by Izzy Shows
I shifted my weight from one leg to the other, feeling awkward and out of place under his gaze. I didn't want to drop eye contact, knowing that to do so would be to show weakness, but the logical part of me told me that was just what I was supposed to do. Appear weak, appear afraid, appear respectful. I forced my eyes to fall to the floor, doing my best not to grit my teeth together as I did so.
"It was in the centre of the club," I said, keeping my voice as quiet as possible while still making sure I was audible over the din of the crowd.
“You're doing great,” Mal said, sending a telepathic touch of reassurance with his words.
"Why are you so different today?" Jakub said, at last sounding fed up with the entire charade. "You are The Hunter, I know the power you possess, and you were not at all like this when we met."
Mal stepped forward, placing a hand on my shoulder. "You question her natural reaction to the presence of an incubus? She knows her place."
Jakub looked from Mal and back to me. "A disappointment, then. I had thought she was something new."
I turned my face away from the two of them so that Jakub could not see the snarl that twisted my lips, catching the inside of my cheek between my teeth to keep me from shouting at him. I wasn't afraid of him, any more than I was afraid of Mal. I could destroy him, I knew that I could, and I was sure that he had known it the other night. He had been respectful, intrigued even, and now he thought so little of me. I shouldn't care what someone like him thought of me, but I did. I wanted him to know that he meant nothing to me, that he was little more than a speck on my radar.
But Mal needed me to play this part, and I didn't want to let him down.
"Rest assured, she is more than capable of handling this situation. But it is only natural that she should feel uncomfortable in the presence of a new demon."
"But she wasn't the other night."
"The edge of the crowd got to her. You will forgive your impertinence and continue on." Mal's voice had an edge to it, a threat hidden in the polite words that I picked out with ease. He wanted Jakub to back down and forget about the way I had reacted to him when we'd first met.
I knew that it was for the best, but I didn't want that.
How was he supposed to believe that I was afraid of a mere demon when I had taken on so much already? Were demons so much to be afraid of, or did they just think highly of themselves?
I would find out sooner or later, when we caught up to the succubus and I had to take her down.
Jakub seemed to take Mal's words at face value, nodding his head and turning his back on us to go into the crowd. I followed behind, sending Mal a dark look. I didn't like what he had said, about knowing my place, and I wanted him to know that.
“I didn't mean it.”
“Doesn't mean I must like it.”
I looked straight ahead now, following Jakub to the centre of the crowd. It was hard to manoeuvre around them, they were all so focussed on one another and enjoying the dance. No one gave me so much as a second look, which was good. I didn't want to be recognised, I didn't want to be feared by the masses; all I wanted was to smash Jakub's face in and have him know that I wasn't afraid of him.
It occurred to me that these two desires were conflicting. If Jakub knew that I wasn't afraid of him, then he would no doubt spread that information around the Kin, and it wouldn't take long for that information to reach other demons. From there, it was only a matter of time before the entire community found out about me.
I had to suck it up and deal with it if I was going to stick to the idea of not being known.
It took a bit of time to reach the centre, and when we did there were quite a few people there, dancing and ignoring us. One of them shoved into me, and without thinking of the implications, I shoved them back.
"Hey!" The woman I had shoved stepped away from her partner to glare at me. "Watch where you're going."
"Why don't you take your own advice and get the hell out of my way," I said, returning her glare.
We got into something of a staring contest for a few moments, before I took a step forward and faked a lunge at her, at which she hastily stepped away.
"Come on, let's go," she said to her partner, grabbing him by the hand and dragging him away.
I shook out my shoulders, returning my attention to the two demons. Mal looked wary, Jakub had that intrigued look on his face again. I could tell that I was becoming something of an enigma to him—he didn't know what to think of me. One moment I was meek, the next moment I was getting into a fight with a random stranger.
I shrugged my shoulders nonchalantly, looking back down at the ground again.
"Interesting," he said, before he returned his attention to the ground of the club. "There is little energy to be found here, but I will do my best if you can keep the patrons of the club away from me."
I nodded, stepping next to him while still leaving a safe distance between us. Mal took up position on the other side of him, which meant that we would have limited ability to communicate with one another while Mal worked. It was one thing to send the energy that carried our thoughts from one to the other while he was beside me, but with Jakub in the middle it meant there was a risk he would pick up on the fact that we were talking, even if he couldn't figure out what we were saying.
I sighed, aware that this was going to be a long process. It had taken him a while to get the reading back at the strip club, I didn't expect this to go any smoother than that had. On the contrary, I expected it to be a lot harder for him. He was going to have to read through several layers of energy, as so many entities had passed through the space since the attack had happened.
Another person bumped into me, and this time all I did was swat them back with a lazy hand. I didn't like being in the middle of the crowd like this—there were too many bodies, too much energy going around with the tendency to overload me.
"What are you doing?"
I turned around at the voice behind me and found Geoff standing there, frowning, with his arms crossed over his chest.
I glanced over my shoulder at Jakub, who had taken a knee to be closer to the ground, and then back to Geoff. He was ignoring Jakub, and not even looking at me, but paying close attention to Mal.
Right, he didn't like it when Mal was here. I'd forgotten about that.
"We're just trying to get a read on the location, see if there's anything we can pick up from the attack."
"You're not going to find anything here, this is a waste of time. The residue is going to be long since gone, not to mention covered up. Anything you could pick up on a succubus is just as likely to be an innocent patron as it is to be the one you're looking for."
I blinked, surprised at how gruff he sounded, and by the fact that he still hadn't looked at me. All his attention was centred on Mal, and his stance was very aggressive.
"Hey, you said that I could come by whenever I wanted, remember?"
"I didn't say you could bring him around whenever you wanted."
"Well, he's with me. He isn't hurting anyone, what's your big gripe with him, anyway?"
Geoff looked at me then, a warning in his eyes.
I may not have any fear for Mal or Jakub, but I did have a healthy amount of respect for Geoff. He was a werewolf, the only one that I knew of, and that was a little terrifying.
Everything Fred had told me about them said that he should be a savage, ready to tear me limb from limb at a moment's notice, but Geoff had done none of those things. He preached tolerance, the practice of being around others to normalise the experience, and to learn how to control yourself. I figured if a werewolf could do it, anyone could.
That didn't mean that I wasn't still waiting for him to fly off the handle.
"We're only going to be here for a little while longer," I said.
"Actually, we're done," Jakub said from behind me. I looked back to see him straightening up to a standing position.
That had been a lot faster than the last time.
&n
bsp; "The man is correct. There is nothing to read here, there is too much interference. I suspected that would be the case, but I wanted to check it out anyway. Just to be safe."
Geoff looked at me with eyebrows raised, very 'I told you so.'
I rolled my eyes. "There you go, then. We'll get out of your hair."
"Do me a favour, and stop bringing him around." He jabbed a finger at Mal and then turned around and stalked away from us.
I turned and looked at Mal, a question in my eyes, but he just shook his head.
Someone was going to have to explain this to me at some point.
"Where to next?" Jakub said as he dusted his hands off; I assumed he was purging himself of any energy he had picked up in the reading process.
"There's another girl, Rebecca, who was found in an alley," I said. "We'll go there."
He nodded, and we left.
I hoped that there was going to be more to find when we got there this time. We were running out of places to look.
We headed out from the club, moving as a triangular unit with Jakub taking the lead, when someone jostled me.
“Hey, wanker, watch where you’re going,” I said before I had time to think about whether it was a good idea. I reached behind me and yanked on the shoulder of the man who had shoulder checked me.
“Buzz off,” he said, giving me a weird look.
“Watch where you’re going.” I repeated the words, balling up my fists as I spoke.
His eyes flicked down to my hands and a slow grin spread across his lips. “What are you going to do about it, mundane?”
I snorted. He thought I was mundane? At first I thought it was funny, but then some part of me had the insane response of feeling insulted and needing to teach this tosser a lesson. Ice coalesced on my hands, hardening there, and turning them to deadly bludgeoning tools. I snapped, pulling back and slamming a fist into the face of the offending man, thrilling at the satisfying crunch his nose made when I made contact.
He stumbled backwards, clutching at his nose with one hand and barely managing to catch his fall with the other. He howled out a litany of curses, glaring at me at the same time as he struggled to contain the bleeding.
I took a step forward, a vicious grin on my lips, my blood pounding with the desire to finish him.
A hand grabbed me from behind, spinning me around just in time for me to smacked around the head with an open palm strike.
“The hell are you doing, Sheach?” Geoff’s angry words buzzed in my ears, but it was hard to pay attention.
I was seeing stars and bells were a-ringing in my ears. It was like having my own off-season Christmas pageant playing inside my brain.
Fuck me but Geoff was strong.
Why did he care what I got up to? I glared at him.
“Blair.” Mal’s words were a gentle caress against my mind, serving like a splash of cold water on the rage that had temporarily taken control of me.
Shame washed over me in waves. I had attacked someone unnecessarily, engineered a fight that didn’t need to take place. And why? Because I was sick of being caged up by Mal, or because the brand was taking control of me?
I pushed the panic down, forcing a stiff smile to my lips.
“Sorry, Geoff. Won’t happen again.”
He narrowed his eyes, removing his hand from my shoulder. “See to it that it doesn’t. I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but I don’t like it. Now get out.”
I bobbed my head, averting my eyes. Geoff was confusing, intimidating and kind all at once, and I hated that he would think less of me because of this.
Without bothering to check in with Mal or Jakub, I shouldered past the two of them, making a bee line for the door.
23
"This is the wrong place," Jakub said as soon as we got to the spot in the alley where the victim had been found.
"What do you mean?" I frowned, looking around. "This is where the file said she was found."
"She may have been found here, but this is not where she died. There is no death energy here, can you not feel it?"
I spread my awareness throughout the alley, testing it out, and soon found that he was right. There was energy of decay, a body going through the usual stages, but there was no sign of a violent death. Which, you might not think it would be a violent death, considering the condition the victims are found in. But it is. You try having your soul sucked out through your teeth and then try to tell me that isn't violent as fuck.
"What are we supposed to do now?" I managed not to curse, as I would normally do, instead focusing on being as direct and respectful as possible.
"It's a dead end," Mal said, moving to stand beside me. "I doubt there is anything that we can do."
"Not so fast," Jakub said. "Give me a moment, I might be able to get something from the area."
I knew I should have done that spell.
“What spell?”
Oops, I hadn't meant to send him that thought.
“There's a spell I can do, where I can see the victim's last moments. I didn't think it would be worth it, because I wouldn't be able to identify the succubus that way. But if I had done it, I would have known where she was when she died.”
“That's a handy trick. Why have you never mentioned it before?”
“Because to use it...it takes a lot of energy, I'm useless for the rest of the day. The last time I used it I was attacked shortly after, and I almost lost.”
I didn't like to think about that day. It was obvious, in retrospect, that the attackers had been thralls controlled by the vampires that were after me. They had been trying to snatch me to stop me from investigating, to feed on me as well. At the time, I hadn't been able to piece that together, and the only explanation that had been available was that they had been after me for more...male desires. And that had shaken me. I could deal with monsters of all varieties, but hand me a human behaving like a monster, and I don't know what to do with myself.
I expected more of humanity.
Jakub lifted his head, his look of concentration dissipating. "She was killed at a brothel, not far from here."
"How did you get that?" I spoke before I could think about whether it was respectful. I was getting tired of the charade.
"The leftover energy of what she had been doing, joined by the location and my knowledge of what is in the area," he said, seemingly not noticing anything wrong with what I had said.
Just as I hadn't liked the idea of Sara being found at a strip club, it filled my belly with distaste that Rebecca had been found at a brothel. It occurred to me that the succubus might be leading some of its victims into more secluded areas, where what she would be doing would be looked on without surprise. No one would question her wrapping herself around a customer at a strip club, and it was only natural for her to spend alone time with a customer at a brothel.
It made me feel a little bit better to think that anyway, so I made up my mind that was what was going on.
"Let's go, then," Mal said.
Jakub led the way back out of the alley and down a few blocks, until we find ourselves at the brothel in question. It didn't look like much from the outside, a normal hotel that anyone would pass by without giving it a second thought. Finn would flip his lid if he knew that a brothel was operating out in the open like this, but I probably wasn't going to tell him.
Call it a weird sense of morality, but I didn't see the harm. The only people that came here were ones looking to spend their money that way, and as long as no one was forcing the workers into service, then it was everyone's decision to be involved. Now, if I were to find out that any of the workers were here against their will, that would be a different story entirely.
We entered the brothel without waiting any longer. On the inside, it was just as much a regular hotel as it was on the outside. There was a clerk at the desk, flipping through a magazine, looking bored. They looked up as soon as we entered into their field of vision, clearly surprised.
I suppose we didn't
look like their usual clientele. Both Mal and Jakub could make a lot of money working in a place like this, it wouldn't make a lot of sense for them to come here and spend money.
Me? I didn't look like I had any money to spend. I wasn't as beautiful as either of the men I was with, so I suppose it could be logical that they might be here to spend money for me, but that would be unusual in and of itself.
"How can I help you?" The clerk asked, his eyes flitting from one of us to the next nervously.
"You had a client here, name of Rebecca, that you disposed of in an alley when you discovered her body. I want to see the room you found her in," Jakub spoke for us, just as he had at all the other locations. I didn't think his usual charms were going to work on the clerk, he didn't appear interested, but Jakub's voice had such a tone of authority in it that even I would have decided to do as he said.
The clerk's cheeks flamed. "I have no idea what you're talking about."
Mal stepped forward. "Do you think that you are going to be able to talk your way out of this?" He tilted his head to the side, his voice soft—but I recognised the danger in his tone, and knew that his eyes would carry the same threat promised there.
I hadn't thought the clerk could turn any redder, but he did. "I, um, I..." He stammered but couldn't seem to find whatever words he was looking. "Yes, I suppose you're right." He mumbled out the words at last, opening a book and flipping it to the prior page. "She was in room 247."
I glanced at the two men, who nodded to one another and seemed content to move on, but I wasn't. I moved forward, so that I was beside them.
"Did anything about her seem odd to you, when she came in?" I had to know if she felt compelled to come here or if she had come here of her own volition. I didn't know why it was so important to me, to clear these women of any disillusionment of their reputations, but I cared. I didn't want to go back to their families and tell them that they had spent their last hours in dens of iniquity like this.
"To tell you the truth, I wasn't particularly paying attention. I suppose she was a little...off. She didn't seem to be paying much attention, and she chose the woman she wanted to spend the time with without much deliberation. Actually, without any deliberation."