Rare Blood

Chapter Thirty-Five: No Mercy

"What'd you tell them," Cyrus growled.

"I ah, I told them what I found out."

"If you keep making me drag these answers out of you I'm going to be just as slow... You got it?"

"Everything. I gave them have her social security number, her birth certificate, her school records, her previous addresses, her adoption records and, her birth mothers death certificate. You know how I operate, I don't miss things. They have copies of it all."

Cyrus stood up and ran his hands through his hair. He was absolutely going to kill Richard, he just needed confirmation on who the information was given to. Although he already knew Roxy was the assistant he asked, "The woman, she kind of  young with black hair, and grey eyes, wearing heels?"

Richard nodded yes.

"And the guy, was he shorter, stocky, and Spanish?"

"No, he was about your height and build with the same color eyes as the woman. Look I don't know what you are, and I don't have to..." and he kept talking, but Cyrus heard none of it.

His mind was flashing through the images of everyone he knew for someone that fit that description. When he settled on one he actually felt his stomach churn like he might throw up.

Dmitri, the head of the U.S. Vampire Council, the untouchable and unscrupulous head of the Council, that thanks to Richard now knew more about Faye than she even did. He ran his hands over his face and Richard got up off the floor. 

He said, "I can give you the file too, it's in the safe."

"Get it," Cyrus ordered trying to settle his nerves as Richard moved a framed abstract painting to reveal a hidden wall safe.

Cyrus heard the clicking of the combination being entered then the latch set free. Richard opened it, removed something and turned towards Cyrus, holding a gun.

Cyrus was caught off guard; reeling from the shock of how much larger their problem had become. The ballsy old man fired quickly and decisively hitting him twice in the chest, a few inches from his heart. He looked down seeing the holes in his black sweatshirt thinking it hurt, but he was able to block it out, and spring forward snatching the gun from Richard's hand. He tossed it to the floor, then stuck him in the jaw, hard enough to knock him down. He glared down into his dime sized pupils and said, "You have no concept of what you've done. If you would've come to me the minute they approached you, I would've given you anything you asked for."

A look of shame spread across his face, and a tear rolled down his cheek.  It didn't matter, mercy wasn't in the cards for Richard Cleary.

"You betrayed me, you shot me, and you endangered the only person that matters to me," he growled, unable to conceal the ice in his voice.

"I made a mistake," Richard cried.

"The biggest of your life," and then Cyrus put his hands on either side of Richards face, and jerked, relishing in the sound of his neck snapping.

Richard went limp and Cyrus let him drop. Without pause he started to comb the office for any information related to him or Faye.  He took the hard drive out of the computer to examine later then smashed the reaming parts. He copied the incoming and outgoing calls from his cell phone for the past week then crushed it too. It wasn't until he checked the open safe that he found an actual folder on Faye. It was manila and it broke his heart.  Her twenty years of life had been condensed into a quarter of an inch.

It wasn't right that she had so little life experience, and now she was gonna have to be sheltered and restricted for the rest of it.

He needed to get back to her.  He needed to get out of there, get the bullets out of his body, and get back to Faye. He did a quick check to make sure he left nothing behind, then he stepped over Richard's lifeless body, and he walked out as undetected as he entered.

He made his way back to his cabin with the hard drive, the call history, the manila folder, and two bullets that were slowly working there way out of his body. He couldn't focus to come up with a plan on what he was going to say to Faye, and truth be told, he realized that was probably a good thing. He promised he would tell Faye what happened and he knew if he was clear headed enough to plan what he was going to say, some things would be omitted, and he didn't want to lie.

He had good intentions when he sent that original e-mail, all he could do was hope Faye saw it that way too.

When he made it to his front door the sun was a couple hours from rising and he hoped Faye would be sleeping. He knew there was a chance Elsie might wake to his moving around, but Faye probably wouldn't. He just wanted to get the bullets out so the wounds would close before he saw her. He would tell her that he'd been been shot, but that kind of news would be better received with little to no remaining damage.

With a steady hand he unlocked the door and went in silently. He heard snoring coming from the living room so he crept into the room and found Elsie asleep on the couch, and Faye curled up on the love seat. He smiled and backed from the room, heading to the garage. He opened a tool cabinet and found a pair of needle nose pliers.

He took his shirt off, and then the light flipped on, followed by Faye's sleep filled voice, "Cyrus?"

Shit, "Yeah, it's me Love."

"I'm so glad you're back," she said stumbling out of the house. She headed over to him, asking, "What're you doing out here?"

There was no way around it, he turned to face her and she smiled upon meeting his eyes which was torture because he got to watch the sheer look of horror spread across her face when she saw the two bloody holes and him standing there with pliers at the ready.

She rushed forward, then stopped before she reached him, looking panicked.

"Don't worry Faye, I'm fine, I just need to get them out and they'll close right up."

"You've been... someone shot you?"

"Yes, but I'm fine.  Go inside, I'll only be a minute."

She looked to the pliers, then back at the wounds, "I think I'm gonna be sick," she said and spun around heading straight for the bathroom.

He let her go and plucked the nine-millimeter slugs out.  As soon as it was done, he could feel his flesh knitting back together. Another minute or so, and the wounds would be closed, so he went in to find Faye who was standing over the sink dousing her face with water. 

Cyrus didn't speak, he simply took one of the hand towels off the hook next to her and soaked it under the water, then wiped the blood off his chest revealing the wounds were sealed completely.

"I'm fine," he said, and she rushed forward throwing her arms around him. He held her to him for a moment, relieved to feel her against him, then he pulled back and said, "I killed a man tonight."

She didn't even recoil, she said simply, "And I drank too much," as if they were comparable.

"Faye, did you hear me?"

She looked him right in the eyes and said, "Yeah."

"So you're ok with it."

"Cyrus, if you're ok, I'm ok.  Are you ok?"

"Yeah."

"Then all I want to do is brush my teeth, climb in bed, and pretend this was a dream until I wake up."

Though he found her acceptance strange, he was thankful for the reprieve, and said, "Ok," then scooped her up, and carried her to the bedroom, wondering why he was suddenly smelling Elsie's wolf.