Curious and nosy, I unfolded the note. A phone number I could hardly read was scribbled on it. The last two digits were smudged as though the paper had come in contact with water. But I didn’t recognize the area code. I wasn’t sure if the number was important to Sam, but I stowed it in my pocket, just in case. After I slipped my bra on and redressed in Sam’s sweatshirt that practically hung to my knees, I met Harley in the living room.
She was waiting by the door, texting someone.
“Good news about Sam, I hope,” I said.
Her rosy cheeks whitened.
“What happened? Did Sam…” I couldn’t say the word or even think the worst. All I could do was clutch my heart and pray.
18
LAYLA
Istood at the foot of Sam’s bed in the infirmary, my hands trembling and my muscles tense. I’d bitten every nail on my fingers down to nothing. Two fucking weeks had passed, and Sam still hadn’t woken up. Dr. Vieira had performed every test he could. He’d even taken Sam to the local city hospital for an MRI after Sam’s seizure. The latter was unheard of for vampires.
The MRI scan showed an object the size of a rice grain sitting on Sam’s brain stem. We speculated Carly had implanted a microchip, and our fears were confirmed when Sawyer’s team found a recent study on innovative technology of a BMI—a brain-to-machine interface—that collected and analyzed data. The article named Camden Industries in partnership with Cobra Technologies as the leader in paving the way for people to complete everyday tasks with just a thought. The deeper Sawyer’s team dug into the technology, the more they’d found. In an interview, Adam Emery had said that the BMI could be the next generation of weapons in a war against our enemies.
Bingo!Emery was testing the technology out on supernaturals, using them as guinea pigs in his attempt for money and definitely power. Case in point: that was precisely how Adam, my grandmother, and the other investors would lead an army of what I believed would be mismatched predators if they succeeded in altering human DNA.
But I couldn’t care less about all the mumbo jumbo about the BMI. We had to focus our efforts on removing the stupid thing from Sam. Since it was sitting on his medulla, Dr. Vieira was hesitant to rush into an operation. According to him, it was too dangerous and paralleled a beheading. More than that, he wanted more information. For all we knew, the chip acted like a bomb—if Sam didn’t follow orders, then they could blow up his brain. Maybe that was one way to control him.
I shivered at the thought as the urge to strangle Carly was pulsing in my fingertips. I wanted to see her suffer for what she’d done.
The heart monitor beeped, a sound that steadied my pulse and pumped up my hope. Sleep was nonexistent. I spent most nights at Sam’s bedside. I barely showered, and I resembled a zombie out ofThe Walking Dead.
The only routine I had was eating like a horse and drinking blood.Good stuff.My belly was growing, my body was changing, and that weird tingling sensation I had in my stomach was more intense but irregular. The feeling always spread upward into my chest. It didn’t hurt, and it wasn’t heartburn, which were the answers to Dr. Vieira’s questions when I mentioned the issue. Given that I was pregnant with a preternatural being, I believed I was developing some magical abilities, and my banshee scream was one of them. Dr. Vieira agreed.
I slid over to Sam’s bedside, dropped into the chair, and entwined my fingers in Sam’s. “Come on, vampire. Open those soul-stealing green eyes and say something snarky. Your kid needs you. I need you.” When I kissed the back of his cold hand, a prickle snaked up from my tummy to settle in my chest, then quickly vanished.
I rested my head on the mattress, our conjoined hands tucked near my chin as I stared at the sexy bloodsucker. His black hair framed his angular, unshaven jaw. A slight smile shaped his lips, and he seemed at peace as his chest rose and fell.
I inhaled and exhaled in rhythm with him, the act hypnotizing me as my drowsiness set in.
Suddenly, I was on a road in the dead of night.
Flames danced along the edges as my bare feet slapped the warm, cracked pavement. “Stop!” I shouted at the figure ahead of me.
“No, Mom. Don’t. She’s not the person you think she is,” a little boy said behind me.
I whirled around. But there was nothing there but an old beat-up truck.
“Layla.” A woman’s alarmed voice speared through my subconscious. “Layla.” A hand grabbed my shoulder.
I jerked upright, searching and blinking.
My sister, Jordyn, stood beside me with unease creasing the skin surrounding her brown eyes.
I flew off the chair and threw my arms around her.
She squeezed me to her. “I’ve missed you too.”
Sighing, I edged back and whistled. “Look at my beautiful sister.”
Her brown hair was styled into a messy bun with wispy strands framing her oval-shaped face. Her navy-blue pantsuit was tailored to her curves, and her black boots with two-inch heels made her the same height as me. Jordyn was the shortest, while Rianne was an inch taller than me.
“You look fab, sis,” I said. I hadn’t seen her in over a week. But she seemed to have blossomed—or maybe I hadn’t noticed before now.
Her red lips spread into a weak smile. “We should make an appointment to have our hair done.”
