If she’d been attracted to Killian before, it was nothing compared to talking to him up close. He was hot enough to grill on. God, who wore leather pants in the first cusp of Seattle’s cold, spring humidity? And how he wore them well. It had been difficult to keep her eyes safely averted, but she hadn’t failed to notice the bulge of his—uh, yeah—his muscles through those leathers. Luckily, he hadn’t caught her gawking at his perfect set of steely buns. His charcoal shirt pulled tight over his back gave her a clear picture of how that tall, sinewy shape would look stripped naked.
When he’d faced her, he was all smooth skin and masculine angles, kissable lips with the lower slightly fuller than the upper. The shirt had made the color of his eyes a dark cherry. Last time she’d seen him, he’d had his hair pulled back from his lean face, but he’d cut it since then to just below the top of his collar, where it brushed the fabric in disheveled waves. His ears stood out more, but it only seemed to suit his sexy Irishness and dusky auburn hair. Yum. Just yum. And then he had to open his impudent mouth.
The hint of rumbling brogue may have been arousing, but she didn’t take well to force or threats of any kind, so yeah. He’d screwed the pooch on that choice. Second chances weren’t things she spared anyone, least of all a man in law enforcement. Maybe the power went to their heads, but she had yet to meet one with an ounce of sense or ethics. She’d been damaged enough by men like that. Besides, hot men were easy enough to come by.
If you worked with models.
What the hell was she doing? No work was getting done this way. As she reached for the intercom to check in with Piper, the phone rang.
“All right, sweetie, got you Denton and Campbell to take the investigation. They’re verifying identity and hunting down the kid’s application. Photos are back, most of them anyway. I’m sending digitals your way. The dicks—ha-ha, thought you’d get a kick out of that—are getting the prints.” Piper took a deep breath, finally, but cut Alice off before she could speak. “I’m going to dinner. How’s sushi?”
“It’s only dinnertime?”
“Dinner number two.”
Alice offered a weak laugh. “Right. Like I could leave. I haven’t even called Glenn yet.”
“So? He’s as useful as a bellybutton.”
No disagreement there. “So I can get out of answering all these messages from the media. He’d jump at the chance to deal with them.” Being the center of attention had never been one of Alice’s favorite pursuits. “You should know. They’ve been calling your line.”
“You mean your line. You have to eat sometime, Alice. You’re like a tiny bird. It’ll only take a bread crumb to fill you up.”
“Jealous? Anyway, I can’t leave. I’ll pick up something bigger than a bread crumb on the way home.”
“Yes, Boss.” And then the little hooker hung up. Boss? Really? Piper was begging for a little retribution.
Alice fortified herself with the luxury of a soda from her mini-fridge before making the call to Glenn. All he cared about were the media messages, but she gladly passed them on. Delegation, of course. Not like she was camera shy or anything. With that business out of the way, she opened her e-mail to view the pictures.
Clearly, this wasn’t a blooding case. First, the vic wasn’t human, despite what she’d told Killian. Second, though the boy had been bled out, there was minimal blood on the scene, which meant the killer moved the body. She’d know more about the primary murder scene when the detectives pulled the transformation records. And finally, candle wax circling the body indicated some sort of ritual had occurred.
The neighbors hadn’t seen nor heard anything prior to the body being found by a transient seeking shelter. No luck with eyewitnesses. No luck period.
Her only option was to interview the vampires responsible for the kid’s transformation. Which meant talking to Killian. As much as she’d love to leave that part to Denton and Campbell, she didn’t trust the agents. They’d give in to Killian’s bullying.
With a yawn, Alice stretched and then leaned on the edge of her desk. A final e-mail from Piper appeared in her queue. She didn’t want to open it. It was the unholy crevice of night, and she had enough trouble getting up in the mornings as it was. Who knew what other pleasant little surprises were in store?
Guess she was a glutton for punishment. She clicked on it, and it was exactly the information she needed. The kid had been housed on the estate of a Dominus named Ander. Just Ander. No last name. The guy had to be older than the pyramids. The e-mail didn’t say whether Ander had been the one to transform the kid from human to vampire.
It crossed her mind for all of a second to call Killian, but it was a very, very short second. She’d contact him in the morning when there was no chance he’d answer. No deep voice rumbling in her ear and making her spine quiver. It was really hard to hate a man’s guts when your spine was aquiver.
With a stream of self-recrimination rolling like a script through her head, she ran a quick Google search on Ander. She’d never heard of him before, and there weren’t many links, but he was kind of a big deal in the Immortalis world. Powerful. Multibillionaire. Damn those old vampires. You couldn’t toss a stone and not hit a rich one. Maybe she’d been searching in the wrong places for sugar daddy material.
She powered down her computer and closed up the office. It was on the drive home when the doubts crashed hardest. The only thing she had going for her was her organizational skills. She wasn’t a detective. She’d barely graduated from high school, for crying out loud. What the hell did she know about finding a killer? She was going to fail this kid.
Like she’d failed Zach.
Chapter Four
As dawn drew near, Killian itched to push it back from whence it came. There weren’t enough hours in the night. He rubbed his hands over his face, but the strain wouldn’t wipe away that easily.
It was strange to meet at Ezra’s industrial-style Pioneer Square loft instead of Kade’s posh penthouse at the Akkadian Towers. The leader of their ragtag group of covert, mercenary law enforcers had left them to their own governance to take his pregnant, soon-to-be-queen, Val, into safe seclusion at his estate in Glacier. Hell, Ian would have done the same, and he didn’t blame Kade for having clear priorities.
Where Kade had opted for a cleaner, more modern environ, Ezra’s loft was a massive open space of brick, heavy timber, and the leadlight windows lining the length of the outer wall. The sleeping area was on a dais, the massive, canopied sleeping enclosure framing a bed large enough for orgies, and knowing Ezra, probably used for them, too. Most of the floor space had been left as the original concrete.
“Have you fed?” Ezra’s rasp cut through Ian’s fatigue.
When Ian didn’t answer, Ezra’s pale red eyes zeroed in on him with laser intensity, one eyebrow kicked up higher than the other. Ian shrugged. He probably should have left when the rest of the team had. As old as he was, he still squirmed inside under his friend’s scrutiny. He damn well knew enough to see through the Nordic vampire’s happy-go-lucky facade. The Dominus was one of the oldest adjuvants and could probably take a head off someone with a fifty-yard stare. Then again, all adjuvants were something more, with abilities beyond other Immortalis, ones that made them the only vampires capable of turning humans or procreating.
“No time.”
Ezra cleared his throat prominently. “There’s time now.” He gestured toward the high-arched windows framed in weathered red and ash brick. Ian barely spared a glance.
“Got a nice place here.”
“Yep, and I’d like to enjoy it alone,” Ezra rasped, tipping his head toward the thick, oak doorway in a not-so-subtle gesture.
That got a laugh. “Well, that’s a first.” He stood with a groan. “You know, Kade would have worked us until the sun was on the horizon.”
“I lied.” Ezra cocked an eyebrow. “I have company on the way.”
Yeah, that was more like it, and it was Ian’s prompt to head out posthaste.
/> “Let me guess. Sonia? The gothy chick, right?”
“Among others. Care to join in? Might cheer you.”
“Not my thing, my friend.” He was at the door in a heartbeat. “I don’t have your obsession with all things human.”
His night had kicked off with a long-lost nightmare brought to life, and after raging like a Spartan at the abandoned house, he hadn’t cared to feed. Instead, he’d followed up with a steam-blowing round of rogue hunting. Rogue vampires weren’t much of a challenge. If they were dumb enough to abandon the big, happy Immortalis family, they were too dumb to hide from a well-seasoned Legion Tracker like himself. Hunting hadn’t done much to take the weight from his thoughts. Nothing could shake the prophetic disquiet eating him, and it wasn’t just the case.
Running into Alice had been a strange combination of arousing and maddening. Something about her had pulled his fuse. Dangerous. He needed that anger to ram down her wall of resistance.
Despite the temptation of her curves, she was a disaster waiting in the wings. The audacity of the woman, keeping a case that obviously belonged to the Immortalis. She’d been right that technically the case belonged to her, but Chrissake, sometimes common sense had to take precedence. Common sense and the greater good was the entire reason for his covert team’s existence. If they followed the letter of the law, the world might come to an end. Frustrating wench.
Ian had barely entered the south end of Belltown when he could have sworn… Yep, no doubt about it. Aforementioned wench dead ahead at his twelve. He couldn’t mistake that enticing sway of her ass encased in a second skin of a skirt. Shiny, black boots sheathed her calves and left a breathtaking expanse of slim, succulent thighs for him to dream about for weeks. What the hell was she doing out at the break of dawn?
He should’ve raced for the protection of his home, but that sway and that peachy flesh so close in front of him hypnotized his senses. The fading moon swelled nearly full, and her hair curling to the base of her spine was made of its light, the gloss reflecting that ethereal blue glow.
A pair of men stepped toward her from the shadows. They said something she obviously didn’t like. When they reached for her arm, he was a split second from ripping their limbs off when she sprayed something. Both men collapsed to the ground clawing at their eyes and screaming while she sauntered away as if nothing were out of place.
“Holy shit,” he murmured. She didn’t fuck around. He jogged up behind her. “Hey.”
Whipping around, she aimed a canister squarely at his…chest. The canister lifted to eye level before she recognized him and startled, her lips parting on a gasp.
“Are you haunting me already?” she asked. He fought back a laugh at the exasperation in her tone. “I said we’d work together on it. No need for creepy stalking.”
He couldn’t hold back. The laugh escaped as he raised his hands in the universal sign of surrender. “Don’t shoot.”
She eyed the canister as if she’d forgotten it was in her hand. “Oh.” Tucking it away in her purse, she turned the way she’d been heading and started walking. He kept pace beside her.
“I wasn’t stalking. Yet.” He glanced at her in time to catch a flash of her pretty smile. “I live in Belltown. Sort of.”
“Meaning?” Her eyes flickered over to him, punching into him midchest every time they did.
“Temporary housing when I’m working in town. I actually live in Graham.”
She stopped walking to stare outright. “I never would have guessed.”
Catching her hand, he tugged her forward again with a wary glance at the lightening sky. “Why so? Is it that hard to see me in cowboy boots?”
“No. Uhm…yes.” She studied their joined hands for several beats before carefully extricating hers.
“I’m a rural kind of guy.” He shook his head. “But I draw the line at the Stetson. It’s a baseball cap for me.”
“Now that, I can see.” Her laugh was sweetly melodic and appeared to take her by surprise. A giddy sensation skated along his nerves. “I’m right up here.” She gestured toward a fairly dilapidated apartment building, and her lingering smile took a wry turn. “I know. It’s not much, but it’s affordable. It even has a doorman.”
He followed her gaze. A fat, blue-haired cat with a sour expression, ears back and all, lounged at the top step leading into the building.
“He seems intimidating enough.”
“She is quite the guardian angel.”
He grinned again, his cheeks protesting the unaccustomed happy shit going on since he’d met her. “Speaking of guardian angel, you handled yourself pretty damn well back there.”
“No, I handled them. A girl has to defend herself.”
“That she does,” he said. An uncomfortable burning sensation spread over his skin, and his eyes again went to the sky. “Damn. I have to go.”
“Oh. Wait!” She stepped closer, and that kicked feeling struck his chest again. He rubbed at it absently through his T-shirt. “Can I meet you tonight?” She did her lip-biting thing again, making his mouth water. “I mean…about the case?”
“Of course. I’ll come to the VLO as soon as I’m able.”
“You’ll come to the VLO?” Her disbelief caught him off guard.
“Why not?” His brow furrowed. “I’ve been there plenty to work on rogue cases.”
A shake of her head sent a stray lock of hair over her eye. She tucked it behind her ear and then ignored it when it slid right back where it had been. His fingers tingled with the urge to run through the silk of it.
“I’ve just never seen you there.”
“So I would have caught your eye?” He couldn’t help teasing. The hazy, rising light revealed a deepening blush on her cheeks, which sent a ripple of pleasure through him.
She scoffed, but couldn’t meet his gaze. “Hardly.”
“I’m usually on the second floor with the investigators.” He had let her off the hook. What was wrong with him? Sun-addled. He had to be. And he’d best get the hell out of Dodge before he couldn’t drag himself home. As it was, he’d have to flash to make it to safety. “Tonight then.”
He waited for her acknowledgement before gathering his strength and running straight into the flash. Ha. What would she make of that? There one second and gone a blink later. Hopefully, no one would begrudge his lack of discretion. Flashing was never done in the presence of humans. They weren’t even supposed to know it was possible, though rumors abounded.
It felt good, the wind racing past his skin, the rush of speed. The buildings were a blur, people and cars mere blips visible through the protective membranes shielding his eyes. Snippets of early morning sound came and went as he passed in a gust of air. When he arrived at his doorstep, it took an effort to stop. His energy hit the floor. Not only did it take a lot out of a guy to flash, the sun sheeted lava over his flesh.
The pain had been worth spending time with Alice. His body hadn’t come this alive in ages, the long-forgotten sensations of desire suffusing his skin, his insides, and without a doubt, his cock. Once safely inside, he flopped onto his overstuffed couch, lacking the energy to make it to his bedroom. Blessed rest.
The rest part was a long time coming. With his mind—among other painfully hardened parts—no longer consumed by Alice, it turned unerringly to his most recent case. The similarities to the Infancy killings were much too close to keep chaos from whipping through his emotions.
He’d been so sure, so very sure.
Had he murdered the wrong man?
Chapter Five
Sitting at her kitchen table in a patch of rare, late-evening sunlight, Alice lingered over her coffee, idly tracing the worn grooves in the wood. She could get used to this being-on-salary thing. No pressure to race to the office. No worries over sleeping in. The whole morning had been one big, delicious sleep fest. Heaven on earth after working all night long. And Killian’s unexpected appearance had tucked her into bed but good.
He was something else, his
personality so different from how she’d imagined. In spite of his initial anger and infuriatingly pushy way, his humor broke past the dark and broody moments. He smiled a lot, drawing her gaze even more than the ab-hugging T-shirt he’d worn. That was saying a lot. She’d been working too much to squeeze in quality sexy-times lately. Ogling had become her middle name, and he was more ogle-worthy than most. Given time, drooling would be next. And he was a country boy. Who would have guessed?
Any overprotective male would’ve given her crap about the altercation with the would-be harassers she’d run into, about how a lady shouldn’t take risks like that. Not him, although he’d walked her all the way to her building, even as the sun’s predawn presence had to have hit him hard. It didn’t strike her that his purpose was for her protection. He’d regarded her as if she were the only one under the moon that night. The appealing, boyish charm in his smile and his voice and his eyes made it unbelievably tough to stay angry with him.
She’d half convinced herself that, in her exhaustion, she’d imagined the whole exchange after he’d disappeared instantly, gone quicker than a knife fight in a phone booth. If she hadn’t heard from Val about the vampire ability to flash, she would vote for a trip to the loony bin. He had to be a very old vampire to have such a skill, and didn’t that just freak out her unnatural, albeit understandable, attraction to him?
With a sigh bordering on dreamy, Alice rose to put away her coffee cup, sending her table into a precarious wobble. Yet another item in desperate need of a replacement she couldn’t afford. Dingy apartment living was slowly choking the life out of her. She never invited friends over, a bit embarrassed by the stained and dated carpet, cracked linoleum, and old paneling on the walls. Her furniture was just as shabby, torn or chipped with duct tape and wood glue holding it all together.
All of her money went to Zach’s care, and she refused to stick him into a public facility just to have nicer furniture. Anxiety sufficiently roused, she reached for her cell and called the care home. Thankfully, the nurse on duty reported Zach’s condition hadn’t changed. They’d had to put him on a respirator the week before.
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