by Joey W. Hill
He didn’t take them to his intended destination right away. When they were near enough to it he could feel the back of his neck itching, he brought them to a halt, spoke low, no matter that Mikhael had said they could speak normally.
“Give me a minute.”
He made a motion to Marcie, to get her to stay with the other two. Then he strode toward the Italian Society Vault, a cylindrical marble monolith, the tallest thing in the cemetery. His gaze lifted to the top, where the pensive statue of Charity stood, a female draped in soft robes, her hand lifted as she posed next to a cross. He’d sat up there with her a lot of times, his back propped on the cross. As he’d gazed at her face, he’d thought about the mother he’d never know.
He circled around to the opposite side of the vault, his fingertips gliding along the ornate curved drawers. Once out of view of the others, he put his back against the vault and drew a breath. Cursed softly but viciously to himself. But he knew what needed to be done, and was already reaching into the pocket of the open shirt he was wearing over dark T-shirt and jeans.
It had been awhile, maybe several months, but if any moment called for it, it was this one. He drew out the cigarette pack and the lighter.
No one snuck up on him, ever. But there were people so far in his trust zone, they could move into his personal space without raising the slightest alarm flags. It was a small group, but they were the people who mattered most to him.
Marcie’s rich brown eyes captured the light even on this cloudy gray day. As she stood in front of him, between his braced feet, she gripped his hand, brought it down. Somehow the cigarette and lighter disappeared. Instead, his hands were filled with the sure grip of hers, and her, as she pressed closer.
“You don’t need that,” she said. “You’re not alone. Not now, not ever again.” Her palm was on his chest, the heat of it transmitting through the cotton. “I’m here.”
“Yeah, you are.” He stared down at her. And she shouldn’t be. But she was, and he hadn’t been able to say no to her. He pushed away from the vault. “Give me back the lighter, brat.”
She produced it from God knew where. She gave him an impish look, and held it away from him, as if he didn’t have a half foot of arm length and height on her. But she had a vicious stomach jab. “Marcie,” he said, quieter. Even. “What you said, I heard it. But there’s a reason for it. So give it back.”
To be who he had to be in this moment, he had to cross a line in his head. From who he was, back to who he’d been. He knew one sure way to do that.
She was studying him in that penetrating way she did. But before he had to repeat himself, she’d put the lighter in his hand. When his fingers closed over it, she let it go. But she didn’t give him the cigarettes. Instead, she fished one from the pack, brought it to his lips. Then she closed her hands over his holding the lighter, and positioned her thumb in front of his, flicking the flame to life, helping him light it.
As her hands slipped away, he took control of the cigarette, drawing on it as he put the lighter away. She stepped back, to the side. She slid her lovely denim-covered butt down the side of the stone to squat on her heels. At his side, but in his peripheral view, so he could get his head where it needed to be.
One draw, two… It took him back to dark, cold places, when the burn of the smoke in his lungs and throat told him he was a creature close to hellfire, but capable of staying one step ahead of it. The flames close enough to keep him warm, angry and driven to stay alive.
A dozen puffs and the stillness had settled over his shoulders. Every nerve ending on alert, while every muscle was deadly loose and ready.
He stepped away from the wall. He heard her rise, the whisper of her shirt, the light tread of her rubber-soled shoes. He could smell her hair, her female scent beneath it all, unique to woman, to her. In the shadows, one learned to assess everything in a blink about the unknowing marks who passed by. And determine which ones weren’t marks, so as to stay out of the hands of the cops—and to stay alive.
To this day, he would never know what guardian angel had interfered with his judgment so badly when he’d attempted to pick Jonas Kensington’s pocket. Because the man was so obviously not a mark, a sign pasted on him couldn’t have stated it any plainer.
No. That was the turning point in his life away from this. He needed to turn back. Not only face the darkness, but step into it.
He pivoted as she rose, and he moved, faster than she could anticipate. He swallowed her gasp as he pressed her against the unyielding surface of the vault. He closed his hand over her throat in a grip that was a little too tight, his other grasping her waist and hip as he took her mouth, diving deep, seeking and getting that tiny, maddeningly helpless whimper at the back of the throat. It brought forth a savagery in him he couldn’t ever explain. That he didn’t have to explain.
Not to her.
She was well-trained, his brat, her palms immediately pressing flat to the smooth marble on either side of her, fingers curling around the handles on the drawers. It gave him some pretty interesting fantasies of bringing her back out here one night and tying her to them.
When he lifted his head, he stared into her eyes. “You’ll do as I tell you,” he said. Not a question.
“Yes.” That breath caught as he tightened his grip even more. “Sir,” she added.
But her gaze stayed fastened on his face, her expression thoughtful. She didn’t fear this part of him, and would never have the good sense to do so. But she knew when he wasn’t fucking around.
He let her go, turned and walked. Two hundred steps. Then right. He could do it with his eyes closed, though he hadn’t gone back there for years.
He’d left it to Marcie to signal the others that they were on the move, so when he came to a halt at their destination, he wasn’t surprised to find Mikhael and Raina standing with Marcie, only a few steps behind him.
As Mikhael drew closer, Ben saw the Guardian’s gaze had sharpened upon him. Mikhael had apparently felt the shift inside Ben. But he only made one comment about it.
“There is a time to switch gears, to call on the uglier parts of yourself to do what needs to be done. Just be mindful that you do not swing too far into darkness,” he said. “It will give her an advantage you do not want her to have.”
Ben might have told him to fuck off, but Mikhael wasn’t taunting him or getting up in his business. Though Ben wasn’t much on taking advice, the direction was valid.
Mikhael’s attention turned to the crypt. It was one of the oldest here, the gray stone uneven and worn. The statue on the crest of the vault was recognizable, though the ears were tiny stumps and the face was a featureless oblong egg shape. A lamb.
“This is the crypt of a child,” Mikhael said.
“Once. I relocated the remains a long time ago. He’s in his father’s vault now. Kid was a bastard who died when he was two. The guy’s wife refused to let the baby be buried with them. But she’s long dead, so I figured she’s had time to get over it.”
“Mmm.” Mikhael placed a hand on the stone, his expression probing. Probably because magic was considered a miraculous thing to humans, his next move should have been punctuated by a dramatic soundtrack and a significant pause. Without that, there was merely a silent rearrangement of the air around him, then a slight grating noise, like Marcie scraping the sole of one of her mouthwatering stilettos against a cobblestone on Bourbon Street. Dust puffed out from the cracks of the vault, and Mikhael moved back. One hand lifted; he twitched two fingers right, providing directional guidance to the magic he’d summoned, and the door shifted accordingly.
“You weren’t kidding when you said I didn’t need to bring any tools,” Ben said. He stared at that dark opening, felt the women drawing closer.
“No way I’m taking you down there. Fuck that.”
Marcie slid her fingers in between his tense ones. “No way I’m letting you go without me,” she said.
“If I can find her by following this passage, neither
of you need to accompany us further,” Mikhael interjected. “As non-magic-users, your presence might be more of a hindrance, regardless.”
The male’s voice was neutral, his expression bland. Son of a bitch. Mikhael could give Matt a run for his money in knowing the right strategy to get a person to do what needed to be done. From the tightening of Marcie’s chin, the flash in her brown eyes, it appeared she felt the same way Ben did about it. His sweet, badass brat. Hell, they were doing this. Goddamn it.
“Much as I’d love to take that patronizing insult as a pass on this whole thing, there’s a lot of ground to cover, and I’m not following a Point A to Point B map. Not a visual one.”
Mikhael’s gaze flickered. “You’re linked to her.”
Raina didn’t say anything, but the Guardian’s attention went to her. “You knew.”
“I suspected. His story is his own to tell.”
“Yeah,” Ben said shortly. “And I sure as hell don’t feel like telling it.” For one thing, he couldn’t explain it, and he didn’t want the cosmic power guy probing and figuring it out for him. Ignorance wasn’t bliss, but it sure as fuck wasn’t as painful as the truth.
“Then I will not require that. Unless it becomes necessary,” Mikhael added. “I will take the lead, and you will direct me.”
The Dark Guardian’s tone was a clear you’ll do what I tell you to do, sure to raise Ben’s hackles. “I don’t need a shield.”
“It’s his job,” Raina said, stepping to Mikhael’s side and making a placating gesture. “Like a cop. And it will keep her safer. You can focus on her, while he focuses on all of us.”
“Ben.” Marcie rested her hand on his elbow. “If the big bad sorcerer wants to take the lead going down into the creepy tunnel, I don’t think we should deny him the honor.”
“Fine. He can clear out the spiders and rats waiting for us,” Ben said.
Mikhael said nothing throughout the exchange. He merely appeared to be waiting, semi-patiently, for them to fall in line. It annoyed Ben, even as he knew he was going to let this one go.
“Spiders? I may go back to the hotel room after all.” Marcie’s lips twitched. “Order more beignets from the insanely expensive menu.”
“Your husband wouldn’t say no. Matt pays me more than enough to get you fat on pastries.”
“I earn plenty from Savannah. I can pay for my own,” she rejoined.
Ben looked toward the dark hole of the vault, felt the coldness in his vitals settle in. “Soon enough, you’ll be earning a cop’s laughable pay,” he said absently. “Then you’ll need my money for those pastries.”
As he turned his gaze back to her, she flashed him a tight grin. But her eyes were serious as she checked the gun in the holster she wore over her form-fitting tank, under the loose drape of her open shirt. Mikhael’s expression said it was time to stop shooting the shit and do this. Ben knew that. But sometimes one more minute was…one more minute.
“Stay close,” he reminded her.
“I’ll be right on your ass,” she promised. “Every moment.”
“Spoken like a true wife,” he said.
Relief glimmered inside Marcie at the flash of humor in his gorgeous emerald eyes. Then it was gone in a blink and he showed Mikhael that grim face once more. “Let’s go.”
Ben went in first to remove the planks from the platform that would have held the body of the most recently dead. The area in back, where the bones of previous family members would have been swept while the latest one was decomposing, only had a thin layer of dirt, what time would have loosened from the surrounding walls.
The lamb was an indication that the vault had been sealed directly after the babe’s death, the parents’ grief such that they’d dedicated the crypt to a single soul. Marcie wondered about the baby’s mother, the man’s mistress. Had she come here, laid her hand upon the stone, marked it with her tears? Somehow, she knew she had, because there was some of that poignant energy still here. How had Ben found this entry point? More likely, it had been an exit. Had the bereft mother’s surfeit of feeling drawn him, another lost child?
After the planks were removed, there was a door in the floor of the crypt, one that had been nailed shut. Ben backed out, giving Mikhael room to move in, drop to his heels and study the problem.
A squeaky sound, a little like mice, and Marcie saw the nails working their way out of the wood, carefully. They dropped away one by one, plinking against the stone sides of the platform before they dropped to the dirt floor. Mikhael just seemed to be sitting there on his heels, almost casually, but she was starting to recognize the signs when he was working magic. It was a shimmer in the air hard to describe, but upon contact with the skin it was somewhere between a vibration and a small electrical tingle. She’d felt it when he’d protected them from prying eyes, and it had stayed with them, a light veil dropping over them, moving where they moved. She was starting to feel like Harry in Chamber of Secrets, when he saw the Weasley house and proclaimed with wonder, “I love magic.”
Well, that kind of magic. When Mikhael moved out and Ben lifted the door, a palpable bad feeling wafted out of the empty hole. That energy was neither a protective veil nor a whimsical alternative to a claw hammer.
Ben retrieved a coil of rope from the back of the vault, checking its condition before he tied it off to a sturdy pipe driven into the concrete platform.
“It’s not a long drop,” he told Mikhael. “But the rope will be useful to climb back out. A thousand angels maybe can dance on the head of a pin, but down there, there’s not room for even one birdman to spread his wings.”
Mikhael gave him a bland look at the snark. He peered down before he squatted, took a grip on the rope and used it to swing himself into the opening, but then he let go. They heard the light thump of his landing.
Ben gestured at Marcie to come in and go next. Sitting shoulder to shoulder with him in the cramped space, Marcie peered over the edge. She saw Mikhael standing fifteen feet below, holding the rope steady. If not for the faint gray light coming in from the vault opening, she might not have seen him at all. It appeared to be pitch black below. Though she was sure Mikhael had some magical way of putting an illuminating glow around them, she wouldn’t have minded the backup provided by Duracell.
Ben helped her over the edge and then she was lowering herself hand over hand, glad for all her upper body work. Mikhael’s sure touch guided her to the ground. She stepped aside to make room for Raina.
The witch descended a couple feet, and then let go. Before Marcie could gasp, or even blink, Raina had dropped straight down into Mikhael’s arms, who’d moved faster than Marcie could follow. Raina gave her mate her feline smile.
“You did promise to always catch me when I fell,” she told him.
“I do not recall ever saying that,” he said.
“It was implied,” the witch responded.
He shook his head at her, but as he let her slide down his body to her feet, Marcie noticed his touch lingered at her waist, the curve of her hip, and he gave her a mild pinch of reproof, even if his face stayed locked in that total I’m-at-work mode.
Ben came down last. Marcie was amused to see Mikhael step back, following the unspoken guy code that men didn’t want help unless directly asked. She also noticed she wasn’t the only one appreciating Ben’s flex of back muscles, tight ass and taut thighs, because Ben could wear the hell out of a pair of jeans. Marcie couldn’t fault Raina for looking, especially when the witch rolled her eyes at her and showed her teeth in a mischievous smile.
“I have visually restored the opening,” Mikhael said. “Though it remains open in reality, in the event a quick exit is needed.”
Practical. She hadn’t thought of that. Marcie looked around her. Her pulse jumped, seeing how pitch black closed in on the tunnel, immediately past where the light from the opening above could reach. It was a darkness so absolute there’d be no way through it except blind feel.
And then there was light. A dim yel
low glow illuminated their way, like sensor lights in freezers at the grocery stores. Yet she saw no torches embedded in the walls, or old electric lights strung, running off noisy generators. The light turned everything the color of old dry newspaper, making all of them look like people in old photographs, so long gone there was no one still alive to remember them.
The tunnel was wide enough for two to walk abreast, but not quite tall enough for the men to straighten to their full height.
“The light is not from me,” Mikhael said. The second the illumination had occurred, he’d gone on full alert. His words added to the chills spiking down her spine. “Someone knows you are here, Ben. Whoever takes the lead now makes no difference. We need to stay alert to front or rear attack.”
The green of Ben’s eyes was an almost colorless gray in the shadows. He nodded, his jaw set, and started down the tunnel, glancing back to ensure Marcie was close behind him. Despite the two of them being in the middle, Marcie noted neither she nor Raina dropped their own guard. Raina’s radar was different though, seemingly attuned to something in the air itself, her gaze slightly unfocused as they moved forward. That worked. Marcie was good with having someone watching the paranormal attack points.
As they followed Ben, Marcie noticed the tunnel grew far wetter, the walls damp and the ground underfoot crunchy sludge. The smell soon surpassed Bourbon Street on its raunchiest night, that unforgettable aroma of human excess. Though the Monteleone food had been as good as advertised, Marcie was glad she’d eaten lightly.
She watched for alarm cues, not allowing herself to get fixed on any one point. But she did register that she was seeing a very different side of Raina now. No sultry flirtation vibes. She looked serious and dangerous. As she walked, she flicked the fingers of her right hand in a deliberate short movement, another indication she was using less obvious senses to probe their surroundings.