The Shifters

by Alexandra Sokoloff

  “Three days away,” she said, feeling ill.

  “And every drunk, stoned tourist in town is up on Bourbon Street for the night,” Jagger concluded grimly. The three of them went silent, looking down at the corpse in front of them.

  “We have to move fast,” Ryder summed up.

  “What is this ‘we,’ Kemosabe?” Jagger asked him, his tone just this side of scathing.

  Caitlin was jolted back to the present, surprised at his sudden vehemence.

  “What the hell do you care what happens to this city?” Jagger went on.

  Ryder’s face closed like a shutter. “That’s none of your business, vampire.”

  “It is if we’re going to work together, shifter,” Jagger replied, equally cold.

  “I have a job to do,” Ryder said evenly. “This city is where it led me. I have no attachment here one way or the other.”

  Caitlin felt as if she’d been stabbed in the heart at his words, and the feeling was frightening. I can’t trust him. He doesn’t care. It’s all a job for him. She scrambled for detachment, to make herself cold. We haven’t done anything but kiss. Why should I feel torn apart?

  “And who hired you for this ‘job’?” Jagger demanded.

  Ryder didn’t budge. “That’s my business.”

  “Then we’re done here, aren’t we?” Jagger said. The two of them faced off, stony and implacable.

  Oh, good grief, Caitlin thought. This is why nothing ever gets done in the world. Men.

  Even if neither of the men she was now looking at was a man at all, technically speaking.

  Jagger turned on his heel to go, a move of dismissal. But Ryder had one more trick up his sleeve.

  “You’re not quite done, vampire.”

  There was such power in his voice that Jagger turned back. Ryder waited an infuriatingly long moment before he continued.

  “I think that entity went after Cait specifically.”

  There was instant, electric tension in the chilled room, a palpable blend of Jagger’s disbelief and Caitlin’s sudden jolt of fear.

  “There was only one entity going after Cait, as far as I could see,” Jagger responded, his voice dripping sarcasm.

  Despite her apprehension, Caitlin felt outrage at the men talking about her as if she weren’t even there. But before she could protest, Ryder was snapping back at Jagger.

  “Joke about it if you like,” Ryder said, and his tone could have frozen water. “But once inside a body, walk-ins generally only care about their own pleasure, and the only things they notice are what’s right in front of them. They resort to violence only if someone or something is standing in their way. But that possessed tourist was stalking Cait—he followed her from Bourbon.”

  Jagger was motionless, processing. Caitlin’s stomach was roiling, remembering the force of the tourist’s body barreling into her, knocking her down, the hands around her neck, choking the life from her….

  Ryder’s eyes were boring into Jagger’s.

  “So consider. If these entities want full reign of the city, and if they, or at least their leader, are aware of the Keepers, who do you think they’re going to want to neutralize first?”

  Even through her own emotional reaction, Caitlin admired how Ryder seemed to have read Jagger, whose Achilles’ heel was Fiona. If there was anything that would keep Jagger engaged…

  But in her own head, Caitlin was a million miles away already. Let the men fight it out on their own. She knew exactly what she needed to do next.

  I have to talk to Danny. If we’re dealing with discarnate entities, I need someone who can look into the astral and see what’s really going on. If anyone can find these things…

  She felt someone watching her, and looked up sharply to see Ryder looking at her, as if he could hear her thoughts. And for the first time she realized there was a good possibility that he could read her thoughts, or something like it. Not all shifters were psychic, but the more developed their other skills, the more likely they were to pick up on information while passing through the astral.

  How psychic is he? Like Danny? If he were half, or even a quarter, as adept, he could be dangerous to her….

  “All right,” Jagger said, drawing Caitlin’s attention back to the moment. “All right. What would you suggest we do next?”

  Caitlin could tell how much it cost him to ask the question, and she had to admire his willingness to ask.

  “If we can get hold of one of the walk-ins while it’s in a body, before the host dies, I may be able to bind it and force it to talk. We need to track down the lead entity.”

  Caitlin could see Jagger’s mind working. “That means patrolling Bourbon,” he said, and reached into a suit coat pocket. “I need to make a phone call,” he said, and Caitlin could tell by the quiet anxiety in his voice that he was thinking of Fiona. Even as he speed dialed, he was stepping outside the room for privacy.

  The instant the door closed, Ryder turned on Caitlin. “What were you thinking, just then?”

  “Just when?” she asked innocently, and thought in triumph, So he can’t read my thoughts, not precisely.

  “You know very well what I’m talking about,” he said roughly, and in two steps he was towering over her, taking her by the wrists. “What are you holding back?”

  She tried to jerk away from him, but he simply pulled her against him, holding her wrists behind her back, his arms encircling her waist, immobilizing her.

  “This isn’t a game we’re playing here,” he said.

  “I’m not playing,” she snapped at him, and tried to push him away.

  “Neither am I,” he said, as he continued to hold her against him, legs against legs, hips against hips.

  She could feel the live heat of him, warming her body to the core, and his sheer raw power. There was no question that she would not go free until he decided to let her go, and as he stared down at her, Caitlin felt herself turning to liquid, knowing he was going to kiss her again.

  Instead he released her and moved a step away—just as Jagger pushed back in through the door. He stopped in the doorway, looking at the two of them, the distance between them obviously not fooling him for an instant.

  “Your sisters are fine,” he told Caitlin in a clipped voice. “I’m taking you home now.”

  Caitlin was about to protest that she wasn’t a baby, and how dare he, then realized that would only make her sound like the baby she claimed not to be, and be sides, her alternative was staying with Ryder, and she didn’t want to talk to him, much less…everything else that could and obviously would happen if they were alone together.

  “Good,” she said, and shot Ryder a superior look.

  Jagger held the door for her, and she marched out of it. Ryder followed. In the dark hall outside, Jagger locked the door behind them, then turned to Ryder.

  “I suggest we meet for breakfast, and you can fill all the Keepers in on what you know.”

  “I’d be delighted to meet the family,” Ryder said with a straight face, but his eyes slid to Caitlin.

  She felt herself tremble again, and instantly was furious with herself for even responding.

  A shifter. The last person—make that nonperson—you can trust. Get a grip.

  She stuck close to Jagger all the way out of the building.

  Chapter 8

  Caitlin was uncomfortable—squirming, actually—in the passenger seat of Jagger’s unmarked Cavalier as he drove the few short miles back to the Quarter and the small compound she shared with her sisters.

  His too-perfect vampire profile was chiseled, stony, beside her, and his disapproval rolled off him in waves. Still, he managed not to say anything until they were through the security gates and parked inside the compound, and he was finally walking her across the courtyard to her front door. Vampires and their eternal manners.

  He stopped outside her door, under the shadows of magnolias. “Caitlin, we don’t know each other well yet. But I knew that one about a century ago.” He didn’t
use a name, and he didn’t have to. Caitlin’s face was already burning in the shadowed dark.

  “And I don’t want to see you hurt. You shouldn’t trust him,” he finished, earnestly.

  “I don’t need you to tell me that,” she flared. And then she couldn’t help herself; she went on to say something unforgivable. “You don’t have to worry about me. Keepers and Others shouldn’t mix, period. It’s a conflict of interest.”

  She pulled open her door and flounced inside, but not before she’d seen the startled look of pain on his face.

  She regretted it even before she’d closed the door, and she had the impulse to pull it back open, to call out, “I’m sorry,” after him. And in fact, before she’d even made it to the staircase she was turning around, crossing to the door….

  But when she stepped outside, she could see him across the courtyard, in the light of the moon and the sprinkled lights from Fiona’s balcony. He and her sister were already locked in an embrace, as if they hadn’t seen each other for years, and they were completely oblivious to her.

  Caitlin stepped back inside her doorway and closed the door, roiling with emotion: resentment, regret.

  Then she hardened herself, locked the door behind her and stalked up the stairs to her bedroom.

  After she’d shed her clothes, she stood under the steamy spray of the shower and lathered herself with lavender to get the morbid, formaldehyde smell of the morgue off her…but found her thoughts obsessively straying to Ryder and the feel of his hands on her, the unbearable pleasure of his mouth on her breasts. Her mouth and nipples felt swollen under the hot pulse of the water, and she ached between her legs, as wet inside as she was out.

  She leaned back against the tile wall, imagining him stepping into the shower with her, his body hard and naked against hers in the steamy heat…and then forced herself to open her eyes, to straighten. All right, that’s enough of that.

  She shut the water off and grabbed a fluffy tow el.

  Minutes later, wrapped in a silk robe, she stood at the French doors of her bedroom and combed out her hair, a little more savagely than necessary, while she tried to breathe and focus.

  She looked down over the quiet compound, the three-part house she and her sisters shared, and let her mind go to what could happen if a whole horde of discarnate entities intent on possessing human bodies suddenly descended on New Orleans during the revel that Halloween would be. If drugs and alcohol and sex made walking-in easier, then the walk-ins would have the easiest pickings in the world.

  Ryder was right. They didn’t have much time.

  She turned to her dresser and looked at a silver-framed photo of her parents, arms wrapped around each other, looking at each other in the way they al ways looked: lovers, partners, soul mates.

  “What do I do?” she whispered, not realizing she spoke aloud.

  The photo was silent, but their palpable radiance brought tears to her eyes.

  She brushed at her face angrily.

  Danny, she thought again. These walk-ins aren’t anything we can find by looking for them in the real world. They’re in the astral.

  I have to talk to Danny.

  She glanced at the clock and was startled to see it was three-fifteen in the morning. Bons Temps would be closed, and God only knew where Danny and Case would have gotten themselves to—or what they’d got ten into.

  Tomorrow, then, she thought, and then stopped, staring out through the doors, down into the courtyard.

  A shadow moved under a tree.

  There was someone outside.

  Without thinking, Caitlin backed slowly away from the French door, then turned and bolted for the door into the hall.

  She ran down the stairs toward the front door, her bare feet silent.

  At the door, she paused to draw a breath, and then she threw the door open and strode out into the courtyard.

  “Who’s there?” she demanded, staring out toward the tree where she’d seen someone move. She saw nothing but shapeless shadows at first, and then she caught the glow of a cigarette.

  Part of the dark disengaged itself from the rest and stepped slowly forward; she caught a glimpse of a gaunt face and a familiar twisted grin. Case.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” she demanded, breathless.

  “What, you aren’t going to invite me in?” the musician/shifter mocked her, as he took a last drag of the cigarette and flicked it away onto the paving stones.

  Caitlin was on the verge of telling him to go straight to hell when she realized that this was exactly the chance she needed.

  “Of course, what was I thinking?” she tossed off. “I’ve been lying awake just hoping you would show up.”

  She was gratified to see a startled flicker cross his face; she’d surprised him, though he covered with a lazy drawl. “Good to know things haven’t changed.”

  She stepped back toward her patio and held the door open. He walked by her, slowing to look over her body as he passed. She realized she was in nothing but a short silk robe, bare legs, bare feet, bare…everything.

  Oh, well…it can’t hurt.

  Before she closed the door behind him, she glanced quickly toward Fiona’s wing of the house, afraid that they’d woken Jagger. I don’t need him butting in.

  But her sister’s windows were dark. They’re probably otherwise engaged, Caitlin thought with ire, and she shut the door behind her, a little harder than necessary.

  Inside, Case had already made his way to the liquor cabinet; she found him pouring himself a straight whiskey. “What can I get you, cher?”

  “I’m fine,” she said, folding her arms as his eyes lingered on the open V of her robe.

  “Fine as wine,” he agreed lazily. “But tense.” He drank deeply, smiling at her.

  She felt a wave of fatigue, and something more disconcerting, too—attraction. Get a grip. After all he put you through? How hard up are you? Aloud she said, “It’s three-thirty. What do you want, Case?”

  “It’s more about what you want,” he said suggestively, as if he’d read her thoughts. And she knew too well that might have been exactly what he’d done. “I’ve decided not to deprive you.”

  This was all taking a turn down a road she didn’t want to go down.

  “Of what?” she asked, stalling. “Is this some kind of riddle?”

  He circled back to the liquor cabinet for another drink. “You still want to see Danny, don’t you?” he asked her casually as he poured again.

  She felt a prickle of anticipation. “Yes. I do.”

  Case shrugged. “I don’t see any reason that can’t happen.” Instant paranoia. And what’s the catch? “I appreciate that,” she said slowly. To her surprise he laughed. “Aw, now, cher, don’t be like that. No strings—unless you want them, that is.”

  “Why the sudden change of heart?” she couldn’t help asking.

  He shrugged. “It’s important to you.” He circled closer. “But it would help if you told me what’s so urgent.”

  She hesitated, but what was the harm? “Those tourists are dropping dead because they’re being possessed by…entities. They’re called walk-ins. They’re taking over human bodies and going on rampages, and when they leave, they burn out the bodies in a way that looks like a meth overdose.”

  “Walk-ins,” Case repeated, quirking an eyebrow. “Never heard of them.”

  “I hadn’t, either,” she admitted.

  “What do you think Danny can do?” He frowned.

  Now that she’d decided to tell him, she found it was a relief to be able to talk to someone familiar. “These things are completely formless. When they’re not in side a body, they spend all their time in the astral. And we need to find them before—before Halloween would be good, because that’s when they’ll have the chance of doing the most damage.”

  Case looked skeptical but intrigued. “That is a wild story, cher. How do you know all this, anyway?”

  Caitlin took a long pause, but then felt reckless. “The
re’s a shapeshifter in town who says he’s been hired to track them.”

  “How do you know he’s not blowing smoke up your ass?”

  Caitlin flinched at the language, but this was Case; she should expect it by now.

  “Don’t tell me you trust him,” he pressed her, his ice-blue eyes probing her face.

  “Hardly,” Caitlin scoffed. “He’s a shifter, through and through. But I think he’s right about these things. I saw…” She shuddered, remembering. “I saw a man die tonight. There was something inside him, struggling to get out, and then…there wasn’t. And whatever it was, when it left, it left the body fried. It was awful.”

  She realized she hadn’t had time to process the fact that a man had died right in front of her, a grotesque, horrific, painful end to an innocent human being who had wanted nothing more than a good time in her city. She found she was shaking, tears stinging her eyes. She turned away, fumbling for the arm of the sofa to sit down.

  And then Case was striding toward her, pulling her into his arms, holding her. “I’m sorry,” he whispered into her hair. “I’m sorry you had to see that.”

  Her instinct was to pull away, but to her vast surprise, he didn’t try to kiss her, didn’t make any moves, just stood holding her, his arms strong and sure around her, and suddenly she felt warm and comforted and not so alone.

  Case was stroking her hair, and she found feelings stirring she wasn’t aware she still had. Attraction, for the first time in years. Confusing, conflicting…

  As if feeling the change in her, Case tipped her head up to his and moved to kiss her, but she turned quickly, and he only caught her on the cheek.

  “No,” she murmured, without pulling away.