by Tessa Bailey
Kill the vampire who murdered your friends. Take his friends as tribute. An eye for an eye. Reclaim your pride.
Eighteen months later, Roksana had nothing to show for her time spent in New York. “I went on a vacation instead of doing my job. Now it’s over.”
His scar turned the color of cotton. “What are the consequences, Roksana?”
Death. “Considering my mother is meting out the punishment, she’ll probably just ground me.” She put on an American accent. “Aw geez, mom. I can’t even play Xbox?” She shrugged. “That will be me, probably.”
“You’re making light of it,” he said, sounding as if he was trying to keep his tone even. “You don’t think I can tell?”
“Can we be done with this discussion? I want to browse magazines before my flight. There’s a double issue of Dungeon Beautiful I have my eye on.”
She tried to step past him, but he shot an arm out, keeping the door from opening. “What time is the flight?”
Nine thirty. “Eleven forty-five. Why?” He didn’t answer, but his jaw looked close to snapping. Do not consider the possibility he might care. Do not. She’d spent eighteen months in purgatory, waiting for him to give her a sign he felt something for her. A sign that he remembered. Anything. But he didn’t. He hadn’t maintained his humanity, like Ginny and Jonas. This was just an undead being who liked control and exercised it as a matter of fact. Nothing more, nothing less. Yet now he stared down at her now like she could crumble him with a snap of her fingers?
Oh. Oh, she remembered now.
Roksana rolled her eyes and jerked up the hem of her dress, untucking a small, gold object from her garter belt. “You are waiting for your credit card back, da? Here you go.” She pressed it into his palm. “Those weird porn charges aren’t mine.”
Elias’s rapt gaze was still locked on her exposed thigh, burning her sensitive skin.
Attraction.
That was the one area she knew they connected. Not that he ever came close to acting on it. Nor would she let him! No, they hadn’t so much as held hands since that kiss in Vegas. A kiss which he didn’t remember but would be branded on her memory forever.
“Keep the credit card, Roksana,” he rasped.
“I don’t need—”
He moved in a fit of speed, reversing their positions and flattening her back against the stairwell door, rattling the hinges. Stunned by the unexpected, electric contact—contact she’d been craving for years—she could only swallow a sob as Elias gripped her knee and jerked it up, his breath pelting her mouth as he slid the credit card back into her garter. “Keep. It.”
Kiss me.
Hurt me.
Make love to me.
Anything.
The tortured begging sounding off in Roksana’s mind prompted her to push him away, even though the loss of his nearness caused her knees to buckle, her back hitting the door. How dare he? How dare he exploit her weakness in these last moments? The final seconds she would ever share with him. Shame and irritation and grief over what could have been rose up within her, a stake materializing in her hand without a formal thought.
She raised it.
Elias stayed very still, hands loose at his sides.
Looking her in the eye. Searching.
She searched him, too, rummaging for the man who’d made himself a vital part of her existence in the matter of one night, then turned into a monster—
There.
There? Did she see him? Was there a glimmer of something like…bitter longing?
No, her mind was merely playing tricks on her. Still, what if?
What if?
Roksana dropped the stake, threw open the door and ran, hating herself with every step. At least by tomorrow, she’d no longer have to live with the memories.
CHAPTER FIVE
Las Vegas 2017
Elias wondered briefly if his beer had been spiked.
Was there another logical explanation for the sight that greeted him when he opened his hotel room door?
The woman had several inches of height on Elias—and that was saying something considering he was six foot two. He couldn’t pinpoint her age, but she could have been anywhere between thirty and fifty. Pretty hard to tell with a mask hiding the top of her face and an explosion of blonde hair falling around her shoulders like curtains.
Was that a cape she was wearing?
Usually this level of Vegas lunacy remained in the streets, but somehow the fringe had made it up the elevator.
Elias rapped his knuckles on the doorframe. “Sorry, I think you’ve got the wrong room.”
Her mouth pulled up at the edges, remaining poised in an unnatural smile that made the hair stand up on his arms. “Nine fifty-six, right?”
Her lips barely moved when she posed the question, so he couldn’t place her accent. Not precisely. But it sounded…Russian. It couldn’t be, could it? That was too big of a coincidence, considering he’d just lost his mind over a girl from the same part of the world. A very faraway part.
His attention ticked to the number on the door, just to be sure he’d memorized it correctly. God help him if he gave Roksana the wrong room—he’d lose his shit. But no, just a second ago, he’d seen his discarded shirt on the bed, left there from this morning. This was the right place. Which meant they’d either double-booked the room, she’d misremembered her own room number or…or what?
He didn’t have a clue.
“You, uh…want to wait here while I give the front desk a call?”
“I’m in the right place,” she murmured, playing with the tie of her cape. “How was your evening with my daughter? She’s always been a bit of a handful.” Her head tipped to the side. “Sadly, not in the way I’d hoped.”
Russian. Definitely Russian.
Discomfort unfurled like a flag in his chest. What the hell was going on here? Surely this wasn’t really Roksana’s mother. She had to be some yahoo who’d heard them talking in the bar, although wouldn’t he have noticed someone this distinctive? And weren’t the odds extremely low that they’d have been within earshot of another Russian?
A memory of the man with the white feather in his hat rose unbidden, but he staved it off. There was a satisfying explanation for this and he was going to find it.
“Who is your daughter?”
Her laughter was high and tinkling. “Roksana. Don’t think to test me.”
A buzzsaw started to spin in the back of his head. Whatever was going on here, it was worrying and he didn’t like Roksana out of his sight. “Where is she?”
“Off making a fool of me, I’m sure. She does it so well.” Her teeth snapped together and she strode into the room.
“Listen, lady—”
Elias’s protest was cut off when men began piling into the room, one by one. He was so stunned by the fact that he hadn’t noticed them obviously loitering in the hallway that it took him a few seconds to try and shut the rest of the intruders out.
They hadn’t made a fucking sound.
Now, they shouldered past, their movements unnatural, jerky, to say nothing of their effortless strength. Elias could handle himself in any fight. He’d spent most of his youth and some of his twenties picking them to show everyone just how much he didn’t give a shit about approval, so the fact that he couldn’t manage to close the door on these men…rattled him.
He made eye contact with the final one to enter and reared back.
There was a white feather in his hat and…
The guy was hollow.
Dead. Lifeless, save the body propelling him forward.
Pride kept Elias positioned inside the door. Pride and the need to understand this woman’s connection to Roksana. Something was wrong with this situation. Way wrong. He wanted every single one of the facts—and he wanted them now, so he could protect her to the best of his ability. She was not…the same as these people.
While she did share the same hair color and slim build as the woman claiming to be her mother, there w
as none of Roksana’s impishness. This woman’s eyes didn’t sparkle with mischief and hope and occasional nerves. No, there was a malevolence to the person who’d knocked on his door that made him feel wired. On edge. In a way that the worst criminals of Los Angeles had failed to do.
“Come in, come in,” called the woman, perching on the end of his bed and spreading out her cape. “We have much to discuss.”
Elias let the door close and crossed his arms. “I’m fine where I am.”
Her laugh was little more than a baring of teeth. “As you desire, Mister…”
“You can call me Elias.”
“Very well, then I’m Inessa.” She reached out and tickled the chin of one of the surrounding men, eliciting no reaction. “I also answer to Queen of Shadows.” Elias was still processing the absurdity of her words when she swept a hand full of rings along the white comforter. “It’s a shame you didn’t manage to seal the deal with my daughter. It would have made our job so much easier.”
If she was trying to wound his ego, she’d have to try a lot harder. But he didn’t like her phrasing what he wanted from Roksana as “sealing the deal.” He didn’t have a name for what took place between them tonight, but it was a hell of a lot more than brokering a one-night stand. And what mother talked about their daughter like that, anyway?
“What job are you referring to?” If he didn’t like her answer, did he even have a chance of preventing some bad shit from going down? He mentally calculated how long it would take him to reach the safe and remove his department issued gun. Too long, dammit. “Does Roksana know you’re in Vegas?”
“Nyet, darling.” Inessa reared back with a pout. “That would make it much more difficult to kill her.”
Elias’s adrenaline spiked so hard, his vision blurred. Why didn’t he get Roksana’s number? How was he going to protect her if he didn’t know where to find her? “Yeah, there’s no fucking way that’s happening.” He worked to keep his voice steady. “Why do you want to kill your own daughter?”
Anger erupted in her eyes. “She makes a fool of me. Shunning her birthright to party and make merry and dance in the streets like a joke. Her insolence will not stand.”
Elias blinked several times, but his depth perception seemed to waver and he had a hard time focusing on her words. There was an odd energy coming from the man with the white feather in his hat, his focus on Elias oddly hypnotic. No way could he be responsible for the way Elias’s mind started to fuzz, his tongue turning heavy, though. Had his drink been spiked? “Her…birthright?”
“Yes.” Inessa rose from the bed, her long, white fingers clasping together at her waist. “Roksana was born to be a slayer, like myself. To carry my mantle. The slayerhood’s Russian contingent didn’t even exist until I built it from the ground up, populating it with nighttime warriors.” She squeezed her hands together so hard her hands started to shake. “My daughter makes a mockery of the institution I created. An institution that safeguards Russia, and in turn the world, from the putrid undead.” Stopping beside the man with the white feather in his hat, she patted him on the shoulder. “No offense.”
“None taken,” he rasped, his voice cultured, southern. “We know the score.”
“Are they…” Elias shook his head trying to clear it. “Roksana thought he was a—”
“Vampire? Oh, he is. They all are.” Inessa inclined her head. “It is even more infuriating that she refuses to embrace the family business when she possesses the gift of intuition. She could have been one of the best. Perhaps not as lethal as me.” She shrugged a shoulder. “Then again, who is?”
He struggled through his lethargy, piecing together the information she’d imparted as best as he could, but his eyes kept trying to close, his hands heavy as barbells by his sides. “What is happening to me?” he muttered, not intending to say it out loud.
Inessa smiled. “There’s a strength in you and we’d like to keep it at bay.”
Focus. Focus. Fight the fatigue. He’d been through worse, hadn’t he? “You say you’re a slayer? Of…vampires?” His right knee buckled and he caught himself against the wall. “Let’s say that bullshit is true. Why are you here together in the same room?”
She was silent so long, he wasn’t sure if he’d blacked out and missed her answer. Finally, though, she murmured, “At the top, there is no division. It’s only the risen cream, doing what needs to be done to stay afloat.” Her eyes tracked over him. “I think he’ll make a fine vampire, don’t you, men?”
All at once, the intruders took a step in Elias’s direction. “Stay the hell back,” Elias growled, reaching back for the door handle. Before he could wrench it open, the man with the white feather in his hat materialized behind him. Jesus Christ. Was he hallucinating or had the guy moved at the speed of light?
Elias grabbed the smirking fuck by his collar and threw him up against the wall, hitting him with a right cross that snapped his head to the side.
The lethargy in him dissipated.
He didn’t have time to enjoy the recovery. A set of hands caught him by the shoulders, dragging him farther into the room—and just like that, he was surrounded.
These were just humans, he reminded himself. He was just seeing things.
No way were their eyes glowing eerily green, others gold.
No way they had fucking fangs.
Elias should have been concerned for his own well-being, but there was only one thought running through his head. They want to kill Roksana. They want to kill Roksana. That reminder had Elias’s fists bunching, his body dropping into a fighting stance. “You want to go?” He crooked his finger at the closest dude. “Let’s fucking go, then.”
One of them laughed before breaking into a dead blur around him, but Elias fought his shock and found a way to use that speed against him. Breathing, waiting for the perfect timing, he hauled back and wailed on the guy, the impact sending him crashing against the opposite wall.
He shook out his stinging hand. “Who’s next?”
The fight continued for long minutes, Elias in constant motion. The ramped up strength of his opponents found him on his back several times, and despite the steady drain on his energy, he kept staggering to his feet, gesturing for the next one to bring it on, fighting with every ounce of defiance inside of him. Until suddenly Inessa stepped into the circle. “Stop!”
The ring of intruders dropped their fists as if they’d been deprogrammed, leaving Elias panting in the center of the brawl.
“I think this one will be very useful to me.”
Elias spat blood on the carpet. “I’ll be nothing to you—”
A wooden stake was produced from the inside of her cape before he finished speaking, arcing down and slashing through the center of his lips. Pain and shock struck him immobile and all he could do was stand there, staring back at Inessa and dripping blood on to the carpet.
“I don’t fight women,” Elias coughed through his ravaged lips.
“You will,” she hissed, her face contorting in an evil mask. “Soon, darling, you will be so desperate to feed yourself, you won’t have the ability to discriminate. All humans will be blood donors to you. You’ll leave carcasses in your wake.”
“Never.”
At some point during the brawl, his mind had begun to accept that these were not normal, everyday people. They were inhumanly strong. Their fangs shot in and out of their gums as signs of aggression. They moved at a rate of speed his eyes weren’t sharp enough to track.
Holy shit. Was he really believing this?
How could he not? He was seeing them with his own two eyes.
Vampires.
The idea of becoming one of these soulless monsters was so abhorrent, he could no longer stop the fear from taking hold. How could he stop them? He’d fought them with every ounce of skill and spite in his arsenal and barely winded them. They operated differently. More efficiently. If they wanted to make him a vampire or worse, hurt Roksana, he couldn’t stop them. Not physically.
<
br /> Elias closed his eyes briefly, wishing he had his teammates at his back. Wishing he’d spent a little less time taking them for granted. More time appreciating what they’d given him. Friendship. Security. Acceptance. There was no time to dwell on that now, though. Not with Roksana’s safety in question.
“You claim I will be useful to you. How?”
A hint of a smile curled her brutal mouth. “You will lead them to my daughter. You will be there for the slaughter of Roksana and her friends. I wish her to taste betrayal and heartbreak, the way she has made me feel it, every day since she walked away from her birthright.”
By the time she finished, Elias was so pissed, he was shaking. “Vampire or human, whatever the hell you turn me into, I will never lay a goddamn finger on her and neither will any of you. Bet on it.”
Inessa carefully replaced the blood-covered stake in her cape, her eyes turning thoughtful, calculating. “Let’s not pretend you could stop us, shall we?” She paused, scrutinizing Elias. “But perhaps slaughtering only her friends will drive her back to the fold. I had not considered this. See, already you are useful to me.”
He glimpsed hope in the form of Roksana living and pounced on it. Because Inessa was right. As much as it scored his pride to admit it, he couldn’t stop nearly a dozen inhumanly strong beasts from hurting her. “Spare her and I’ll do anything you want,” he said thickly.
Triumph wove its way through her expression. “I need someone to help train my slayers to keep up with the undead. And of course, the experience needs to be authentic, doesn’t it? Yes, a year of your life should do it.” She waved a hand. “Well, I use the term life loosely. Since technically, we’ll be taking yours.”
Refusing to show weakness, he lifted his chin. “No matter what, I’ll be keeping my soul.”
“That’s sweet, but don’t get your hopes up,” she cooed, before her face hardened and she pointed a long, bejeweled finger in his direction. “Tell my daughter of this bargain and it’s off. I’ll lop her head off in the middle of Red Square.”
