“You have to. Because when she turns, that won’t be Laney anymore, and you know it.”
That was the problem. Troy knew. “But she’s not human, not really. How do we know the lycan bite will work the same on her as it works on humans?”
There was no shock or surprise on John’s expression as the comment revealed Laney wasn’t human. But then he’d seen her in action. There was no way anybody that was human could take on an entire werewolf pack and win the way she had. They would have torn most people to pieces within seconds of stepping through the door.
He nodded. “If she’s not human… then no, the infection might not work the same way.”
Troy sighed in relief, but John wasn’t done, his frown deepening. “It might be worse.”
Troy’s heart lurched. That wasn’t what he wanted to hear.
“Do you want to unleash a super werewolf on the town? We can’t deal with normal werewolves. How are we going to deal with something that’s packing more supernatural power?” John demanded, his grip tightening.
Shitshitshit.
Bile rose, and Troy closed his eyes for a second. John was right. He didn’t know how whatever Laney was would react to a lycan bite. All he knew was that she wasn’t human. Other than that, he didn’t know what the hell she was. She’d danced around the subject whenever he’d asked, and he hadn’t wanted to push, not wanting to ruin what they had.
But no intel was just as bad as crap intel. Both got people dead. Fast.
“Find her,” John urged, pushing him towards the door. “I’ll deal with this. Find her And put her down if you need to. It won’t be Laney anymore; you know that. The kindest thing you can do is put her out of her misery. We’re cops, Troy. Protect and serve, no matter what our feelings are on the matter.”
Troy’s grip firmed on the gun. He nodded, turning toward the door. He had to find out, and God damn his soul… he might have to kill the woman he was sure he was falling in love with.
* * *
The journey through town was short and sweet, but Troy didn’t see any of it. He’d defaulted to his training, heading back to her motel room. If she wasn’t there, he’d cycle through all the places she’d been seen and go from there. He was sure that no mortal police department would get a read on her if she didn’t want them to. Not with the way she could disappear like that or appear to be someone else. He wasn’t sure why he could see her, and from the surprise on her face when she’d explained it, she didn’t know why he could either.
The Shade is the place between life and death.
Her words came back to him. She’d said that witches walked the barriers between the worlds, and he knew there was a wrong side of the Shade, presumably death. But she’d also said that she’d been half in the Shade when he got the weird double versions of her.
“What the fuck are you, sweetheart?” he murmured, swinging his car into the parking lot of the motel. His breath punched out of his lungs in relief. A bike was outside an open door. His eyes widened as he pulled up to park. He’d never liked bikes much, he’d had too many friends killed by them, and this monster radiated danger, a murderous aura surrounding it.
He threw his car into park and killed the engine, out of the vehicle in a heartbeat. Skirting the big bike, he cast it a glance. Not parked neatly, it was sideways onto the door as if the rider had slid to a stop in a hurry. There were no keys in the ignition. On his quick pass, too eager to get inside, he couldn’t even see an ignition. It must be an electronic ignition.
Gun in hand, he shouldered the door open.
“Laney? Laney, are you in there? I’m coming in, sweetheart.”
He shouldn’t have given the warning; he knew that. She’d been bitten. He should have gone in hard and fast, ready to put her down. He couldn’t. Kicking himself for his idiocy, he stepped through the door, expecting to get taken off his feet any moment by a feral version of his girlfriend before she tore his throat out.
That thought stopped him dead just inside the doorway. The room was empty. Still. His mind wasn’t. Was Laney his girlfriend? Could he call her that when they’d never had that conversation? And where the fuck was she?
He cast a look around the room, gaze landing on the trail of clothes across the room. It led to the bathroom, her weapons belt right there outside the door. She was still here.
The sound of water made him frown, and he padded across the room on silent feet. Was she taking a bath? That made sense since she’d been covered in blood. He’d have wanted it off his skin as soon as possible as well.
He reached the doorway of the bathroom and froze. The scene within was not the one he’d expected. His mind had conjured up images of Laney in the shower, skin pink from where she’d scrubbed werewolf blood from her body. But she wasn’t, pink that was. Not from scrubbing or the heat of the water.
Instead, she lay in a bath filled with ice, her skin so pale she was the same color as the tiles, and her lips were blue. Registering him in the doorway, she looked up, surprise in her eyes. He stepped through the door, determined to cross the distance between them, grab her shoulders and shake the hell out of her. Demand to know what the fuck she thought she was up to.
Before he reached her though, she whispered, “oh, bollocks.” Her eyes rolled into the back of her head, and she slipped under the water.
“Fuck!”
He dropped to his knees by the tub and plunged his hands into the water. An icy wave hit his chest, soaking him through, but he got his arms under hers to drag her out. She was so tiny; it barely took any effort to talk to haul her out of the tub. As they tumbled together onto the cold tile floor of the bathroom, he twisted so that his back hit the floor first, and she sprawled over him. A softer landing. A second later, he laid her down on the tiles and leaned over to cheque her vital signs. Shit. She wasn’t breathing. Jamming his fingers into her throat, he swore. She didn’t have a pulse.
“Oh fuck! Laney... oh God, come on Laney. Please!” he begged, leaning in to start CPR. With each compression and breath of air into her lungs, he prayed silently. She was going to be alright. She had to be alright. He wouldn’t accept any other outcome.
An eternity passed, but it could only have been a few minutes before he felt the life return to her body. She groaned and shoved at him. Rocking back to sit on his heels, he helped her turn onto her side. Her color was coming back, the pallor of death fading from her skin.
“Fuck’s sake, break a couple of ribs, why don’t you?”
“Shit... are you okay? You stopped breathing. I couldn’t find a pulse.” Yeah, so his voice was a little tight with worry. Sue him. She’d been dead when he pulled her out of that tub, and he knew it.
“Yeah,” she croaked in reply, struggling to sit up.
He didn’t give her the chance to get there on her own, hauling her up against his chest. She shivered as she wrapped herself around him. Cold and wet, it was an embrace he would remember for the rest of his life. Reaching to the side, he snagged a large towel from the rail to wrap it around her. She gave a soft sigh of relief and pleasure and clung to him in a way that fed the male animal inside. Making sure to wrap her completely in the towel, he lifted her gently to carry her through to the bedroom.