She exited without completing that backward glance.
Kiko stood there for a second, just before the doorway.
“Dawn?” he asked.
She met his gaze, afraid to see what’d be hiding in his eyes, now that they were alone.
“You beat it tonight,” he said, his eyes a clear blue. A gaze that wasn’t wavering from hers.
He wasn’t talking about beating a vampire, either.
“Remember that, okay?” he added. “You stopped whatever it was you can do with that head of yours. You ended up keeping it under control.”
Then he left, and Dawn tried to feel good about what he’d said.
But, instead, she felt like she’d been locked in a dark room.
A room where a slant of light was the only thing creeping through the broken shutter of a window that had been pried halfway open, only to be slammed shut again.
TWENTY-EIGHT
THE BEAUTY MARK
ABOUT an hour later, after they’d secured Claudius under a watch group of Friends and bound him with nearby crucifixes down in the lab at a fortified headquarters, Dawn peered in the mirror in her bathroom, her wig tossed to the side as she scrubbed her face for the fifth time.
The makeup had come off during the first cleaning, but after all the others, her face still wasn’t clean.
There was still a mark above her left cheekbone in the exact place she’d felt that tiny explosion while she’d been squeezing Claudius’s skull to the breaking point.
She backed away from her reflection.
Was this what was in store for her? A mark for every bad thing she did from now on?
The darkness taking over from the inside out?
A tremor ate away at her gut as she started to walk away, but then, like she couldn’t stop staring at that mark, she was back at the sink again, leaning closer to the looking glass, her heart throttled by something like panic.
Every time she glanced at the spot on her face, she couldn’t decide what it was. On initial inspection, she’d discerned a small, vague crescent that resembled a half-moon, just like the earring she used to wear before she became a real hunter. On the second look, she’d gotten the feeling that something on her skin was half smiling in one of those little grins a person wore when they’d done something wrong and they’d almost gotten away with it. On the third, she’d only seen something that resembled a gunpowder burn—a blemish she could scrub off if she tried hard enough. Then on the fourth, she’d told herself it was only a scar that had replaced the ones she’d lost when she’d become a vampire for a short time.
But now, as she kept looking, she thought that maybe the mark was a Rorschach test designed to make her crazy.
She felt someone—something—behind her before the mirror even showed Costin.
Was he here to tell her she’d be okay, like Kiko had done earlier?
But then she realized that his eyes were blue, and she glanced back at her mark.
“You doing okay?” Jonah asked.
She’d forgotten—he’d returned to his dominant position even before they’d exited that scummy apartment in Dalston. On the drive back, he’d told the team about how he and the boss had fought together, and she’d understood only then that Jonah had been helping Costin use his vampiric powers, encouraging him.
She had no idea just how Costin felt about that, now that he must’ve realized fighting with his new powers was necessary for him to survive out there.
“In what way do you think I’d be okay?” she asked Jonah. “In that yay-we-caught-a-master way? Or in a more of a wow-it-felt-great-to-almost-kill-another-master one?”
He took her wounded sarcasm in stride, leaning back against the door frame, his gaze on her facial mark, even though he didn’t comment.
“Just thought I’d come up here to check on where you’d gone after we took care of Claudius in the lab,” he said. “Thanks to security precautions and the Friends, this place is as good as a fortress, so if the Underground comes to us to stage an escape for Claudius, we’re ready.”
Were they?
He added, “Dawn, the sun’s almost up, and you should get some sleep in before tomorrow night comes around and Costin emerges to question Claudius. After that, things could go pretty quickly, with us getting a location out of this master, then destroying him, then figuring out how we’ll lay waste to this Underground and the co-master.”
“There’s no sign of Shadow Girl outside yet?” she asked, finally glancing away from the mirror and grabbing a hand towel to wipe down a marble counter that didn’t really need it. “If anything like one of those shadows was tuned into what we were doing or saying back at that apartment building, they’re going to follow us here.”
“There’s no sign of much right now. Really, Dawn, shut down, okay? I’m going to do it so Costin’s rested and ready for Claudius. If there’s an attack on the horizon, the Friends have got it covered. They’ll alert us.”
Shut down, he’d said. Just like a robot.
“Dawn,” he continued, and he sounded the way he did when he’d almost bitten her and she’d been all too willing to let him.
She tossed the towel back on the counter. “Jonah, is it too much to ask to be left alone for even an hour?”
“No.” Yet he didn’t go anywhere. “But if you don’t plan on sleeping, maybe it’d be a good idea to come and lounge with the others. They’re winding down themselves.”
The others. Why did she feel so far removed from them?
But even if that was the case, going downstairs to be with Kiko, Natalia, and her dad tempted her. Better yet, the thought of going into Eva’s room, where her mom hadn’t emerged from, seemed like perfect medicine for what Dawn was feeling. Sitting by her mother’s bed while she slept sounded like a good way to be around someone who didn’t insist that she talk about tonight.
Dawn made eye contact with Jonah in the mirror, and he seemed so understanding that she didn’t want to look away. Not this time.
“I’m not sure what I’d do,” she said, “if I went downstairs and they all stopped talking. I’d know exactly what the subject was, Jonah. I’d know what they were thinking while they looked at me, all awkward and embarrassed and judgmental.”
“And what exactly would they be saying about you?”
Was he for real?
“Okay.” He straightened from the door frame. “Maybe Natalia was taken aback—I’ll be honest about that, but she hasn’t been in this business long at all. She really has no idea what it’s about on more than an ideal level. But Kiko’s on your side through and through. So’s Frank.”
“He is?” She could barely get the words out.
Somehow, even though they hadn’t been the closest throughout the years, her dad’s approval mattered.
“He gets it,” Jonah said softly. “He knows that it’s easy to lose yourself in the fight sometimes.”
She wanted to believe Jonah, but ... God. It couldn’t be this easy. “Breisi doesn’t understand. And I know Costin sure doesn’t.”
Before Jonah could give her any platitudes about that, she looked down at the sink, away from the mirror, her voice wavering until heat rushed her eyes.
She fought it back. “I’m going to change. I’m not going to let it happen again. I’m going to ...”
She gestured to the dark spot on her face, stopping short of saying that she was going to do everything within her power to avoid being marked every which way.
But Jonah’s expression hardened: that face she had once likened to a broken saint‘s, back when he’d first come out of the shadows and become more than just a voice.
Yet that had been Costin coming out of the shadows in Hollywood, not Jonah.
“You are what you are,” he said, his voice intense. “The worst thing you could ever do is deny it, Dawn.”
She liked hearing that, but then again, she didn’t like it, because she knew that it was one thing to use what she had for the greater good and another to use it b
ecause it felt good.
Besides, this was Jonah talking. When had she listened to anything he had to say, no matter how much she wanted to hear it right now?
Still ...
She walked past him before he could persuade her any more, because what he had to say was too destructive. But as she headed downstairs to face her coworkers—she had to do it sometime, and it might as well be now—she sensed Jonah following.
Yet strangely, she didn’t tell him to go away.
Instead, she headed for the lounge where everyone was sitting around, their voices strung out in murmurs that echoed off the old wood and paintings. And the second she stepped into the room—the one with the hunting tapestries on the wall—they all really did stop talking.
Dawn wanted to turn around and get out of there, but then Kiko stood.
Then Frank.
Natalia stayed in her chair, watching Dawn as if she was concerned about her breaking loose on her next.
Dawn swallowed, knowing she should say something but, for the life of her, she had no idea what it should be.
Frank extended an arm. “Why don’t you just come here, Dawnie.”
Hesitantly, she went to him, sitting next to her father as they both sank down to the sofa, his arm draped over her shoulders while he pulled her to the hard bulk of him.
For the first time in ages, she dropped all her defenses and leaned her head against her dad, just like she’d done a few times as a girl during the rare occasions they had actually been getting along. And when he hugged her closer, her eyes went hot and wet again.
She was still a girl, she realized. Still making her way in a world she didn’t understand at all.
She glanced back to see where Jonah was, but he wasn’t around anymore, so she turned back to the rest of them as they slipped into a conversation about vintage cars—a subject she knew they’d plucked out of thin air.
But as she listened to them make distracting talk—the only thing that was probably keeping them together right now—she kept resting her head against Frank.
Almost feeling like part of the family again.
Dear Reader,
Thank you so much for reading The Path of Razors. You won’t have long to wait for Dawn and the team’s business with this Underground to conclude—the next book in the London trilogy, Deep in the Woods, will be released March 2010, and I hope you’ll keep your eye out for it. As you know, this series uses trilogies to complete mystery, character, and mythology arcs, so as with Books One through Three in the Hollywood trilogy, this London adventure will be resolved in the next installment.
Please stop by www.vampirebabylon.com for more news about future releases, and once again, I really appreciate all your support.
Happy hunting,
Chris Marie Green
The Path of Razors Page 29