by Nova Archer
“Shut the door and take a seat.”
Jace lifted a brow while he swung the door closed. “Uh-oh, what did I do now?” He stalked over to the chair and flopped down into it.
Caine leaned on his desk and looked at his investigator unsure how to proceed. Jace had a level of unpredictability that Caine didn’t like. It was probably the only reason, Caine hadn’t promoted him to a level three investigator. This was going to be the case that Caine would’ve evaluated to give him that promotion.
Jace smirked. “That bad, eh?”
“I have to place Eve on lead.”
Springing forward in his seat, Jace growled, “Excuse me? I don’t think I heard you right.”
“I’m sorry. The Baron gave me no choice in the matter.”
Jace exploded out of his chair and prowled the room. “I can’t believe this. A NOP comes into our lab and takes our case. What else does she want, our souls?”
Anger swelled over Caine. He didn’t like the way Jace spoke about Eve. He understood the lycan’s animosity toward humans. Out of them all, Jace had suffered the most despite his claims otherwise. However, his seething hatred toward Eve made Caine want to jump out of his seat and defend her. It was irrational, but the feeling was present nonetheless.
“Jace, I understand your resentment. I feel it too, but I would ask that you refrain from using that word in referring to Eve. She has done you no wrong, and is only here to help.”
Stopping in his tracks, Jace glowered down at Caine. “Eve is only here to help,” he echoed. “What is the matter with you, Valorian? Are you attracted to her or something? You want to nail her, is that it?”
Before Jace even had time to blink, Caine was out of his chair and looming down at him. The urge to wrap his hand around Jace’s neck surged through him violently, like a rabid fever. He had to clench his hands into fists to stop from reaching for Jace.
“This is exactly why I won’t promote you, Jace. You are irrational and hotheaded. That may help you gain status in your pack, but the only thing it does here, in my lab, is create unnecessary tension and conflict.”
Caine could taste the lycan’s fury. It was thick and cloying, almost overpowering. But he didn’t back down. He couldn’t, not when confrontation was the only thing the stubborn lycan understood. In this lab, Caine was the alpha male.
Finally, after several tense minutes, Jace took a step back, and dropped his gaze, indicating Caine’s superiority. “I won’t work under her.”
“Understood.” Caine nodded. “And I didn’t expect you to either. This is my lab, I run the show. She’s just going to be the star attraction for a while, like a circus act, okay?”
After a few moments, Jace’s anger abated and he slowly unclenched his fists at his sides. He nodded, indicating his agreement.
Sighing with relief, Caine stepped back and sat on the edge of his desk. “Why don’t you take a few hours? Go home, get some rest, eat, and come back refreshed.”
“Is that an order?” Jace asked, his usual humor alight in his eyes.
“Make it a strong suggestion.”
“All right, Chief.” He turned and reached for the door. Turning the knob, he threw it open and took a step out. Eve stood framed in the doorway, her eyes as wide as dollar coins, and a look of utter surprise on her face at running into two-hundred pounds of solid lycan.
She put a hand to her chest, and took in a ragged breath. “Oh my God, you scared me.”
Without a word, Jace sidestepped around her and stalked out into the hallway.
Eve watched him leave, her hands still visibly shaking. “Why does he hate me so much?”
Caine pushed away from the desk and approached her. “It’s not you he hates. It’s humanity in general he has a problem with.”
“Oh well as long as it isn’t just me.”
Caine smiled. The woman was a lot tougher than he gave her credit for. “What’s up? You look like you have news.”
Instantly her demeanor changed. Excitement filled her eyes replacing the trepidation that was there only seconds before. “I got an address off that email.”
“Good.”
“108 Fallen Road.” She glanced down at her notebook. “I did a search on the address, and it looks like a business called The Red Express.”
Caine nodded. “It’s a blood bar and internet café, and not far from the Black Heart Hotel.”
“A blood bar?”
“It’s a place vampires can go for a...drink.”
Eve’s face visibly paled and he could see her neck working overtime, likely swallowing the bile rising in her throat. Her ignorance of these things frustrated him. He assumed she would’ve done her homework before volunteering to work in his lab.
“It should be no surprise to you that vampires drink blood, Eve. It would be the same thing as ingesting milk to humans. It provides the vitamins and minerals we need to stay strong and healthy.”
“I guess I never thought of it that way.” She blinked up at him, an unadulterated innocence glowing on her beautiful face. A mere century ago, he would have ripped that innocence from her with his seduction. Thankfully, he had learned to control those desires, those hungers to take and devour in any way possible. But sometimes when she stood so close, intoxicating him with her delectable scent, he vehemently cursed his civility.
Turning on his heel, he marched to his desk and sat down behind it. “Well, you need to start thinking of it. This is not San Antonio, where your human sensibilities rule. This is Necropolis, where vampires drink blood, lycans fight for dominance in packs, and witches can conjure spells with a few well-placed symbols and an incantation. Violence and bloodshed are ways of life here.”
She closed her notebook and looked at him as if she’d been blindsided. He supposed she had been. “You’re right. I’m being naïve about the situation. There is a lot I don’t know or understand.” She took a few steps further into his office. “But I want to learn, and I really want to catch this guy.”
Caine ran a hand through his hair as he eyed her. She was regarding him with sincerity and an eagerness he recognized in his own team members when the hunt was on for a killer. He wasn’t angry with her. He was frustrated with his own reactions to her. At first, there had been distaste and annoyance at having been forced to work with her. But now he didn’t feel that way.
His anger had turned into something far more threatening to a man in his position, and far more dangerous to Eve. His growing attraction to her could only lead to disaster. And if he wasn’t careful something even worse for them both.
“Okay.” He leaned back in his seat. “Blood bars don’t open until sunset, so we have some time yet. Why don’t you get some rest and eat something.”
When she opened her mouth to protest, he put his hand up to stop her words. “There’s nothing else you can do right now. The trace lab is working the evidence they have. Lyra’s still decoding those symbols. It’s not going to go any faster by hovering over them. I know. I’ve tried it. It doesn’t work.”
She smirked. “I know. I’ve been on the receiving end of that.”
“There’s a cot in a separate room off the staff area if you don’t want to go to your hotel. You can get some sleep.”
She nodded. “I don’t know if I can sleep, but maybe I could have some reading materials to pass the time.”
He stood up, swiveled around to his bookcase, and proceeded to slide out three thick volumes of Otherworld lore. He walked around the desk, and set them on her outstretched arms. “Here’s a little light reading for you then.”
She smiled at him over the top of the books. “Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it.” Caine returned her smile. “If anything happens I’ll find you. If not, I’ll see you in a few hours.”
She turned and headed for the door.
“Oh and Eve, stay out of Jace’s way. He’s a little...sensitive right now.”
Glancing over her shoulder, she said, “Yeah, I kind of figured that out
for myself.”
He watched her leave, and then let out the breath he was holding. He hoped it wasn’t a huge mistake having her on the case. The Baron was risking more than he knew by demanding it. Eve was out of her element and it could prove to be hazardous not only to the case but to her own well-being.
Some Others preyed on the weaker races. And humans were at the bottom of the food chain when it came to some people’s minds. If it weren’t for the fact that humans outnumbered the otherworld community one thousand to one, some of the Others would desperately like to be on top of that chain.
At one time, long ago, he held that sentiment in a tight bloody fist. He reveled in it, in fact, granting him quite the reputation. Vampire politics were a bitch to unlearn.
Grabbing the phone off his desk, Caine dialed Mahina’s number. She would need to meet them at The Red Express to hunt down their suspects and get to the truth.
A truth, Caine was starting to suspect, that no one, Otherworlder or human, was going to expect or like.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Eve gulped down half her coffee as Caine maneuvered the SUV around the downtown Necropolis streets. The sultry night had settled in, and the gaudy neon signs of all-night diners and varying nightclubs flashed at her as they sped by. There seemed to be no end to the oppressive heat. Thank god for air-conditioning.
Struggling with fatigue, she rubbed at her stinging eyes. She had managed to get in a few hours of sleep despite her claims of not being able to. After two hours of poring through the three thick volumes that Caine had given her, exhaustion had settled in and she had gladly succumbed to it.
She had processed tons of information, and even now was still contemplating what she had read. She had learned more than anyone hoped ever to imagine about the otherworld community and the races that made it up. We had it all wrong.
Eve chastised the humans that gathered the information on the various races. They had obviously taken their cue from bad horror films and cleverly written genre fiction. Nowhere had anyone mentioned the hierarchy and streamlined political system of the vampire. Nothing she had read in the primed dossiers had truly prepared her for the reality of it or Necropolis.
“We’re just about there.”
Caine’s voice broke into Eve’s thoughts and she glanced out the window as they turned the corner onto Fallen Road. The Red Express was in a particular seedy part of downtown. She thought Fallen Road was aptly named, given all the dilapidated buildings lined up on either side. Some of them looked like they would collapse if a sudden gust of wind blew by.
Caine pulled up in front of an unassuming brick building with a painted black door. There was a small sign right above the door, painted in dark red, The Red Express. After turning off the engine, he swiveled in his seat toward her, a stern look on his face.
“You need to be really careful in here. I won’t let the same thing that happened in the hotel, happen here, but you need to be on your guard. Even in a place like this, vampire politics are at play.”
“I know. Don’t make eye contact with anyone, stay by your side, and let Captain Garner or you ask the questions. I got it.” Sighing, she opened the passenger door and jumped out. What did he think she was, stupid? She remembered all too well when the vampire clerk jumped on her, his grotesque fangs drooling over her neck. The image still gave her shivers.
She rounded the vehicle, grabbed her kit from the back, and followed Caine closely as he led them into the building.
The first thing that hit her the moment she stepped into the dimly lit bar was the metallic smell. Blood. It was overpowering like bleach in the wash. The odor almost made her eyes water.
She sidled up next to Caine. “How can you stand it?”
He looked around, put his nose in the air and breathed. “To me it smells no different, than if we were to walk into a human bar and the strong odor of beer wafted up my nose.” With that, he continued into the room. Mahina was at the bar waiting for them.
As they walked, the sparse clientele watched every step. Well, Eve thought they were tracking her every move. She could almost feel their gazes moving over her, like fingers playing up and down a piano keyboard. Some were strictly sexual feelings, but others she could feel were far hungrier.
Subconsciously, she pressed closer to Caine, so close she could feel the solid warmth of his body.
He stopped walking, looked down at her, and whispered, “I said stay close, but don’t glue yourself to me.”
She took a distancing step away. “I’m sorry. It’s just everyone’s looking at me like they want to eat me.”
Caine glanced around at the patrons, then back at her and nodded. “They do want to eat you. Your blood probably smells like an aphrodisiac to most of them.”
Her body quaked as she pictured his words in her mind. She glanced up at him. His eyes glowed just a little like white coal in a barbeque. “Do I smell like that to you?”
She didn’t know why she asked, particularly at that moment, but she wanted to know. Especially with the way he was looking at her. Like she was dessert. She didn’t find the thought unappealing. In fact, she liked that he looked at her like that and that frightened her a little.
He dropped his gaze, putting it on the floor. “No.” He cleared his throat. “Mahina is waiting for us, let’s get this done.” He continued walking. Eve followed.
Caine was lying. He couldn’t look her in the eye when he answered. He was hiding his emotions from her. She wondered what his feelings encompassed. Did he just see her as food, a fresh blood supply? Or something a hell of a lot more? Either way, Eve wasn’t sure if she was strong or daring enough to find out.
Mahina smiled when they approached. She shook Caine’s hand, and then nodded politely to Eve.
“I showed Clive here—“ she pointed at the bartender “—a picture of the deceased and he doesn’t recognize her. And I know he’s telling me the truth because I already threatened to revoke his blood-serving license.”
Clive nodded his head. “I’d remember a girl like that.”
Eve noticed his fangs were extra long and that they hung over his bottom lip. That caused him to slur his words a little. She’d laugh, if the guy weren’t a vampire and could rip out her throat with one easy move.
Caine slid an enlarged picture, sans logos and dates, of the vampire boy band he had discovered under the victim’s mattress across the bar counter toward Clive. “Do you know any of these guys?”
Clive glanced briefly down at the photo. “Shit yeah. That’s Crimson Strain. They’re in here all the time.” He smiled at Caine. “They even played here once.”
“Do these boys have names, by chance?”
“Sure, that’s Gnash—” he pointed to each member, “—J.C., Phoenix, and that’s Xavier.”
Eve perked up with the last name. Xavier. With a big old X. Caine glanced back at her and raised a brow. He was thinking the same thing she was. They had an internet moniker of vamploverX. X as in Xavier? Maybe.
“Any of these guys in here right now?” Caine asked as he slid the paper back into his pocket. “If they are, please don’t point, just nod in their general direction.”
Clive surveyed the growing crowd. Finally, his gaze rested in the corner. The darkest corner, Eve noticed. It figures.
“In the corner. Gnash and Xavier.”
“Thank you.” Caine glanced at Mahina. “Let’s go in nice and slow. Don’t want to spook them.” He glanced over his shoulder at Eve. “Stay behind me.”
He didn’t need to tell her. She had already slid in behind him, with her hand on her ALS flashlight. It wasn’t a gun, but somehow it made her feel better to know it was there. It hadn’t stopped the skinny vampire from the hotel, but she didn’t plan to let anyone else get the jump on her like that again.
As she looked past Caine to the corner where the two men sat in the shadows, Eve wondered if they were going to run.
Seconds later, she had her answer.
Faster than she coul
d discern, the two men were up and dashing for the back exit, clearly marked by the flashing red sign. They knocked over tables and chairs on their way across the room.
Mahina and Caine were right behind them. On instinct, Eve followed them. It was either that, or stay in the blood bar with several hungry vampires and her without her garlic or holy water. Although, she knew now that that was utter bullshit. The only thing that could kill a vampire was a stake through the heart, or decapitation. Those things would clearly kill anyone. She’d rather go for a run.
She pushed through the metal door and saw Mahina running down the alley one way, and Caine running the other. He glanced over his shoulder at her just as she came rushing out.
“Stay there, Eve! Don’t move from that spot!” He turned and ran, disappearing around the corner onto the main street.
The moment he was gone, Eve became very aware of the shadows creeping across the alley’s cracked cement walls and road. Turning around, she reached for the door handle, but found nothing but smooth painted metal. She was locked out. There was no going back in unless she walked around front and went in through the main door again.
Caine had told her to stay put, but she had foolishly left her kit on the floor near the bar. What if someone took it? There would be hell to pay if she lost all her equipment. They would need the evidence gathering tools if they caught the suspects.
Glancing back and forth down the alley again, she made up her mind. She would quickly race around front, go in retrieve her kit and wait for Caine by the SUV. No harm, no foul.
Sucking in a deep breath, Eve edged along the wall toward the mouth of the alley, keeping her back pressed against the gray cement. Her blouse clung to her like wet sand. The heat from the night and from a hearty dose of dread had rivulets of sweat running down her back and chest.
A clanging echoed down the road. Stopping, she glanced over her shoulder, her breath heaving in her chest. An empty pop bottle rolled across the cement.
Just a cat, Eve thought.
She swung back around and continued to creep along the wall. She got maybe another two feet, before the hairs on the back of her neck drew to attention, like quills on a porcupine. Something was definitely behind her. Grasping the flashlight in her hand, she flicked it on and swiveled around pointing the light like a ray gun.