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“What?”

“Just a little healing thing I’ve been throwing at you.”

“Sure.” Except when V brought up his business hand and started talking off that glove, Butch recoiled. “What are you going to do with that thing?”

“Trust me, true?”

Butch barked a laugh. “Last time you said that I ended up with a vampire cocktail, remember?”

“Saved your ass. That’s how I found you.”

So that had been the why of it. “Well, then, fly me some of that hand.”

Still, as V put the glowing thing close, Butch winced.

“Relax, cop. This isn’t going to hurt.”

“I’ve seen you toast a house with that bastard.”

“Point taken. But the Firestarter routine isn’t going down here.”

V hovered his tattooed, glowing hand over the wound, and Butch let out a ragged groan of relief. It was as if warm, fresh water was pouring into the wound, then flowing over him, through him. Cleaning him out.

Butch’s eyes rolled back in his head. “Oh…God…that feels good.”

He went limp, and then he was floating, free of the pain, sliding into some kind of dream state. He let his body go, let himself go.

He could actually feel the healing, as if his body’s regenerative processes had kicked into high gear. As seconds passed, as minutes went by, as time drifted into the infinite, he felt like whole days of rest and eating well and being at peace were coming and going, leapfrogging him from the battered state he was in to the miraculous gift of health.

Marissa tilted her head back and stood right under the showerhead, letting the water fall down her body. She felt shaken loose and thin-skinned, especially after watching Vishous carry Butch to the bed. The two of them were so close, the mutual bond clear in the way their eyes met and held.

After a long while, she got out, toweled herself off roughly, then blew her hair dry. As she reached for a fresh set of undergarments, she looked at the corset and thought, the hell she was putting that on. She shoved it back into a bag, unable to bear having that iron grip around her rib cage right now.

As she put her peach gown on over her naked breasts, it felt strange, but she’d had it with being uncomfortable. At least for a little while. Besides, who would know?

She folded up the pale blue Rodriguez and put it into a biohazard bag along with her old underwear. Then she braced herself and opened the door out into the patient room.

Butch was sprawled on the bed, the hospital gown pushed up onto his chest, the sheets down around his hips. Vishous’s glowing hand was resting about three inches above the blackened wound.

In the silence between the two males, she was an intruder. With nowhere to go.

“He’s asleep,” V grunted.

She cleared her throat, but couldn’t think of anything to say. After a long silence, she finally murmured, “Tell me…does his family know what’s happened?”

“Yeah. The Brotherhood all know.”

“No, I mean…his human family.”

“They are irrelevant.”

“But shouldn’t they be—”

V looked up with impatience, his diamond eyes hard and a little mean. For some reason, it occurred to her now just how fully armed he was with his black daggers crossing his thick chest.

Then again, his sharp expression went with the weapons.

“Butch’s ‘family’ doesn’t want him.” V’s voice was strident, as if the explanation were none of her business and he was elaborating just to shut her up. “So they are irrelevant. Now come over here. He needs you to be close to him.”

The contradiction between the Brother’s face and his command to come closer tangled her up. So did the reality that that hand was the biggest help.

“He most certainly does not need me or want me here,” she murmured. And wondered once again why the hell V had called her three nights ago.

“He’s worried about you. That’s why he wants you to go.”

She flushed. “Wrong, warrior.”

“I’m never wrong.” With a quick flash, those navy-rimmed white irises flipped up to her face. They were so frigid that she stepped back, but Vishous shook his head. “Come on, touch him. Let him feel you. He needs to know you’re here.”

She frowned, thinking the Brother was crazy. But she walked to the