A voice she hushed.
No escape. No anonymous life. No going home.
Not until the monster was dead.
Rutgers wet her hair, slicked it back from her face with her hands. Her heart drummed a fierce rhythm against her sternum.
She hadn’t resigned from the goddamned Bureau just so she could retire to a condo in Miami, play bingo, and write a tell-all memoir.
She’d resigned so she could do the thing that she’d been unable to do as a member of the Bureau—stride into the deep, dark woods to slay the monster at its heart.
She’d resigned so that she’d never have to tell another set of parents that their son or daughter had died carrying out her orders while she sat safe and distant in her tower of concrete and glass.
I deeply regret your son’s loss. He was a fine agent, one you can be proud of.
Rutgers’s chest tightened. Too many bright lives snuffed out or ruined, all because of Prejean.
Now, for reasons Rutgers still didn’t understand, the Shadow Branch had severed the Bureau from their role in Bad Seed and declared Prejean off-limits. No matter how much blood he spilled—agents and innocents alike—Underwood and the Shadow Branch were willing to step back and wave him on.
And warn everyone else away.
Of course, no longer being a part of the Bureau or Bad Seed, Rutgers could go where she pleased, do what she wanted. The Shadow Branch could shove their directives up their collective asses.
As she lathered her skin with perfumed soap, snatches of her whiskey-soaked conversation with Gillespie earlier that morning, after she’d finished watching the disk, drifted through her mind.
Dear God. He’s not only a vampire, he’s the son of a fallen angel.
Fucking spawn of a demon, I think you mean.
Did you know that fallen angels actually exist?
Sure. As a kid I used to watch out my window every night hoping one would fly by so I could make a fucking wish. What the hell do you think?
All right, no need to get snippy. How the hell are we supposed to kill Prejean? He unmade Moore. And what he did at the cemetery . . . We’re out of our league here.
I agree that we’re in way over our heads. But since he can be hurt, he can be killed. We just need to figure out how.
We need help, Gillespie. More information. We’ll only have one chance at this.
I hear you. We blow it and the bloodsucking bastard kills us.
We need to plan if we’re going to succeed. We need to do research on fallen angels. Find an expert to question.
I agree with the planning, but . . . an expert on fallen angel–vampire half-breeds? Good luck with that.
And that was another thing—Rutgers had never imagined working side-by-side with an SB agent, and especially not with Section Chief Sam Gillespie, with his reputation for booze and poor judgment.
A rueful smile tugged at Rutgers’s lips. So what did that say about her own judgment?
Booze hound, obsessed, yes, Gillespie was those things. But she believed the runaway SB chief to be sincere in his desire to end Dante Prejean’s violent life. Gripped with an almost religious fervor to ride with her into those stark and twisted woods with a lance tucked under his arm, ready to tilt with the beast.
Religious fervor.
Remembering the church she’d seen several blocks down from her Best Western motel room, an idea burned bright in Rutgers’s mind. Expert advice.
She hastily finished her shower, dressed in a gray plaid skirt, white blouse, charcoal blazer, and black pumps. Then, tucking her Glock and her cell phone into her purse, she walked out of her motel room.
THE CHURCH WAS NEARLY empty.
Rutgers eased into a smooth wood pew near the entrance. Just a couple of people lingered in the pews, heads bent, while a few others lit candles for the dead, the early afternoon mass over. Sunlight streamed in through the trio of stained-glass windows above the altar, staining the air with translucent color.
The church was fragrant with the smells of incense and beeswax and polished wood. With fragile hope. A charged and holy hush seemed to resonate throughout the church’s interior as though a song had just ended, the last note lingering at the edge of hearing in the quiet air.
Rutgers spotted the priest in a belted black cassock standing beside one of the confessionals, his head bowed thoughtfully as he listened to a parishioner, a middle-aged black woman in a blue velvet pants suit.
Rutgers wondered how the priest would react to her questions. Would he have any answers for her, any insight on how to send Prejean straight to hell, or would he just listen politely, then usher her, the crazy woman from off the street, back outside.
Prejean cups Moore’s face. His hands tremble. Glow with blue light. Blue flame. His hair snakes up into the air. Blue light shafts into Moore’s body . . .
Rutgers stiffened in the pew, blinked the images away. She felt a sudden and troubling desire for a drink.
Goddamned Gillespie.
Another image flared in her mind, but this one was of Heather Wallace as she’d looked the last time Rutgers had seen her—sitting in Rodriguez’s office, her attractive face composed, her intelligent blue eyes calm as still water as she pretended—quite well, Rutgers reflected ruefully—that she knew nothing about Bad Seed.
A smart move on Wallace’s part. It had kept her out of custody and alive.
But now the Shadow Branch hunted her, eager to unlock the mystery she presented—her mortally wounded body healed by Prejean and without using his blood.
Rutgers glanced at the linen cloth–draped altar, her gaze skimming past the grim crucifix to the stained-glass windows above. Could Wallace be saved? She’d chosen Prejean over her career, the Bureau, even her family. She’d even helped him commit murder. Slept with him.
A pang of something close to grief knifed Rutgers’s heart. The dedicated agent who’d yearned to be a voice for the dead was gone, her soul sucked dry by a goddamned vampire. Wallace was beyond saving.
Lowering her gaze from the sun-soaked images of saints and Christ and angels—white, feathered wings, not smooth and black—Rutgers shifted her attention back to the confessionals.
The priest spoke in low tones to the woman in the blue velvet pants suit, an expression of sincere sympathy on his rugged face. He squeezed her hand between his before offering her a warm and encouraging smile.
A cynical smile tugged at Rutgers’s lips. Go and sin no more?
With a murmured “Thank you, Father,” the woman walked away, heading toward the rows of flickering candles.
Rutgers rose to her feet, looped her purse around her shoulder, and strode up the aisle toward the priest. He looked at her as she approached, his brow furrowing as if he saw something in her body language or on her face that troubled him.
Must be the FBI stride—all authority and grim purpose. I’ve forgotten how to walk any other way.
“Excuse me, Father,” Rutgers said, drawing to a halt in front of him. This close, she realized how tall he was, six-four or six-five, his frame well-muscled beneath his cassock. Gray salted the temples of his close-cropped dark brown hair. “I was hoping I could take a little bit of your time. I need information rather urgently.”
“How can I help?” His voice was smooth and soothing, a slow glide up the Mississippi. She’d bet women flocked to his sermons for the sensual sound of his voice alone.
“Is there somewhere we can speak privately?”
He regarded her for a long moment with eyes the warm color of sunlit honey. “Of course, Ms . . . ?”
“Monica Rutgers,” she supplied.
“Is this an official visit of some kind, Ms. Rutgers?”
Even though her FBI badge was still tucked inside her purse, Rutgers knew she’d only put the priest on the defensive if she displayed it. “No,” she said finally. “And I appreciate any time you can give me, Father.”
“Aloysius,” he murmured. “Father Aloysius.” He glanced around the church, taki
ng stock of those still lingering in the building, then nodded. “We can speak in my office, Ms. Rutgers.”
“Thank you.”
Father Aloysius’s office was at the back of the church, at the end of a long, narrow hallway. He scooped a pile of what looked like hot rod magazines off the chair parked in front of his cluttered desk.
“Please,” he said, nodded at the chair. Dumping the magazines on the carpeted floor beside his desk, he moved around behind it and seated himself. “You mentioned an urgent need for information. About what?”
Rutgers smoothed the back of her skirt underneath her as she sat down and met the priest’s curious gaze. She drew in a breath of air musty with the smells of books with leather bindings and yellowing pages, of crackling parchment and fresh ink.
“This may sound odd, but, trust me, I’m very sincere,” she said. “What can you tell me about fallen angels and demons?”
Father Aloysius’s eyebrows crawled up to his hairline. Blowing out a surprised breath, he leaned back in his chair, the springs squeaking as it rocked back. “I’ll admit that’s not what I was expecting, Ms. Rutgers.”
She chuckled. “I’ll bet.”
“I thought you were going to ask about all the blasted vampires.”
RUTGERS FOLLOWED FATHER ALOYSIUS down to the basement, bits of their conversation from upstairs ringing through her still partially disbelieving ears.
Unmaking people. Destroying the cemetery. Blasting doorways into Hell. If what you’ve said is true—and I’m not saying it isn’t—we might be dealing with something much bigger and even deadlier than a demonic True Blood/Fallen hybrid.
And that would be?
The Great Destroyer.
Excuse me, the Great . . . what?
Destroyer. Cultures throughout the world have been seeded with prophecies about this angelic being and what his or her appearance means for humanity.
And what does it mean for humanity?
Our end.
Do you mean the Antichrist? But that’s just . . . I mean, even if it’s true, he’s defeated and—
The Great Destroyer, the Unmaker, has absolutely nothing to do with Christianity, Ms. Rutgers . . .
The pungent scents of sandalwood and frankincense permeated the closed-in air as the priest led Rutgers down a narrow, well-lit hallway to what looked like a steel door at its end. She noticed a symbol sketched both on the door and above it in what looked like dried blood.
“Protection sigils,” Father Aloysius explained, following her gaze. “Holy script.”
“And who does it keep out?” Rutgers asked.
“Anything not mortal.”
“And has anything ‘not mortal’ put it to the test?”
“Not yet,” the priest admitted.
“How long have you been doing this . . . killing vampires?”
“Just the last year, but we’re learning with each strike.”
Of all the churches in all of New Orleans, I walk into this one, Rutgers mused. Maybe there really was such a thing as destiny or fate.
A keypad rested on the wall beside the door, a tiny green telltale glowing at its base. Father Aloysius quickly punched in a code. A beep sounded from the pad, then Rutgers heard a solid clunk as the door unlocked. Grasping the handle, Father Aloysius pushed the heavy door open. Air laced with the smells of gun oil and candle wax whooshed out of the room.
The priest ushered Rutgers inside. As she went in and looked around, her pulse picked up speed. Hope blossomed within her.
Weapons of all sorts lined the walls: pistols, assault rifles, shotguns, crossbows, stakes of different lengths. Computers rested on workstations. Books were shelved in cases hugging the lower half of each wall.
A bulletin board displayed photos of vamps beneath two headers: MISSION and ACCOMPLISHED.
Father Aloysius followed her into the room, his cassock rustling, and stood beside her. “We’re called the Hand of God, and we meet every Tuesday and Thursday,” he murmured. “We have access to information—both arcane and practical—all around the world. God bless the Church and the Internet.”
Rutgers looked at him, and a grim smile curved his lips as he met her gaze. “Trust me, Ms. Rutgers. We’ll find a way to kill this Dante Prejean. No matter what he is.”
25
A WISE MAN
DALLAS/FORT WORTH INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT
March 28
I WISH TO REQUEST a leave of absence, sir, effective immediately.
Slim black briefcase in hand, James Wallace entered the airport terminal from the gangway and strode past the crowd—bouncing up on tiptoes, buoyant expressions matching the enthusiasm demonstrated in their feet—waiting for friends and relatives and loved ones.
Someone else altogether would be waiting for him outside the terminal.
Does this request have anything to do with the situation involving your daughter?
Sir, it’s a personal matter.
After retrieving his champagne-pale Samsonite suitcase and wheeling it through the automatic glass doors leading out into the bright Texas sunshine, James stood at the curb, feeling the moisture practically being sucked from his Pacific Northwest skin in the dry air. A white van marked only with SI in elegant black lettering on the side panel glided to a stop in front of him.
If a man should go looking for a missing daughter during a leave of absence, it’s no one’s business but his own. Wouldn’t you agree, Wallace?
I would, sir.
With a metallic click, the van’s side door hummed open. James slid his suitcase inside, resting it on the floor in front of the empty passenger seats. As the door hummed shut again, James opened the front passenger door and climbed inside. A pine-tree shaped air freshener hung from the rear view mirror, saturating the air with the reek of artificial pine.
Of course, once a man found his daughter, he’d be wise to take her and go and forget about the off-limits male in whose company he found her.
A wise man indeed, sir.
“Good flight?” the driver asked, offering James a thinning of the lips that he most likely believed passed for a smile.
“As good as any flight can be.” James strapped on his seat belt and settled his brief case on the floor beside his feet. He looked at the driver.
Late thirties, with well-creased crow’s feet at the corners of his gunmetal gray eyes, a man who spends a lot of time in the sun and the weather, a thick-muscled and powerful build beneath his black Members Only jacket. Ex-military or law enforcement vibe.
“You must be Stevenson,” James said.
“That would be me, yup.” Stevenson edged the van into the slow crawl of cars, vans, and taxis headed out of the airport. “Do you have a lead on where the bloodsucker took your daughters yet?”
“No, but I imagine New Orleans will be the destination,” James Wallace replied, shifting his gaze to the front windshield and the traffic flow beyond.
“No offense, but I gotta ask, how the hell did this bloodsucker manage to snag both of your daughters?”
Good question.
Heather had been brainwashed. The damned vampire had wormed his bloodsucking way inside her head, inside her heart, into her bed, and taken control of her every thought, every action.
That was the only thing that made sense. Why else would she have thrown away her career, her life?
And Annie? Whether Annie had simply tagged along or been forced to accompany her sister on her cross-country flight, James didn’t know. But he had a strong feeling Annie would call him when she found an opportunity.
“I don’t see that how he managed to grab them matters,” James said. “What matters is retrieving them before he turns them.”
“How do you know that he hasn’t already turned them?”
James’s heart did a slow, painful thump inside his chest. “I don’t,” he admitted. “But again, it doesn’t matter. Turned or not, we extract them.”
“Let me make this very clear, Mr. Wallace, even though you’re in
charge of this little operation. The Strickland Institute isn’t equipped to deal with bloodsuckers. And won’t. We only handle human extractions and deprogramming—unhooking people from the grip of a religious cult, a government deep-cover mission, or a bloodsucker’s influence—that’s all. Hell, the majority of our staff don’t even know that vampires exist.”
“I understand all that,” James replied. “And I won’t be asking the institute to deal with my daughters if they’ve been turned—only to pull them out. The rest would be my responsibility.”
“That it would be,” Stevenson agreed, his gaze on the heavy traffic cruising alongside them as they headed for Dallas. “Just as long as we’re clear.”
“Are all the arrangements in place?”
“That they are, Mr. Wallace. All we need is the go-ahead from you.” Stevenson nodded his head at a small paper bag resting on the console between the seats. “There’s the special item you requested. Gotta admit, that particular request was a first. But then again, we’ve never had to deal with a born vamp before either.”
“You and your team won’t be dealing with one at all. I’ll be handling that honor.”
“Bullets filled with the resin from a dragon’s blood tree. Who knew?”
Hardly anyone, as it had turned out.
James’s research had turned up almost zilch on True Bloods and how to kill them or even if a different method other than the usual bullet/stake/ice pick/what-have-you to the heart followed by decapitation and burning was even required.
The Bureau’s files had contained nothing useful regarding born bloodsuckers, and he’d been refused access to SB files. Period.
What little information he’d managed to dredge up online had possessed all the frantic factoid qualities of urban legends—only a silver stake dipped in holy water thrust into the heart at high noon; the heart needs to be cut out and burned on a pyre a la Percy Shelley—until he’d stumbled upon an obscure but enthusiastic website dedicated to nomad culture and their pagan beliefs.
The clan shuvano (shaman; shuvani to indicate a female shaman) favored me with a fantastic tale about a night elemental (born vampire) and her adventures in the ancient world, and how she died unexpectedly in Yemen after spotting a tree bleeding red sap and tasting the resin out of curiosity . . .
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