Blood From a Stone Page 10

  Right. He knew damned well that was never going to happen! And remembering the promise he’d let escape his lips before he’d walked out of Willow’s door just hours ago filled him with even more resolve. Maybe it wasn’t the blood after all….but it had to be something and he was going to figure it out before the next Change.

  **********************************

  Sasha stood in the middle of Willow’s kitchen, arms crossed with one eyebrow raised.

  “Okay, so you’re telling me he kisses that hot and you let him go home, why?”

  Willow laughed. “Oh, yes. I was really going to invite him in on a first date….take him right to bed after one cup of coffee and a cruller! Just hang a sign on my back that says, “I Do it For Donuts!”

  Sasha burst into laughter. “Where’s my Sharpie? I’ll make one for you now. And well…technically it was your second date since he stayed with us over night.”

  She grabbed two large mugs from the cabinet and poured coffee and some half and half into both before handing one of them to Willow. “In all seriousness, you’re right. It’s too soon. But still…I don’t know if I’d have been able to let him walk out the door from the sounds of it!” She laughed sheepishly. “I know, I know! It’s wrong.”

  Willow shrugged. “Oh, believe me. It wasn’t easy sending him on his way, but I did.”

  She took a sip of her coffee and felt her face flush remembering the feel of Samson’s lips on her own and his hands on her skin.

  She shook off the feeling and quickly said, “So…not to change the subject, but are you on duty with me tonight?”

  Sasha shook her head. “No. I took the night off, remember? I was supposed to go to a seminar but it got cancelled. I figured screw it. I could use a little down time.”

  “Good! Then you can come over and let Cisco out for me while I‘m at work. Do you mind?”

  Sasha nodded and sighed. “Well, I suppose. I will have to clear a spot in my busy schedule to fit it in between my television appearance, my red carpet arrival and my debutante party at The Embassy.”

  Willow chuckled at her sarcasm. “Seriously though, I do think he gets lonely when we’re gone.”

  Sasha nodded. “I know. I’ll stay with him ‘til you get home. How’s that?”

  Cisco chose that moment to come bounding over, seeming to understand that they were talking about him. Willow reached down and patted his soft golden-brown head as he looked up at her with affection.

  Remarkable that this was the same dog who’d tried to attack them a couple of nights ago. Gone was the dingy, matted coat, sunken eyes and sickly appearance. Instead here stood a beautiful, sweet pet… full of life, health and intelligence.

  Samson had somehow known what kind of animal he really was…one that just needed some good food, rest and the love of the right human. It was as if he could see into the dog’s soul somehow. And yet, there was something more that still bothered her about the whole situation. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it. The dog had seemed so sick on first sight. How could it have recovered so miraculously overnight? And how come there were no wounds on his mouth? For the amount of blood that had spilled out on the pavement there should have been some pretty bad bite marks or something. And yet there was nothing. Just like there’d been not a mark on Samson’s arm either. It made no sense. She sighed and decided to not over-think it. She looked at the clock.

  “Well, I guess I’d better get ready. I’m on duty a little earlier today than usual. I go in at noon instead of 3pm, so I’ll be off by 9 and you will be free to attend any governor’s ball or grand openings you have on your celebrity schedule.” She laughed, setting her empty cup in the sink and headed down the hall to shower and get ready for work.

  Five hours later, during her break, her cell buzzed. It wasn’t a number she recognized. Then again, what if it was Samson. “Hello?”

  “Hey.” She smiled. So it was him after all. “What are you doing?”

  “Well…I’m at work. You know that I’m sure, since you‘re officially a stalker.” she joked. “You seem to know exactly where to find me and what I’m doing as proven by last night‘s little escapade, no?” she teased.

  “Well, true. But technically, it wasn’t stalking. It’s called, ‘Put-her-on-the-spot, so-she-can’t-say-no when you ask her out.’ He laughed.

  “Yeah I guess you did that didn’t you,” she smirked to herself. “So, what are you doing?”

  “Not much…just figuring out a little problem.…for work.“ He stumbled over the words.

  It sounded vague enough. And it wasn’t really a lie. Trying to figure out what the hell was going on with his blood was, after all, something that affected his entire existence.

  “I know we were together last night, but do you want to have dinner with me tonight? I don‘t want to push to hard too soon. So if it’s a bad time…” his voice trailed off.

  She smiled. “Yeah. Actually, that sounds….nice. I’ll call Sasha and ask her to either stay later at my place with Cisco or go ahead and head home if she doesn’t want to hang out there past 9 when I get off. Is that too late for dinner though?”

  “You’re worth the wait,” he said. “I’ll pick you up a little after 9. Where do you want me to meet you?”

  “I guess the same place as last night. Elevator in the parking garage?” she said.

  “I’ll be there.” He hung up.

  He’d spent the morning pondering his situation to no avail and finally decided it wasn’t going anywhere, so he took the rats to the nearest park and let them go, and headed to an electronics store to investigate this technology called ‘personal computers.’

  After a quick tutorial and thorough sales pitch, he’d bought a laptop, brought it home and spent the better part of the afternoon reading the manual, making a couple of calls to get internet service for his apartment and setting it up. To his surprise someone had been available to get his service up and running that afternoon, so he hadn’t had to wait. He’d picked up a couple of books on computers and being a fast study, seemed to get the hang of it enough to get by, if only a little.

  He marveled at the miraculous technology, how it worked and the sheer volumes of information that were now available. He would have to have Willow show him more about this thing called internet, although he wasn’t sure how he’d explain his lack of ‘computer savvy’ to her, since everyone in this day and age seemed to know so much about them. There were still some people he supposed that might not be up to speed on it and he figured he’d have to just be one of them as far as she knew. It wasn’t a lie after all.

  He’d then looked at the clock and realized it was after 5pm and decided to call her in the hopes he might get lucky and catch her on her dinner break to see if she wanted to grab a bite to eat. He’d lucked out reaching her…although she seemed more interested in just waiting ‘til she got off work to go out for a late dinner than meeting right away. All the better he supposed. They could take their time and find somewhere nicer to go than the hospital cafeteria or around the corner to Chico’s again.

  He finished reading the laptop manual, messed around with it a little more, than took a quick shower, put on a nice button down shirt and jeans, and his boots, grabbed his jacket and headed out the door to go pick up her up.

  She was waiting for him by the elevator when he got there. He jumped out and opened the door for her before she could do it herself.

  She smiled. “My aren’t we the gentleman tonight? What happened to the ass-grabber I met at Velvet?” She laughed.

  “Oh, he’s still here. Jekyll and Hyde….he’s waiting for the right moment.”

  Damn. He had to smile because somehow the statement didn‘t seem so far from the truth when he thought about it. He was after all, part human and part something else, wasn’t he?

  She sighed. “You know maybe we can’t really do this tonight after all’’. She opened her coat. “I’m sorry, all I have is my scrubs. I didn’t bring a change of clothes for after work
. I didn’t know I was going anywhere,” she shrugged.

  “You look fine.” He closed her door, walked around and jumped in beside her. “Besides…this way everyone will know I got me a date with the hot nurse, right?” He winked and laughed. “They’ll be wondering when you’re gonna take down the hair and shake it out…rip off the scrubs and get down to the garters. You know. The whole routine.”

  She wrinkled her nose and gave him ‘the school marm look’ like she wanted to slap the living shit out of him. Damn she was sexy when she did that.

  He reached out and grabbed her hand smiling wickedly. “I’m just kidding. I told you Hyde was waiting for the right moment.” He laughed as she shook her head in mock exasperation.

  His expression softened and he traced a finger down the side of her cheek. “You look beautiful no matter what you have on so don’t worry. Now…where do you want to go, my lady?” He pulled out onto the street and headed north up the hill towards the strip where several restaurants, and bar & grills were located.

  “I would say that Pancake Pantry or maybe Chico’s is about all I’m up for dressed like this, unless you’d prefer fast food?” She cringed.

  “Alright then, pancakes it is. Although donuts and coffee last night…pancakes tonight? It’s terrible for my manly figure.”

  She laughed out loud. Her laughter was soon replaced by a scream as the car careened wildly and she grabbed the dash to steady herself.

  A cat had run in front of them and Samson swung the wheel to avoid hitting it. Although his reflexes were lightning fast; inhumanly so, he was still at the mercy of the mechanisms of the man-made vehicle he was driving and was unable to avoid clipping it. The thud against the wheel made him cringe as he quickly checked to make sure no one was behind them, slammed the brakes and jumped out in one swift motion.

  Willow gasped and caught her breath. The cat had no doubt been crushed at the speed they were moving.

  She grabbed the door handle and got out, walking slowly over to Samson’s side of the car, expecting the cat to have perished.

  The limp animal lay in Samson’s hands with blood pouring from its mouth and nose as it struggled for its last raspy breaths.

  Samson swallowed back the lump in his throat damning himself for not being fast enough to have avoided the poor creature. He dragged in a ragged breath as his brows knit together. His mind was racing.

  His blood. This seemed like no better time and place than to try again…and if it meant that he could stop this animal’s suffering or save its life before it drew its last breath here in agony, then damn he was going to try. Even if he couldn’t save it, if he could at least make it more comfortable and spare it some of its pain before it died, then it was worth the try. And it was certainly a way to test out his theory again under different circumstance. But first he somehow had to divert Willow’s attention. Remembering her reaction when Cisco had bitten him outside the club, he knew that wasn’t going to be easy.

  “He or she’s hurt and bleeding. It’s….bad. I think I may have some tissues or a couple of napkins in the truck. Then I’ll turn him over to you since you’re the medical professional”.

  “I’m a nurse, not a veterinarian,” sighed Willow. She moved in closer and could see the cat’s little tan and brown body was limp and broken.

  “I can tell by looking at it, that he or she’s not going to make it,” she said softly shaking her head. She reached forward and stroked the side of the little cat’s face. The way its body was bent at a frightening angle and the blood pouring from its nose and mouth said it all.

  “You don’t happen to have anything more substantial than tissues do you? Maybe an old towel or a t-shirt we can wrap him in? Once we wipe off some of the blood and lay it down on a flat surface, I can check its heart and lungs. Like I said, I’m no vet, but I‘ll give it a listen and see if there‘s any hope. If so, we can take him to the emergency veterinary clinic. There’s a 24 hour one on Balfour Avenue.”

  He nodded toward the truck. “Check my glove box. We’ll have to make do with whatever I have.”

  Willow turned and walked toward the vehicle. He had to think fast. How was he going to slice his skin? He grabbed the cat’s front paw and using one of its long, sharp claws, he tore deeply into the flesh of his palm and squeezed as hard as he could. A nice gush of blood spilled out and he dripped it into the cat’s mouth.

  He held only a small shred of hope to cling to that this might work, after the rat experiment this morning but it was all he had right now.

  Twenty or so seconds passed and it felt like twenty years, as everything moved in slow motion.

  And then he felt it. The buzz started in his fingertips and began to spread up his forearm and into the shoulder like a jolt of static electricity along with a slight chill. The feeling spread through his entire body and for a split second he felt the animal’s soul within his own. He almost smiled just from the sheer joy of knowing that he had been right about his blood, but didn’t want to find any solace or hope in the emotion prematurely. He needed to be sure.

  A moment later, the cat’s breathing slowed and he prayed it wasn’t dying after all. But instead the raspy sound coming from its lungs seemed to disappear, and the light of life began to come back into its yellow eyes.

  The blood dripping from its mouth and nose staunched itself and dried up and seconds later it lifted its head and looked up at him with gratitude and something else. It seemed to be looking into his soul as well. It licked the rest of the blood off his palm before his wound healed itself over and disappeared.

  Now, there was no mistake. He knew with utter certainty that his blood had the power to heal….to give life and regeneration.

  Willow approached him with a handful of napkins. “This isn’t going to be enough to wrap his body in, but….” her voice trailed off and she gasped, as the cat sat up in Samson’s hands, rubbed against his face and began to purr. Her mouth dropped open.

  “How? What did you do?” She dropped the napkins on the pavement and backed up slightly.

  Samson stared at her quietly, not sure how he was going to explain this one away. He’d managed with the dog, but this was going to be a lot tougher. She was a nurse and even had she not been, any idiot could see the cat’s body had been broken in several places as it lay there limp in his hands moments ago.

  He swallowed hard, trying to remain calm. What was he going to say? She came over and knelt beside him and began to pet the cat. She grabbed her stethoscope from the pocket of her scrubs and gently placed it against the cat’s chest and listened. Heart beat was steady and lungs sounded clear.

  She sighed heavily before she spoke. “I know that Cisco was probably just cold and hungry and I can sort of believe that. He’s a wonderful dog and he just needed someone to love him. He wasn’t sick….I guess.”

  She brushed her bangs back from her face and stared at him long and hard.

  “But this?” she pointed to the happily purring creature that was now kneading his pant leg as it sat curled in his lap as if it were in front of a warm hearth on Christmas Eve.

  She shook her head in disbelief. “I know what I saw a few minutes ago.”

  His eyes traveled to the pavement and he blew out a long breath.

  “I dunno. Maybe she wasn’t as hurt as we thought?” he offered feebly, knowing damned well it wasn’t going to work. “And it is a she, by the way…I checked,” he said, refraining from telling her that he knew the cat’s name was Tabitha.

  “Don’t lie to me.” She stared at him, fighting back the tears that were welling in her eyes. “Samson, you’re scaring the hell out of me.”

  She was a strong woman; she had to be with her job. She didn’t cry often, but right about now, she just didn’t know what to think! She was scared. And not just a little bit.

  And what about Cisco? My God, just this afternoon she hadn’t been able to shake that nagging feeling that something wasn’t quite right about the situation. The complete overnight turnaround
of a dog that skinny, that sick and mangy and apparently rabid? And now this. A cat who had been nearly broken in half hit by the car, who lay dying just minutes ago, was now sitting up and acting like life was a bowl of cream! She was a medical professional, and there seemed to be no scientific explanation for such things. There was however, one common denominator in both cases…and his name was Samson.

  C HAPTER ELEVEN

  Samson turned away from Willow and looked down at the purring little feline in his lap, staring long and hard into her yellow eyes. He could feel her soul…feel the release of pain and fear as it left her body. And he could feel her gratitude. Yes, there was a feeling of something akin to a

  ‘thank you’ in there somewhere. Not something you’d put into words as an emotion, but it was just a sense of being. The cat somehow knew he’d helped her.

  He popped a gentle kiss to the top of her head and patted her softly, before walking over to the side of the street and releasing her on the sidewalk.

  She stared up at him and he could feel her reluctance to leave his side.

  “Go on, Tabitha, you’re okay,” he whispered. Although he was sure she could hear his words in her mind, the same as he could feel what she was feeling in his and like it had been with Cisco, it was almost unnerving.

  She headed up the stone walkway towards the well- kept little house they stood in front of, and gave him one quick backward glance before sashaying up the steps.

  Samson smiled and then sighed heavily as he brushed the hair back from his forehead, remembering that Willow was standing by the car burning holes in his back right now with her eyes, wondering what the hell was going on.

  He could tell she was scared shitless, and he wasn’t sure what he was going to tell her, but he’d better come up with something quick. The truth? Christ. How would she ever believe that. But he wondered right about now if he even had a choice in the matter. Pretty much anything he told her wasn’t going to add up, so he was screwed no matter what he did. He pulled his leather jacket tighter around him, turned on his heel and walked to the truck slowly, reaching out to take Willow’s hand in his own as he stepped over the curb. She backed up from him abruptly and pulled her hand away, her brows knit in both confusion and fear.