by Faith Hunter
The MPRs weren’t up to date, but they indicated the direction of the investigation—back into the witch community itself, which I figured was a smart place to start. Over the last decade, it looked as if every known witch above twelve years of age had been questioned, and some fifty vamps. I checked the name of the lead investigator. Elizabeth Caldwell. It meant nothing to me, but I could pump Rick later. And then I remembered the look on Leo’s face, torchlight flickering across his features. His eyes on Angelina above me, his nostrils wide as he took her scent. Leo couldn’t be involved with the disappearing kids. Yet the thought iced across my shoulders and down my spine like sleet, sharp as frozen knives.
I spent the next hour photographing police files. I didn’t know what I was looking for until I found a folder with twenty-seven police reports in it. The reports were cases of attempted and successful rogue vamp attacks. They too went back some twenty years.
A heated frisson of certainty sizzled over my skin. This was it.
The reports were in no particular order, so I spread them out over the table. Making educated guesses, I pushed any reports that might be about old rogues into one stack, while young-rogue attacks went into another. Once I got them separated, I had twenty-one that fit my profile—small fangs, unclaimed by any clan. I wanted the addresses of the attacks so I could situate them on a map and see if any particular locales stood out. Wishing for a map application on my cell phone, I jotted notes, texted them to myself, and added anything that looked interesting. Then I photographed the pages. Info in triplicate. I was so not losing this.
On a hunch, I did a quick comparison to see if any witch disappearances correlated with the young-rogue attacks and was disappointed to discover that none correlated exactly; they were weeks apart in some cases. But it was close enough to make me curious.
Before I put them away, I sniffed the reports. Three of the oldest reports smelled like the same cigarette tobacco on the anomaly list. All of them had been handled by Jodi. Satisfied, I put them away, making sure I was leaving nothing behind.
I looked at the locked door. And around the room. No landline phone. Hadn’t Rick told me to call his desk when I was done? I checked my cell. No bars. I had texted a lot of stuff to myself and the info would be in my sent texts, but still . . . I was locked in. Beast woke and snarled. She did not like cages.
Holding her down, I knocked on the door, and before the second tap, it opened. A wrinkled patrol officer stood there, poorly shaven and overweight. I could have sworn that was powdered sugar on his shirt, like from donuts, or the New Orleans version, beignets, but I figured it was impolitic to ask or stare, and maybe something like racial profiling. Could you do employment profiling? And would it be politically incorrect? Not feeling my usual cop-induced nervousness, I smiled. Beast settled down, tail twitching. Annoyed.
“What?” he said roughly, seeing something in my eyes he didn’t like. “You done?”
“Um . . . almost. I need to use the ladies’ room.”
He shook his head, turned away, and waved me to follow. He took me up two flights of stairs and waited outside while I went in. I pulled the phone and the camera’s memory chips, discovered that I had two bars, and uploaded all the photographs to a secure Web site I’d had created last year. It was a fail-safe in case my camera and my notes were confiscated on the way out.
I started to sweat halfway through. It was taking too long. After twelve minutes, the officer opened the door to inquire after my health. That wasn’t quite what he said, but it was kinder than his “Hey, lady. I’m not rushing you or nothing, but shit or get off the pot. I got work to do.”
New Orleans’s finest and best.
I finished, forced myself to relax again, flushed to make things sound right, and walked out. “Not feeling too good,” I told the guard, holding my stomach. “Must be the unrefrigerated dinner.”
“Yeah,” he said. “We got a lot a’ pukers in the hospital. You need to go?”
“No. I’m good,” I said, doing a mental head shake. I saw the metal detector just ahead and put my hand out for a shake. “Thanks. I can find my way out from here.”
The cop looked at my hand, held his to the side, and backed away saying, “No offense, lady, but you just finished being sick in the toilet.”
I nodded and dropped my hand. “So I did.”
He moved away, leaving me with no witnesses. I didn’t see Rick on the way out, but I did set off the metal detector. I pulled my cell out of my boot, held it up to justify the alarm to a cop walking in the door, who shook his head. Feeling a spurt of relieved adrenaline, I jogged out of NOPD and slapped the rain off the bike seat. That was one problem with bikes, even totally cool ones like Bitsa. No protection from the elements. I sat on the wet leather, helmeted up, and started her, heading out into the day. I hadn’t had much sleep and I needed a nap.
Back home, the house smelled divine, the scent of slow-cooking beef permeating the whole place. The smell made Beast even more eager to change and hunt. It had been days and she was getting antsy, which made her more likely to try to take control, to play me as she played with her dinner when it was still alive. “Not yet,” I said to her. She huffed and milked her claws into me. I ignored the discomfort and she rolled over in a snit.
From my closet, I ferreted out a map of the city and surrounding parishes. Louisiana wasn’t divided into counties, but parishes, which amounted to the same thing. With no regard to the smooth purity of the paint job, I tacked it to my bedroom wall. Onto the map, I tacked the young-rogue vamp attacks over the last twenty years. There were three major clusters and, oddly, I had been to two of them. Hot exhilaration shot through me. I downloaded my woo-woo cop photos to my laptop and spent time arranging them into proper files for printing when we had reliable power.
I had cell bars, made a few calls, left messages, and fell into bed as a secondary storm chasing the tail of Ada hit the city. Through half-closed eyes, I watched as the light through the windows darkened and rain lashed the glass like liquid fingers, seeking a way inside. Thunder and lightning rattled through the floor and up through the mattress, sending bright flashes into the room. The lights flickered on and off several times, settling again on off.
Upstairs, I knew Molly was putting the kids down for naps. Nap time in the middle of the day wasn’t something new, as I often slept in the daytime after a night spent prowling in cat form. But this formal napping, of an entire household settling in for a snooze, was new and oddly comforting. I closed my eyes and sleep pulled at me, seductive and peaceful.
Also sleepy, Beast rolled over inside me, the sensation so real I could feel her pelt scraping inside my skin. My last thought was of Beast, curled in the dark, her/my tail wrapped tightly around my body. Small furry forms were curled against my belly, between my four paws, sleeping. Kits, breathing, snuffling, smelling of milk and exhaustion.
I woke to the smell of sweetgrass smoke, the sound of drums in a slow four beat, and the beeping of my cell. The dream slid away like silk sheets being pulled slowly from my mind. I opened my eyes. The storm was over, rain plinking and gurgling outside, the world brighter than two hours past. I fumbled in my boots beside my bed and answered. “What,” I grated out, my voice full of sleep. Okay, so I wasn’t at my best upon first waking.
“George Dumas here. You left a message”—a trace of humor crept into his tone—“before your . . . nap?”
A curious heat rolled over me, settling in my lower belly. That man had a great voice. Clearing my throat, I rolled to my back and stared at the ceiling twelve feet above me. Well, ten, as I wasn’t lying on the floor. I mentally shook myself. I needed to be sharp when I talked to Bruiser, not a melted puddle of hormones. But I could hear the warmth in my tone when I said, “I’m that transparent?” Crap. I sounded flirty. I did not need to be flirty with this man. I needed to keep it professional. At that thought, I remembered the photo of Leo and Katie. Being professional.
“You sound like a child just waking up,�
� he said, his voice soft.
I will not flirt with this man. But it seemed I couldn’t help myself. “Yeah, Bruiser. I’m cute that way.” I rolled into a sitting position and dropped my feet to the floor. My braid had come half undone in my sleep and hair cascaded around my thighs. I needed caffeine. A lot of it.
Beast reared up. We need to mate.
That stopped whatever I meant to say. After an awkward pause, I managed to Bruiser, “I need some help.”
Now he hesitated. “My boss may not be interested in my helping you.”
“You said may not. Meaning that he didn’t specifically prohibit you from helping me.”
“No. Not specifically.”
“There are four vamp parties this week. All I need is this—to know which parties Leo won’t be at, and then an invitation to attend at least one of them.”
The silence after I spoke was sharp and pointed, like a bayonet held to the heart. “And how do you know there are four parties this week?” he asked. Any hint of flirtation was gone from his tone, which helped me focus, remembering that this man was Leo’s security expert and would likely kill me without a thought if his boss said to.
I recalled the calendar hanging in Raisin/Ernestine’s office, every date of the vamp council’s social life marked in Ernestine’s lovely penmanship. Not that I was about to give away anything I might need later. Flirting with Bruiser was out, now, so I settled on flippant. “I have connections here and there. Is Leo still in mourning? Well, except to leave his coffin while trying to burn me alive in my own den.”
Everyone knew that vamps didn’t sleep in coffins. Just very secure, hidden, underground rooms that they called lairs. Coffins was mildly insulting, and Bruiser said, “I understand that you were on the side porch, not the den, when you faced down Leo and his top scions.”
Oops. Den was Beast talk. I was more sleepy than I thought. Or Beast’s comment about mating had taken me seriously off guard. Maybe I should hold off baiting the blood-servant of the city’s most powerful vamp until I was more awake and thinking less about Bruiser’s butt in tight jeans when he delivered Leo’s invitation to vacate the city. I said, carefully, “Figure of speech. You boys gossiping about me?”
“When you killed the creature who had taken Immanuel’s place, you saved most of Clan Arceneau’s blood-servants; Brandon and Brian are alive and breathing because of you. But you left their blood-masters chained with silver when you found them, which works against you, and despite proof that the creature wasn’t Immanuel, Leo feels the loss of his son.” I could hear the distaste in his voice. “For good or ill, most of the clans’ security has a more-than-passing interest in you, Jane.”
That woke me up better than a whole pot of tea. “Well, that makes me feel all warm and cozy.”
“It shouldn’t. Why do you want to attend a vampire party?”
Not so I could boogie with the rich and fangy. I thought it but I didn’t say it. What actually came out of my mouth was worse. “I need to sniff them.” Bruiser barked with disbelieving laughter and I could have socked myself. Thinking fast, I said, “Just after the hurricane passed, I found where the sire making the young rogues had been. He, or she, wears a striking, distinctive perfume.”
Bruiser wasn’t going for it. “You aren’t human,” he said. “I saw evidence of that myself. So, does that mean that whatever form of supernat you are has an enhanced sense of smell?”
In lieu of a formal introduction when we first met, I had taken Bruiser down and then burned his boss with a silver cross. Not something any human would likely succeed at. I was screwing this up. I lifted my nose in a self-conscious gesture that felt very Beast-like. “That invitation? The sooner, the better.”
But Bruiser wasn’t being pushed. “Last time you went to a vampire party, you were under the protection of Leo himself. There won’t be anyone to protect you this time.”
“You could take me.” The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them. The silence lasted longer this time. A lot longer. I broke out into a hot sweat and wanted to babble to cover the silence, but I bit my lips and waited.
“I would need to inform Leo and obtain his permission,” Bruiser said very carefully.
Just as carefully, thinking of the way he looked, standing on my porch, I said, “That would be nice.”
“I would tell him that taking you to the soiree would be an acceptable way to keep an eye on you, and whatever you were doing.”
Taking you to the soiree sounded like a date. I wondered if he meant that. A flush spread over me, hot and needy. “Um . . . yeah. Okay.”
After another long pause, during which I heard pages turning and computer keys clacking, he said, “Clan Rousseau is having an event tonight in the Old Nunnery in the Warehouse District.”
“Tonight?” I squeaked, lifting a snarl of my hair and getting a good look at my unshaven legs. “After a hurricane?”
“The Warehouse District is quite upscale and power has been restored there.”
“I . . . um . . . I have a dress,” I said, thinking of my one little black dress.
“Clan Rousseau requires formal attire.”
“More formal than my dress?”
“Much,” he said dryly. “If Leo approves, I’ll send someone over with a selection.”
Of dresses? Oh, crap. “I look good in black.”
His voice heated. “Yes, you do. I’ll call after sunset.” The line went dead.
I closed the cell, staring at the floor. “Okay,” I said, not sure exactly what had happened.
“Well, well, well,” Molly drawled. I looked up from contemplating the floor to see her leaning against the doorjamb. “Big Cat has a daa-aate,” she sang out. Smugly she said, “And Big Cat might get lucky.”
I dropped back into the covers and banged my head on a pillow repeatedly as Molly laughed at me. I remembered my body’s reactions to the sight of Bruiser’s butt, and the tattoos of my beasts on Rick’s shoulder. I hadn’t kept track of the phases of the moon. If tonight was a full moon, Beast’s and Molly’s hope that I’d get lucky was more probable than I wanted to imagine. During the full moon, Beast was more in control than usual. And Beast hadn’t mated in a long, long time. For that matter, neither had I.
CHAPTER 6
I’d rather be shot, stabbed, or chewed on
I grabbed the laptop, stalked to the master bath, and shut the door. Lighting candles so I could see in the dark room, I sat on the toilet seat, thinking. What had I gotten myself into? Crap. Online, I searched calendar sites for one that listed the phases of the moon. The full moon was two days away. Relief poured through me. I was safe.
Mate, Beast demanded.
“No,” I said. “Not Bruiser.”
Beast sent a rush of sexual energy through my brain and suddenly I had a mental image of Rick, naked, spread out on a bed like dessert. There were claw scars across his chest, pale against his golden skin, and his tattoos almost glowed—a mountain lion and a bobcat on one shoulder and big bloody cat claws on the other. “Not him, either,” I muttered.
Thanks to the natural gas, I had a long hot shower, during which I washed my hair and did all the fun things a girl did before a formal party . . . and a date. . . . I followed it with a long cold shower, during which I argued with Beast about my sex life. The conversation ended in a draw, and when I left the bathroom, the walls still steamy because the exhaust fan didn’t work, I looked more presentable, nails polished, legs and pits shaved, skin all slathered with good-smelling cream, and brows plucked. As soon as I shifted again, I’d lose all the results of the effort, so I didn’t get gussied up often. But it felt really good when I did. As I primped, the smell of slow-cooking steak wafted in under the door, making my stomach rumble with hunger.
I braided my hip-length black hair and left it hanging down my back, wet and still dripping. Throwing on jeans and a tee, I made my way through the house. The sound of a man’s laughter stopped me in the entry. Bruiser? No. Rick LaFleur. And Angeli
na.
Molly, murmuring baby talk, was upstairs and I wondered why she had left Rick with Angie. Then I smelled dirty diaper, and I knew exactly what had happened.
Moving with the silence of my kind, I stopped outside the open kitchen doorway. Rick was turned to the side, so he couldn’t see me, and I paused, studying him. Rick hadn’t been to the house since he was mauled. Though pale, he looked good sitting in the kitchen, holding one of Angelina’s dolls as she leaned against the arm of his chair.
“And I have a redheaded Martha, and a blond Rachael who wears a long dress like a princess, and two brown-headed dolls, Sally and Mary, but Ka Nvsita is my favorite biscause Aunt Jane gived her to me, and biscause she gots black hair like Aunt Jane and is a Indian.”
“She kinda looks like your aunt Jane too,” Rick said.
“Nuh-uh. The real Aunt Jane is Chur’kee and her skin is browner, but she has scars and yellow eyes, and Ka Nvsita doesn’t. I’m gonna ask Santa Claus for another Chur’kee doll this winter, except that Santa Claus isn’t real. Did you know that?” she whispered, looking from the doll to the cop. “It’s a secret. I know lots of secrets.”
“Like what?” Rick asked, his gaze focusing down on the little girl.
“Like names and stuff. And how to make oatmeal. And how to start the war—”
“Just like a cop to ask personal questions of a child, grilling her away from her parent, and doing it while sounding all innocent,” I said.
Rick looked up, caught in the act and not even trying to look ashamed. “Oops,” he said, not sounding at all contrite. His eyes traveled at a slow, leisurely pace from my feet to my gold nugget necklace dangling over my shirt, to my face. “But no need to be envious. I’d like to hear your secrets too. All of them.”
I wasn’t completely certain that it was a sexual come-on; it could have been just a cop crack, but combined with the look, I had a feeling it was more. Fresh meat, Beast thought at me. I laughed at her comment and Rick thought I was laughing at his. Angie smiled at us grown-ups, laughing for no reason she could see, and trotted out of the room.
