Chapter 17
Change
His roommates were home when he got back. Regardless, he slept fitfully. When morning came, and he heard them getting ready to go to work, instead of burrowing deeper underneath the covers, Rhyne got up and went into the kitchen to fix himself some breakfast.
Presently, he heard Welsh’s familiar trod approaching. Not sensing anything alarming, Rhyne assumed the color change hadn’t occurred yet.
Yet.
The suspense from waiting was almost becoming unbearable.
The man grunted when he spotted Rhyne sitting at the table with a bowl of corn flakes.
“What are you doing up so early?”
“Just felt like getting up. Is that a crime?” Rhyne quipped.
Welsh grinned as he tugged on the sleeve of his shirt. “Know what color this is?”
Yes, he did. It was orange, a glaring, almost neon shade of orange, but Rhyne feigned ignorance. “Blue?”
“It’s orange, dumbass! Now ask me how I know that.”
Rhyne played along. “How do you know that?”
“Because I remembered oranges are orange, and this is almost the same shade.”
Rhyne glanced out the one window. “Like pumpkins?”
“Yeah! Like pumpkins.”
Opening the fridge, Welsh perused the contents, then shut the door. “Nothing in there I wanna eat. I’m gonna stop at the taco place and get me a breakfast burrito along the way.” He started for the back door when Rhyne stopped him.
“Forgetting something, amigo?”
Welsh glared at him. “What?”
Rhyne held out his hand. “It’s the first of the month. It’s also my turn to have the car.” He expected an argument from the guy. He wasn’t disappointed.
“Gimme a break, Rhyne. One more day. I only had thirty days last month. You get thirty-one.”
Straightening in his chair, Rhyne didn’t try to hide his irritation. “That’s never been an issue before. Why bring it up now?” He extended his arm. “Give me the car keys.”
He saw the man hesitate. Any moment, he expected Welsh to ignore his request and go for the door, but he was closer to the garage. And faster. The man wouldn’t make it far.
“Give him the keys, Welsh.” Nash’s voice was harsh and authoritative, breaking through the stalemate.
The man whirled on Nash but checked his actions. Seeing he was outnumbered, he pulled the key fob from his pants pocket, threw it at Rhyne, and stomped out of the house, slamming the door on his way out without comment.
“Well, that was easier than I thought it would be,” Rhyne remarked sarcastically, setting the fob on the table next to him. “Thanks for the backup.”
Nash responded with a wave of his hand as he grabbed the loaf of bread on the counter. “One of these days, I’m going to let the two of you go at each other while I sit back, eat popcorn, and wait to find out who’s the victor.”
Getting to his feet, Rhyne took his empty bowl and spoon to the sink when Nash spoke again.
“Hey, do you believe this shit Welsh is telling us?”
“What shit?”
“That he can see in color.”
Rhyne figured the best way to answer the man would be to shrug. If he tried to deny it verbally, Nash would know he was lying. That, or trying to cover up something. Instead, he concentrated on washing his dishes and placing them in the drain rack to dry.
“I need to run a couple of errands before I head to work,” he noted. Giving Nash a pat on the shoulder, he wished him a good day and left for his bedroom.
Norris hadn’t called him, even though the man had promised to. The fact that he trusted the guy who’d never reneged on his word before left him puzzled and worried.
A glance at the time told him Grace should be arriving at the hospital any time now.
He briefly debated going there to see if Norris was still on site.
Even if he wasn’t, it would give Rhyne the chance to see Grace.
Maybe share another cup of coffee again if he hung around long enough.
But he also needed to go to the bank to draw out his money, and then make a run to the market to stock up with whatever he and Grace would need to get by in the event they were forced to go into hiding.
He checked his phone for the umpteenth time. There still was no incoming call logged from Norris’s number.
“Damn it, Norris. Why haven’t you called?”
Going to the bathroom, he threw some water on his face then hurried out of the house just as Nash was sitting down to enjoy his buttered toast and jam.
* * *
Welsh furiously pedaled the bicycle on his way to work.
The normally fifteen-minute drive would take him closer to thirty minutes on the bike, depending on the traffic, but in a way the exercise was therapeutic.
The steady pumping of his legs became automatic, allowing him to blow off some steam as he stewed over this latest altercation with Rhyne.
Reaching an intersection, while he waited for the light to change—from glorious red to green!—he inserted an earbud into his ear and called Nash. He had to talk to someone, and the only person who’d listen to his tirade was the other guy he lived with.
“Yeah, Welsh. What’s up?”
“I need to vent.”
He heard a loud sigh. “Welsh, I only got nineteen minutes left, and you’re gonna use them all up?”
“I’ll buy you another freaking phone card on the way home tonight,” Welsh almost growled. “Listen. Cargill and the others will be there this evening.”
“Yeah? So?”
“I’ve been thinking.”
“About what? Are you still planning on kidnapping that girl?”
“Not just that. I’m talking about swapping.”
“Swapping?”
“Rhyne for someone in his nest.”
Silence answered him. At the same time, the light changed. Welsh walked his bike across the intersection before mounting the seat to continue down the road.
“Welsh, tell me you’re not serious.”
“As a heart attack,” Welsh confirmed. “Him and me, we don’t see eye-to-eye. Never have. Never will. And I know you don’t like having to play referee every time we get into it. You don’t, do you?”
Another sigh. “It’s gotten pretty tiresome,” Nash admitted. “You two seem to be at odds more frequently these past few years.”
“So you wouldn’t be averse to me talking to Cargill about swapping one of his guys from his nest over to our nest in exchange for…” His words died in his throat before he could utter them.
Coming to an abrupt halt, Welsh stared in confusion and growing despair as the world around him slowly faded back to blacks, grays, and white. The color leeched out of everything in sight as though someone was gradually turning a dial.
“No! No, no, no!”
“Welsh? Welsh, what’s wrong?” Nash’s worried voice broke through the man’s trancelike state. “Welsh!”
“It’s gone,” Welsh softly replied, too numb to move.
“What’s gone?”
“The color. The friggin’ color’s gone!”
“Welsh—”
“I gotta get it back. I gotta get the color back!” Turning the bike around, he began pedaling toward the hospital. “I gotta get more of her blood so I can see in color again!”
“Welsh! No! Listen—”
“Later.” Welsh abruptly ended the call and stuffed the cell phone into his pants pocket.
He knew Nash would try to call him back, but it didn’t matter.
At that moment, his concern was focused on getting more blood to revive his color sight.
Not to mention the others who were due to arrive who’d be introduced to this great miracle.
All right. So the effects of the blood were temporary, not permanent as he’d originally thought.
Because of this new revelation, he had to come up with a whole new plan of action.
Clearly he couldn’t charge the price he originally wanted to for the others to gain the privilege.
Now that he knew it was a temporary measure, he had to lower his price. Much lower.
“But that’s okay,” he told himself and found a smile crawling onto his face. “Once they get a taste of its potential, when it fades, they’re gonna want to experience it again, and they’ll pay for it. And they’ll keep paying for it.”
That revelation gave him hope. “I don’t need to charge them out the wazoo.
I’ll keep the cost reasonable because I’ll make what I originally intended to ask for and a shitload more from returning customers.
” His smile widened. “Oh, yeah. That’s the trick.
Offer a product that’ll hook ‘em, charge a reasonable price, and watch the money roll in. It’ll be like a vampire drug. All I need is the product.”
He checked around him. The next time he had to stop for traffic, he’d call into work and plead sick. That would give him the whole day to set everything up.
Bending over the handlebars, he doubled down on the pedals. It no longer mattered that he didn’t have access to the car. Miss Lockhart had her own vehicle they could use.
All he needed was the product, and now was the time to obtain it.