“What murder? Why would anyone call the police?” she asked with a combination of alarm and confusion.
“Mary,” he said solemnly. “The turn is very painful. You have been screaming your head off for four days. We had to take turns, two of us holding you down to ensure your bindings did not snap and loose you to hurt yourself, and one of us out in the hallway controlling anyone within hearing distance.”
“You tied me down?” she asked with amazement.
“We had to. You would have hurt yourself otherwise,” Dante said apologetically.
“I would not,” Mary assured him indignantly. “I’m not into cutting or any of the other self-abuse things.”
“It is not a matter of being a self-abuser,” he assured her. “It is a matter of the pain being so great that . . .” Dante paused as if searching for an example, and then sighed and said, “I heard once of a turn who stabbed himself in the eye trying to end the agony.”
“Ewww,” she said, sitting down abruptly.
“Si. Exactly.” Dante nodded. “I wished to avoid your doing something like that.”
“Thank you,” Mary muttered, trying to imagine how bad pain had to be to make a person do something like that. She couldn’t even imagine it though. It just seemed so alien. Shaking her head, she admitted, “I don’t remember suffering any pain.”
“That is a blessing then,” Dante said and began to move the plates with food still on them closer to her.
Mary stared down at the food before her, and then glanced up and asked almost apologetically, “You said Russell is sure the kidnappers followed us back here?”
He nodded.
“So they drove us off the road and then just let this Russell and Francis collect us and bring us here?”
“Not exactly,” he said dryly. “When the kidnappers forced us off the road, Russell and Francis were in the SUV directly in front of us. I do not think the men in the van even realized they were there. The RV probably blocked their view of them.”
Mary nodded. She had noticed the SUV he was talking about. It had practically been riding the RV’s front bumper. She had no doubt the kidnappers hadn’t known they were there and had probably thought the road empty when they forced the RV off the road.
“Russell and Francis pulled over at once when we were forced off the road,” Dante continued. “Apparently shots were exchanged and then the kidnappers must have decided not to risk themselves. The van pulled away and Russell and Francis gave chase, but we were only miles from town. Russell and Francis had to slow down once they reached the more populated area to avoid harming innocent mortals. The van, however, did not and they lost them. Russell and Francis then came back for us.”
“I see,” Mary murmured, accepting the fork he handed her. She managed to wait until he’d reclaimed his seat, then dug in. Literally. She was suddenly starving, her stomach churning with it, so she started with some sort of pasta dish that was quite nice, then halfway through it, picked up a chicken leg and began to alternately gnaw on that and scoop pasta into her mouth until she realized that Dante was watching her with amusement. Realizing what a disgusting picture she must make, she set down the fork as well as the chicken leg and reached for the glass of water he pushed toward her.
Mary took a sip of the cool water, then set it down and asked, “Is it the nanos that are making me this hungry? Am I always going to be wolfing down food? And if I am, how the hell are the nanos going to keep me at my peak condition?”
Dante chuckled and shook his head. “You will not always be this hungry. No doubt this is a result of a combination of the turn and not eating for four days. As for the nanos keeping you at your peak, they will. It is as simple as that. You can eat all day and night and they will keep you at your peak. They will also use a great deal of blood to do it, however, which means you would have to consume more of it.”
“Oh.” Mary had picked up her fork again, but now lowered it to the table and glanced down at her new hands worriedly. She hadn’t considered that part of the deal. It was awesome and lovely to look and feel young and strong again, but he had turned her to do it. She would have to feed . . . on blood. Mary wasn’t sure she could do that. She didn’t even like rare steak. The blood turned her off.
“Eat Mary, you can worry about everything else later,” Dante said gently.
She hesitated, but then gave in and picked up her fork again. Her stomach was still churning with hunger, and she hadn’t eaten for four days. She reminded herself of that and then decided that starving herself would probably mean taking in extra blood too.