Her Perilous Wolf by Julie Steimle (free e books to read .txt) 📖

were you thinking? We promised to keep the Bruchenhauses out of it! Rick is going to be furious with you.”

He pulled out a phone.

“Ah man! William! Please don’t tell him!” Troy huffed, reaching for that phone. “Doug just wanted to meet you. Come on! The long distance lab arrangement does not work! Ok? We can’t waste this opportunity over a small fear.”

“Small fear?” Dr. McAllister shook his head, yet his finger paused over the second to last button. “Do you understand what could happen if he is just seen with us? The SRA are unforgiving.”

Doug paled. “SRA? You don’t mean that whack-a-doo monster hunting club, do you?”

Both Dr. McAllister and Troy turned to stare at him, raising their eyebrows.

“You know about the SRA?” Dr. McAllister asked with open concern.

Doug nodded. “Yeah. Audry pulled up their website and showed it to me the beginning of this summer.” He looked to Troy, “I thought it was a LARP site. But they had things about people Audry knew there—including you, come to think of it.” He nodded more. “And they were calling you a vampire.”

Troy groaned, hanging his shoulders. He muttered under his breath, “That’s all I need…”

Dr. McAllister curiously inquired with a side look, “Was there anything about me?”

Doug shook his head, yet paused, thinking. “There was a McAllister, though, come to think of it. Audry swore when she saw it.”

“It’s probably about Eve…” Dr. McAllister murmured with a sigh—not quite relieved, but not really resigned either. Nodding to himself, he said, “Mr. Bruchen—”

“Call him Doug,” Troy interjected. “Skip last names. You don’t know who might be listening in.”

Nodding a little tersely to him as he was still upset with Troy, Dr. McAllister started again. “Doug. As much as I am pleased your enthusiasm for the work is genuine, I don’t think it is wise for you to be seen with me.”

“Why not?” Doug frowned. “You’re a doctor that specializes in bites. I specialize in blood. What’s weird about that?”

Sighing, Dr. McAllister pinched the ridge of his nose. “In that respect nothing. But it is who I am connected to that makes being seen with me a risk to you.”

“Because of your connection with the Deacon family?” Doug asked, peeking to Troy.

Troy shrugged.

But Dr. McAllister shook his head. “No. Because of who my sister is.”

“Who is your sister?” Doug watched as the good doctor sighed, shooting Troy chastening glances once more.

“I’m not supposed to elaborate,” Dr. McAllister replied.

“And why not?” Doug was feeling surer that he had stepped into something quite like a secret society. Troy was not supposed to meet him, but that was due to his condition. Yet the doctor, who had been on call for Mr. Deacon, did not seem to be anyone out of the ordinary—until now.

“To keep you safe,” the doctor said. He then shook his head. “There are people like the SRA who would label you as a collaborator and harm you.”

“Collaborator?” Doug made a face. “And what is wrong with collaborating for a cure?”

“Nothing,” Troy said in a tone not unlike a grumble. “Will, would you please stop freaking out? Doug is up to it. I’ll keep him safe. But we need you to work with him, as he sees blood in a different way than the rest of us, and you see bites as they really are and not as you wish them to be. I need you both to help me.”

“And what about your research? I thought you were translating that manuscript—”

“I’ve hit a dead end.” Troy peevishly cut Dr. McAllister off. “I keep coming back to the awful possibility that extreme surgery is what needs to be done. And… well, we were just talking, and it occurred to Doug that possibly changing the metal of the tools might make the surgery more effective.”

“I was joking, though,” Doug said, staring at him. What was going on in that man’s mind?

Chuckling, Troy nodded. “Yes. But what you said made sense. ‘If it was magic, why not use silver tools?’ I made fun of it at first, but… why not?”

Dr. McAllister pondered that for a moment, as if it were a legitimate question.

“We need to get Silvia in on this as well,” Troy added. “If it is magic, then a magical solution needs to be used.”

“What?” Doug felt as if the guy had hit him with a book.

Yet the good doctor nodded at Troy. “Ok. Fair point.”

“Fair point?” Doug murmured.

“Here’s what I was thinking,” Troy said, not quite hearing him. “We can try different surgery tactics. You have that one guy who has been coming to you regularly for treatment, right? The one with the multiple bites?”

“Keith Vicar,” Dr. McAllister said, nodding, his mind going over the scenario Troy was proposing with genuine thought. “The comfrey keeps him in good condition, but then his wounds keep opening up because of…” He looked to Doug uncomfortably, stopping.

“It’s ok,” Troy interjected with a glance to Doug. “He knows about the eternal bleed. I already explained it to him.”

With a nod to Doug, Dr. McAllister explained, “Ok. Here’s the problem. These wounds don’t heal. The bites… there is a toxin in them that—”

“I saw it in the lab.” Doug nodded to him, feeling off. Something was off here. “Whatever is in the saliva transforms the wound into a bleeding lesion. There are those toxic pale erythrocytes in them—the parasitic ones. So whatever is in the blood is also in the saliva. It is possible that those parasites create some sort of plasma excretion that… I don’t know, webs into the cells. I think we need to examine it under a higher powered microscope.”

“That’s a problem…” muttered Dr. McAllister with a cringe. “The light and heat in the microscopes tends to degrade the cells—and we barely can see anything. It turns to dust and rots.”

“Well, what about using the microscopes in a cooled lab?” Doug suggested. “You know, like that Japanese scientist who photographed snowflakes for his water resonance experiment. Have you ever heard of that one?”

Dr. McAllister shook his head, but Troy nodded.

“We’d need a freezer and warm coats to work it,” Troy murmured.

“But it is more the light than the heat that damages the cells, isn’t it?” Dr. McAllister said.

Troy shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve never tried a cooler room before. And the color of the light could be adjusted. It’s worth a shot. I can turn my lab into a freezer for a few weeks. I hardly feel the cold, so I could do it.”

“What kind of procedures have you tried with this man for his oozing lesions?” Doug asked.

“All sorts,” Dr. McAllister wearily replied, sitting down on a near stool. “From all kinds medications, peroxides and treatments.”

“Have you ever thought about traditional cauterizing the wounds?” Doug muttered.

The doctor chuckled, nodding. “Yes. It lasts for two days, then rots to a seeping wound again. The same goes for plastic surgery and all stiches. The infection is unkillable and only spreads.”

Doug frowned.

“I’ve been thinking in terms of drawing salves,” Dr. McAllister explained. “But in the end it does look as if only a deep-tissue surgery would do it. But you’d lose muscle—and any bleeding just spreads the infection. I’ve considered freezing it off so there is no blood flow.

Troy nodded grimly. “Yeah…”

“And Keith is up for anything,” Dr. McAllister muttered.

“Isn’t that risky?” Troy folded his arms, frowning. “He’s got enough wounds as it is.”

“He says he does not mind being the guinea pig.”

“He may not mind, but getting bit that much is bad enough. What’s his pain threshold?”

“I don’t know.” Dr. McAllister shook his head, glancing to Doug who could not wrap his mind around what they were saying. “But he wants to be part of the cure.”

“I think he just wants to be the first one cured,” Troy muttered.

“Is that so bad?” Dr. McAllister looked to Doug again. “Are you ok?”

Doug shook his head. “When you said ‘bit that much’—how much are you talking about?”

Nodding Dr. McAllister gestured for Doug to take a seat. Doug did sit, realizing somehow he was truly falling into the Twilight Zone.

“Keith Vicar was attacked by a…how do I put it? Um, pack of…”

“Vampires,” Troy put in dryly. “I told you about that gang, the Order of Blood? Well, they had one big group out west. They murdered people who hiked in the mountains in this one area. This man was attacked, but they could not drink his blood as he was stinking of garlic—which they are allergic as you know. And he fought them off.”

Dr. McAllister leaned back, staring at Troy with a murmur. “You’re good at this.”

Troy shrugged, blowing it off.

Frowning, Doug said, “And how did he find you?” He looked to the good doctor.

“That’s because of me.” Troy raised a hand. “Last year I initially started a bite victim support group, and I had advertised online.”

Doug’s eyes widened. “You what?”

Troy nodded. “You heard me. And he found us around the time we were stopping in-person group meetings. Most of them are in online chatrooms now, with aliases.”

“We’ve been providing treatment since then,” Dr. McAllister added. “He wants the cure more than anybody.”

Doug nodded. Yet he peeked to Troy. “Why did you end the in-person group meetings?”

Cringing with deep emotional pain, Troy peeked to Dr. McAllister as he said, “Well, you kind of have to be a special sort of naïve, or a special kind of creep to be bitten by a vampire, usually.”

Doug stared, trying to comprehend what he was leading up to.

“Not all cases are like mine,” Troy explained, averting his eyes to the floor. “There is a sort of personality I like to call ‘vampire bait’. It’s rather predictable. The problem is, one of the guys we vetted was mentally unstable and actually wanted to become a vampire.”

“He killed two people in the group,” Dr. McAllister clarified.

Doug looked to Troy again, who nodded.

“One was that jerk I told you about,” Troy said. He then closed his eyes. “The other was my girlfriend.”

Doug drew in a breath.

“So in a way, I can understand why Rick would not want you to be in too close of a proximity with me,” Troy muttered, still looking away. The man looked like he had been kicked too many times. He was still grieving.

Dr. McAllister patted Troy on the shoulder. It was more of a ‘now you’re getting it’ it kind of pat.

Yet Doug looked to Dr. McAllister. “How did you get into this field?”

“I thought I mentioned it,” Troy murmured with a shrug, shaking off the intense emotions of grief with effort.

Doug shook his head.

Sighing, Dr. McAllister answered, “My sister Eve is half vampire. She’s got the same blood condition—including all the problems with sunlight and garlic. And, well… for that matter, I think we lived near the colony where Mr. Vicar was attacked.”

“There was a vampire colony near where you lived?” Doug’s eyes went wide on him.

Nodding. Dr. McAllister replied rather too casually for his taste, “Yeah. It was a town rumor for years—but I’ve also met a few.”

“And people got attacked?” Doug was going pale.

But Dr. McAllister chuckled. “My town? No. We had a resident vampire hunter living in our town. We joked he was retired. But, uh, he was a registered hunter with the SRA. Everybody was scared to death of him, including normal folk.”

“Actually,” Troy interjected. “I heard the colony was cleared out one year by—”

Dr. McAllister shot him a sharp look.

“Oh.” Troy straightened up and cleared his throat. He looked to Doug and smiled. “Anyway, point is, Keith is our man. He agreed to be our guinea pig. So, do you want to meet him?”

“Not today…” Doug murmured. His head was swimming.

Dr. McAllister went over to a small fridge under his desk and opened it. He soon had a small boxed orange juice for Doug—straw out.

Taking it, Doug looked up to him. “Do you always have these ready for your patients.”

“Only for those who look like they are about to faint,” the doctor murmured.

Sipping from the straw, Doug nodded. But then he said, “What do you