by Jane Kindred
And then she “heard” Vanessa inside her head. Let me speak to him.
It wasn’t exactly what she’d meant by “okay,” but it seemed she’d agreed to let Vanessa step in to her.
Lucy shrugged. Have at it.
It was an odd sensation feeling herself move toward Oliver without actively willing it. It reminded her of the possession by Daisy, but this was more conscious. She felt she could stop Vanessa at any moment if she chose to.
“Hey, Ollie,” she heard herself say. Oliver’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t respond. Vanessa continued. “This will be hard for you to understand, baby. I know they told you we were still on the mission, that we’d meet up after I got back from doing recon. But I’m not coming back.”
Oliver bristled. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“It’s me, baby. It’s Vee. I’m so sorry.”
Oliver’s right hand had gone to his sidearm. “Stop it.”
“Do you remember our last mission? The blood lab?”
“I’ve never been on a mission with you. You’re not Vanessa. You’re some kind of demon. I saw your wings and your claws. So you goddamn leave my wife out of this.”
“Okay, baby. Calm down. Let me put it this way. Just hear me out. Do you remember your last mission with Vanessa?”
“I don’t know what you’re trying to prove here.”
“Just tell me what you remember. Did you go to that house with Vanessa?”
Oliver frowned, his fingers curled around the butt of his sidearm. “The blood lab? You mean the meth head vamps? Yeah, we...we took the back while Baker and Keene took the front. So what?”
“What happened when you went in?”
“Same thing that always happens. We busted down the door, Vanessa went first, and...” The blood drained from Oliver’s face. “No. This is some bullshit demon-craft head game.”
“It’s not, baby. It happened. It’s real.”
A wave of horror washed over Lucy at the images in Vanessa’s mind. She wanted to grab her throat to stop the blood, even though she knew her own throat hadn’t been slit, but Vanessa was dominant, and her arms stayed at her sides. The image of a younger, darker-haired Oliver was superimposed in front of her, his eyes reflecting the pain and horror Lucy was experiencing through Vanessa’s memories.
“It wasn’t your fault,” said Vanessa. “You did what you had to do. I ain’t mad, baby. You spared me from what that thing was going to do to me. And our child. You’re a goddamn hero, and I love you so fucking much.”
Tears poured down Oliver’s face as his hand moved away from his sidearm. “No. No. Fuck, no. Please. This can’t be true.”
Lucy found herself crossing the landing to him swiftly, her arms wrapping around his neck at Vanessa’s willing, the gun dangling in her hand. She could feel Vanessa’s love and heartache at the loss of Oliver—the loss of the baby she would never know—and it was impossible to bear.
Her own feelings for Oliver were tangled up in Vanessa’s, with all the pain and love and all that history between them, and when he kissed her, there were three of them in the kiss. She wanted to stop him hurting, and she couldn’t tell whether the thought was Vanessa’s or her own. Oliver’s love and passion for Vanessa was also apparent in the kiss, and a kind of desolation settled over Lucy as she moved back into her own mind, leaving Vanessa to him.
She had never been loved like that. Would never be loved like that.
“Well, isn’t this sweet?”
Lucy and Vanessa released Oliver as one, stepping back to see Artie on the stairs, with Finch and Ramirez behind him. The names came to Lucy instantly with Vanessa’s recognition. Along with something else. The knowledge of their part in how Vanessa’s last mission had gone wrong.
Artie nodded to Finch as they came up onto the landing. “Get the hound.”
Before Lucy could thrust her own will to the fore to take action, Finch had hooked a leash onto Colt’s collar and was steering the panicked, yelping wolf down the stairs. Something about the collar seemed to keep him from shifting. Darkrock had planned for everything.
Artie aimed his sidearm at Lucy. “Drop your weapon.” As Lucy glared at him and refused the order, he called over his shoulder, “Shoot that fucking thing if she doesn’t comply.”
Finch had a gun pointed at Colt. With a sigh of resignation, Lucy tossed the gun onto the carpet runner.
Artie looked her over, shaking his head. “Just what the hell are you, sweetie? I’m sure the world will be very interested in knowing that the CFO of Smok International is some kind of demon freak.” He jerked the gun toward the stairs. “Come on. Let’s go.”
Lucy glanced at Oliver, but he looked lost. Darkrock still had a hold on him.
Firecracker, Vanessa whispered in her head. When you find the right moment, when you think he’s broken their hold, use it. Firecracker. And just like that, Lucy could no longer sense her. Vanessa had gone. She had no idea what the hell “firecracker” meant. Lucy sighed and went down the stairs.
* * *
“What are they going to do with him?” Lucy sat beside Oliver in the front seat of the Humvee that followed the van they’d loaded Colt into.
“That’s on a need-to-know basis.”
“Are you going to let them experiment on him?”
Oliver glanced at her and looked quickly away, eyes focused on the road. “I don’t know exactly what you did to me back there, but don’t think for a minute that I’m buying any of it.”
Lucy sighed and leaned back against the seat. “Believe what you want to, Oliver. I didn’t do anything back there, and I think you know that as well as I do.”
“You talk to me like you think you know me. You don’t know a damn thing about me.”
Lucy shrugged. “I suppose that’s true. I know what you look like when you come, but that’s about it.”
The Humvee lurched forward as Oliver’s foot slammed the gas pedal to the floor inadvertently.
He eased up, deliberately not looking at her. “And how exactly would you know that?”
“You don’t remember the last few years, let alone the last few days.” Lucy shook her head. “I don’t know what to tell you.”
“You expect me to believe I have some kind of relationship with you.”
A sharp little “Ha!” burst out of her. “No, Oliver. We don’t have any kind of relationship. You can be assured of that.”
“But you’re saying we’ve had sex.”
“A few times.”
He was silent for the next several minutes, the Humvee following the twists and turns of the road through the mountain to Prescott Valley in the west in a rhythmic, almost-wavelike motion—forward, slow turn, back toward the mountain, slow turn, forward toward the next curve of red rock. It was calming. Almost hypnotic.
“Okay, let’s say what you’re claiming is true.”
Lucy jumped slightly. Her eyes had been half-closed. “Sure.”
“Did I know about your...aberration?”
“My aberration?” Lucy turned an icy gaze on him. “You mean the fact that I share infernal blood with my twin brother, the current ruler of hell? Yeah, you knew about that.”
He made a scoffing sound. “Why would I willingly have a sexual relationship with something inhuman?”
“I’m not inhuman. Darkrock has you convinced that there’s some kind of purity test that can be applied to people, and anyone who’s a little different is impure, not worth the dignity of being treated like a human being.” It struck her that Oliver might have said the same to her when they first met. And she’d willingly perpetuated the belief she was now accusing Darkrock of harboring. That shifters and sirens—and demi-demons—weren’t people.
“Look, I’m just doing a job.”
God, she’d said that, too. Lucy studied his profile, little worry lin
es creasing his forehead. Vanessa had almost snapped him out of it. He wanted to know the truth, but Smok’s pharmacogenetics were the best in the world. It wasn’t going to be easy to undo a biologically induced false reality.
“You know that bookstore café Darkrock keeps having you raid? That’s yours.”
Oliver darted an incredulous glance at her. “Delectably Bookish? You’re out of your mind.”
A subconscious impression she’d retained from Vanessa’s step-in came to her. The bookstore café B and B had been Vanessa’s dream. She’d hoped they could retire and raise a family in a place like that.
“You bought it for Vanessa. To honor her memory.”
He glanced at her again, this time not so incredulous. “How do you know that?”
“Vanessa’s shade told me. She was touched when she saw it. That’s where you’ve been living for the past three years. You changed your name to Oliver Connery—”
A hearty laugh interrupted her. “Now, that I can almost believe. That’s kind of a private joke of mine. I used to do a Sean Connery impression for Vee—Vanessa.”
“In your spare time, you’re a volunteer firefighter.” Despite the circumstances, she gave him a little sidelong smile. “The uniform looks very nice on you, by the way. I may have a little bit of a fireman fetish.”
“Oh, really?” An answering smile flickered at the corner of his mouth.
“And you sit on an unofficial town council that monitors the paranormal activity in the town of Jerome.”
Oliver’s eyebrow lifted, but he didn’t offer a comment.
“That’s how we met. Your council called me in to deal with that thing you guys took down last night.”
That interested him. “The werewolf?”
“I call it the hell beast. I thought it had escaped hell. That turns out not to have been the case.”
“What do you know about it?” His voice had taken on a sort of falsely disinterested tone, something he’d been trained to affect. He was in full commando mode.
If she told him what she really knew, it would be like telling Darkrock. He wasn’t ready to believe what she was telling him about himself. He would report on everything she said to him.
“I asked Lucien—my brother. He has no record of it in hell’s inventory.”
“You brother is actually the ruler of hell.”
She probably shouldn’t have mentioned that. But she figured whoever was leaking information and biotech from the firm had probably leaked that already, as well.
“It’s kind of a family tradition.”
“So you already knew about this thing before this ‘council’ called you in. The council I supposedly sit on.”
“No. I mean, I was tracking something that was killing people up north of here, so when I got the call, I figured it was probably the same thing. But I didn’t know what it was at the time.” She watched him, wondering how much more he was able to hear right now. “Are you aware that when the hell beast is wounded—you share the wound?”
“Darkrock thought that might happen. It has the ability to project transference magic to keep itself from being fatally injured.” It was an interesting theory on Darkrock’s part.
“That isn’t why.”
“Oh? I suppose you’re going to tell me why.”
“If you want me to.”
“It’s been a really entertaining story so far. Makes the drive seem shorter.”
“The morning I met you—the morning before your council called me in on the job—I was tracking the thing, like I said. I ended up in Jerome, unaware of the paranormal population, and I went after a reptilian shifter—a single mom working as a waitress in a Jerome coffeehouse. You jumped me when I tried to take her out. Said you were Jerome’s self-appointed protector of all things ‘extra-human.’”
Oliver laughed. “This story just keeps getting better.”
“You told me later that you’d promised a young shifter that you’d watch out for his kind after some drug dealer tried to take advantage of him. Somehow you’ve inadvertently managed to take on any injuries to paranormal creatures in the vicinity ever since. And you have no idea how or why.”
“That sounds like a load of crap.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought when you told me, to be perfectly honest. I figure you know exactly how. You just didn’t feel like telling me. Maybe you don’t really trust me.”
“Should I trust you?”
There was something about the way he said it that seemed like more of a sincere plea, as if he needed to be able to trust her, to trust someone.
“Yes. You should. I may not know everything about what you’re involved in or what’s going on, but I would never lie to you.” And that, she realized, was a pretty rare thing for her. She considered lying to be a business necessity much of the time. Though she preferred to call it “creative omission.”
They’d reached the valley, and they picked up speed on the highway, heading for Bullhead City.
“One of the creatures you protect is that wolf they’ve got in the back of the van.”
Oliver’s jaw tightened. “I’m protecting society, as a matter of fact, by getting things like that off the street.”
“And things like me.”
Oliver met her eyes for the moment, obviously conflicted. “Yeah. And things like you.”
Chapter 25
The sense of familiarity he’d had the night before as he watched the winged creature—Lucy—fly away was even stronger now. It was uncanny how her scent seemed as familiar to him—and as essential—as Vanessa’s.
Oliver tossed his gear aside as he undressed for decon. It was some bullshit she was projecting, some hell thing—infernal blood, she’d called it. She’d managed to make him believe for a few minutes that he’d really seen Vanessa die. And what kind of sick imagination would have put that method of death in his head? Trying to play to his emotions, she’d made him see Vanessa pleading with her eyes for him to put her out of her misery after her vocal cords had been severed by a vampire lord’s knife. And that extra little detail about Vanessa being pregnant—that was the giveaway that this whole thing was bullshit. Vanessa would have told him if she’d been pregnant. He’d never have let her go on the mission if that were true.
Except that he could remember a conversation with Vanessa now in vivid detail where she had. He’d accused her of lying and tried to pull rank on her to keep her from doing the job. She’d read him the riot act for that dumb stunt.
No.
Oliver hit the button on the decontamination shower and stepped under the scalding spray. That wasn’t real. It was all a lie. And as soon as he met up with Vee later this morning, he could stop letting that demon mess with his head.
As the water streamed over his abs, he noticed the bruises from the transference injuries had already faded, the scars looking like they were from weeks or months ago. Quite a trick that thing was able to pull off. They’d have to neutralize that somehow if they were going to do any exploratory surgery on the beast, because those bullet wounds had felt all too real. He didn’t relish having to experience every cut of the scalpel. It probably wouldn’t have the ability to project its injuries on to him if it were unconscious, but Oliver knew better than to hope Darkrock would want it sedated. They were big fans of the vivisection.
“Stop stroking your dick and get moving.” Artie tossed a towel at him as he came around the wall from the dressing room, and Oliver managed to step out from under the spray and grab it before it got soaked. Artie grinned. “I’m sure we’re all very impressed, but they’re waiting for you in Block D for testing.”
Oliver wrapped the towel around his waist as Artie stepped under the shower. “Your mom was very impressed last night.”
“I think you’re confusing my mom with that four-hundred-pound werewolf you shagged in the back of the v
an while it was out cold, but it’s a common mistake.”
“Jesus, dude.”
Artie shrugged. “What can I say?” He indicated the thick hair on his chest as he rubbed the soap over it. “The whole family’s hairy.”
Oliver rolled his eyes as he went around the partition to get a clean uniform out of his locker. “Hey, any word from Vanessa? Shouldn’t she be reporting back from her recon mission today?”
“You know that’s classified. Relax. If I’d heard anything negative, I’d have let you know, rules or no rules. I’m sure she’s fine.”
He couldn’t shake the images Lucy Smok had infected him with as he got dressed and headed down to Block D. He wasn’t going to be able to get them out of his head until he saw Vanessa in front of him.
They’d put Lucy and the wolf—the small one—in two adjacent cells with the same magic-dampening technology as the cell they’d put the bigger wolf in. He couldn’t see what damage these two could possibly do even with their abilities intact, but it wasn’t his area of expertise. Oliver kept his eyes straight ahead as he passed the bulletproof glass front walls of the cells and reported to the technician on duty.
“Hey.” He nodded to the tech. “Artie says you need me to take some tests.”
“Actually, we need you to oversee some tests.”
“Oversee?”
“They want you to observe the intake procedures for the new acquisitions.”
“Why would they need me to observe them?”
The tech shrugged. “Beats me. Just passing along the orders.” He switched on the screen in front of him to reveal side-by-side feeds of the cells where Lucy and the hellhound were being kept. The wolf was now in human form, huddled naked in the corner, and the glass between the cells allowed the two to see each other, as well. Security guards were stationed inside each cell. The tech spoke into the mic on his laptop. “Ready when you are. Let’s start with Subject A.”
One of the guards in Lucy’s cell stepped forward without warning and punched Lucy in the jaw. He got his ass handed to him as a reward, with Lucy moving so swiftly to immobilize him and drop him to the floor with a knee to his throat that it took his partner a moment to recover and pull his sidearm on her, ordering her to back off. She did so, her stance ready to take them both on if she had to. He had a feeling she might be evenly matched despite being unarmed.