by Angie Derek
Lily bit her lip in automatic doubt, but nodded and turned to jog down the alley away from all the vampires including her guardian.
CHAPTER TWO
Lily walked down the quiet road toward the emergency lights flashing in the night. Sophie was almost asleep and a dead weight in her aching arms. If their lives didn’t depend on continuing to move and putting distance between them and the vampires, she would have dropped several blocks back. She worried over coming across a band of roving vamps. The darkness surrounding them wasn’t helping her nerves.
Revolving blue and red lights beckoned to her like a beacon. Several police cars were parked in front of a convenience store, their lights flashing, but no sirens blared. She didn’t allow herself to hesitate as she approached on the sidewalk. Hopefully Brenda was successful in her mission, but she couldn’t count on it and there could be a pack of vampires quickly closing in on her. She had to get out of the heart of the city and fast.
Lily needed help. Slowing her steps, she wondered if she should try to get assistance and how she would convince someone to help her. The vehicles in front of the gas station were all police cars. Several cops meandered casually around. Whatever had happened here was over and they were wrapping it up. Her eyes met with an officer as he came toward her.
Her gaze locked with his. An instant connection zapped through her body taking her by surprise and she froze. He wasn’t a vamp or a pet, but this sense of familiarity worried her. Her brain told her to keep walking, but her body didn’t obey and he reached her in a couple of short strides.
Dark brown eyes moved from holding her stare to sweeping Sophie with a quick look. “You okay?”
His deep voice caressed her spine and she shivered in the hot, humid air. “I need help,” she said, surprising herself by her own truthfulness. The bond solidified between them. He would help her if she could convince him. “We have to get away from here.”
“This way.” His hand caught her elbow and he propelled her to the patrol car closest to them.
As he opened the passenger door, another officer jogged toward them from the other side of the gas station. A vampire’s pet had spotted her. She wasn’t surprised a cop was a pet, but she wondered at how quickly he’d recognized her. She could barely tell he was under the influence of a vampire from this distance. He shouldn’t have been able to see who she was.
Her officer followed her glance and shoved her roughly into the seat. Slamming the door, he ran around to the driver’s side. His door thudded shut and he shifted the car into gear. The tires squealed as he spun the wheel to shoot out onto the street.
She looked over her shoulder, watching the blinking lights fade away as the car swerved down a side street. The engine roared as they raced down the dark road.
“Are you injured?” he asked.
She pulled her gaze from the rear window trying to see if the pet followed them. Her attention riveted by his warm eyes again, eyes that seemed to know what she was thinking. “I’m fine.” She jerked her gaze away to stare at the street in front of them.
“You’re covered in blood.” His voice was even, but loaded with tension. She wasn’t sure how she knew, but his normal voice was much slower and relaxed.
“It’s not mine.” She needed to reassure him so he wouldn’t insist on taking her to a hospital or any other public place where she would be found.
“The girl’s?”
She shook her head. “She’s uninjured. Someone else’s.”
With the hotel and pet far behind them her fleeing instincts were backing off to allow her brain to start communicating with her. Her brain wasn’t too happy with the situation she found herself in. He’d just loaded a woman covered in blood with a small child in his car without a single question. Normal people didn’t do that. He’d gotten her out of there as if he’d known who and what she was running from.
Lily forced herself to look at him again determined to see why he’d helped them and when he glanced to meet her gaze she focused on his eyes. They were alive with no sign of any vampire influence. His lips quirked as if he knew what she was doing, and he focused back on the road before pulling off into the parking lot of a mega box store.
****
Reyes Vega waited for her to say something as he shifted the car into park. Besides asking for help she hadn’t said much of anything. He turned to her, resting his arm across the steering wheel as he tried to see her through the blinding glow of her aura. He’d noticed her as bright as a beacon walking toward the convenience store, a whitelighter, just like his mother. Revving down his senses he was able to see her blue eyes and suspicious frown.
He supposed she had a lot to be frowning about, including finding herself in a car with a man she knew next to nothing about. Her intent had been clear when she’d read his eyes to make sure he wasn’t under the influence of a vampire.
He checked the rearview mirror again to make sure no one was coming in the entrance. She was being hunted just as his sister had been. He hadn’t been there to protect his sister. But he could protect this woman and the child she held.
“Why did you help me?” Her voice was soft like the features in her face.
He couldn’t stop staring at her eyes. Whether she would allow his help would depend on his answer. “My mother would never forgive me if I let another whitelighter fall to the vamps.”
Her eyes widened in shock. “You know what I am. But you’re not a…”
“No.” He shook his head. Regret cruised through his veins. He would always wonder if he could have saved his sister if he’d been born with real powers. “But I know one when I see one. My mother’s a whitelighter.”
“Oh.” She bit her lip.
The gesture had him focusing on her mouth and a completely inappropriate shot of desire went straight through his gut. She needed his help not his lust.
The radio squawked with a familiar call sign, his. His supervisor was finally asking for a status check. He hadn’t cleared the convenience store robbery with his dispatch when he’d darted out of there. He swore mentally and tried to think of what to say to Tony Faber. He couldn’t risk bringing her into the station. The pet who had spotted her at the robbery scene wasn’t the only cop in his department under the influence of a supernatural creature. Tony wasn’t one of them, but he didn’t know what Officer Dave Method might have already said to his sergeant.
Disappearing with a patrol car wasn’t even on the table. If he failed to answer his radio for much longer dispatch they would put a trace on the car.
He grabbed the mic. “JSO Z-two F-three, seventy-seven, fifty-three citizen assist, en route to Urgent Care on Atlantic.” He set the mic down as dispatch acknowledged his traffic. Tony’s voice acknowledged quickly and then asked for an update on another officer. Turning the speaker down so he could still hear, but the audio wouldn’t talk over them, he looked back at her.
“I want to thank you for your assistance.” She hesitated. “I’m afraid I’m going to ask for more.”
He smiled slightly to reassure her. “You couldn’t shake me if you tried.”
She nodded and he suddenly realized he had no idea what her name was.
“What should I call you?”
Her hand ran down the child’s blonde pony tail. Amazingly, the girl was in a deep sleep. Her lips parted as she breathed. “Lily, and this is my sister, Sophie.”
“I’m Reyes Vega. What do you need?”
“A safe place to hide for the night free of pets and vamps.” The little girl shifted in her arms. The family resemblance between the two was incredibly strong. If he had to guess, the young woman had probably looked identical to her sister at the same age.
His first thought was his condo, but then he realized his home would be the worst place considering Dave would easily be able to look up his address. It had to be someplace where there weren’t any vampires who would be able to spot her.
The doors to the store swished open and he frowned at the couple walking out.
The woman’s colors in her aura were off enough to concern him. Lily followed his gaze as he shifted the car back into drive and drove away from the couple before the woman had a chance to look inside.
“What is it? Vampire?”
He hesitated, but shook his head. “No, but could be a pet. Bad swirls.”
“Swirls?”
A pet would have to get a lot closer to Lily to be able to feel the power coming off her. How had Dave known what she was? He should have been too far away to recognize a whitelighter by sight. Dave didn’t have any abilities as far as he knew which made him wonder if her’s and the child’s descriptions were being broadcasted through the underground.
****
The roads remained mostly empty as they drove away from the store. He still hadn’t elaborated on his cryptic comment. She watched him tap his fingers on the steering wheel and waited for him to tell her he needed to get back to work and his life. Lily remained silent hoping to get as long a car ride as she could before she would have to hoof it again. She had no idea where she was so the first thing she had to do was figure out where they were. Looking out the window, her eyes blurred from exhaustion and she wasn’t sure she would even remember the street names she was reading five minutes from now.
“I’m going to call my dispatch. Just be quiet so they don’t hear you, okay?”
She looked back at him and nodded. What was he going to tell them?
He flipped his cell phone open and pressed in the number with one eye on the road. “Hey Amber, it’s Vega. Can you clear me from the Urgent Care? Yeah, flag down. Listen, I haven’t been feeling well all night. I think I’ve got the stomach flu. I’m gonna need to go ten-ten. Great. Thanks, Amber. Yeah, talk to you tomorrow. Have a good night.” He disconnected the call and set the phone down next to him before glancing at her again. “It’ll be a couple minutes before she logs me out so we’ll have time to get to the station and get my truck before anyone knows.”
“Where are we going?”
“The station’s a few blocks away.” The car roared as he pressed on the accelerator. “We’ll take my truck and go down to the river to lay low.”
She tried to remember what she knew about the river, but even though they had been hiding in Jacksonville for a couple of months she didn’t know much about the area. Sophie shifted with a whine and Lily slipped her hand under the small pack to rub her back as she hummed to get her to relax again. Of course, she’d probably wake up when they switched cars, but it couldn’t be helped. Sophie needed the oblivion of sleep to forget. The tires squeaked as he whipped the wheel and pulled in behind the sheriff sub-station.
He parked the sedan right next to a truck. “Here.” He pulled a key from his pocket and passed it to her. “You two get in and I’ll grab my stuff.”
Lily swung her door open, breathing deeply before emerging from the safety of the vehicle. Sophie stirred only slightly to snuggle tighter into Lily’s arms as she unlocked the grey truck’s passenger door. She slid in and shut the door behind her. A bench seat ran in the back, but she didn’t want to relinquish her sister so she kept her in her arms. Reyes opened the driver’s side door and threw in a bunch of stuff onto the bench seat. He jumped in, plucked the key she held out, and started the truck. Despite its old age the engine roared to life with the purr of a well maintained vehicle.
The clock on the dash told her it was two in the morning as he drove down the back street behind the station. Sleep threatened to envelop her as the adrenalin continued to fade. Somehow she forced herself to stay semi-awake for the most part, but when the truck bounced a curb she was pretty sure she’d nodded off at some point. Darkness surrounded the building he parked in front of. A small neon sign flashed “vacancy” in the window.
She rubbed her eyes and tried to get her brain functioning again as she looked out the window. Small cabins surrounded the main building where they were parked. The place looked like one of those cabin motels that usually advertised weekly rentals on the outskirts of a large city.
“I’ll go in.” In the dark, he unbuttoned his uniform shirt and unvelcroed his bulletproof vest, tossing them onto the bench seat. A few clicks and his heavy belt and gear followed though he shoved something into the back of his pants. “Stay where I can see you.”
She frowned, but didn’t protest. The catnap had cleared some of the fog she had been functioning in. Why was she following his lead without any protestation? She only followed Brenda without question when there were vamps hot on their heels. The rest of the time she drove Brenda nuts refusing to do as she was told. But here she was, no vamps hot on her heels, being led around like a little child with a man she’d met barely an hour ago. An armed man.
He grinned slightly and jumped out of the cab to walk into the dimly lit office. In less than five minutes, while she sat there debating the pros and cons of staying or running, he climbed back into the truck and drove to the last cabin.
“Alls good, let’s go,” Reyes said.
Lily followed, Sophie secure in her arms, and stifled a yawn as he herded her into the cabin farthest from the road. He flicked on the lone light and she was relieved to see it looked clean. But it wasn’t your typical hotel room. A lumpy couch, small dinette table and a TV dresser stand greeted them.
He gestured to the door in the corner. “Bedroom’s separate.”
She peeked in. A queen size bed took up almost all of the small space. Laying Sophie across the bed, she focused on the task of stripping the child out of her bloody clothes. She pulled a shirt out from Sophie’s backpack and slipped it over Sophie’s head. Tugging the covers back, she tucked in her still sleeping sister.
Reyes leaned against the door jamb his expression searching, but when he spoke his words didn’t reflect what he must have been thinking. “Go ahead and clean up if you want, I’ll keep an eye out.”
She waited until he stepped back into the front room before shutting herself in the bathroom. Thinking better of shutting the door, she cracked it open, so she could hear her sister. She made quick work of stripping out of her clothes. She kicked all of them into the corner and turned the shower on needing to wash off what had soaked through her clothing.
The shower woke her out of her stupor. Now fully awake, she stepped out of the low tub and dried herself off before pulling on the single change of clothes she kept in her backpack. Even after towel drying herself, her black cotton t-shirt clung to her. The grubby clothes in the corner brought the entire evening’s activities back in stark detail. With a resigned sigh, she reached into the bloody jeans pockets and pulled out her pocket knife, her latest fake ID, and the small wad of twenty dollar bills, transferring them to one of the pockets in the cargo pants.
Steam followed her out of the bathroom and she peeked at Sophie to make sure she was still asleep. Lily tip-toed to the bed and smoothed the covers over her sleeping sister. She watched her a moment wishing her second wind, or perhaps her third wind, didn’t have her wide awake.
CHAPTER THREE
Stepping into the small living room, she hesitated at the sight of the man she barely knew standing in front of the single window, peering out into the darkness. She studied him in the dim light. He was at least half a foot taller than she, almost six feet, and lean with a hint of muscles outlined under his shirt. His gaze remained on the parking lot.
A dash of panic skittered up her spine at his intensity. “Is someone out there?”
He shook his head, turned to her and smiled reassuringly. “Just keeping watch. I think you’re safe for now.”
She stepped into the room, noting he had made a bed on the lumpy couch. “Bathroom’s yours.”
“I’m fine.” His voice was rough and he turned back to look out the window. “You should sleep.”
“I’m awake now.” The reminder of sleep made her wish she could fall asleep. It would be ugly when this latest burst of energy drained out.
He looked back at her as he hit the switch to turn the lone lamp off. The room we
nt dark except for a faint glow from the walkway lights outside.
She chewed on her lip. “You could sleep.”
“I’m on graves. Won’t feel tired till morning.”
The darkness added a layer of intimacy to his voice. She went to the window herself to look out and make sure all was really silent. Amping her power up, she looked out and he chuckled.
“What?” She glanced back at him.
“You’re blinding me.” He closed his eyes briefly before glancing back at her.
She cocked her head not understanding what he meant. “How?”
“Your whitelight, it goes neon whenever you run hot.”
Crossing her arms, she faced him, pulling it back in. “Better?”
“Yeah, we’ll have to work on that.”
“You going to tell me how you can see my light when you aren’t a vampire?”
“A little late to be asking me such a suspicious question.” He raised an eyebrow and smiled. “I told you my mother is a whitelighter.”
“But you can actually see the light. Normal people don’t see the light. What are you, Reyes?” Her intuition told her she could trust him, but she wouldn’t be led around any longer without answers. She had to know what made him different.
His dark brown eyes stayed on hers, his lips still curved into an amused smile. “I read auras.”
The swirls comment outside the store suddenly made sense. “That’s how you knew the other officer was a pet when you looked at him.” Her own instincts allowed her to sense when someone was a pet or a vampire if she was close enough, but she couldn’t visually see the difference. “Like a sign?”
“I know. Not very studly. My sister got the real powers. I got something pretty useless.”
“You see people for who they really are. I wouldn’t call that useless.”
He shrugged, his eyes straying away for a moment before catching her gaze again. “It might be helpful, but it isn’t useful when the shit hits the fan.”