Lucifer (Vampires in America: The Vampire Wars Book 11)

by D. B. Reynolds

  She nodded jerkily. “How come I’m all flustered, and none of this bothers you?”

  He yanked her against him in a sudden movement, one hand flat against her lower back, pressing her against the hard ridge of his erection. “I’m bothered,” he growled. “We’re both going to enjoy this later.”

  She threw her head back and looked up to meet his eyes, her own big and blue and shining with emotion. “Promise?”

  He grinned. “Oh, yeah.”

  She flattened her lips and nodded sharply. “Okay, let’s go chat with Mom.”

  ANDY ANDERSON and his mom lived in a modest home about ten miles from McGill University. It was a thirty minute drive in good traffic, which it was at this time of night. The house looked as if had benefited from some recent improvements, which only added to Eleanor’s suspicions about Andy and his brother Jack. It was one thing for Andy to do a favor for his twin’s vampire friends, but it made much more sense to her that he’d have done it for money. Especially since, unless he was blind, he had to have known that his new vampire associates were up to no good. It’d be hard to miss the locked room and the round-the-clock guards, even if all he did was provide regular access to the tunnels beneath the university.

  Lucifer was already standing on the strip of concrete walkway that led up to the small front porch, when Eleanor climbed down from the big SUV and came around to stand next to him.

  “New paint,” he said, sniffing to indicate he’d smelled the same thing she did. “And a new car in the driveway.”

  She’d seen a car parked in the back, near the detached garage, but hadn’t noticed it was new. “Aiding and abetting pays well, apparently.”

  He lifted his chin in acknowledgement, then stared at the house, his eyes losing focus as he scanned for life forms. “No vampires,” he told her. Not a surprise there. “Four humans. I can’t tell what they are—male or female—humans all feel the same to me.”

  “Tastes like chicken,” she commented.

  He turned to her with a half grin. “Exactly. Let’s ring the doorbell.” He led the way up the walk, taking the four stairs in a single, graceful leap. Eleanor could have done the same, but it didn’t look nearly as graceful when she did it. More like a bunny hop. So she settled for taking them one at a time, but using her vampire speed, so that when Lucifer pressed the button on the doorbell, she was standing next to him.

  Footsteps approached from inside the house. Light, short steps that told her the human was probably female. The porch light went on a moment before the door opened, and a pleasant-looking older woman stood there, her gray hair a curly pixie cut around her head.

  “Can I help you?” she asked, standing well back from the screen door, far enough that she could slam the wooden front door if necessary. But since her visitors were vampires, she was actually quite safe.

  “Mrs. Anderson?” Lucifer asked, using his most persuasive voice. “We’re friends of Andy, from the University. I wonder if he’s home?”

  “Andy? Oh, of course. You must be the ones he’s been talking about. Jack’s friends?” Of course, she’d love Jack and Andy’s new friends. After all, they’d paid for the upgrades on her house.

  “Yes, exactly,” Lucifer agreed happily, as if he was just so pleased that she’d made the connection. “I saw Jack yesterday (well, that was true enough) and I thought we were meeting here tonight, but maybe—”

  “Oh, no, I’m sure you’ve got the right of it. I don’t know about Jack, but Andy called. He’s running a little late, and he’ll be here any minute.” She glanced over her shoulder. “I’ve got my bridge club tonight, but—”

  “That’s all right,” Eleanor said, speaking up for the first time, doing her best to look small and non-threatening. Which wasn’t much of a stretch. It didn’t matter that she could throw a grown man around like an empty trash can. Her small size, coupled with her long, blond hair, and a face that would forever be that of a twenty-something human, did the job very nicely. “We’ll just wait in the car.”

  “No, no, that’s not necessary,” she said, opening the door. “It’s cold out there. You come on in, and sit in the living room where it’s warm. We’re all back in the den, but you probably don’t want to listen to our gossip and such.”

  “That’s very kind,” Lucifer murmured, crossing the threshold before the woman could change her mind. Eleanor followed, with a final glance at the neighborhood and the street. Most of the houses had lights on, but there wasn’t much traffic, and no one was around. There’d be no witnesses.

  “Forgive my manners,” the woman said. “I’m Muriel Anderson, Andy and Jack’s mother.” She gave them an expectant look.

  “Luc and Ellen Scuderi,” Lucifer said promptly, and Eleanor had to refrain from rolling her eyes. Apparently they were married now. “Andy’s been such a great help with our research on the Underground.”

  Muriel’s eyes lit up. “He’s always been so fascinated by the tunnels in this city. Ever since his father took him to McGill. He was a professor there, you know. His father, that is. Andy, too, now. But when he was little—” She stopped herself with a dismissive wave. “But you don’t want to hear about all that. You make yourselves comfortable. Would you like a cup of tea while you wait?”

  “Not for me. Ellen?” Lucifer asked, his eyes twinkling with mischief, as he took her hand, threading their fingers together.

  “No, thank you, Muriel. We’re having dinner after this, and I don’t want to spoil my appetite,” Eleanor said sweetly. She had to cover a wince when Lucifer’s fingers nearly crushed her hand.

  “If you’re sure,” Muriel said slowly. Her voice trailed off at the end, and her eyes took on a glaze that told Eleanor Lucifer was messing with her mind.

  “I love bridge, Muriel,” he said smoothly. “Why don’t you introduce me to the others?”

  Muriel nodded agreeably and started toward the back of the house. Lucifer lingered long enough to meet Eleanor’s worried gaze. “I’m not hurting her. But I want her and the other women out of the line of fire, if it comes to that. They’ll be perfectly safe.”

  Eleanor nodded, feeling somewhat bad that he felt the need to explain to her. But at the same time, she was pleased that he’d bothered. “I know,” she said, putting all of her trust into those two words.

  She walked over and sat in one of the chairs next to the fireplace, appreciating the warmth. Vampire or not, she felt the cold. It might not kill her—her vampire-enhanced metabolism could regenerate almost anything short of an actual amputation—but the cold still got into her bones. She’d been born and raised in the warmth and humidity of the Louisiana swamps. Apparently the body never forgot its roots.

  “All set,” Lucifer said, gliding into the room to sit across from her. “Now we wait for Andy.”

  “Think he’ll have company?”

  Lucifer shrugged. “His brother, maybe. But I don’t expect any vamps to be with him. Not that it matters. We’ll handle whatever happens.”

  He’d said “we.” A rush of warmth filled Eleanor at his confidence, not only in his own abilities, but in hers, too. “What do we do with the twins once we have what we need from Andy?”

  “I wiped Jack’s memory when we sprang their trap at the house last night. If he’s with Andy tonight, he’ll need a little extra. But either way, once I’m finished with them, they’ll both forget they ever heard of vampires and secret tunnels.”

  “Will we go after Murphy tonight?”

  Lucifer seemed to think about it, but then shook his head. “I hate to wait, but we need to get a sense of the layout and timing. There’s just the two of us, so any way you look at it, we’ll be outnumbered down in those tunnels. I’m hoping to avoid Yamanaka and Landry during the rescue. That’s where the timing comes in. Once we have Murphy safely ensconced back at the hotel, we can go after both of them, ass
uming they don’t come after us first. It might be better if they do, actually. It’ll save us the trouble of finding them.”

  “What about Colin? Will he be safe at the hotel? I don’t want them coming after him while we’re off dealing with the others.”

  “Don’t worry about Murphy. He’s a warrior. Give him a little blood to bring him back to fighting form, a few hundred rounds of ammo, and he’ll take care of anyone who walks through the door. He’ll have Cal and his team here with him, too.”

  Eleanor drew a deep breath, and nodded thoughtfully. “You’re right. Colin’s solid.”

  “But not as beautiful as me,” Lucifer commented.

  She laughed. “No one’s as beautiful as you are.”

  “That’s what I thought.” His head came up, and his eyes sharpened. “Andy’s home.”

  LUCIFER DIDN’T BOTHER to get up when Andy Anderson came through the front door. He stopped dead in the arched opening to the living room, and stared.

  “Who the hell—” he began, and then Lucifer flashed some fang, and recognition flooded Andy’s face. “How’d you get in here?” he asked, with a worried glance toward the back of the house and its bridge players.

  “Muriel invited us in. She and her friends are perfectly fine, by the way. You should worry more about yourself. And your brother.”

  “I told you people—”

  “But we’re not the same people. Have a seat. Let’s talk.”

  His reluctance was obvious, but he’d had enough experience with vampires recently to know that resistance was futile. Lucifer chuckled inwardly at the words that had bubbled into his brain, but they were certainly accurate.

  Andy set his briefcase down, shrugged off his jacket, and hung it on a wooden hall tree in the entryway. Coming into the living room, he perched nervously on the edge of an armless tapestry chair, the farthest one from where Lucifer and Eleanor sat near the fireplace.

  “What do you want?”

  Lucifer smoothed a hand over the fine slacks he’d worn that night, wanting to make a good impression on the twins’ mother. He could manipulate minds when necessary, but it was much easier not to. “I want the same thing the others did,” he said plainly.

  “What others? I don’t know what—”

  Lucifer stopped him with a single look. “Don’t play games with me. You won’t win. We both know you sold information to some vampires. A sale most likely set up by your brother Jack. So don’t bullshit me. I want what you gave them.”

  “It’s not a blueprint or anything. I have to show you, just like I did them.”

  Lucifer studied the human, trying to figure out if the man was playing them or not. “Eleanor.”

  She looked at him, a question in her eyes.

  “I need to know if Andy here is being honest with us.”

  “What? Why would I lie?” Andy blustered, but Lucifer didn’t care about the human. His attention was only for Eleanor, and if she’d let him do what was necessary to ensure their safety. He needed to scan Andy’s brain. It would be gentle, but there was question that it would violate the human’s mind.

  Eleanor’s gaze on him softened. “Do whatever you have to,” she said quietly. “I trust you.”

  Her simple declaration meant more to him than all of the accolades he’d received from Lord Aden or any of the others over the past few years. He wanted to grab her, and kiss her, and never let go.

  “Later,” he promised, and he knew from her smile that she understood. “But right now . . . Andy,” he said returning his attention to the human. “I need the truth.”

  With a single thought, he froze the human in place, sliding smoothly into his mind with the ease of long experience. It helped that Andy was one of those humans with no natural shields whatsoever. It horrified Lucifer to think about going through life so unguarded, but the human probably wasn’t even aware of it.

  “Tell me about the vampires,” he told Andy. “What did they want? And what did you give them?”

  “Jack told them about me, about my hobby with the tunnels,” he said, seeming unaware of Lucifer’s manipulation. “They wanted somewhere underground, a place no one knew about. Or rather, no one, but me. It had to have at least two rooms, or, you know, dead ends that could be made into rooms. But that turned out not to be necessary. There’s an old storage tunnel down there. I think they used it to store supplies and equipment during the original construction.”

  “And that’s where you took them?”

  Andy nodded. “Jack introduced us, and I showed them the way.”

  “So this is from the McGill University tunnels, not the Underground.”

  “Strictly speaking, yes. The tunnels connect through the Metro, if you know where to look.”

  “And you know, of course,” Lucifer said dryly.

  “Sure. No one knows those tunnels better than I do.”

  “Why’d you help them? What’d they give you?”

  “My brother’s pretty high up—”

  “You’re brother’s a tool, Andy. If you learn nothing else, know that. He’s a disposable hired gun, a human who’s only still alive because I spared his life. Remember that.”

  Andy stared. “I talked to him today. He didn’t say anything about that.”

  “Because he doesn’t remember, and neither will you. You didn’t answer my question. What’d they give you for your information?”

  “Money,” the human admitted. “Enough to fix up my mother’s house, with sufficient left over to make sure she can stay here for the rest of her life without worrying.”

  Lucifer had trouble believing Yamanaka would leave Andy alive with all of this information in his head, but maybe they weren’t finished with him yet. He’d have bet good money that when all was said and done, when Sophia was dead and Murphy along with her, and Berkhard or whoever sat on the territorial throne . . . one of the first deaths would be Andy’s. The information in his head was too valuable to risk having an enemy vampire discover it—an enemy like Lucifer.

  “All right, let’s go.”

  “Go?” Andy said, surprised. “Go where?”

  Lucifer stood, and Eleanor with him. “You’re going to show us what you showed the others. And then I’m going to save your life, Andy. You and Muriel, both.”

  “What about Jack?”

  “I can’t make any promises about Jack. I kept him alive once, but—” He shook his head. “No promises,” he repeated.

  Andy was understandably distressed about that, but Lucifer’s compulsion dulled his emotional responses so that they didn’t interfere, at least for now. Once the compulsion was lifted . . . well, Lucifer wouldn’t be here, and didn’t really care what happened then. The human twins had made a choice to work with some very bad people, and sometimes there was a price to pay.

  Chapter Ten

  LUCIFER WAS SURPRISED at the extent of the tunnels beneath the university. Supposedly, they’d been built to give students a safer, warmer transit between buildings during Montreal’s harsh winters. He’d never heard of a similar tunnel system beneath any of the U.S. universities located in colder climates. It was a good idea, but it was certainly an invitation to abuse. And who better to take advantage of this open invitation than vampires?

  He followed Andy Anderson along an unlit and barely finished tunnel that they’d accessed via a maintenance closet. It hadn’t been a real closet, just a room with a few metal shelves filled with cleaning supplies, whose main purpose was to conceal a second door at the back of the room. That door had been protected by a keypad lock, for which Andy had just happened to have the code.

  “You didn’t discover that by accident,” Lucifer had commented quietly, while Andy tapped in the 16-digit code.

  “I have a friend who freelances computer work. Some of her most lucrative jobs are borde
rline criminal.”

  “Sounds like a match made in heaven, now that you’ve crossed that same line.”

  “All I did—”

  “Save it for the judge, bud.”

  They’d gone about thirty yards down the hall when Andy slowed, but kept walking. “There’s a dead-end up there,” he said, whispering for the first time since they’d descended into the tunnels. He gestured with his flashlight into the stygian darkness. The flash was the only light they had down here, and it wasn’t that strong. But it was more than enough for Lucifer and Eleanor. If anything, it was too much, and they had to be careful not to temporarily blind themselves by getting too close to it.

  Lucifer looked ahead, where Andy had indicated, and could barely make out a wall of rock and dirt, even rougher than the walls to either side of them. Whoever had dug these secret tunnels had done so in a hurry, and with an eye toward secrecy. He was sure Andy had some history on that, too, but he didn’t care enough to ask. All he cared about was finding Colin Murphy, and getting him out of here. Once that was finished, it wouldn’t be Lucifer’s problem, because he’d be back in Chicago.

  He scowled as the ramifications of that thought penetrated his brain. He’d been so fixated on finishing the job and getting back home. But that had been before he’d reunited with Eleanor. Now that he had her, he wasn’t ever letting her go, but what did that mean for their future? They were sworn to two different North American vampire lords.

  He was still mulling over that when they reached the dead end.

  Andy flashed his light to the right, and walked for a short distance before making another sharp turn to the left, and that’s where he stopped, careful to keep his light down low. “That’s it down there,” he whispered.

  Lucifer was tempted to do a quick mental scan down the tunnel to determine who, if anyone, was there. But he and Eleanor were both shielding like crazy to hide their presence in the tunnels, and if he did a scan and Yamanaka or someone equally powerful happened to be around, it could give them away. And he was reluctant to invite a fight without knowing whom, and how many, they’d be facing.