Midnight Hunter (The Execution Underground Book 3)

by Kait Ballenger

  She’d never claimed to be smart.

  * * *

  THIS WAS GOING to be even harder than he’d anticipated, because...well...he was already harder than he’d anticipated, and wow, did that make him feel like a grade-A creeper. Shane dared another glance at Vera as she walked beside him down the block. He should not be this attracted to a student, let alone a student who also happened to be a witch, yet here he was, as hungry for her as the day he’d first seen her in his classroom months ago.

  It was only a little over a month since he’d discovered that she was not only temptingly beautiful, but a witch with black magic history to boot. During a brief meeting about class work, he’d put two and two together when she’d known far more about the occult than your average religious studies student. One would think that would have been a huge deterrent to his libido, considering he hunted witches for a living, yet somehow it wasn’t.

  Despite having grown up the son of a Vegas showgirl and spending countless hours hanging out in dressing rooms with some of the most beautiful women from around the world stripping naked before his eyes, the sight of Vera Sanders fully clothed and in his jacket made him sweat. He wasn’t really sure what it was about her that drew him so strongly, but the combination of long jet-black hair, nearly glowing green eyes and milky-white skin sent his pulse racing to parts of his body other than his heart. If he envisioned what he thought Snow White would look like embodied in the flesh, she was it...well, if Snow White wore fishnets and a plaid miniskirt. Couple that with painted red lips and the long legs of a Rockette, and he was basically a goner.

  Clearly, when it came to Vera, in spite of all his intelligence, he had no common sense. If he did, he wouldn’t be here.

  He wasn’t even quite sure what it was about her that flipped all his switches to the on position and made his brain short-circuit like he was a twenty-year-old Compaq computer instead of the iMac it normally functioned like. He didn’t even really know her, but from the moment he’d seen her, he’d wanted to get to know her, even though he knew that was a very bad decision.

  “So what is it you wanted to talk to me about?” she asked.

  He shoved his hands in his pockets to shield them from the cold air blowing off Lake Ontario. “I’ve just been assigned a case I could use your help on. I’d like you to point me in the right direction.”

  She raised an eyebrow at him like he was nuts. Maybe he was. After all, being near her in a personal capacity, let alone working with her, was a compromise to both his professions, yet part of him wanted to do so much more. But he couldn’t and he wouldn’t. Damn, he was messed up.

  “What sort of case could you possibly need my help with?”

  “A case involving black magic. I need someone to help me navigate, or at the very least locate, any and all black-magic covens in town.”

  Vera stopped in her tracks. The silence left when her high-heeled boots were no longer clicking against the pavement was awful. Nothing but the sounds of the occasional car driving by with blaring, bass-thumping rap music, a staple in this neighborhood, and the wind remained.

  Her jaw fell open slightly. “First off, why in the world would you assume I know anything about the black-magic covens in this city?” Color rose in her cheeks as her words filled with anger. “And secondly, even if I did, why would I give you any information about them? I don’t owe you anything.” She glared at him.

  That wasn’t the reaction he was expecting. “I’m sorry. I just assumed with your past history you might know...”

  She scoffed. “Yeah, that’s right, you assumed. You know what assuming does? It makes an ass out of ‘u’ and ‘me,’ so now you’re an ass for thinking I’m involved in anything to do with black magic, and I’m an ass because I’m standing here yelling at my professor. So thanks for that, Dr. Grey. Thanks.”

  He met her gaze. “As I’ve mentioned before, you can call me Shane when we’re not in class.”

  She huffed and threw her hands into the air, stripping off his coat. She bundled it into a ball and threw it at him. Without another word, she turned and stomped back toward her apartment.

  He hurried after her. “I’m sorry I offended you. That wasn’t my intention. I was hoping you could shed some light on...”

  She spun to face him and pegged him with another menacing glare. “I can’t shed any light on anything for you, nor would I willingly help the Execution Underground again. That was a onetime-only deal.” She almost sneered at the mention of the organization he had sworn his life to. “Do me a favor and forget this conversation ever happened.” She turned on her heel again and strode off.

  As he watched her go, he couldn’t help but wonder why simply asking for her help had angered her so much. Logic told him it was reasonable to think she might know something about black magic, considering she had a past history of it, so much so that at one point she’d gotten herself into trouble with the Execution Underground. He had seen how black magic affected someone, and he knew how bad addiction could get. It was a nasty, vicious cycle.

  Black magic caused a person to feel powerful, grandiose even, like some sort of magical high. In many ways it was just as addictive, perhaps more so, than the cocaine his mother had snorted throughout his entire childhood in order to work all the long hours needed to put food on the table as a single parent. While street drugs deteriorated your health, black magic damaged the soul in a way that, if not stopped, was irreparable.

  He hoped Vera wasn’t irreparable.

  * * *

  VERA’S HEELS RAPPED against the pavement as she stormed back to her apartment. Frustration and anger throbbed in her temples. She slammed the building door behind her for added drama and stomped up the stairs. Who cared if it was the middle of the night and her lousy neighbors were sleeping? They woke her up on a regular basis with their bad seventies porno antics, anyway. Debbie Does Dallas, anyone?

  When she finally reached her apartment she shucked off her boots before promptly pitching them at her sofa as if the torn-up cushions were the perpetrator of her current woes. Ripping her shirt over her head, she marched into her bedroom, stumbling out of her skirt and fishnets as she went. A massive blob of fur and fat lay sleeping directly in the middle of her feather-down pillow. The gargantuan tomcat didn’t take any notice when she flopped down on the bed beside him.

  “I’m angry at myself, Binks.”

  Binks cracked open one lazy yellow eye to glare at her before closing it again.

  She frowned. “Aren’t you supposed to do my bidding, you big lug? Isn’t that what a familiar is for?”

  Binks opened both eyes this time and crouched into a long cat stretch, his large belly swaying against the pillowcase. He turned in a circle, his tail held high in the air, then flopped back down again with narrowed eyes that clearly said, Don’t interrupt my sleep, infernal human.

  She covered her face with her hands. Binks had never been any good at doing her bidding. Black-magic familiars were said to be a gift from the devil, a means for a witch to enhance her power. Binks had showed up on her doorstep several years earlier at the height of her past forays into the dark arts. At the time she’d wondered why of all the animals Satan could have sent her, she’d ended up with an overweight white-and-orange tomcat. Binks was supposed to be a part of her, a reflection of her magical abilities. She often wondered what it said about her abilities that Binksy’s most stunning accomplishments were finishing off an entire Sam’s Club pallet of Fancy Feast in a week and spending copious hours attempting to lick his own balls.

  Speaking of accomplishments, she had really hit it out of the ballpark in the I’m-a-freaking-idiot competition tonight. There was no reason in the world for her to have taken such offense to Dr. Grey’s assumptions she might know something about black-magic covens in the area, because, well...she did. When she’d exploded with anger, she’d known very well tha
t her anger wasn’t directed at him. Anger at herself bubbled inside her for being so fucking weak, for being an addict, for doing things she knew she shouldn’t be doing and not caring about the consequences. She wasn’t certain what it was, but something about Shane—no, Dr. Grey, she needed to call him Dr. Grey if she were to have any semblance of hope of maintaining her distance—made her feel like she was better, like she was worth more than that.

  Of all the things about him—his obviously superior intelligence, the fact that he was a hunter, his badass combat skills—it was the feeling he inspired in her that scared her the most.

  CHAPTER THREE

  INTERRUPTIONS IN THE middle of a good lecture were the bane of Shane’s existence. He was fairly certain of that. He nearly swore as his thoughts jumbled. His words fell apart midsentence while the most gorgeous distraction he’d ever laid eyes on slipped into the back of his classroom. The door to the lecture hall thumped closed behind her in the relative silence of her fellow students scribbling notes. Vera slid into the back row, not bothering to look up at him.

  He wasn’t normally one to call out students on being late, as much as their behavior frustrated him. He was easygoing by nature, but something about the casual way she strolled in, despite how she had basically cussed him out last night, bugged him. That, on top of the fact that he knew she had failed to turn in her midterm despite the leniency and extra time he’d given her, served to compound his anger until he couldn’t help himself.

  “Ms. Sanders, thank you for finally gracing us with your presence.”

  She glanced up from her notebook, her eyes wide with alarm at being called out on her tardiness. A pale pink blush crossed her cheeks, and he forced himself to look away and return to his lecture.

  Yep, that was it. That building pressure beneath the fly of his jeans was the exact reason why, after last night, he’d decided that asking her for help had been an idiotic decision. Sure, if she did have any information on the local covens, getting that information would save him a ton of time compared to acquiring it on his own, but he could and would complete the job without her. The inclusion of a witch in a witch hunt—a witch who was his student and had a past history of run-ins with the Execution Underground, at that—was a no-go.

  He had been thinking too much with the wrong head. He didn’t need Vera’s help. With only one murder, there was no indication he was battling time constraints or that the coven—or even a single witch—behind it would strike again, or at all. He pushed the case from his mind and refocused on his lecture. Crowley’s writings weren’t going to teach themselves.

  As class ended, he waved a stack of freshly graded papers in the air. “Come get your midterms.”

  A swarm of human bodies surrounded him, arms reaching to grab at the papers he handed out as he called his students’ names. When he’d nearly reached the bottom of the stack, he glanced up, only to find himself face-to-face with his favorite vice.

  “Dr. Grey, I wanted to talk with you about last...”

  Oh, no, not here. He shot Vera a look that said, Close your mouth now, if you know what’s good for you. “Ms. Sanders, my office. Now.” He dropped the rest of the papers on the desk and left the remaining students to fend for themselves. He threw his computer bag over his shoulder and strode toward the door, not bothering to look behind him to see if Vera was following. When he reached his office, he pulled the key from the back pocket of his jeans, unlocked the old wooden door and turned the worn brass knob.

  Once he reached his desk, he tossed his computer bag down and turned toward the door.

  Vera stepped inside and shut the door behind her. She twisted her hands together and bit her lower lip before she finally looked up at him. “If this is about my midterm, I...”

  “What do you think you’re doing, bringing up last night in front of the other students?” he hissed.

  Her eyes widened. “It’s not like I was planning to say, ‘Hey, Dr. Grey, remember that black magic you were asking me about at my apartment last night?’ I was trying to be discreet.”

  He shook his head and ran a hand over his ponytail. “Not discreet enough. I can’t have anyone getting the idea that there’s something going on between us.” He waved his hand in the air between them to emphasize his words. It was especially vital considering he did want her, despite all logic telling him that was a bad idea. How many times had he fantasized about taking her on top of this very desk? It didn’t matter that there was only a few years’ age difference between them, since he’d finished his dissertation at Yale by the time he was twenty-three. A relationship, even a fabricated one, with a student would get him canned. And damn it, he loved his job and had always been a good, objective professor who would have shuddered at the idea of being involved with one of his students—until she came along.

  Her jaw hardened. “Why? Because everyone on this campus thinks I’m easy, because of the way I dress and the fact that I work in a strip club?”

  He frowned. What the hell was she talking about? “The reason why is because I’m your professor and you’re my student, so regardless of what you look like, how you dress or where you work, accusations of a relationship or even favoritism outside normal professional interactions would be the end of my career.” He slammed his hand on his desk and tried to keep his voice low. “And yes, your midterm is late, and you’ll be lucky if I even accept it now. I told you to have it in by the beginning of class.”

  When he met her gaze, his breath and pulse stopped. Just stopped. As if he’d died for a moment, because he swore he saw a hint of hurt in her eyes, and fuck if he could have that. The mere thought that she might want him, too, killed him. He tore his eyes away. Damn, he was a fool. He was imagining things.

  She unzipped her plaid backpack, reached inside and removed a paper, then slammed it onto the wooden surface in front of him. When she spoke, her words dripped with venom. “That’s the midterm you so graciously gave me extra time on, Dr. Grey. I’m sorry it wasn’t in by the beginning of class and that I was late to your lecture, but I thought I was doing something that would be of particular interest to you. But you know, I wouldn’t want anyone to think I’m attracted to you or your hunky nerd charm or anything, like every other female in your classes. I wouldn’t want to feed your enormous ego.”

  For a long moment he was at a loss for words. He wasn’t sure which surprised him the most. The fact that she had just called him a “hunky nerd,” that she was clearly implying a good chunk of the female student body was attracted to him—both of which were certainly news to him—or the fact that she had the balls to tell him he had a big ego. Did he have a big ego? He supposed most academics did like to hear the sound of their own voices, but he’d never really thought of himself like that.

  She reached into her backpack again and pulled out a large mason jar. It landed on his desk with an audible thump. A large tarantula flexed its legs against the walls of the glass. “I’ll go ahead and give this to you. Consider it a witch’s version of an apple, Professor.” She turned to leave.

  “What is this?” he asked.

  She glanced over her shoulder as she opened the door. “If I have to spell it out for you, maybe you’re not as good a hunter as I thought.”

  His eyes widened as he examined the spider. “Is this your familiar?”

  She closed the door again and turned back around. “Don’t you think that’s a little too personal a question, Dr. Grey? You wouldn’t want to cross a professional line, but for your information, no, that is not my familiar. My familiar is a massive, overweight ball of fur who likes to lick his own balls.”

  He stared at her. He wasn’t sure what the hell she meant by that.

  “This is someone else’s familiar,” she continued. “I don’t know whose, but I was rudely awakened by the feeling of its legs trying to pry open my mouth last night.” She shivered. “So I thought it might in
terest you that someone was trying to use me as a receptacle for their black magic.”

  Adjusting his glasses so they sat correctly on the bridge of his nose, he examined the familiar writhing inside the glass. The last time he’d seen one of these so-called “gifts” from the devil, he’d been in the middle of his training with the Execution Underground just after he’d finished his PhD. That particular familiar was a toad, and the warlock it belonged to had been detained for allegedly using black magic to evade the cops in order to continue running a successful drug business. The warlock’s drug trade had resulted in loads of humans becoming addicted to a type of cheap cocaine, which had been mixed with something that caused a flesh-eating virus. The Execution Underground refused to tolerate any supernaturals that hurt humans.

  He extended his hand. “Will you sit down, please?” He continued to examine the familiar as she sat in the chair in front of his desk. “Do you have any idea who sent this to you or why?”

  “No,” she said. “Not a clue.”

  He looked up from the familiar then to watch her face. Damn, she was gorgeous. Hunky nerd? He couldn’t get past the fact that she really thought of him that way. He always thought of himself as just a nerd, plain and simple. God help him. “I’ll help you, if you help me.” He said it before he could stop himself. He had decided working with her was stupid, yet here he was, making the offer, anyway. That was exactly what the problem was: she muddled his decision making. But he couldn’t bring himself to turn her away when she so clearly needed protection. He wasn’t the type of man to do that. She may have been a witch and he a witch hunter, but regardless, he would not stand by while any woman, witch or not, was attacked. He would figure out how to control his inappropriate feelings.

  She raised an eyebrow at him. “Who says I need your help?”

  “Why else would you bring this to me? Last night you wanted nothing to do with helping me, but I figure from the way you shivered at the thought of this tarantula possessing you that you’re either extremely afraid of spiders or afraid of someone using you for black magic against your will, and that seems like something that a normal person would want help from a witch hunter for.”