by Judy Teel
—A truck slammed into me. At least that's what it felt like.
The impact of a solid, muscled body ramming into me fast and hard catapulted me toward the wall. Just before the moment of impact, my attacker spun us around so that his back hit the wall instead of my face. At the same time a buzz of recognition vibrated through me, and I realized it was Cooper.
One of his arms banded across my chest just under my collar bone with the other one clamped around my waist. I could feel the bulge of his biceps against my right arm and the left side of my ribs. His heart beat steady and strong between my shoulder blades, and my body pressed that intimately against his made me a little short of breath.
Angry that he could do that so easily to me, I tightened my hand around the handle of my gun. "That's a great way to get shot," I snarled, leveraging against him with my shoulders and hips to get out of his grip.
"Powering down the magic isn't a good idea," he said in my ear, his voice low and velvety. "Any glitch in the electricity or flow of magic and things explode."
Hadn't found that little specification tidbit on the Internet. Might be time to upgrade some of my snooping software.
"Next time be a little less dramatic about stopping me," I groused, shoving my gun back into its holster.
"No time to say please, sweetheart."
I stomped down on the toes of his right foot with the heel of my work boot. Cooper gave a grunt and let go. Staggering a couple steps forward from the sudden lack of support, I did my best to ignore how cold my back felt without him.
Turning around, I backed away a few steps. The more distance between Agent Daine and me, the better. "Why are you here?"
"Same reasons you are."
I narrowed my eyes at him. "I doubt it."
"You'd be surprised." He watched me, looking relaxed and pleased with himself.
I wondered if he'd guessed that my plans included some breaking and entering. Then I wondered if he'd been planning on doing the same thing.
I weighed my options, feeling wary and defensive. "Go home, Cooper," I finally said. "You'll never get past the paranormal filter, and if you did, she wouldn't talk to you anyway."
I could feel him studying me as he pulled in a deep breath through his nose. A Were's eyesight was ten times better than a human's in the dark, and his sense of smell about a hundred times better in any lighting. I waited, knowing I couldn't do a thing about what Cooper's Were powers would tell him.
"Liar," he said, not sounding the least surprised.
"Duh." I crossed my arms over my chest.
"You know she's not there. You were going to break in."
I gave him the evil eye knowing he could see me quite clearly. "You're getting an awful lot like a stalker, you know that?"
"Just doing my job."
"Like you were last night?"
"I have no idea what you're talking about." He turned and started walking down the length of the wall in the opposite direction from the gate. I caught up to him and matched his pace as well as I could. Weres moved with a smooth, powerful grace that no human could ever hope to duplicate.
He glanced at me and then was suddenly walking between me and the woods. I tried not to jump, but I couldn't stop the twinge of annoyance that sped up my heart rate.
He was constantly putting himself between me and anything he thought might be a threat, and I wasn't sure what that meant or how I felt about it. I don't think he even did it consciously, which made his actions even more puzzling. Maybe it was nothing but a male wolf thing and he'd have done it for anyone.
As we cruised along the edge of the cleared area, I noticed that the crickets and rustling critters got quiet and then started up again after we'd passed. I drew my gun in case the big bad wolf wasn't Cooper, but I was a lot less worried than before.
"You should reconsider coming to work for us," he said, his attention on the forest.
"I don't do FBI."
A flash of teeth gleamed in the moonlight. "You sure about that?"
I rolled my eyes. Boys. Sheesh!
"Weres are very open-minded," he continued. "Our clans welcome the occasional infusion of fresh blood."
"A lesser woman would run screaming after a comment like that from a werewolf. I, however, am merely insulted."
"What if you're one of us?"
I stumbled, but recovered fast enough not to look too much like a dope. I wrestled down the empty space that sat constantly in the center of my heart whenever family or heritage was mentioned. I'd gotten used to the idea of never knowing where I came from a long time ago. That didn't mean it didn't hurt and I tended to respond accordingly.
"Oh-kay," I said, "you got me. I have no idea who my parents were. Sadly for your theory, I've remained solidly human since I turned fifteen."
"There've been cases in our history where a pup never received their initiation. Without an animal totem, they never shift."
"I bet they still register as Weres on the scanners."
He hesitated, and I knew I had him. "Most of the time," he finally admitted.
I pressed the flat of my gun against his chest, effectively bringing Cooper to a halt. His brows raised in amazement at my audacity. "Look, whatever this is," I waved my free hand between us, "would be easier if we were the same species, but we're not. The best we can hope for is a sneak-around human and Were fling, and I'm not interested in that kind of stress. What happened at Christmas was a spell-induced mistake that will never happen again. We're better off ignoring it. Stay professional, get the job done, everyone goes home happy."
"You know that's not how Cupid spells work. Even if the two people don't want to admit it," he countered.
"Hello? Still not socially acceptable to be together? Interested in staining your stellar FBI record? Or ruining my fledgling business?"
"People do it all the time, Addie."
And I secretly wished I could be one of them, but I wasn't that brave. "Good for them," I said instead. "Now drop it."
The pale light of the moon reflected in his eyes, giving them an eery, silvery glow. "What if I can't?"
Even as a thread of excitement shivered through me, I considered sticking the barrel of my gun against his chest to help get it through his thick head that we would never be a couple. Except even I wasn't that stupid. Only an idiot pointed a gun at a mature werewolf and believed there wouldn't be consequences.
I settled for getting up in his face. A blatant Were insult and just as foolish, but the odds of living through it were better. "Not going to happen," I snarled.
Before I could so much as squeak with surprise, he disarmed me and kissed me hard, right on my mouth. I lurched back, a shimmering warmth spreading down from my chest to my stomach in a cascade of yearning. "You...did not just do that."
"If you don't shut up, I'll do it again." He studied the added container tubes and discharge chamber of my Browning, and then held the weapon out to me.
I was torn between slugging him in the nose and touching the place on my mouth where I could still feel the tingle of his lips against mine. Instead, I snatched my gun out of his hands and scowled at him. "This is exactly why I wouldn't like working with you."
"Before you say anything you'll regret, I want to show you something."
"I bet you do."
"It's up ahead." A cocky grin spread over his face, and he sauntered past me. I could either follow him or loiter around looking like a fool. I followed him.
He stopped and waited about six yards ahead of me. When I reached him, he pointed to a section of the stone wall. "See anything unusual?"
Palming my flashlight, I pushed aside my annoyance with him and the swirling attraction sizzling through me and swept the beam of light over the wall. "Somebody's chipped out handholds in the stone. I wonder if they fried when they reached the top."
"I have two theories." He narrowed his eyes at the wall as if hoping enough intimidation would make it talk. "One, some of the kids in this freaky, locked down neighborhood figured out a way to
sneak in and out without their parents knowing. Two, someone wanting to get in started this rock climbing project, got fried as you put it, and went away."
I moved the beam of my flashlight to the barbed wire. The magic running through the metal coils danced in the light like glitter. Except in one section. "The wire's been cut and replaced with three strands of copper wire. Whoever did it managed the switch without alerting anyone to the disruption. Off hand, I'd say only Laiyla has that skill." I moved closer to the wall and studied the lowest handhold. "There's a few spots where the moss growing in the crevice has been crushed or knocked off."
"Someone's been sneaking in and out of Morrocroft." Cooper's iC buzzed on his belt. He unclipped the device, activated it and identified himself. Pressing the private call button, he put it to his ear. His expression turned serious, but as the conversation continued, his eyes narrowed with anger.
Disconnecting, Cooper stared up at the wire along the top of the wall. He didn't look happy.
"Anything I need to know?" I asked, not sure I really wanted an answer.
He pulled in a long breath and brought his gaze back to me. "The police found Laiyla."
* * *
I wasn't happy to be nearly shoulder-to-shoulder with Cooper again, but it was a heck of lot quicker than the hover system.
"They found her in Carmel Park," he said, taking Colony Road to Fairview.
I scooted closer to the passenger door to give myself some thinking space and stared out the window. Brick or stone walls marking all of the once better neighborhoods tracked along the road, as gaping and mangled as an old woman's smile. Like Morrocroft, most of the once luxurious homes had been converted into boarding houses or apartments, their manicured lawns supporting gardens and goats now. Signs for first floor home businesses appeared here and there, usually small groceries or repair shops.
It took a long time for communities to recover from the shock of a catastrophic attack and a significant paradigm shift, but it could be done. Stuff could be fixed and lives rebuilt. People though...losing people was permanent.
I hadn't known Laiyla, not really, but I dreaded what was ahead. I'd heard the tense note in Cooper's voice when he got the call, the way shadows of frustration and regret had gathered in his eyes. That could only mean one thing.
"She's dead, isn't she?" I said, a tense sick ache sinking to the bottom of my stomach.
His jaw hardened. "About eleven this morning."
While I slept, Laiyla was dying. Was it because I'd gone to see her? Had that flagged her as a risk? Guilt seeped into me. "She was tracking that series of vampire attacks in New York several months ago, too. There might be a connection," I said as Cooper turned right onto Oglukian. Wild poplar trees, ferns and abandoned houses crowded in on the car. "The murderer might have found out that she talked to me."
"You mean he wanted to shut her up?"
"And me, too."
He released a long breath, his focus on navigating around potholes.
I frowned, annoyed by his silence. No one could play oblivious like an FBI agent. "If you want me to work with you, start by telling me why I'm not dead after a vampire chomped on me last night."
"Like I said, I don't know what you're talking about."
"A silver and black wolf kicking butt when a Were tried to join the fight doesn't ring a bell?"
Cooper got scary still. "Nope."
I studied his profile, my gaze touching where his silver hair blended into sorrel brown and then to black at his temple. "Any speculation about why a Were and vamp might work together, or why the vamp's eyes were solid black instead of feeding frenzy blood red?"
"Not really."
"I found the vamp's chewed off head when I came to. And the rogue Were was gone. I don't know many people who could kill a vamp and make a second body disappear. They'd have to be, oh I don't know, maybe one of the FBI's paranormal agents?"
His face tightened down into neutral lines as rigid as a three-foot thick cement wall.
"I guess leaving the evidence could have been awkward," I said.
"Killing vamps without a Church order is dangerous," he said, his tone flatly conversational as if he were discussing the weather. "Especially if someone's able to bury their fingers halfway into the vamp's neck like it was butter, puncturing the windpipe in four places and severing the carotid artery."
I blinked. I was strong, but not that strong. "Who could do something like that?"
He shot me an impatient look before turning back to his driving. "Dead paranormals aren't something cops like to find. Neither do the good citizens of Morrocroft. Whatever happened to those bodies, I'd say someone did you a favor. Being grateful and not asking too many questions might be a good course of action."
I considered that for a moment. After completely discounting the nonsense about necks and butter, I concluded that he had a valid point. Sometimes dealing with a situation directly complicated things unnecessarily. The FBI knew that better than anyone and so did the paranormal community. Both were very skilled at making dicey situations disappear if they thought it helped a more important cause.
"You're right. Thanks." I said.
"Like pulling teeth," he muttered.
Guess I hadn't sounded as grateful out loud as I had in my head.
Cooper turned right onto a dirt driveway. We wound through the trees and emerged into a cleared area with an old farmhouse hunched against an overgrown grove of fruit trees at the back of the property. An ambulance, FBI car and several police cruisers were lined up on either side of the drive. Flood lights lit up the two-story structure that looked like something out of a horror film complete with peeling paint, a broken roof and a spooky-as-hell energy coming off of it.
A shudder ran down my back as I studied the busted, sagging front porch and boarded up windows. "Creepy," I said, though the label was barely adequate to describe the ominous mood hanging over the place.
"The house was headquarters to one of the 2024 terrorist strike teams," Cooper mused as he gazed at the place. "A parish of about twenty-four vamps. They called themselves Hand of God."
I sneered. "Typical." Vampires loved thumbing their noses at established religion even while they worked to infiltrate and control it. I wasn't religious in the conventional sense, but God and I had an understanding. I believed in Him and He believed in me, and we left it at that.
"Not too keen on going in there," I admitted.
"Me neither." A snarl pinched his mouth and quickly disappeared. "Let's go."
We got out of the car and Agents Stillman and Miller met us out in the weed-choked yard. Miller's comb-over fuzzed around his head like he'd run his hands through it most of the night. His eyes were tired and troubled. Agent Stillman seemed just as exhausted, only on her it looked mean.
She leveled her hard eyes on me and then shifted them to Cooper. "This isn't something for an amateur."
I took a step toward her, thinking it might be time to add to the Were chick's scars. "I'm experienced enough to kick your—"
Cooper blocked my way with his arm, his focus locked onto the other woman. Nothing in his expression changed that I could see, but Stillman paled and her gaze dropped as she moved back a step. Cooper lowered his arm and headed for the house.
I followed him, keeping to the edge of the rotting staircase so I wouldn't risk stepping through one of the boards. There was an evidence flag, an orange plastic ribbon on a wire, stuck near the corner of one of the steps. Taking a closer look, I saw that a few of the ragged edges of wood were stained with what looked like dried blood. Whoever came in here was either in too much of a hurry to be careful, or someone had been forced into the house. Based on the oppressive feeling hanging over the place, I was inclined to go with option number two.
Cooper stepped into the dusty, disintegrating hall and I hurried to catch up. Crossing the threshold felt like pushing through swamp mud. "Something very bad happened here," I muttered.
He glanced at me over his shoulder, a
nd I thought I saw regret and a touch of sympathy in his eyes. I didn't want him having second thoughts about including me, not with the vamp hierarchy breathing down my neck. I shut my mouth and vowed to keep it that way no matter how nervous I got.
At the end of the hall, Cooper turned right. Stepping across a fallen beam, he passed under the wide arch of what had probably once been the entrance to the family room of the house. As I got closer, the horrible smell of death burned my nose. The dread I'd been feeling thickened.
I crossed the beam, careful not to touch anything, and walked into a room about twenty-seven feet long and twenty feet wide. My focus went straight to the far left corner of the room. Some part of me had been hoping there'd been an error, that maybe Laiyla had been found unconscious or severely injured, but was otherwise okay.
There hadn't been any mistake.
I'd only seen a few dead bodies in my life, even though when I was twelve, I lived on the streets for a while when the paranormal fighting was in full swing. There was no mistaking some things, and even I could tell she'd been here for a while. I pushed down my repulsion and forced myself to study the scene before they took her away. Any detail might help us find the killer and was worth a little discomfort. I owed Laiyla that much.
The body was suspended between the corner of the walls about three feet above the floor. Bolts had been driven into the exposed studs, two on each side, with the barbed wire from Morrocroft secured around each bolt. The other ends of the wires had been wrapped around Laiyla's wrists and ankles, digging into the skin like thorns. The lifeless ruby in her protective necklace had cracked and a chilling darkness seemed to cling to it.
Dried blood trailed down the arms and feet, leaving scattered splashes of rusty brown across the floor under the body. No other mark was on her that I could see.
Her face was frozen into a mask of complete and utter terror, and my legs trembled with the need to run. She'd been a powerful practitioner. Who or what could have terrified her so completely as it killed her without leaving a scratch?
"Look at this," Cooper said, his voice tense.
I dragged my attention away from the horror and pain on that face and focused on Cooper. Balancing on the balls of his feet, he'd squatted down to peer at the floor around the body.