Whiskey, Vamps, and Thieves (Southern Vampire Detective #1)

by Selene Charles

  It wasn’t often that I witnessed an enraged Mercer, but it had happened in the past. Realizing that the crack of thunder I thought I had heard was more likely to have been Mercer destroying his office, I decided to go back and investigate.

  My stomach sank when I saw the destruction of the antique writing desk I’d bought for him twelve years ago. It’d been utilitarian, and nothing all that cosmetically pleasing to look at, but it had been what I could afford with my meager salary at the time.

  As far as birthday gifts had gone, it’d been a lame one. But he’d seemed to like it well enough. Shame crept over me then. He’d broken something I’d given him, which could only mean I’d pissed him off again.

  Mercer was my only ally in the place. My only true friend. If I didn’t have him, I had nothing.

  A large hand settled on my shoulder. Immediately I scented the peppery warmth of James’s blood, and my hunger, which always simmered just below the surface, growled for more.

  “Take your hand off me,” I said low, not wanting to turn and attack him.

  It wasn’t him so much as the fact that when Merc hurt, I did too. I’d done that, so I would fix it.

  James did as asked and walked around before me. His silver eyes full of knowledge, he nodded once.

  “C’mon, let’s clean this shite up before he gets back.”

  There was more that I wanted to say. Like why? Why had James left without a word? If he’d told me that Mercer had banished him, I’d have understood. I wouldn’t have liked it, but I wouldn’t have been left to wonder for years.

  But somehow it seemed wrong to talk about those things in here. So instead I nodded and followed him inside. Together we cleaned, never saying a word.

  ~*~

  I went home just as the sky turned a light shade of lavender. I wasn’t really sure when the myth spread that vampires couldn’t walk in the sun for fear of turning into a towering pillar of ash and flame. My thinking was that ol’ Stoker had something to do with that farce.

  Truth was, we didn’t like bright light, and some of us were allergic to it. And for those poor bastards, well...the legend was probably true. But the majority of us tended to go more gremlin, crying, “Bright light. Bright light. Hiss. Hiss. Hiss. Chomp.” Then the Wicked Witch of the West screaming, “I’m melting. I’m melting. Arghhhh.”

  And by not liking it, I meant it made us cranky and moody as hell and sometimes even a little psycho, depending on the type of control we had of our monster. I was a good little vampire; if someone doused me in sunlight, I’d probably just break their leg for it. At least they’d get to crawl away relatively unscathed.

  Mercer still hadn’t returned, which meant I’d pissed him off bad. I was heartsick and exhausted and didn’t want to think anymore.

  Dropping my keys down in the empty fishbowl sitting on the coffee table beside my door, I sighed, breathing in the clean scent of lavender and magnolias from the backyard.

  My home was my little slice of calm in a crazy, upside-down world.

  It wasn’t much, just barely over a thousand square feet and built of bricks back in the early seventies—a few years before my first birth. Merc and I had added a wraparound porch a few years back.

  Early in my vampire years, when the itch to feast was a constant and irritating nagging in the back of my throat, he’d tasked me with the project to keep my mind off the thirst.

  The porch was painted white and had two wooden rockers on it that he’d bought me from the local surplus store. I even had a teal-colored porch swing hanging off the beams that I made use of on cool autumn nights. Flower boxes were affixed to my windows, flowering with bright yellow and red marigolds.

  I took as good care of the inside of the place as I did the outside. I’d always been a bit of a Southern belle and decorated accordingly. Lots of whites, creams, and blues. Wicker furniture, potted ferns, and charming antebellum-style wall sconces.

  It was my haven. My sanctuary. I had only one rule here, no killing. Ever. I never wanted my home tainted with the stench of death. Death was all around me, but my home was the one spot in all the world where I could breathe and pretend for a while that my life wasn’t what it was. That I hadn’t ever stared dead-eyed up at the stars as the life slowly bled out of me beneath a honeysuckle bush.

  And I liked “charm,” which was just another fancy word for gently used items. I’d had to look long and hard to find pieces for my home that weren’t tainted by dark memories. Being an empath was rarely fun. The last thing I’d wanted to do was come home after a long night of busting criminals only to be surrounded by scenes of violence.

  I was just crawling into my crypt—totally kidding...it was a bed, because who the hell would want to sleep on rocks?—when a knock sounded on my front door. Hissing, I marched for the door, tossed it open, and glared holy death at whoever stood on the other side of it.

  And who stood there just so happened to be my sex on a stick, late-night snack.

  “What do you want?” I snapped, rubbing my brow as my skin tingled.

  Although I said I wouldn’t fry while standing in the light, I didn’t like it, either. I scooted my toes and fingers into whatever wedge of shadow I could find, peeking at him through dusty, gray motes floating between us.

  James, who I knew hadn’t slept a damn wink all night, stood there smelling like clean soap and grinning. And because of his Glasgow scar, that grin almost reached his ears.

  It should have made him look stupid. But my heart, still high on his blood, gave a pitiful lurch, which was probably the equivalent of a rapidly beating heart for anyone else.

  “Had some time to think about what happened back there tonight,” he said in that thick burr, and as tired and downright cranky as I was, I fidgeted from foot to foot.

  Damn his masculine charms.

  “Yeah? And?” I leaned against the door, resting one bare foot on top of the other, allowing part of my white tank top to ride up and show a sliver of skin.

  I almost grinned when his eyes tracked toward my toned abs and his pupils flared. Good to know I wasn’t the only one feeling the chemistry thing happening here.

  I lifted a brow when his eyes finally found mine again. He knew I knew, and rather than deny it, he simply shrugged as if to say, Yeah, you caught me.

  Sniffing, I shook my head. “My head is throbbing. And I’m about two damn seconds away from snapping your spine in half if you keep me standing in this sun a second longer.”

  “Stop being a baby.” Laughter brushed his words. “We both know you willnae die from it. And maybe if you let me in, you wouldn’t have to—”

  I snorted. “You think that little kiss back there is gonna get you laid? Get bent, Viking. You ain’t comin’ in my house.”

  Yeah, he might look like sex on a stick, but I wasn’t stupid. Mercer’s talk hadn’t told me much. I’d been a detective long enough to know not to ignore my gut, and right now, my gut told me James’s sudden reappearance wasn’t coincidence, but more than that, it was trouble.

  That easy smile faded from his face, and the hard, calculating mask was back on. The same one I’d witnessed after breaking off our little tête-à-tête in the woods. The predator lurked in the shadowy confines of his gaze, and I bit my lip, feeling my own monster rise and bleed through my eyes.

  “I felt your power,” he said, his voice thick and gruff. “Felt what you stole from me. Why didn’t you ever tell me what you could do?”

  Well, shit. I knew I’d leaked some power tonight. I’d been too hungry. For years I’ve been adept at hiding my powers from just about everyone. But James had always been a kind of kryptonite for me.

  My empathic nature was known only to a select few. Mercer had thought it best not to reveal it to all and sundry. A vampire’s particular skill set tied them directly back to their maker and, by default, their house.

  Freed as I was, if my house discovered another one of their kind was out and unsired, hell would be at our doors in seconds.

&
nbsp; I’d done some digging since my rebirth, and one thing I’d learned was that empaths like me were rare. I hadn’t actually come across another case of a vampire who could read death or memories as I could, but I’d once read a story of a girl—who must have been a vampire since she’d lived to be over a thousand years old—who could oracle the future. Many wars had been fought to enslave her before her eventual death in the early Middle Ages.

  I suspected it was because of that vampire that Mercer was so cautious with me.

  To be able to see was a prize worth killing for. Not even the Alpha knew of my skill. Among the Silver Creek shifters, only Merc knew it. The fact that he’d willingly kept that truth from his Alpha...well, it was bad. It would be considered the ultimate betrayal. It would be viewed by his family as though Merc had chosen me over them. Which, in essence, was exactly what he’d done.

  Why? I was still not really sure. All I knew was that I owed Mercer everything. I wouldn’t be alive if it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t be free, and I definitely wouldn’t be me. So though I wished I could take us back in time and make him tell Clarence right at the start of all of this, I would never betray him. My secret was his, but his was mine. I’d die before I ever let him take the fall for me.

  The only other people I’d had to tell was when I’d gone through the med boards to join the Paranormal Investigative Unit—PIU—of the Silver Creek PD. And then only because I’d hoped that by becoming an investigator, I could learn more about my own death. Who’d made me? And why? Hoping that maybe there’d been a file on me, but there hadn’t been. My search into the vamp clans had come up disgustingly empty in the over twenty years I’d actively searched.

  And that was it.

  Telling Carter and Doc had been my idea, sanctioned by Merc but with a caveat. There’d been threats made. And not by me. Thankfully, Carter and Doc—who happened to be his brother—had been more concerned with putting away the bad guys than trying to start World War III.

  The knowledge of who I was, what I really was...it was mighty dangerous in the wrong hands, and the thought of that happening made my hackles rise.

  My lips pulled back, exposing my dropping fangs as I waited for the highlander’s threat. He sniffed, and his own lips began to curl.

  “I’m not your enemy, Scarlett. Never was,” he said, but his voice had grown thick with the beginnings of a growl.

  Put two predators in a room together and there were bound to be fireworks. Still, James was handling the obvious threat well. Kudos to him.

  “You’re not my friend, either. You left me. Without a word. Did you really think I would just forgive and forget? Think you can just crawl back into my bed like nothing’s happened? Screw you.”

  I figured he was about to tell me he came to put the fear of God in me. But then that wall of steel slipped just a little and his eyes softened a touch as he said, “Mebbe I’d hoped ye would.”

  Not sure where to go with that, I licked my tingling canines. They wanted blood, but he confused me. Why had James really come back? It sure as hell wasn’t for me. And yet the way he looked at me, I could almost believe it was.

  Gritting his teeth so hard I saw the muscles in his cheeks twitch, he nodded once then backed down my stoop. Still keeping an eye on me.

  Smart man.

  Never turn your eyes off a predator. That’s a surefire way to get yourself dead.

  “See you around, Scarlett.”

  He didn’t turn until he got to the Harley parked across the road. Only then did he kick his leg over the seat, push up the kickstand, throttle that beast to life, and with a throaty roar of pipes, he was gone in a plume of gravel and dust.

  I was gonna be keeping my eye on that wolf.

  “I got you in my sights now, Viking.”

  ~*~

  I didn’t see much of James the next few days, or even Mercer, come to think of it.

  The only time I saw James was mainly at the bar, speaking in low tones to a few shifters sitting at the same table with him, day in and day out at seven o’clock sharp for two to three hours before scattering to parts unknown.

  But they weren’t the regular everyday shifters. Emerson was there, with his slicked brown hair and his greaser clothes on. He fashioned himself a modern-day James Dean with fur. Beside him were two other shifters I didn’t know near as well.

  Melia—aka Medusa—was an Amazonian ginger who liked to do a little bare-knuckle boxing on the weekends. The only female of the bunch, she was scrappy as hell. Of the lot, I think Medusa liked killing the most. Then there was Clay—six feet of Nubian beauty. His skin was so black it practically blended into the shadows around him. He had the most arresting green eyes I’d ever seen on a man, and one gold front tooth.

  I’d tried, back in the day, to flirt with Clay, let him know I was definitely interested...only to learn he was more interested in Mercer than in me.

  Gay or not, Clay fought like the devil.

  It was no coincidence that Jamie was sitting with them since those three and Merc were the Alpha’s soldiers in arms. All shifters could fight, but when those four fought, it was almost like watching a lethal ballet.

  “Why are you so interested in James, Scar?” Mercer’s deep treble cut through my musings.

  I frowned, turning to stare at him with my most innocent look. He had barely spoken more than three words to me since that night in the back room. I went from being pissed off as hell with him to swallowing a giant lump in the back of my throat because he’d finally deigned to talk to me.

  So I erred on the side of flippant with my response. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Considering you’re about to rub the wood grain bald in that spot—”

  I jerked my arm back, only then realizing I had been running a wet rag in the same circle for the past twenty minutes. James was definitely getting to me to throw me off my game this way.

  Merc eyed me back, saying nothing else, but then he really didn’t need to.

  Finally I decided to fess up. “Been here three days. He’s in constant talks with the Wolf Pack, and you won’t—”

  “It’s because I didn’t know.” He held up a finger.

  “Didn’t? As in, now you do?” I pursed my lips.

  Mercer just looked at me, which finally prompted my huff. “Well, spill, wolf boy. What are they hiding? Because I’m telling you, I have a bad feeling in the pit of my gut that whatever reason he’s been sent here for, it’s not good. I don’t know that I...”

  My words trailed off as I looked back at James, hunched over and whispering in low tones. As a vampire, I had highly sensitive hearing, but considering shifters did too and could speak in tones even I couldn’t hear, that skill set was mox nix here. I sighed.

  “I don’t trust this, Merc. I don’t trust him.”

  He lifted a brow, looking at me thoughtfully. He wanted to know why I was so curious about James? The truth was, I wanted to know why he cared so much what I thought. But after our last disastrous talk, I wouldn’t dare broach the matter.

  Resting a hand on a beer spigot, he jerked his chin toward the bunch. “You know I can’t tell you pack secrets.”

  I nodded, also knowing that Mercer had always found ways around that little rule through a private language he and I had learned together.

  “But let’s just say that a bunch of bread’s gone missing and the little ones might be responsible for it. Maybe.” He shrugged.

  Money had vanished, and the fae were responsible. So the assassin had been brought in for a kill?

  “Hmm.” I turned back to look at the intense group of pack. “But there’s more than that, right? I mean, you feel it? Involving the caveman in a game of slap and tickle is really all you need to do to take care of the little ones. No need to bring in all the big guns, right?”

  Mercer’s lips twitched, and I hated to admit that I felt stupidly happy to see him smile again, but I did. Without thinking, I laid my hand on his stomach.

  “I�
��m sorry.” I’d been dying to tell him that for days.

  The muscles of his abs flexed beneath my touch, and I almost sighed. Almost. He looked down at my hand but went absolutely still otherwise.

  Feeling suddenly self-conscious, I made to pull away, but he laid his hand over mine, holding me fast. “About what?”

  Neon green threaded his eyes, and I swallowed hard.

  “You destroyed that desk.”

  I felt the powerful shudders work through him, and I hated that I didn’t know why. What was happening to Merc and me? I’d gone from thinking one thing for years to suddenly being confused about everything. About him. About me. About us.

  “A-about the other night. About the things I said. I shouldn’t have said what I—”

  His face twisted up into a mask full of pain. “Don’t. Just don’t, Scar,” he said, shaking his head, but his voice was low and throaty and mingling with that of his wolf.

  Then he dropped his hand and mine with it. I shook my head.

  And though wolves had great hearing, I knew that James hadn’t turned to look at us over his shoulder because he’d heard us talking about him. We’d kept our voices low enough to keep things private.

  His glance didn’t last long, but in his eyes, I saw steely determination. What that could possibly mean, I wasn’t any closer to knowing. Yet. I licked my front teeth. James was the first to look away.

  Merc sighed, opening his mouth to say something, but whatever it was died on his tongue the moment we both spied Carter step through the doors.

  My old partner and very human detective did as he’d always done when walking into a den of rowdy shifters. He stood straight, and made a point of staring directly into the eyes of those looking back at him.

  Shifters mostly inhabited Silver Creek, but we boasted all sorts. Though we were in the South, we liked to consider ourselves far more progressive than some other conclaves. We didn’t discriminate against folks. If they were good to us, we’d be good to them. Our Alpha had set that tone for the past almost-century.

  Race. Gender. Species. None of that mattered so long as you were good people. If you weren’t, well...you didn’t tend to linger long.