Nico nodded, miserable, still staring at the floor. Caesar clapped him on the shoulder, startling Nico, who looked up at him with unmitigated terror in his eyes. “Not to worry, old boy, we can’t all be heroes.”
The look of profound relief that crossed Nico’s face was priceless, and made Caesar smile. How he loved his people to fear him! The feeling of power he experienced when he scared someone was almost as heady as the feeling of power he had when he whipped a girl bloody.
Terror and violence were such exquisite aphrodisiacs.
Heat rushed to his groin and he shot a glance at the girl on the wall, needing suddenly to get back to his unfinished business with her. “We have to assume this isn’t a coincidence, though why this Shifter was alone, I can’t fathom—the Council of Alphas would have sent a contingent if they knew we were here—”
“He wasn’t alone, sire,” said Nico. “He was with a girl. A human girl.”
Arrested by this new bit of information, Caesar turned back to Nico. He knew for a fact the other colonies did not allow Shifters to mix with humans, on pain of death. Especially after what he’d done at Christmas. The massive killing spree he’d orchestrated at the Vatican had ended the lives of the pope and many others, ensuring the world would never forget exactly who they were dealing with. In response to his act of terrorism, so many were hunting the Ikati it wasn’t safe for them anywhere anymore, not even in their heavily fortified colonies. It was all part of his ultimate plan, of course, but for a Shifter to be in Barcelona, alone, and hostile—clearly not wanting to be part of his growing colony as so many others were—what could it mean?
Perhaps he was some kind of outcast? A lone wolf? Or, perhaps…an assassin, sent alone so as not to attract attention?
But if he was an assassin, he’d still be bound by colony Law. Why would he be with a human on the street?
Caesar asked, “What was he doing with the human girl?”
Nico made a small motion with his shoulders, the barest of shrugs. “Kissing her, sire. The two of them were kissing in an alley when we passed by on the street. He shoved her away as soon as he saw us and she ran, but before that…they were just kissing.”
Openly kissing a human. Hostile to other Shifters. Willing to Shift in full view of anyone who cared to look. Mulling over these facts, Caesar’s mind began slowly to churn.
“Nico,” he said thoughtfully, “would you recognize this girl if you saw her again?”
Nico nodded, a definitive yes. Of course his vision would be keen enough to see over distances and in low light; the Ikati could even see in the pitch dark.
“Do you think you would be able to describe her to Marcell?”
Marcell was his second-in-command, fiercely intelligent, with a gift for drawing. Caesar had once seen him draw—Michelangelo’s David in charcoal—from memory. It was perfect.
Nico nodded again.
“Good,” Caesar said, a smile spreading slowly over his face. “That’s very good. Get it done.” Dismissing Nico with a waved hand, he turned back to the girl. A violent surge of lust rose in him, hot as flame, and his fingers tightened on the corded leather handle of the whip.
Just as the sharp crack sounded, in unison with a scream of pain from the cowering girl, Nico whispered, “Yes, sire,” and quickly backed out of the room.
The next seven days were some of the longest of Ember’s life.
She had no memory of how she’d made it home Sunday evening after running in terror from Corbin. She had no memory of how she’d spent the rest of the long, black hours before the early rays of dawn had lightened the sky, creeping stealthily over the jagged black peaks of the mountains until finally Barcelona was bathed in a shimmering, lovely pink radiance perfectly unsuited to her mood. The first thing she remembered was a feeling of freezing cold, because she was sitting outside on the terrace of her apartment in the pretty apricot dress with no other barrier to ward off the chill of the February morning.
She had been shivering violently, sitting stiff in a chair with her arms wrapped around her drawn-up legs, gazing out toward the sea. Her hair was misted with dew. There were blisters on the soles of her bare feet. Even a week later, she couldn’t find the shoes she’d been wearing that night. She assumed she’d somehow lost them along the way as she ran.
Just as she’d lost a few other things in the days since.
Ignorance, for one. Using the Internet she’d done a bit of searching and it was surprisingly easy to find what she was looking for. Newspaper articles, talk show discussions, online forums and eyewitness video, the horrible recording of the massacre on Christmas Day, along with the taped manifesto of the madman who’d devised it. For the last three years, she’d been insulated in her little television-free world. Swaddled as she was in the numbing cocoon of her own pain, her mental state as fragile as that old vellum manuscript in Christian’s library, she’d grown accustomed to ignoring most everything else. It wasn’t an excuse for her ignorance, but it was a reason—a reason that was now defunct.
Now she could no longer avoid the truth.
Christian was not human.
He was, as her mother would have said, part of the world invisible to humans, elves and fairies and demons and monsters, vampires and goblins and ghosts. Her mother had a word for these kinds of supernatural beings, a word Ember had heard a thousand times as a child and dismissed as a figment of her mother’s fertile imagination:
Elsething.
Christian was Elsething, and Ember had feelings for him.
It.
The conversation they’d had in the bookstore came back to haunt her with unwelcome regularity. Whatever goes upon two feet is an enemy. Whatever goes upon four feet, or has wings, is a friend.
His eyes and face and voice haunted her, too, and she didn’t know what to do with herself, much less what to do about the situation. Because there was a situation, a very bad, dangerous situation, in which she was unfortunately caught in the middle, whether she liked it or not.
The authorities were on the hunt for the large, black animal that had escaped the night of the shooting in Gràcia. They’d found one enormous dead panther, its throat torn out—and an unidentifiable man whose heart had been eaten right out of his chest. Curiously, the man had no fingerprints. Which, a local newscaster had explained, was because he wasn’t actually a man at all.
Elsething. Apparently they were everywhere these days.
She’d heard them called Ikati, an ancient Zulu word that meant “cat warrior.” As exotic as the creatures it described, the word also held a sinister undertone when spoken aloud. It sounded supernatural because it was; it sounded dangerous because they were.
They were killers. They were murderers. They were animals, to a one.
All animals are created equal…
She wondered if her father had some weird premonition when reading his beloved Animal Farm to her when she was a child. She wondered if he somehow guessed one day she would come face to face with a creature that seemed for all intents and purposes the same kind of animal she was—the human kind—but who in actuality was not.
She wondered what her father would do in her shoes, knowing as she did exactly where that animal lived. Knowing there was a substantial reward for his capture, or the capture of any of his kind.
One million euro might have tempted someone of greater greed, but to Ember the money meant only one thing: Christian had a very, very big target on his back.
And he had not contacted her since that night.
Feigning illness, Ember had taken the week off, which forced Marguerite to work behind the counter of Antiquarian Books, an undertaking she loathed and would undoubtedly take revenge on Ember for, one way or another. She’d hidden in her apartment with the door locked and the shades drawn, terrified Christian would call or come over. She was strangely disappointed when he didn’t, wracked with the desire to see him and the desire to run for the hills.
The irony that the one person who’d made her feel
alive in years was the one person who was more dangerous to her than any other person on Earth—and who wasn’t even a person, per se—made her wish for the first time in her life that she drank.
And speaking of drinking, she wasn’t even seeing Asher, which was worrying him sick.
“Ember,” he’d said sternly into her voicemail this morning, his tone just short of angry, “you can’t keep avoiding me like this. What’s happened? Are you sick? Are you dead? Actually I know you’re not dead because I went into the store and that hemorrhoidal stepmother of yours told me you had the flu. Not that I believe her; she’s probably poisoned you. If you don’t call me back, I’m coming over. Do not make me use my key.”
She’d texted him back, a mere six words:
Not dead. Don’t worry. Everything OK.
Even in type, it looked like a lie.
But she wasn’t ready to see him yet. She wasn’t ready to see anyone, if truth be told. Because how could she pretend everything was normal and life was just as it had been before, when everything had been turned upside down?
When everything she had believed about the “real” world had turned out to be false?
She hadn’t even gone to the animal shelter to volunteer as she usually did on Sundays. When she called in, the man who ran the place—a grizzled, dour, bear of a man by the name of Parker—told her she’d be missed, as they were full to overflowing.
People were abandoning their cats—beloved house pets turned suspected killers—by the hundreds.
Especially the black ones.
It was worse on the news; cats were being burned, tortured, thrown from buildings. Since Christmas, when an Ikati had murdered the head of the Catholic church along with dozens of innocent bystanders, zoos all over the world had closed due to fear of retribution on their big cat enclosures from an angry, frightened public. The panic was widespread, and showed no signs of slowing.
Not only black panthers but cats of all kinds were now at the top of the public enemy list.
And what, Ember wondered, was Christian’s place in all of this? Was he a murderer, too?
The first clue to an eventual answer came one night in the form of a note slipped under her front door. In Christian’s lilting, perfect handwriting, it read, Why haven’t you shared my secret with the world? What are you waiting for?
You, she decided, the note gripped so tightly between her fingers it began to tear on one side. I’ve been waiting for you.
She burned the note, rinsed the ashes down the kitchen sink, showered, and got dressed for the first time in days. As she locked her apartment door behind her and headed down the stairs, she gripped the gold rings that hung on her necklace with one hand.
In the other hand, hidden inside the pocket of her coat, she gripped the slender metal handle of a switchblade.
“Give me fifteen minutes. If I don’t come back by then, you can leave.”
The taxi driver looked at her dubiously, then looked out the windshield. It was pitch dark, a cloudy, starless night, threatening rain, and the temperature was dropping rapidly.
“Estas seguro?” he asked. He didn’t want to leave her alone in the forest in the middle of the night, that much was clear.
She replied in Spanish, “Yes, I’m sure. Fifteen minutes, okay?”
He shrugged—suit yourself—and Ember paid him and climbed out of the cab.
The gate to Christian’s house was just around a bend in the road; as she began to walk, the sky overhead opened and it began to rain.
She started to run.
By the time she reached the massive iron gates, she was soaked through, her shoes squeaking, her jeans sopping, her hair plastered to her cheeks. Panting from the run, shivering with cold and the adrenaline mercilessly lashing through her veins, Ember lifted a shaking hand to the little electronic box beside the gate.
Before she could push the speaker button, the gates creaked open with a metallic, bone-jarring screech of metal against metal. Ember looked into the small black camera mounted high on the stone column beside the gate and stared into its unblinking red eye for a long moment, then turned and made her way toward the mansion. Silent and unlit, it appeared like a slumbering giant among the trees, the rain-slicked windows black as hollowed eyes.
She wondered if the moat that surrounded it was stocked with crocodiles.
Her “Hello?” was barely a whisper, spoken as she pushed open the massive front door which stood slightly ajar.
Silence answered her.
There was no Corbin to greet her, no lights in the foyer. Most of the house was plunged in darkness as far as she could tell. But from down the corridor she saw the wavering orange glow of a fire reflecting off the polished floor, and heard the spare crackle of burning wood.
Someone was in the library.
Her heart like a wild thing in her chest, Ember eased the door closed and made her way down the hall toward the library. She paused just outside the door, looking in.
Standing with his arms braced against the stone hearth of the massive fireplace, staring down into the flames, Christian didn’t acknowledge her presence, or turn to look at her as she slowly entered the room.
Though the light in the room was low, the only illumination the glow of the fire and the tapered candles in a silver candelabra on the desk, everything felt too bright and sharp, the edges of things hurting her eyes. The urge to turn and run away was powerful, and so was the urge to cross to Christian and touch him. He wore loose clothing, ivory linen drawstring pants and a matching, untucked shirt rolled up to his elbows. Against the glossy parquet floor, his feet were tanned and bare.
Now that she was here, ambivalence was a noose around her neck, a noose tightening in degrees with every second Christian stayed silent.
What could she say? What could he? Why, in fact, had she even come?
Finally, he said into the hush in a tone devoid of emotion, “Are you here to kill me?”
That startled her. A little breathlessly, she asked, “What kind of question is that?”
Without turning away from the fire, he lifted his head and turned it slightly so she saw him in profile: tight jaw and stern mouth, the perfect line of his nose, the serious, black slash of his brows. “A logical one. Unless you’re planning on playing darts with that blade in your pocket.”
Her fingers tightened around the switchblade. Her heart jumped into her throat. “How could you possibly know that?”
Now he did turn, slowly, straightening and lowering his arms to his sides. With the firelight behind him flared into nimbus around his head, his features were cast in shadow. His eyes, however, those preternatural green eyes, flashed silver against the light, like a cat’s.
“I can smell it,” he said very softly, his gaze locked onto hers. “Just like I can smell the metal in your arm, the fear you have of me now, your ambivalence, and your confusion. I could smell you as soon as you got out of that cab, Ember, which incidentally I also could hear coming, all the way up the mountain.” He stepped forward slowly, soundlessly, his gaze still trained on hers. “Why are you soaking wet?”
“Stay where you are,” she insisted. The cold and her wet hair and clothes were beginning to have their way with her, and she was shivering uncontrollably. The hand she held out—in vain, she knew—to stop him from advancing, shook.
He’d stopped in place when he saw her outstretched hand, but this little concession did nothing to quell her sudden anxiety. What a fool she’d been, coming here to confront him. Alone. Alone in a house with a supernatural creature who had a predilection for chewing things to shreds. And not a soul on earth knew where she was right now.
Screw it, she thought, straightening her shoulders. I’m not going to be intimidated by a…by a—
“And when you’re angry or irritated,” Christian said softly, “it feels like fingernails scraped over my skin.”
“Stop that,” Ember hissed, a flush of heat rising in her face.
He examined her expression, her
flaming cheeks, her stiff back, and shaking hands, and exhaled a slow, controlled breath. Watching her face carefully, he said, “I thought I might never see you again.”
Ember’s teeth began to chatter. She had to clench her jaws together to keep them from clattering right out of her skull. “I know…I know what you are.”
His left brow lifted, but that was all.
“You’re not human?” She’d meant it as a statement but it was still so unbelievable to her, standing with him so close, looking so normal, that it came out with a lift at the end like a question.
It brought a grim smile to his face. “I assume you already know the answer to that, or you wouldn’t have brought a knife. Not that it will help you.” He took another step toward her.
She blurted, “So you are dangerous…to me.”
“You already know the answer to that, too. Yes to the first part, no to the second. And I’m not answering any more questions unless you answer some of mine in return. Quid pro quo, September.”
His eyes were fierce and intent, burning with some unknown emotion that had her nerves singing. The term “quid pro quo” always reminded her of Hannibal Lecter and Agent Starling sharing information in Silence of the Lambs, something she really didn’t want to think about at the moment. Next he’d be telling her about eating someone’s fried liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti.
Hysteria began to take hold of her body, sinking sharp teeth into her throbbing heart.
“Did you kill those—those men? In the alley?”
He nodded, and it took her breath away. She’d seen the pictures on the Internet, she’d read all about the mangled bodies, but it was still stunning. This beautiful man was a murderer.
A murderer. He’d eaten out someone’s heart.
She managed a horrified, “Why?” but he shook his head.
“My turn. What are those?” His gaze dropped to the chain around her neck and the two gold rings that hung from it.
She whispered, “My parents’ wedding rings. Why did you kill those men…people…creatures?”
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