by Virna DePaul
Tamsin observed the action discreetly in her compact mirror. An open stare would earn her a vicious slap from Vlad. He considered it disrespectful, and had even told her once that it was a sign of aggression among his people.
She was so not looking forward to their upcoming clan gathering. She just wasn’t all about family, not after growing up in foster care until distant relatives had taken her in. Left to the mercy of her nasty boy cousins, Tamsin got an early education in rough sex.
But at least they didn’t drink blood. The vampires might just decide that she was the goddamn first course. She had only ever allowed Vlad to drink from her. The unusual sensation intensified her natural inclination toward submission, something she hadn’t explored much until Vladimir had introduced her to its pleasures. He did the thinking. She could just drift and enjoy herself. The way he handled her was seldom gentle once he was aroused—it helped her really let go. She was perfectly willing to get spanked, tied up, whatever he wanted to do.
He had hinted at other, stronger pleasures in her future. Tamsin was eager, in her lazy way. Vlad was older than she was—he never said exactly how much older—but he had a rock star body and a long, gorgeous cock to match.
And if she satisfied him properly, he could be quite generous. There was a lot in it for her in this relationship if she behaved herself. The occasional dead body underfoot was no big deal to Tamsin.
One of Vlad’s underlings was crossing the unfinished arena toward them, keeping his head down so as not to look at her.
That was something else Vladimir Ouspensky didn’t allow. She snapped the compact shut when she felt his dark gaze sweep toward her. Tamsin turned to him, totally focused on his face. He stepped in front of her, running a hand through her hair, stroking her cheek in a possessive way.
She couldn’t see the murdered man being rolled into the tarp. But she heard the dragging sound of canvas over concrete as Vlad’s terse orders were carried out. They had left the arena by the time the pipe disgorged a flood of cement and embedded the shrouded body forever.
Vlad guided her past the elevator to a private staircase tucked behind closed doors to which only he had the access code. He indulged himself once more in the pleasure of sliding his hand up her skirt, fondling her intimately as she mounted the stairs, staying in front of him. The high heels she wore made her hips sway temptingly under the filmy dress that clung to her bare behind.
He withdrew his hand to tap a code into a keypad and exit with her to the main level. He stopped and let her go on, wanting to experience what ordinary customers would see. A runway bracketed with footlights split the space in two, with front-row seats for the big spenders and cocktail tables for others. The strippers and the dancers would work the runway in timed shows. Above it were two balcony levels; with the second, higher level cantilevered over the first so that no one would miss a second of the constant action. Each level was glassed in, so that clubbers could see and be seen. Access was restricted to the attractive ones who made it past the velvet rope, of course.
All of that was for humans. The far more exclusive group of born vampires with wealth, his personal A-list, would not care to mingle with them. Vlad had built the underground level for his own kind, where no disturbing ray of sunlight could penetrate. Dark deeds could be carried out within its shrouded spaces and no one above would ever be the wiser.
“Looks super great,” Tamsin enthused, looking around like she was seeing it all for the first time. Vlad barely heard her.
They did need publicity. He hoped the media coverage of the preopening party would be favorable. He wanted to outclass every club in Atlanta, put Club Red on the map in a big way from day one. To do that, he’d spent a fortune to host a press junket, including dozens of plane tickets and deluxe rooms at the hotel and a charter bus to herd them all back and forth. And then there were the swag bags. Reporters and bloggers who posted glowing reviews would find ten thousand dollars cash tucked into theirs. They all gossiped. The critics would sing a different tune the second they found out about Vladimir Ouspensky’s generosity.
He had planned it all.
Chapter 15
Barrett strolled beside Ginny along the river, sidestepping an occasional jogger and rejoining the older woman at a wider part of the walkway.
Ginny kept looking around, as if someone were following them. Barrett didn’t push, knowing whatever it was Ginny had to tell her, she had to do it in her own time.
Finally, the other woman fumbled with the strap of the large tote over her shoulder and checked inside. Barrett glimpsed a file folder stuffed with what looked like legal documents and a closed paper bag.
The older woman looked up again, down the path to a stone bench in a secluded nook. “Let’s sit there. I—I found some papers in the attic that I wanted to discuss with you. That’s why I couldn’t meet with you at home.”
A few minutes later, Barrett was reading them quickly as Ginny’s nervous gaze darted up and down the path. No one seemed to notice them. The slowly flowing river, a dull gray-green, carried a few kayakers downstream.
Barrett turned to Ginny, her stomach churning with disgust. “These are dated a year before Sarah’s death.”
“That’s correct.”
“He wanted Sarah to die. Because he knew you’d get custody of Jane. Because he liked looking at her.”
“Because he wanted to do more than look at her,” Ginny whispered. It was as if the older woman had no rage left, only sadness. Her worn face seemed defeated. Yet she had come here to try and make things right.
“He was so controlling with her. I thought he was trying to be a good father figure. Not …” She pressed her lips together.
“You need to get these back into his files. And you need to pretend you never found it. Not yet, Ginny. Not until we have a better idea of what’s going on with Jane. If it turns out he had something to do with her disappearance, we don’t want to tip our hand.”
“I can fake like nothing’s wrong. I’ve had a lot of practice at it.” Ginny’s terse reply had the ring of truth. “Those are copies. You can keep them. A friend of mine has a second set. The originals are back in his study.”
The women exchanged a look of mutual understanding. Barrett knew she had an ally in Ginny.
“I stayed with Malcolm partly so that Jane would have a home until she was at least eighteen. Now? I hate that I didn’t see him for what he was. That he posed such a threat to Jane. But at least now I have no choice but to leave him, something I should have done long ago.”
The older woman reached into her tote and took out a new paper bag folded over several times at the top. She met Barrett’s curious look. “No, this isn’t evidence. Even though I saw on TV that they collect it this way.”
“Oh. What is it?”
Ginny handed the bag to Barrett. “Jane’s sleep shirt and sleep socks. They were under her pillow. In case you need them—” She broke off.
Her meaning was clear enough. Sooner or later in abduction cases, trained dogs were used to help find victims.
Barrett took care of other business once she had returned to her apartment. The folder of Malcolm’s documents she stashed in a desk drawer, not wanting to look at it again for a little while. Pedophilia was nothing new to her, but she needed time to get her anger under control. Then she’d analyze the document more closely for hidden clues to his relationship with the girl. She might be able to find some hint in there of a plan—his—to abduct Jane someday. For her own good—or so he seemed to think. Men like Malcolm Prescott were capable of fooling everyone.
Her cell rang from inside her purse, muffled. She dug around, not finding it, and picked up on the last ring.
“Hey. It’s Nick.”
Barrett stiffened. “Hello.” She hadn’t called him since he’d left without saying good-bye. She hadn’t known what to say.
“You were right, Barrett. The Turning Program hasn’t been shut down. My handler—Director Rick Hallifax—has been lying to me
.”
“Hallifax,” she whispered. “I know that name.”
“You should. Apparently he’s the person in charge of Belladonna. Fuck, no wonder he never told me about it. Told me about you. Your whole mission is to contain vampire criminals so the Turning Program doesn’t get shut down.”
“How did you find all this out?”
“I went searching. And once I went searching with certain names at my disposal—Peter Lancaster, being one of them—it wasn’t hard for me to come up with the name of Kyle Mahone.”
She sucked in her breath on a hiss. “You talked to him?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“And I ran your theory by him. The one about the FBI experimenting with a select few turneds. Then recruiting me to get rid of them when the experiments backfired. We don’t know if it’s true, we might never know, but it’s on his radar now. So, unfortunately, am I.” He took an audible breath. “Barrett, listen—I owe you an explanation.”
“You don’t owe me—”
“I do. And I’m sorry, angel. I know you were just saying what you had to say.”
“And I know why you reacted the way you did,” she said quietly. “And why you wouldn’t want to believe it. But it doesn’t change anything, Nick. You did what you had to. You saved your brother needless suffering.”
“Maybe. Or maybe if the FBI poisoned him, it had the means to reverse that poison. Or it might … in time.”
Oh, God. She hadn’t thought of that. “Nick—”
He barked with bitter laughter. “God, we’re a pair, aren’t we. How could we possibly be together? Our combined guilt and baggage doesn’t leave room for much else.”
Was he trying to tell her something? Like he’d changed his mind about how committed he was to her? When he said nothing else, she asked, “So that’s where you’ve been all this time? Tracking down Mahone. Because I was hoping you’d call me eventually.”
There. It wasn’t exactly a declaration of love, but he’d have to know what she’d meant. What he meant to her.
“Of course I was going to call you, Barrett.”
Of course, he said. Because of Jane?
Or because of them?
He’d told her he loved her. And she hadn’t said it back, even though she felt the same way. Even now she was relying on his intuition to guess how she felt. Was she really that much of a coward? Maybe at one time.
Nick had accused her of running before. Running away from him. From the certainty that loving him would hurt.
But for the past two days, not knowing where he was or if he’d actually get in touch with her again? That had hurt more than anything she’d ever experienced.
So she wasn’t running again.
She was fully committed. Enough for both of them, if need be.
“Anyway,” he said, his voice tight, and the sound of it made her heart clench. “I just wanted to apologize, fill you in on what I learned from Mahone, and let you know what the NSA techs found on the laptop’s hard drive.”
There it was again, that sharp bite of jealousy. By now she knew it was unwarranted, but she couldn’t resist needling him a little. “Hmm. Let me guess. You talked to Ms. Wong again?”
He paused, then spoke, his tone far lighter than it had been. “That’s right. I had to sleep with her and her identical twin sister before she’d talk. Twenty times in all. Together. Apart. Whew. They wore me out.”
Bastard, she thought with more humor than heat. It was no use sticking out her tongue when he couldn’t see her. “I’m sure you did your best, stud. Did the NSA find anything usable on your computer?”
Nick sighed, finally accepting that Barrett had truly accepted his apology. “Easy hacks, apparently. There is no such thing as privacy in cyberspace.”
“So why were we lured into it? Who saw us looking?”
“Whoever wanted us on the hook. For whatever reason.”
“I take it there was no way to identify that person or persons.”
“Correct. The URL wasn’t registered to an individual.” She heard the rustle of paper. Nick sounded like he was looking at notes he’d made. “Let me double-check my hard copies. Okay. Long story short, all of the SexFlash websites are traceable to one hub. Just one. You would think with that much money at stake that they would be more careful, but no.”
She stuck to the subject. “Where is the hub?”
“New City.”
“What about the portal to the video feed from the white room?”
“That came from somewhere very close to a place that hasn’t opened yet, also in New City. Ultra luxury, for the discerning man about town, according to their online ads. Multilevel space, not completed. It’s going to be called Club Red.”
“Seriously? I found a Club Red flyer in Malcolm Prescott’s car trash. It’s opening in a few days. There’s an open call for auditions. Dancers. Strippers.”
“How the fuck about that.”
They were both kind of stunned. She spoke first. “Anything else, Nick?”
“Yeah. The owner has an unusual name—hang on, I have it on my phone.” He paused to tap into a different screen. “Vladimir Ouspensky. Russian national, papers in order, no expired visas, hasn’t done anything bad. Shacks up with a Miss Silicone at the same hotel we stayed at.”
“I wonder if I saw him,” she whispered. “Or her.”
“I’m looking at her photo right now. I know I didn’t. I would have remembered her.” She knew he hadn’t meant that in a good way.
“The FBI’s official task force on trafficking confirmed an influx of several hundred women and girls to the area in the last year. Strip clubs, exotic dance revues, you name it. Club Red is muscling in on the action. And this is interesting. There’s a nice new blood bank in town. I’m thinking their clients might include vampires who can pay top dollar for scary smoothies.”
“Riiight,” Barrett said. “God, of course. So simple. But has Belladonna checked around at any local blood banks? No. Too obvious and a waste of our super spy time.”
“No one can think of everything at once,” he said.
Nice of him not to slam the competition, if her agency actually was any competition for him.
“Let me back up, Nick. Collette is investigating the most important blood businesses in the U.S. We need to get on this.”
“Don’t be too hard on yourself. I’ve got skills,” he said.
“You do, Nick,” she said softly. “The best.”
Had he thought she was being sarcastic? Not anymore. A silence stretched out until he cleared his throat. When he spoke, it was only to say, “Getting back to the flyer and the ads—there has to be a connection between Club Red and Jane.”
“So what am I going to do?”
“You mean, what are we going to do? Because one thing’s for sure. I’m not a hired gun for the FBI anymore. Not given what I’ve found. I’m just not going to tell them that yet.”
“Okay. So what are we going to do?”
“First, aerial surveillance of the club.”
“You have the chopper.”
“Yeah. But seeing as how my bunker’s no longer safe, both me and the chopper have been holed up at the base just outside of New City.”
“Right,” she said, rubbing her temple.
“You okay?”
“Sometimes I still struggle to process all this, you know?”
“Yeah,” he whispered. “I know.” He cleared his throat. “So, how about you? I’m going to be flying. What are you going to be working on?” he asked.
He was going to get a look at Club Red from the air. It only made sense that she try to do so from the ground. But something stopped her from telling him that. Maybe it was the fact things were already so tense between them. Or that she didn’t want him to try and stop her because he wanted to protect her again. Whatever it was, it guided her answer.
“I’m going to check in with Belladonna. Make sure Ty and Peter and Ana are doing okay. You know, n
o signs of neuron-rage.” She was also going to call Justine and enlist her help to get inside Club Red.
He didn’t respond, as if he was weighing whether she was being truthful or not.
“Keep me posted,” she finally said.
“Same with you, angel,” he replied. He hesitated for a fraction, as if he wanted to say something else.
But he didn’t. So she did, blurting it out before she lost her nerve. “I love you, Nick. I always have.”
Before he could respond, she hung up.
Chapter 16
Nick did another flyover of New City. He didn’t swoop down or do any wild moves that would attract attention, keeping an eye on the feed from the gyrocam and following its grid, which matched the street layout, except where it ended in sprawl.
Even so, his heart was pumping and his adrenaline was rushing.
He wished he was inside a jet, conducting high-G maneuvers: rolls, climbs, loops, barrels, and turns. He wanted to pump his fists and scream like a madman.
Because Barrett loved him. And she’d actually said it.
And fuck-fuck-fuck, if he wasn’t already up in the air, he’d still feel like he was flying.
Grinning, he shook his head and told himself for the thousandth time to settle down. She’d said it. She’d meant it. The next time she said it, he was going to make sure he was inside her and she had her legs wrapped around him. Until then he had to keep his shit together and focus on the mission at hand—finding and saving Jane. Then there was the fact that the FBI had lied to him, that Barrett had turned vampires for friends and that they might pose a problem in the very near future, and a hundred and one other concerns to deal with.
But right now, Barrett loved him and he was holding that close.
A minute later, he was over Club Red.
It had been built on the outskirts of the city, standing alone in a lot of raw land. Green turf had been laid around the building, and the parking lot spaces marked off.
He used a remote cam to take dozens of photos. You never knew what was going to be important. Visibility was excellent, for what it was worth.