Damian's Assassin

by Lizzy Ford

  “Dusty, I’m-- ” Darian started. Dusty knew at once by Darian’s tone that whatever the Grey God wanted to do, it would get him in trouble.

  “No,” Dusty said.

  “But I met this girl and she-- ”

  “Hell, no.”

  “Dusty-- ”

  “My house, my rules, no compromise,” Dusty reminded him. “Get your ass to the range and learn to shoot. I’m activating your GPS. If you’re not there in half an hour, I’m coming to find you.” Darian gave another of his annoyed sighs and hung up.

  Bianca was staring at him. He ignored her and parked, leading her into the hospital. He hung back as she approached the first nurse’s station they came to, aware of the effect he had on humans. Those around him moved away, and those on a path towards his side of the hall changed their minds and turned around. He looked at his watch, aware he had a morning packed with activities to follow up on.

  His phone rang again, and he answered, trailing Bianca to an elevator.

  “Hey, boss,” Toni said. “I took a look at the logistics info you showed me. Hector in Missouri is gonna help me straighten it out. We should have it done by noon. Also, ikira said you needed help managing your schedule, so I’m forwarding you your agenda for today. I’ll take a couple of the meetings, and I tasked Jenn to start forwarding intelligence reports to me as well. Are you groovy with all that?”

  “Yep,” he said, pleased. “Do what you need to. Sasha’s files are on the shared drive. You can dig through those as well. He was more anal than me, so I know everything is in order.”

  “It gets kinda crazy around here, doesn’t it?”

  “Definitely,” Dusty said with a trace of a smile. “If the inmates try to run the asylum, give me a call.” He hung up.

  “What exactly do you do for a living?” Bianca asked, her eyes wide.

  “You’re not ready for that.” He tucked the phone away and met her gaze, watching the emotions that crossed her face. Red crept up her features, and she looked away. She still looked fatigued, with dark circles under her eyes and skin pale beneath the caramel.

  He sensed the presence of the vamp before they exited the elevator. The sense grew stronger as she led them down the hall past a waiting room and nurse’s station towards the quiet hallway lined by patients’ rooms, each housing four to five patients. She slowed to look at the room numbers.

  The hairs on the back of his neck rose as she stopped in front of one and pushed the door open.

  “Jonny?” she called, entering the well-lit room. Dusty followed her, a familiar tension filling him as he looked at the lone person in the room.

  “Hey, B,” her brother responded in a groggy voice.

  Her brother was a vamp. Dusty resisted the urge to draw his hand cannon from the small of his back. Jonny sensed him as well and looked up, confusion and fear crossing his face. Bianca hugged him, and Dusty resisted the urge to pull her away and snap the vamp’s neck. Instead, he sat down across from him, his penetrating gaze on the young vamp. His blood quickened with bloodlust at the thought of ending the life of another miserable vamp. His phone vibrated, and he withdrew it.

  Just wait, Sofi’s text read.

  Damn Oracles, he typed back before putting it away.

  Bianca looked at him, and he ignored the sense she wanted to be alone with her brother.

  “I’m so sorry,” Jonny said, horror crossing his face. His gaze went from Dusty to his sister. “I never meant to drag you into this, B.”

  “We’ll talk about the drugs or whatever later,” she said. “Are you okay?”

  “Not really.”

  They both looked at him. He didn’t move. She sighed and reached out to her brother, resting her hands on his cheeks.

  “No, B,” Jonny said, pushing her away. “I screwed up. I’ll make it right.”

  “Stop it,” she ordered in her soft voice. “You’re acting like a kid.”

  He relented and closed his eyes.

  Dusty felt the slow change in the air around him and tensed. It was a subtle shift, an undercurrent of cool energy that brushed by him, like when Sofi used her voodoo fortune-telling powers around him. Until that moment, he hadn’t really cared why Sofi saved the life of the woman before him. Talon’s work on her arms pissed him off, but he hadn’t considered the wounds were as recent as yesterday.

  Healer. It was Sofi’s whisper in his mind, a new trick she’d picked up from Darian. Dusty straightened. The spidey senses that warned him when a vamp was around calmed until he no longer sensed Jonny.

  Bianca drew away from her brother, eyes glazed. Jonny opened his eyes, and the red ring around his irises was gone. She’d just turned a vamp back into a human. Dusty had never heard of such a thing!

  “Excuse me. Are you next of kin?” a doctor asked, knocking on the door.

  “I am,” Bianca said, rising. She wobbled and balanced herself against the wall. They stepped into the hallway, and Dusty’s gaze returned to Jonny. Jonny clutched his sheets, his gaze down.

  “You know you fucked up,” Dusty said. “Next time, you’ll answer to me.”

  The young man’s face paled even more, until he was as white as his bleached hair. He’d never be normal, not with what he’d done. Dusty knew the memory of killing in order to be initiated wasn’t something even Bianca could take away from him. He didn’t think the memory was enough of a punishment for taking the life of an innocent human, but he was constrained again by the primary mission of the Guardians to protect humanity against evil, deserving or not. Jonny was once again a human, albeit one that deserved a beating for dragging a sister as sweet and innocent as Bianca into Talon’s grip. He dialed Jenn.

  “Whatcha need, boss?” she answered.

  “I need Travis at Mercy Hospital, room 515. You may want to talk to the occupant as well,” he said.

  “I’m on it.”

  He rose without another look at Jonny and intercepted Bianca on her way back from the nurse’s station.

  “We’re leaving,” he directed.

  “Can I say good-bye?” she asked.

  He stepped aside, waiting impatiently. She looked up at him as she returned, as enthusiastic as a man walking to his own hanging. He nodded for her to walk ahead of him.

  The elevator door opened to reveal the massive form of Travis, one of Jenn’s spies on the local police force. Clad in the dark blue uniform of the police, Travis gave a nod of recognition as he passed him. Dusty ignored Bianca’s searching look and punched the button for the ground floor.

  He sensed the incoming vamps before the elevator door opened. They were somewhere in the hospital.

  “You know where the car is?” he asked her, holding out the keys.

  “More or less.”

  “Wait for me there.”

  She took the keys a little too quickly. He expected her to ditch him and run, but the car was tagged and could be tracked. There weren’t many places she could go where he couldn’t find her, especially if Sofi kept interfering.

  He watched her until she exited then remained in place long enough that he knew the vamps could pinpoint where he was. He exited through a different route, one that took him across a courtyard large enough for the vamps to see him as he crossed it, and between two buildings.

  There were more than he expected, and he counted six. Talon’s goons were coming for the kid.

  “Dusty!”

  He turned, irritated to see Bianca held by the neck by one of Talon’s vamps.

  “I told you to go to the car,” he said, leveling a glare on her. Her cheek was red as if she’d been struck, and there were tears on her face already. Her large eyes were fearful once again.

  The others found him at the same time, and his blood ignited. He drew a deep breath, refreshed by the idea of slaughtering six bad guys at one time. The vamp holding her grinned, his eyes glowing. He placed the tip of a gun to Bianca’s head.

  “Tell us where the kid is or-- ”

  Dusty didn’t let him finish. T
he vamp’s head exploded with the first shot of his hand cannon, the bullet missing Bianca by a couple inches. He snatched her and shoved her down beside a metal dumpster. The two vamps behind the first went down with one shot each, and he grunted as the others racing down the opposite side of the alley managed to plant two rounds in him before he blasted all of them to hell.

  He glanced down at the bullet holes and splashes of blood in his chest, agitated at having to change clothes so early in the day. His body rejected the bullets, and they popped out of his chest.

  He’d never gone a day without silently thanking Damian for the gift of self-healing.

  Pissed that his morning hadn’t gone as planned, he strode forward and put another bullet in the heads of each of the vamps to ensure they weren’t returned to life by their brethren. He tucked the gun away at the small of his back and looked at Bianca.

  Her face was white, her eyes glassy. Dusty didn’t think twice about offing anyone who posed a threat to him, and he didn’t remember what it felt like to be a human who witnessed what looked like a mass murder. Naturals got over it soon enough.

  “We don’t have much time,” he said, pulling her up.

  Her whole body trembled. He fished his keys out of her pocket and hurried her towards the parking lot.

  She didn’t move the entire trip back to the condo, as if afraid he’d blow her head off next. Sofi would chew him out if he gave Bianca to her like she was, and he himself couldn’t help but feel somewhat concerned that she’d gone unresponsive. Her beautiful eyes no longer sparkled, and he was surprised to find he felt the absence of her warmth and liveliness.

  She showed no sign of life until he locked the door behind them. Only then did she woodenly move forward to the bedroom and close the door.

  He peeled off his ruined sweater and tossed it in the trash. He reloaded his weapon first, then entered his bedroom for a new shirt.

  The shower was on and the bathroom door closed. He paused, sensing her distress. He opened the door enough to see in and blew out a breath. Bianca sat, fully clothed, at one end of the shower, drenched and shaking.

  So maybe she wouldn’t get over what she’d seen as fast as she should.

  He pushed the door open and opened the shower door. The water was cold, and she shook, her arms hugging her knees to her chest. He turned off the shower before lifting her and setting her on her feet in the middle of the bathroom. She didn’t move, didn’t speak. Her skin was cold; she was in shock.

  Suspecting he’d just driven Sofi’s healer completely catatonic, he peeled her soaked sweater and jeans off to display matching pink underwear. Goose bumps rose all over her body, and he dried her as quickly as he could before draping a bathrobe around her.

  Wondering what twisted sister of fate thought him capable of mothering one let alone three people, he lifted her and laid her on the bed. She curled on her side, shaking. The loosely tied bathrobe fell away from one smooth leg to her hip at her movement, and he paused.

  Even traumatized, she was one of the sexiest women he’d ever seen. The sight of her shapely form in his bed made his blood burn for a different reason.

  He should walk away, leave her to figure things out, and finish what he needed to this morning. But he stopped, a twinge of something akin to regret filtering through the hard layers protecting his emotions. He really didn’t want her to lose the spark of life he’d found as appealing as her body. After all, that spark was why he fought so hard, so humans didn’t turn into someone like him.

  He looked at his watch again, then settled in bed on his side behind her. He smoothed her hair from her face and rested his hand against the soft skin of her exposed thigh, admiring her body. There were tears on her face, and her breathing was shallow and ragged.

  “You killed them,” she whispered.

  “That’s what I do. I kill bad guys.”

  “You won’t kill Jonny?”

  “He’s safe for now,” Dusty said, his own mind going to the boy who’d been a vamp for a day.

  “Will you kill me?”

  “Only if you turn into a bad guy. Mine is a very brutal world,” he said. “My job is to protect people like you from monsters like those in the alley.”

  “You can’t just kill people!”

  “They’re not people. Talon’s men turn them into killers who take the lives of the innocent. Your brother had to take at least one life to become one of them.”

  “Jonny would never do that!” she snapped.

  “It’s the only way for him to become a vamp.”

  “But he’s not one of them!”

  Dusty considered her words. Whatever Natural talent she had, she’d somehow turned her brother from a vamp back into a human. He’d never heard of anything like it in all his years.

  She rolled onto her back, unaware of how exposed she was. The bathrobe fell away to the knot, revealing her almost to her bra. He looked her over, enjoying the view, and rested his hand on her warm stomach.

  “He’s not!” she insisted.

  “Not anymore,” he agreed. “You brought him back.”

  “Then you shouldn’t kill any of them, if they can be saved!”

  “There’s no such thing as asylum for vamps,” he said, amused. “And your brother may not thank you when he realizes he must live with the reality that he killed an innocent for the rest of his life.”

  “He wouldn’t …” She stopped, pensive. He met her gaze and saw her look.

  “You walked in on him,” he assessed. “Tell me about your healing ability.”

  She shook her head.

  “I don’t ask twice.”

  “It doesn’t matter. You’re just going to kill me,” she said in a tiny voice.

  “You think I wouldn’t have killed you by now if I wanted to?” he challenged.

  “I think you’ll do whatever you want.”

  “I’m not going to hurt you, Bianca. I belong to an organization called the Guardians. We’re commanded by the White God, who is charged with protecting humanity against the Black God, commonly referred to as the devil. Your ability to heal makes you what we’d call a Natural, a human with extraordinary capabilities. We find Naturals and bring them into our organization before the Black God makes you one of his. We offer safety in exchange for the use of your abilities to support our mission.”

  “But you kill. How are you good?” she asked.

  “I only kill bad guys.” He held her gaze, gauging her reaction. She didn’t have a clue what to think. Her eyes traveled his face, and he saw her pupils dilate as the nearness and heat between them fed into the sexual tension. His gaze lingered on her lips, but he didn’t move. She was too traumatized and he too busy to deal with another source of drama. He preferred his life much simpler than it already was.

  She wiped her face and returned to her side. His hand remained on her hip until she shivered again. He pulled the robe over her exposed body, feeling the urge to run to the gym or call Jenn for a quickie to relieve the sexual spring within him. He didn’t have time for either.

  “As of today, you’re a ward of the Guardians.” He pronounced the words that would forever alter her life. “You belong to me.”

  She met his gaze with a frown. He rose and pulled on a sweater.

  “The door will be locked while I’m out,” he told her.

  She said nothing, and he left.

  Part of her accepted his explanations after what she’d experienced the past few days. Another part of her couldn’t fathom how a man colder than a sociopath could be working for the side of good. Never mind she felt awed by how sexy he was lying in bed beside her, his muscular chest inches from her and his large hand resting possessively on her stomach. He could have told her he was the devil and that he now owned her soul, and she would have stayed there, wondering if he’d kiss her.

  She slept until the edge of her fatigue was gone before borrowing his neatly folded clothing and making herself a huge pancake and egg midday breakfast. She’d tried the door m
any times and determined if it didn’t open, it was because he didn’t want it to.

  Jonny was safe, even if she hadn’t been able to wipe away all traces of the poison in his blood. She wasn’t sure why she trusted the stranger, but everything he said was said with conviction. She, on the other hand, was living a Stephen King novel in the clutches of a mass murderer. She watched TV for a while, waiting for details of the Mercy Hospital massacre to air. Nothing did.

  “Dusty said I have to leave the cat with you.” The agitated voice came from behind her, jarring her.

  She twisted to stare at a large, wiry man with a whip-like body and a face that would scare Freddy Krueger standing in the middle of the apartment, her cat in one arm and the litter box in the other.

  “My god, how did you get in here?” she all but shouted, hopping to her feet.

  He looked pissed as it was, his unusual golden eyes swirling in a way not even remotely human.

  “I like your cat,” he said. “Dusty won’t let us have pets. It’s, like, rule thirty-six or some shit.”

  She gaped at him as he set the cat and the box down. Sunny darted for the darkened bedroom.

  “I’m grounded, but I’ll come back later,” he said. He disappeared right before her eyes.

  Bianca sank onto the couch, staring in disbelief. The litter box remained, and she knew if she looked under the bed, Sunny would be there. It wasn’t a dream. This world was real. She felt the sudden urge to join Sunny under the bed.

  “Sofi said to give these to you,” he said and reappeared just as suddenly. He stood near the windows and had in his arms a stack of clothing. He set them down on the chair near the desk. “She’s grounded too, but I can just pop in and out. If she leaves, then Pierre tells Dusty, and we all get yelled at. It’s totally not fair. So, what’s your cat’s name? It took me forever to get it out of the closet in your apartment.”

  “Sunny,” she managed.

  “She matches Dusty’s condo.”

  She nodded, trying hard to recover from the latest surprise. He was right. Sunny was black and white, just like the rest of Dusty’s world.