Forbidden Taste

by Jennifer Ashley

  Carriages hadn’t changed much in the last three thousand years, Cai noted. This one was made of different materials from those of the elegant rig that had pulled him around Paris before he’d struck out for the New World, but the concept was essentially the same. The car was propelled by means Cai didn’t know, but humans were constantly inventing machines to do things for them. It was not a surprise they’d come up with a carriage that moved without horses—the Parisians had been perfecting automatons before he’d left.

  “The vamp gangs who have been roaming the streets of late,” Tain began. His voice lilted with an accent Cai couldn’t place. “They are being led by a demon.”

  Cai jerked his contemplation from Mariah and how soft her skin had been in the vision. “Vampires following a demon?” he asked in amazement. “Demons are scum. Or has that changed in my two hundred and fifty years of dark sleep?”

  “Tain’s wife is a demon,” Septimus said in a calm voice. “Well, half demon. She is the matriarch of her demon clan.”

  Cai’s world shook again. “A demon and an Immortal?”

  “Long story.” Tain shot him a wry smile, the first glimmer of humor Cai had seen in him. “Samantha has discovered that the rogue vamps have been following a master that is not a vampire. The attack patterns are all wrong. She said demon, and she knows. Samantha thinks—she fears—that the demon is an Old One.”

  “And I told you, it can’t be,” Septimus said to him. “I’d have heard.”

  “Not if he used his clan’s dimension to come and go,” Tain said. “They do that.” He gave Septimus a look as though how he knew was another long story. He switched his gaze to Mariah. “I want you to find him.”

  Mariah sat still for a moment. Then she opened her mouth and said, “Woof. Woof.”

  Cai immediately understood, and laughed. Mariah softened and laughed with him.

  Tain said nothing. Septimus heaved a sigh. “What the hell are you talking about, Detective?”

  “Hunting dog,” Cai and Mariah said at the same time.

  Mariah flashed a smile at Cai and held up a gloved fist. Cai hesitated a moment then touched his fist to hers.

  She quickly lowered her hand again, the smile deserting her. She was regretting doing that, Cai realized. Though Mariah could touch him with the gloves, it only increased her temptation to touch him skin to skin. The vision he’d conjured had made things worse. Damnation.

  Tain was watching him. All that power grated on Cai’s nerves, like grit inside his eyeballs that he couldn’t get out.

  Mariah turned back to Tain. “You want me to find the demon and arrest him?”

  Tain shook his head. “I want you to find the demon, and I will kill him.”

  No half measures. Cai knew this man would do exactly what he said. “I’ll help you,” he offered.

  “No,” Mariah cut in. “That’s not how the paranormal police work. You should know that.” She gave Tain a severe look.

  “That is why you will lead us to the demon and then leave,” Tain said.

  “Call for backup if you wish,” Septimus put in. “They’ll rush to help you, but unfortunately, the demon will be beyond saving. The police can arrest the leaderless vamps and take them in, as you like to do.”

  “I can’t sanction …”

  “They’re not asking for your sanction, love,” Cai said, leaning to her. She still smelled of roses, the scent that had pulled him away from his blood hunger when he’d first emerged into the club. “They want your help taking out a threat. Rules are only good to a point.”

  Cai would break every one of them with her. Their shared vision was just the beginning.

  He determined, as the car rolled on through wide avenues choked with other vehicles, to discover the answer to her curse, and shatter it, no matter how long it took. Cai needed to hold on to someone in this strange new world, and he knew with every power he possessed that the someone was Mariah.

  When they arrived at another area of town, darker and dirtier than what they’d left, Septimus exited the car, holding the door open for Mariah.

  She stepped out. Cai was about to follow—closely—when a tendril of searing hot magic wrapped around Cai’s arm and jerked him back inside the limo. He turned, and found himself face to face with the Immortal.

  Chapter Six

  Cai had fought an Immortal only once in his life—long, long ago, when the Roman Empire was fading and Cai had gone to Constantinople to find the last vestiges of civilization. An Immortal had found him there and tried to kill him as a matter of principle.

  That Immoral had been half insane, with a sword of flame, laughing as he casually deflected Cai’s attacks. Cai had barely made it out alive, escaping only because he’d flung himself into the blackness of the sea on that moonless night. The Immortal hadn’t followed.

  Cai knew that he’d escaped because the Immortal with the fiery sword had let him. It had taken Cai several years to recover his full strength.

  “I am no threat to you,” Cai said, speaking the truth. “Or to your city. I just came out of dark sleep and have no interest in enslaving a town such as this.”

  “You mean you are no threat today,” Tain countered. “You are stronger than Septimus, or will be when you fully recover. You should leave.”

  Cai was aware of that. There was a reason vampires of similar strength didn’t work together much, or if they did, they put a large amount of space between themselves. Cai and Septimus would get into a confrontation over territory sooner or later. If the two fought, the battle would be devastating. They’d unleash powers that could flatten cities, even one as large as this seemed to be.

  Cai glanced out at Mariah. She was speaking with Septimus, gesturing with her gloved hands. She trusted him, her body language said.

  A battle between Cai and Septimus would hurt anyone who got in the way, and Mariah was the kind of person who would try to get in the way.

  “Do you know about her … let’s call it malady?” Cai asked Tain. “That the touch of a dark-magic creature will take away her telepathic ability?”

  Tain gave him a slow nod. “My wife told me of this. It makes her a very good cop. Careful.”

  Cai returned his gaze to Mariah. She was graceful beneath the suit that tried to hide her curves, beautiful in movement. She laughed at something Septimus said, which lit up her face. Mariah stood out of arm’s reach of Septimus, avoiding even a casual brush with him, but vampires could strike with the suddenness of a snake. She wasn’t safe.

  Tain’s tendril of white magic tapped Cai again. “Don’t even think about hurting her.”

  Cai was thinking about making love to her. Slow love, bathed in moonlight, on a pristine beach or draped in sheets on top of a wide bed.

  Mariah would open for him, her body rising to his. He’d lower his head to lick her neck and then take a long, satisfying bite. She’d taste like a river of fire—Cai saw it in her even now.

  Tain’s magic tightened on him. “Not for you.” His voice was quiet but unmistakably stern.

  Not for Cai … not yet. Once Cai was finished here, he’d scour the world for a mage that could remove whatever stupid curse someone had inflicted on her family. Then Mariah would be his.

  “You should go,” Tain repeated, and Cai knew it was not a suggestion.

  “I’ll think about it,” Cai said.

  Tain gave him a long look but at last released him.

  Cai climbed from the car, trying not to clap his hand to his wrist where Tain’s magic had touched it. The leather of his jacket was whole and not even singed; only Cai’s flesh had been seared. But when he slid up the sleeve to look, his skin was unmarred.

  The street bore a stench that made Cai’s lip curl—an acrid stink of smoke, waste, and a metallic tang he couldn’t place.

  He went to stand as near to Mariah as he dared. Cai could simply take her, run with her far from here, make her his blood slave—to hell with worrying about stripping her of her powers. She wouldn’t need th
em if Cai took care of her.

  He also knew he would never do that. Being cruel because you could only revealed your weakness. Compassion was always stronger.

  Which was why Mariah was strong. She could have chosen to cower at home, refusing to come out and jeopardize her telepathy. Instead, she helped as she could, ferreting out death-magic beings who were threats to her city.

  “Vamps there.” Mariah pointed to a tall building on the other side of the street.

  The building was abandoned, windows broken, walls covered with crisscrosses of paint. Symbols, Cai deduced, with hidden meanings. The Romans too had covered walls with graffiti, but they’d been blatant messages proclaiming someone’s prowess in battle or in bed. The messages had often been filthy, their meanings clear.

  “I guessed that,” Septimus said impatiently. “I’m not looking for the vamps; I’m looking for their sugar daddy.”

  “Do you know how many there are?” Mariah asked him. “More than we can fight. You need the police.”

  “We have two Old Ones and an Immortal,” Septimus returned, too sure of himself. “We can finish them without even going inside.”

  “And I won’t let you,” Mariah returned. “Are all the vamps in there evil? Or were they recruited and coerced? ’Cause sure, no strong demon would do that.”

  Septimus gave a tight smile at her sarcasm. “If they are following a demon, they will be dangerous, no matter how innocent they might have been when they began. We kill them, end of problem.”

  Cai saw that he and Septimus would indeed come head to head as Tain predicted. There was no reason to kill vamps who could be turned to your cause. Why throw away resources? Was Septimus that careless with all creatures in his city?

  Mariah saw the situation entirely differently, Cai knew. She viewed the vampires inside the building not as a collection of brainwashed slaves ready to kill anything their demon told them to, but as individuals. Each one with a different story. Why had they come to fight for a demon? Had they been forced? Was it their fault?

  Cai’s connection with Mariah let him see this from her eyes—not literally, but he knew what she was thinking. She had pity for the vampires, not revulsion.

  Such thoughts would kill her one day. Might be today.

  Tain had emerged from the limo during this discussion, his power dampened but still palpable. “We go in,” he said.

  Mariah turned to him, her expression stubborn. “No, we wait for backup.”

  “If we wait, it will be too late.” Tain stated this calmly.

  Cai stepped closer to Mariah, not liking her exposed to the Immortal. “I think he’s right,” he had to say. “Strike before they can organize or respond to a command from their master.”

  Mariah frowned, weighing the arguments. “All right,” she conceded. She spoke to Tain, not Cai or Septimus. “But please stun them rather than kill them. They’ll need to be arrested. The paranormal police don’t go on wholesale slaughters, no matter how bad the bad guys.”

  Tain looked skeptical but also resigned. He’d do what Mariah wanted.

  Which was astonishing. An Immortal warrior acquiescing to a human’s command. The world had indeed changed.

  The vehicle with Mariah’s compatriot, Alejo, arrived, the man having followed them. When he climbed down and approached Mariah, Cai knew he’d been completely wrong to ever think he was her master. Alejo’s stance, his look, was deferential—Mariah had precedence over him.

  Even so, Alejo was more than happy to argue with her. “You stay out, Detective,” he growled when he heard the plan. “Backup’s on its way, and these vamps aren’t messing around.”

  “I’ll bring up the rear,” Mariah promised. “But you all need me to point out where they are. They won’t be simply waiting for us in the lunchroom. Alejo, you will stay here and coordinate the backup.”

  Cai liked this idea better. He didn’t want Mariah to remain outside—Cai could protect her more effectively if she were right next to him. There was nothing to say the vampires wouldn’t sneak out and get around behind them anyway.

  “She goes in with us,” Cai said with finality.

  Septimus gave him a nod. “And we’ll drive these assholes out into the waiting arms of the LAPD.” He straightened the sleeves of his finely tailored coat. “Assuming the cops get here by the time we round up the rogues.”

  “They’ll be here,” Mariah said with confidence. She drew both her stunner and her stake and gave Cai, Tain, and Septimus her big smile. “Shall we, gentlemen?”

  * * *

  Mariah kept to her agreement to follow the other three, but it was not easy curbing her impatience. She wanted to finish here, drive Cai to the police station, and then go the hell home. She’d recommend that Cai be handled gently in light of his centuries-long sleep and the fact that he’d be an asset. Old Ones working for the good guys could be a big help.

  Even as she had the thoughts, Mariah knew in her heart that she had no intention of taking him in for processing. She was going to let him go. Cai didn’t belong here—not in Los Angeles, not in the new hierarchy of life magic and death magic that had been established after the last war.

  Mariah hated to think of him locked away in a sterile interrogation room, kept there for months maybe, or even years, while the paranormal division assessed his threat status.

  Cai had just come out of prison, having lost everyone in his life. Mariah couldn’t shove him back in again and walk away.

  She’d ask Septimus to find somewhere for him to go, and then she’d tell Cai good-bye. Perhaps one day in the future Mariah would meet him again, to discover what he was doing, see how he fared in the new world.

  But she couldn’t be part of his life. It was unrealistic even to hope for the possibility.

  Cai put his hand on her shoulder, careful not to brush her skin. “Are you all right?”

  Mariah snapped out of her reverie. The auras of the rogue vamps began to press at her, their minds full of rage, violence, and hot hunger.

  Tonight Mariah had been bombarded by Cai’s presence, then Tain’s. Now this nest of thirsty, furious vamps ready to rampage started battering at her thoughts. She seriously needed a vacation.

  “They’re all over the place,” Mariah said. “Scattered in rooms throughout the building. Groups no bigger than seven.”

  “Small forces that can harry,” Cai answered. His hand was still on her shoulder, his warm strength cutting through the vamps’ beating auras. “Making sure that if one group is destroyed, there are plenty to take their place. Vamps have been fighting like this for centuries.”

  “They have no imagination,” Septimus said, disdainful.

  “They stick with what works,” Tain returned. “Some will live to become Old Ones.”

  Septimus’s voice became wry. “Touché, my friend.”

  They lapsed into silence. The vamps were well aware of them. The best thing Mariah and her hunters could do was try to funnel them outside where Alejo and the paranormal police would sweep them up.

  The darkness in the old building weighed on her. The two vampires and the Immortal could see fine in the blackness—Mariah could not, but she could sense.

  Cai’s hand kept her steady, not letting her fall as they ascended to the upper floors. He whispered into her ear to help her avoid obstacles, his breath hot. Fire trickled through Mariah’s body, tightening her breasts and swirling between her legs.

  They passed under an overhead vent where air flowed down on them, bringing with it a stomach-churning stench.

  Mariah gasped and halted. “They have humans in here.”

  She now felt what she’d missed under the auras of the many vampires. Human beings, trapped, terrified, knowing they’d die.

  “Where?” Tain asked, voice grim.

  Mariah pointed straight up. “Next floor.”

  Tain jogged away, white sparks flickering from his fingers. “I’ll get them out,” he said over his shoulder. “Find the vamps. If some are killed, so be i
t. As my brother likes to say, let’s scare them shitless.”

  His footfalls receded, as did the intense energy of his magic.

  “And he’s one of the good guys,” Septimus murmured.

  “Good and evil are relative,” Cai said. “Always have been.”

  “Too true,” Septimus agreed. “For instance, which are we? Vampires need blood to survive, but is it any different from humans feeding on the flesh of animals they raise for the purpose? Is the animals’ fear different from that of our victims?”

  “Don’t make it complicated,” Mariah growled. She’d heard the arguments before. “Vamps who take people hostage and drain them or do other vile things to them are evil in my book. Let’s get this done.”

  Septimus chuckled. “She’s so young.”

  “She’s perfect the way she is,” Cai answered him.

  Mariah shivered. The way she warmed at his words was dangerous. “Vampires ahead,” she said. “In the room on this next turn. Six of them. They know we’re here.”

  “Good,” Septimus said. “Makes it more fun.”

  Mariah felt Cai’s strength burgeon, the darkness of him pushing at her. She sucked in a breath and involuntarily stepped back, which put her up against the nearest wall.

  Cai touched her arm again through her blazer, making sure she was all right. “Wait here,” he said. Another squeeze, then Cai left her and joined Septimus. “As Mariah said, let’s get this done.”

  Mariah remained against the wall, the solidness of it reassuring. She sensed Septimus and Cai approach the door together. “Like the old days,” Septimus said.

  Cai seemed to know what he meant. He laughed, the sound echoing, then they linked arms and kicked in the door.

  There were snarls, screams, shouts, from within. Mariah slid out her cellphone and punched Alejo’s number. “We’ve engaged,” she said when he answered. “Six to come out. There are humans in here—Tain’s rescuing them. We’ll need medics. What’s the status down there?”

  “On their way,” Alejo said. “I sent for EMTs, just in case. They’re heading here now.”