The group turned, surprised into action. There was a shout but Jakob cut the man off with a strong backhand. Blood blossomed on his victim’s face and a woman ran, fleeing into the forest. The circle evaporated, leaving with a tingle of magic. Three of the witches that were left cowered together.
Rina didn’t cower; she stood firm, locking her hands into fists. I could feel her start to gather magic but she never finished. Jakob was in front of her, his eyes on hers before another second passed. She crumbled, her body folding in on itself until it came to rest curled in a tight ball, a high moaning sound coming from her lips.
George left Phoebe at the altar to run at Jakob, the knife raised. I screamed but wasn’t fast enough, and the knife sank through Jakob’s shirt into the meat of his back. The fabric tore open and blood poured out of the wound, bright red on familiar pale skin. The knife stopped, hit something, stuck. Jakob took advantage of the moment to twist, grabbing the man by the shoulders.
Jakob was shorter, more than a foot shorter, but he lifted George off the ground and sneered at him, glowing red eyes and sharp white fangs. The moment seemed to still, and death waited in the silence.
On the altar Phoebe sobbed. Her loud cry broke the quiet and Jakob very slowly put the man down. He looked at him, a look with power in it, and George crumbled to the ground the way Rina had. Jakob stepped over the body and began to rip Phoebe’s hands free. I ran from my hiding space toward them.
“Mal?” Phoebe asked, completely unsure of herself. I grabbed onto her, holding her tight and she sobbed against my shoulder. In the distance, I heard another familiar voice.
“Hold still.” Mark brought his hands to Jakob’s back. There was a soft sucking noise followed by a wet pop before Mark tossed the knife on the altar. “You just had to fly faster, didn’t you?”
“Take care of them,” Jakob ordered before he left too fast for me to see him go.
“The squad is on its way, about three minutes behind us.” Mark tried to be soothing.
“Go after him!” I shouted.
“But…”
“Go! He’s been stabbed! Take care of him.” Mark looked confused for a minute and then left as quickly as Jakob had.
Chapter 18
Jakob
Jakob beat the younger vampire so savagely only the tree behind him kept the man upright. Hatred and rage welled up inside him. Soon it would end, this threat would be over. Blood coated the tree trunk and the ground around it. Jakob stopped, holding the man in front of him, one hand tightly grabbing the brown hair and pulling it back, stretching the neck long in front of him, ready to eat.
“No,” Mark said, stepping between the two of them, his hand on Jakob’s arm. Jakob tensed, fighting through a blood rage. Warring with himself, he mastered his emotions.
Mark moved his arm to gesture to the barely alive vampire. “He’s a cop and there are fifteen more of them coming this way. Whatever you want to do is going to have to wait.”
Jakob looked at him, weighing his words. They barely made sense thanks to the anger coursing through his veins.
“You can kill him later. Go home. Call James.”
Frustrated but not stupid, Jakob took the advice, losing the bonds of gravity to reach his home.
****
In his library, still painted with blood, Jakob dialed the numbers without thinking. What time was it there? Was James even home? Why was he even bothering to take Mark’s advice when he should be ending this problem? A male voice with a heavy Scottish brogue answered the phone.
“James? Mark instructed me to call you.”
“What’s happened?”
Jakob told him the relevant details, sparing his own peace of mind nothing, becoming more enraged as he repeated them.
“Mark’s right, you can’t kill him. He’s a cop. Take his mind, make him quit the job, then kill him.”
“I have no desire to wait that long.”
“But you’re not stupid, so you will. Besides there’s the question of if he’s done anything wrong.”
“He used her—”
“The way they used to use death witches. He could have killed her. Or worse, bound her to him strongly enough to call her away from you in the middle of the day, ruining her love for you, taking away everything you hold dear.”
“You’re not helping his cause.” His voice betrayed an increasing rage.
“I know your world is black and white; someone is wrong and you kill them or they’re right and you protect them. But life isn’t always like that. You can’t force every situation into one box. If you found him using her that way, you’d be completely justified. If he’d taken her for any other reason I’d tell you yes, go crush his heart. But he did it all to save her friend. Are you going to kill him for trying to save someone she cares about?”
“He is a threat,” Jakob replied, unwilling to concede the point.
“Then render him an ineffective one. I know you’ve never wanted a blood slave, but if you make him one he’s not a threat anymore. Or be less dramatic, he’s not a fool. Make him see any action against Mallory will cause him a great deal of pain. Make it so costly he doesn’t attempt it.”
“There is no good way to solve this problem.”
“I’ve given you two. Here’s a third, let her handle it. You trust Mallory. Why not trust her judgment? Tell her what he was doing, explain the whole situation, the White Crescent and down the line, everything. Tell her why you’re scared; because that’s what this is, by the way. You wouldn’t be angry if you weren’t scared for her. You need to recognize that before you go off killing. Your rage is fueled by fear.”
“I do not fear this man.”
“I didn’t say that, I said you fear losing her. There’s a considerable difference. You don’t need my permission to kill and you never will. You wouldn’t be on the phone with me if you weren’t having doubts. Mark couldn’t have stopped you if you didn’t agree with him on some level that this man should live. Some part of you sees the difference between this and a thousand other death-worthy offenses.”
“Perhaps,” Jakob agreed.
“You called me, not Rowan. You knew if you said you needed to understand a woman’s point of view and asked for her, she’d agree with you. The two of you could have wasted hours plotting his excruciating demise. Bloody Hell, she’d fly over there to help you with it.” James paused, no doubt considering his wife’s bloodlust. “Should I wake my beautiful wife, Jakob?”
“No.”
“Of course not, because you realize Rowan’s course of action isn’t always the best one. The man lives. Not because you like him, although I suspect you do or he wouldn’t have made it this long, but because your hands are tied by his noble actions. Catch him trying to seduce her or to use her that way, to even talk about any of it means he has to die but now, you can’t justify killing him for this.”
“I do not have to justify it to anyone.”
“Just yourself. And that’s really what this is about isn’t it?”
“I suddenly recall why I don’t call you all that often,” Jakob said.
James laughed, and Jakob imagined his old friend, red hair moving as his whole body shook with laughter, his brown eyes filled with mirth.
“Are you wrapped in plaids over there? Sitting in front of a peat fire while some of us deal with the ugly realities of life?”
“Ach no,” James replied, his accent strong. “I’m how she likes me, waiting patiently for whatever she wants when she wakes up.”
“You’re a fool for that woman.”
“Always have been,” James said, his voice swelling with pride. “But then you were too.”
“Rowan,” Jakob replied, the emotion in his voice entirely different.
“Rowan.” Thousands of miles away, Jakob could guess from his friend’s tone that James watched his wife’s naked sleeping form. “We should come back to the states. We’ve been away too long.”
“Your room is always ready.”
&n
bsp; “I suspected as much. Admit it, you might want to be a cold-hearted killer but really you’re a romantic. And you won’t kill this vampire because it’s a pretty damn romantic gesture, risking his life to save the girl in the circle.”
“It’s not quite so romantic; they were lovers once but she paid for the privilege.”
“Don’t we all?”
“He’s waiting for another woman, has been waiting for decades.”
“More romance. No, you’ll let him live. You’ll hurt him a lot first, though.” James laughed again, and Jakob’s own lips curled into a smile.
“Am I so predictable?”
“Only to your old friends.”
Chapter 19
I held onto Phoebe, whispering soft words that didn’t mean anything while she cried. A few minutes later sirens announced the cavalry was coming. A few minutes after that, EMTs pried her from my arms to check her out. I saw half the night shift, a handful of uniform cops, and most importantly, the lieutenant striding toward us through the trees.
“What happened?” he demanded.
I opened my mouth but I didn’t know what to say. I couldn’t tell if he wanted me to explain the case or what happened in the last thirty minutes. If it was the second one I was in trouble. I didn’t know how to explain it. Amadeus used me somehow, pulled the death witch magic from me, then Jakob arrived and stopped him, maybe? I wasn’t sure of anything.
“They had the girl on the altar. Detective Baptiste managed to break the circle but it knocked him back. He’s pretty beat up.” Mark summed up with conviction. I only believed half of it.
I looked at Mark, willing him to hear the questions I couldn’t ask: where was Jakob? Was Amadeus all right? What was going on?
“And these?” The lieutenant gestured to the people around us, two still curled tightly and moaning, another three huddled together scared.
“There’s two more in the woods somewhere. These two will wake up with a throbbing headache any minute now. I never touched the other three.”
The lieutenant nodded then strode off to handle the growing chaos around us. The circle, or what was left of it, was filled with cops, an ambulance parked firmly to one side. There was no more magic here, certainly not enough to distract me. A pair of EMTs took Phoebe away, leaving me free to ask Mark the question I desperately wanted answered.
“Where’s Jakob?”
“Home, cooling off so he doesn’t kill Baptiste.”
“Oh come on, don’t exaggerate…”
“Let’s see, he’s known me for four centuries, he made me, and when I touched your hand at dinner he lost his temper and threw me against a wall, then sliced my face open. After what Baptiste did, do you think I’m exaggerating?”
“What did Amadeus do?”
“I don’t even know where to start. It’s probably too long to explain out here anyway.” Mark gestured to the circus of cops around us. “It’s like biting but with magic. He used you, could have drained you dry. You can guess how Jakob would react to finding Amadeus with his teeth in your throat.”
“Okay, good point. I’m heading home to him. You make sure Amadeus doesn’t do anything stupid.”
“Too late for that,” Mark sang behind me as I walked away.
“Mallory!” Phoebe shouted over the insanity. Both Mark and I headed toward her. “Don’t go yet! I need a ride.”
I looked at her, seated on the back bumper of an ambulance, a blanket wrapped around her. She didn’t look like she was going anywhere. A completely unseasonable breeze drifted over me and I realized Phoebe was reading me.
“I know how I look but I’m fine. I can go home after I give a quick statement, but they want a friend to take me. I don’t want to tell the girls about all this yet, so I figure, if you drop me off—”
“No,” the EMT interrupted her. “You shouldn’t be alone.”
“Right, you said that.” Phoebe flashed him a winning smile. “Of course, she’d stay for a while. Detective Mors is my friend, you can trust her.”
“Pheebs…” I wanted to help spring her from EMT jail but I was worried about Jakob. Phoebe had been through a violent crime; Jakob could be out committing one.
“I’ll get her home,” Mark offered.
“What?” we both asked in unison. He answered her.
“Hey, you said we’d be friends, right?” He turned to the EMT and flashed a badge. “I’ll stay with her, too, until sunrise anyway.” The EMT looked at Mark, judging him. Mark must have passed because he looked at us one last time and headed back into the ambulance.
“Wow, you’re really turning into a nice guy,” I marveled.
“Yeah, don’t tell anyone. It’ll ruin my reputation.”
I left the two of them by the ambulance and asked for the first uniform cop I saw for a ride back to the station. She spent the drive giving me a half an hour discourse on witches and how dangerous they were.
I didn’t bother to interrupt; the case swirled around in my mind enough that I barely heard. She dropped me at the garage and I got into Lara, starting her engine and shifting gears while the memories of the night filtered back to me. Amadeus’ back, the way his flesh had been scrubbed off by the forest floor, Jakob in that circle, hurting but not killing, tearing Phoebe’s hands free, and lastly Phoebe’s face, eyes wide with terror. I wondered if Christine looked that way once, or if her death took place in the bathroom, far away from the sacrificial circle.
Mark had been right, and wrong. Christine had taken a risk; she’d gotten into the car with a woman she barely knew, a woman who flirted with her. That woman turned out to be part of a group of killers, and that was where Mark was wrong.
Christine had come back to beg me to stop them from killing someone else. I succeeded, even if I took too long to spare my best friend the terror of being up on that altar. I turned into Jakob’s driveway thinking about the other people the Terra Prima group hurt, the lives they’d affected. One of them was inside, hopefully cooling off from a fury that could break bones and tear bodies in half. I took a deep breath and went to see the man I loved.
I unlocked the door with my key, listening to the quiet of the house. It was so quiet I doubted he was there. After whatever Amadeus had done, I didn’t want to use my magic to find out. Instead I dropped my keys but not my gun as I went, listening for any indication of what was going on. There might be a fight or maybe an execution. Light spilled from under the door to Jakob’s office. I stood, picturing the inside, his desk, with its neat blotter and fountain pen resting in the center, the out-of-place office phone. I finally pushed the door open, hoping the neatness hadn’t been destroyed by violence.
It hadn’t. Jakob sat in the tall executive chair; his head bent forward resting on the opened fingers of his hand. His shirt and pants were soaked in blood I hoped wasn’t his.
“Sweetheart?” I asked softly, not sure I wanted to disturb him.
“How is she?” He looked up at me, his eyes filled with worry.
“Fine, shaken up, but still Phoebe, you know? She wanted to go home alone but they wouldn’t let her. She was begging a ride from me in a second.”
“Is it that late already?”
“No.” I shook my head. “Mark said he’d take her.”
“He’s a good man.”
“So are you,” I offered, trying to see if that was the problem.
“I suspect Amadeus thinks otherwise.”
“You mean he’s conscious enough to think?” I joked, perching on the edge of the desk, my body in front of him. “That was a pretty strange kiss.”
“It was more than that, you know. There was a time…” He traced the outside edge of my chin with his fingertips. “How much do you want to know about the darkness in the world, my love? How much should I protect you?”
I thought about the case I’d had this morning. If he could protect me from that I was willing, but something told me there was more going on here. “I like it when you ride in to save the day, but I’m an adult.
If there’s something I need to know, tell me.”
“There was a time,” he started again but faltered, then stood up quickly, kissing me hard. I held onto him, kissing him back, my hands low around his waist to avoid the wound he’d gotten earlier in the night. We stopped kissing and he whispered in my ear, “Vampires used death witches, the way he used you tonight. They killed them for the power, and then for sport. They feared them, so they exterminated them, or they craved them, so they bred and killed them without remorse. I will not tolerate it.”
I shivered a little at his tone. “I’m glad. I want you to protect me from that.”
He drew back and looked at me, his eyes locked on mine, his voice solemn. “I promise I always will.”
“Come to bed.” I tugged at his shirt, still wet with blood. “I want to make sure your back is all right.”
“It’s fine.”
“You won’t really know that until someone takes a look at it. Come to bed,” I said again, and this time he understood.
When I woke up the next morning Jakob was still awake, watching over me. I pulled him into bed next to me, snuggling up against his body, telling him not to worry. I didn’t want to know what terrible memories had him so shaken but eventually he started to drift to sleep. He’d been right about the stab wound; when we got to bed there was nothing there, just a pair of matching holes in his shirt and undershirt.
My commute in was lovely; the sun rising in front of me painted the sky a thousand shades of gold and pink. I knew what was ahead of me: paperwork, a few interviews to wrap up our investigation, and meeting with the lawyers to hand off the case.
The case had messed with my schedule enough that I had a second Saturday in a row off. I decided I’d spend the day with Phoebe, whether she wanted me to or not. Rhythm said we should all go dancing and if Pheebs was up for it we would. Otherwise some nice peaceful, one-on-one time with my best friend who almost died sounded lovely.
The morning started slow. The FBI took our two prime suspects, Marina and George. We got a phone call graciously offering to let us watch, but not take part in, those interviews. Both Danny and I declined. I didn’t ask him his reason but I knew mine.
Blood, Dirt, and Lies Page 27