by Cassi Carver
She had never killed anyone before, but she’d wanted to. Every time she and Abbey found another woman victimized, Kara wanted to put the assailant down like a sick dog. Wasn’t that the humane thing to do with someone who’d lost his humanity and had no hope of being reformed?
But she never did cross that line. A few cuts from her blade when they struggled, a few bruises when they got mouthy and one very effective spell to cut them off from their manhood were all she allowed herself.
Truth be told, she wasn’t sure she could take someone from life to death if the moment came. Regardless of what Tray said, Kara didn’t think she was above the law, or even a law unto herself. She operated within a very strict set of rules she and Abbey had come up with years ago before they’d gone on their first mission.
They were so naïve back then. They had no idea what kind of crap they would find when they waded into the cesspool that was downtown after dark. Kara wasn’t sure what was worse, the tourists from around the world looking for a good time, the drug-related crime spilling over the Mexican border, or the native San Diegans stirring the pot, hoping to alleviate their boredom in “America’s Finest City”.
Looking back, Kara wasn’t sure she’d have done anything different these past eight years, but so many nights she wished she could sleep without the images of violence and degradation popping up in her dreams.
Finding the woman last night, being too late to save her and absolutely zero help at the hospital… Well, she couldn’t blame herself for taking refuge in a warm and willing neighbor, even if he was a tenant. It wasn’t as though she’d broken the manager/tenant golden rule or anything…right?
And for one blinding moment, a brief flash in the nebulous shadows consuming her life, she’d felt safe again. Cherished. Like there might actually be a reason males and females walked the same planet together. The fragrance of Julian’s roses permeating her apartment had seemed proof enough.
But now, miles away from the Gaslamp, with Abbey beside her and one big-ass knife hidden in Kara’s even bigger-ass purse, doubt was creeping back in again. What was the world coming to? Even Abbey, who preferred letting Kara do the rough stuff, wouldn’t leave the house tonight without pepper spray and her taser.
Abbey’s troubled sigh was the first sound she’d made in a mile. “Would it be wrong to say I almost hope we don’t find him?”
Kara slowed and glanced over at her friend. She looked adorable in her black jogging suit with vibrant white sneakers poking out the bottom of the pants and her hair in a high ponytail. She wouldn’t know bad-ass if it bit her in the bottom.
“We can call Tray to pick us up. If we’re in over our heads, it would be smart to acknowledge it, right?” She didn’t know if she was offering an out to Abbey or herself.
“Now that he thinks I was at a wild swinger party at your house earlier? No thanks. I’d rather wrestle a salmon from a grizzly bear’s jaws.”
Kara snorted. “Smart lady.”
“I was thinking, though…what’s the plan if you do find the guy? This isn’t just a catch and release. He’s a psychopath.”
Kara clutched her knife tighter to her side through the fake leather bag that enfolded it. She might stalk the streets like she owned them, but she didn’t think she could really kill him. Did the SoCal Rapist deserve to die? Probably. But couldn’t the police handle that in a tidy shootout or something—anything that wouldn’t add to her nightmares? Even the man from the alley had haunted her sleep on Abbey’s sofa, and all she’d officially done was kick the gun at him.
It always seemed to come back to those horrific dreams, those sleepless nights of tossing and turning as she heard the victims cry for help. She was so sick of it.
After the most amazing sex of her life tonight with Julian Mercés, she shouldn’t have been thinking about the shadowy dream lover who’d given her a brief reprieve from the dark visions. But here she was, tracking a criminal, counting the minutes until she could go home, fall asleep and block out the chaos beyond. Talk about easy. Three nights of wet dreams replacing bad dreams, and she was hooked.
She and Abbey turned down another street, getting farther and farther away from Abbey’s piece-of-crap white Neon they’d parked on a side street in Barrio Logan. They walked because Kara couldn’t sense much from the passenger seat, but leaving the car in that neighborhood, she’d be surprised if it was still there when they returned.
“You really didn’t put the feather under my bed?” Kara asked, her mind looping back to the strange dreams.
Abbey glanced at Kara with a look of exasperation. “What? Honestly, Kare-bear, I love you, but who gives a crap about a feather right now? I’m walking through gangland, trying not to make eye contact with the drug dealers and the pimps, tracking a guy who carved a woman like a Thanksgiving turkey. A feather? No. I didn’t do it.”
“Okay. Sorry.” That didn’t go over too well. “But if it makes you feel any better, I can tell you we’re getting closer to something.”
Abbey reached over and grasped Kara’s hand. “Is it him?”
Kara shrugged. “I don’t think so. It feels different. More passionate, more personal and not so much like…death.” She hadn’t wanted to put a name on what she’d felt last night, but after processing the strange feeling, “death” was the only thing that came close to describing it.
Abbey pulled her sweat jacket tighter as they passed a couple on the street who looked stoned out of their minds. “I don’t know how you do it, all that evil flooding in all the time. Grammy D says she’ll keep working on another spell to try to get rid of it, if you want her to.”
Kara shook her head. “Nothing’s worked so far, no offense to Grammy D. We all know I’m the worst witch in history. There’s no reason I should have to take you everywhere I go to do these spells, Abbs. They look pretty straightforward to me, but they don’t work when I do them. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
Abbey followed Kara down another dark street where the rundown businesses gave way to old, worn-out houses with tall weeds in place of grass and short fences that didn’t look as if they’d keep in a playful pit bull, much less a really angry one.
“Stop it, Kara. Somehow you think not being a first-class witch reflects on your general value in life. That’s crap. It doesn’t mean anything. Imagine how happy I was to find a friend in the fifth grade who had any witch blood at all.”
“You have lots of witch friends.”
“None I want to spend any time with. Without you, it would just be me and Gram.”
“And Tray…” Kara teased. “He may not be a warlock, but he’s definitely under your spell.”
Abbey groaned. “Yeah. And Tray.” Then she looked over at Kara and smiled. “Speaking of sex—’cause there’s never a bad time to bring a penis into the discussion—when are you going to tell me the details of the little romp between you and your newest neighbor? You’re two for two, Kare-bear. I’m so proud of you!”
Abbey reached out for a fist-bump, so Kara rolled her eyes and rapped her knuckles lightly against her friend’s. “Thanks.”
“So…how hot was it?”
As they approached a gray bungalow-style house with a flat roof and peeling paint, Kara slowed. She didn’t need to use her sixth sense to find the right place with all the noise coming from the back of the house. “Uh, not now. I think we’re here.” She reached into her purse and donned her black leather gloves. They didn’t look half bad with her denim skirt and black sweater. “Suit up, Abigail. Don’t forget to wear protection.”
Abbey frowned. “Sounds more like a wife-beater than a rapist. We don’t get involved in domestic disputes, remember?”
Of course she remembered. It was one of their rules.
Kara glanced sheepishly at her friend. “I couldn’t be sure until we got closer. But now that we’re here…”
Abbey reached out and grabbed Kara’s arm. “Don’t you dare! You go in there and try to subdue the guy, and the wife will probably
clobber you with a frying pan—and that’s if they aren’t armed. Look at this neighborhood. The preschoolers are probably packin’.”
The voices built to a crescendo and a loud scream tore through the night. Kara’s stomach dropped to her feet. “You know what I said about this not feeling like death—I think somebody changed their mind.”
“Kara, no!” Abbey whispered as Kara took off for the back gate.
“Stay here!” Kara mouthed over her shoulder, adding hastily, “Cloaking spell!”
She hoisted herself over the fence and jumped down, then crept toward the back screen door and dropped her purse in the bushes. She didn’t hear Abbey say the words, but she felt the tingle, like snakes slithering over her body when Abbey cloaked them from view. With Abbey cloaking them both, they could still see each other, but it was hard for her to keep the illusion up for more than a few minutes. At least nobody would remember seeing Kara enter the house.
With the lights on and the door open, it was like stepping onto the set of a horror movie. Kara could see every detail of the man standing in the kitchen, baseball bat in one hand while the other hand raked through his balding brown hair. “You bitch,” he moaned. “Why’d you make me do this? You cheating bitch.”
His wife—judging by the gold bands on their fingers—lay in a puddle of blood, her black hair matted to the side of her temple where the skin was broken and weeping. Her face was a collage of old bruises and new, but Kara doubted her husband had ever taken it to this level before, for the simple reason that the woman would have been dead by now.
Not taking her eyes off the man, Kara felt a rush of wind at her shoulder and heard Abbey’s frantic whisper. “What’s wrong with you? Two guys in two days and now you’re breaking the fourth rule? Are you having an early-life crisis or something?” Then Abbey must have seen what Kara did, because she breathed out, “Oooh, shiiit.”
Just then, the woman began coughing and rolled to her side. Kara could see the exact moment the man realized he hadn’t finished the job and at the same time, his evil intent spiked through the air and sliced into her like a dagger. She scanned the kitchen for less than a second. Immediately spying what she needed, she bounded up the steps, threw open the screen door and headed straight for the stove.
Kara knew how some women berated themselves for not keeping the house clean enough, not cooking good enough meals, etc., etc. But little did the woman know when she fried her dinner tonight that leaving the heavy cast-iron skillet on the stove might save her life.
Kara grabbed the skillet by the handle and came at the wide-eyed man, clocking him upside the head with a staggering blow. The last thing he would have seen was a frying pan flying through the air of its own volition. Before he could even finish his “What the fu—”, he was face-down on the linoleum, out for the count. Kara wasn’t sure how badly she’d hurt him, and truth be told, she really didn’t care. But the woman was in bad shape.
Abbey leaned over and heaved, her cheeks puffing up with air like she was going to blow, but then she clenched her fists and straightened her spine. “How is she?”
Kara walked to the woman and touched her forehead, testing the thrum of energy in her veins. She smiled when she felt the force of will reach up to meet her palm. “Strong.”
Abbey nodded. “We can’t get Tray involved in this again.”
“We won’t.” She lifted the woman’s limp hand, wrapped it around the handle of the frying pan and set both down gently on the floor. Next, she grabbed the cordless phone, dialed 911 and set the phone within easy reach of the woman’s body, careful not to touch the blood or grease splattering the floor.
“Oh…” Abbey mouthed silently, giving Kara the thumbs-up.
When they were safely outside, gloves off and purses in hand, jogging down another street they hoped wouldn’t intersect the path of the patrol cars, Kara felt the cloak slip away. When she finally heard the blessed noise of sirens in the distance, she smiled. “We did all right tonight—and we didn’t even need to call Tray.”
Abbey’s grin stretched ear to ear. “You’re a frickin’ superhero, you know that? You looked like a dragon slayer going to battle in there. But, you know, with a frying pan instead of a sword.”
Kara laughed. “A slayer, huh?”
“Yep. Bad guys and hot tenants beware! The slayer is here.” Abbey thrust her hand out, striking the air with her imaginary blade. They were both walking with a little pep in their step. Breaking a rule had never felt so right.
“Hey, you gave me the idea with your smart-ass frying pan comment. That makes you a hero, too. And you’re getting so fast with those spells.”
“I am. Aren’t I?” Abbey fired back, smiling as she fiddled with the taser in her pocket. “So you’re okay with going home without finding our target?”
Kara shook her head. “If he was out here, I would have felt him. Besides, we may have saved a woman’s life. Hopefully, her husband is going to jail for a very long time. Yeah, I’m okay with how it turned out tonight.”
“Me, too. Let’s celebrate!” Abbey reached into her pocket for her cell phone and punched in a number. “Hello? Antonio? This is Abbey. Meet me at my house in an hour. I’ll make it worth your while.”
Abbey shoved the phone back in her pocket and Kara rolled her eyes. Some things never changed. “Sorry, Abbs, I don’t think I can take another night hanging off your couch. I’m gonna chance it at my place.”
As they turned down another road, heading back toward Abbey’s car, an electrifying chill ran from the base of Kara’s neck all the way down to her toes. She glanced around, wrapped her hands over her cold arms and kept walking.
The shadow regarded the two women from his perch on the nearby rooftop—his dappled wings folded and brushing the backs of his leather-clad thighs. He’d been filled with lust for his brown-haired beauty when he saw her battle the weak man and strike him down with one blow. She was a rare and worthy adversary, but his alone.
If the man had raised a hand to her, he would have torn the human to bits and left him in small pieces for the rats. As it was, it only took a moment to punish the fool once Deanna’s daughter and her red-haired companion had fled.
There were few benefits of leaving the Shadowland to visit this realm, but one was the exquisite thrill of the game and the other was the beautiful simplicity of taking a human’s mortal life.
Watching them exhale their last breaths as their corporal bodies ceased to struggle against the inevitable was one of the few pleasures the shadow could still feel. And tonight, though it had been brief, it had been sweet.
Chapter Nine
By the time Gavin materialized in the living room of his new apartment, he had almost calmed his trembling. He’d hated traveling to the Mercury Clan tonight and leaving Julian alone with Kara, but it wasn’t as if the other lord was going to volunteer to go in Gavin’s place—not when he had a female all to himself for the evening.
Still, Gavin trusted Julian to do the right thing. He was sure he’d talked some sense into him about responsibility to the clan and not getting attached to Kara Reed. He knew Julian would hold back. Gavin had even promised Aiden it wouldn’t be a problem when he’d seen him tonight.
He was so convincing, he’d even begun to believe it himself…right up until he saw the elegantly appointed table and smelled the essence of Demiáre sex in the air over the staler scents of beef, chocolate and red wine.
Gavin stared at Julian’s closed bedroom door. He couldn’t describe the sensations pounding through his blood, but his eyes began to glow, casting a dim blue light into the room around him. He couldn’t kill Julian, not if Kara was sleeping beside him.
Gavin closed his eyes and reached out with his mind, sensing only Julian in the bedroom. He expanded the circle and found Kara wasn’t next door, either. He didn’t worry much for her safety. Their scouts hadn’t detected Aniliáre in the city, and she could handle any conflict with humans. Her own species, though, was proving to be a problem. O
ne he planned on dealing with himself.
Gavin stalked across the living room and shoved his hands into the door without slowing his pace. The wood splintered and the door flew open to bang against the wall. He saw Julian lying in the rumpled sheets and went to the bed, grasped the mattress and flipped his friend onto the floor in an explosion of bed linens and flailing limbs. “Get up!”
Julian cracked open his lids to glare at Gavin, then he grabbed a pillow and put it over his head as though he had no trouble going back to sleep on the floor. “Fuck off,” came the muffled growl from beneath the feather stuffing.
“What have you done?” Gavin demanded, sifting through the sheets, looking for evidence that Julian had pulled out. The veins in his temples throbbed as if they might explode, and he couldn’t mask the blue fire in his eyes even if he wanted to.
Julian threw the pillow off his head and rose to his feet. He was completely naked and his shaft hung limp and content over his balls. “Put my sheets down, you sick bastard. It wasn’t a group activity.”
Gavin ignored him as he searched for the milky fluid, praying Julian hadn’t spilled his seed in Deanna’s daughter. He couldn’t be jealous. He couldn’t want to rip his oldest friend’s head from his fucking shoulders over a woman. It wasn’t that he wanted Kara for himself, it was the clan Gavin worried for. It must be. “Please tell me you kept your word.”
The strange thing was, if Gavin was furious, Julian looked positively hateful. He glared at Gavin as if he were the enemy. “It wasn’t my word. It was my plan. The plan changed.”
Gavin sucked in a breath and dropped the sheets, his hands fisting at his sides. He had to swallow before he could speak. “You came inside her?”
The muscle in Julian’s jaw twitched. “Yes. But it was more than that…there was a coupling between us.”