And, Jake suspected, she hadn’t wanted him tied to her any longer.
He had, of course, refused to leave her, to start a life of his own. Not when she’d needed his protection. He’d covered for her and had protected her when she’d slept from the time he could put two and two together. She’d always wanted what was best for him, and in the end, he feared she’d thought it best if she was out of his life for good.
But she’d been all he’d ever known. He hadn’t had anything to live for but to seek justice by destroying the undead creature who had turned her.
He’d traveled from country to country, city to city, alone. Always alone. And just when he thought he would be alone forever, that there was no one on this earth who could challenge him, who could surprise him, who could, most of all, accept him as he was, along came Shelley Caldwell.
Detective Shelley Caldwell…just his luck to fall for a cop.
Cops had rules, and in his world, the rules were all twisted. Shelley didn’t understand. She didn’t want to. He couldn’t blame her. But he couldn’t help but yearn for what he’d never had—a true relationship with a woman. With this woman.
He was used to taking what was offered and then going on, not involving his sex partners in his mess of a life, fearing one of them might get caught up somehow and be turned into another creature of the night.
But he wanted Shelley for more than sex.
Laughing at himself—knowing that Shelley thought he was a freak—he picked up his cell to check for messages. His gut tightened the moment he heard her voice.
And when she got to “I’m starting at Desiree’s,” he swore loud enough to shake the foundation of the building.
Waiting only to make sure there wasn’t more he needed to know, Jake grabbed his clothes and shoes and dressed his naked body as he flew down the stairs.
Fear drove him.
Shelley wouldn’t stop until she got to the master, and then she would descend to her own personal hell.
Shoving on sunglasses to protect his light-sensitive eyes, he drove like a madman, which he was. He couldn’t let it happen to her. He could give her up if that’s what she wanted, but he couldn’t lose her this way.
So when he got to Desiree’s and the door was locked, he didn’t let it stop him. With one powerful kick, he slammed the panel practically from its hinges.
Knowing Desiree would be compelled to answer, he used the high-pitched tones that no normal human could hear. No one but Shelley, it seemed.
A moment later Desiree joined him in the parlor, careful, of course, to stay away from the windows, where the last blush of light innocently threatened the room. And her.
“She’s not here, chéri.”
His eyebrows shot up. “‘She’?”
“Whichever sister you’re looking for.”
Then Shelley had been here. “What did you do with her?”
“No harm came to her. I sent her on her way.” Desiree stared at him and stepped close, sniffing the air around him. “What are you?”
One vampire always recognized another, but Jake wasn’t a vampire. His heart still beat blood through his body. He was alive.
“I’m someone trapped between two worlds.”
Desiree blinked and though she couldn’t possibly understand, in a way she must, for she said, “I sensed you to be different from the first….”
“I need to know where Shelley went.”
“She seeks her sister.”
He knew what that meant. “Where is the lair?”
“If I tell you, he will have me destroyed.”
“If you don’t, I’ll destroy you myself,” Jake threatened, stepping closer. “And trust me, Desiree, as fast as you move, I can follow. As strong as you are, I’m stronger.”
He expected to smell Desiree’s fear, but he didn’t. He sensed something different from her. Approval?
“You will see that he is stopped?” she asked.
“Or die trying.”
She told him, and Jake was gone before she’d finished her sentence.
Wild images whirled around me: fire and swirling smoke…distorted figures…thump-thump, thump-thump…Silke struggled frantically, bindings tearing into the soft flesh of her wrists—
I gasped and blinked out of the momentary trance, Silke’s terror filling me. “Silke!”
Hauling the duffel bag with me, I pushed away from the car toward the building. My twin was here. I could feel her. Panic welled in her, and I was having trouble breathing. As much as I wanted that backup, I couldn’t wait for it to arrive. I pulled out my cell and called Norelli again.
When he answered, I asked, “Where the hell are you?”
“On the way. We got caught in traffic. We’ll be there in ten minutes.”
“I can’t wait that long!”
I told him how to get inside and down into the tunnels. Not knowing where I would go from there, I prayed that was enough for them to find me.
Once inside and down to the basement, I headed to the elevator but followed tracks leading to the other side of the room and around a corner I hadn’t noticed before. I saw a door barely visible in the darkness. It opened easily and I could see stairs going down. I decided to take them, thereby avoiding the mechanical noise that would alert the killer. The stairwell was long and steep and choked with dust. I waited until I got out the lower door to stop, to breathe deeply and to concentrate.
Silke, I’m here. Help me find you.
Her thoughts were muddled, but somehow I managed to follow them, this time taking the left branch of the tunnel.
I had a lump in my stomach and another in my throat. This was it. I knew it. I was not only going to find Silke, but at last I would also come face-to-face with the murderer.
A second turn and I heard a splatter along the tunnel floor, as if someone kicked broken concrete. I psyched myself for trouble, if that was possible. My holster and the duffel bag were open, the disparate weapons ready. I held the tac-light—now attached to a baton—in one hand, a can of Mace in the other.
I stepped cautiously forward, my heart thudding against my ribs. This time I had followed procedure and still I was going it alone.
Where the hell was backup when I needed it?
Suddenly, my light picked up a familiar form as he walked toward me.
“Well, if it isn’t Hung Chung,” I said sarcastically. “You left the bar without saying goodbye.”
“I’ll say good-night instead. Permanently.”
“Deal.”
I whipped the baton around and whacked him in the face. He seemed startled. And then majorly pissed off.
With a loud yell, he came for me, swinging and kicking in best martial-arts style. I danced backward and slashed at him with the baton—leg, body, arm—but then he got a lock on the weapon and yanked it hard. Not wanting to let go of my only light source—not to mention a weapon that could be turned against me—I went spinning and crashed into the tunnel wall, falling on my butt.
At least I was still hanging on to the damn baton.
Chung came directly for me. I was still recovering, so I did the only thing I could under the circumstances.
I held out my other arm and, aiming for his face, squeezed my trigger finger. He yowled as he sucked in the stream of Mace. I closed my eyes and even held my breath for as long as I could so I wouldn’t be affected. I didn’t want to open my eyes until the pepper spray had settled, so I blindly released the handcuffs from my belt, rose and plunged forward. My shoulder hit him hard in the chest. He toppled over, taking me down with him. Just in case he had more left in him than I imagined, I cracked open my eyes and punched him in the neck with my knuckles, not hard enough to smash his trachea, but hard enough to stun him into thinking he couldn’t breathe.
Gasping for air now, he threw his hands up to his throat as if they could relieve his distress.
“Thanks.” I clipped one wrist with a cuff, and made sure he was still breathing. He deserved not to breathe, not after w
hat he’d done to Raven and Thora and LaTonya. I didn’t want to think about what he might have done to Silke or I would be tempted to kill him with my bare hands.
Instead, I rolled him onto his face and yanked that arm behind his back. “Give me the other hand or I’ll break this one.”
He swore at me and clawed at the tunnel floor, as if trying to escape, but he would be fighting the effects of the Mace for a while. I planted my knees solidly in the middle of his back, grabbed the flailing arm and mastered it.
Click.
He was mine.
I flipped him onto his back. Grabbing the tac-light, I shone it in his face. His eyes were squinched and tearing, and mucus ran from his nose and spittle from his mouth. The fluids dripped down onto his shirt and the gargoyle pendant he wore.
“My sister—where is she?”
He began to cry and slobber and mutter to himself.
“C’mon, Chung, I know you have her. You didn’t kill her like the others, did you?”
“No,” he wailed. “No, I won’t.”
At first I thought he was answering me, but then I realized he wasn’t even here anymore. He was in some other world. A real loony-tune. Then again, what murderer wasn’t? And at least I had him. But he wasn’t going to talk, not for me.
I slid off him, pulled a long plastic cable tie from the duffel bag and used it to bind his feet together. Primitive but effective. The only way he could get that thing off was to cut it, an impossibility as far as I was concerned.
I stood and concentrated on finding Silke. When I sensed her presence somewhere nearby, I sighed with relief that she was still alive.
“I’ll be back for you, Chung,” I said. “Or maybe someone else will find you first.” If backup ever arrived and managed to find this tunnel.
I shouldered the duffel bag—not that Chung could do anything to it with his hands behind his back, but I wasn’t about to get sloppy now. Picking up the baton, I felt something sticky on my hand. I flicked the beam over it and realized my hand was smeared with blood.
From what? I hadn’t wounded Chung.
I flashed the light over him one last time and caught sight of twin holes on his neck. Several sets, actually. No blood there, though.
The maze of tunnels in this direction proved to be as intricate as the first route I’d taken. The difference this time being Silke. I was honing in on her like a bloodhound with a scent. I didn’t let my guard down, though, not for a minute. For all I knew, Elvin Mowry and his followers could be around.
Those holes in Chung’s neck bothered me, though. Holes like those found on the two dead homeless men. I hadn’t seen anything like that when I’d fought him before. And Chung wasn’t exactly Mr. Attractive. The other cult members all were.
So was Hung Chung the exception? Or a conclusion that I’d jumped to?
I thought about it as I picked my way forward. He had a couple of tattoos, but no gargoyles. Only the pendant. I couldn’t remember seeing the pendant before, either, and I’d been up close and personal with him.
It occurred to me that the gargoyle could be a symbol of control, of belonging to another being. Desiree had said Chung wouldn’t bother anyone anymore. Perhaps when Chung had been with her all night, it hadn’t been the romp I’d imagined. But Desiree had denied being the murderer—I’d believed her—and she’d sent me here.
As to the bites on his neck…
I remembered Jake telling me that the new ones needed to feed and didn’t have control of themselves, the reason they’d killed the homeless men. To believe that, I would have to believe in vampires, I thought uneasily. For the sake of argument, I gave the possibility credence. What if the new ones had been feeding off Chung? Was this his punishment? Had Desiree given him over to the master?
If Chung was being controlled, which seemed possible, then who was the murderer?
Over the past days, I’d felt my will affected several times by various people at the bar. And since I didn’t believe Desiree was guilty…
As I moved on, an image came to me and the pieces began fitting together. Suddenly, I knew and I couldn’t imagine why I hadn’t figured out the murderer’s identity sooner.
A mechanical screech echoed down the tunnel behind me. The elevator. Backup, at last. Or so I hoped. It could be anyone coming down here. Another cult member. And I was too close to reaching my sister to go back to find out.
Channeling Silke the best I could while on the move, I sensed she wasn’t alone, but I got no specifics. Mace wasn’t going to work this time, not when I was trying to round up my sister while fighting off anyone who tried to stop me.
Going in alone made me jittery, and I wished yet again that Jake was here to get my back.
I pulled out my gun and prepared myself for the fight of my life.
Chapter 18
The one he wanted more than anything was making her way through the labyrinth to him now. He was ready for her. The new ones were also. They guarded the entrance. She would have to get through them to get to him. He was looking forward to being entertained. Chung had telegraphed her presence, but now he could sense her himself.
His plan had worked.
“You are a pretty thing,” he said to Silke, who was fully awakening from her drugged state for the first time since he’d abducted her. “Exquisite, really.”
He’d been taught to appreciate beauty in all its forms from the time he was a child. His mother had seen to that. She’d also seen to his sensual upbringing, again from his childhood. She’d been turned while in full bloom, but she’d resisted allowing him to join her in blood until well after he’d reached manhood. He hadn’t understood why she’d held back until after she’d turned him in a fit of uncontrollable passion. Then he’d understood. After that, she’d no longer been enough for him. She’d been greedy, though, and had wanted him all for herself. He’d never found another companion her equal.
Not until now.
“It’s your twin who excites me,” he told Silke. “She’s clever and strong and single-minded. I knew she would come for you.”
“You used me to trap her.”
“Clever girl.”
Silke gasped. “My fault.”
“Indeed.”
“I won’t let you—”
He interrupted with a laugh sharp enough to cut. “Do you really think you have anything to say about what I do?”
Silke stared at him as if he was evil incarnate—and perhaps he was—but no more foolish threats escaped her full lips.
Good. It wouldn’t be long before both sisters were under his power. A unique experience, tasting two sides of the coin at once. His groin ached from fantasizing about the experience of immersing himself in sweet blood and mind-blowing sex with them both, the reason he’d left Silke untouched to this point.
“You’ll never have either one of us,” Silke suddenly said.
Either she was more clever than he’d given her credit for, or she’d just read his mind. “I take what I want,” he declared.
“You don’t know Shelley.”
“I’m looking forward to the experience.”
“And if she can’t stop you, I will.”
He looked at her hands and feet bound to the bed and sighed. “An idle threat.”
“Don’t ever underestimate a Caldwell woman.”
But he was no longer listening. He could hear the other one, her footsteps light along the tunnel. Her breath coming in shallow bursts.
And, oh, her heart.
Thump-thump…thump-thump…thump-thump…
Practically salivating in anticipation, he signaled to the new ones—whose names he’d already forgotten—to be ready. They would test her mettle. He expected her to triumph. They were expendable.
Before dawn, he would have the only woman he’d craved to distraction since destroying his own mother.
Flickers of light like those I’d seen when connected with Silke drew me down the tunnel.
I was close to finding her. It was
getting hard to breathe, though not due to lack of air.
Fear stole away my breath.
Fear that I wouldn’t be on time, that I would fail to rescue Silke, that she would be lost to me before I had the chance to tell her what an idiot I’d been.
I took as deep a breath as I could, and tightening my grip on my gun, I turned into an intersecting tunnel.
And came to a dead halt when I set eyes on the lair ahead—a hedonistic boudoir of dark velvets, bloodred satins and pale, sheer hanging fabrics. I raised my eyebrows. The decorator must have spent a fortune at Whorehouses-R-Us. When I took a better look at the canopied bed, my momentary humor dissipated.
Silke was gagged and tied to the bed like a satanic sacrifice. From each of the four posts, a winged gargoyle grinned down at her. She was giving off vibes like crazy, trying to make me turn back.
“Don’t worry, Silke,” I said in a low voice. “I’m prepared for any kind of trouble.” I stepped forward, adding, “Bring it on.”
Okay, so maybe I shouldn’t have said that. Maybe if I hadn’t challenged the fates, I wouldn’t suddenly be facing two guardians of the keep who seemed to have appeared out of nowhere.
One young woman was of average height and dressed in a tattered Goth dress. Her skin was pale, contrasting with her smeared, dark-rimmed eyes. The other young woman was tall with caramel skin. She was dressed in basic black—athletic pants and a T. They both looked eerily familiar.
“Thora? LaTonya?” I asked disbelievingly.
I stared at them. What were they doing on their feet, walking around as if they were alive? Impossible.
“How do you know LaTonya?” the black woman demanded.
I blinked and caught my breath. She’d answered to the name of the dead girl.
“I know your mother,” I said, my mind whirling, allowing for crazy possibilities. “She grieves for your loss. When you disappeared, I looked for your murderer.”
“Now you don’t have to. You got me,” she said, giving me a wide smile. Her teeth looked sharp, especially the incisors. And her eyes seemed to glow in the dim light.
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