Mortal Bite (Golden Vampires of Tuscany)

by Sharon Hamilton

  “I think I’ve found what they were looking for,” he said.

  “You found the book?”

  “I found a crate that was destined for Novotny’s bookstore. I don’t think anyone else knows about it.”

  “You know what you’re looking for?”

  “Help me out a little bit, brother. Or, do you want to send a big truck and we’ll take them all?”

  “That would take too much time. It will be pretty damaged, probably flaking. I’m trying to remember what color the rest of the books were.”

  “You saw them?”

  “Yes, when I was little. This was part of Grandfather’s set, and he showed me the books before the war. I wish I’d paid more attention then. God, if only they were still alive.”

  “We are the old ones now, brother. Would you recognize the book if you saw it? Why don’t you trace here and help me look?” Though Paolo was whispering, he felt his voice was carrying too loudly throughout the warehouse. Several of the men surrounding the woman had turned to look at him. And she was pointing right at him. “Um, I’m afraid I’ve run out of time. You best not do that—“

  Marcus appeared right next to him and cleared his throat. Paolo darted a quick glance at the crowd of onlookers and several of them crossed themselves. Well, if they were afraid, that could give the brothers a few extra minutes. He’d have felt much better if they had one of the Jett brothers to help out. Marcus was doing a stare-down with the man Paolo thought was the foreman.

  “Don’t look at them. Let’s get to work,” Paolo said to his brother.

  Incredibly, under the second layer of books was a light greenish-brown book that had been covered in green plastic archival wrap. There was no title on the outside, which Paolo thought was odd.

  Marcus untaped the wrap and opened the interior of the book. There were diagrams and charts, sketches and celestial maps for navigating the oceans. A hole had been carved into the pages of the book without damaging the text. Inside the hollowed-out pages was a tiny skeleton key.

  “What’s this? Did grandfather ever speak of this?” Paolo asked.

  “No. Never.” Marcus put the key in his pocket and re-wrapped the book in the green plastic. The group of men began to descend upon them, but by the time they were close, Marcus and Paolo had traced back to the family villa in Imprunetta, taking the sacred text and the key with them.

  Chapter 41

  Paolo and Marcus were ecstatic with their find until they got the call from Lionel Jett.

  “Lionel! You escaped, thank the God of vampires. Good to hear your voice. We had feared the worst,” Marcus said.

  “Prepare yourself, Marcus. I have some bad news.”

  Paolo couldn’t help but overhear the conversation. He instantly thought of Cara. He had not felt anything coming from her for some time. He’d thought perhaps her altered memory had made the physical distance between them more significant than it had been earlier.

  “Cara is missing.”

  Paolo grabbed the phone. “Lionel, was she taken?”

  “No, Paolo. I am sorry to say we misjudged her and she slipped right out, when we were distracted.”

  “Distracted?”

  “It’s a long story. I must bear the responsibility myself.”

  “When?”

  “Sometime this evening. She had been put to bed. The maid brought her some fresh clothes and a nightgown, and watched her fall asleep. When she checked on her later, Cara was gone. Sometime between midnight and two.”

  “Who do you have looking for her?”

  “Just about everyone.”

  “I’ll be there shortly. Let me make arrangements and I’ll come help out.”

  “Thank you. And Paolo?”

  “Yes?”

  “I am so sorry for my poor judgment. We were sort of celebrating. All my fault.”

  Paolo didn’t want an apology. He wanted Cara back. She was at huge risk, being out there by herself. But he also knew Lionel would even lay down his life if necessary to save her.

  “Let’s concentrate, Lionel. We need to be sharp, or we won’t find her.”

  “That’s affirmative.”

  Paolo handed Marcus back his phone. “No matter what, you stay here with Anne and the baby until all this is over. Protect Lucius. I have to go find her. If you have to, go before the Council with the book and give it to them. Explain this to them. I wish I could stay and study it with you, but I think I can still feel her emotions, and that gives us an advantage.”

  “And you are also doing the Council’s bidding. You forget that they want to see her tomorrow.”

  “No, Marcus. I haven’t forgotten the stakes. I will not fail you again.”

  Paolo peeked outside the kitchen windows and saw Lucius and Laurel in serious conversation about something on the patio. He walked over to his son and hugged him, inhaling the boy’s fresh scent one last time. This wasn’t the kind of war he’d expected to wage, chasing after a mortal woman down a dark alley. Waiting for the dark forces to rain down their wrath on all their innocent women and children. On his son.

  “Lucius, you mind Laurel. I have to go away for a little bit.”

  “How long?”

  “I’ll be back very soon. I promise.” He hated to make a promise he wasn’t sure he could keep, and a glance at Laurel told him he was a bad liar. She was fighting back tears.

  “You are going alone?” she asked.

  “We have all the guys back in California. Marcus will stay here with you, Anne, the baby and Lucius. Cara’s escaped.”

  “Oh Paolo, I’m so sorry. Don’t be foolish. We need you. If she has a death wish, don’t let it cost—" she stopped because Lucius was hanging on every word. The boy’s lower lip quivered.

  “Be brave, Lucius. Can you do that for me, for auntie?” Paolo asked.

  Lucius sullenly nodded his head.

  Paolo picked up his duffel bag, gave the boy’s hair a tussle, kissed Laurel on the cheek. As was his tracing routine, he inhaled, as if taking the last breath of the land he loved so much. He arrived a moment later in the living room of Marcus and Anne’s house in Healdsburg.

  Lionel Jett was waiting for him. Paolo noticed Lionel wouldn’t look him in the eye. He could tell the man was filled with remorse.

  “You’ve got to get a grip, Lionel. Things happen.”

  “But I let you and the family down, sir.”

  “No, you’ve been our loyal, trusted bodyguard for centuries. We owe you our lives from so many occasions in the past. This is a complicated mess. We must concentrate. Can you do that for me?”

  “Affirmative.”

  “Where should we start? Know anything about what she was thinking before she left?”

  “No. I didn’t speak with her. I was otherwise occupied,” Lionel blushed and squeezed his eyes shut. He briefly told him what had transpired in the warehouse.

  “And she is with your men, looking?”

  “Yessir.”

  “You trust her?”

  Lionel was having difficulty answering. “I just don’t know who to trust anymore, sir, and I needed the manpower. The woman is fearless, Paolo. I don’t feel she means to do us any harm. She could have done that easily already.” Lionel blushed again as he looked at his feet.

  “Lionel, I thought you were smarter than that. For all we know, your little lapse in judgment wasn’t that, but a carefully orchestrated plan to draw Cara out into the open so they could snag her.”

  “I’ve thought of that.”

  “Where is everyone else?”

  “Where aren’t they? We’re in radio communication. Since Cara doesn’t have a vehicle, we’re all over Sonoma County.”

  “Do a check-in with everyone. See if there are any new leads,” Paolo directed. He walked into the study, scanned the bookshelf and satisfied himself that the book was still where Marcus had placed it. He wanted to touch it, knowing it was something Cara had touched, but he didn’t want to leave his scent anywhere it could be detected
by a dark vamp.

  Cara was freezing cold, which only added to her confusion. She was running away from a house full of armed guards into the night filled with who-knew-what crazies. What was she running from? But her instincts had demanded she get out of that house. Something else internally told her she didn’t have much time to get her hands on that book before it fell into the wrong hands.

  Though she had on a long-sleeved shirt and jeans, they had not provided her with a jacket. She was going to have to find an all-night restaurant that served hot coffee, and had a decent bathroom. Then she’d sit down and think about what her next step should be.

  Over and over in her head she thought about the dark, handsome campus security staffer, Paolo Monteleone. Hadn’t she seen something in that face she could trust? Why was she not surprised when she slid into that bed last night and felt his presence? Was that the room he stayed in? Surely the master of a house that size would have a lavish master suite. And the maid had said it was a guest bedroom. So Mr. Monteleone was a guest?

  She scanned the pebbles along the dirt pathway that shone in the moonlight. It helped to keep moving. There was, thankfully, no wind. She would need some money in case she wound up on the road for a few days. She cursed the fact that she had no cell phone.

  She remembered her old phone, which was in a box at the apartment. Perhaps it had survived the bomb. She had planned to give it to Johnny. She stopped, frozen in space.

  Johnny. Suddenly she was filled with images of him lying in a pool of blood in her office, his head ripped almost completely off his body. She remembered the police and rescue crews. She now remembered the questioning she had undergone.

  So, Paolo Monteleone, whoever the hell he was, had been right. She had forgotten all these things, temporarily. Now they were coming back in layers.

  Cara headed further down the dirt path along the country road she knew led to the square in downtown Healdsburg. There might be a coffee shop open somewhere nearby. Someone who might give her a free cup, since she had no money.

  Paolo Monteleone. Something in her heart called out to him.

  And she felt the warm response in return. I am here, mi amore.

  Cara stopped and turned around. The street was deserted. An oncoming car’s headlights, though distant, scared her. She jumped behind some hedges and waited for it to pass.

  Her mind was racing as little pieces of memory began to stitch themselves together. She remembered the smell of the lemon shower gel, the way the robe in the bathroom had left a tingling sensation on her skin when she brushed against it. Sliding into the almond-colored satin sheets had been like sliding into—

  Then she saw the lovemaking. Paolo leaning over her, kissing her, filling her with his love. Hot tears began to slip down her cheeks. How could she have forgotten so much? Or were all these just vivid dreams?

  Are they dreams, or did I live them? What is happening to me?

  She started to run, seeing lights of a gas station directly in front of her. Checking her surroundings, she saw a car full of men waiting in the shadows. Grateful they hadn’t noticed her, she detoured around the bright lot, heading down Healdsburg Avenue toward the square.

  The bar crowd was letting out, and several couples lingered under twinkle lights of the square, gazing into shop windows. She pretended she was one of them. A bar was still open on her right, so she entered.

  Grateful for the darkly lit room, she motioned to the bartender she wanted to use the restroom and was granted a nod, as he pointed to the back. Locking the bathroom door behind her, she collapsed to fetal position, leaning against the wall covered in graffiti. The tears came. She felt hunted. Trapped in a strange bathroom. No money, no help. And there was something else; something dark and sinister had formed around her.

  Her eyes had been shut. When she opened them, a man she recognized from her apartment, dressed in black, stood before her in the women’s rest room.

  It was not Paolo.

  Instinctively she held her neck.

  “That’s right, little one. I nearly separated your pretty little head from your luscious body.”

  His hungry eyes perused her body like he owned her.

  “Paolo should be shot for keeping you all to himself.”

  “But I am not with Paolo.” She tried to sound brave. It didn’t work.

  “And good for me, then. Does this mean I won’t have to beat you to submission?” Dag stepped closer and yanked her to her feet, gripping her by the upper arm. “Or, do you like it rough, my sweet?”

  His foul breath sickened her. Paolo. Help me. He is here.

  Dag cocked his head to the side. “How nice. You speak to each other non-verbally. I get to eavesdrop on the lovers. This is a most unexpected pleasure.”

  Cara was terrified she’d committed a fatal error. She was hoping the fact that Paolo wasn’t answering her back meant that he was trying to locate her without being detected. She could tell he was close. God, she needed him and his strong arms.

  “When you and I are having delicious sex, your lover boy will be able to enjoy the festivities as well. How nice for you both.” Dag smiled and Cara could see the pink healing scar on his cheek from the wound Paolo had given him. Dag grabbed her by the hair and forced her face against his. His tongue plunged down her throat and made her gag.

  “I’m going to enjoy this. I shall kill you slowly, as I fuck you to death, Cara. Or, excuse me if I call you by the very apt name he gave you, mi amore.”

  Dag hauled her to the hallway and pulled her through the bar. She looked with alarm at the bartender, who frowned. He bent down and reached for something from under the bar. Dag turned on him before he could stand up.

  “Not wise, unless you want to sacrifice your life for hers.”

  The bartender stood back and raised his hands in surrender. “No trouble, please, no trouble,” he babbled nervously.

  “That’s what I thought. Good choice,” Dag said and continued to haul Cara out onto the street. A black van pulled up with its rear doors flapping open. Dag threw Cara inside and into the arms of several men, then slammed the door shut.

  She was assaulted by the rotten cabbage smell first. She tried to move and accidentally kneed someone’s foot. That someone was huge. He howled like a wolf. As the van began to take off, in the streetlight glare she could see a large, protruding, festering toe and what looked like a thoroughly rotten toenail sticking out from a hole crudely cut into a boot. The toe began to bleed.

  “Sorry,” she said, out of reflex.

  She was rewarded with a slap across the face that made the whole world go dark.

  Paolo lost her location just prior to arriving with Lionel at the square. The only opened structure on the block was a bar. He ran over to the bartender.

  “Have you seen a brown-haired woman, about twenty-six—“

  “Yes, she was just here. A guy dressed in black broke in the women’s restroom and took her. They took her in a black van.” He pointed outside. “They went down towards the freeway.”

  “Shit.” To Lionel’s wounded face he said, “They’ve got her. Damnit. Must have done something to her, because I can’t get a read on her. We were that close,” he held up his thumb and forefinger.

  “I’m going to call on Huge and Jeb and some of the boys to meet us here. We can trace the SEALs anywhere you say.

  “Come again?”

  “They dig the ride. Again, Paolo, long story. We don’t have time for this.”

  “Your little distraction will be among them?”

  “Fuckin’-A, she will be.”

  “You be careful. She could turn on you. Or be a secret ally of Dag.”

  “Not likely. She’s killed his executioner, just remember that.”

  Lionel radioed the rest of the teams, and a crowd of armed men in dark glasses traced, arms in arm, to the nearly abandoned streets of the square and quickly separated upon arrival. Paolo could hear a couple of wa-HOOs erupt from the crowd as he felt the sizzle of their en
ergy, pumped and ready for war.

  In the middle of the group was a stunningly beautiful blonde warrior woman, covered in camouflage face paint, wearing a skimpy top that showed her flat, muscled midriff. She also wore a pair of cutoff jeans revealing long, tanned thighs and muscular calves narrowing into steel-toed boots. Paolo was taken aback.

  “I’m Shirley,” she said, extending a leather-gloved hand. She wore an ammunition belt buckled over her shoulder, and gripped an H&K MP5 semiautomatic assault rifle like she was balancing a toddler on her hip. Paolo could feel Lionel’s testosterone level spiking off the charts, as well as that of the rest of the team.

  “Welcome to our war,” Paolo said and was rewarded with huge grins all around the group.

  Then he caught an internal image of a warehouse door being slid open. Cara’s vision was blurry, but he saw what she saw. She was sending him the images with great detail.

  He turned to Lionel. “Warehouse, greenish silver on the outside, near a chain link fence, like a school.”

  “I know right where it is,” Lionel replied. “Men, we’re rolling in, and hot. Shirley, you stick with me and Paolo.”

  “Yessir,” came the group reply. Arms were clasped. Paolo found himself being hugged by a couple of really huge mortal guys with tattoos covering their forearms and necks. Linked together, they traced to the warehouse.

  The team spread out. Lionel was whispering orders in his Invisio. Paolo wondered where he had gotten the training, but he was also very grateful the men seemed to know what they were doing. Shirley stayed by his side the whole time. He made a point to stay out of her way, too.

  He wondered if he should telegraph to Cara he was here. He decided it would be too dangerous for her. But the visions he got next speared him through his core. Cara was chained by the wrists. Her clothes were being stripped. She was standing naked in front of a room full of dark henchmen. Through Cara’s terrified eyes, he saw the images of every one of their faces, and he counted the numbers, grateful she had her wits about her.

  “I count fifteen at least,” Paolo turned and told Lionel. Jeb and Hugh Jett each took five men and planted them outside the other two entrances.