Night's Cold Kiss

by Tracey O'Hara

  Rain started to fall with heavy fat drops, making visibility difficult. She missed the corner when Oberon turned right into a narrow one-way street. She pulled over to the curb.

  The streets were deserted in this industrial part of town. She turned around and came back, turning off her lights before rolling to a slow stop across the street. He’d climbed off the bike and was leaning against it, waiting. Probably for his partner.

  She flipped open the glove box and took out her gun, which she’d left there earlier tonight—just in case. Now she was glad to be prepared. Antoinette looked down at her bare feet. The heels she’d been wearing would hardly have been suitable, even if she hadn’t left them back where Viktor had died. She swallowed her grief. Later.

  There was nothing she could do about the shoes now; and she hadn’t thought to bring a spare pair. A car slowed and pulled in behind Oberon.

  Cerberus sat up in the passenger seat with ears pricked.

  “Stay!” she said.

  The dog groaned and lay back down, cocking his doggy eyebrow as if accusing her of being mean.

  “Good boy.” She ruffled his head and climbed out of the nice dry car into the pouring rain.

  Dylan got out of the black Jeep Wrangler, checked his gun, and stashed it in his shoulder holster. “The police got a call from a witness about a woman being dragged into this alley.”

  “Let’s get moving then, the Slasher may like to take his time, but we don’t have that luxury.” Oberon sluiced the water off his face. “It’s time to hunt.”

  “Do you think he’s still near?” Dylan asked, rain plastering tendrils of hair to his cheeks.

  “I don’t know.” Oberon turned to his partner. “We can only hope.”

  The rain lessened as they entered the alley but the ground was flooded. Blocked drains backed up, preventing the runoff of the water gushing from down-pipes from the rooftops above. Oberon cursed as it washed away the scent trail.

  Dylan squatted to pick up something—a delicate gold chain too short to be a necklace.

  “I’d say we’re on the right track,” he said. “This anklet looks pretty expensive. Not something that would go unnoticed for long around here.”

  They moved down the alley checking the side doors for signs of entry. A shoe lay half hidden under a Dumpster near the other end of the alleyway. By some miraculous piece of luck, it had landed in the only dry spot in the entire alley, sheltered from the rain and not floating in a puddle. Oberon held it to his nose.

  A soft footstep landed in the wet ground and he spun around to find Antoinette following behind with a 9mm handgun.

  “You shouldn’t be here,” he growled.

  “Neither should you.” She straightened. “But I want this guy as much as you do. You’ll have to physically restrain me to stop me.”

  “Don’t tempt me,” Oberon growled.

  “We don’t have time for this, we’re gonna lose him,” Dylan said. “You may as well let her come. Besides—she’s a licensed Venator, not a civilian. Hi, I’m Dylan Jordan—his partner.” He stretched out his hand in greeting.

  Antoinette smiled and shook it. “I know who you are—the felian, right?”

  Bloody human. And why was Dylan being so civilized?

  “Ahhhh!” Oberon slammed his fist into the wall. The pain shot up his arm, clearing the rage from his mind. “As much as I like the idea of locking her up, you’re right, we don’t have time.” Oberon flexed his hand as the bones popped back into place, healing in seconds. “The woman’s scent from this shoe is fresh.”

  He shifted the muscles in his face, elongating his jaw and nose, but he didn’t do a full transformation. He only needed to use his bear-enhanced olfactory abilities for now.

  The victim’s human scent was ingrained into the leather with traces of a floral perfume, possibly moisturizer or a hand cream of some kind. Again it seemed expensive and out of place for this part of town. It hadn’t been in the alley long enough for other smells to taint it, so a good bet it belonged to our victim.

  This was no spiking fang-whore. This victim had money. Her scent lingered in his nostrils until his brain processed the pattern and then he could “see” her trail—flashes of reddish orange where her skin had brushed the wall or a line where a foot had grazed the cement pavement as she was dragged. One of her hairs stuck to the brickwork, long and fair just like the rest.

  The rain beat a constant tattoo all around him. Antoinette pushed up the arms of an oversized jacket to reveal raised goose bumps. Puffs of visible white breath erupted from her blue-tinged lips. At this rate she would catch her death before they caught the killer.

  “You should go back,” Dylan said to Antoinette. “You don’t even have any shoes, you’ll catch pneumonia.”

  The girl shook her head violently, her teeth chattering as she swiped her wet hair out of her eyes. “I’m fine. Just keep going. I have a feeling we’re close.”

  Stubborn bloody human.

  They left the alley to come out in front of a large multistory abandoned building with one of the large front doors slightly ajar.

  Oberon brought two fingers to his eyes and then pointed to the gate. He glanced at Dylan, hit his chest then pointed at Dylan and Antoinette. She didn’t look happy but they both nodded. Oberon would go first.

  He pulled his 9mm and Dylan unholstered his Desert Eagle, and they crossed the street quickly and took up position either side of the door.

  Antoinette gripped the pistol, the excitement of the hunt rising in her veins. She looked to Oberon, waiting for his signal, and was impressed he still had the head of the bear while his body remained human. It took great control to maintain a partial transformation. He nodded his large head and held up three fingers, then one by one he put them down. On the last finger they entered the building. Antoinette didn’t mind being tail-end charlie—it was Oberon’s turkey-shoot after all.

  The drumming of the rain receded the further they made their way toward the center of the building. Water dripped from the ill-maintained ceiling above, forming puddles on the floor.

  Oberon led the way through a maze of debris and rusted metal. He seemed very confident of the direction, stopping occasionally to sniff the air and then set off again. For a large man, he was remarkably light on his feet. He called for a halt and nodded toward Dylan, who took off up a set of stairs leading to the naked support beams of the collapsed floor above.

  Dylan flowed in and out of the shadows as silent as the felian he was. He ran with ease along a thin metal support beam and stopped halfway, looking down. Oberon snapped out a few tactical hand signals Antoinette didn’t understand. Dylan responded with a few of his own then dropped eighteen feet to land silently beside her.

  Oberon took them deeper into the dilapidated building toward a stairwell leading down into the basement. This had an all-too-familiar feeling, though usually she did it alone.

  Oberon’s face began to twitch and shrink; hair sucked back into his skin, leaving only his goatee beard before he stretched his jaw, snapping it into place.

  He leaned in close to her ear. “He brought the girl in here,” he whispered against her ear. “I can smell his scent as clearly as hers now, even in human form. Dylan says there are no lookouts or guards. He’s working alone.”

  When he pulled back, he held his forefinger to his lips then pointed down the stairs. She gave him the thumbs-up, and with a nod from Dylan, Oberon led the way down to the soft glow coming from the floor below.

  The foot of the staircase opened out onto a cavernous basement floor filled with hundreds of candles. In the center of the room was a large ornate stone platform. The woman lay bound hand and foot to the altar, the candlelight flickering over her naked body. Dante really took this melodramatic shit a little too seriously.

  The woman turned her head, her eyes widening when she saw Antoinette. When Oberon placed his forefinger against his lips, the woman’s face relaxed with hope. Her eyes darted to the other side of the room and s
he twisted her head toward a door. That must be where Dante had gone.

  Oberon tapped Antoinette’s shoulder and signaled for her and Dylan to go after the girl. The felian dropped to a squat and drew a knife from a sheath around his ankle before signaling he was ready.

  As they neared the altar, she smelled the decay of old blood. Symbols and ancient text were carved into the surface of the stone altar and grooves ran along the length to channel the blood toward the feet for collection.

  “He’ll be back—” the girl started to say.

  “Shh,” Antoinette hissed, cutting her off.

  As Dylan sliced the bonds tying the girl down, Oberon moved closer to the other side of the room. Suddenly the door burst inward from its hinges, hitting Oberon full on and knocking him backward.

  Antoinette glanced up as Dante filled the doorway and the girl screamed, tugging at the last of her bonds. Antoinette moved toward him. With a flick of his wrist Dante sent Dylan flying back and pinned him high on the wall behind.

  Calmly, she raised the gun and fired twice in quick succession. The shots took him in the left side of the chest. She took two more steps and fired again. This time she got him in the right side, in the heart she was sure, but she continued to empty the gun into his body. The force knocked him onto his back.

  Something growled behind her and she spun in the direction of a whirlwind of fur and rage. Oberon’s clothes were shredded remnants of leather at the feet of one gigantic and extremely pissed-off grizzly. She pointed the gun back at Dante’s body, only to find it gone.

  “Noooo,” she cried, running through the doorway into the room beyond.

  Drops of dark blood lay on the bare floorboards where Dante had fallen, more was smeared by fingerprints a few feet from that. Abruptly she was shoved aside by the solid wall of muscle and claws, landing on her ass. The bear stopped and sniffed at the floor then turned to her and snarled.

  This was the first time she’d seen Oberon fully transformed, and while she knew he’d be big, the sheer size of him kept her on her butt looking up at him. Swirling patterns rippled through his brown fur too neat and precise to be accidental.

  He tilted his head to the side, and his strangely human eyes stared at her until she stood up. His lips peeled back, she could swear he smiled. He wanted her to follow.

  Even with all that bulk, he moved fast through the rabbit warren of rooms and hallways until they reached another staircase leading up. It was too small for him in his current form, but not for her. She raced past him and up the stairs two at a time. At the top she slammed through the fire escape doors, bringing up the gun and aiming first left, then right, and then left again. Further down the alley red taillights flared and with a screech of tires shot down the alley toward the street.

  Fuck! She lowered the barrel of the gun.

  Two seconds later a very naked human-form Oberon burst through the same doors.

  “FUCK!” he screamed echoing her thoughts as the car disappeared around the corner. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He kicked the nearest Dumpster, sending it skittering several yards down the filthy alleyway.

  Tribal scarification marked his skin in Celtic patterns all over his upper arms, back, and thighs. Antoinette couldn’t tear her eyes away from the intricate work cut into his skin. Diluted silver nitrate solution was the only thing that would stop the skin of an Animalian from healing completely to its natural state, but it would hurt like hell.

  “Well, fuck me sideways, Dante Rubins,” he growled, staring down the street after the car with his hands on his hips and his back to her. “I never would have believed it in a month of Sundays if someone told me Dante Rubins was still alive.”

  “So it just wasn’t my imagination?”

  Oberon shook his head. “If it was, he sure packed a punch for an illusion.”

  “One thing’s for sure, he’ll be out of action for a while,” she said.

  “Why’s that?” The ursian paced back and forth.

  “This pistol was loaded with silver-encased rounds.”

  He glanced at the weapon in her hand. “So he’s going to be very sick, even if he can find someone to take out the slugs straightaway.”

  Antoinette averted her eyes from his full-frontal nudity.

  Oberon took pity on her. “Do me a favor, go see to the girl downstairs. I think I frightened her.”

  No shit!

  The ursian put his hands on his hips. “And if you have a cell—call this in. I think I stood on mine in the transformation.”

  21

  Vanished

  Antoinette’s stomach rumbled. She slid out of the chair in the library to go in search for something to eat. At least she had her appetite back. The first week after Viktor’s death was a blur. She could hardly get out of bed, let alone eat. Cerberus slept on her bed and followed her everywhere, although lately he’d started following Susan as well. The whole house was grieving, and the fact that the master of the house was still missing didn’t help.

  Her days had fallen into a routine of waiting. She had taken to reading her way through Christian’s book collection, something she never had the luxury of doing much of.

  It’d been two and a half weeks since Viktor’s murder and the encounter with Dante.

  And nothing.

  No Christian, no more attacks, no more leads. Apparently the blood on the stone altar where they found the girl wasn’t even human; it was used by a satanic cult to sacrifice animals. Sick bastards. The VCU had warned both her and Oberon to stay away from the case, threatening them with charges of obstruction if they continued. Not that it would stop her; they’d just run out of leads.

  Antoinette was going stir crazy and thought she should really go back home, but Dante was still out there and no matter what that dickhead Roberts said—she was staying put.

  She could understand Christian needing some space after Viktor’s death, but she was starting to get a bit antsy and wanted to help nail Viktor’s killer.

  Antoinette heard voices outside the room and found Lilijana with her hands on her hips scowling at Kavindish.

  “When did they call you?”

  “This morning.” The butler’s voice remained calm, but the skin around his mouth and eyes tightened. “I left the message for you straightaway.”

  Antoinette’s heart stopped. It was the closest she’d ever seen Kavindish to showing emotion, and that scared her more than anything. Looks like she wasn’t the only one wondering about Christian’s disappearance.

  “What’s going on?” Antoinette asked.

  “This is none of your concern, human.” Lilijana’s vehemence smashed against Antoinette in a tidal wave of heat, but then she looked almost sorry.

  “The master stumbled into the house upstate in the early hours of the morning,” Kavindish said. “He’s not in good shape, and now he’s locked himself in a room and they can’t reach him.”

  Lilijana took out a small pink cell phone with a diamond encrusted L hanging from it. The Aeternus woman’s hands shook as she dialed and Antoinette pretended not to notice. Christian’s mother was only just keeping it together. Kavindish could see it too. His forehead creased and he exchanged a worried glance with Antoinette.

  Lilijana tossed her dark locks as she put the cell to her ear. “Have my helicopter ready to fly up to the northern house—I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

  “I’m coming with you,” Antoinette said. If something had happened to Christian…no she couldn’t think about that, not after just seeing Viktor die. It would be too much. She stopped, surprised at her feelings. They were parahuman—a few weeks ago she would’ve celebrated their deaths. But not today.

  “Do what you want human, just stay out of my way.” Lilijana swept out of the house and into the waiting car with Antoinette and Kavindish hot on her heels. An hour of uncomfortable silence later they landed at Christian’s estate and Lilijana led the way inside the house.

  “Where is your master?” she demanded of the maid in the main hal
l.

  “In his room, ma’am,” the timid girl said.

  Lilijana turned to Kavindish. “Find out what they know, how long he’s been up there.”

  Antoinette was left at the bottom to catch up to her on the third floor.

  When Antoinette finally made it to the third floor, she found Lilijana pounding on a door. “Christian—do you hear me? It’s your mother. Open the door and let me in.” When no sound came from beyond, Lilijana’s confident mask finally slipped completely. She sighed and slumped against the door, her face sagged with fatigue. “What if he’s succumbed to the Dark Sleep?”

  If Christian had fallen into a Dark Sleep, it could be impossible to wake him. For some reason the thought terrified her. “Break down the door.”

  “That’s impossible. The door is reinforced, triple locked, and barred from the inside,” Kavindish said, joining them.

  “What did the rest of the staff say?” Antoinette asked.

  Kavindish shook his head. “He’s activated the sun shutters, which are also reinforced, and he hasn’t touched blood in nearly a week. I’ve organized a crew to come up and cut through the reinforcement but it’s going to take some time.”

  “Surely there is some way. How would you send in his blood?” Antoinette asked.

  Kavindish shrugged. “The dumbwaiter, but it’s not strong enough to hold a person.”

  “It doesn’t need to if I can climb up the shaft. Get me a bag of blood and meet me in the room below.” To Lilijana she said, “you stay here and keep trying to get through to him.”

  To her surprise no one argued.

  Lilijana grabbed her hand. “Thank you,” she said with a heartfelt expression.

  Antoinette patted her hand then ran downstairs to find the dumbwaiter.

  A few minutes later Kavindish appeared and handed her a small carry-bag. “I’ve sent the dumbwaiter to the kitchen and told the staff it’s not to be used. You should be able to climb unhindered.” He opened the small door in the wall.