Kneeling beside Mary, Dante began to run his hands over her, searching for injuries. His heart began to sink as he realized there were many of them. The blood was not all from the bags. She had cuts, bruises, broken bones, and a fearsome head wound, he saw as he turned her face to see both sides. What scared him most, however, was the jagged piece of glass he found protruding from her side. The blood was oozing out around the glass. Too much blood. Her weak heartbeat was growing slower with each beat.
“Mary,” he whispered helplessly, and then did the only thing he could; Dante slid one hand under her neck so that her head fell back and her mouth dropped open, then he raised his other wrist in front of his mouth, let his canines descend and bit viciously into his own flesh. Dante pressed the gushing wound to her open mouth, and kept it there, hunching over her protectively as the RV exploded behind him.
Twelve
Mary smiled sleepily and reached up to pet Bailey when the dog ran a wet tongue up her cheek. She frowned in confusion, however, when her hand encountered a curtain of long soft hair instead of short, dog fur. Blinking her eyes open, she peered blankly at Dante. He was leaning over her, but his head was presently turned away as he did something out of her line of vision. When he swung his head back, his eyes widened as he saw that she was awake, and then chagrin filled his expression.
“I am sorry. I was hoping to clean you up before you woke, but I did not intend to wake you. I expected you to be unconscious for a couple more hours at least.”
“Clean me?” Mary asked weakly, sure she’d misunderstood.
“Yes.” Dante raised a washcloth she hadn’t noticed in his hand and gave her face another swipe. “Francis, Russell and I were so busy trying to hold you down and keep you from harming yourself I did not get the chance before now. You only calmed this morning and by then we were so exhausted . . .” He shrugged. “But when I woke from my rest and saw your face I thought I’d best clean it. I did not want you to wake up, see your face all covered with blood and . . . What?” he asked uncertainly when she suddenly closed her eyes with relief.
“I thought you were licking my face,” she admitted.
“What?” he asked with disbelief.
“Well, really I thought Bailey was licking my face, but then when I opened my eyes and it was you here I—” She shook her head and waved the matter away. “Never mind. I have more urgent matters to attend to. Where is the bathroom?”
“Oh, it is there,” Dante said, turning to gesture to a door in the wall behind him.
The moment he turned his face away, Mary tossed the blankets and sheets aside. All she had on was an overlarge T-shirt. She’d rather been hoping for more than that, perhaps joggers and a T-shirt or something else that would cover her from throat to toes. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. Equally unfortunately, she had to relieve herself so badly that she couldn’t wait for him to leave so that she could get up. So, Mary leapt from the bed and sped around it to dash to the bathroom door. She was inside and slamming it closed so quickly she even impressed herself. Adrenaline was apparently a truly amazing thing, Mary thought as she hiked up the T-shirt and dropped to sit on the toilet.
As she tore some toilet paper off the roll, Mary remembered a time when she was young and being chased by a boy at school. He was known to like to grab the boobs of all the girls while they were out on the playground at recess. Mary had seen him coming up behind her one day, hands out and at the ready, and she’d taken off at a dead run. Her feet had moved so fast they’d barely touched the ground. It had felt to her as if she’d almost just flown across the playground.
Mary hadn’t thought she still had it in her. But it seemed even an old broad could practically fly when faced with humiliation. And having handsome, young-looking Dante get a gander at her dimpled thighs was definitely a humiliating prospect to her. He was so damned perfect, and she so wasn’t.
Grimacing, she finished her business, flushed the toilet, and stood to wash her hands. It was as she soaped her hands that Mary actually looked at any part of herself for the first time, and then she paused and frowned with confusion. Her hands were pale and as smooth as a baby’s bottom, the nails long.
Actually overly long, she thought with a frown and turned her hands over then back. She hadn’t seen these hands in years—many, many years. Time had scarred and wrinkled them, marring them with age spots and—but no more. Now they looked like they belonged to a young woman. Someone maybe twenty or twenty-five and—
Thoughts dying, Mary stilled and stared blindly at her hands, her mind suddenly racing, and then she slowly lifted her head and peered into the mirror over the sink. An old friend stared back.
“Dante!” Mary called, her voice coming out strangled.
“Yes?” He answered right away. It sounded like he was right outside the door. “Are you all right?”
Mary merely stared at the woman in the mirror. Her hair had grown a bit and now hung almost to her shoulders. It was also a golden blond for the first couple of inches, before becoming the platinum white age had turned it to. It actually looked kind of cool, she noted with surprise. Like some kind of young, hip hairdo.
Her face also looked young under the smudges of dirt and blood still on it. Mary picked up the folded washcloth on the counter and dampened it, then ran it over her face, cleaning away the smears of blood that Dante had missed. Then she let the cloth drop into the sink and simply stared at herself. Her cheekbones were high, her lips full, and her eyelids no longer looked like they were drooping with exhaustion. But her eyes themselves? They were a beautiful cornflower blue mixed with a silver that had never been there before.
“Oh my,” she breathed.
“Mary?” Dante asked through the door with concern. “If you do not answer me I am coming in.”
“What did you do?” she asked in almost a whisper. “Look what you did to me.”
The door opened behind her and Mary shifted her gaze briefly from herself to Dante. He looked worried.
“I am sorry I had to turn you without asking permission,” he said quietly. “But you were dying. I could not let you die.”
“Ah,” Mary breathed and shifted her gaze back to her own face again. He’d turned her. This was her peak condition. She must have been badly injured in the accident after they’d been forced off the road.
“The RV?” she asked, her gaze still sliding over her face.
“The council will replace it,” Dante assured her.
“Ah,” Mary said again. The RV had been totaled then. She wasn’t surprised. She had a vague recollection of them rolling. RVs were not good at rolling. Meeting his gaze in the mirror, she asked, “And the kidnappers?”
He shook his head unhappily.
“I’m sorry,” Mary said sincerely.
Dante’s mouth tightened, but he merely said, “They will try again. Russell is sure they followed us here from the accident sight.”
“Russell and Francis,” Mary murmured slowly. He’d mentioned both names earlier as she recalled and she tilted her head and then asked, “Are they the men Lucian sent?”
“Yes.” Dante nodded and then asked, “You are all right?”
Mary blinked in surprise at the question, and then recalled that he’d entered because she’d called out in shock when she’d first seen herself. Shifting her gaze back to her reflection in the mirror, she marveled over it again. It was incredible, and made her wonder how long she had been out. How long did a turn and this kind of transformation take? Before she could ask, a knock sounded at the door of the bedroom. Mary turned to peer at him in question.
“Wait here. It is probably room service,” he said, turning away. “I was getting hungry and ordered food.”
Mary watched him go, and then turned her gaze back to herself. It was probably horrible of her to admit it, but she was quite enthralled by the wonder before her. Dante had turned her. She was at her peak condition. All of her, she thought suddenly, and losing interest in her face, reached for the hem of the overlarge T-shirt she wore and jerked it up.
Mary pulled it all the way up to her neck, leaving only her throat and shoulders covered. She then stared at what she could see of her body in the mirror. High, full, firm breasts, a much smaller stomach than she was used to seeing, but still with a soft roundness, and the tops of curvaceous hips. Wishing she had a full-length mirror, Mary continued to hold up the shirt and turned to look over her shoulder to see what her peak-condition butt looked like. She had to get up on her tiptoes to be able to see it, but once she did . . .