Die for Me

“Oh my God, Georgia!” I cried, and looked over at my sister. I used the last bit of my strength to crawl over to her and touch her bloodless face.

“Are you okay?” I asked her.

“I think so. It just hurts to move,” she replied, her voice weak.

“She needs help,” I said urgently to Ambrose. “She might have a concussion—she really slammed her head hard and was unconscious for a while. And I’m pretty sure her hand is broken too.”

Ambrose crouched over her and, being careful not to move her neck, pulled her out of her crumpled position and laid her flat on the ground.

“We need to get her to the hospital,” I said.

“She’s not the only one needing medical attention,” Ambrose replied, pointing at my shoulder.

I looked down to see my shirt soaked in blood. Although I hadn’t felt it before, a burning pain now raced through my arm, exploding as it reached the open gash. I grabbed my shoulder, and then just as quickly, wincing in pain, dropped my hand.

Hearing ru

“She’s fine,” called Ambrose. “Sliced up her shoulder and leg a bit, but she’s alive.”

Jules looked around the room wildly, and seeing Vincent’s form near the fireplace, fell to his knees in relief. Holding his hands to his head, he said softly to the air, “Vince, oh man, I’m so glad you’re still here.”

A pungent, acrid smoke began to pour out of the chimney as Lucien’s body caught fire. Looking in that direction, Ambrose said, “We should get out of here if we don’t want to suffocate on the fumes.”

Jules got to his feet, opened the windows, and then squatted down next to us. “How’s she?” he asked, nodding in Georgia’s direction.

“Alive,” I said.

“And how about you?” he said, cradling my face in his hand.

Tears clouded my eyes. “I’m fine,” I said, and quickly wiped them away.

“Oh, Kate,” he said, and leaning toward me, wrapped me in his arms. It was exactly what I needed: human touch. Okay, not human, whatever. Since Vincent wasn’t there to hold me, Jules made a more than adequate substitute.

“Thanks,” I whispered.

“Hospital,” Ambrose said simply, and stood to pull a phone out of his pocket. He walked to the other side of the room to make the call, and Jules released me to follow him.

I looked down at my sister. She seemed dazed. “We’re going to a hospital. Everything’s going to be okay.”

“Where is he? Lucien?” she asked numbly.

“Dead,” I said simply.

She looked at me and asked, “What happened?”

“How much did you see?” I asked her.

She gave me a weak smile and said, “Enough to know that my sister is one badass sword fighter.”

Chapter Thirty-Eight

THE OTHERS ARRIVED HOME JUST AS OUR AMBULANCE pulled up. Ambrose had called their regular contact, who agreed to take us to a private medical clinic without filing a police report. The paramedics didn’t want to move Georgia’s head, so she was fitted with a neck brace and carried to the ambulance on a stretcher. After they put temporary wrappings on my wounds, Jules and I climbed into the back, sitting next to her.

I had to wonder what the paramedics were thinking about us: two fragile-looking teenage girls who looked like they had been in a gang fight, and Jules dressed up like someone from The Matrix. I was a hundred percent sure that if they hadn’t been paid off, we would be on our way to a police station to be questioned.

Even though I was dying to know what had happened at the Catacombs, we didn’t talk, since one of the paramedics was sitting in the back with us. He was obviously using discretion with the questions he asked, and after glancing at Jules for approval, I answered simply that Georgia had hit her head really hard on a wooden bedpost, and that someone had stepped on her hand. I told him that the cuts on my shoulder and leg were knife wounds. I hoped that providing him with basic information, no frills, would be enough, and judging from his satisfied nod, it was.

Once at the clinic, Georgia was inspected and judged to be fine, except for a few broken bones in her hand, which were set. My leg wound wasn’t deep, but my shoulder required a dozen stitches. After testing my hand’s mobility, the doctor said I was lucky that the blade hadn’t touched any nerves.

He followed that with a regular checkup, light in the eyes, blood pressure, and the like. Finally he sighed and said, “Mademoiselle, it looks like you’re suffering from extreme exhaustion. Your blood pressure is dangerously low. You’re ru

I shook my head.

“When you were hurt, had you been taking part in . . . intensive physical exercise?”

“Yes,” I said, wondering what he would think if he knew exactly what type of physical exercise it had been.

“Do you feel faintness, fatigue, or nausea?”

I nodded.

Actually, since Vincent had left my body, I felt like a rag doll, with barely enough energy to walk. Knowing that the well-being of both my sister and myself depended on my being able to put one foot in front of the other was the only thing that had kept me going.

“You need to rest. Your body needs to recuperate from whatever it is that you’ve just been through. You and your friend”—he nodded at the bed Georgia was lying on—“have had quite an evening. Rest and recover, or you’ll end up hurting yourself even worse.”

He gestured toward Jules and lowered his voice. “You can answer me by nodding or shaking your head. Should I let you leave the clinic with this man?”

I realized how dangerous Jules appeared in his steel-toed boots, leather pants, and layers of black protective clothing. I whispered, “It wasn’t him. He’s a friend.” The doctor looked me in the eye for another second, and, finally convinced, he nodded and let me step down from the table.

As Jules was talking to the doctor and handing him cash in exchange for the treatment, I whispered, “Vincent?”

Yes, came the immediate reply.

“Have you been here the whole time?”

How could I leave you at a time like this?

I closed my eyes and tried to imagine his arms around me.

We returned to a house that felt like a general’s headquarters post-battle. There was a muffled movement from room to room as people visited one another and helped tend to the others’ wounds.

I had explained to Georgia that we had to spend the night at Vincent’s house. We couldn’t go home like this. I led her up the stairs and helped her into Charlotte’s bed, guessing that Lucien’s body was still burning in Vincent’s room. Even if it wasn’t, I couldn’t imagine going back to the scene of that gory bloodbath. Still mute from shock, Georgia was asleep by the time her head hit the pillow.

My shoulder was starting to burn again, now that the anesthetic used to stitch up my wound was wearing off. I headed downstairs to the kitchen for some water to swallow the pain pills I had been given.

Does it hurt? came Vincent’s voice in my head.

“Not much,” I lied.

Jules walked through the swinging doors, looking much more himself in torn jeans and a formfitting T-shirt. He flashed me a smile that conveyed both tenderness and respect. “House meeting,” he said. “Jean-Baptiste wants you to be there.”

“He does?” I said with surprise. Jules nodded and handed me a clean T-shirt. “I thought you might want to be a bit more presentable,” he said, pointing to my blood-soaked clothes. He turned his back as I quickly changed and threw the ruined garment into the garbage can.