Predatory

by Alexandra Ivy

  “We need to look at the bodies.”

  Never mind.

  “Look at the bodies? What for?” I wanted to know.

  “Anything. Signs of struggle, bruises, cuts—something the police may have missed.”

  “I certainly don’t have a whole load of faith in breathers but I figure the cops—and the coroner, or medical examiner—would probably have found, photographed, or scraped off anything of evidentiary importance.”

  “Did you say breather?”

  I grabbed my purse and stood up quickly. “Sure, breather. It’s what everyone calls the cops in San Francisco. You know . . .” My mind raced. “They ‘breathe’ justice?” I turned on my heel. “I’ve got to go.”

  I felt Pike’s hand close over my forearm and the strong warmth sent a shiver of gooseflesh all over my body. He pulled me closer and my breath caught in my throat, the tight anticipation all at once amazing and uncomfortable. His lips brushed over the part in my hair, then barely touched my earlobe. “Meet me tonight.”

  My body felt like warm Jell-O as his command oozed through me. I swallowed, batting my eyelashes in that slow, bedroomy way that Elizabeth Taylor created and I mastered. “Where are we going?”

  “The morgue.”

  It’s official: I’ve been living with Sophie Lawson for way too long.

  It’s never dark in the city. It’s also never without a population or a pulse, which was why I was wearing a form-fitting black Shoshanna Lonstein dress (I forgive her for the Seinfeld marriage debacle; we can’t always avoid the starter husband) with six-inch platform heels in blazing blue for my evening sojourn to the morgue. Besides the fact that I would never be caught dead (again) in anything velour or with a drawstring, the ensemble was a perfect cover: New Yorkers might mistake me for a socialite or a supermodel, but a morgue burglar? Not a chance.

  Pike looked me up and down and despite that fact that our upcoming “date” revolved around the officially dead, his appraising grin shot a little zing down my spine. “Well you look like you’re ready to catch a killer.”

  Vlad crossed the living room, gave me a once over, and muttered, “Or hepatitis.”

  The Lower Manhattan City Morgue sits like a fat, ugly beehive among other government-owned fat, ugly beehive buildings.

  I suppose there isn’t a lot of support of a morgue makeover.

  It was easy enough to slip inside and easier still to scurry around unbidden—vampires have no scent, nor any discernible weight, which means no footsteps, no creaky floors to give us away. And also the man at the front desk was asleep.

  I waved Pike through and we scurried down the dimly lit hall.

  “Okay, stay out here and stand guard.”

  “No way,” I said. “I’m going in. You stand guard.”

  Pike sighed. “Do you have any idea what you’re looking for?”

  “Look, Pike, my roommate is basically a private investigator who is dating a detective. I have inadvertently been on more stakeouts, snuck through more morgues, and flopped around with more dead bodies than all the NYPD put together.”

  “I don’t know why, but I’m kind of aroused right now.”

  “You’re sick.” I yanked open the storage-room door. “Stand guard.”

  Inside, I was pleased to see the bodies were stored in an orderly fashion (did I mention we vamps are a little bit OCD?). I was able to find Reginald and stretch him out on one of the exam tables in record time, gingerly placing a file folder over his flash-frozen man bits—I could only investigate so many things at once. I checked out the red-purple bruises circling his neck—not entirely certain what I was looking for—and was walking my fingers toward a tiny red pinprick behind his left ear. “Interesting,” I whispered to my dead audience. The pinprick was minuscule and could have been a broken blood vessel or a mole for all I knew, but I knew how to find out. I pulled Reginald’s file and did a quick scan. The bruises were listed, as well as a hernia scar, a hair weave, and a little tattoo on Reginald’s derriere. There was no mention of the pinprick.

  I left Reginald laid out and went to find Emerson. She wasn’t listed on any of the drawers and I gulped, staring at the heavy metal door for the “overflow” body storage. There are very few things that give me the heebie-jeebies, but walking into a room where the dead are laid out and stacked like bakery goods made my stomach lurch—and not in a good way. I sucked in a nerve-steadying breath and stepped into the walk-in freezer, jamming a Gross Anatomy book in the doorway. I had seen one too many television shows where the main characters get locked in a walk-in and end up freezing to death or eating their weight in ice cream.

  All my bases covered, I went to work examining the paperwork stacked on each body. I was so engrossed—or so desperate to get Emerson and get out of there—that I didn’t hear someone slyly removing the Gross Anatomy book. What I did hear was the heavy metal thunk of the door closing.

  My heart locked in my throat, but I refused to let myself panic. I casually walked up to the door, certain that the giant refrigerator people had seen all the locked-in-the-freezer episodes as well, and had created some sort of snazzy trapdoor or inside lock pop.

  Apparently, refrigerator people are not TV watchers.

  I dug into my cleavage and yanked out my cell phone. I wasn’t entirely sure whom I’d call to rescue me from a walk-in freezer filled with people-sicles, but Vlad was usually good for the occasional rescue. I wrapped my arms around myself and hit the speed-dial button.

  And nothing happened.

  “No bars!” I groaned. I started to pace, staring down at my screen. Closer to the back of the fridge a few cheery bars popped up. If I held the phone above my head, I got another half. Still not enough to support a phone call.

  I pressed myself as far back as I could, then eyed the stackable body shelves. If I could just get a little higher . . . I tentatively poked a foot on the edge of the lowermost platform, careful not to get anybody on my shoe. I took a step up. And then another. And then I grinned down at my phone when it decided it could make a call.

  And then I heard the weird, scraping sound of the undead coming back to life. My hackles went up, hot adrenaline sparking through me.

  I jumped from the cart and launched it backward. I would like to say I barrel-rolled or did something equally as theatrical but what I did was sail through the air, arms outstretched, fingers clawed and desperate for something to hold on to. When I landed on the cement floor, I had the slick, cold plastic of body bags in each hand, the contents of each bag—and several others—pummeling me from above.

  I howled.

  I don’t think my feet hit the ground as I jumped, and tossed my body into the door, screaming bloody murder.

  “Pike! PIKE! Get me out of here! Get me the fuck out of here! I’m stuck!”

  It seemed to take eons for Pike to hear me and loosen the door. When he did I ran out, circling the autopsy tables, relishing the way the room-temperature air burned at my frozen skin.

  I felt Pike’s eyes on me, curious, as I rubbed my arms and let the adrenaline drain from my body. “Where were you?” I finally hissed, eyes narrowed.

  “I was outside. Standing guard. Just like you told me to be.”

  I couldn’t fault him for doing as I’d told him, but I wanted to. “Why did you come in here?”

  “You were taking forever, I had to pee, and then I heard you huffing and thumping. I thought maybe you were getting a little frisky with ol’ Reg there.”

  He grinned and I recoiled, disgusted. “You’re a big ass.”

  “And you’re a big ol’ side of beef locking yourself in the deep freeze. Did you find anything?”

  “First of all, I didn’t lock myself in the freezer. I shoved a book in the doorway so I wouldn’t get stuck.”

  Pike made a show of looking all around for a book.

  “Someone filched the book and shut the door on me.”

  Pike raised his eyebrows, though he didn’t look the least bit convinced. “Is that so? B
ecause I’ve been waiting out there,” he said, jerking a thumb toward the hall. “And I happen to know for a fact that no one came in here.”

  I gaped. “Are you calling me a liar?”

  “Of course not. I might be calling you a little bit embarrassed because you locked yourself in the fridge, but definitely not a liar.”

  The chill from the fridge had distinctly worn off and rage burned through me. Before I could open my eyes—or my fang-filled mouth—Pike was checking the bodies piled in the fridge. “Here’s our friend Emerson.”

  He laid her out on the slab and unzipped her. I was surprised when a stab of emotion shot through me—I’m not sure if it was seeing Emerson laid out this way, or seeing Nicolette red-eyed and torn up over the death of her sister. Either way, the body was just a shell—I knew that better than anyone. But there was something pulling me.

  “So what are we looking for?”

  I hugged my arms across my chest. “Look behind her left ear.”

  Pike did as he was told and I watched his finger slide over Emerson’s marble-still flesh. “Nothing.”

  I peered, and pointed. “See that tiny hole? Needle prick.”

  “Needle prick? What does that mean?”

  “Reginald has one, too. Same place. It means that neither Reg nor Emerson died the way we thought they did.”

  Pike was fingering Emerson’s chart and I could see his lips move as he read. That should have been enough for me to shake him off but there was something charming and sweet about the way his lips moved, little bursts of breath puffing at every other word. “Well, that’s something they didn’t say in the papers.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Drain cleaner.”

  I stiffened. “What?”

  “They found drain cleaner in both of them.”

  “Why would someone inject—”

  “It would cause pain, an arrhythmia at best, death at worst.”

  I stepped back. “Do I want to know how you know that?”

  Pike snapped the file shut and got to work putting Reginald and Emerson back. “Probably not.”

  We were able to sneak right back out of the morgue—a happy coincidence for us, an unsettling lack in homeland security for the rest of the country. But, I supposed, as I brushed my dress back down over my thighs, maybe terrorists going on body raids wasn’t exactly at threat level red.

  It was one of those nights where everything about the city hummed and moved, but the city itself stayed impossibly still. The air didn’t move and the moon hung in the sky, as pale and anemic as everything else that wilted in the heat.

  “Okay,” I said as we walked, “two people are injected with drain cleaner, then made to look like they’ve either committed suicide or been murdered.”

  “By you.”

  “What?”

  Pike slurped the last bit of the purple ICEE he made us stop for through his straw. “First one looked like suicide, second one looked like a murder caused by you.” He grinned, his teeth tinged purple.

  “Thanks for pointing that out, Colombo.” I frowned. “And we have nothing in the way of leads, do we?”

  “Other than you trying to kill off the competition, no.”

  I spun, my finger a quarter-inch from his nose. “What did I say? Look at me.” I jumped back, gave him a good chance to take in my self-styled ensemble. “I would have won that competition fair and square. Someone is out to get me.”

  Suddenly Pike was face to face with me and I could feel his hot breath breaking over my cheeks. “Then why hasn’t he gotten you yet?”

  Anger bubbled in my veins. “Because I’m a—”

  “A what?” His eyes flashed.

  I broke his gaze. “I don’t need to tell you anything.” I tried to turn away but his hand was around my arm, clamping down. His warmth shot through my whole body and I remembered things. . . .

  Another ink-black night where everything hung still and quiet in the oppressing heat. A rustle in the bushes and I was on the window sill, tucking my petticoats between my legs . . . I felt the air cut open when I dropped, my boots hitting the soft earth below my window. And he was there. He was just a shadow then but he was there—I didn’t need to see him to feel him over every inch of my body, to feel the air sizzle with his vibrant electricity. His fingertips brushed my arm and they were ice cold but sent fire-hot prickles and every synapse firing—and then he closed the distance between us and his lips were on mine. Wanting, tasting. And I was young and I was thirsty and I had never felt this way before . . . then his lips left mine and trailed slowly, with feather-light kisses over my jaw and down my neck. I felt my pulse throb and his tongue circled it. My heart pounded and my head was filled. There was fire roaring through me and it was at my neck. I heard the pierce before I felt it. My virgin skin popped and his teeth sunk in. And when I closed my eyes, everything was dripping in the most vibrant shade of red. . . .

  “Pike.” I was breathing hard and trying to push the word past my teeth. Pike had me now, tonight, in this city, and I could feel his fingers pressing at the small of my back as I crushed against him, his hand cupping my chin, my cheek. The city cracked and came alive and I was distinctly aware of every horn honking, every New Yorker talking, yelling, laughing. Waves crashed. The world crashed when Pike’s lips covered mine. I tried to pull back but his fingers dug into me and my entire body was exploding with things I hadn’t felt since that last night, since that last moment when my own blood shot through my veins.

  I could feel.

  My entire body was on high alert and I felt the hot softness of Pike’s wet lips. I felt his tongue nudge my mouth open and I could taste him.

  And somewhere, there was blood.

  Too close.

  My eyes were on the vein throbbing on Pike’s neck.

  “No,” I said, pulling back, pushing against his chest.

  “Don’t go.” Pike pulled me back to him and I felt the word on my earlobe as his mouth opened and he nibbled.

  My body throbbed. My need deepened. I pushed away—tore myself away—from Pike and stumbled backward and then started to run.

  “I know what you are.” Pike’s words tumbled out and hit every wall of the dismal little alley.

  I stopped, turned. “What are you talking about?”

  He took a slow step forward, his eyes still hard, pinning me. “I know what you are, Nina.”

  I licked my lips and all the energy, the heat that had surged through my body, was gone. I was hollow again, and cold. “I don’t know what you think you know about me.”

  Pike licked his lips, bee-stung and red from our kiss. “You’re a vampire.”

  I turned my back and left Pike standing alone in the alleyway.

  I walked the rest of the way home and Pike didn’t follow. I kept my thoughts focused on the murders so I wouldn’t hear his voice reverberate through my head. A vampire. I knew it, I flaunted it—in the Underworld, natch—but hearing the word come out of his mouth . . .

  I sunk my key into the lock and shoved into the apartment vestibule. The overhead light was buzzing and swinging lightly, illuminating the squarish, brown-paper-wrapped package on top of my mail slot. The sender had used a whole spool of tape and twine and addressed the thing simply to “LaShay.” I shoved it under my arm and carried it to my apartment.

  “Hey, where’ve you been?” Vlad wrinkled his nose. “You smell like morgue.”

  I flopped down on the couch.

  “What’s with you?”

  “Pike knows.”

  Vlad finished his blood bag with a mighty suck and pushed himself up to a sitting position. “Pike knows who the murderer is? That’s good because all this death and dying is really ruining my vacation.”

  “No.” I blinked, staring straight ahead. “Pike knows about me.”

  I didn’t need to fill him in; the knowing flashed across Vlad’s eyes. “He knows you’re a vampire? Does he know I am?”

  I swung my head. “I doubt it.”

>   “So we have a murderer on the loose, a guy who knows you’re a card-carrying member of the undead. . . . How did he find out? And, he’s not going to go all Van Helsing on us, is he? Because we’d need special approval from the UDA to take him out and you know who handles that paperwork, right? Kale. She’d never approve me. Hell, she’d call Pike and leave a trail of breadcrumbs or Hostess CupCakes right to me.”

  I swallowed. “I don’t know how he knows. He just—he just said it. ‘I know what you are.’”

  Vlad crushed his blood bag and tossed it onto the coffee table. “Ominous.”

  “Vlad, what am I supposed to do about this? A breather knows about me.”

  Vlad shrugged, finding the remote control and aiming at the TV. “I don’t know. Kill him, I guess.”

  Something washed over me and it took me a good minute to realize that it was pain. I didn’t want to kill Pike. I didn’t want to be what I was.

  “I—I need some air.”

  Something was welling inside me, pressing against my chest and making my eyes sting by the time I crested the steps down to the apartment vestibule.

  And then everything changed.

  Two of the ancient windows were cracked open; I could see there was a gentle breeze outside but the air in the vestibule itself was staid and heavy but crackled with a weird, electric energy. I sniffed. The metallic scent was sharp and distinctive and my whole body went on high alert—my fangs sharpening and elongating, saliva rushing toward my tongue.

  There was blood in the air.

  It stank of injury and heat with just the slightest tinge of something fresh. I took a step. The energy-filled trail stopped dead on the bottom floor landing and so did I, spinning slowly in the darkness, and finally cussing at myself for being a scared little girl. And then I heard the whimper.

  It was soft, barely a breath, but there was something in the single syllable that was anguished. I stiffened.

  “Hello?”

  There was a breath of pregnant silence and then two ragged, heavy breaths. “Help?”

  I turned toward the voice. “Where are you? Who are you?”