Sanguinary (Night Shift Book 1)

by Margo Bond Collins

  I had arrested that vampire.

  He was the one who had left all the scars on my shoulder.

  I fought an urge to look around wildly, to see if Mendoza was actually looking at me or at someone else. And then I fought the urge to run like hell.

  He knows, I thought frantically. He knows I’m a cop.

  The only thing that kept me from fleeing the room was Reese’s hand gently touching my back, right between the shoulder blades. It was a calming touch, a touch that sent power and strength flowing through me.

  Garrett, I suddenly thought. Garrett told Mendoza. I knew it as surely as I knew anything.

  But then Mendoza’s gaze moved past me, and I was no longer certain.

  Besides, if my cover was blown, if Mendoza knew I was a cop, we would have to scrap the operation. And I wasn’t willing to do that on a hunch.

  “We, therefore,” continued Mendoza, “have an administrative opening.” A murmur swept through the crowd and Mendoza held up his hand, waiting for quiet. “The administration has met and rearranged our upper levels. I have resigned my post as Dallas administrator and will be accepting the position of North Texas administrator.”

  He paused for a moment, looking around the room, apparently making eye contact with specific people, though I couldn’t tell which ones.

  “We will be looking for someone to take over the position of Dallas administrator.” Again the crowd murmured; again Mendoza held up his hand until they were quiet. “I will announce my replacement at the ball; it seems appropriate, somehow,” he said, smiling. “We will, of course, be looking for someone of special power, special abilities.” His eyes scanned the crowd again, but this time I could tell exactly which vampire they landed on.

  Reese.

  I turned my head to look at him, but Reese stared back at Mendoza with an inscrutable gaze.

  Mendoza is considering making Reese the head of the Dallas vampires?

  We had hoped for an in to the Sanguinary. This was much more. My first instinct was that it was bad. I felt my shoulders tense.

  Reese must have felt my reaction, felt my muscles preparing for flight, maybe even felt my panic through the bond between us, because he moved his hand from my back and slipped his arm around my waist. I stiffened, and he held on tighter.

  “Don’t do it,” he said, leaning down to whisper in my ear. “We’ll talk about it when we get out of here.”

  Mendoza continued speaking. “We will be accepting nominations and applications until tomorrow, October 30. I look forward to seeing you all at my soiree. In the meantime, please enjoy yourself tonight.” He stepped down from the dais and made his way through the crowd, pausing to chat with small groups of vampires who stopped him, presumably those who wished to congratulate him on his step up in the administration.

  I pulled on Reese’s arm.

  “In the administration, Cami,” he whispered. “It’s where we want to be.”

  I wasn’t sure which part scared me more: that I was in a room full of vampires who might turn on me at any moment, that Mendoza might see me as a threat, or that Reese might actually be interested in the power Mendoza seemed to be offering him.

  I stuck to Reese’s side. It seemed the least of all the evils in the room at the moment. I took several deep breaths to calm myself.

  Once my panic had subsided, I noticed that Reese’s own breath had caught in his throat at some point when I was trying to calm myself. He was only now taking in a couple of shaky breaths, and I was reminded of his earlier reaction to my fear.

  My fear provoked Reese’s desire. Add that to the list of things that terrified me.

  The next thing I noticed was the way the other vampires were treating Reese. It wasn’t anything overt. But before, the other vampires in the blood house had ignored him, too intent on their own pleasure or power to pay a relative nobody any attention. Now, however, they acknowledged him. They weren’t quite deferential—after all, he hadn’t actually been named as Mendoza’s successor—but they made eye contact as they passed. They nodded to him. A few of them quietly spoke, mostly in greeting, when they would have ignored him before.

  And Reese handled it smoothly.

  As if he’d been waiting for this.

  The fear in the back of my mind threatened to surge forward again, and I had to consciously beat it back down. Reese glanced at me out of the corner of his eye and frowned.

  “Are you okay?” he whispered, leaning in close.

  “Fine,” I said. “Ready to get this over with, that’s all.”

  He nodded, but he didn’t quit frowning.

  Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Mendoza made his way around to us. I took a deep breath when I saw him approaching.

  Reese spared a brief glance for me and rested his hand across the middle of my back. Once again I felt his support—not really as a physical sensation, but as a sort of strengthening of my resolve, as if his hand on my back were actually helping me find my balance.

  I consciously let the feeling wash over me, deciding to accept it for now and examine it later. After we’d dealt with the immediate situation.

  “Good evening.” Mendoza said, nodding to each of us. “I have something for you.” He reached into his pocket. I flinched, certain for a moment that he was going to draw a gun. Then I realized how stupid that was. Vampires don’t shoot people. They rip them to shreds with their teeth.

  He pulled an envelope out and handed it to Reese. “I hope you’ll both join us,” he said before strolling back into the crowd.

  I felt my entire body sag and realized that Reese had removed his hand from my back. The envelope was nowhere to be seen, tucked into Reese’s own pocket.

  “Let’s get out of here,” he suggested.

  “It’s about time.”

  Not until we were halfway to the exit did I allow myself to feel any of the satisfaction coursing through me.

  We’d done it.

  We were going to the monsters’ ball.

  Then I stumbled, shaken by the sudden realization that not all of the exultation I felt actually belonged to me.

  It was Reese’s.

  His emotions were filling me up, as if they were my own.

  More vampire mind-control.

  Chapter 21

  “Come on.” Grabbing Reese by the sleeve, I tugged him more quickly toward the exit.

  Once again, the vampires melted away from us.

  The whispers started before we made it all the way to the door. “Claimed,” I heard, over and over.

  I pulled Reese through the foyer and slammed the door behind us. “What happened in there?” I demanded as soon as we were outside. “What did you do to me? Why was I able to throw Dahlia around like that? Why can I feel you, in my head, in my stomach, everywhere?”

  “I don’t know.” Reese held his hands out as if to ward me off. “This is like nothing I’ve ever felt before.”

  “Liar. You Claimed me tonight, didn’t you? That’s what you were doing when you told Mendoza to back off, isn’t it?” He was backed up against the redbrick wall, and I was right in his face.

  “Um. Maybe?” he said.

  “You sneaky, lying, son of a bitch…vampire!” I spit out the word, unable to think of any worse term.

  “I mean it—this is new for me too. I didn’t do it on purpose. I didn’t even know that’s what I was doing.” He slid around me, moving so he faced me on the sidewalk.

  “But it’s what you did. Without ever even asking me. What if I don’t want to be Claimed? What if I don’t want to get stuck with a fucking vampire for the rest of my life?” I was shouting now.

  “I don’t think that’s how it works,” Reese said in a quiet voice.

  “Then maybe you’d like to tell me how it does work, since you’re such an expert.” I stormed down the street, hoping for a taxi to come by.

  “I don’t think the human gets to choose. You just get Claimed. The vampire does the Claiming.”

  “Oh!”
I nearly screeched in frustration. “You get to choose? Why don’t I get to choose? How about this? I Claim you, Reese.” What had the magic words been? “My Claim, my blood!” I shouted the last words at the top of my voice.

  A window flew open in another building and someone yelled, “Shut up, lady!”

  I wasn’t listening, though. I was too busy dealing with my body’s reaction to what I’d announced.

  It was like getting punched in the stomach. All the breath flew out of me and I collapsed to my knees, clutching my abdomen. Stars of pain floated in front of my eyes, bright sparks on black velvet. When they cleared, I looked around and saw Reese huddled against the brick wall of a nearby building, mouth working like a gaping fish but no sound coming out.

  The thread between us was almost palpable, not quite silver or ringing or burning, yet overwhelming all of my senses with its bright invisibility.

  “Oh,” I moaned. “No.”

  No, no, no. What have I done?

  But I had a pretty good idea what I’d done.

  Claimed Reese.

  Even if it wasn’t supposed to be possible.

  Double damn and hellfire.

  This was not turning out to be one of my better evenings.

  I walked back over to Reese and pulled his arm so it draped around my shoulder, heaving him up until he was almost standing. “Come on,” I said. He staggered down the street with me, turning bleary eyes to meet mine.

  “Well,” he rasped. “That’s a hell of a note.”

  Chapter 22

  “Did you know you were being promoted to Dallas administrator tonight?” I asked as I guided Reese toward his pickup.

  “No, of course not,” Reese said. He was beginning to perk up, taking more of his own weight, staggering less and walking more. He stopped on the sidewalk and turned to face me. “I do not want any part of the administration.” He turned back around and started walking again.

  I didn’t move. “You told Mendoza you wanted in.”

  “That was part of our cover, a way to learn more. I don’t want to be a member of the Sanguinary. I want to wipe them out. That’s all. The end.”

  “Why?”

  He stopped again, but this time he didn’t turn around to face me. “Why what?”

  “Why do you want to take out the Sanguinary?” I asked. “I don’t think the recent murders are all that’s motivating you. Maybe not even the possibility of shutting down the portals.”

  His shoulders lifted and lowered in what I assumed was a sigh.

  When he didn’t answer immediately, I groped around with those senses that weren’t really senses, feeling my way along the connection between us as I searched for something in particular. “This is more personal,” I said.

  “Stop it,” he said. “I’ll tell you. Just quit digging around in my head.”

  We reached his pickup and he handed me the keys, leaning back against the tailgate and closing his eyes. “I had a bloodgiver once. Leila. The Sanguinary killed her.”

  I didn’t have to search across our connection any longer. His emotions, dark and painful, shot through the link, punching me in the stomach and bringing tears to my eyes. “How?” My voice sounded small, lost in the misery pulsing from him in waves.

  “They drained her. Took her in a blood house, against all the rules, and drained her. Used her in one of their rituals to open a portal.”

  “Oh, Jesus,” I whispered. “Were you…was she Claimed?”

  “Yes.”

  At the word, jealousy spiked through my chest, hot and fast, and Reese jerked, opening his eyes to stare at me. I pushed the unwelcome emotion back down, but it was too late. Reese had felt it too.

  That didn’t mean we had to acknowledge it, though.

  “Do you know which Sanguinary member actually killed her?” I asked, working to maintain a calm appearance, no matter how I felt.

  Reese nodded. “Dahlia,” he said. He growled the name.

  “Why haven’t you done something already?” I asked.

  “Because I know she wasn’t the only one involved. And I want to take all of them down.” Our bond shivered with his snarl.

  Despite my best intentions, I couldn’t keep the questions from swirling through my mind. Had his connection to Leila been this strong?

  Had she felt his every emotion? Had he felt hers?

  Had he felt her die?

  He shook his head, answering my unspoken questions. “It wasn’t like this. Whatever we have is…different. Something new. It’s like nothing I’ve ever heard of.” His voice roughened with something akin to desire, and his eyes began to glow. Heat pooled deep in my belly, and I couldn’t tell if the feeling was my own, or if it came from Reese.

  Crap. We were both far too vulnerable to one another’s responses. We had to get out of here, go somewhere private to figure out what the hell had happened to us when I announced my Claim on him.

  “Okay,” I said breathlessly. “The Sanguinary needs to be taken down. I’m with you. But first we’ve got to deal with this Claiming business.”

  “Agreed. My place still? I’ll drive.”

  Reese may have sounded a little stronger now, but I still didn’t trust him behind the wheel. “No way in hell, cowboy. You gave me the keys. I’m the designated driver.”

  * * *

  Rather to my surprise, Reese lived in an art gallery. Through the front window, I could see large canvases hung in tasteful arrangements on the walls.

  “This way.” Reese stepped away from the truck and unlocked a side door leading into a small hallway, and I followed him back to an office. The room had an expensive-looking desk, several leather chairs, and a matching leather couch. It also had another door that led, I presumed, into the rest of the gallery.

  I wandered around for a moment, and discovered I was right: lots of fancy art in the front, offices in the back.

  The smell of coffee drew me back to Reese’s office. Silently, he handed me a cup.

  I took a sip and leaned back in the chair I had chosen. I was staying away from sofas for a while, I had decided. At least while Reese was around.

  “So what do you think happened back there?” I finally asked.

  He shook his head. “I don’t know. But I don’t feel any more powerful. Just more…connected.”

  I grimaced at the understatement.

  “Me too. But I wasn’t even trying to hurt Dahlia.” My neck and breasts were beginning to ache a little where he’d bitten them too. Not that I would tell him that. Or show anyone else.

  Vampire bite marks—more embarrassing than the worst hickey ever.

  His glance suggested that he knew exactly what I was feeling.

  “Maybe we should try an experiment,” I said. “See if you got anything special out of the Claiming.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know. Like…” I searched my memory for things that an uber-strong vampire might be able to do. For all my years on the Sucker Squad, I didn’t know much more about vampires than how to kill them. All I could come up with were scenes from old movies. “Try to turn into a bat.”

  “What?”

  “You know. Small, flying, nocturnal creature. Uses sonar to navigate.”

  “I know what a bat is, smartass.” Reese shook his head.

  “Then try to turn into one.”

  “I wouldn’t even know where to start.”

  “Close your eyes and imagine what it’s like to be a bat.” I mimicked wing flutters with my hands.

  “Fine.” Reese closed his eyes. We both sat in silence for a minute.

  “You’re not changing,” I said.

  “I didn’t think I was.”

  “There’s not even a little bit of mist or anything. Try harder.”

  Reese opened one eye to look at me. “I don’t really want to be a bat.”

  “What do you want to be?”

  “I’m fine being me.” He took a drink of his coffee.

  “Dammit. I need you to take this s
eriously. You said humans aren’t supposed to be able to Claim vampires at all. Is that because no one’s ever tried, or because it shouldn’t be possible?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know.”

  I kept talking, running over his words with my own. “And if it’s not possible, why did it happen with us? What can we do with it? Is it a weakness? A strength?”

  Reese leaned forward to clasp my hands in his own cool, dry ones, stopping my litany of increasingly hysterical-sounding questions with his quiet words. “We’ll try again.”

  I drew in a shaky breath. “Okay.”

  He continued holding my hands as he closed his eyes, absent-mindedly stroking his thumbs across my wrists.

  This time, I felt something in the bond between us, like flickers of light dancing along a wire.

  “Keep going,” I whispered.

  The flickers intensified, like hot wax dripping onto me, then flames licking across my skin, sending shivers trembling across my body. Within moments, heat poured through me, pulsing across every inch of my skin.

  Reese’s glowing blue eyes popped open, his gaze boring into mine. Sheer, raw power swirled inside me, and then rushed through our clasped hands, pouring into him in waves. The transfer didn’t last for more than a few seconds, but left me gasping with something between pain and pleasure, my senses reeling from the power transfer.

  We stared at each other for a long, silent moment, until Reese stood up. As he unclasped my hands, I realized that his grasp had grown as warm as if he had recently fed.

  “I don’t know what that was, but I still didn’t turn into a bat.” A shaky smile highlighted his own uncertain reaction.

  I was about to suggest that he try shifting into a wolf when I heard a strange, arrhythmic thumping noise from outside the room.

  “What is that?” I asked.

  We both listened for a moment. It was like nothing I’d ever heard before. But the screeching that came along with it gave me a pretty good idea of what it might be.

  “Wait here,” Reese said. “I’ll go check it out.”

  He stepped out of the office and into the hall, the noise increasing in frequency as he opened the door. I trailed along behind him and stood in the doorway, listening, poised to run in case it was something horrible.