“None. I don’t date.”
“Sounds like I’m not the one with the problem.”
I studied him. Unnerved by his argument. I wanted to believe he was wrong. But it was bad to lie to myself. Worse to want things I could never have. Things I was being offered by someone immune to my charms. At least, while he wore the totem.
I stopped fighting instinctively. Let my higher intellect override my insecurities. I stared at him like a man. Appreciated the breadth of his shoulders again. The firm muscling of his neck. The clean lines of his jaw. Masculine. Strong. There was more than intelligence in his eyes. There was emotion. An openness that his persona faked. This was real.
“Fine. I’ll consider it.” I fought the words as they came out of my mouth. I think I blushed. That was new. “Slow and steady though. Begin with friendship. Flirtation. Nothing physical until we get to know each other. I’ll tell you when. If ever.”
He smiled. But it was cautious. “Didn’t forget that I like to be dominated did you?”
Now that I’d agreed to get to know him, he was afraid of me. Afraid of being hurt. That I wouldn’t find him worthy. The candor on his face made him easy to read. Made me think I’d been wrong to call him shallow.
“I’m a strong woman. I don’t let a man tell me what to do. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not bossy either. But I know my own mind. I don’t compromise on many things. Or for many people.”
“There’s a differences between being bossy or controlling, and dominating someone. A true alpha knows it. Somewhere in here.” He pointed at his chest. Not the heart. Something more encompassing in his gesture. The soul maybe?
I looked for other ways to push him away. To test his resolve. “You know I’m a Christian, right?”
“That for real?”
I laughed, startled. .”Hell, yes, it’s for real. That a problem?”
“Not for me.”
“What’re you?”
He shrugged meekly. “A pragmatist. There may be a higher power. But I don’t need one to get through life.”
“Fair enough. I don’t really need you to believe in God to believe in me. As long as you understand, I do. I believe he’s real. That he made creatures like me for a reason. Not evil. Not to punish men. Just another predator on the food chain, maybe. Something. Anything but chance.”
“Heard and understood.” He bobbed his head with a shy smile.
“That’s a start. No get out of my office. I have some files to go through and I don’t need you here distracting me.”
He practically beamed at me. “So I would be a distraction?”
“I’d want to keep smacking that smug grin off of your face. So, yeah. You’d be a huge pain-in-my-ass distraction.”
“I’ll take it.” I didn’t think he could grin any broader but he managed it as he left the office with an exaggerated bounce in his step. I heard him chanting down the hallway “She likes me. She likes me.”
“Don’t think I don’t know the little boy routine is another affectation.”
He laughed and it was a nice sound. A warm masculine tone that faded slowly from my mind. Then I was alone with myself.
Usually I liked being alone. This time, with him finally gone, the room felt empty.
I swung my feet off the desk and focused on Killian’s financials. Somewhere, there had to be a place they’d hide a prisoner. Whether it was Thrace or Vincent or both of them. I had to figure it out before the sun set tomorrow. I had no time for romantic flights of fancy. Or self-pity. If I couldn’t do this, Vincent was dead. I knew it in the core of my soul.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
“Nothing.” I growled at the file as I slammed it shut and slid it across the desk.
“Pardon?”
I looked up at the unexpected male voice. “Bob. What’re you doing here?”
The wall-clock said three-twenty-one in the morning. I automatically scanned his hands. No weapons. Clenched fists. Anxiety all over his face. It seeped away as he gazed at me.
I cursed, grabbing my sunglasses. I put them snuggly into place. Waited for him to regain control of himself. His anger was the worse for having had thoughts of desire.
Bob was a couple of years older than Janet. Not unattractive I supposed. He hadn’t aged nearly as well as she had. Receding hairline. Bald patch at the center. His remaining hair was still dark. Almost black. Stubby painted a mask on his jaw. His belly sagged from lack of exercise and he was twenty pounds overweight. Fingers doughy. Probably destined for diabetes.
“Janet can’t keep doing this.” His knuckles were white as he clenched harder.
I tried to keep my expression bland. Professional. Maybe even friendly. “This is a conversation between you and Janet.”
“No. It’s a conversation between me and you! Cheating husbands and embezzlers are one thing. Even the occasional murderer isn’t nearly as terrifying as knowing my wife is being exposed to real monsters!”
I leaned back in my chair and folded my arms behind my head. “I’m not going to mock you by pretending I don’t understand what you mean. Vampires and werewolves.”
“Yes! Goddamned right, I mean vampires and werewolves! And Jan won’t listen to me. She won’t abandon you to the dangers of this job. The dangers that come from being what you are!”
“A strong and capable woman?”
I narrowed my gaze. He couldn’t see my contempt. My resentment that the woman I loved most in the world loved a man who couldn’t stand me. Who treated her with less respect than she deserved. I’d never make Janet choose between us. I wouldn’t make her give up one love for the other. But that’s why Bob was here. What he was trying to do.
“Don’t fucking mess with me, Bianca. I’m not a sexist. I know women are strong and capable. Jan’s stronger than me. That’s why she’s not half as terrified of this job as I am.”
“I admire you for acknowledging that. But it’s still a conversation between the two of you. I’m not taking away Janet’s choices because you’re afraid for her.”
“So you’re willing to risk her life? Get her killed? That’s how much you love her? Why she’s so goddamned loyal?”
“Will you please stop taking the Lord’s name in vain?” I wasn’t really upset about it. Linguistically, it had nothing to do with questioning God or calling on his wrath. It was linked to the same part of the brain that people with Tourette’s tapped into. Emphasis rather than meaning. But the complaint stopped him.
“I wasn’t being disrespectful to God. Or to you. Or to women. For God’s sake! Shit. For Pete’s sake, Bianca! Please let her go! Don’t wait until she’s almost killed again before you decide that the life that works for you doesn’t work for her.”
“Bob. That’s just it. I can’t take away her choice. I didn’t decide that Janet should stay with me. That the risks of the job were anything other than serious. I’ve told her a hundred times if it gets too rough, she can retire. I’ve already vested her severance package.”
“Y—you have?”
“Yes. She’ll get eighty-percent of what I pay her now just to call it a day. Stay at home and be safe for the rest of her life. Play the doting wife. Knit or decoupage or whatever it is modern housewives do these days.”
“I never said she had to stay home.” He grew defensive. If he’d had a hat in his hands he’d be wringing it. “There are plenty of jobs that are challenging but won’t put her in front of a werewolf.”
“I was the one attacked. Not her. But fine, talk to her. Tell her you talked to me. Insisted I let her go. Have her come to me and agree. I won’t try to change her mind. Won’t even tell her how much I’d miss her. Will that make you happy, Bob?” I couldn’t keep the anger out of my voice.
He grew agitated, pacing. Small half-steps in either direction as if he couldn’t make up his mind. He wanted to come around the desk and stick his fists in my face. But he wasn’t the kind of man who threatened women. I suspected he wasn’t sure that I fell into the ‘woman’ category
.
“She won’t listen to me. You have to be the one. Tell her you don’t need her anymore. You want to go solo.”
“I can’t do that, Bob. It’s not only impossible to keep my business running without someone to man the front desk, but it’d be a lie. I do need her. Or at least someone like her.” I scowled and ran my nails across the desk in frustration. “I knew her before you, Bob.”
“That shouldn’t matter. I’m her husband.”
I looked up at him harshly. “You mean her owner?”
His face paled, mouth dropping open. “Stop putting words in my mouth.”
“You just said her opinion shouldn’t matter. That you’re her husband and that what you wants is all that does.”
“Not all! But it should matter. Some! Enough that she could find something safer.”
“Bob, you’re not hearing yourself. You’re not asking her to give up a job. You’re asking her to give up a lifelong friendship. You don’t think that never stepping foot in my office makes her less of a target than if she’s my best friend, do you? Right now people think she’s an employee. Hating me doesn’t have to involve her. But if she’s my friend first, people can leverage Janet to get to me.”
His mind raced. I’d suggested things he’d never considered. The terror in his eyes grew. His fear had become a many tentacled creature. “You’re saying someone’s more likely to hurt her if she doesn’t work here? Unless she stops being your friend?”
“Yep. That’s the short and sweet of it.”
His voice grew hoarse with emotion. “She’d never do that. She’d give me up before she’d let you go.”
“Would you want her to do that? Give me up? Never see me or hear from me? Honestly, Bob? Would you want what that would do to her?”
“No. Goddamn you Bianca Savage! You are a bigger bitch than I thought.” He stormed out and I simply stared at his back.
I didn’t like Bob. But it wasn’t my call. Janet did. Hell, she loved him with all of her enormous heart. His name-calling didn’t faze me. What bothered me was that he’d created a need for me to lie to Janet. Or at least, not tell her that he’d stopped by.
The man complicated my relationship with her because he was afraid. Didn’t trust her to know her own mind. But I understood one thing that Bob didn’t. Janet would be just as devasted at losing him if he forced her to choose, as she’d be giving up me.
I glanced back down at the pack financials. I rewound my thoughts. Nothing. Right. There was nothing in the documents to suggest a physical location besides their Joshua Tree commune. No payments going out that could be rent or property taxes. Nothing recorded with any county on the West Coast. Not just California. The FBI had even added Nevada, New Mexico and Oregon for safe-measure..
I started to call Janet. Remembered the time and held the phone to my chest. Thinking. I went to her desk and found the number for Yuri Kamaguchi. Dialed it myself.
“Do you know what damnedable hour it is?” His accent was thick with annoyance.
“Yep. But security never sleeps does it?”
He muttered. I heard fabric rustling. “No. No it does not. Good news or bad?”
“I need your help.”
He grew interested. “Another werewolf attack?”
“No. Not yet. Something related, though. Do you have men you could spare to watch Killian’s pack? Follow anyone who leaves their compound without being noticed?”
He didn’t answer right away. I listened to his breathing. A rattle from something wrong with his lungs. Chain smoking maybe. Or allergies.
“You want them now I take it?”
“Only reason I’m calling. The pack lives in Joshua Tree.”
“I know. We vetted the gay werewolf’s connected to them. See, I can use proper language like an American.”
“Never said you were dumb, Yuri. Can you arrange it?”
He grunted. Pleased or annoyed, I couldn’t tell. “What are you looking for? Why follow them?”
“I’m looking for someplace they might store something.”
Now I had his attention. I could hear excitement in his words. “Like a kidnapped boy?”
“That, too. But I don’t want your people to move in if they find a place. They can be there when I go in. But I’m the one leading the way. You understand me?”
“Da. Can do. See, now I sound like Russian immigrant.”
“Why the performance? Mocking me because I woke you up so early?”
“No. Just showing you that Paul Chandler is not only one who can hide where he comes from. I’ll see to it that you’re called the moment someone leaves Joshua Tree and arrives someplace else.”
He hung up abruptly. I was too stunned that he knew Chandler was MI-6 to respond. Then I dialed Paul. He answered on the first ring.
“Miss me already?”
“Just a friendly warning. Amperdyne knows you’re MI-6. Kamaguchi just dropped that tidbit on me a minute ago.”
“Shit. My cover’s supposed to be too deep for their connections.”
“Or someone’s talked.” I paused, asked a question I really wanted answered. “What’s the real purpose of watching Chilton?”
His voice tightened. “Can’t say. Won’t tell.”
“That’s not how it goes.”
“I know. Doesn’t change the facts.”
“Fine. I respect your discretion. Doesn’t mean I like not knowing.”
“If it would put you at risk, I’d warn you. Thanks for the head’s up. I’ll have my people look into it from our end. He gonna take action on that knowledge?”
“Don’t think so. Just trying to rattle me. Pissed that I woke him up with demands.”
“Demands for what?”
“Surveillance. More eyes on the pack than we have access to between us.”
“Us as in you and me?”
He sounded happy. That pissed me off for some reason. “Not if you put it like that.”
“I do like the sound of ‘us.’” He went silent. Then I heard a rush of air. “You’re giving Amperdyne the case? Why?”
“I’m not. That’s the other reason he wanted to rattle me. I told him that I get to be there when anyone goes in. That I’m in charge.”
“Bet he wasn’t happy about that. Not like I’d have been.”
“He wasn’t. So telling me my new acquaintance was a spy was his way of paying me back.”
I could hear his playful frown. “Now see, you’re going backwards. Acquaintance is such an ugly word.”
“Good night, Paul.”
“Night, Bianca.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
I made it back to my condo before dawn. In retrospect, that was probably a mistake. I was tired. Sloppy. The shadows were darker than usual.
The nightlight that I always left plugged in for Martini was burned out. She didn’t greet me as I tossed my keys on the counter. I hadn’t bothered hitting the lights. I hesitated. Unable to see well enough to navigate the condo. I just wanted to fall into bed. Fully clothed. I was that tired.
I saw movement in the blackness. There was no time to pull the gun from my thigh holster. Someone struck me. Wrapped their boney hands around my throat and carried me to the ground. An inarticulate keening of rage filled the room. It almost sounded inhuman. Not a werewolf though.
My stomach grew icy cold. My arms shivered with goosebumps as energy flowed along my skin. I lashed out with my power. Finding nothing. No testosterone. No warmth. The cold blankness of the undead.
I punched blindly at my attacker. There was a crack of bone on bone. I’d connected with the jaw. It hurt my knuckles. But had to hurt their face more.
The hands loosened. The vampire didn’t speak. Fingernails dug into my skin as they tried to grab hold of me again. Clawing at my flesh.
I ignored the pain and reached for my Glock again. Thankfully, it was the one with wood-tipped bullets. I couldn’t see to aim. But at this range, there was little chance I’d miss. I only hoped whoever it was, wa
sn’t someone I’d regret killing. If I hit them in the heart by accident.
I aimed lower in the ribcage. Squeezed the trigger. This time there was a scream of pain and rage. Female. Feral and hateful but definitely a woman. Not Dusty then. I had an idea who though.
The vampire withdrew back into the shadows. I glanced at the microwave. No LED. Same for the oven. The power had been turned off. The curtains pulled tight as always. I was at a serious disadvantage. Night vision wasn’t one of my preternatural abilities.
I threatened the darkness. “Stay back if you don’t want me to unload the entire clip into you!”
“He was mine! I warned you! Begged you to leave him alone! But no! You ask for him personally!”
I knew who it was for certain then. “Rhoda, you need to stop. I’ll kill you if I have to. And I won’t lose a wink of sleep over it.”
“Kill me! Go on. Then he’ll see you for the monster you are.”
I sighed. When other monsters started calling me a monster, I took it personally. “He’ll understand it was self-defense. That you lost your mind at his rejection of you. He won’t blame me. But he’ll blame himself. Is that what you want?”
“No. That’s not right!” I heard doubt in her declaration. She was moving. Back and forth. Making herself a difficult target. She could see my uncertainty. The one thing vampires had that I wished I did. At least at the moment. Night vision.
“It is, Rhoda. You’ve already threatened me in front of him before. This is my apartment. There’s no reason he won’t believe the police report. You have no other reason to be here.”
“I don’t care if I die! As long as he hates you!”
“Then maybe you better not die. Try something else.”
She lunged again. I heard her sobbing. The air moving in front of me. I raised the gun and fired.
The flash from the muzzle revealed her position and I adjusted. Up eight more inches. Not her heart. Her shoulder. The first shot had hit her below the ribs. It wasn’t enough to slow her down
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