Free A Vampire's Honor by Carla Susan Smith

through my tears. He picked up the discarded syringe and injected the full dose into my arm, and when he was done, he followed it up by giving me the second one. A double dose. There was no way to know what I’d been injected with. It could be the Ebola virus or bubonic plague or mad cow disease. But I was very aware that I couldn’t allow Gabriel to feed from me as long as my blood was tainted.
    Perhaps that was his plan . . .
    â€œDid you make that for Anasztaizia too?” I sobbed as he put the empty syringes back in the case.
    â€œYes, but it can be used on any human.”
    Are you still human? I mean, technically?
    I gave my inner bitch the mental equivalent of a who knows? shoulder shrug.
    â€œWhat do you want to do with her?” Gus asked. He seemed a little hesitant, but I think that was due more to Petrov’s unexpected reaction to me than to any real threat I might pose.
    â€œI really don’t care. She’s of no use to me,” Petrov told him. “Do whatever you want.”
    â€œReally?” Rat Boy, snickering like a perverted schoolboy with his first porno magazine, gave me a speculative look.
    â€œJust make it quick, although I don’t think that will be a problem for you.” He gave Rat Boy a disdainful look before turning and addressing Gus. “She should last for about thirty minutes, but if I were you, I’d be gone long before that.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œJust in case someone does come looking for her.”
    â€œWhat’s gonna happen in thirty minutes?” Rat Boy piped up.
    I don’t know if it was the second injection suddenly kicking in and giving me a rush, or maybe my brain releasing endorphins. Either way, my body recognized that if I was to survive whatever was coming, I needed help. The pain in my hand began to subside, changing from an agonizing shriek to a manageable pulsating throb. The change allowed me to focus on what was going on around me.
    â€œWhat’s gonna happen in thirty minutes?” Rat Boy repeated, and I could hear the curiosity mingle with his excitement.
    â€œShe’ll be dead,” Petrov told him, “but if your sexual proclivities run to necrophilia . . .” He let the rest of his sentence hang.
    Rat Boy looked confused.
    â€œFucking a corpse,” Gus told him.
    I hurt too much to be impressed that he knew what Petrov was talking about. But at least I now knew what a double dose of his just-something-I’ve-been-playing-with formula was supposed to do.
    Yeah, but that still doesn’t mean you’re going to die.
    Well, I guessed we’d find out in about thirty minutes.

Chapter 7
    P etrov vanished. One minute he was there, and the next he was gone. I didn’t know how it was that he could be awake during the day anyway, but for all I knew the stars could already be twinkling in a midnight sky.
    If they were, Gabriel would already be here.
    Okay, not nighttime then, but maybe close to sunset, and being in a pretty dark place—in more ways than one—was probably okay for the vampire.
    I’d been telling myself that I could survive anything because Gabriel was coming for me. That was as certain as celebrating Independence Day on July 4, but the throbbing in my hand was making it difficult to hold onto that belief. Was Petrov’s inhibitor drug actually working as he intended? If so, then Gabriel wouldn’t be showing up anytime soon, and until he did I was on my own with homicidal Tweedledum and Tweedledee.
    As for whether or not I was going to die, the validity of my demonic deal was about to get its first real test.
    I dropped my swollen hand to my side, gritting my teeth as the tips of my fingers brushed against my leg. The pain had definitely lessened, but I think that was due to a combination of released endorphins and compressed nerves numbing my fingers. I gripped the bars with my good hand and pulled myself to my feet. No way in hell was I going to let