“Oh, yeah, I know. I just…” Dante gave a lopsided grin. “Lately it seems the only time I see EDs is when they’re dead. Or killing someone. I guess I’d just rather see them in more normal circumstances.”
Nix slid a sidelong glance at him. While his attitude was commendable, he obviously still had a lot to learn about the preternatural community. Most of them had a bit of nasty worked into their DNA, which meant they could get really cranky really fast. Even cute, flirty little pixies could be deadly when riled or drunk. There was no such thing as “normal” when you were talking about prets.
Not sure she wanted to dispel his hopeful outlook, she still felt the need to warn him. “You’re not likely to see prets at their best when they’ve had a few too many drinks, you know.”
He grinned and patted his gun. “I can handle myself.”
Nix bit back a sigh. Dante was still so naive about prets. A vampire could stand motionless ten feet away and then be at his throat before he ever had time to draw his weapon. Werewolves and the cat shifters were almost as fast. The only consolation with Dante going to the Devil’s Domain was that security was high and the bouncers would protect humans as well as prets who might be under threat from someone else.
They stopped a few feet away from Tobias, who she knew had heard the last of their exchange. She waited for him to make some sarcastic remark, but, with his gaze on Dante, all he said was “One of your techs wants a word with you.” With a lift of his chin he motioned toward one of the men standing at the opposite side of the crime scene.
Dante glanced down at Nix. “I’ll see you in the morning.” He walked away to talk to the man in blue coveralls.
In the silence that remained, Nix shifted air from one cheek to another and then blurted, “He asked me out.” Some small measure of satisfaction filled her in imparting the information. She couldn’t help it. At least Tobias would know someone was interested in her even if he wasn’t.
“I didn’t ask.”
Nix stiffened at the complete unconcern and lack of interest in his voice. Hurt shafted through her again, then she got angry at herself. She shouldn’t care that he wasn’t bothered that Dante had asked her on a date. At least now she knew when he was tossing those damned pheromones her way he was only being a jerk. She propped her hands on her hips. “You’re a real piece of work, you know that? Just how long did you say you’ve been back in town?”
“Got in this morning. And since I was here, like I said, the council asked me to look into these murders.” He stared at the blood on the pavement where Amarinda’s body had lain. “I wouldn’t be back now, except she called me.” His voice was soft and full of regret.
Nix focused on his last statement. “She called you? About what?”
“She wouldn’t say.” His lips firmed. “All she told me was that she had something she wanted to talk to me about, but she didn’t want to do it over the phone.” His steely gaze cut back to Nix. “Guess now I’ll never know.”
“Unless it ends up being the reason she died.” Still fighting back outraged anger, Nix was proud of the noncommittal tone of her voice. Looking around the crime scene, she added, “I don’t care what you say, demons didn’t do this.”
He stared at her a moment, then gave an abrupt nod. “Tell you what. I won’t include it in my report, for now.” His eyes narrowed. “But you have to come back with solid evidence that rules them out, not just a gut feeling. Or I will have to let the council know.”
She blinked. Tobias Caine, the original Mr. By the Book, was actually going to let her skate on this one? Against her better judgment she found herself cutting him some slack. If he could relax his vigil on the rules, maybe he had changed a little in the years they’d been apart.
Tobias glanced at his watch. “Speaking of the council, I’m surprised we haven’t gotten a call yet.”
Nix’s phone rang. She pulled it out of her pocket and glanced at the number. “Yeah, speak of the devils,” she said.
“That’s them?” He seemed genuinely surprised.
She looked at him. “What did you do, page them when I wasn’t looking?” She wouldn’t put it past him.
“No.” He shoved his hands into his pockets. “It’s coincidence.”
“Uh-huh. Someone told me a long time ago that when you’re dealing with murder there’s no such thing as coincidence.” She shot him a pointed look.
“That hardly applies to a phone call,” he said, the look on his face showing he remembered that he’d been the one to tell her that.
She huffed out a sigh and answered the phone.
“They want you here, pronto,” one of the dispatchers told her.
Nix frowned at his abrupt tone. “I’m doing well, thanks for asking,” she replied. As he started to respond, she cut him off. “We’re just about finished up here—”
“They said now. Just you. Since the vic is a vamp, Caine’s lead on the case. He can finish up at the scene.”
There wasn’t any point in saying anything other than, “I’m on my way.” She disconnected the call and looked at Tobias. “They want me.”
The look that flashed through his eyes sent a shiver snaking down her spine. At one time that look had been much less fleeting and had been the start of hot, intense sex.
Nix drew in a breath and held it for a five count. The council was waiting and she’d better be on her way. To cover her reaction to the banked need in his eyes, she gave Tobias a mocking salute and turned toward her car, waving to Dante. As she drove away she glanced in her rearview mirror, watching the vampire standing so tall and straight, surrounded by activity yet so alone, the man who always managed to entice her inner demon to the surface.
Chapter Three
The Council of Preternaturals, made up of thirteen representatives from most of the major groups of preternaturals, tried to keep peace among prets as well as between prets and humans. They were not always successful, especially recently with tensions rising because of the upcoming rift. There was always some uproar or another needing their attention. They were overworked and under a lot of stress, which made for some interesting and not-so-pleasant interactions. Whenever things rolled downhill, the liaisons were the ones to catch all the crap. At least that’s how Nix saw it.
She was kept waiting for almost two hours. Her emotions were already topsy-turvy, first from seeing Amarinda’s body and then Tobias at the crime scene, and this delay certainly hadn’t made her any more even-tempered. As it was, it probably wouldn’t take much more to make her go off. Standing at the end of the hallway, several yards away from the doors of the main chamber, she tried some deep breathing to stave off her nerves. It helped, but not a lot. Not as much as a tai chi workout would have, but she couldn’t just break into her routine outside the council chambers. She wouldn’t give them any reason to doubt her ability to do her job.
Once they finally did deign to see her, she was hard pressed to keep the irritation from shining through. But while most demons she knew would just as soon spoon someone’s brains out through their nose, she was determined to follow a more human path and kept a pleasant expression pasted on her face. No matter that her skull felt like it was about to split open, a sure sign that it wouldn’t take much for her horn buds, usually recessed in her forehead, to pop out. Then it was anyone’s guess as to what would happen. But she’d do her best to hold it together, because the people in this room were very powerful.
The room in which she stood was dimly lit. Roughly the size of a high school auditorium, it held a long semicircular mahogany table at the far end where the council members sat. There were a few chairs in front of the table, ostensibly for liaisons to use while making their reports, the wooden folding kind that were hell on the butt. Nix usually stayed on her feet mostly because of that, but also because the council was big on formality, and it seemed much too informal to sit in their presence.
When the full council met, thirteen people sat at the table. Which meant when she spoke before all the me
mbers, her nerves increased tenfold. Today, thankfully it was only a tribunal of three, though they were not always on her side. “We’ll know more after the autopsy, I’m sure,” she said as she wrapped up her report. She looked at the members of the tribunal and tried to gauge their reaction to this latest news. That they were disturbed was obvious, yet she could sense something else. Some other disquiet.
“Is there any significance to the fact that this victim is also a vampire, other than the obvious hate crime scenario?” Deoul Arias, a high elf and president of the council, leaned forward, elbows resting on the table top, chin resting on his fingertips. The flowing white sleeves of his formal council robe fell away from his forearms. His skin had the translucent quality that all older elves possessed, and he wore his long black hair loose except for two thin braids at either side of his face. His pale blue eyes seared Nix, skewering her into place like a bug pinned to a display board.
“We’re not quite sure yet.” She glanced at the other members of the tribunal—William Braithwaite, a vampire who’d come through the rift at the same time as Tobias, and Caladh MacLoch, a shape-shifting seal commonly called a selkie in his native Scotland. Even as she looked at him, he picked up a small spray bottle and spritzed his face with water. He had to keep his skin cool and wet or the resulting dryness made his skin crack in long, deep furrows that were excruciatingly painful. Knowing that Deoul waited for an answer, she moved her gaze back to him and added, “It’s really too early to tell.”
Deoul heaved a sigh laden with irritation and impatience. He folded his arms and narrowed his eyes. “Isn’t it your job, as a quadrant liaison to humankind, to know the answers to these questions and to show up at the crime scene on time?” His voice was cultured, holding disdain and the hint of an accent so ancient it spoke volumes about the kind of power he possessed.
Anger at his attitude, at his continued questioning of her abilities, because this certainly wasn’t the first time, rose within her. And, as usual, she tamped it down even as the patches of skin covering her horn buds started to itch. It wouldn’t do any good to lose her temper. She wondered if he did it on purpose, trying to teach her patience or some other fey nonsense. Or maybe he just liked pushing her buttons. Seeing the derision in his eyes, she decided he did it because he didn’t like her.
The feeling was mutual.
“I showed up within a reasonable time of when I got the call from dispatch.” Nix kept her voice steady and calm, and hopefully respectful enough to pass muster. Damn that werebear dispatcher. She knew he’d deliberately waited to call her, and now Deoul was taking it out on her hide. She drew a breath and went on to answer the first part of the derisive question. “It’s my job to find the answers to your questions. Which I will do as quickly as possible, I assure you.”
Deoul’s lips pursed, disappointment flashing across his face. He had wanted to get a rise out of her. Bastard. It made her doubly glad she hadn’t given him the satisfaction. If it killed her she’d hold on to her composure, just to spoil Deoul’s mood. Her grandma used to quote Scripture at her, obviously trying to subjugate the demon, and mostly Nix hadn’t listened. But one particular quote had stuck with her. Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink; for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head.
Damn, she’d wished her grandmother had practiced what she’d preached with that particular passage. But for now Nix would reflect on those words as it related to Deoul. Heaping figurative coals of fire on his head might be just what she needed to maintain her control around him.
Deoul leaned back in his chair. His icy eyes glittered but he remained silent. She glanced at Caladh and Braithwaite and saw varying amounts of displeasure on their faces. Her heart pounded a little harder as her anxiety increased. She was doing the best she could, but this might just be the excuse they needed to get rid of her. She knew the reason they’d chosen her to begin with was because she was so familiar with prets. They’d pushed aside their aversion for everything demon and had focused on her humanity.
At least she’d thought they had. Now she wasn’t so sure. It seemed the longer she served as a liaison the more contemptuous the council became. Maybe one day she’d find a sense of self-worth not attached to the job and tell them all where they could shove their biases. For now, though, she had something to prove to them. To herself. She drew in a breath and held it, counting to five. Then she exhaled. “Look, I’m not a medical examiner or a forensics expert. You didn’t hire me to be either of those. What you did hire me to do is act as a go-between, to gather information and sift through it to get to the truth.” She made eye contact with each of them. “And that is exactly what I will do. But you have to give me time.”
“Two murders in two days would suggest we don’t have a lot of time to give.” Deoul rested one hand on the table and began drumming his fingers on the dark wood surface. “Just how many more bodies will we go through for you to get to the truth?”
She’d like to see him go out and do what she did. See how fast he came up with information. “I promise you’ll have answers sooner than you expect.”
“How can it be sooner than I expect when it’s already later than I’d thought?” He lifted a dark eyebrow and turned his head to one side to glance at his colleagues. The upper curve of his ear peeped out from his long hair, and Nix had the sudden urge to lean over the table and yank on it. Elves had very sensitive ears. She knew his yelp of pain would be very satisfying for her.
She restrained her mischievous urge and clenched her jaws against a scathing response. “I’ll have answers as soon as possible.”
“See that you do.” Deoul gazed toward the back of the room and gave a nod.
Nix heard the doors open and turned sideways so she could see what was going on yet still keep an eye on the council members. Not that she didn’t trust them, but…
Hell. She didn’t trust them. None of them had gotten to the powerful positions they were in by being nice. While it was true they were intelligent and generally made positive decisions that benefited the pret community as a whole, it was equally true that most of them had had to be ruthless, conniving and downright mean to get a seat at this table.
Tobias and a slender woman in a flowered skirt and white blouse—Victoria Joseph, werewolf and liaison to the shape-shifter community in Nix’s quadrant—walked in. Well, Victoria walked. Tobias sauntered.
And looked damned fine doing it.
Nix scowled. This was so far away from being good. The fact that they were calling in two other liaisons, especially Victoria, who shouldn’t even be involved, didn’t bode well for Nix.
When the two reached the table, they both bowed to the council. “Ati me peta babka?” they asked in unison in the common language from the other dimension. How may I serve?
Deoul’s gaze cut to Nix as if to say, See? This is how it’s done.
She scowled. So she hadn’t given a damn bow. She’d said the frickin’ words, hadn’t she?
“Thank you both for coming on such short notice.” Caladh spritzed his face again and gave a soft sigh of relief. “Victoria, my dear, it is agreeable to see you again.” Pleasure turned his dark eyes liquid.
The werewolf’s smile was slow and sultry. “It’s good to see you, too.”
Nix looked from one to the other. She wasn’t always the quickest match to light, but there were definite undercurrents between these two. Interesting.
Caladh’s gaze lingered on Victoria a moment before he turned his attention to Tobias, signaling that it was now Tobias’s turn.
Tobias clasped his hands behind him and rocked back slightly on his heels. “I await the pleasure of the council.”
“We would like to know your opinion on the current spate of murders,” Deoul said.
Again with the “spate.” Nix shot a glance at Tobias, who only shrugged. She wasn’t stupid. This was why the council had kept her waiting. They’d snuck Tobias in around her and had already heard his report. No
w they wanted him to trot out everything again for her benefit.
Shit. If he’d told them about smelling demon at the scene, even though he’d promised her he wouldn’t, she was SOL because she’d kept it out of her report. She ground her jaws together and focused on keeping a placid expression on her face. By the way her eyes had begun to burn she knew the demon yellow in her irises was shining, spurred by her bubbling but as of yet not boiling over temper.
Tobias answered Deoul. “There is no conclusive evidence to point to a specific preternatural. The predominant scent was that of human.”
There was silence, as if the council waited for him to say more. Nix shot him another glance but he didn’t look her way. His steady gaze remained on the three on the other side of the large table.
Finally Deoul looked at Victoria and asked, “Have you heard anything from the shape-shifter community?”
“There have been murmurings, of course. Where there’s a lack of truth, rumor runs wild.” Her voice was melodious, as calming as wind chimes on a summer breeze. Quite at odds for someone who went furry once a month, oftentimes more, and would just as soon rip your lungs out as look at you. “Nothing substantive, though.”
“So we don’t know if humans did it or prets?” Caladh sat forward and reached for the spray bottle again. His eyes glittered and a scowl darkened his face. “That’s quite helpful.” Before Nix could respond to the sarcasm, he said, “There has been some unrest as of late. Prets have become targets of human prejudice and I’ve heard of escalating tensions between prets, especially between vampires and demons. Perhaps demons have called a blood feud?” he said with a glance at Nix.
Nix’s heart stuttered. Was it possible? Could demons have officially been on a vampire hunt? No. She hadn’t heard anything, and she would have been informed if a blood feud had been called. Plus the scent of demon would have been much stronger at the scene. With a quick glance at the faces of the council members, she still couldn’t tell if they knew about that or not. For now, she’d take Tobias at his word and proceed as if the council was in the dark. She shook her head. “It wasn’t demons.” At their skeptical looks, she said, “If it had been a demon, we wouldn’t be standing around asking if it could have been one. The scent would have been unmistakable.”
Kiss of the Vampire Page 4