by Liz Schulte
My eyes struggled to roll back into my head as soon as I opened them. I blinked until the room started to come into focus around me. Blood trickled down the side of my head. My hands were bound and my legs wouldn’t move either. My head throbbed. The people in the room moved too fast, too smooth.
Fucking vampires.
None of them gave me a second glance, which was good. If they didn’t know I was awake, I still had time to come up with a plan. I closed my eyes again and stayed as still as possible as I worked my thumbnail against the zip tie around my wrists. My nails were thicker than human fingernails. I kept them sharpened, not just because they looked totally badass (they did), but also for situations like this. The plastic snapped and I caught it before it could fall. Not one of them looked back.
The vampires were distracted by an argument they were having between them, but that wouldn’t hold if I moved, which made freeing to my legs harder. Big movements like that would probably get someone’s attention.
“He specifically said to not kill her,” a woman said. “We’re to wait for him.”
“She’s still breathing,” a thick, deep voice responded. “But I don’t see why we can’t sample her. She has plenty of lives. He doesn’t have to know about it.”
I inched down the column they had me strapped to.
“If you go near her, I’ll kill you myself. We aren’t to touch her. She knows where Thomas is,” the woman insisted. “Paolo wants to question her.”
Damn it all to hell. Fucking Thomas. That rat bastard son of a bitch. I never had a single vampire problem until him. And I sure as hell wasn’t going to wait around here until Paolo, the unofficial leader of the vampires, showed up. He had always blamed me for Thomas getting away the first time.
“What about Corbin?” the man said.
“Corbin doesn’t have a say. Maybe he isn’t the favorite anymore. Maybe Paolo is ready to move on—or at least he will be after she breaks,” the woman said snidely. “Then more deserving people can step into his spot.”
Pssh. Break. They could take all of my lives and I wouldn’t tell them anything. Even if I knew something to tell, which I didn’t. I shifted my legs as I continued to ease myself lower, trying to figure out how my ankles were bound. My boots were still on, so it was possible they hadn’t taken my knife, but even with a knife, there was no way I could move faster than a vampire.
“More deserving.” Corbin’s silky voice came from across the room with a perfect amount of irony and pique. Did he practice these things?
I opened my eyes. He was just the distraction I needed. I squatted, hand immediately going inside my left boot. The knife was right where I always left it. How stupid were these vampires, leaving a prisoner armed? I cut the ties around my ankles in the back, but didn’t remove them. Not a single vampire looked back at me. Corbin’s timing couldn’t have been better. There were only about five other vampires in the room. I could take them.
I stood back up like nothing had happened and put my hands behind my back again, with the knife resting against my forearm.
“Paolo is on his way,” the woman said with bravado she couldn’t have felt looking at Corbin’s black, soulless eyes. “He’ll see for himself that she knows more than she shares with you. Your days are numbered.”
Corbin laughed without humor. “I have no doubt the Sekhmet knows more than she shares with anyone,” he said dryly. “But this isn’t the way to make her talk. She will sooner die than have information forced out of her. Do you know nothing of her people? Allies are better than enemies.”
“Kristina has already contacted him. And you have come one step closer to losing his favor.” I could hear the smile in her voice. “There’s always a new and better replacement waiting to take your spot. It’s Kristina’s time now. I will say you have been quite disappointing.” She crossed her arms over her chest as two huge vampires moved to either side of her. “I hope he doesn’t show you mercy.”
“I certainly didn’t show it to your daughter when I took her life. Who do you think ordered that hit, Joann?” Corbin’s eyes flickered over me for a moment, and one corner of his mouth went up. “Besides, I’m not the one who failed today. If you and Kristina leave now, you might be able to hide at least for a day or two before he finds you.”
“We haven’t failed,” she said, shaking her head, making her black hair ripple.
“How hard is it to keep one Sekhmet from escaping? I really don’t think he will be understanding. Especially if you damaged the relationship we have fostered with her.”
All heads swiveled in my direction. A vampire who looked like a bodybuilder came toward me. “She’s still here,” he said in his deep, thick voice, like his tongue was too big for his mouth. He reached around me to check the ties.
I jammed the knife into his temple with my left hand as I hit out with my right hand as hard as I could, leading with my fingernails. His soft undead flesh and bone gave way, and I came back with his heart. I dropped it to the floor. The knife pulled out as he fell in front of me. Two others reached me before he even hit the floor. I threw the knife at the one on the right at the same time I kicked to my left. The silver heel of my boot sank into his eye with the force of his own assault. The vampire screamed and pulled back, dropping to his knees, both hands covering his face. The one I’d hit with the knife hit me from the side, knocking me off balance.
Grabbing his shirt as I fell, I pulled him to the ground with me. I grabbed the hilt of the knife lodged in his chest and twisted as I used the weight of my body to flip him over beneath me. He got in one good punch that made my ears ring and my mouth fill with blood before I jammed the blade into his brain and pulled it back out.
The last two were already coming toward me, but Corbin stopped their charge. “If you want to die, please do carry on. I have no doubt she will dispatch the two of you as easily as she did the others.”
The woman and her last brute stopped, glaring down at me as I stood up, spitting out the mouthful of blood. I grinned at her. My teeth were probably red. “Any time you’re ready,” I said with a wink.
“I should have let them kill you when they found you,” she spat.
I advanced on her slowly, not missing Corbin’s warning glance, but he didn’t tell me what to do. No one did. I held my arms out wide. “Give it your best shot.”
She didn’t budge.
I dropped my arms. “That’s what I thought.” I wiped the blood off the blade of my knife on her shirt before I slipped it back into my boot. “Come after me again, and I will finish what I started here today.”
Her mouth pinched, and the big guy stood stoically next to her, awaiting her commands. Sheep.
“I tried to warn you, Joann. Now you have lost two of Kristina’s men and this poor devil,” Corbin said, pointing at the guy still bemoaning the loss of his eye. “Will have to live with pirate jokes for the rest of eternity.” He tilted his head at the man. “Could be worse, mate. Women love patches.”
I shook my head as I took off my leather jacket and peeled the formerly white t-shirt off my body. See, that was the problem with wearing regular clothes. I’d never get the bloodstains off. “Does anyone have a towel?”
Corbin reached behind him and tossed me a dirty, oily rag, but at least I could clean off some of the signs of violence. The jeans would have to be thrown away. I should have worn leather. When I was as clean as I was getting, I put the leather jacket back on and zipped it up. We were in some sort of garage, but it really didn’t look like anything special. “All of this was about Thomas?” I asked casually.
Corbin took the rag out of my hand and dabbed it against my temple. “Missed a spot.”
My jaw tightened at the pain of the touch. “Nope. Still bleeding,” I said, knocking his hand away. “I don’t want oil and dirt in the wound. Thanks anyway.”
“Hold still,” he said, as he tilted my head to the side and looked at the spot where they’d bashed it against the building. Those assholes. It was amazing my skull wasn’t
fractured. “You’ll live,” he said, letting me go.
“No shit.” I bent down and picked up my t-shirt and tore it in half, leaving the bloody front part on the floor, and wadded up the cleaner back portion, pressing it to my head. “So did they attack me in particular, or is it any bounty hunter who comes into the area?”
Corbin took a deep breath. “New Orleans is their turf. It should have been cleared with Paolo before you came here.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Since when do I need vampire permission to go wherever in the hell I want?”
He shrugged. “Since when do you let barely adolescent vampires sneak up on you? You’re getting sloppy, Femi.”
“I was distracted—I don’t have to explain myself. I shouldn’t have been attacked. I don’t know where fucking Thomas is.” I shouted the last part to make sure the other ones could hear me. “I haven’t heard from him since he abandoned us in Arizona. For all I know, hell has taken him, because that’s what happens when you make deals with demons that you can’t follow through on. They fucking kill you. I wish people would stop coming to me as the standing expert on him. I don’t know anything.” The anger was real, even if my words weren’t entirely. I didn’t know where he was, but he obviously wasn’t in hell, since he’d sent me a gift.
Corbin squeezed the bridge of his nose. “That cockroach is still around. Sightings pop up almost daily. But maybe the demons are helping him. He’s always gone by the time I get there. If not demons, he’s turning to someone. There’s no other way he could have avoided me this long. Last place he was seen was here, and then you show up. You must know how that looks.”
“If you knew Thomas was here, why didn’t you tell me?”
Corbin said he had been spotted at my apartment, but he didn’t say a word when I told him I was assigned a case here.
“You’ve been following me again, haven’t you?” Corbin’s dark eyes met mine without apology. “Tell me, what have you seen? Have I met with Thomas? Have you seen him at all?”
“No,” he said.
I nodded. I didn’t like any of this. I was sent to the exact same city Thomas just so happened to be in. One that vampires apparently felt they owned, and which was now having fake werewolf attacks. This whole scenario had Thomas written all over it. He was in some way manipulating this. When I found him, I’d kill him myself.
For a moment Corbin just looked so over everything. “You should probably go before Paolo gets here,” he said quietly, eyes flicking toward the door. “I’ll take care of everything here.”
My legs didn’t move. “Have you really lost favor with him?” Corbin and I might not have been friends, but I still liked him fine. Losing favor with Paolo meant one thing: he’d be killed.
He winked at me. “It wouldn’t be the first time. He’ll come around. He always does.”
“Was it because of…” I didn’t say Selene’s name. Corbin was so touchy when it came to her—the half-elf fairy queen who apparently had his heart, whether or not she wanted it.
“Among other things. I’ll make it right or we’ll part ways. Life will return to normal one way or another.”
“Won’t he kill you?”
“He can’t,” he said without explanation. He ran a hand over his face and looked back at me. “I would recommend leaving the city.”
I shook my head. “I’m on a job.”
He walked me to the door, but didn’t touch me. “Tell Sy to send someone else. Your past with Thomas is known, and unfortunately Kristina called Paolo.” He ground his teeth together. “The reward for his capture is too high, and Paolo is getting impatient. Every vampire is now a threat to you until he is caught. This is the last place you want to be right now.”
I chuckled to myself, though the situation wasn’t funny. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t leave. I’d signed that stupid contract. I could mentally hear Holden telling me “I told you so.” If I left now, the council would punish me. I didn’t know what that meant, but it probably wasn’t a good thing. And besides that, I wasn’t about to let a bunch of vampires run me off. “Even if I wanted to, which I don’t, I can’t. I have to solve this case.”
His black eyes stared into mine. “What sort of case is it?”
“The classified sort,” I said, and raised my eyebrows. “Given to me by mutual acquaintances.”
He went vampire still. As always, it was eerie as hell. “I’ll buy you as much time as I can. Call Sy. You need a miracle of public relations right now, and if anyone can pull that off, it’s him. Tell me something about Thomas, and I might be able to stall them…”
I rolled my eyes. “I don’t know anything to tell you.”
Corbin opened the door. “Talk to the half-elf, then. The sooner the better.” He closed the door behind him.
Well, shit. That complicated things.
I pulled the rag away from my temple and glanced at it. The bleeding had mostly stopped, though my head still hurt like hell. I tossed the remainder of my shirt in the next garbage can. I could call Sy, but Holden had made it clear I was on my own for this case. Neither of them could get involved. But this wasn’t technically getting involved in the case. It was a different matter entirely.
I dialed Sy’s number.
“Hey,” he said. “Solve the case already?”
“Not quite,” I said. “I’m having a little vampire issue.”
He was silent for a moment. “Is that right?” he finally said. “Great. I am sure you will wrap this up in no time.”
I rolled my eyes. He wasn’t alone. Message received. “Fine. Whatever. I’ll take care of it.” I hung up.
It wasn’t like Sy to completely blow me off. Maybe the vampires were connected to the case and he knew it. There was way too much coincidence to ignore. The simplest answer was normally the correct one. So we either had two separate yet similar killers and a sudden vampire uprising that I was in the middle of, or someone was moving all of us around like toy soldiers. But why?
I couldn’t stand not knowing. That was why I took the job with the council to begin with. The fact that there was a council at all ate at me. I wanted to know all of their secrets—I wanted to know Sy’s secrets. The hows and whys kept me going and pushing forward with everything I did. It was that insatiable curiosity that had driven me from my homeland in search of more. It was also the reason I couldn’t just leave.
I replayed everything that had happened in the garage and everything they had said. Really, it could have gone much worse. Actually, it probably should have. The whole thing was too easy. My feet slowed to a stop, and I looked back over my shoulder at the faint scratching noise behind me. A rat scurried into an alleyway.
The vampire who’d snuck up on me wasn’t an adolescent vampire. No way did a new vampire get the jump on me. That vampire had been too fast and too silent for that. Yes, I had been distracted, but so was I just now, and I still noticed a rat. Even distracted, I was alert. The vampire who’d captured me had to have been older, much older, and stronger. I lightly touched my head. It was the perfect spot to knock me out, but not permanently damage me. And my skull hadn’t been fractured. That showed a tremendous amount of control.
And then there was the knife in my boot. Why would they leave the prisoner armed even if they were tied up? That was an unnecessary risk, even for a vampire. Sure, they could move fast, but it gave the prisoner a chance to get the jump on them, like I did. What if I had waited to attack until it was Paolo standing in front of me?
Also, if they knew they hadn’t really searched me, why was no one watching me? Why were all the vampires there so new? I had personally spotted at least twenty older vampires since I’d set foot in this city. Yet the ones charged with guarding me were babies, and slower than most. It was almost offensive that they hadn’t taken more precautions.
Not to mention Corbin’s timing was perfect. Too perfect…that son of bitch.
He knew I wouldn’t tell him if I knew something about Thomas. He also knew he couldn’t force
it out of me, but he could “save” me and make me feel like I owed him something. I’d bet my next three meals that Corbin was the one who’d hit my head against the wall, and he had arranged everything that happened. I was good, but making it out of a situation like that pretty much unharmed was nearly impossible. Just when I was starting to like him, too.
Were the others in on it, or was Corbin playing both sides? Knowing him, it was the latter. He was on the outs with Paolo, which meant others were probably honestly vying for his spot in the vampire hierarchy. Fake-kidnapping me meant embarrassment for them, and he would buy himself more time to find Thomas, hence his renewed interest. I almost felt sorry for him.
I rolled my eyes.
I had no idea how he’d done it, but obviously he had made sure they “found” me. Then he let them call Paolo before he waltzed in, giving me the chance to escape, thereby making them look incompetent and making me trust him. It was actually a really good play. All things considered, they were incompetent, or they would have done a better job with me. At the same time, though, he’d used me and put me in a dangerous situation.
As annoying as that was, the real part I needed to focus on was how did all of this connect? Had the council set it up as a test, and if so, why? Or was Thomas once again at the heart of this clusterfuck? He knew I was here. Was he reaching out, or was he using the vampires to distract me from the case? Then there was Corbin. Twice, Corbin had helped me on cases that had nothing to do with him. I didn’t want to suspect him, but what choice did I have?
You know what they say: never trust a vampire.
Chapter 7