THE PERFECT TEN (Boxed Set)

Cloud,” Ainsley said. At Eli’s nod, she continued: “He died as a result of ingesting my blood.”
    Eli’s eyebrows shot up and he glanced at Delano. “I thought he might have had a little help from you, Del.”
    “Afraid not. He died pretty much by his own hand. Shortly after attacking Ainsley, he started to feel weak. In an effort to bolster his strength, he fed again. When I found him, he was already dying from acute hemolysis. The mutation reversal must have already started when he fed the second time, leaving him open to ABO incompatibility.”
    Eli whistled. “So it does work!”
    Ainsley gripped his arm. “But you don’t know for certain that it was the second feeding that killed him, right? Maybe it was just the exposure to my blood that killed him!”
    In her excitement, her nails bit into his flesh. Despite the seriousness of the situation, the irony of it curved his lips. Mere weeks ago, he’d agonized about her reaction should she discover that her blood had killed Webber. Now, she looked positively gleeful at the prospect that her blood could inflict deadly harm. Context was everything.
    “God, if that’s the case, our problems with Janecek could be solved, since he fed from Devon, and Devon carries the Merzetti blood. If we just wait—”
    “No.” Delano held up a hand to stop her. “It will take more than just exposure to the Merzetti Effect to bring Janecek down. Exposure merely initiates the reversal. For harm to come to the subject, they have to take blood again, potentially setting off a transfusion reaction. If they abstain from feeding while the reversal transpires, or if they feed on a victim who happens to be a compatible match, they’ll suffer no ill effect.”
    Ainsley, however, was not prepared to abandon her theory that the Merzetti Effect alone might be sufficient.
    “You can’t possibly know that!” she said. “I know you’re very close, but your research isn’t there yet.”
    “Nevertheless, I am quite positive. The Merzetti Effect merely reverses the mutation; it doesn’t kill.”
    “How?”
    He unbuttoned his shirt and shrugged it down to expose his back, then turned to display it for her. “This is how I know.”
    Her sharply indrawn breath indicated she understood what the thin pink weals meant.
    “Omigod! They didn’t disappear with the day sleep.”
    “No. Nor did the lacerations on my scalp disappear. Nor will the cracked ribs I sustained diving onto that landing earlier.”
    Eli swore, evidently also comprehending the situation.
    Ainsley was staring at him with a mixture of disbelief and some other emotion — horror?
    “You’re … omigod, you’re—”
    “No longer a vampire.” He shrugged back into the shirt and started to do up the buttons again. “Apparently, the Merzetti Effect is sexually transmissible after all.”
     
    Ainsley struggled to bring her panic under control. No, no, no, no, no. She couldn’t do this anymore. She just could not.
    The minute she thought she had some things figured out, the world shifted on her. What else could change? What new, inconceivable, fucking thing could happen to finally push her bruised psyche past the breaking point? Could the chairs walk? Would the walls talk? Was this whole life-on-earth thing a controlled experiment conducted by alien scientists from light years away?
    “Ainsley, we need to talk, but there’s no time.” He took her hand, which hung limply at her side. “Right now, we need to come up with a plan.”
    She put a hand to her forehead, trying to push back the panic. “I don’t know. I don’t know. Dammit, I can’t think!”
    He cupped her face in his hands. “Ainsley, look at me.”
    She complied, immediately falling straight into those dark, nearly black, eyes.
    I know it’s a lot to take in, baby, but I love you. I love you and I’m going to take care of you. Nothing will change that. Nothing.
    Ainsley felt the extreme effort it cost him to slip into her mind. She let her thoughts touch his, drew comfort from his calm assurance. Then he was gone, sliding back out of her mind like an ebbing wave retreating from the shoreline.
    “Okay.” She drew in a deep, shuddering breath, then let it out. “I’m okay.” And as she said it, she found it was true.
    “Good.” He squeezed her hand. “But if it’s all right with you, we’re going to tell Janecek that you’re not okay.”
    “Huh?”
    “We’re going to tell him you’re having a bona fide, Grade A meltdown.