Series Firsts Box Set

by Laken Cane

  I pulled my hand away and took a sip of my Coke to wet my suddenly dry throat. “Someone should tell Shane.” Then I frowned. “But why the foam?”

  “To get you to hold still for it,” Angus said. “Our cowardly attacker is a weak little ass pimple of a bitch.”

  “Probably sick,” Rhys agreed. “And he’s not going to be interested in Copas.”

  I shook my head at Angus and looked at Rhys. “What makes you think he’s sick? He was very fast, and not even Clayton throwing him into a wall seemed to rattle him much.”

  “Only someone desperate would take the risk he took,” Clayton said. At last, he lifted his stare to mine, and it was like his eyes were magnets. I could not look away.

  “Clayton.” Miriam rapped the table with her knuckles. “Continue.”

  “I think he’s after you in particular,” Clayton told me, dropping his stare. “You’re not just a hunter. You’re something…more.”

  “Clayton used to be something…more,” Miriam said, lightly mocking. “Before I plucked him out of Death’s greedy embrace. Before I changed him and took away everything that made him special. Isn’t that right, Clayton?”

  I sighed. Clayton looking me in the eye had obviously pissed her off.

  “Yes,” he murmured. Blank. So blank.

  “You were so upset.” Miriam’s voice became high and pleading as she mocked him. “Send me back! Send me back to the niche! I beg you…”

  He tightened his hands into fists and she reached over to tap the back of his hand with one small finger, silently ordering him to relax his fists. “Send me back,” she said softly. “Remember, Clayton?”

  “Yes,” he whispered.

  I slapped the table so hard the plates jumped. “Stop it, you bitch!” Only Amias Sato had ever triggered such rage inside me. I wanted to reach across the table and tear off her head. “You fucking bitch.”

  Rhys grabbed the back of my neck and squeezed. The spot bitten by the vampire began to throb beneath his grip and I focused on that pain until I was able to control my rage. I didn’t want to fight with Miriam. I would lose.

  I didn’t want to make an enemy of her.

  But I could not watch as she tormented another being. As she tormented Clayton.

  The room went completely silent.

  The dinner crowd hadn’t yet arrived, thank God, and the dining room was empty but for us and a couple of kids cleaning. The kitchen was full, though, and even they had silenced.

  “Trinity,” Miriam said, shocked, though she tried hard to empty her eyes. “What on earth?”

  Rhys eased his grip, then began rubbing his thumb over the bandage. “Okay now?” he murmured.

  I looked at Miriam. “I don’t like the way you treat him.”

  We stared at each other for a good two minutes. Clayton didn’t look up. He didn’t move. Most likely, I’d just made sure he was in for a hard night with his sadistic mistress.

  “She’s human,” Rhys told Miriam. “We must remember that.”

  “Don’t do that,” I said. “Don’t make excuses for me like I need them or she deserves them.”

  “Let’s get back to the matter at hand,” Angus said, finally, his voice gruff. “Trin, you don’t know the circumstances. Mind your business, girl.”

  Miriam smiled and continued to hold my stare. “Maybe I should tell her. Should I tell her, Clayton?”

  Slowly, so very, very slowly, and without moving anything but his eyes, he looked at me. “Yes,” he murmured.

  Surprise lit her face and she glanced at him. “I should?”

  He did not reply, and now it was no longer Miriam who held me trapped in her darkness, but Clayton. I couldn’t break away, and I continued to stare at him, at his despair, even though he was once again studying the tabletop.

  Finally, Miriam shrugged. “All right. It’s understandable that our bloodhunter is soft on the golem. She has no idea.” She took a deep, shuddery breath. “Clayton Wilder was a hunter, once upon a time. A bloodhunter, Trin, like you. Only problem was, he hunted more than vampires. And he took it upon himself to trap, torture, and murder my beloved father.”

  Her face had gone even paler than usual, and tears stood in her eyes. When she continued, the horror of her memories made her voice raw and hoarse and so filled with pain that I could barely stand to listen.

  “Took my father an entire night to die. It took me a lot longer to kill Clayton, and then to bring him back as something I could own.” She leaned forward, suddenly, and grabbed my face, forcing me to look at her. “Clayton is my Amias Sato, Trinity. And I’ll treat him however I please for as long as I can bear to keep him alive. Do you understand me?”

  I wanted to ask her why Clayton had killed her father, but that would have made it seem like I believed there was an excuse for the killing. A reason for it. And I could not belittle her pain that way. I simply nodded, so sick of our capacity for violence, sickness, and horror, and I dropped my gaze.

  “Good.” She let go of me and sat back, then picked up a slice of cheese pizza and took a small bite, chewing into our uncomfortable silence.

  “Do we…” I had to stop and clear the gravel from my voice. “Do we know what the attacker is? He’s not a vampire.”

  Clayton answered me, his voice as calm and empty as his eyes always were. No, not always. There were times when his stare was hot and fierce and male and alive, and that made his forced submission to Miriam seem even worse.

  But he was a murderer, and a sadistic one, if I believed Miriam. And I did. At least, I had absolutely no doubt that she believed everything she’d just said. Perhaps there were two sides to the story. I couldn’t know.

  “I believe he’s some sort of demon.” He stared over my head. “You will need extra protection. If his life depends on taking yours, he will find a way.”

  “So he’s feeding,” Rhys said.

  Angus, a little more subdued than usual, put his elbows on the table and leaned in, as though he didn’t want anyone else hearing what he was about to say. “You don’t think he’s just a demon, do you?” he asked Clayton. “You think he’s an—”

  Miriam’s gasp interrupted him. “Incubus,” she spat, her voice a whisper. She turned her head slowly to look at Clayton.

  He flinched. Not obviously, but I saw. I saw the flinch in the area around his eyes. I saw.

  But Rhys scoffed. “Incubi have been scarce since the fourteenth century. I doubt one is showing up now, trying to suck the life from Trinity.”

  “I don’t doubt it,” Angus said. “They are rarely seen anymore, but they still exist. I think Clay has something. I think he’s right.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me that?” Miriam asked Clayton, quietly.

  “I wasn’t absolutely certain.”

  Her lip curled. “Oh honey, I know you.” She leaned closer to him. “You’re trying to assert yourself.” She pressed her lips against his cheekbone. “It won’t work. You’re strong, but you’re not that strong.” She laughed, suddenly, and clapped her hands. “But I do enjoy watching you try.”

  She winked at me, as though I joined her in her delight.

  Rhys sighed and put his arm around my shoulders. Angus reached across to pat Miriam’s hand, and I understood two things at that moment.

  One, Miriam was a little more broken than the rest of us, and two, they sincerely cared about her.

  And then realization popped into my head exactly why the attacker—who may or may not have been an incubus—used the Foam of Aphrodite. “The victims,” I whispered. “They have sex with the attacker and then he kills them? He rapes them?” I swallowed my sudden nausea. “Why?”

  “If he’s an incubus,” Miriam answered, when no one else would, “that’s how he feeds. He takes his victim’s life force to survive.”

  Angus cleared his throat. “Usually an incubus doesn’t kill his victims. But there’s something wrong with this one. I’m just spitballing here, but if he’s an incubus, and if he’s killing when he fee
ds, then he’s…” He shrugged. “He’s just sick.”

  “Maybe,” Rhys said. “And he’s weak.”

  “Because he ran from Clayton?” I asked. “Because he has to use the foam to get…” I gestured, unsure.

  “Laid,” Angus said, helpfully.

  Miriam eyed me. “Because a demon at full strength would have torn Clayton into little bitty pieces and you would not be talking to us right now.”

  “And an incubus wouldn’t ordinarily need help from sex foam,” Angus said. “They hold some sort of magical influence over their preferred gender. Makes them irresistible to the human they want to feed from.”

  “You must be an incubus,” I joked, then wanted to sink into the floor and disappear when I realized I’d insinuated that I found Angus irresistible.

  Angus roared with pleased laughter.

  Rhys chuckled. “I never understood his appeal myself,” he said. “Now it all makes sense.”

  “I only meant…” I muttered.

  “Honey, don’t even try,” Miriam told me, giggling.

  I glared, cleared my throat, and got back to the business at hand. “The other attacks. You don’t know anything about them? Don’t the supernatural communities in the different cities communicate with each other at all?”

  “They will,” Miriam said. “Clayton, you said Jade’s just back from Thomasburg? Go talk to her. Find out everything you can.”

  He didn’t say a single word, just slid from his chair and walked to the door, pulling out his cell phone as he went.

  “Who’s Jade?” I asked, absently.

  “Jade Noel,” Rhys replied, “is the Red Valley supernatural community’s unofficial private detective slash cop. She and her minions were put in place twenty-seven years ago and they try to keep the peace. They also help investigate when a supernatural crime is committed in our lovely city.”

  “I’ve never heard of her,” I said, “and six years ago a supernatural crime was definitely committed. Where was she then?”

  “That was between the humans and the vampires,” Angus said. “We don’t police either one of those groups.”

  I knew that, but still, it irritated me. “Twenty-seven years. How old is this woman?”

  “You know we don’t age like you do,” Miriam said, strangely and abruptly deflated. Maybe she was just tired.

  “We’ll protect you, Trin,” Angus said. “Don’t worry. He won’t get near you again. You’ll stay with me, and won’t go hunting until we’ve caught him.” He pulled his cell from his pocket. “I’ll call it off with Copas.”

  “No,” I said. “You won’t. I’m not going to sit around, hiding behind you until this douche decides to show himself. He could have moved on to find someone easier. We might never see him again.”

  “She’s right,” Rhys said. “As long as one of us is with her, she’ll be fine. He ran off when Clay smacked him. We can handle him.”

  “What are they sensitive to?” I asked. I really needed to read up on my incubi. “Holy water or silver like the vampires? Incantations? Demon traps? How do we defeat him?”

  “Only one way I know to get rid of an incubus,” Rhys said, watching an attractive, older blonde who’d walked in alone. She sat at the table across from us, and when she caught Rhys watching her, she sent him a tiny smile. “We send him back to hell.”

  “And how do we send him back to hell?” I asked.

  “We call Chuck Norris,” Angus said.

  I gave him a scathing look. “This is serious, Angus.”

  He laughed. “We don’t have a clue, sweetheart.”

  And with that useless proclamation, little knots of guests began arriving, laughing and cheerful and absolutely clueless to the fact that in the supernaturals’ world, death, demons, and despair were a normal part of the dinner conversation.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Captain Crawford emailed me the vampire’s photo and specifications, including his name. “Gordon Gray,” I murmured, staring down at the photo. “I’m coming for you.”

  Gray looked like a teenager. His hair was a little long and messy, his eyes bright and twinkling and alive—in person, I could spot a vampire easily. In photos, I couldn’t tell the difference. He had his tongue out, and his teeth were even and white, with no sign of fangs. Only sick vampires lost the strength and control to retract and release their fangs—something that made it more difficult for them to hide their bloodsucking status and usually ended badly for them.

  He had his arm around someone, but only a tiny part of her face and a couple of long, thin locks of her hair were visible. Lucy? Probably.

  Shane didn’t come in to fetch me. Perhaps he felt that might have seemed too nice. Instead, he sent a text to my phone letting me know he was outside.

  And even his words on my screen were reluctant.

  I’d offered him half of what the captain was paying me if he’d help me capture or kill Lucy’s killer. At first he’d flat out refused, but he’d called me later to say he’d changed his mind.

  I didn’t ask him why. He wouldn’t have told me anyway.

  Angus walked me out, unwilling to even let me walk through the parking lot without an escort. He handed me off to Shane with a terse greeting to the other man, then he strode back inside, nodding hellos to the humans leaving their cars.

  I knew the supernats had met with Shane earlier, and likely had threatened his life if he failed in protecting me. It was embarrassing and I’m sure it didn’t exactly endear me to him. That was okay. I’d do my best to earn his respect.

  Just as he would have to attempt to earn mine.

  “Baby hunter,” he said. “Let’s go. Follow my lead, learn what you can, and don’t get in my way. I’ll have this scum in a body bag before midnight.”

  I pulled a plastic bag from my jacket pocket. “I have to latch onto his scent.”

  He threw back his head and heaved a sigh at the dark sky. “You haven’t done that yet?”

  “Obviously not.” And still I held it, strangely hesitant. It was my first time trying to catch someone’s scent. I wasn’t even sure what would happen when I sucked the vampire’s invisible residue up my nose. And if it didn’t work and I was proven a fraud, I was not going to live that down.

  “Captain Crawford is going to call me if there’s another dead female,” I told him, delaying the inevitable. “He hopes I might pick up a scent to follow from the corpse before the trail disappears.”

  He crossed his arms and leaned against his truck, a battered blue pickup, and simply stared at me.

  “The vampire serial killer,” I went on, “is not mad like the one I killed in New Gravel. He doesn’t have the virus. He’s controlled. Deliberate. What do you think he’s gaining from these deaths?”

  Shane lifted an eyebrow and remained silent.

  I hefted the shirt. “I should wait until we get to the city,” I said.

  He leveled a cool look at me. “You’re going to be a pain in the ass. I knew you would be.”

  “Shit,” I whispered, then held the shirt to my nose. I closed my eyes and inhaled, deep, deeper still…

  Nothing.

  I lowered the shirt and looked at him. “Huh. I got nothing. Maybe the scent has dissipated.”

  “Or maybe,” he said, disgusted, “we’re going to have to do this the old-fashioned way. Get in the truck.”

  But then…

  The scent hit my brain.

  It wasn’t a smell, exactly. It was a…knowing. Something slid into my brain, and Lucy’s killer was part of me. I saw him in the colorful streamers of fog snaking across the ground. His trail was dark gray with swirling bits of off-white weaved into the smooth darkness, like lazily rising smoke from an unmoving cigarette.

  I had his scent.

  All I had to do was follow it.

  When I opened my eyes Shane was watching me with maybe the tiniest bit of interest. It was something other than his usual contempt, anyway.

  “Can you track from the truck?” he
asked.

  “I think so,” I told him. “With the windows down.” Then I shrugged. “We’re about to find out.”

  “Get in.” He barely waited for me to sit down before he slammed the door shut and jogged around to climb in under the wheel.

  “The trail is dim here,” I told him. “He’s not in Bay Town.”

  He grunted. “Just keep your nose to the wind. We’ll have to leave the truck sooner or later but I’ll take us as far as I can.”

  I nodded, then reached down to squeeze the comfort of Silverlight at my belt. The trail completely disappeared as Shane pulled out onto the highway, but before I could panic, I picked it up once again.

  It would be a hell of a lot easier to track vampires when all I had to do was follow my nose straight to them.

  They couldn’t hide from me. Not even in the city.

  But the scent didn’t lead into the city. By the time Shane was forced to stop the truck, we were surrounded by swamps, woods, and long, deep hollows. We were still in the county, but the city was miles away.

  The gray tracks swirled mistily in the moonlight, disappearing into the woods, and we couldn’t drive into the woods. I lifted my nose to the air and Gray’s scent was there, floating along the ground on those misty colors, urging me on.

  Shane reached behind the seat after we climbed from the truck, and emerged with a semi-automatic short barrel shotgun. It looked mean—black and sleek and shiny—and he handled it like it was a special friend. It had an attachment beneath the barrel—a detachable magazine with extra rounds. A lot of them, by the looks of it.

  As a hunter, he could kill vampires with that shotgun, as long as he shot them through their hearts. And he didn’t look like he’d be the type of guy to miss whatever he aimed at.

  The sight of the gun made me feel better, but only marginally. I brought the picture of Gray up on my phone and turned the screen toward him. “This is what he looks like.”

  He gave the image a cursory glance, and then we walked to the bed of the truck and Shane threw open the lid of a large, black box. “Take what you need.” He began loading up his belt and pockets with gear. “Flashlight, holy water, stakes, silver…it’s all in here.”