Sam was at Jack’s side in a second, grasping his arm. “Man, I get it.”
Jack jerked out of Sam’s hold, breathing fire at my hubby. “Do you, vampire? How the fuck would you know how I feel? You don’t have a human son who’s been changed into something far worse than anything I’ve ever seen.”
Sam backed away. “You’re right, Jack. I don’t have a human son. But right now, I’m concerned about you.”
A maniacal sound came out of my uncle as he again slapped his hands on the table and shouted, “Fuuuck!” Then, before Sam could catch him, my uncle’s chin hit the table as he collapsed on the floor.
My pulse beat so loud and hard that the room spun when I ran to my uncle and dropped to my knees. “Jack.” I tapped on his face as blood oozed from the gash underneath his chin. I felt for a pulse, my own soaring, beating erratically.
Sam lifted Jack without any struggle. “I’ll take him to the infirmary.”
“He doesn’t have a pulse,” I cried.
Kraft came in, his eyes wide.
“Alert Doc,” Sam said to Kraft as he hurried out.
I was right on Sam’s heels, tears spilling as I prayed for my uncle’s life.
21
SAM
Istood at Murphy’s desk while his long fingers flew over the keys. The tech guy was one of Sawyer’s expert hackers. But I didn’t need anything hacked.
I’d left Layla in the infirmary with her uncle while I attended the strategy meeting. I had a few minutes before it started, and I wanted to see Noah with my own eyes. It was easier and faster to bring up the camera feed in Noah’s cell than it would be for me to visit him, which I’d never intended to do. But after Jack reacted so strongly to the change in his son, I was intrigued. I also wanted to see what Carly’s serum did to a person the longer it had been in his system.
“Is that human man who collapsed going to be okay?” Murphy asked.
“I think so. Jack was breathing when I brought him to the infirmary.” That was the good news. The bad news was Jack’s blood pressure was through the roof. Doc was taking measures to lower it and start him on fluids.
Murphy’s dark eyes swept upward from his monitor as he turned it toward me. “Here you go, man. This dude is fucked, if you ask me.”
I leaned in close as if I needed glasses. “He looks like a—”
“A circus show?” Murphy interjected.
Noah’s face was covered in hair, his red eyes were bulging, his brow bone protruded outward, his ears were pointy, and he was lying on his back, staring at the ceiling. I could see why Jack had flipped out.
I hadn’t expected Carly’s SS2 mixture to mimic my uncle Patrick’s. But for fuck’s sake, compared to Blake Turner, Noah was far worse off.
“Murphy, can you bring up Carly Aberdeen’s cell, the woman who was brought in yesterday morning?”
Noah had the serum in his system longer than Carly, but I wanted to see if she was exhibiting any new features. Because she hadn’t had hair on her face when I’d seen her yesterday morning.
Five keystrokes later, Carly was on-screen. Squinting, I had to lean in toward the monitor. She didn’t resemble Noah, but she was flopping around on her bed as if she was having a seizure. Then a red light went off in her cell before the guards rushed in.
“It looks like she’s seizing,” Murphy said.
“Can you find out from the master-at-arms what’s going on?” I asked.
The guards hauled her out while Murphy got on the phone. The prison had a small medical office but not an infirmary.
Sawyer waltzed up with a folder in hand. “I heard you say Jack will be okay.”
“He should. But now Carly is seizing. This serum is not good.”
Sawyer leaned around Murphy’s cubicle into the next one. “Veronica, can you bring up the feed on Intech in Chicago?”
