Kiss of Steel Read Online Free PDF Page B

There. She’d said it.
    The doctor’s eyebrows rose. “You’ve known what was wrong with him?”
    She shook her head. Then nodded. “I know what the craving virus looks like, Doctor Madison…But it’s impossible. Charlie shouldn’t be able to…” She stopped then. More words that she didn’t dare speak aloud.
    “Shouldn’t be able to?” he prompted.
    “I simply can’t believe this is happening.” She smiled weakly and poured him a cup of tea.
    The doctor gave her a look of fatherly concern, sipping at the tea. “You’d best be on your guard. I noticed the cot in his room. I don’t think either of you should be staying in there with him in these circumstances.”
    “He would never hurt us.” And yet the way Charlie had looked at her, at the blood…
    “He might not be able to control himself,” the doctor replied. “The monster inside him—”
    “He’s not a monster.” But was that not what a blue blood was? What she’d always believed?
    “Of course not. I meant only that Charlie might not be able to stop himself.”
    Honoria sank into a chair. She—more than anyone—knew what the craving virus turned a person into. She had taken her father’s notes and helped him with the gentler patients at the Institute. There was even a scar on her shoulder where a young girl named Daisy—a sweet, mild-mannered girl before Vickers infected her—had gone for Honoria’s throat with her bare teeth one day when Honoria hadn’t kept her guard up.
    If Charlie lost control—if he went after Lena—Honoria would never forgive herself. The infection was growing worse. If she didn’t find some way to stop it soon, it would be too late.
    “I’ll move the cot. And I’ll lock the door when we’re asleep.”
    The doctor squeezed her shoulder. “I’m sorry. I’ll have to report this.”
    “No.” She surged to her feet. “No, please. They’ll take him away. They’ll kill him if he can’t control it, or if he does, they’ll lock him up and make him into one of their slaves.” She’d seen the mindless brutes the Echelon kept chained, displaying them on leashes as though they were the latest accessory. And those were the ones who survived.
    Tears burned in her eyes. “Please,” she whispered.
    “You have a month. It’s the best I can do. I would advise you to stay away from him as much as possible. Perhaps sucking on some raw meat might assuage his hunger. If he becomes violent, then restrain him.” The doctor hesitated on the doorstep. “There’s no charge for today.”
    Honoria dashed at her eyes. “That’s not necessary. I can pay you—”
    “I won’t be coming back, Miss Pryor. God have mercy on you.” Then he slipped his bowler on and hurried down the steps into the alley.

Chapter 3
     
    A light shone in the window. Blade stalked through the fog that clung to the ground, swirling about his thighs. He couldn’t see a blasted thing, but he knew the cobblestones beneath his feet like he knew the back of his hand. It had been fifty years since he’d staggered into the ’Chapel, bleeding from a dozen stab wounds. He had decided then that this would be his home and that nobody—not even Vickers—could take it from him.
    Blade’s war with the Echelon had been short but bloody. The metaljackets hunting him had the numbers, but the terrain was perfect for the kind of guerrilla warfare that Blade excelled at. Vickers might have taken him from the gutters, but Blade had never forgotten them. In the end, he had knifed more than twenty of the elite Coldrush Guards and destroyed at least fifty of the metaljacket drones with them. The Echelon had withdrawn, ceding him the rookeries.
    Running a hand over the cold iron banister, he climbed the steps to the peeling, pea-green door. She hadn’t come. Miss Honoria Todd had reneged on their bargain. A kinder man might have asked why. But his first instinct was to work out how much advantage he could take from this.
    Reaching out, he rapped sharply