Tristan folded his arms across his chest.
“I want to help. Let me help. This has been my life’s work. She’s from my line and I want this to work. I won’t be careless, regarding anything, including your preferences. I assure you. I know you have no reason to trust me but please…let me try to help. I am not your enemy. I want the Constantin line to carry on. I want the work Alexander and I have dedicated years toward to bear fruit. I am on your side. And I like her. Very much.”
Tristan snickered, “You’re wrong. You are my enemy. The only reason I’m keepin’ you alive right now is in case you’re of use to me. But my patience is running thin.”
He turned his back on Adrian and went back inside.
She was still in front of the window.
“Did you go out? Did he come in?” Tristan demanded.
She shook her head and then said, “No.”
“What was he doing?” He poured a coffee from the pot, which she’d obviously made. If there was one thing his girl couldn’t do without, it was her coffee. Clearly that transcended being in the midst of her own zombie land. She hadn’t poured any for herself so he poured her a cup.
After a beat she said softly but without emotion, “Staring at me with a sad face.”
“What do you see when I stare at you? Do I look sad?” He approached her and looked into her eyes. She met his gaze. It wasn’t lucid but she was searching his face, almost dazed, or drugged-looking, but clearly she was attempting to read and interpret.
“Hurt. Or mad.”
“When you said you were hurt were you feeling hurt or were you hurting with body pain?”
“Yes.”
“Both?”
She blinked at him.
“Are you hurt right now?”
“Um… yes?”
“Why were you shaking and scratching?”
A long pause.
“Hurts.”
This was useless.
“Stay here.”
He left the kitchen in a state of exasperation. He stepped outside to assess Leonard and Jeff’s states of mind and to program the right sorts of results if things went wrong or if Adrian approached again.~~~That night she woke up screaming and crying while scratching again.
“Lemme out!” He heard her cry.
He’d been downstairs, in the midst of drafting an email to Brandt after having checked her a few moments earlier and seeing that she appeared restless, like she was dreaming, but he didn’t know what to do for her so he’d just gone back downstairs. Now, at her sounds of despair, he had immediately run up and reached for her and pulled her tight against him, “Out of where?”
She whimpered.
“Shhh, baby. It’s okay.”
“Okay, Tristan.” But she hadn’t stopped scratching and shaking.
“Kyla, it’s okay.” He rocked her back and forth.
“No,” she whimpered, “Can’t stop…” she was scratching hard and he could smell her blood.
“No,” she cried out.
She felt hot; she had a fever.
He put his lips to her forehead, “Shit, you’re burning up, princess.”
“Princess,” she started sobbing hard, looking like she was in intense pain and like the nickname had some sort of affect.
What the fuck? Does she comprehend me?
“What can I do?”
She kept sobbing into his chest, “It hurts. Get me out!”
“What hurts?”
“Me.”
“Fuck. Kyla, I don’t know what to do!”
He wanted to spit nails, smash something, wanted to fuck off away from this madness with her, take her somewhere safe, take her back to when she was safe. He was close to his breaking point.
“Try to sleep, baby, please…” he told her through clenched teeth because he didn’t know what else to do.
She kept jerking in his arms and she was getting hotter. He caught a few winks here and there but was too worried about her to catch any real sleep. By dawn she felt even hotter. He’d tried to help by wiping her body down with a cool cloth but it didn’t work so he’d taken her into a tepid bath and sat with her, holding her. She’d been trembling even harder and started scratching her legs so he’d taken her back to bed, fed her Advil, and held her some more, holding her hands so she couldn’t scratch. The medicine wasn’t helping. She was like a fireplace.
He spied the phone on the nightstand so he finally let out a breath and lifted it, feeling more helpless and hopeless despair than he’d ever felt in his life. He pressed zero and was answered by one of Adrian’s minions who transferred him.
“Tristan?”
“She’s been burning up all night. Having seizures or something. Worse than the previous two nights and her fever is at least 103. Advil, cool bath, nothing’s helping.”
“I’m coming.”
“No! Just tell me how I can help her.”
“T-t-take it…” she breathed. Goosebumps rose on him.
Take it? What the fuck did that mean?
“Have you fed from her, checked her blood?” He asked.
“No.”
“Try. If it doesn’t work you’ll have to let me take vitals, do bloodwork and see if I can figure out what this is.”