by Dannika Dark
I scratched between two tight laces on my dress. “I was bit once a long time ago and have a scar to show for it. That’s how I found out.”
Viktor wagged his finger at me before walking off. “Do not keep secrets from me.”
In all honesty, it wasn’t a secret that hurt anyone, but I got where Viktor was coming from. It showed him a lack of respect as our leader. The team didn’t necessarily have to know a damn thing about my abilities, but Viktor did. I owed him that much.
Christian folded his arms and rocked on his heels. “Is that going to leave a scar like the other one?”
“Probably. Someday I’m going to look like a walking pincushion.”
“Come with me.”
Chapter 29
Since we had plenty of time to kill before the Regulators arrived, I followed Christian upstairs to the top floor, where he opened a window and made a sweeping gesture with his arm.
“Sick of me already?” I grinned, climbing onto the roof.
This one had steep rooftops. He led the way to a private area in the middle that gave us a good view of the swarm of cars fleeing the scene of the crime. Apparently no one was thrilled about spending their evening as a witness.
I walked along the ledge of a flat section.
“Give me your hand,” he insisted.
“What does it matter? I won’t die. I’ll just break my neck.”
I was mad at myself. Mad that I hadn’t leapt over the handrail and tried to save the child, even if I might have broken my legs in the process. I wanted to kill the human inside me who’d forgotten she couldn’t die.
He yanked me by the hand and forced me to sit on a level section of the roof. I watched a couple down below arguing as they got into their car.
Christian took a seat to my left and bit into his wrist. “Take some.”
My eyebrows shot up to my hairline. “For what?”
“You can’t go around with those scars on your neck. You’ll stand out even more than you do already.”
“So?”
“Maybe I don’t want you looking like swiss cheese. Call it an experiment. Viktor wants to know your limitations, and you can’t keep avoiding what makes you uncomfortable. Chitah bites don’t heal on a Mage, but you’re not exactly full-blooded, are you? Hurry up. I’m dripping.”
I gripped his wrist and held it to my mouth. “For someone who thinks blood sharing is a sacred act, you sure like to offer up a vein every chance you get.”
“Act now before the offer expires.”
“You sound like an infomercial.”
Our trip to Washington had confirmed that his blood had no lasting emotional effect on me, so I drew a few mouthfuls until the healing magic tingled on the bite wound and the soles of my feet, which were scraped up after running barefoot.
Christian withdrew his arm and then licked his wrist to heal the wound. “We need to work on testing your strength.”
“I’m not going to make this a regular habit.”
He pointed down below. “Perhaps you should go lift one of those cars and give Viktor a demonstration.”
I chuckled and slapped his arm.
He leaned back on one hand. “Why do you like it up here?”
There was no simple way to answer that question. “Because the alternative is down there,” I said, pointing to the madness ensuing on the front lawn.
“I can see that.”
“Don’t you have a place you go when you need to think?”
He smiled darkly. “My scenic retreat in the woods.”
“Château Cinderblock?”
“Reservation not required.”
I drew up my knees. “Back there when Glass accused you of killing those women and then charming me after an attack, I thought he just might get away with it. No one will question a lawman in public, and the evidence was stacked against you. That was a smart move on his part. But weren’t you afraid of the crowd turning on you and building a bonfire out back?”
He pulled up one of his long socks. “Most people don’t want to get involved in affairs that aren’t their own. Don’t you think I can fend for myself?”
“Against a mob?”
“You might be surprised to see what kind of damage I can do.”
I shivered and hugged my knees. “We would have never been invited to another party again.”
Christian scooted closer. “I didn’t bring my jacket.”
I looked over at his knees. “You can lend me your skirt. The material looks pretty warm.”
A line of cars headed down the road. Some grew impatient and sped through the open grounds.
“Why didn’t you jump over the banister to catch the boy?” I asked.
“I would have crushed him, to be sure. Is that why you’re vexed?”
I closed my eyes and tried to find my center of calm like Niko was always teaching me. “I keep replaying the scene in my head. I should have reacted faster. I could have flashed and maybe caught him before he went over. I just didn’t think he’d do it. It was the last thing I could have imagined.”
“The last thing is the first thing you should always consider.” Christian draped his arm over my shoulders. “You can spend the rest of your life living in the past, or you can pull up your trousers and move on.”
“Is that the Vampire motto?”
“Don’t dwell on what you can’t change. Just think about how you’ll do it differently next time. My biggest regret on this case was giving Glass a piece of candy when he asked for one. See what I get for being so generous? He pocketed the wrapper, probably planning to set me up from the beginning, especially after learning I was your partner.”
A few black cars headed toward the house.
“Those must be the Regulators,” I said, my stomach twisting into knots. “What do I tell them?”
“What happened here tonight, but nothing else. They can get details on the investigation from Viktor. If they press you for answers, tell them to shove it up their arse and speak to their boss. Everything that happened tonight is fine. It doesn’t fecking matter anyhow. It’s over.”
During our conversation, my body had molded against Christian’s in search of more heat. It was like cuddling up to a lion. Sure, they looked innocuous, but you could never take the wild out of them. Darkness lived in his eyes beyond the onyx hue. From the beginning, I’d wanted to hate him. But I was feeling something more than just toleration when in his presence. Each time I found a fault, he would do something unexpected like heal my wounds or try to save a little boy’s life.
Christian wrapped his arm around me and didn’t say a word. He just sat there and kept me warm as we watched the Regulators exit their vehicles. Christian made me feel alive, and we had more in common than I’d once believed. He had alluded to a dark past, and I knew all about that life. He never bullshitted me, and yet he always knew the right things to say to make me laugh or feel better. There was a sense of familiarity like nothing I’d ever known when he held me in his arms—a feeling of protection and safety. No matter how much I tried to dissect or deny it, Christian Poe had claimed a small piece of my heart.
Not all of it, but just enough to give me pause.
“I shagged the dead woman,” he said matter-of-factly.
I let go of the heart-shaped pendant around my neck that I’d been turning between my fingertips. “You what?”
“Marlene.”
I pulled away and gave him a cold stare. “I thought you ditched her on the dance floor?”
He tipped his head to the side and pursed his lips. “I did. After we had a private rendezvous.”
“Why didn’t you mention that fact before?”
“You mean during the investigation when everyone thought I stabbed her in the heart? Maybe I thought it was a tad inappropriate. Anyhow, it barely went on for thirty seconds. She wasn’t my type.”
“B negative?”
“Laugh it up,” he said flatly. “Maybe it had something to do with the fact she was cleaning
out my ear with her tongue.”
I smiled guiltily. “I had something to do with that.”
He gave me a sideways glance. “I guess this means you won the bet. I owe you a favor of your choosing.”
I shivered and looked back down at the cars. “I can’t decide whether you’re being noble for telling me the truth or just a manwhore.”
“I’d like to think I’m a little of both. I have a reputation to uphold. I can’t go soiling it with rumors of good deeds.”
“Well, it’s a shame a woman had to die because of all this. Marlene wasn’t his target; she was just a pawn… like me.”
“Aye.”
I hugged my knees to my chest. “Glass said Vampires murder indiscriminately, but so did he.”
“Not entirely. He discriminated in his own way. He targeted those women because it made sense to him. They represented the kind of woman he’d never had. He chose victims who didn’t have families to protect them. Maybe that’s why he found himself attracted to you.”
I shivered at the thought that I was the kind of woman who turned on a serial killer. “He was just using me to find out how far we were in the case.”
Christian drew up one leg and draped his arm over it. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. You can turn a few heads.”
“How did he get away with killing all those women? And we don’t even know how many.”
“Had he lived in the Breed district, a Vampire would have overheard or a Chitah would have scented something. He was smart living where he was, and that’s why I don’t trust anyone who lives around humans. It makes me think they’re hiding something.”
“It sounded like his parents were hiding him. They must have cared about public opinion.”
“The older ones are like that,” he said.
“I guess he stuck around to take care of his mother. I might have felt sorry for his situation had he not used his defect as an excuse to kill.”
“I don’t have pity for anyone.”
A lock of my black hair danced in front of my face from a gust of wind. “If someone other than Blue had met with him tonight, he would have led her to his car and paralyzed her with venom,” I said. “I guess he got a lot of rejections.”
“Imagine you’re a Mage and you show up to discover your blind date is your mortal enemy. They must have felt deceived and horrified, unlike some women I know.” He gave me a pointed stare.
“Can we forget the fact I dated a psychopath? Lesson learned. I’ll never buy a coffeepot again.”
Christian’s mouth twisted to the side. “I don’t follow.”
“If I hadn’t bought the coffeepot—forgetting that I didn’t have an outlet in my bedroom—I wouldn’t have gone to return it. That’s when I bumped into Glass and he asked me out on a date.”
“The shite was probably stalking you. Your poor taste in appliances gave us a boost in the case.”
I frowned. “All I wanted was a warm cup of coffee in the morning. Sometimes I hate having to get dressed and go all the way down multiple flights of stairs.”
“You’re a peculiar woman.”
A laugh bubbled in my throat when the wind ruffled up his kilt.
“Is something amusing?”
“I had a tickle in my throat.”
His voice lost all inflection. “So kiss and tell, Raven Black. How far did you go on your date?”
I sat Indian style and played with the ends of my hair. “I didn’t kiss him. He tried, but I drew back.”
Christian tilted my chin up with the crook of his finger. “Why?”
I shrugged. “Something didn’t feel right. Maybe I wanted butterflies and all those feelings you get when you kiss someone, but they weren’t there.”
He leaned in close, our lips just a breath apart. “Trust your instincts. They’re all you’ve got in this world.”
“Your instincts must be in perpetual mating season.”
He gave me a crooked smile and leaned back on his elbows. “And here I thought you’d kissed a lot of men.”
I looked over my shoulder at him. “I only do what my heart tells me to do. I don’t kiss someone unless I mean it.”
Christian bit his lip, and his dark eyebrows drew together. I was expecting him to fire back with a remark, so it seemed peculiar that he didn’t. After a beat, he sat up and brushed off his elbows. “I guess everyone can sleep well knowing there’s one less killer on the streets.”
I gazed up at the countless stars. “For every one caught, there are nine hundred more. It’s enough to give you nightmares.”
“Is that why you go long stretches without sleep? Because of nightmares?”
Had he been spying on me?
“I’ve heard you scream in the night,” he continued. “No one else knows, but it’s something I can hardly ignore.”
That was getting too personal. I stood up and wiped my hands. “Bonding time is over. I have to get out of this dress.”
He gave me a fiendish smile when he rose to his feet. “I don’t suppose you’ll be needing any help with that?”
We both turned when something scurried toward us from behind.
Wyatt appeared on the raised part of the roof and balanced on the steeple. “You’re being summoned,” he said dramatically. When we didn’t react, his shoulders sagged. “Viktor sent me to find you. The Regulators are questioning everyone now, and I want to leave early before that chicken-wing place closes.”
I approached him and looked up, wind at my back. “How’s Gem?”
Wyatt shivered. “She snapped out of it. I guess she caught Shepherd off guard and got a taste of some of that power. Never sneak up on a Sensor. Holy Toledo, it’s freezing up here!” he exclaimed, his teeth chattering as he turned away.
The blustering wind blew up his skirt, and the mystery of what men wore beneath their kilts was revealed.
I stared at Wyatt’s bare cheeks and squinted. “Is that a tattoo?”
He gave a mischievous smile from over his shoulder. “You bet. And you’ll find out more about it soon enough.”
Chapter 30
The Regulators questioned us for a grueling three hours. Once they finished taking our statements, Viktor sent us home. Wyatt made a quick detour to get chicken wings, and once we arrived at the mansion, I went up to my bedroom and slept like the dead. I didn’t even bother to light a fire; I just stripped out of my clothes and crashed within minutes. All that flashing had drained my energy, reminding me that all gifts come with pros and cons.
Something pulled me out of my slumber, and without opening my eyes, I used my Mage ability to tell me it was already morning. I swept a tangle of hair out of my face and noticed someone had lit the fireplace at the foot of my bed. What a long way I’d come from the trailer parks. It was hard to believe that just a few months ago, I was sleeping in abandoned buildings and on the streets.
Through the window on my right with the diamond-shaped metal lattice on each shutter, I saw an overcast sky. No rain yet, but it made me want to crawl back under the covers and sleep for the rest of the day.
A delicious smell drew my attention toward the bedside table on my right.
What the hell?
I blinked a few times to make sure I wasn’t still dreaming. I smelled coffee, and when I touched the thermos, it was hot. Beside it was a packet of sugar and a spoon. I smiled. Christian just couldn’t help himself with another spoon joke. I sat up, my heart-shaped necklace sliding around my neck, and put my feet on the floor. After a sip of what tasted like gourmet, I decided not to admonish him for entering my room without permission.
Once the caffeine woke me up, the first thing I wanted to do was check on Gem. The Regulators had separated us during questioning, and afterward, she rode home with Viktor and went straight to her room. I put on a pair of sweatpants and a red shirt and jogged down the hallway, the stone floors chilling the soles of my feet. When I reached the second level, I pounded my fist against her door.
“Gem, it’s me. Are you in
there? I came to check on you.” Then I tapped my thermos lightly against her door, wondering if I might have scared her. “Gem?”
“Come in,” she said, her voice uncharacteristically melancholy.
Despite the clouds, Gem’s room had a warm and vibrant atmosphere because of the rugs, fabrics, gemstones, and twinkle lights. She was sitting on the floor in the middle of the room, facing the windows. I knew something was wrong when I saw her outfit. The only thing flashy about it was the pink platform sneakers. Her dark grey sweatshirt was three sizes too big, and her matching leggings had a small hole in the knee. She had her hair pulled up in a messy knot, one wayward lock hanging in front of her face. No makeup.
“Are you okay?” I closed the door behind me and offered her my mug. “Have some. It’s just coffee.”
After a quick sip, she grimaced. “Don’t you like cream and sugar?”
“No. I like it black, like my heart.”
She snorted. “You don’t have a black heart. Speaking of hearts, where did you get that heart necklace?”
I sat facing her and touched the red stone. “Just a cheap trinket Christian gave me for the party, but I kind of like it. What happened last night with Shepherd?”
She shook her head. “That was all my fault. I got carried away and should have known better. He pushed emotions into me by accident, and I experienced the whole thing from that little boy’s eyes. The terror he felt when the man threw him, falling… Shepherd didn’t mean to do it. I shouldn’t have gotten near him right after it happened. He hasn’t looked at me since then, and I don’t know if he’s mad at me.”
“It was just an accident. You had everyone scared, though. One minute we’re rejoicing, and the next… Bam! You’re lying in the middle of the floor.”
She smacked her hand against her forehead. “I’m mortified.”
The way Sensors could transfer emotions and experiences gave me the shivers. If that little boy’s panic could make Gem faint, what would the experience of feeling death do to a person?