by Sara Snow
“Did she get what she wanted after the two of you left the bar?” I remembered the redhead leaning over Carter, her hair hiding their faces from me. I remembered Carter’s grin when she whispered something in his ear.
“No. Not at all. She dragged me into an alley and tried to make out, but I pushed her away. For all I know, she was sent by the succubus to distract me. One thing you need to know about demons is that they can lure almost any supernatural creature into taking part in their agenda, as long as that creature isn’t committed to good.”
“I’m starting to realize that.” I took another pastry from the plate Olympia had left behind. I was ravenous this morning. “Why did you leave with her, anyway?”
“That was a huge mistake. I believed her when she told me that she had information to give me. I thought she might have some news, something I could use to identify the demon who murdered a friend of mine a couple of weeks ago. Maybe she had news, maybe not—we never got that far. I knew I had to go back and find you. You were the only thing on my mind.”
Carter gave me a long look. He held his coffee cup in his hands, turning it around and around without drinking from it. I knew he was trying to work up the nerve to tell me something, so for once I kept my mouth shut and waited.
And waited.
Carter cleared his throat. He opened his mouth. Nothing came out.
“You must think I’m the dumbest twit!” I cried, exasperated. “I’ve known what you are for weeks. I just needed you to confirm it. But you kept hiding it from me, as if I was too delicate to take the news.”
Carter hung his head. “You’re right. I underestimated you. I thought you couldn’t take another supernatural surprise on top of everything else.”
“With everything I’ve been through in the past few weeks! Are you kidding? I was almost sucked up by a soul-eater. I was abducted and attacked by a succubus. My new BFF is a witch. And you’re a vampire. I suspected it a long time ago, but I got all the proof I needed last night. I was lying there on that stretcher, bleeding, and you stuck out your fangs at me. You were hitting on me, vampire-style, while I was busted up into a million pieces!”
He winced. “That was an involuntary response. Yes, I wanted you. No, I didn’t control my desire very well. But now I’m here to ask you to forgive me for that whole fucked-up night.”
“So, when your fangs pop out, I assume that’s the vampire equivalent of getting a hard-on?”
“Yes. I’m afraid it is.”
“Well, then. I guess you were just being a typical vampire. Responding to my blood instead of my boobs.”
“I’m only half-vampire,” Carter said. “If that makes any difference to you.”
“I don’t know if it does or not. But I’m listening.”
He looked so miserable that I couldn’t help reaching out to touch his hand. The contact made him flinch, but he didn’t take his hand away. He let me wrap my fingers over his while he told me his story.
“I wasn’t born Carter Black. My given name was Charles of the Shadow Clan.” Carter gave me a warning look. “I know it’s a ridiculous name. Don’t you dare laugh.”
“I wouldn’t dream of laughing,” I lied.
“Anyway. I was born in 1950 to a vampire named Lenora. She was a torch singer and quite the seductress—a vamp in more than one respect. She used to draw big crowds for her beauty and her voice. My father was human, but I know nothing about him. I assume he was some poor guy she picked up in one of the clubs she sang at.”
“Did you ever try to track him down?”
“Oh, yes. I spent years trying to find my human family. Lenora wouldn’t tell me anything about my dad. I doubt she even knew which one of her lovers was the sperm donor. I never found out who he was. Not even a clue.”
“Is Lenora still alive?”
“Lenora is immortal, so she will live forever. I wish I was happy that my mother has the gift of immortality and that she passed it on to me. But I’m not. I’ve often wished she was dead. Not because I wish her any harm, necessarily, but I wish she wasn’t always lurking in my background.”
“Does she ever try to get in touch with you?”
“No. But I’m sure she will someday. Lenora needs to have control over everyone around her. That’s why I left home in the ‘80s and changed my name to Carter Black. If I hadn’t changed my name and my identity, I’m sure she would have tracked me down—in between cocktails and one-night stands.”
I mulled this over. I had suspected that Carter was a vampire ever since he sliced my breast with the iron stake and licked my blood off his finger. But hearing him admit it and hearing about his history made the whole thing more real and more frightening.
“Do you kill humans?” I asked.
“No. I do drink blood from living mortals, and sometimes from other vampires, but I’ve never drained anyone to the point of death.”
“But there’s a first time for everything, right?”
“Not for that,” Carter said firmly. “That’s where I draw the line. I don’t kill humans. Not for blood, anyway.”
“Well, that’s reassuring. Sort of.”
“It should be. Kingston is the one who made me take an oath never to kill. I’ve stuck to that oath ever since. He’s everything to me: father, best friend, fellow slayer. I would never go back on my word to him. He met me at one of the lowest points in my life, when I was trying like hell to destroy myself. That’s one of the worst parts of being half vamp; you don’t get the option to check out of life when it becomes unbearable.”
“Is Kingston a vampire, too?”
“No.” Carter smiled. “Kingston is an angel. A fallen one, but an angel.”
I wasn’t sure if he meant that as a figure of speech. My bet was that he truly was a divine being who had gone wrong somewhere, but I didn’t want to press Carter for information about his friend.
“Kingston is the one who introduced me to slaying demons,” Carter went on. “Becoming a slayer changed my life. For the first time, I felt like I was contributing to the good of this world, fighting on the side of light. He trained me on how to kill demons, made me his apprentice. He taught me how to use the gifts that my vampire origins had given me while hanging onto the best parts of my human nature. That’s why I have a conscience. I owe that to Kingston.”
I owed a lot to Kingston, too. He was the one who had lifted me off the ground at the scene of the accident, out of the blazing fire made by the destruction of the succubus.
“That thing, that succubus who tried to kill me. Who was she?”
Carter groaned. “When I met Imogen, she was a vampire. We had a thing going for a while, but it didn’t last. Another succubus, a female, took over her body so she could steal her immortality. She became a dangerous hybrid of vamp and succubus, so monstrous and vindictive that she could only express her wrath by killing humans.”
“Is she really gone now? Couldn’t she come back?”
“I doubt it. Not after being banished by Kingston, stabbed with iron, and burned. It takes a lot to destroy a vampire, but I think we accomplished it last night. If Imogen does come back, it will be in a very different form.”
I didn’t like the sound of that. Or the fact that Carter had been involved with Imogen at one time. For a vampire who held such high moral principles, he was sure willing to roll in the mud when it came to women. Half-human or not, Carter was a player.
“How do I know you’re not going to hurt me?” I asked.
Now it was Carter’s turn to take my hand. He looked into my eyes, holding my gaze. I scanned his mouth, but I didn’t see any fangs jutting out, only his lips set in a serious line.
“I would never hurt you, Georgia. I would never take anything from you that you weren’t willing to give me. I promise you that. You mean far too much to me.”
His voice caught in his throat. I had never seen Carter so open before, so raw. He usually glossed over his feelings with a snide joke or shut down in a moody silence. Now, he was b
eing so vulnerable with me that I could almost forget he was half-vampire.
Almost.
The thought that I actually meant something to Carter, that he might want me for more than the powers I could contribute to the team, was scarier to me than his vampire background.
Though Carter looked about thirty-five years old, he had been born decades before me. But even more than his chronological age, his experience intimidated me. He’d been around the block and then some. He had killed supernatural beings and possibly human ones. He was deeply involved in the terrifying world of demons that swirled in the skies outside my window at night.
“Can you forgive me for leaving you alone last night?” he finally asked.
“Yes. If you can forgive me for turning our mission into such a disaster,” I said. “I feel like I screwed up royally.”
“No, you didn’t. Yes, the mission turned out to be much more dangerous than I had expected, especially for you. But I don’t know that we could have achieved our goal any other way.”
“Will you ever take me again?”
“Oh, yes.” Carter smiled, a slightly predatory gleam in his eye. “Any time you’ll let me.”
20
Georgia
It took a couple of days for the aches and pains in my body to subside. Though my muscles and bones had already repaired themselves, my nerves were still sending pain signals to my brain. True to his word, Kingston refused to allow me to train until I felt better. He would have had me wait another day or two, but Olympia stepped in and defied him.
“This kind of training won’t tax your body,” she explained as she led me to the training room. “We’re going to be working on your other superpower.”
“Telekinesis?” I asked.
“That’s the one.”
Olympia had set up two chairs in the middle of the training room. The chairs faced each other as if they were waiting to be occupied by the host and guest of a late-night talk show.
“I don’t have telekinetic powers myself,” Olympia said. “Though I’ve made the earth move for more than one lucky male.” She preened, running her hand over her mass of blonde curls. She motioned for me to sit in one of the two chairs while she took the other.
“What are you going to teach me, then?”
“How to channel your energy so that you can use your power whenever you want to. Right now, it’s a survival mechanism. It’s at its peak when you’re mad or scared shitless. What we need to do is teach you how to tune into the power of the universe so that you can make things move regardless of the emotions you’re experiencing.”
Olympia’s New Age lingo made me giggle. “Are we going to chant and light incense while we do this?”
The witch scowled. “No, but I’m going to cast a silence spell on that mouth of yours if you don’t shut it voluntarily. Now, close your eyes.”
I obeyed.
“I want you to imagine that your mind is an ocean. It holds enormous depth and power. The waves can be violent and destroy entire islands. But they can also be extremely calm, like glass. Either way, there’s an infinite source of energy in those waters. Do you get where I’m going with this?”
“Um, no. Not really.”
“That’s okay. You will. Now, visualize your mind as the ocean when it’s completely still. The water is almost perfectly smooth. There’s not even a breath of air to riffle the surface. Your emotions are as calm as your mind right now. You aren’t sad, angry, or scared. You’re not joyful or happy. You’re simply at peace, feeling nothing but that sense of calm.”
I kept my eyes closed and tried to sense the peace that Olympia was describing. It wasn’t as easy as her hypnotic voice made it sound. Worries clouded the sky over the ocean, and small waves rocked the surface against my will. I dug my fingernails into my palms, and the pain made the waves grow higher.
This exercise felt like meditation, and meditation always stressed me out. Whenever I tried to quiet my mind, it fought me like a feral cat trapped in a cage.
“You’re fighting this, Georgia. Try to relax. Let the waves die down. Let the water settle. You are calm. You have no worries. You are at peace. When the wind whips up, just let it go.”
For a moment, I actually understood what Olympia wanted me to feel—a sense of endless acceptance. I stopped fighting my mind and let my thoughts grow still.
“Good! From the place where you are now, I want you to make the water move. The motion starts deep in the fathoms of the ocean. It’s like the force of an underwater earthquake, powerful but slow. It’s not frantic, scared, or angry. This is an energy that begins in the depths of your mind and rushes up to the surface, shifting the water and creating waves.”
I visualized my power emerging from the ocean floor and rising upward. The water was so deep and heavy that I had to stay focused in order to make the waves that Olympia was describing. I wasn’t trying to brain a horny jerk with an ice scoop or make a steering wheel turn in order to save my own ass. I was using my energy for its own sake from a space of quiet.
“You’re doing great, Georgia. Keep focusing. Make those waves move!”
I heard several objects, probably weapons, crash to the floor. I didn’t open my eyes to see what had fallen. I kept focusing, channeling my energy into shifting the masses of water.
“Now make the water move faster, stronger. We’re talking typhoon force. You’re not angry, you’re not afraid. You have no particular emotions right now—you’re just making the storm happen. Go!”
Olympia shrieked in surprise, and I heard a clattering sound. I opened my eyes to see her sprawled on her butt on the floor, her chair overturned.
“What did you do that for?” Olympia said. She stood up, wincing and rubbing her hip. “I didn’t tell you to throw me across the room, I told you to cause a storm. A storm on the ocean, Georgia.”
“I thought that’s what I did,” I said innocently.
“Bravo!” Carter applauded from the door. “That was fabulous, Georgia. Can you do it again?”
“No, she cannot,” Olympia snapped. “Not unless you want to volunteer. Maybe she’ll throw you into the wall.”
Carter laughed. “No, thanks. I fully appreciate Georgia’s power now that I’ve seen her toss you on your bottom.”
I had to admit, I was impressed with the technique Olympia had taught me. For the first time since I fell into this paranormal world, I had applied my power outside of a life-or-death situation, and it had worked. For the first time, I felt total control over part of my life that had felt uncontrollable.
I walked over to the witch and gave her a hug.
“Thank you, Olympia,” I said, meaning it with all my heart. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. If I’d kept my eyes open, maybe I would have thrown something else, like one of those big, bouncy exercise balls.”
“I thought Olympia’s ass was a big, bouncy exercise ball.” Carter smirked. Then, he wisely ducked out of the room before the witch could target him with her wrath.
Carter caught me by the wrist as I walked down the hallway. With the training session over, I was planning to head back to my apartment. I needed to check up on my school assignments, and I needed to call my boss to tell her that I planned to be back at the call center bright and early tomorrow morning.
“That was quite impressive,” he said softly. “You’re coming into your power now.”
Carter stood close to me in the corridor. Energy flowed through his fingers into my arm. His hand was cool, his hold firm.
“Yeah. It’s about time.” I tried to keep my tone light, but it was hard not to respond to the intensity in his eyes or the insistence of his grip.
“It won’t be long before we can go out hunting again. This time, I promise not to leave your side. Not for a second.”
My cheeks flushed and I broke our gaze.
“Yeah, because you kind of fucked up the first date,” I said.
“I hope you’ll stay for dinner with us tonight. Kingston is making prime rib
. He cooks it very rare for me, almost pulsing on the plate. That should keep my hunger at bay.” He winked at me.
I pulled my arm gently out of his grasp. “Actually, I’m leaving as soon as I get my things together. I have to go back to my apartment. And I have to go back to work.”
“Georgia, you really should decide if that life is what you want. That miserable little place can’t be comfortable, and that job is way below your capabilities. Even if you didn’t have extraordinary gifts, you’re far better than that.”
Carter’s dig at my lifestyle, spoken in such a patronizing tone, annoyed the hell out of me. I lifted my chin and glared at him.
“Yeah, it’s a shitty apartment and I hate the job. And maybe it’s not the life I always dreamed of, but it’s a life that I made based on things I chose for myself. What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothing. I’m just not convinced that the things you wanted for yourself a year or two ago are the same things that you want now. Think about it.”
“I already have. I’m leaving now. Give me a call when you can talk to me like an adult.”
“Georgia! At least let me drive you back to your apartment.”
“Don’t worry about that. I’ll take the bus,” I said over my shoulder.
I pushed past Carter and ran up the stairs to the guest room. He had no right to put down my choices or my goals. I wasn’t harming anyone—in fact, I was trying to improve myself so that I could be a nurse and help other people heal. In the guest room, I shoved my few belongings into my backpack.
Damn, he could be irritating. So stuffy and full of himself. At times like this, he definitely seemed seventy years old.
It took me almost two hours to locate a bus line in that neighborhood and make the three transfers necessary to get back to my place. Once I was back in my apartment, I felt so tired from the journey that I didn’t feel like turning on my computer, but I knew I had to see where I stood with my school assignments.
The computer begrudgingly awoke from its slumber. I logged onto the school’s website and clicked on my Fundamentals of Nursing course.