Thirst

by Jacquelyn Frank

  Thirst is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  A Loveswept Ebook Original

  Copyright © 2017 by Jacquelyn Frank

  Excerpt from Hunger by Jacquelyn Frank copyright © 2017 by Jacquelyn Frank

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States by Loveswept, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

  LOVESWEPT is a registered trademark and the LOVESWEPT colophon is a trademark of Penguin Random House LLC.

  This book contains an excerpt from the forthcoming book Hunger by Jacquelyn Frank. This excerpt has been set for this edition only and may not reflect the final content of the forthcoming edition.

  Ebook ISBN 9780425286241

  Cover design: Caroline Teagle

  Cover photograph: © Boas73/Shutterstock

  randomhousebooks.com

  v4.1

  ep

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Epilogue

  Dedication

  By Jacquelyn Frank

  About the Author

  Excerpt from Hunger

  Prologue

  Rafe walked into the seedy little bar and his nose was immediately assailed by the smell of humanity and stale beer. The bar was moderately busy, most of the patrons gathered around the two pool tables at the dimly lit back of the bar. He ignored the bar itself, a row of worn seats lined up against an equally worn wooden bar top. There were two people sitting there, one nursing a beer, the other nursing something much harder.

  Rafe let his eyes dart over the dark tables in an alcove across from the bar itself and saw the man he was looking for sitting with a woman leaning against his side. She wasn’t exactly pretty—she came across more as desperate. She appeared eager enough, he thought. She was wearing a pair of tight jeans and a tank top, her dyed blond hair halfheartedly dressed up in a ponytail. She seemed generally unkempt. She was exactly the kind of woman Halo liked. Easy. Cheap.

  Halo was seated next to her, sprawled back, his long legs stretched out under the table. He had a bottle of tequila settled near a row of overturned shot glasses. There were several spent limes and a saltshaker on the table. Halo reached for the tequila bottle and poured two shots into clean glasses, while the woman draped against his side grabbed for the saltshaker. She licked her hand, sprinkled salt over the wet spot, then reached for a fresh lime. She swayed unsteadily, her hand shaking as she picked up her shot glass. She slammed the shot in tandem with Halo, licked the salt from her skin and sucked on the lime. Halo took the tequila straight, no salt, no lime.

  Halo looked up at Rafe slowly, clearly having known he was there all along. He cocked a cold grin at Rafe.

  “Just gonna stand there or are you gonna join us for a shot?”

  Halo knew better than that. He knew Rafe didn’t drink. Halo shouldn’t have been drinking either. However, Halo walked to the beat of his own drum…even if it meant flirting with unclean practices. The alcohol didn’t seem to be affecting Halo, which was surprising considering the amount he had obviously ingested, but it was affecting the washed-out blonde. She looked very drunk. Rafe was disgusted by the sight of them both.

  He hooked a chair with his foot, drew it up to the table, and took a seat.

  “Want to get rid of your friend so we can talk?” Rafe said, nodding to the blonde.

  Halo reached out and grabbed the woman by her cockeyed ponytail. He forced her to focus on him.

  “Take a hike, sister.”

  She frowned.

  “But…” she began.

  “You can come back after he leaves,” Halo said, nodding to Rafe. The drunk blonde looked at Rafe as if she had only just noticed him.

  “Well, what am I supposed to do in the meantime?” she whined.

  “Why don’t you go play some pool?”

  “It’s no fun without you,” she slurred.

  “Beat it, kiddo. Go entertain yourself.” He gave her a shove and she staggered to her feet.

  “You’re being an asshole,” she complained.

  “I’ve been called worse. Now go.”

  She looked like she wanted to argue some more, but eventually decided it wasn’t worth it. She really wanted to drink more and, after all, he wasn’t telling her she could never come back. But, just to be sure, she grabbed the bottle of tequila off the table and tottered over to the pool tables.

  “There. Happy now?” Halo asked.

  “Infinitely.” Despite his words, Rafe frowned. “I have a job for you.”

  “I figured as much. Otherwise why would you meet me here? I know how much you love places like this.” Halo grinned, pleased at Rafe’s imagined discomfort. In truth, Rafe didn’t give much of a damn where they met up. Sure, he wasn’t as at home in a place like this as Halo was, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t fit in like anyone else had he wanted to.

  He just didn’t want to.

  “I have a new bounty for you.”

  “Obviously. You don’t exactly go out of your way to seek out my company. Who is it?”

  “Roth.”

  Halo lifted a brow. His features were rugged, and Rafe supposed he was handsome in his way, but when he smirked like he was doing right then, it just made Rafe want to punch him square in the face.

  “Roth?” Halo echoed. “The high and mighty Roth who barely acknowledges he’s one of us? I find it hard to imagine him giving in to his baser side.”

  “It happens to the best of us,” Rafe said tightly.

  “Even you?” Halo asked, his smirk returning.

  Even him? Hell, he hoped not. Because that would mean someone would be sitting where he was right now putting out a contract on his life. It would mean he’d lost everything about himself that he treasured. His dignity. His self-control. His right to life.

  “It could happen to me. I strive every day to keep control. We all do.”

  “Not all. If we all did there would be no need for me,” Halo said.

  “As I said, it happens to the best of us. You’re just as susceptible as any of us are.”

  Halo snorted. “And what would you do then? Who could you possibly send out to collect me as a bounty? That’d be some neat trick.”

  “We’d find someone. You’re not all-powerful, you know.”

  “Close to it,” he said with a raspy chuckle. “But don’t worry; I don’t have any plans of going rogue. You’re all safe for the time being.”

  “I’m glad to hear that,” Rafe said dryly.

  “I know you are. I’m scary. Me going rogue is one of your worst nightmares.”

  He was right, but Rafe wasn’t about to admit that to him.

  “Are you going after Roth or aren’t you?” Rafe asked irritably. “If not, I can get Dyson to—”

  “Dyson! That guy couldn’t find his own asshole with a fart to give away its location. I’ll take Roth. It shouldn’t be too hard. Roth is a creature of habit. He’ll haunt his usual places thinking he can take on
anything that comes his way. Hubris goes hand in hand with going rogue.”

  “You might want to watch out for that yourself,” Rafe said.

  “Roth?”

  “No. Hubris. You’ve got a real bad case of it.”

  Halo chuckled. “That’s because I’ve earned it.”

  Rafe wasn’t amused. Of course, the truth was Halo had earned it. There was no better bounty hunter among their people. Rafe certainly wouldn’t want to go head-to-head with Halo. Oh, he could probably hold his own, but there was guaranteed to be pain and damage on both sides if it came down to it. No one would wish for that. No one in their sound mind anyway. He almost felt sorry for Roth.

  “Now if that’s all, I’d like to get back to what I was doing,” Halo drawled.

  “Getting a human woman plastered so she’ll sleep with you?”

  Halo snorted. “I don’t have to get her drunk. She’d sleep with me regardless. And anyway, sleeping isn’t going to come into the picture until much later.”

  “You need better taste in women,” Rafe said, looking over at the staggering blonde who was presently leaning up against another man. She was taking swigs straight from the tequila bottle now, limes and salt clearly unnecessary.

  “Better women have the sense to stay away from me,” Halo said with a shrug. “I’m happy with mediocre women. It gets me what I need.”

  “Be careful, Halo,” Rafe warned.

  “Are you my mother? I can take care of myself.” Halo got to his feet. “Later, Mom.”

  He walked over to his blonde, leaving Rafe behind. Rafe watched as the blonde drunkenly threw herself into Halo’s arms. Halo snatched the bottle from her hand and poured some of the tequila straight down his gullet.

  Rafe took the dismissal for what it was and got to his feet. He was fine with that. The sooner he got out of that piss-smelling bar the happier he would be. He didn’t know how Halo could stand it.

  He turned and exited the bar, breathing deep of the fresh, cold night air the minute he was out on the sidewalk.

  Chapter 1

  “Hey, Holden! We caught one!”

  Renee Holden jerked her head up at the sound of her partner’s voice shouting out across the bull pen. She stood up and clipped her cellphone to her belt on the side opposite her badge. As was her habit, she withdrew her sidearm and checked the safety and the slide. Then she tucked it securely away in the holster clipped to her belt, behind her badge on the right side.

  “Where?” she asked her partner, James Franconi, as he came to his desk and grabbed his jacket.

  “Park Avenue if you can believe it. Probably some rich guy’s wife bumping off her old man for the insurance.”

  “What have I told you about walking into an investigation with preconceived notions in your head? Your prejudices blind you.”

  “Hey. I’m not prejudiced. I’m just seasoned. I know what’s what out there. C’mon, Nee, you know it too. We see the same kinds of people doing the same kinds of crimes over and over again.”

  “That may be, but I’m not jumping to any conclusions before I even get to the crime scene and neither should you. We’re detectives. So let’s go detect.”

  “Aye, aye, sir!” Jimmy said, giving her a smart salute. The salute was sharp and clean, echoing the fact that James had been a commando in the years before becoming a police officer. Now, he still wore his hair cropped to military shortness and kept his body fit and sculpted. It made for a healthy and reasonably disciplined partner. Of course, he still had his flaws. One of which they’d just been discussing.

  “Wiseass,” Renee said, scooping her coat off the back of her chair. She shrugged into it, but didn’t button it up in spite of the cold she knew was out there. She didn’t like not having free access to her weapon. She would rather shiver a little than cover up her gun.

  She did put on gloves and a thick scarf though, trying to compensate for the gap down the center part of her coat.

  “Is the dead guy inside or outside?” she asked Jimmy.

  “Dunno. Guess we’ll find out when we get there.”

  “Guess so. I’m driving.”

  “Oh c’mon! I want to get there reasonably alive!”

  “You’ll get there alive, I promise.”

  “Yeah, but you’ll James Bond me.”

  “James Bond?”

  “Shaken, not stirred.”

  Renee laughed. “I’ll drive safe.”

  “Sure you will.”

  She got them to the crime scene in one piece, ignoring Jimmy’s grumbles about how he’d be safer in the back of a taxi driven by a half-blind cabbie. They got out of the car and saw the scene was outside and taped off to keep the looky-loos out of the way. Renee and Jimmy got past the yellow tape and walked around to the alley between the buildings where the body of a man lay half-slumped against the brick wall of the building on the right-hand side of the alley. The man was in his mid-forties by the look of him and was wearing an expensive cashmere coat. So far Jimmy was half right. He was a rich man.

  She took off her winter gloves, trading them for latex ones. She squatted down in front of the body, getting eye to eye with him. His eyes were open, as was his mouth. It was as if his face had been frozen into a look of horror. Renee considered herself to be immune to most of the horrors of her job, but the expression gave her a chill. She shrugged it off in order to focus on the scene.

  “Not a robbery,” she said, picking up the man’s hand gingerly and taking note of the gold and diamond rings on his two last fingers. He also wore an expensive watch on his wrist.

  “Wallet’s still here,” Jimmy said, pulling it out of the man’s pocket. “Arnie Cooper. Lives in this building right here.”

  “Feet away from the safety of home,” Renee said. “I don’t see any obvious wounds, no strangulation bruises.”

  “How do we know he didn’t just die of a heart attack?” Jimmy asked.

  “We don’t. But looking at the expression on his face…I’m going to wait and see what the coroner has to say. My gut tells me this is a homicide. Let’s comb the area for evidence.” She looked up and around. “Pull the video on nearby street cameras. I want to know why Mr. Cooper came into this alley instead of heading right into his building. Maybe someone lured him out here. I’m not ruling anything out until I see what video we have and what the coroner has to say. Jimmy, you and I will start questioning witnesses.”

  “Start with who found him,” one of the beat cops said as he nodded to a woman with a toy poodle on a leash. She was standing next to another cop who was engaging her in conversation. She wore a very expensive pair of shoes and the diamonds on her fingers glittered in the morning sunlight as she moved her hands in dramatic gestures.

  “I’ll talk to her,” Renee said. “You canvass the rest of the gawkers. Make sure the CSU guys get pictures of the crowd. Our perp may be watching.”

  “A smart guy would be to hell and gone from here by now,” Jimmy said.

  “Lucky for us they are rarely smart.”

  Renee got up from crouching over the body and walked toward the woman and her little dog. The poodle yapped at her as she approached. Renee bent to pet him, gingerly at first in case he wasn’t friendly, but then more enthusiastically when he proved to be social.

  “What a beautiful dog,” she said to the owner. “What’s his name?”

  The owner stopped talking to the cop in front of her and looked down at Renee. Her mouth curved into a smile.

  “She’s a girl. And her name is Roxy.”

  “Well, she’s a beautiful picture of her breed.”

  “Oh, thank you!” The woman’s smile grew. “Do you know much about poodles?”

  “Not poodles, but breeding. My dad is a breeder upstate. We breed Labs and German shepherds for the blind and for the police to train.”

  “Oh, what a fulfilling career that must be for your dad. Does he show his dogs? Roxy has been in a couple of shows.”

  “He does but not often. He’d much rathe
r train them for other things. So,” Renee said rising to her full height, “was it you or was it Roxy who first noticed our victim, Ms….?”

  “Anna Sophia. It was me. I saw them struggling and thought something was wrong almost immediately. I was afraid but I got closer…and I saw one man biting the other man on the back of his neck. It was such an odd thing but I knew it was bad because of the expression on the man…your victim. Oh, that poor man! And then suddenly the attacker noticed me watching and disengaged from the man’s neck and snarled at me. He had fangs! It was a vampire! I couldn’t believe it!”

  Renee resisted the urge to roll her eyes at the woman’s dramatic interpretation of the attack. The woman’s mind was obviously filtering what she had seen in a way that she could cope with it. She had probably read one too many paranormal romance novels.

  “Can you describe this…attacker?” Renee asked, avoiding the word “vampire” though she was tempted.

  “He was tall…had dark hair…black, I guess you could say. Overall he was a very handsome fellow—if not for those eyes. They were like staring into evil.”

  “Do you think you could describe the man in greater detail to a sketch artist?” Renee asked.

  “Oh yes. I’m never going to forget that face.”

  Well, that was something, Renee supposed. She seemed like a solid eyewitness, once you filtered through the drama. Renee turned to look at the crowd that had gathered. “You don’t see him here do you?” she asked the woman.

  “Well…nooo,” the woman said as she craned her neck and looked around. “He leaped away, moving like a cat. Down the alleyway and over the fence. He’s probably long gone by now. And good riddance, I say. I never want to be that close to him again! My life was in danger! He could have killed me! Then what would happen to Roxy?”

  “Thank you, ma’am. Please go with this officer,” Renee said, pulling aside one of the beat cops. “He’ll take you down to the precinct and we’ll get you together with our sketch artist.”