Vampires Are Foreve(50)

“You can do it,” Inez told herself as she walked back out to the living room, but her voice sounded doubtful even to herself.

Thomas still lay exactly where she’d left him. Inez set the towels on the floor beside him and then examined the knife in his back, trying to judge how deeply in it was. She decided it appeared to have gone into his back at least a couple inches and then realized her hands were trembling.

She peered at them with a frown and then moved to the bar fridge. Inez examined the contents, then pulled out one of the tiny bottles of alcohol and began to open it. She was in Amsterdam, about to pull a knife out of a man’s back, Inez couldn’t think of a better time to reach for Dutch courage.

She downed the bottle quickly, grimacing as it burned its way down her throat, then set it on top of the mini fridge and opened another. This one went down easier than the first, but didn’t taste any better. Inez started to reach for another, but then changed her mind. She wasn’t much of a drinker as a rule, and suspected the two would be more than enough. Three would probably have her unconscious on the floor next to Thomas.

Slamming the refrigerator door closed, Inez straightened and turned to approach Thomas, pleased to find that while the alcohol couldn’t possibly have hit her blood stream yet, she at least felt a little steadier. It was psychological, she supposed.

She eased to her knees and surveyed the knife again. It still made her queasy just to think about pulling the knife out, but it had to be done.

Inez stared at it for the longest time, trying to come up with a way to avoid having to do it herself. Perhaps she could order more blood and make the delivery guy do it. It was all his fault Thomas was in this state to begin with. If he hadn’t left the wrong blood here, Thomas never would have consumed a bag and been so out of control that he got himself stabbed. At least, Inez didn’t think Thomas would have acted as he had if he hadn’t been affected by the concentrated Sweet Ecstasy. He just didn’t seem to be the jealous, head-banger type. He was too considerate and…well…sweet for her to believe he would have behaved like that under normal circumstances.

Inez seriously considered the blood order idea until it occurred to her that she might get a different delivery guy, and then someone else would know about what had happened tonight and instinct was telling her that wasn’t a good idea.

“Just do it,” Inez muttered to herself impatiently.

Taking a deep breath, she reached out and wrapped both hands carefully around the handle, trying not to jar it as she did. She then closed her eyes, counted to three, tightened her grip and jerked the knife up and out of his body, blinking her eyes open and glancing sharply toward Thomas’s head when he groaned in pain. Unfortunately, Thomas’s head was turned to the other side and she couldn’t see if he was awake. However, when he didn’t make another sound, she dropped the knife on the towels, and then had to move that towel aside so she could retrieve another one.

Turning back to Thomas, Inez tugged his T-shirt quickly from his jeans and peered at the wound, grimacing at the sight of the blood seeping out. It seemed to be flowing from him rather quickly. Biting her lip, she covered the wound with the towel and pressed down firmly, holding it there for a few minutes before lifting the now bloody towel away to see what was happening.

Thomas had said the nanos repaired and regenerated, but apparently it wasn’t instantaneous like the vampires on television. The wound was still there, though it did seem as if the bleeding was slowing down. She pressed the towel to the wound again, waiting another few moments, and then lifted it for another inspection. The bleeding had definitely slowed down now.

Letting her breath out on a sigh of relief, Inez set the used towel aside and grabbed another, laying this one lightly over the wound, just to make sure the little bit of blood still seeping out didn’t run down his side and drip on the floor, then she stood and moved to the cooler to retrieve a couple of bags of blood. Inez carried them back to Thomas and knelt beside him again, only to stare at him uncertainly. She had no idea how she was supposed to get the blood into him. If he were on his back, she’d just pop a hole in the bag and let it run into his mouth and hope he swallowed it. However, he was on his stomach.

Inez considered the problem for several moments and then sighed and simply laid the bags of blood beside his head so that he’d find them when he woke up.

If he woke up, Inez thought and frowned, but then recalled his saying that immortals couldn’t be killed by most injuries. Not even a stake through the heart could kill them if it was removed quickly enough.