Y-you said almost all.”
Nodding, Rhyne pulled a small smile into the corners of his mouth.
“We don’t have fangs, we don’t sleep in coffins, and we don’t turn into bats.
Yes, we do need blood, but not a whole helluva lot.
Well, most of us don’t. We just need enough to keep our metabolism in balance.
The same way you take a multi-vitamin every day.
That’s why whatever residue is left in those blood bags you give us is enough for our daily requirements. ”
“What happens if you don’t get the blood? Or enough blood?” the lab tech whispered.
“We weaken,” Rhyne admitted. “But that’s not what’s at issue right now. One of the things we lose when we’re turned, other than our human aspect, is our color vision.”
“Your color vision?” Norris asked, perplexed. “You mean, you don’t see colors anymore?”
“Nope.” Rhyne lightly shook his head. “Our world turns black and white, like those old-timey movies.”
“What does that have to do with Miss Lockhart?” Norris pressed, getting Rhyne back on track.
“The other night, when you sent us that batch of bags that included the one of AB negative, yes, I drank from it. Just me and no one else. And the next morning, when I woke up…” Rhyne pointed to his eyes. “My color sight was back.”
Norris’s mouth dropped open. “It was?”
“But it didn’t last.”
The mouth grew wider. “What?”
Nodding, Rhyne informed him, “Less than three days later, I woke up to find my vision had shifted back to black and white. That’s why I brought the bag to you. To find out who the donor was so I…” He grimaced, but Norris understood.
“You wanted the color back.”
“Yeah.”
The guy glanced over Rhyne’s shoulder. “So now your roommate… Which one is he?”
“Welsh.”
“So Welsh has had a taste of Miss Lockhart’s blood, which means he can see now in color.”
“But it won’t last. In another couple of days, less, actually, it’ll revert back to the way it was. When it does, that’s going to put Grace in some serious trouble.”
Norris swallowed. “How serious?”
“Very serious.” Rhyne shoved his hands in his pockets.
“We vamps, and, yes, I’m calling myself out for what I am, but you already knew that.
But we vamps are still very human. And like humans, some of us are good guys, but some of us are not.
In fact, more of us are on the bad side rather than the good side. ”
“Why?”
“Because of our abilities. Because we’re stronger, and faster, and more agile than you.
Than any of you, including trained athletes.
Our eyesight, despite the color issue, is stronger.
Same for our sense of hearing and smell.
That’s why many, many vamps, once they’ve turned, have gone on a power trip and haven’t looked back. ”
“Can I ask a stupid question?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“If you guys are so superior, why do you hide? Why don’t you come out and, say, try to take over the world and such?”
Rhyne grinned. He’d been expecting the man to ask that question. “Because we’re not invulnerable. We can be killed as easily as one of you.”
“You mean like with a wooden stake through the heart? Or—”
Rhyne made a dismissive gesture. “A wooden stake through anyone’s heart will kill them. And don’t get me started with the holy water or other such mumbo jumbo. I told you, that’s all Hollywood garbage. It’s not reality.”
“Sooo, anything can kill you?”
“If it can kill you, it’ll kill me.”
“Guns?”
Rhyne nodded.
“Knives?”
Another nod.
Norris let out a soft, “Whoa.” Then it hit him. “So, if Welsh’s eyes, when Welsh’s eyes stop seeing color, you think he’s going to go after Miss Lockhart?”
“I don’t think. I know,” Rhyne grimly admitted.
“He’s gonna want more of her blood so he can see color again, huh?”
“Guaranteed.”
The man’s face went another notch paler. “What’ll he do? Do you think he’ll try to kidnap her or something?”
“Norris, in all my years, Grace is the only person I or anyone I know of whose blood is able to do what hers does. That not only makes her unique, it makes her invaluable to others of my kind. I have no doubt Welsh is the kind of vamp who’ll take her prisoner and keep her alive just so he can milk her to retain his color vision.
You’ve heard the expression that in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king?
Well, a vamp with color vision is superior to the rest of us, and Welsh will use that to his advantage every way he can. ”
“How?”
Rhyne frowned. “I don’t know, but I wouldn’t put it past him to try and use her for self-gain.
Knowing the guy as well as I do, he might try to sell her blood to other vamps for a hefty price.
And because the ability fades after three days, they’ll keep coming back for more.
He doesn’t know that bit about the fading yet, but it isn’t going to be pretty when he does. ”
“But if he does, if he lets other vamps get the color sight, won’t his status as being a superior vamp be diminished?”
“Not in the least. In fact, it’ll raise his status tremendously.”
“How?”
“Because he’ll have sole control of the product. While he keeps his vision intact, the others will have to bow to his demands if they want to retain theirs.”
For a second there, Rhyne wondered if the man was going to hurl, but Norris managed to keep himself together.
“Can’t you stop him?” he finally begged.
“I’m going to try,” Rhyne admitted.
“How?”
He let out an exasperated breath. “I have no fucking idea, but that’s never stopped me before.”