Midnight Hunter (The Execution Underground Book 3)

by Kait Ballenger

  There had always been something seemingly invasive about the thought of looking into Vera’s Execution Underground file without her consent, so much so that despite all their interactions, he’d avoided doing so until now. He flipped the folder open. A photo of Vera looking several years younger was clipped to the upper left-hand corner. Her name, height, weight, eye color—all the standard police info—were listed on the back.

  The first page held the descriptions of her crimes and time served. He began to turn the page, then abruptly closed the folder. No, he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t bring himself to violate her privacy in that way, even though as a hunter he had open access to the information. That was a part of her past, and one she seemed eager to keep hidden. It wasn’t his place to pry into it, regardless of whether she’d been forthcoming about who her father was. The more he considered it, she hadn’t flat-out lied about her father. His name had just never come up. And honestly, what sane person wouldn’t want to hide the fact that her father had been Johnathan Summers, one of the wickedest black-magic warlocks of his time? He’d hurt too many people to count. There was no shame in Vera wanting to distance herself from her father’s past, was there? Clearly, she’d changed her last name for just that reason, and hiding that fact from the Execution Underground counted as sheer self-preservation.

  He shoved the folder into his computer bag, pulled out his cell phone and punched in number five on the speed dial. While Jace McCannon wasn’t known for giving the world’s greatest advice, he was an expert at being honest with a person, and Shane knew his friend and fellow hunter would sympathize with his current situation.

  “Yeah, kid?” Jace’s assertive voice barked through the receiver.

  “I need some advice.” Shane lowered his voice. The last thing he wanted was for Vera to overhear him. “About a woman and that case I’m working.”

  Jace chuckled. “And I’m the person you called?”

  Shane shrugged, even though Jace clearly couldn’t see the gesture. “You’ve been in a similar predicament yourself.”

  A moment of silence passed on the other end of the line before Jace asked, “This isn’t about that witch who’s a fucking stripper and your student to boot, is it?” Jace might not have been college educated, but he certainly wasn’t slow on the uptake.

  “She’s not a stripper. She’s the bartender.”

  Jace huffed. “Sure she is. Whatever helps you sleep at night.”

  Shane stood and crossed the room from his desk to his bed. “What would help me sleep is if you told me what to do.” He recounted the story from start to finish, careful not to leave out any details as he confessed to Jace that he’d been working with a witch on his current case, all the way down to the detail of his father having been the one to murder Vera’s. If there was any member of the team he could trust not to squeal to Damon, it was Jace.

  When Shane finished his story, Jace whistled long and low. “Damn, Doc. That’s fucked up six ways till Sunday.”

  Shane couldn’t have agreed more. “Yeah, I know, which is why I need your advice. What should I do? How did you deal with Frankie when you were working the case with her?” Nearly a year earlier Jace, their resident werewolf hunter, had partnered on a case with Rochester’s female werewolf packmaster in order to catch a sadistic serial killer. Frankie, the packmaster in question, had ruffled Jace’s feathers as much as she’d intrigued him, but he had needed her help in order to close the case, in much the same way Shane needed Vera.

  Jace laughed. “Well, either I handled it perfectly or as badly as fucking possible, depending on who you ask, but my advice to you is this.” A moment of silence followed, and then Jace said, “Follow your instincts, wherever they lead you. If you think she’s playing you, don’t trust her, but if your gut says otherwise, go with it.”

  Shane flopped back onto his pillows and pondered Jace’s wisdom. His gut said Vera was dangerous, but not in the way a hunter would think. She was dangerous because just the thought of her fully clothed had his cock springing to full attention. She was dangerous because on top of being gorgeous, she was sweet and kind, sarcastic and funny. She was dangerous because she was his student and he couldn’t have her. All the elements of her dark past had led up to her not being forthcoming, but she certainly hadn’t lied outright, either. In his mind, that translated into Move forward, but proceed with caution and keep it in your pants.

  “Thanks, Jace. That actually helped. A little.”

  “No problem, kid. But if you ask me, at the first sign she’s not what your gut says she is, cover your ass with both hands.”

  No goodbye, just the sound of the receiver ringing like the flatline of an EKG machine as Jace clicked off. Damn, that man was awful about saying goodbye.

  * * *

  “LAUREN SEATER... I like the sound of that name. She’ll be perfect.” Nathanial circled her name in pen on the obituary list. It was a sort of ritual he’d begun since he’d first attempted necromancy. He relished ritual. It was one of the many things he loved about black magic. The ritual, the ancient traditions, but most importantly the power...the power that he wielded.

  “Karen retrieved this from the storage locker where Lauren’s family kept her things. It should do nicely for the spell.” Trista dropped an old hairbrush into Nathanial’s outstretched hand. The wooden handle branded with the words Elegant: Anti-Static rested comfortably in his palm. Inside the teeth of the brush remained a few strands of delicate brunette hair, more than enough to complete the spell. A personal item was all he needed, but actual strands of hair? That would make the spell so much more powerful.

  He stood and crossed the room to the altar. Trista or one of the other coven members had already taken the care to light the altar candles and prepare the sacrificial bowl for him. His favorite blade rested beside the bowl, the one his mentor had gifted to him all those years ago.

  If only he could see him now, how proud he would be at everything Nathanial had accomplished since his death. Where he had ultimately been weak, Nathanial was strong, and he would soon attain a level of power of which his predecessor had never even dreamed.

  “I’m ready,” he said.

  The sound of a metal cage opening, followed by the squawk and flapping wings of an upset chicken, filled the room. One of his followers wrestled the squabbling beast into submission before handing the animal to him, feet first. He clutched the hard, ridged legs as the chicken’s talons dug into his hand. The bird continued to squawk and cry as it writhed, trying to free itself. Blood seeped where the bird’s claws pushed into him as he held it over the bowl, but he paid no mind as he used his knife to slice the animal’s throat. The chicken’s blood poured into the bowl. When he’d thoroughly drained it, he passed the carcass off to his follower.

  Now for one of his favorite parts.

  Trista stepped forward, holding a three-foot king snake in her hands. The yellow-and-red-striped snake hissed, its tongue darting from its mouth in a rhythmic dance as it slithered over Trista’s hands. Nathanial gripped the snake just beneath its head and at the base of its tail. The creature attempted to slither free, but Nathanial held it tight and lifted it toward his face, so he could see into its small, beady black eyes.

  “You’re dying for a noble cause,” he whispered. “A sacrifice to the original serpent himself.” Releasing the snake’s tail, he gripped his knife and ran the tip of the blade down the length of the snake’s stomach, allowing the blood to drip into the bowl. Once he’d thoroughly filleted the animal, he twisted its body in his hands, feeling the cold blood ooze across his fingers as he continued to fill the bowl.

  He discarded the snake’s carcass as he added herbs and stirred the concoction with his bare hands before retrieving the hairbrush. He plucked a single strand of brown hair from the brush and added it to the mixture. As he called out the first words of the chant into the silence of the room
, the mixture bubbled as if it were sitting atop a gas burner, but there was no artificial heat involved, only the heat of hell.

  Nathanial lifted the bowl from the altar as it continued to bubble. Slowly, one by one, the coven members joined his chanting as he took his place in the circle. He set the bowl on the floor in front of him. Trista sat to his right, and she extended her hand to him as she continued to chant, but he didn’t take her hand as he usually would.

  Instead, he reached forward and dipped his hand into the bubbling bowl. His fingers dripped with the blood-based potion. He smeared the red liquid across the skin of his forearm.

  “Nathanial, it’s too dangerous,” Trista pleaded as the others continued to chant. “It’s too soon. So many things could go wrong.”

  He pinned her with an angered glare. “I know full well the consequences, and I’m ready. Do you doubt my abilities?”

  “N-no,” she stammered. “But possession of a necromanced corpse is so dangerous, and you’ve only just begun the practice, so just a little more experience beforehand would make it so much more...”

  “Do you think Johnathan had time for practice?” he interrupted her. “Do you think he paused to question whether something was too dangerous, too risky?” When she didn’t respond, he answered for her. “No, he didn’t. He took risks and never looked back. If I am to be even more powerful, which I will be, I must take even greater risks.”

  He dipped his hand into the blood again and painted the liquid over his forearms, forehead, cheeks and mouth before finally taking Trista’s hand. As he rejoined the chanting, he allowed the power from every witch in the room to flow into him. He basked in their energy and the power the devil himself gifted him.

  He would be more powerful than his predecessor ever was. Of that he was certain.

  CHAPTER SIX

  THERE WAS SOMETHING about decapitating an already-dead woman, only to follow up with shared brownies with a witch he wasn’t sure he trusted and simultaneously wanted to do the horizontal tango with, that drained the energy from him.

  When Shane finally dragged himself out of bed the following afternoon, he dressed for the day, ducked into the bathroom to brush his teeth and pull his hair back into a ponytail, then wandered out into the kitchen. Vera was sitting at the kitchen table with his grandmother. The two of them were poring over an old photo album and...oh, no.

  “And that’s Shane running naked in my backyard when he was just four years old.”

  He groaned as if he were a child all over again. “Grandma, not the naked photos.” He ran a hand over his face, wiping away the grogginess of sleep.

  Vera laughed. “Look at the little dimples on his bottom. So cute!” She giggled. “And those two front teeth.” She laughed again. “Shane, you should really thank your grandmother for paying for your braces.”

  His grandmother looked up from the photo album, and a smile blossomed across her face. “Shane, what are you doing here all the way from Vegas?” She stood, as if to go over and hug him, but he crossed the room to her instead. He leaned down for her to plant her regular morning kiss on his cheek.

  “I’m here to see the best grandma in the world, that’s what.” He smiled back at her, despite the way his heart ached whenever he gave in to her distorted reality. It made it easier on her when he played along. She was happier, less frustrated with herself over her confusion, because she was blissfully ignorant.

  “I was just showing...” His grandmother paused and glanced toward Vera.

  Vera smiled with encouragement and repeated her name. “Vera.”

  His grandmother nodded. “Yes, that’s right. I was just showing Victoria here the pictures of you as a child. Aren’t they cute?”

  And that summed up Shane’s grandmother and her ailment to a T. Currently she could recall the long-ago past with great detail, but her short-term memory suffered. Her brain no longer created space for anything that happened less than six years ago. He feared waking up to the day when she didn’t remember her past, either.

  “Well, sit down. Sit down.” Grandma Grey pointed to the seat beside her. “I’ll fix you some breakfast.” He allowed her to flit about the kitchen, happily making a mess of things in the guise of cooking. It was her favorite activity.

  He turned to Vera. “How’d you sleep?”

  “Just fine, thanks. How about you, dimple-bottom?” She flashed him a knowing smirk.

  He frowned. “Naked baby photos should be outlawed.”

  She closed the photo album. “So tell me, do you still have those cute dimples on your ass?”

  Heat rushed to his face, and Vera fell into a fit of hysterics. A deep blush crept across his cheeks.

  “I’ll take that as a yes.” She grinned.

  Oh, man, this was a level of embarrassment he just couldn’t allow without fighting back. “As a matter of fact, I do. Perhaps you’d like to see them sometime.” The words toppled out of his mouth before he could stop himself. What was it about her that made him say things that he would never normally dare?

  This time it was her turn to blush. A deep pink flushed her cheeks, and if Grandma Grey hadn’t been in the room with them, he would have growled at the sight. The things Vera did to him without even trying. The sweet innocence of her face was a deep contrast to the daring and outspoken woman he’d come to know.

  She didn’t allow him to get too used to the change before she retorted with, “You sure you want to make that offer, cowboy? I might just take you up on that.”

  Yep, his cock was officially made of pure titanium steel now.

  Just as he was about to throw all his caution and his entire career to the wind, the sound of Aerosmith’s “Dude Looks Like a Lady” promptly saved his academic life. He reached into his pocket for his phone and answered as fast as humanly possible. Damn it. Jace and Ash had changed his ringtone for Damon once again. It was a running joke between his fellow hunters. Of course, Damon didn’t look remotely like a lady, but his fellow hunters couldn’t help needling their leader in any way possible.

  “Hello?”

  Damon voice’s sounded as if it were a bag of rocks being dragged over gravel when it rumbled through the phone. “Have you seen this morning’s paper?”

  Shane’s eyes widened, and his stomach dropped. Damon wasn’t exactly the type to call and chat about the latest news, which could mean only one thing...

  Rushing to the apartment door, Shane searched for the paper on the mat, only to find it wasn’t there. Slamming the front door behind him, he headed into the living room and found Mae perched on the sofa, the Democrat and Chronicle folded open in her lap.

  “Hey!” she squealed as he snatched the newspaper from her. “I was reading that!”

  “You’re supposed to be watching my grandmother, not reading, and it’s my newspaper,” he snapped. He flipped from the comics to the front page, only to see a woman’s face plastered above the fold, along with a murder headline. He scanned through the article, and found a quote from a neighbor who said the deceased had claimed she was being haunted before her death. He swore into the receiver still clutched to his ear.

  “This is worse than we thought,” Damon replied.

  No, no, no, no. This wasn’t happening. It had been his worst fear, and now it had come true.

  “I need to get into that crime scene.”

  Damon grumbled on the other end of the line. “That scene’s still hot. There’s no way I’ll be able to get you anywhere near it with the Rochester PD...”

  “Screw the Rochester PD, I need in there, and fast,” Shane interrupted.

  Silence echoed from the other end of the line. Shit. He’d just challenged Damon, his terrifying, tough-as-nails, I-eat-small-children-for-breakfast leader. The long silence was pregnant with tension, and Shane’s gut did a small flip. Now he was in for it.

 
Just as he was about to beg for his life, Damon said, “I’ll pull some strings, but don’t make a habit of it.”

  Shane nearly melted to the ground in a heap of grateful relief. “Thank you,” he gushed as if he’d just won a beauty pageant. “That will be so help—”

  “Report afterward, at the meeting.” Those were Damon’s last words before the line went dead.

  Shane lowered the phone from his ear and stared at the screen. What the hell was with his fellow hunters and not saying goodbye? Was there some unspoken code of alpha-male masculinity that dictated one absolutely could not under any circumstances end a conversation normally? Apparently, he’d missed that memo during training.

  Stuffing the phone back into his pocket, he beat feet into the kitchen. Vera stared at him as he entered. His grandmother stood at the stove, placing an empty pan into the turned-off oven with the sounds of Mae’s complaining about her stolen newspaper filtering in from the living room.

  “There’s another crime scene,” he told Vera quietly. “I’m leaving to investigate now. It will be bloody. You can stay here if you want.”

  Despite the wide-eyed look on her face, she shook her head. “No way I’m staying here. What if you need me to save you again?”

  He opened his mouth to tell her that while she’d been helpful, she certainly hadn’t saved him, but she stood and placed a single finger over his mouth. The inexplicable urge to suck that finger between his lips to show her the exact magic he could do with his tongue, if she allowed him, nearly overpowered him. Thank God for strong willpower, he thought as he managed to hold himself back.