"We need to search the place thoroughly before we leave here," Jameson said as he eased her onto the couch. She could still smell faint traces of Brookie's popcorn. "Amber, rest here, on the sofa. You're safe here."
"I'll stay with her," she heard Edge say quickly. Then there was a prickle of tension in the air, but it passed.
She opened her eyes to find him sitting on the sofa beside her, his gaze fixed on her face, as if searching... for something.
"I didn't need rescuing," she managed to say. "I let him bring me here on purpose."
"And it was working well, love. Right up until he dosed you with that drug."
She thinned her lips, nodded. "I filled some of the syringes with water. Faked him out the first couple of times."
"Think he caught on?"
"Nah, just grabbed the wrong needle." She drew a breath, sighed. "You seemed... mad at me after we... "
He shrugged. "More at myself than you." Then he tipped his head to one side. "A little at you, though."
She pursed her lips. "You tried to kill Stiles, even though I begged you not to."
"Okay, so I was more than a little mad at you. Do you blame me?"
She frowned, unsure what he was talking about.
"Jesus, Alby, isn't there anything you want to tell me here?"
Very quickly, she averted her eyes. Obviously he sensed she was keeping something from him. He couldn't know what, of course. But-God, she wasn't ready to talk about this. Not here, not now. How did you just blurt something like this out to a man who thought himself sterile? She imagined herself saying it. "I might be carrying your child, even though you and I both know that it's physically impossible. And oh, by the way, don't worry too much about it, because it's going to be stillborn."
No.
"Alby?"
She sighed. "Look, there is something, but it's... "
"None of my business?'' he asked.
She frowned. "That's not what I was going to say."
"Why not? It's true. I'm sorry, Alby, you're right. I've got no right to press you on this. It's... not my place."
"The house is clear," Amber heard her father call. "Let's get Amber the hell out of here."
Someone lifted her from the sofa. It wasn't Edge. She needed to talk to him, to tell him he had things all wrong. But the drug was fighting her every step of the way.
"Rhiannon and Angelica will take her back to Salem. It's the closest, safest place for her," her father said.
"And the rest of you?" Edge asked.
"Roland, Dante, Donovan and I will transport Stiles to Eric's lab, in Wind Ridge. It's in Southwestern Pennsylvania, near the West Virginia border. Which group you go with is up to you, Edge."
Amber tried to open her eyes, get her voice to cooperate. She wanted to tell Edge to stay with her, that she did have something to tell him. But before she could manage to win the battle of wills with the drag, she heard him say, "I'll stick with Stiles. Alby's in good hands. She doesn't need me hanging around."
Her heart seemed to contract and shrink in her chest. He sounded so angry, so... hurt. Amber gave up the fight, feeling she'd lost more than just the battle, and sank into sleep.
She felt as if she should be in a state of panic, but she couldn't seem to work up to it. Everything was happening in a soft haze of slow motion bliss. Her head and limbs were heavy, her eyes too tired to stay open. And yet, when they did fall closed, the dream returned-or the memory of it did.
Her eyes flew open. "What-where-"
"Take a breath, honey," her mother said softly. "You're all right. I've got you."
She was, she realized, in the back seat of a car, snuggled in the curve of her mother's arm.
"Where... are the others?"
"The men took the other car back to Pennsylvania," Rhiannon told her softly. She was driving. "Stiles is in their trunk."
"What about Edge?"
Her mother looked at her gently, probingly, one hand stroking her hair.
"Oh, he's not in the trunk," Rhiannon said, deadpan. "Though I think he might have been safer there." She turned slightly, just enough to send Amber a sneaky smile.
"He shouldn't be with them," Amber said. "He wants Stiles dead. He'll kill him if they turn their backs."
"Darling," Angelica said, "there are four powerful men with him. Dante, Donovan, Roland and your father. They're not going to let him hurt Stiles."
"They won't stop him."
"Of course they will. Meanwhile, we're taking you back to Salem, where you can rest and recover from your ordeal."
Amber sat up. "Mother, the only thing I need to recover from is that one dose of tranquilizer Stiles managed to get into me. Other than that I'm fine."
"Are you?" her mother asked.
Amber frowned at her, searching her face. "What are you getting at?"
Rhiannon glanced over her shoulder as she drove, curious.
"Did you think I wouldn't know, Amber? As close as we are, did you think I wouldn't feel it the first time I touched you, see it the first time I looked into your eyes?"
"Mom, I don't know what you're-"
"You're pregnant, Amber."
Rhiannon hit the brakes so hard the tires squealed and hot rubber scented the air. She jerked the wheel to keep the car pointed straight ahead and brought it to a stop in a cloud of dust on the shoulder.
Then she turned around in her seat, getting up on her knees to stare fully at Amber, a question in her eyes.
Amber released the death grip she had on the armrest, glad they hadn't crashed, forced herself to look Rhiannon in the eye, and then her mother. "Obviously Stiles managed to spin his fairy tale for you before he was knocked unconscious."
"Stiles?" Rhiannon asked. "Is he responsible for this?"
"He made it up," Amber told them, even though she was no longer sure it was the truth. "He's been trying to convince me of it for some insane reason. I can't imagine why. Much less why he'd try to fool you."
Rhiannon rolled her eyes. But Angelica only lowered her head. "Stiles didn't tell me this, Amber Lily," she whispered.
"Then were did you get such a ludicrous idea?''
Angelica lifted her head again, and there were tears brimming in her eyes. "I told you. I saw it in your eyes, felt it in your touch." She pressed her hand to Amber's belly. "Can't you feel it, Amber? There's life inside you."
Amber felt the blood drain from her face as she shook her head in denial. "It's impossible. He made it up. It can't be real."
"It is real."
"But... but... "
"Who is the father?" Rhiannon's voice was short, clipped, deep and vibrating with menace. "I'll eat his liver."
"No, you can't hurt him. God, I don't even want you to tell him." She shook her head. "Let him go on his way. He's a loner, always has been. He wouldn't want this."
"You don't know that for sure, darling," Angelica said. "Give the young man a chance."
"No, you don't understand. All he wants is vengeance on Stiles. That's all."
The two women met each other's eyes, then, slowly, they both looked at Amber again. Angelica whispered, "Darling, you sound as if you think Edge is the father."
"Haven't you explained this to her?" Rhiannon asked. "Amber, vampires can't reproduce."
"Apparently they can," Amber said. She drew a breath, lowered her head. "He's... the only one."
Angelica searched her eyes, then sent a similar look to Rhiannon. "How is this possible?"
"I don't see that it matters," Rhiannon said. "Except as it concerns the methods I can use to kill him."
"Rhiannon, you aren't going to-"
"I say we douse him in gasoline, give him a head start and then see which of us can be the first to hit him with a lit match." Rhiannon smiled. "It'll be like a game of tag. Only, you know, better."
"Rhiannon, you're upsetting her."
"No, she's not." Amber sat up straighter in her seat and fixed Rhiannon with a very serious stare. "If you want to hurt him, Aunt Rhiannon, you're going to have to go through me first. And I promise you, I'm way tougher than any of you give me credit for being."
Rhiannon looked surprised, then angry. "You dare-"
"You wanna go right now?" Amber jerked her car door open, got out, waved a hand at the driver's door and watched it fly open, as well. She was dizzy, unsteady on her feet, and her jeans were so tight they hurt. But she was mad as hell and ready to fight.
Rhiannon got out of the car slowly, gracefully, like a queen alighting from a chariot. Amber stood ready. She kept her stance wide, knees bent, arms loose at her sides.
"I suppose," Rhiannon said slowly, "raging hormones and Stiles's tranquilizer could be to blame for this."
"Or maybe she's in love," Angelica said, getting out of the car, as well. She stood beside her daughter, put a hand on her shoulder. "Don't be ridiculous, Amber. Rhiannon is not going to fight you."
Rhiannon shrugged. "Not while you're pregnant, anyway."
"You'll have to, if you want to hurt Edge."
"So he gets to keep breathing for a few months longer." Rhiannon shrugged. "Suddenly defending your honor has lost its appeal. Ungrateful little whelp." She spun around and got back into the car, slamming the door.
Angelica shook her head. "You hurt her terribly, Amber."
Amber lowered her head. "She had it coming." But she regretted her tough talk with her aunt. No one loved her the way Rhiannon did. "I don't want Edge to know," she told her mother, deciding to deal with Aunt Rhi later. "Not yet."
Her mother shrugged. "He has a right to know. But you have a right to be the one to tell him." She shook her head. "But don't expect me to keep this from your father. We don't deceive each other."
"Then stay away from him for a while. In Salem, with Willem and Sarafina. Morgan's there, you know."
"Dante's Morgan?"
She nodded, knowing her mother would welcome the chance to get to know the vampiress-screenwriter. "I suppose. That's where you'll be, so I'll stay a while." She stroked Amber's hair. "A girl needs her mother at a time like this." Then her face split into a smile. "A baby," she said. "I can't believe we're going to have a baby in the family again."
Amber accepted the hug in order to keep her face hidden. But the memory of her dream returned, menacing and dark, with the image of the still, pale child in the ornate, almost coffinlike, box.
She closed her eyes to block it out. Please, she thought. Not that.
A car passed, followed by a bus so large it rumbled the highway.
Amber felt something and looked up, turning to follow the bus's progress. Then she yanked open the car door, pulling her mother in behind her. "Follow that bus, Rhiannon!"
"What?"
"The woman who took the serum is on it. I felt her as it passed. Brooke, her name is Brooke, and she's got the cure for Willem."
The voice in his head kept telling him he was going in the wrong direction. It was loud, so loud Edge couldn't believe the other men in the car couldn't hear it. And it was insistent. After arguing silently with the damn thing for several minutes and struggling to keep his thoughts shielded, he barked, "Where the hell do you want me to go, then?"
The other men stared at him, blatantly stunned.
"Hell," Edge muttered, and leaned against the seat back as if trying to catch some rest. In truth, he only wanted a rest from the insistent voice and from his own growing guilt. He'd left Amber in a fit of temper based on nothing more than jealousy. He was an idiot. God, it wasn't as if he were in love with the woman. He had no right to be jealous. Must be a male ego thing. Still, he'd made the wrong decision, for the wrong reasons, and he knew it.
Jameson looked from Dante, in the front seat beside him, to Donovan and Roland in the back with Edge. "Is he all right?"
"Hears voices," Dante said. He drew circles near his ear with a forefinger.
"We all hear voices," Donovan corrected. "Voices, thoughts-both from each other and mortals." He turned to Edge. "Are the voices like that, Edge?"
"Oh, God, he thinks he's a vampire therapist," Edge groaned.
Donovan thinned his lips. "If you'd tell us what's happening, we might be able to help." He looked to the front seat, to Jameson. "It even happened during the day sleep."
Jameson frowned. "That's not normal. Probably not a sign of insanity, either. It would take more than mental illness to penetrate the day sleep. Could it be someone outside you, Edge? Deliberately sending these messages?"
He shook his head. "I don't know."
"Well, what do the voices sound like?"
He pursed his lips.
"Don't bother, Jameson. He's a loner. Far too manly to share his problems with us."
Edge glanced at Dante, who seemed to detest him, and perhaps just to prove the man wrong, he said, "It's one voice. Male. Young, though not a child. It feels as if it's coming from within me. But I can't control it, can't silence it."
"Can you converse with it?" Roland asked.
Edge frowned. "Yes."
"And what does it tell you?"
He sighed, shaking his head.
"It told him where to find Amber Lily," Donovan said, his eyes on Edge. "Didn't it?"
He nodded.
"And what's it telling you now?" Jameson asked.
Edge sighed. "That I'm going the wrong way."
"That's it?"
Edge nodded.
Jameson glanced at his watch. "It's nearly dawn. We're going to have to stop soon, seek shelter."
Edge nodded. "Alby can drive all day. She could put an awful lot of distance between us while we rest." God, why had he given in to his temper and left her side? It didn't matter that she was carrying another man's child. She was in danger, and he had to get to her. He felt it with everything in him, wanted to kick himself for ever leaving her in the first place.
Jameson was studying Edge's face intently. "You're awfully concerned about her."
"You should probably get used to it. God knows I'm starting to."
Jameson's brows went up; then his face darkened a little.
Donovan spoke quickly as if to diffuse the tension. "I wouldn't worry about her getting too far, Edge. After all, she'll stop once she reaches Salem."
She's not going to Salem!
Edge blinked, gave his head a shake, but couldn't ignore the voice. "She's not going to Salem."
"What? Why the hell not?" Jameson demanded.
"I'm damned if I know." He shook his head, heard words whispering through his mind. Canada. Edmunston, New Brunswick. He felt an urgency tugging at him. Dammit, he hated to leave Stiles. The bastard would escape him yet again, and it was high time he extract the vengeance that was his only priority. Or... used to be his only priority, anyway. Hell, when had that changed?
They passed a sign showing a bus icon.
"Take the next exit," Edge said. "There's a bus station. Get me there."
"You can't get on a bus this close to daylight," Donovan argued.
"No, not on one. Under one." He glanced at Jameson, who was studying him without blinking.
"The luggage compartment," he said. "It's not first class, but it gets you where you need to go." He nodded to Dante. "Don't pretend you won't be glad to be rid of me."
"I wasn't planning to." He steered onto the exit ramp, followed the signs for the bus depot.
"The four of you can handle Stiles all right without me," Edge said as he got out of the car when Dante pulled it to a stop outside the terminal. It was more an effort to convince himself of it than a statement of fact.
"Three of them," Jameson said, getting out of the front seat.
Edge looked at him.
"Don't even think of arguing. She's my daughter."
Sighing, he lowered his head. The man was right. He had ten times the right to go after Alby as Edge did. If it had been his own daughter-
Son.
Edge's head came up fast, and he looked around, but like every other time, there was no one there. He blinked hard, felt his throat getting tight. Of all the things the voice had said to him, this one made the least sense of all.
"What? What is it?"
Amber was going to have to tell her father about her condition sooner or later. Edge wasn't the least bit afraid of telling him-hell, he had no reason to be. But it wasn't his place. Right now, though... Right now, he didn't know what the hell to think.
The two men walked to the area just outside the terminal, where buses were lined up in angular parking slots, some with their engines running. Jameson approached a driver, just ambling down out of his vehicle, moving as if it were an effort.
"Is one of these buses going to Canada?''
The driver glanced at his watch, gave a nod. "Woodstock, Grand Falls, Edmunston," he said. "Three slots down. But he won't be leaving for a half hour yet." Then he glanced at the ticket window. "Ticket window isn't open until nine, but you talk with the driver, he can take care of it for you."
"Thanks."
Edge led the way to the large, silent bus. "Half hour," he said, with a glance at the sky.
"The sun will be up by then," Jameson said.
"Driver will come out before then," Edge said. "Warm up the engine, open the baggage compartments."
"And we just... what? Climb in and hope no one notices?"
"We can move faster than human eyes can perceive. Getting in unnoticed won't be a problem."
"And when the driver goes to toss a few passengers' bags in, and there are two bodies inside?"
Edge met the man's eyes, a hint of mischief in his own. "Have a little faith. It's not like I haven't done this before, you know."
Jameson looked doubtful, but he sat down on a bench outside the station. "I'll just sit here, then. Fortunately, this bench faces east, so I'll be able to see the sun a split second before I burst into flames."
"Such an optimist."
Minutes ticked by. Jameson seemed to be growing more nervous with every one that passed. Edge, meanwhile, stood near the bus and smoked.
Eventually a few passengers showed up, cars and taxis dropping them off, then leaving. They invariably went first to the ticket window, then grew anxious when they found it closed. Then they gathered around the bus.
But not around Edge. His smoke created a buffer zone. It was a secondary benefit of smoking-kept nonsmokers from invading your space. Oh, there was always a wheezing mealymouthed type who would come close enough to get a whiff and then make a big production of waving his hand in front of his face and sending Edge a dirty look. Just to make a point. The point, Edge guessed, was that smoking out of doors should be made illegal.
He smiled to himself as he wondered if the passive aggressive idiots ever caught a clue who-or what-he was.
Inevitably, it happened. One pale, scrawny mortal broke from the cluster gathered near the bus, walked a few steps in his direction, then began to cough. He tugged a handkerchief from his pocket and held it to his mouth, scowling over it at Edge.
Edge growled at him, softly, so the others couldn't hear, baring his fangs just for an instant.
The man gasped and backed away so fast he bumped into one of the people standing behind him. When he looked again, though, Edge was gone, having moved to the far side of the bus. Maybe the little prick would remember his manners next time, he thought a little darkly.
He heard the sound of the bus engine starting, then, moments later, the luggage compartments being opened. The driver slung bags in, heavily and none too carefully, one after the other. Edge moved around to the front of the bus, crossed to where Jameson was still sitting, pondering the sky, which had lightened alarmingly to a pale gray near the horizon.
"Ready?"
"As I'll ever be," Jameson said.
He got up, followed Edge back around until they stood near the rear of the bus. The driver's back was toward them, and the passengers were focused on climbing aboard the bus, picking out seats, wrestling with their carry-on bags.
Edge waited until the driver was reaching for one last bag and the final passenger had stepped aboard to knock several bags back out of the compartment with a quick grab.
Swearing and looking as surprised as a toddler when Jack pops out of the box, the driver bent to begin retrieving them-some had shot several feet from the bus, so he was kept distracted.
"Let's go, then," Edge said. And he dove into the compartment, on top of the bags, shoving them aside until he'd made room for himself behind them. Jameson joined him within a heartbeat and assisted him in redistributing the luggage into a neat stack in front of the two of them. There was just room enough to sit up. Not to lie down, and not to stand.
"Grand accommodations, Edge."
"Mmm. Fortunately, we'll be unconscious for most of the trip."
"We'll be more than that, if he doesn't hurry up and close the compartment door."
Beyond the luggage, Edge could see the light beginning to filter through. Not direct sunlight, not yet, but the daylight creeping just ahead of it.
The compartment rocked as the driver slung bags into it. Then, finally, he slammed it closed. Edge heard a latch turn.
Jameson sighed in relief. "About time. I guess we're home free now."
Edge shrugged. "Barring a rollover or flaming wreck, yes, I suppose we are."
"You're just full of happy thoughts, aren't you, Edge?"
"Always."