Page 2 of The Predator
Regardless, eleven days had passed since Layla had left. Eleven days of hell, not being close to her. Eleven days of sleepless nights, thinking of her and every other screwed-up thing happening in my life. I’d been tempted to get my ass on a plane and pay her a visit. Maybe that would calm me down. Hell, I knew it would. But the auburn-haired goddess wanted some space to clear her head, and I wanted to be there for Ben.
However, if she kept ghosting me and not responding to my texts, then, vampire hunters be damned, I would storm their Montana ranch.
“Okay, Dane,” Dr. Vieira said. “Ross, it’s your turn.”
The two traded places.
“Sam, I would like you to meet my beta, Ross Gray,” Dane said.
Ross and I exchanged a glare.
“I see you and my brother will get along great.” Sarcasm dripped from Dane’s voice as he smirked.
I envisioned my hands around their throats, snapping their necks.
As if Doc knew what I wanted to do, he piped in, zapping the tension strung between Dane and me. “I would like to run an autopsy on your dead shifter.” He inserted the needle into Ross’s arm. “Is it possible to bring the body to me?”
“It isn’t,” Ross said, “but we did extract some of her blood before the burial.”
Dane slid a box across the lab bench to Dr. Vieira. “We kept it refrigerated.”
“Mm,” Doc said as he finished pulling Ross’s blood. “Not as good as doing an autopsy, but I might be able to work with this.”
“How long before you have any results?” Ross asked.
Doc tore off his nitrile gloves and deposited them into a trash bin near the sink. “I’m not sure. The blood samples will go to our lab for a full toxicology workup. We have a small number of the darts that were recovered from the club. I’m having the drug analyzed as well.”
Wyman, who had hired Layla and her sisters to capture me, was still in our custody. He’d given the drug to Layla to knock me out so he could turn me over to his former employer—the CIA. Regardless, he’d learned about the drug from none other than Layla’s father. As far as Wyman knew, it was a highly concentrated human sedative that the Aberdeens had been testing when Layla’s father was killed. I was one hundred percent certain Layla didn’t know that tidbit. In fact, she’d given us the impression she had no clue what the drug could do.
But I wasn’t about to divulge that part to the shifters who were salivating to seek revenge on the Aberdeens. I couldn’t blame them. If the tables had been turned, I would have wanted the same. Still, we couldn’t allow shifters to take out humans.
I zeroed in on the conversation.
“You don’t think there’s wolfsbane in the drug?” Dane asked Doc. “That’s the only thing I can think of that would kill us. Can it do the same to your kind?”
“It hasn’t been known to,” Dr. Vieira responded. “But as a doctor, I won’t say it’s impossible. However, not one vampire died at the club that night. Your shifter was the only death.” Doc wiped his hands with a paper towel. “I might need more blood from you and your pack. Will that be a problem?”
“No,” Dane said. “Just let me know what you need.”
“Good. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I would like to pack up these samples for the lab,” Doc said.
Dane scrubbed a hand along his angular jaw. “I have one last question. Why didn’t Roman Brown react the same way as the other vampires in the club? From what he told us, the drug paralyzed him, but he was still awake.”
“It’s highly possible Roman has access to an antidote to counteract sedative-type drugs,” Doc replied. “We have one handy for that very reason, and the SEAL team is given a dose when entering into combat or potential situations with our enemies.”
The Council of Elders had interrogated Roman until they were blue in the face. According to my old man, who was an elder, Roman wasn’t talking. My father had taken the next step to read Roman’s mind, but the fucker was smart. He knew how to clear his head, so my father couldn’t get a damn thing from him—either that or Roman had a mind-blocking potion like ours. After all, he’d worked for a pharmaceutical company, so it wouldn’t have been a shocker for him to have access to drugs.
Doc glanced up at the six-foot-five alpha. “I’ll let Lieutenant Tripp know when I have concrete results on your blood samples.” He collected the tray of samples along with the box Dane had given him and headed in the direction of his office.
Silence descended before Tripp cleared his throat. “Dane, if you have a minute, I’d like to show you something. Follow me.” Tripp didn’t wait for the shifters to answer. He pivoted on his heel and stalked toward the patient rooms that banked one wall in the infirmary.
Dane and Ross exchanged a suspicious look but followed Tripp into Ben’s room.
Once the four of us surrounded Ben’s bed, Dane’s eyebrows pinched together. “You want to show us a patient?” It sounded as if he had never seen Ben before. Maybe I was wrong about him.
The heart monitor beeped as Ben’s chest rose and fell.
Tripp pulled back the blanket, exposing the bandage on Ben’s waist.
