Page 61 of Blade's Battle
“You didn’t kill him, Anna.”
“Don’t you see?” she replied, striving to hold in her emotions. “If I hadn’t blood-bonded him, I wouldn’t have weakened his shifter abilities. When cancer struck, he would have healed.”
“You don’t know that.”
“How many shifters have you ever known to come down with cancer?”
His lips thinned, and he said nothing.
“Exactly.”
“He knew the risks.”
“So he deserved to die?” she asked, stunned.
“That’s not what I meant, and you know it.”
“Then why did you say it?”
“Because you’re looking for someone to blame since you won’t blame Kurt. He knew the risks better than you. He was a shifter.”
“That’s where you’re wrong. I should have known the risks better than him even. That’s my field of expertise. Shifter Genetics. My doctoral dissertation was on proving that shifters turn feral not as a result of a virus but because of a specific gene, CLF3, that gets damaged. It was that work that allowed me to later focus on shifter DNA repair genes, what I thought was the heart of Kurt’s failing to heal himself. But I went down the wrong path. Not only did I weaken him, but I wasn’t smart enough or fast enough to help Kurt. He died because of my failure, Blade. But I won’t fail you. I promise. I’ll work around the clock to find a solution. I won’t let you go feral.
“But I can’t—I won’t. . .” Anna shook her head and as those bright blue eyes of hers locked onto him with an intensity he had never seen in her before.
“I care for you, Blade, a great deal. That’s why I can’t be with you.”
* * *
BLADE
Blade rose and faced Anna. With his finger, he traced the slight scar across her palm, the one she tried to hide from him as if it pained her to acknowledge it. Her skin had never fully healed as it should have. Humans always gained some healing abilities from the shifter during the blood-bond, certainly more than enough to repair the skin sliced open during the ceremony. The fact that her palm had scarred and not completely healed was a sign of how weak a shifter Kurt had been before the blood-bond. His blood hadn’t healed her wound, and it was quite possible he would have died even if they had never blood-bonded.
His sweet Angel had endured the repercussions of a chain of events no one, including her or her husband, could have anticipated. Now she was scared, and she held herself responsible.
“You didn’t fail Kurt. At least not then. But you’re failing him now.”
“What does that mean?”
“You fought for him. Took him to appointments, cared for him, and I’m guessing dedicated every spare moment in a lab searching for an answer. And now you’re guarding yourself against ever getting hurt again. If you are worried about what the blood-bond will do to me, then don’t blood-bond me.”
“What?”
“Say you’ll stay with me, as long as possible.”
“You mean until you go feral?”
“I mean until you find the solution. You can still blood-bond me afterward, but there will be no rush. You can have all the time in the world to decide, Angel.”
“You’d wait for me?” she asked sounding surprised.
“I’d wait a lifetime if that’s what you need.”
She shook her head. “No, that’s not right. You don’t understand. I can’t—”
He kissed her. Before she could come up with another excuse, he had to do something to convince her to let him into her heart. This went beyond what a blood-bond might do to him or the possibility that she may manipulate his genes in a way that would keep him from going feral.
“Are you crazy?” She broke the kiss.
