Hunter's Rise

by Shiloh Walker

  She was also the sexiest damn vampire he’d ever seen, despite the lousy, grainy image.

  “And this is our final complication. Her name is Sylvia James… or at least that’s the name she is using now. She’s something of a mercenary, something of a bounty hunter and something of a pain in the ass,” Rafe bit off, although a blend of amusement and respect glinted in his eyes. “Authorities tend to frown on her methods— a lot of her targets end up dead. Very dead. She’s very good at evading capture, very good at evading detection. The cops don’t have shit on her. She is, in short, excellent at her work.”

  Over by the wall, there was a low, soft chuckle. It came from a petite blonde who spoke with a lazy southern drawl. Her eyes were a soft blue and though she hunted, she was more at home fussing with the house than kicking ass. She did enjoy the occasional ass-kicking, though.

  Which was good. Her name was Sheila, and she was Rafe’s wife. Any woman married to him would have to know how to kick ass, otherwise he’d run roughshod over her.

  “Yes, authority types do frown upon vigilantism,” Sheila murmured. Then she winked at her husband. “So try to keep the smile out of your voice in front of the kids, okay? And try not to drool much more.”

  A faint smile curled Rafe’s lips. “I’m not drooling.”

  Rafe might not be, but Toronto almost was, even as his mind was dancing around the fact that this woman was a mercenary. They definitely had a few of them among their kind. Most of them steered clear of the Hunters, which wasn’t a surprise. As long as they didn’t cross the line, the Hunters wouldn’t mess with them. But if they ended up crossing each other’s paths, there would be problems.

  A bloodbath waiting to happen.

  For that reason, mercenary types and Hunters tended to avoid any sort of close contact. He might not mind risking that close contact in this situation, though, especially since he was still feeling all those weird little clicks.

  Want… the wolf inside him whispered. Want…

  Yeah, boy. Me, too.

  She was a looker. The image showed her stats, even a rough guess at her weight. Five feet five. One fifty— she’d be compact and curved, he figured. A powerhouse of curves and muscle. Shit, he was about to drool. Her hair was dark, as dark as his was pale. The image wasn’t clear enough to show the color of her eyes, but he’d guess they were equally dark. Something about the set of them was faintly exotic, a slight slant.

  She had a wide, lush mouth, and he wanted to feel that mouth under his, then he wanted to feel it at his throat as she fed from him.

  Shit.

  His cock pulsed, throbbed.

  As his hunger started to color the air, several sets of eyes shifted his way, curious, then moved away.

  “According to my info, somehow Toby Clemons’s parents got news of Sylvia James. I don’t know how. She’s fairly discreet, expensive as hell— the Council has a file on her, but she’s always played within the rules— doesn’t do anything that would make them come down on her. She’s got a name in the human world, if people know where to look.”

  “I guess the parents wanted him dead badly enough that they figured out where to look,” Lindsey muttered. As Rafe glanced at her, she shrugged. “I can’t say I blame them.”

  Rafe didn’t say anything, but the look in his eyes said he didn’t, either. “Of course, money isn’t an issue for his folks. They are, to put it lightly… loaded, but word has it, there are certain jobs that James will do for free.”

  Lindsey shifted on the ground, looking slightly miserable. “She’s trailing after the perv who killed their kids and you want us to stop her, don’t you?”

  Rafe hit the remote, and the image changed once more. To the three boys. Nobody in the room moved. The wave of anger and agony was enough to choke them. Most of them would never have kids— were females didn’t carry to term easily. Vamps couldn’t breed.

  Children were precious… and this bastard had slaughtered them.

  “No,” Rafe said, his voice tight and angry. “I don’t want her stopped— I’d happily let her kill him.” His gaze locked on those nameless, lost boys. “But those boys’ parents? They deserve closure, too. She can’t kill him if there’s a chance we can find out what he did with those other boys.” Then he knelt down in front of Lindsey. “But if it makes you feel better… I wasn’t going to let you go out on this one, anyway.”

  She scowled at him.

  “We’ve got James pegged at over a century. I don’t think she’s Master level or I likely would have sensed her when she came onto my land. Still, I’m not taking chances— there are some who can cloak that and I won’t risk her being one of them. All of you are now on alert— watch for signs of her. An older one has to handle this Hunt.” He caught a lock of her hair and tugged. “But I’ll order you a pizza before I head out.”

  Toronto shoved off the wall. “I’ll go.”

  Rafe paused, those black, black eyes narrowing. Although an uneasy truce might have been reached, the Master didn’t look too fond of that idea. “You’ll go,” he echoed, his voice flat.

  “I’m better-suited.” He hooked his thumbs in his pockets, kept his voice level.

  “Better-suited.” Rafe ran his tongue over his teeth and then he glanced around the room. “You all, head out.”

  The rest of the Hunters left, a heavy, weighted silence wrapping around them.

  “One reason, Tor,” Rafe said quietly. “Give me just one reason why I shouldn’t boot you out of here.”

  “I’m the strongest Hunter you have at your disposal, for one,” Toronto said, although they both knew that was an obvious answer… and it was also something that could be easily rectified. All Rafe had to do was ask for more Hunters and he’d get them. Granted, he may not get another Master as strong as Tor. Not many of them were willing to serve. Most of them wanted to lead or just fly solo. But he could get stronger Hunters and they both knew it.

  “Not enough.” Rafe called him on it, shaking his head. “Kel can hold down the fort for a while and Lindsey, Josiah, they may never be Masters, but they aren’t weak. Dom already volunteered to help for a while if I need him— one phone call and that means I’ll have both him and Nessa here. You’re not needed with that kind of firepower.”

  It burned Toronto’s ass to realize that he’d been enough of an ass to deserve a dismissal. Not just today, but often. Very often. It burned, it tore at him, and pissed him off… and left him shamed. He’d failed. The one thing he could do, he’d failed. He wouldn’t keep doing it. It stopped. Now.

  And there was no way Toronto was letting anybody else go after that woman. In the back of his mind, the wolf kept growling, pacing, muttering, Mine… want… All very Neanderthal, but Toronto’s wolf was a rather basic, primitive thing. He wasn’t going to try and modernize the thing, especially when he really, really understood that mine, want instinct. As long as Toronto didn’t let those Neanderthal instincts rule what he did, it was all good, right?

  “I’ll offer my apologies,” he said, his voice harsh and tight. “I’ve been an asshole and I’ll apologize.

  “But I’m going to disagree— you do need me. If this woman needs to be tracked down before she kills her target, your best bet is a day-walker, somebody who can track her while she sleeps. That would be me— I’m your best tracker. I don’t need to sleep much and you know it. I can take as long as I need to, even if she leaves Memphis— you can’t. This is your territory and you’re needed here. I’m your best choice.”

  “And I can trust that hot temper of yours?” Rafe asked, tossing the remote from one hand to the other.

  Toronto’s instinctive reply, Well, I haven’t pounded you bloody yet, have I? leaped to his lips and he bit it back. Instead, he looked at the images on the display. Innocence stared back at him. Innocence broken, destroyed… killed. And their families… left without answers. Had he left behind a family like that?

  It was something he’d never know, and the pity he felt for both the children and
their families, the rage he felt for what had been done to them, tore at him, and he felt the burn of something he hadn’t felt in too long.

  He could fix this.

  Damn it, he could fix this… get those answers for the families. He could never have them for himself, but he could get closure for them. And after that— he could maybe see to it that Pulaski suffered an unhappy, painful accident.

  “You don’t need to worry about my hot temper. I can do what needs to be done for those boys,” he said softly. “And if there are three, there may well be more. They deserve answers.”

  On silent feet, he moved to stand in front of the screen, so close that the faces on it blurred— it didn’t matter. They were burned on his mind. He lifted a hand and let it hover above the screen and then he turned, met Rafe’s gaze across the quiet room.

  “You don’t know what it’s like to not have answers— to live your entire life with that ache inside you.” The growl was back in his voice, but this time, it had nothing to do with temper, nothing to do with rage. Stripped raw and bare, he said gruffly, “I do.”

  CHAPTER 6

  R

  AFE wasn’t surprised when Nessa and Dominic arrived on his doorstep not long before sunset. Although he was jealous, he’d never admit it. Not in a hundred years. At least not around Agnes Milcher— no. Ralston. They’d married. She was known as Agnes Ralston— Nessa Ralston.

  There were benefits to being married to a freaky strong witch, Rafe knew. Studying Dominic’s face, he glanced out at the sinking sun. He could take some rays, but only some. Out and traveling around the daylight? Different story. “Kind of early for you to be up and crawling around, isn’t it?”

  Nessa patted a hand against his chest as she came inside, Dominic grinning, his teeth a brilliant white flash in his face. And although Rafe hadn’t voiced his envy, his friend already knew.

  “We were in the Bahamas a few weeks ago,” Dominic said. “I watched the sun come up over the ocean.”

  “Jackass.”

  Nessa chuckled. Then she stopped in the middle of the brightly lit foyer, her head tilted to the side, wisps of blond hair escaping from her braid. “He’s not here.”

  Dominic frowned at her. “Who?”

  “Toronto. He’s gone.” She turned to face Rafe, a solemn look in her blue eyes. “You didn’t set him after the mercenary, did you?”

  Rafe didn’t bother asking how Nessa knew about Sylvia James. This was Nessa. He’d be more surprised if she didn’t know. “Is that a problem?” Something in her voice made a sliver of cold run through him.

  Nessa sighed. Then she closed her eyes, pressing the tips of her fingers to one temple. “It would seem that wolf finally found a way to let his past catch up to him.”

  K

  EEPING her attention split between watching her back and searching for her target slowed her down. Sylvia’s first spot was Pulaski’s home. Not that she expected to find him there, but she could always hope.

  It was empty, and as much as she’d hoped to find clues, or a glaring neon sign to point the way, there was nothing.

  Since she couldn’t find a glaring neon sign, she checked her iPhone and followed that instead. She’d done a search for areas where she’d find those with particular tastes in Memphis, and that meant another drive.

  She might not find him there, but maybe she could find somebody who knew him.

  It always started like this, these vague sorts of chases. Little bits of nothing, until she finally had something.

  Sylvia suspected she’d been chasing little bits of nothing for a while.

  Before she climbed back on her bike, she sent an e-mail to a contact. She wanted an idea of Pulaski’s history— a background search that she couldn’t run without risking tipping off the police and the like. It could be done, but she wasn’t as interested in learning tech as some, so she let others do it.

  All it would cost her was some cash.

  Once she had that request sent off, she got on her bike and paused, lingered. That vague, itchy sensation still lingered low on her spine but it wasn’t too bad.

  Nobody was trailing her. Yet.

  Hunters all over the place, but nobody at her back.

  “Let’s just hope that holds,” she muttered.

  T

  ORONTO figured the best way to find a hired killer would be to track the hired killer’s prey. He needed to keep the scum alive long enough for Rafe or one of the other vamps to get the information they needed about the rest of the victims from Pulaski, which meant finding him before Sylvia James did.

  He had a few advantages on her.

  He knew Memphis.

  It wasn’t his town, exactly. That would imply it was home, and it wasn’t. But he’d been living here for quite a while and he knew the place. Sylvia, though, she wasn’t from around here. If she had been in the area long, he would have known. Rafe would have known. They would have crossed paths.

  Which was why the mercenaries tended to keep their distances from Hunter types. As long as mercenaries didn’t go over a certain line, Hunters didn’t worry about them. They had their hands too full dealing with the ferals to worry about other shit, but some of the mercenaries traipsed just a little too close to that line.

  He’d almost found himself bending too near that line a few times, but he’d always managed to pull back.

  Rafe didn’t think he could control himself around Pulaski. Toronto got that. His temper was nothing if not explosive and he didn’t always bother trying to control himself. The irritating thing for people like Rafe was that they knew he could control himself. He just rarely did. He let his temper lead him around.

  Just like you have since the day you woke up… you might have learned to control the violence, but are you really that much better?

  Pushing that irritating voice aside, he crouched down on the roof of a building. Down below, Beale Street was alive with action. Pulsing and throbbing with life, lust and laughter, and below, there were licks of anger, aggression, apathy. The smell of liquor was strong in the air, along with the smell of food. He caught the sharp edge of drugs but ignored it. He had another job today and besides, if these idiots wanted to waste their short, fleeting lives rotting their brains out on something that would eat those brain cells and those fleeting days, let them.

  He’d only step in there if he saw drugs being peddled to kids.

  Then he’d step in and shed blood before he was done.

  For now, he was looking for somebody.

  A familiar head of wiry red hair caught his eyes. A satisfied smile curled his lips and he rose to a half crouch and then leaped. It was a three-story jump down and he landed with his knees flexed, the impact as minimal to him as if he’d jumped off a curb.

  The man was gone by the time he moved into the crowds of Beale Street, but that was fine. Toronto knew where he was going. It was a little dive just around the corner where the strippers looked younger than they were, where the clientele was just a few steps up from the scum-suckers and nobody wanted to talk to anybody.

  They would, though.

  Especially Bobby Prescott.

  Bobby Prescott and Toronto had a special relationship.

  Toronto hated the sick little fuck and wanted to kill him.

  Bobby knew this, and he wanted to live. He was a werewolf, but his abilities were weak— he’d barely survived the Change and now he spent the night of the full moon locked in a cage because he didn’t trust his control.

  But that wasn’t the worst part.

  He had a weakness for pretty boys— boys, in the most literal sense. His particularly favorite age was right about fourteen. But he’d managed to keep that weakness to just dreams, and as long as he looked like he was able to control it, Toronto wouldn’t kill him. Toronto’s unhappy responsibility was making sure he watched Bobby, and closely.

  Bobby’s fear of Toronto worked to keep him in line and right now, it might work to help get some information about Pulaski if there was any to be
found.

  Toronto made it to the bar without Bobby scenting him. If the lesser wolf had caught his scent, Bobby would have been half-mad with fear.

  But the second Toronto pushed through the door, the game was up.

  They were the only non-mortals in there and although Toronto could mask his presence pretty damn well, Bobby was a werewolf— weak, but still were.

  At a table off in the corner, Bobby sat rigidly, eyes on the floor.

  Gazes skittered toward Toronto and then away. Unlike Bobby, they didn’t know what he was. They just recognized trouble. He ignored everybody in there, including the pseudoboys dancing on the stage. They’d be legal, he knew. Probably just barely legal, but barely was enough— it had to be.

  Sauntering toward Bobby, he caught the back of a chair and gave it a glance before he sat down. “Your taste in entertainment hasn’t improved, Bobby,” he said.

  Bobby ducked his head, hunching in on himself.

  Toronto leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table, staring at the top of Bobby’s bowed head. “You been being good?”

  “Yes.” It was a high, tight whisper. “I… I swear. I come here. I have— well, a friend. It works.”

  “A friend.” Toronto checked the air. The wolf wasn’t lying. “How old is the friend?”

  “Twenty. He works here. This is how we met.”

  Still being honest. Good enough. Still, he couldn’t let Bobby think he was getting complacent. Laying a hand on the table, he did a minor shift. Judging by the way Bobby’s scent changed— sour, acrid fear— the other man could see Toronto’s altered hand just fine and he didn’t like the look of the elongated fingers, the black claws. It was a freaky sight— that was the whole point.

  “Look at me, Bobby.”

  As the other man lifted his head, Toronto smiled. “You remember what I said I’d do to you if I even thought you were going to slip, right?”

  “Yes…” Bobby blinked his eyes rapidly, trying not cry.

  “You’re not going to slip. Are you?”

  “No.”