SEVEN

As Payne lay on her metal slab beneath the odd chandelier of illumination, she couldn't believe her healer was a human.

"Do you understand what I'm saying?" His voice was quite deep and his accent was strange to her, but not one she hadn't heard before: Her twin's mate had the same intonation and inflection. "I'm going to go in and ..."

While he spoke to her, he leaned down into her field of vision, and she liked when he did that. His eyes were a brown color, but not that of oak bark or old leather or the coat of a stag. They were a lovely reddish shade, like mahogany that had been polished - and just as luminous, she would venture to say.

There had been such a flurry of activity since his arrival, and one thing had become clear: He was well versed in the giving of orders and very confident in his job. Actually, there was something else, too.... He didn't care that her brother had taken an instant hatred to him.

If Vishous's bonding scent got any stronger, it would be visible upon the air.

"Do you understand?"

"Her ears are just fucking fine."

Payne glanced over as far as she could toward the doorway. Vishous had returned and was baring his fangs like he was of half a mind to attack. Fortunately, by his side, a male stood tight upon him, rather like a leash with stout legs: If her twin were to lunge for it, that male with the dark hair was obviously poised to encompass Vishous bodily and drag him from the room.

This was good.

Payne refocused on her healer. "I understand."

The human's eyes narrowed. "Then tell me what I said."

"Whatever for?"

"This is your body. I want to make sure you know what I'm going to do to it, and I'm concerned about a language barrier."

"She knows what the fuck you're say - "

Her healer glared over his shoulder. "Are you still here?"

The dark-haired male beside her twin locked an arm around Vishous's chest and muttered something on a hiss. Then he addressed her healer, speaking with a slightly different accent. "You need to chill, my man. Or I'm going to let him turn you into beef jerky for taking that tone. Capisce?"

She had to approve of the way her healer met the aggression head-on: "You want me to operate, it's on my terms and in my way. So he's out in the hall or you're getting yourself another scalpel. What's it gonna be."

There was a lot of consternated arguing at that point, with Jane rushing over from where she had been at a window that played pictures upon its pane. She spoke softly at first until finally her voice was as loud as the rest of theirs were.

Payne cleared her throat. "Vishous. Vishous. Vishous!"

Getting nowhere, she put her two lips together and whistled loud enough to shatter glass.

As a flame would be snuffed out, so too were the lot of them, although the angry energy lingered about in the air like smoke from atop a wick.

"He shall treat me now," she said weakly, the tension in the room a form of fever that took o'er her body, making her even more lethargic. "He shall ... treat me. It is my wish." Her eyes went to her healer. "You shall endeavor to rebreak my fused spinal vertebrae, as you call them, and it is your hope that my spinal cord is not severed but merely injured. You state further that you cannot predict the outcome, but that when you are 'in there,' you may be able to assess the damage more clearly. Yes?"

Her healer looked at her in a powerful way. Deeply. Gravely. With an edge that she was confused about ... and yet not threatened by. Fates, hardly that - in fact, something in his eyes made her ... uncurl on the inside.

"Have I recalled it all correctly?" she prompted him.

Her healer cleared his throat. "Yes. You have."

"Then operate ... as you call it."

Over by the doorway, she heard the dark-haired man say something to her twin, and then Vishous lifted his arm and pointed his gloved finger at the human. "You will not live through this if she does not."

Cursing, Payne closed her eyes and wished anew that what she had sought for so long had not been gained. Better to have gone unto the Fade than cause the death of some innocent human - "

Deal."

Payne's lids popped open. Her healer stood unbowed before her twin's size and strength, accepting the burden laid upon his head.

"But you leave," the human said. "You need to get the fuck out of here and stay out. I'm not going to be distracted by your shit."

Her twin's massive body twitched in the shoulders and the chest, but then he inclined his head once. "Deal."

And then she was alone with her healer, except for Jane and the other nurse.

"One last test." Her healer leaned to the side and got a thin stick off one of the counters. "I'm going to run this pen up your foot. I want you to tell me if you feel anything."

When she nodded, he moved out of her range of sight and she closed her eyes to concentrate, straining for some kind of sensation to register. Anything.

Surely if there was a response, however dim, that was a good sign -

"I feel something," she said with a surge of energy. "On my left side."

There was a pause. "How about now."

She begged her legs for a similar reception and had to breathe deeply before she could answer. "No. Nothing."

The sound of the soft sheets being repositioned was the only confirmation she got that she was covered once again. But at least she had felt something.

Except instead of addressing her, her healer and her twin's mate conversed quietly, just out of earshot.

"Verily," Payne said, "mayhap you will include me in the discussion." The pair of them came over and it was curious that neither looked pleased. "It is good that I felt aught, no?"

Her healer came closer to her head, and she felt the warm strength of his palm take her own. As he stared at her, she was yet anew captivated: His lashes were very long. And across his strong jaw and his cheeks, a shadow of beard was showing. His thick, dark hair was shiny.

And she really liked the way he smelled.

But he hadn't replied to her, had he? "Is it not, healer?"

"I wasn't touching you on your left foot at that time."

Payne blinked through an unexpected upset. And yet, after all this time being immobile, she should be prepared for information like that, shouldn't she.

"So are you going to begin the now?" she asked.

"Not yet." Her healer glanced over at Jane, and then looked back. "We're going to have to move you for the operation."

"This hallway ain't far enough away, buddy."

As Butch's reasonable voice registered, V wanted to bite the guy's head off. And the urge got even stronger as the bastard continued. "How 'bout heading over to the Pit?"

Logical advice, true. And yet ... "You're starting to piss me off, cop."

"Like that's a news flash? And P.S., I don't care."

The door to the exam room opened and his Jane slipped out. As she looked at him, her forest green eyes were not happy.

"Now what," he barked, unsure whether he could handle any more bad news.

"He wants to move her."

After a moment of blinking like a cow, V shook his head, convinced he'd gotten his languages confused. "Excuse me?"

"To St. Francis."

"No. Fucking. Way - "

"Vishous - "

"That's a human hospital!"

"V - "

"Have you lost your mind - "

At that moment, the godforsaken human surgeon came out, and to his credit, or his insanity, he got right up into V's grille. "I can't work on her here. You want me to try it and paralyze her for good myself ? Use your goddamned head - I need an MRI, microscopes, equipment, and staff you don't have here. We're out of time, and she can't be transported far - besides, if you're the U.S. government, you can bury her records and make sure this doesn't get picked up by the press, so the exposure will be minimal with my help."

U.S. government? What the - Yeah, whatever with that. "She's not going to a human hospital. Period."

The guy frowned over the "human" thing, but then seemed to shake it off. "Then I'm not operating - "

V launched himself at the man.

It was a total blink-of-the-eye kind of thing. One minute, he was planted in his shitkickers; the next he was all fly-be-free - at least until he slammed into the good doctor and velvet-Elvised the bastard onto the corridor's concrete wall.

"Get in there and start cutting," V growled.

The human could barely draw a breath, but hypoxia didn't stop him from manning up. He met V right in the eyeball. Unable to speak, he mouthed, Won't. Do. It.

"Let him go, V. And let him take her where he needs to go."

As Wrath's voice cut through the drama, the urge to go pyrotechnic became nearly irresistible. Like they needed another kibitzer? And fuck-that on the command.

V squeezed the surgeon's collar trash-bag tight. "You are not taking her anywhere - "

The hand on V's shoulder was heavy, and Wrath's voice had an edge like a dagger. "And you're not in charge here. She's my responsibility, not yours."

Wrong thing to say. On so many levels.

"She is my blood," he snarled.

"And I'm the one who put her on that bed. Oh, and I'm also your cocksucking king, so you will do as I command, Vishous."

Just as he was about to say and do something he would later regret, Jane's sanity reached him. "V, at this moment, you are the problem. Not your twin's condition, or Manny's decision. You need to step back, get some clarity, and think, not react. I will be with her the whole time, and Butch will come with me, won't you."

"Abso," the cop replied. "And I'll get Rhage, too. She won't be left alone for an instant."

Dead silence. During which V's rational side fought for his steering wheel ... and that human refused to back down. In spite of the fact that he was one stab through the heart away from a coffin, that son of a bitch just kept glaring right back.

Christ, you could almost respect him for it.

Jane's hand on V's biceps was nothing like Wrath's. Her touch was light, soothing, careful. "I spent years in that hospital. I'm familiar with all the rooms, all the people, all the equipment. There is not one square inch of that facility that I don't know like the back of my hand. Manny and I will work together and make sure that she gets in and gets out fast - and that she's protected. He's got ultimate power there as chief of surgery, and I will be with her every step of the way ..."

Jane continued talking but he heard nothing more, a sudden vision coming down through him like a signal received from some external transmitter: With crystal clarity, he saw his sister astride a horse, going at a gallop on the edge of a forest. There was no saddle, no bridle, and her hair was unfurled and streaming behind her in the moonlight.

She was laughing. With complete and utter joy.

She was free.

Throughout his life, he had always seen pictures of the future - so he knew this was not one of them. His visions were exclusively of deaths - those of his brothers and Wrath and their shellans and children. Knowing how those around him would pass was part of his reserve and all of his madness: He was privy only to the means, never the time, and therefore he couldn't save them.

So what he saw now was not the future. This was what he wanted for the twin he had found far too late and was in danger of losing far too early.

V, at this moment, you are the problem.

Not trusting himself to speak to any of them, he dropped the doc like a dime and pulled back. As the human caught his breath, V didn't look at anyone but Jane.

"I can't lose her," he said in a weak voice, even though there were witnesses.

"I know. I'll be with her every step of the way. Trust me."

V closed his eyes briefly. One of the things that he and his shellan had in common was that they were both very, very good at what they did. Devoted to their jobs, they existed in parallel universes of their own creation and focus: the fighting for him, the healing for her.

So this was the equivalent of him swearing he would kill someone for her.

"Okay," he croaked. "All right. Gimme a minute with her, though."

Pushing through the double doors, he approached his twin's bed, and was very aware this could be the last time he spoke with her: Vampires, like humans, could die during operations. Did die.

She looked even worse than before, lying all too motionless, her eyes not just closed but squeezed shut as if she were in pain. Shit on a shingle, his shellan was right. He was the slow-up here. Not that f'n surgeon.

"Payne."

Her lids lifted slowly, like they weighed as much as I beams. "Brother mine."

"You're going to a human hospital. Okay?" As she nodded, he hated that her skin was the color of the white bedsheet. "He's going to operate on you there."

When she nodded again, her lips parted and her breath hitched like she was having trouble breathing. "'Tis for the best."

God ... now what? Did he tell her he loved her? He guessed he did, in his own fucked-up way.

"Listen ... you take care," he mumbled.

Lame-ass. Fucking lame-ass little bitch. But it was all he could manage.

"You ... too," she groaned.

Of its own volition, his good hand reached out and slowly slid against hers. As he tightened his grip slightly, she didn't move or respond, and he had a sudden panic that he'd missed his opportunity, that she was already gone.

"Payne."

Her lids fluttered. "Yes?"

The door opened and Jane put her head in. "We have to get going."

"Yeah. Okay." V gave his sister's palm a final squeeze; then he left the room in a hurry.

When he got out into the hall, Rhage had arrived, and so had Phury and Z. Which was good. Phury was especially proficient at hypnotizing humans - and he'd done it at St. Francis before.

V went up to Wrath. "You're going to feed her, true. When she comes out of the operation, she's going to need to feed, and your blood's the strongest we've got."

As he put the demand on the table, it would have been great if he'd given a shit that Beth, the queen, might have a problem with sharing her mate like that. But, selfish bastard that he was, he didn't care.

Except Wrath just nodded. "My shellan was the one who suggested it first."

V's eyes squeezed shut. Damn, that was a female of worth right there. Straight up.

Before he took off, he grabbed a last glance at his shellan. Jane was as steady as a house on solid ground, her face and her eyes strong and sure.

"I have no words," he said hoarsely.

"And I know exactly what you're telling me."

V stood three feet from her, stuck to the floor, wishing he were a different kind of male. Wishing ... so much about everything was different.

"Go," she whispered. "I've got this."

V took a last look over at Butch, and when the cop nodded once, the decision was final. Vishous nodded at his boy and then he strode off, out of the training center, into the underground tunnel, and up to the Pit.

Where he promptly realized that the physical distance didn't do shit for him. He still felt he was in the midst of all the drama ... and didn't really trust himself not to end up back down there "to help."

Out. He needed out and away from them all.

Breaking through the heavy front door, he marched into the courtyard ... and ended up parked and going nowhere, just like the cars that were lined up side by side opposite the fountain.

As he stood like a planker, a strange, flicking noise got his attention.

At first he couldn't place it, but then he looked down. His gloved hand was shaking and hitting his upper thigh.

From beneath the lead-lined leather, the glow was bright enough to leave him squinting.

Goddamn it. He was so close to the edge of losing it, he might as well have already been in midair.

With a curse, he dematerialized and headed for the place he always went when he got like this. He didn't want the destination or the drive that sent him into the night ... but like Payne, his destiny was out of his hands.