by Tes Hilaire
Luckily they didn’t need it right away. No one popped out of a window. No cover fire was laid down. The night remained silent.
Probably not the right building.
“You sure about this?” he asked.
She squared her shoulders. For Grim. For Logan and his friend. “I need to make sure.” Besides, she was here. Might as well follow through. And that building was as good as any other on the block.
Damon grunted, falling in beside her as they made their way to the door. He kept up, though there was an almost reluctant hesitancy to his steps.
She bit her tongue, but when he started cracking his knuckles she spun on him. “If you don’t want to do this, just tell me. I’ll call Mike or something.”
“No, it’s cool. I just…” he rubbed a hand over his face. “I had a run-in with my dad. We don’t see eye to eye on things these days.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.”
“Not much to talk about. He wants me to do something. I don’t want to do it.”
She tipped her head, frowning. “You’re old enough to say no.”
He let out a rueful chuckle and reached for the door. “You’d think.”
She was going to ask who his dad was that he could push around his son who was a cop—the Godfather or something?—but the doorknob turned in his hand.
She shifted restlessly from foot to foot as he cautiously pushed open the door. No sounds or movement greeted them. She started to step forward but was abruptly stopped by Damon’s hand on her arm.
“Wait here a sec. I’m the one with the gun, remember?” he said, flipping his jacket open to show the police issue.
“Right,” she said, gesturing ahead.
She waited while he stepped over the threshold and was quickly swallowed by the dark.
“It’s a hall. No lights. And no one appears to be home.”
Taking that as an all clear she stepped in. She sensed more than saw him move forward and followed the soft sound of his tread. It was eerily quiet and pitch black. After the second time she stumbled, she found herself gripping tight to Damon’s jacket. How in the hell did he see without a flashlight?
“This is stupid.” And dangerous.
“Think if he’s hiding somewhere in here he’ll come if you call?”
“Maybe.” Only when she opened her mouth nothing came out. Too dark. Too…something. “There’s no light in here. Even if he were trying to hide he wouldn’t have gone this far in.”
“You’re right. I just thought…”
She heard it. A low rumbling sound, kind of like a chuckle.
“Was that?”
“Yup. A laugh.” The leather tugged in her grip. “This way.”
They took another dozen steps, turning a corner. A large room sprouted from the hall they were in. No windows here either, but across the cement expanse was a slim beam of light. A slight crack spilling out into the vast space from an unclosed door.
Cautiously they eased across the expanse. The low murmur of a one-sided conversation drawing them closer. The inflection of the voice rose, then paused. A question. Another voice, sounding amazingly like Grim’s, though scratchier, muttered something insulting under his breath. Her chest sagged a bit with relief. Thank God. If the kid was well enough to insult someone then he was okay. At least until she got ahold of him.
Why did he hide from the officers Mike sent?
They probably didn’t even check this building out. Good chance the lazy bastards never left the warmth of their car.
“Police! Keep your hands where we can see them.” Damon pushed open the door, gun leading the way as he stepped into the room, Jessica shifting to a better angle behind him.
The room wasn’t large. An old office perhaps, though there was nothing in it other than two chairs and a heavy wooden desk. Both chairs were occupied, the one behind the desk by an astonishingly average-looking man. His hands were in sight, though he neglected to put down his gun. The good news/bad news was it wasn’t pointed at them, but at Grim who sat sullenly in a second chair in the corner behind the desk, hands tied before him but otherwise healthy looking. Hopefully they could keep him that way.
“Oh, look. Our guests have arrived.” The man from behind the desk pushed out of his seat, moving across the room with lethal grace, his gun remaining level with Grim’s brain as the man advanced on his captive. The man was taller than he’d looked behind the massive desk and more muscular too. Brown hair, brown eyes. If he were on the force, he would be the first one recruited for an undercover assignment. Unless it was her picking the assignment, that is.
Dead eyes. They had no emotion in them.
“Say hi, Grim.”
Grim grumbled something else—sounded like another insult—and received a smack on his head with the butt of the gun for his trouble. Instinctively Jess reached for her sig, but belatedly remembered she didn’t have it.
The pause in her knee-jerk response had her re-evaluating the situation. And the conclusion she came up with was that something was seriously fucked up. Grim wasn’t scared. Not really. And okay, Grim had a reputation for mouthing off a lot but even so, there should be something in his eyes. A little smidgen of fear at least.
“Grim, if you set me up…”
The man holding the gun to Grim’s head smiled. “Oh, it is a setup. But not by whom you think.”
“Oh? Care to enlighten me then?”
Grim’s skin split, body growing, morphing as a creature emerged from the skin shell. Jess’s heart skittered in her chest. Oh no. That was not what she thought it was. The thing stood, stretching out its wings, cloven hooves stomping the pile of dermis into the cement. It smiled at her, its jagged teeth splitting a face that nightmares were made of. She knew that face. It was the creature from the garage, only with taut, red skin, as if it had gone through a shedding and was growing a new hide.
Jessica stumbled back, but Damon was right there, catching her under her elbow. “Easy there, babe.”
“Yes. Take it easy. Babe.” The man chortled, the twisted rise of his laughter betraying his utter insanity.
Take it easy? Nope, the best idea of the night: run.
Jess took a step back, her arm screaming against Damon’s tight grip.
Must be in shock. No other reason he wasn’t plugging the demon with useless bullets and screaming his damn head off.
Wait, easy there?
A shiver ran down her back, her gaze automatically drawn to Damon. Denial whipped through her at the fixed expression on his face.
No. Not…“Damon?”
“I’m sorry, Jess,” he said, lowering his gun to his side.
Chapter 20
“Returning to the scene of the crime?”
Logan folded his arms, planting his feet before the cop who came out the back entrance of Jessica’s apartment building. He wasn’t sure whether he was relieved or not that Detective Mike Ward wasn’t one of the “cop friends” currently keeping Jess company, but that he was blocking the doors ticked him off.
“Yup. And I’m in a real pisser of a mood, so unless you have actual evidence to bring me in on, get out of my way.” He had to get back to the hospital, but first he needed to pack Jessica’s bag. She would not be coming back here. Not until he could get her place properly warded and even then…well, they’d see.
“Oh, I have evidence, all right.” The cop held up a folded note card between his fingers. “Unfortunately I don’t think you wrote this.”
“What’s that?” Logan tried to snatch the card but Mike held it away. Dick.
“It’s a note. Found it stuffed into Jessica’s door. Funny, it wasn’t there earlier when CSU processed the scene.”
“What does it say?”
“That’s not as important as who it’s for. Because whoever that
is has gotten Jessica messed up in some serious shit.”
Logan narrowed his gaze, not liking the prick cop’s attitude any more now than he had earlier. “Any guesses?”
“About who’s dishing out the shit? Not really.” He tipped his head. “But about the intended recipient of the note? Actually, I have two possibilities. One I’d like to pin this on a lot better than the other. Seeing how I’m already planning on pounding that fucker’s face in.”
Logan folded his arms. “Aren’t I lucky?”
Mike nodded. Oh yeah, the prick was enjoying himself. Logan had to give it to the cop, his protective instincts for his partner were commendable, and that made Logan uncomfortable. He didn’t want to like Mike. Mike had tried to bar him from Jessica. Probably had a thing for her as well. If Logan wasn’t so angry at being kept from his mate when she was hurt he would have almost felt sorry for the bastard.
Jessica was his and he was hers. End of story.
“What about the other guy. If the note’s for him are you going to pound his face in too?”
“Not sure. First I have to find him. Funny thing, though, his car used to be parked right there,” he added, indicating the empty spot near the building.
Logan’s eyebrows shot up. The other man had been here earlier? “Is this guy another tenant?”
“Damon? No. He doesn’t live here.”
Then why the fuck was he here, asshole? “Who’s Damon?”
Mike shrugged looking at him slyly. “A cop. Oh, and Jessica’s boyfriend.”
“Bullshit.”
“At least three dates that I know of.”
Logan fisted his hands, telling himself to calm down. Officer Michael Ward was baiting him. Even if Jessica had dated this Damon schmuck it didn’t mean anything. Couldn’t mean anything. Not when she was his mate.
“Let me see the note, please,” he added, proud of how calmly that came out. Yup, the unsaid or-I’ll-tear-your-throat-out was barely noticeable.
Mike clucked his tongue, looking between the note and Logan. Finally he held it out and Logan snatched it from his hand. Logan read it through once, twice, sweat breaking out on his skin.
“What did you say Damon’s last name was?”
“I didn’t.”
Logan gave him a withering look. “Does he have almost black eyes?”
Mike’s eyes narrowed. “Yeah…I don’t see how that—”
“Does he make your neck itch?” Logan interrupted.
“What the hell kind of question is that?”
Logan shook his head. “Never mind.”
Mike took a step closer, his head tipped in a suspicious tilt. “You think the note was for Damon?”
“No. It’s for me,” Logan corrected, all but choking on the words. But he could give a guess who it was from: a cop named Damon, who, oh by the way, was also one of Ganelon’s merkers. It was the perfect cover. A position of power. Access to an unlimited amount of susceptible souls. And no one would suspect they had a demon spawn in their ranks. Not even Jessica—who’d dated him.
Fuuucking hell.
Mike’s mouth thinned, the skin around his nose pinching. “Do you know what that gibberish means?”
“I thought that was obvious.” Logan shoved the note back into Mike’s chest. “It’s an invitation to Hell.”
***
All those Hollywood movies were bullshit. Tracking someone across the city without the use of his gift was not sly or easy—it sucked. But he didn’t dare slip into the shade. Not when one of the peeps he was following could pop him out again with a simple flare of her power. And given that he’d be naked if she did, not a good idea.
Damn nulls. And damn all the stupid fucking pedestrians in this city. Though it was probably because of those pedestrians that he’d caught up with them at all. A half block out from the hole in the chain link fence they’d cut, they stopped to play cover-up. Ammo and rifles went into padded duffel bags; trench coats went on over the rest. Even with that little breather he almost lost them, twice, the last just now as they hopped subway lines at Lexington. He jumped on the E behind them just in time to do the crunch-crunch dance with the closing doors. Luckily the Hollywood movies were right on this point: New Yorkers stuck on a subway train together didn’t pay attention to each other. And sure he was at the other end of the car from his quarry, but not a one of them looked over when he played the let-me-in game with the door.
Man, all this BS better be worth it. He hoped Logan’s mate was all right. Logan, though a bit of a prick at times, was okay. He was solid, with a good head on his shoulders, but not so much of an ego that he couldn’t see the shit going on past the end of his nose. And oh man was Valin going to be in a pile of his own the next time he went to Haven. Logan’s daddy was not the forgive-and-forget type. Maybe Valin went a bit far when he used his gift on his Paladin brothers, but he’d wanted to have a chance to speak privately with the interesting null girl about the message she was supposed to deliver.
He rolled his shoulders, his skin itching from his neck down his back. Oh all right, he didn’t give a rip about the message; it was the source he cared about.
Gabby. The succubus/mentor/whatever role she was playing that day had to be Gabby. She was alive. And Valin wanted to find out just what this group of li’l-bit-bloods knew about her—just not in front of his Paladin brothers.
Thank God he’d read Gabby’s messenger right. She’d been all bravado back at Haven but under the act was a scared young woman. Calhoun Senior’s threat of holding her there against her will had put the fear of God in her. So the first chance she got—you’re welcome, sweetheart—she bolted. And Valin was ready to follow. And wasn’t being trapped in a moving subway train the perfect time to have that chat?
Easing past a harried mother juggling an agitated toddler and bag of bottles and poo-catchers, Valin made his way to the other end of the car. He sidled right up beside their little group and still not a one of them noticed. Holy fucking crap, how had they survived so long?
“You know, if you had to go, you could have said good-bye first.”
The null jumped, spinning toward him, as did the rest of her entourage, equal looks of shock on their faces. Points to her nearest companion who recovered quickest and tried to move in to shield her, but Valin gave him a don’t-fuck-with-me glare that had him compromising with a shoulder in the way and a hand in his long trench coat on what was sure to be one of those pretty handguns they’d left stuffed in their pants.
“Crap. How’d you find us?” null girl said, signaling Trigger Happy to stand down.
“Not find. Follow. You really should pay more attention to your surroundings. It’s amazing you all have lived so long.”
She tipped her head, then jerked her chin toward the large African American across from her. “Keon can sense them. At least when I’m not pulling.”
Pulling—that was an interesting name for her lights-out magic routine, but whatever. He wasn’t here for chitchat. “Where’s Gabby?”
Her brow furrowed, then lifted. “Oh, you mean Red. Sorry, can’t tell you.”
“Can’t or won’t?” he growled, his hand clenching with the urge to grab her and shake the answers out.
She shrugged. “She comes and goes as she pleases.”
“Where? Comes and goes where?”
“Now, that I won’t tell you.”
“I could follow you.”
“You could try.” She smiled. “Won’t be so easy now that we know you’re here.”
Valin clenched his teeth, checking it back. Info first, throttling later. “You had a message for us?”
“No, not all of you, just Logan, though I guess Red would be okay with me telling you.”
And why was that, he wondered. Had Gabby talked about him? “Okay, I’m listening.”
>
She glanced around the subway car around them.
“As if they’d care,” he told her. She pulled her upper lip through her teeth, but nodded. “You’re right.”
Of course. He folded his arms, patiently waiting. Damn his neck hurt. Tension, no doubt, from all his fucking restraint.
“Okay, so we told you how Red has helped us out. Well she’s also been giving us information.” She tipped her head. “You know what she is right?”
He nodded. “Tiny li’l pint-sized vamp.”
Null shot a quick look around the train, letting out a relieved breath when she confirmed no one was paying attention—duh.
“Okay,” she went on, “so, you also probably know she doesn’t bat for them anymore.”
He nodded again. From what he got from Logan during their little partnership—and what his own instincts told him from their one memorable encounter—he doubted she ever truly had.
“I think we also told you that there’s been a lot of pressure on us recently. The vamps, they’ve been especially bad.”
“Why?”
“According to Red, they want to recruit us.” She air-quoted the word recruit. “I guess their new leader is obsessed with refilling the ranks after some major loss last summer and he thinks that if he can turn some of us part-breeds who already have gifts, then his army will be stronger for it.”
Valin frowned. “How does Gabby know all this?”
“She’s been keeping tabs. Says now that the old Poobah is dead, stripping the thoughts right out of their minds is easy peasy for her.”
Valin rolled his jaw. Why would that be? Yeah, he’d felt the taste of how powerful her mind gifts were back in the mine last summer, but from what he knew of vampires and how their mind powers worked it wasn’t the same thing as what demons, merkers or Paladin did. A thrall could be done to anyone weaker than the vamp performing it, but a pathway into the mind could only be forged through blood. At least that’s what he’d been taught.
Damn, he really had to find her. If for no other reason than to ask her what the fuck she thought she was doing.
“So, yeah, this new leader, besides looking for recruits, is taking the whole secrecy thing very seriously. No blatant displays of fangs, no drained bodies left out in the open. And that’s where the message comes in.”