Page 24 of For Love and Blood and Fury

“The patient you were just leaving a snail trail all over?—”

“How dare?—”

“Okay, both of you. As excruciatingly hot as this is to watch, and believe me it is, we have bigger things to contend with right now. Marisol, this is Zuri. She’s a witch and I’m pretty sure she’s here to help. Zuri, Marisol didn’t know she was a witch, and she’s been trying to help me.” Elena reached for Zuri. “Now get me out of here.”

“What the hell do you think I’m here to do, Elena?” Zuri snapped. “Paint your fucking toenails?”

Zuri turned toward the wheelchair but she didn’t make it two steps before a new presence slipped in through the curtain. Aman, face plain and unassuming, appeared in the middle of the strangest day of Marisol’s life.

Assuming he was lost, Marisol was about to lead him back to where he belonged when he spoke. Voice deep and fangs like a viper, he said, “If you make a sound, I will kill every person in this hospital. The old lady with Alzheimer’s in seven and the six-year-old with a broken arm in ten. And I promise it will be terrifying and painful.” His casual tone might not have sent a shiver down Marisol’s spine if she didn’t instinctually know he meant what he said.

“This is not your fight,” he said to Marisol and Zuri. “Stay out of it, and I’ll have no reason to kill you.” He turned to Elena and snarled. “I’m only here for her.” From somewhere in his pants, he pulled out a long knife covered in something greasy. The kind that reminded Marisol of sitting in her grandmother’s living room and watching Crocodile Dundee movies on weekend TV because they couldn’t afford cable.

Several things happened at once. Deciding that there was no way one person could take on an entire ER, Marisol spun toward the emergency call button next to Elena’s bed. Blindingly fast, the man lunged for her, crushing her throat in his hands before shoving her to the floor.

Her head slammed into the wall, her vision blurring to compete with the burning agony in her throat. Moving as fast as the man had, Elena pulled something from her sock. She flung it like a dart at the guy’s face, but when it hit him, it didn’t break the skin.

“Come on, motherfucker,” Elena taunted. “Try and get me with that little thing. See if it makes up for what Lilith didn’t give you.” She flashed her fangs and made the kind of sound feral cats produced before attacking each other.

Rage turned corporeal when he turned his attention away from Marisol and toward Elena. Marisol scrambled to her feet,trying to scream, but she couldn’t make anything other than a wheezing sound.

He didn’t reach Elena. Not when Zuri catapulted herself onto his back like a rabid flying squirrel. Clawing at his eyes in a way Marisol had to look away from to avoid getting sick, Zuri locked her legs around his waist and ravaged his face.

“Get off of me,” he growled.

“No,” Marisol cried in a soundless scream. It did nothing to stop him from slashing Zuri’s forearm. A sheet of thick, red blood poured out of her wound like a velvet curtain.

Zuri landed on the floor, gripping her arm. Mouth open and eyes wide with shock, her tanned skin paled quickly.

Scrambling toward her, Marisol meant to keep pressure on the gash. To stop the bleeding before she’d lost too much. But when she covered Zuri’s blood-soaked hands with hers, she felt the sensation she’d tried to reproduce but couldn’t. Like the faintest tingle of adrenaline, indistinguishable from the expected reaction to a serious situation. If she wasn’t looking for it, she’d never discern it from the normal rush of being on a trauma call.

Marisol slowed the bleeding. Willing whatever was working in her to work faster, she closed her eyes and squeezed hard enough to snap Zuri’s radius. She poured herself into the gash, demanding the skin to come back together. To close. To heal.

The pain in Marisol’s head disappeared. Her sore throat soothed back to normal.

“What the actual fuck is this?” He was frozen, staring at Marisol.

All three of them were staring at her. Staring behind her.

“Your worst fucking nightmare, fucko.” Zuri, no longer bleeding, lunged at him again, knocking the knife out of his hand with an awkward chop like she was trying a move she’d seen in a cartoon. He’d still been staring at what Marisol guessed werethe translucent wings on her back, and the distraction had been enough for Zuri to ravage him again—but this time she wasn’t clawing at his eyes. With nothing but her palm on his forehead, she brought the man to his knees.

The man’s eyes turned dull and distant. A low, guttural moan escaped his lips, a sound of pure anguish that sent chills down Marisol’s spine. His body trembled, sweat beading on his skin. Zuri, her face a mask of grim determination, held him captive with a light touch in a way that shouldn’t be possible.

Marisol watched in horrified fascination, her entire body alive with excitement and terror. The air crackled with a raw, primal energy, a tangible manifestation of Zuri’s power. A power Marisol wanted desperately to understand.

After what felt like an eternity, Zuri released her hold. The man crumpled to the floor, his eyes wide with terror, his breath coming in ragged gasps. He scrambled backward, his gaze darting around the room like a trapped animal.

He didn’t even glance at the fallen knife. He scrambled to his feet, stumbling over the curtain as he fled the room, his fear a palpable stench that trailed behind him.

“What did you do to him?” Marisol asked, her voice hoarse even though the pain was gone.

Zuri, hand still pressed against her nearly healed forearm, met Marisol’s gaze. “I forced him to relive his worst memory,” she said, her voice flat and emotionless. She was fatigued from the blood loss. “The one he keeps buried deep inside. I brought it back in living technicolor.”

Eyes gleaming with a predatory hunger, Elena pushed herself up on the bed. “We need to go after him,” she said, her voice a low growl. “He’ll be back.”

Zuri shook her head, her pallor still far too pale for Marisol’s comfort. “We barely survived that,” she said, her voice strained. “We have to go. Now. While we still can.”

Marisol hesitated, her gaze darting between Zuri and Elena when she realized she was now part of thewe. Thinking was hard when she couldn’t figure out what the hell had just happened. “I can’t just leave,” she protested. “I have to report this. Talk to the police.”

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