by Michele Hauf
Domingos took blood daily to survive. Would he grow as dark and evil as those she sought to destroy?
Not if he never killed. But would the madness someday push him to kill a mortal? He was capable, as she’d witnessed with the werewolf outside the burning building.
“Don’t ever follow me again,” she said. “Please? Or tell me if you feel the need to keep close. I don’t mind you wanting to be close, to protect me. Makes me feel safe. But when I’m on a job, I need distance from the one good thing in my life.”
He nodded again against her chest.
“Can we be okay with that?” she wondered. “Because of what this world has made us, we’ll never completely stand on the same side, but I believe we can honor each other’s very reason for being.”
“That sounds fair. You’ve given me so much, Lark. I will respect your request not to follow you on a job. Just...tell me when that happens, yes?”
“Deal.” She sighed. This was some strange and new territory she trod, but she was willing and ready to plunge in. “I need to report the kill to Rook.”
“Do you want me to leave?”
“No. Just give me a minute, will you? I’m going to shower, too. There’s wine in the fridge. Why don’t you open it while you’re waiting?”
“I don’t think we should linger here for long, do you? It could be dangerous—”
A loud, demanding knock sounded on the door. Lark exchanged glances with Domingos, who mouthed, “Like that,” and stepped aside to allow her to answer.
She opened the door to reveal a tall blond man spinning a titanium stake about his fingers.
* * *
Domingos hung back as Lark immediately took to action. He guessed the guy with the stake was another knight, and while he wanted to lunge forward and sink his fangs into his carotid, he’d let Lark handle this one. One, because he didn’t care to put himself in the way of two stakes, and two, because she’d just asked him for that trust.
The knight didn’t flinch when Lark lunged toward him, and only when she bent to deliver a roundhouse kick did the man dodge. Lark caught him aside the head with a palm and shoved, sending him staggering toward the sofa.
Lark grabbed a steel baton that had been tucked behind the television and went after the hunter with such boldness and measured skill that Domingos could only be impressed. She fought one of her own. And the match was incredible. Yet it tugged at his conscience to observe the tussle. Hadn’t he committed the same crimes against his own to save his life while trapped in the cage?
He banged his head against the wall and clasped his arms across his chest. Something wanted out.
While the blond had height and bulk over Lark, she possessed smooth efficiency and her petite frame allowed her to dodge punches and kicks as if they were a nuisance. Domingos had been on the receiving end of her skill and wondered how soon before the man would fall.
Kill them all!
Domingos grasped his head, wincing as the horrible noise clattered into his skull, this time screaming like the last victim he’d slain while the wolves had looked on. Trapped within the rusted steel cage, the phoenix had bled tears. As they fought for their very lives, their skin had slicked off each other, so coated in each other’s blood they’d been.
“What the fuck is that?” The hunter slanted a look at Domingos. “Vampire? That’s the insane one! You bitch, you’ve betrayed the Order!”
“Yes, I suppose.” Lark glanced to Domingos, who gritted his jaw to keep from crying out. “But since when is the Order concerned about werewolves? All of a sudden the wolves tell us to jump, and we do? Something isn’t right. And I need to find out what that something is.”
“What isn’t right is a knight from the Order of the Stake hanging around with a vampire. Is he fucking you?”
“Since when are you concerned about my love life, Gunnar?”
Gunnar. The one she’d said had been assigned to replace her as his killer. Domingos fisted his hands at his sides. The cacophony exploded in his head, and he twisted it down sharply, bending and crouching against the wall to fend it off.
The hunter, noting his inner struggle, marched to the window and drew open the curtains. Brilliant sunlight hit Domingos squarely in the eyes. The whiteness was instantaneous and piercing. He screamed and dropped to his knees, clutching for his goggles, though it was too late. The light had blinded him, chasing away the noise. Instead of dark, only white filled his vision, a white so painful it felt like blades piercing his pupils.
He heard Lark swear at the man and a fist connected with flesh and bone. “You’re not going to take him out in my home,” she said. “Get out of here, Gunnar.”
“Not until the vampire is dust. You think you can use that stake on me? You are a stupid little girl. I never understood why they let you in the Order. And now look how you represent us, by screwing the enemy!”
The hollow echo of a steel bar connecting hard with jawbone ended the hunter’s tirade. Domingos’s body took the brunt as the man fell onto him and rolled onto the floor.
“Come on.” Lark grabbed Domingos’s hand. “Let’s get out of here before he comes to.”
“I can’t see.”
“Put your goggles on. It’ll get better, yes?”
“Yes, but not for a while.” His fingers coiled against his chest. “The pain is excruciating. You go without me.”
“Don’t be stupid. Come on. I’ll be your eyes for you.”
Sensing she was in some sort of hunter action mode, Domingos followed her insistent tugs and stumbled after her, using a hand splayed out before him as she led him toward the stairs and directed him to step down.
“That steel bar to the side of his head should have taken him out,” he said as they landed on the main floor and he could feel the cool darkness of the afternoon shade in the marble exterior. “What, does he have a steel plate in his head?”
“Worse. Scandinavian stubbornness. We’ll go out through the car park below the building. It’s dark, and there’s an exit to the Metro.”
She kissed him, and it was an unexpected moment. Blind to the world, Domingos slid his hands about her back, melting into the sanctity of this hard, dangerous woman who protected him as much as he wished he could protect her. And the pain slipped away, screaming for a hold even as her softness chased it to oblivion.
“Love you,” he whispered into her mouth.
“Love you back.”
* * *
They emerged from the Metro after the sun had set. Domingos could see again, though his eyes were sore and itchy, as if he’d swum in a highly chlorinated pool for hours. He still wore the goggles, and had felt like a freak sitting next to Lark on the bench on the Metro platform, but he figured he fit right in with the rest of the freaks he saw walking around.
She held his hand, his knuckles pressed to her mouth, both hands clasped about his as if to let go would send him reeling and she’d never get him back.
“We need to avoid Gunnar and find out exactly how pack Levallois is involved with the Order,” she said. “This doesn’t feel right. Something is off, and I suspect Rook isn’t at all aware of it. How are you feeling, lover? Eyes better?”
She hugged up alongside him, imbuing his senses with her brightness and lemon scent.
“I can see now. That damned sun will never take me out completely.”
“Why is that? Most vamps can endure the daylight for long periods of time. And yet some vamps can’t walk in the sun at all. It’ll burn them to a crisp and reduce them to ash. How are you able to keep coming back injury after injury?”
“I think it’s the phoenix blood in me. Takes a licking and keeps me ticking, burn after burn after bloody painful burn.”
“How did you get phoenix blood in you? Isn’t that a vampire who has consumed witch’s blood? Something about a protection spell, but I can’t recall the whole history of it.”
“Witches once conjured a great protection spell against vampires, because supposedly back in medi
eval times vamps were all about enslaving witches and stealing their magic. So the spell was enacted that made all witches’ blood poisonous to vampires. The rare vampire was able to consume witch’s blood and survive, yet not without literally dying first and coming back from the ashes. Thus, he became a phoenix vampire.”
“I think I heard about one who exists in the States. Can’t recall his name, though.”
“Nikolaus Drake,” Domingos said. Truvin Stone had mentioned him. “It wasn’t until recently the protection spell was dropped, and vampires had no longer to fear witch’s blood. The last vampire I was forced to fight in the cage was a phoenix.”
“I’m so sorry.” She kissed his knuckles and then pressed his hand to her heart. “But how could you defeat a phoenix? If they are unkillable?”
“Apparently you can kill one if you rip out his veins, and— I don’t want to detail this, Lark.”
“You don’t have to. I understand you were forced to fight for your life. And the madness, it must have pushed you to desperate measures.”
Domingos sighed heavily. That she accepted him, even knowing the horrible things he had done, was amazing. So it was easy for him to forgive the fact that she had to do horrible things to other vampires to protect those in need of protection.
“I think I might know someone who could get us some answers about pack Levallois,” he said. “Danni Weber was in tribe Zmaj along with me. She’s a good kid. Was transformed against her will by an asshole in the tribe who thought she could do things for him.”
“How would she have info about the pack?”
“She’s dating Christian Hart. He used to be in pack Levallois. In fact, he was the wolf who tossed me in the cage for my first death match.”
Chapter 18
“You sure you want to do this?”
Lark squeezed his hand and snuggled up beside him as they strode the street toward the boat docks on the Seine. It was cool this evening, and she’d worn only a thin silk shirt that showed her hard nipples. Domingos had admired them only until he’d noticed her shiver, and then he had given her his coat. He liked seeing her wear his things. She was comfortable in them, and that strung a note of pride through him.
Because if a hunter—whose husband had been tortured by vampires—could accept him—a vampire—then he must be doing something right. And he didn’t want to upset that right.
“I’m sure.” He led her down the stairs toward the docks where the Bateaux-Mouche parked, tourists’ boats that sailed from the launch dock, right in front of the Eiffel Tower and down and around the Île Saint-Louis for half-hour cruises. “Hart is no longer in Levallois.”
“Yeah, but if the guy was the one responsible for putting you in the cage...?”
“He was following orders. Though I admit a certain amount of disdain for him, any wolf.”
“Disdain must surely be putting it lightly. Am I going to have to referee a fight?”
“That’s why we’re meeting on public grounds. Danni thought it best. We need to talk to her boyfriend if we’re to learn information about the pack that can help us both.”
“Fine. But tell me about Danni. Is she an old girlfriend?”
“No. She’s too young for me.”
“Is that so? I’m barely twenty-eight. How old are you?”
“Mid-thirties for the rest of my life. And you wear twenty-eight gorgeously.” He stopped in the middle of the wide stone staircase leading toward the docks and pulled her to him for a kiss. The breeze swept her loose hair across his face and mingled it with his. “But I’m going to age much more gracefully than you.”
“Thanks,” she said with a teasing edge. “Do you really want to have a relationship with a woman who will age while you remain the same? Do I?”
“I don’t know. Never tried it before. Have you?”
“No, but I can’t imagine in a few decades how strange it will be.”
He kissed her again. “I love that you think of our relationship in decades. But let’s take it a day at a time, eh?”
“You’re right. The now is perfect just as it is. God, I love you. And I sure hope when I’m seventy you’ll be saying the same thing.”
He swept her off her feet to a spill of giggles that settled his nerves. Because he was nervous about standing face-to-face with a werewolf. But with Lark by his side, he could accomplish anything.
Decades with this woman? Yes, please.
The boat was set to take off on the last tour for the evening, and was about a quarter full with tourists scattered randomly throughout the dozens of rows of metal benches. Domingos sighted Danni’s bright red hair at the back of the boat—she waved at him—and he paid for their tickets and boarded behind Lark.
Tall, fit and always wearing some kind of military T-shirt and camo pants because she’d once served in the armed forces, Danni greeted them, shaking Lark’s hand and saying how nice it was to meet her. Then she put her arms around Domingos’s neck and hugged him. “It’s good to see you, Domingos. I’m glad they didn’t beat you.”
“You can’t put a good vampire down. Not for long, anyway,” he added.
Looking behind Danni, he nodded to the stoic man with broad shoulders and a stern demeanor. The side of his face and neck revealed long slash scars. From talons? Interesting.
Danni slipped an arm around the wolf’s back and stepped beside him. “Lark and Domingos, this is Christian Hart.”
The wolf offered his hand to Lark, who shook it, and then to Domingos.
Domingos could but stare at the offering. His throat closed off and he was suddenly hot, then cold. The tingling in his fangs warned that he was hungry—for revenge.
“I, uh—” Danni looked to the werewolf “—didn’t explain completely to Hart who you were, Domingos.”
“You don’t remember me?” he hastily asked the wolf, who showed no sign of recognition. “Danni didn’t tell you about my adventure with pack Levallois?”
“No, I—” He looked to the redhead, who still held him, and then back to Domingos. Memory moved behind the wolf’s pale gaze, and as the boat shifted into motion, swaying the foursome briefly, Hart shook his head. “Oh, man, I’m so sorry. You. The pet.”
Domingos winced at the label. Remy Caufield had taken malicious joy in calling him that. His idiot leech of a pet who wouldn’t die, no matter the tortures he was served. He’d been reduced to an animal, and had been labeled one, as well.
“Oh, dude, I shouldn’t have said that,” Hart hastened to say. “I had no idea. Danni, you should have told me. I didn’t remain in the pack long after they took you in.” He stroked the scars self-consciously. “I know that’s no excuse.”
“Doesn’t matter anymore,” Domingos said, shaking if off. “What’s done is done.”
He could do this, and without screeching cats playing harmony. Lark clasped his hand, and he fought not to clench her fingers. For now, she anchored him.
“I heard you’ve taken out half the pack.”
“Close to that.”
“Deserving,” Hart said. “Are you...okay?”
“Does okay mean I have UV sickness that blinds me in sunlight and burns my flesh instantly, and puts crazed voices in my head and forces me to feed daily? Then...sure. Okay.” He grimaced at Lark. She offered him a comforting smile and a squeeze of his hand. “But we came to get information, not discuss my health.”
“Sure.” Hart moved to the railing, now avoiding Domingos’s eyes. The wolf didn’t smell like the mangy pack wolves, but that didn’t mean Domingos was going to embrace him. “You’re a friend of Danni’s, and that makes you a friend of mine. I’ll tell you anything I can. I’ve been out of the pack for months, though. I don’t have current intel.”
“Have you ever known the pack to have an association with the Order of the Stake?” Lark asked.
Hart’s eyebrows rose. He looked to Danni, who nodded that he should speak.
“Uh, yeah. Why do you ask?”
“I’m a knight,” Lark sai
d.
“A woman?” Hart put up a placating hand. “Sorry, I’m saying all the wrong things, guys. The two of you have knocked me a little off-kilter. The Order of the Stake and pack Levallois? Yes. Well, not officially. One specific knight, to be exact. He and the pack leader, Remy Caufield, have been associates for a while.”
“Associates?” Domingos said, while at the same time Lark asked, “How long?”
Hart shrugged. “Few years? Let’s see. The pack started taking in a lot more vamps for the blood games, hmm...about two years ago.”
“What does that mean?” Domingos insisted. “How are the blood games associated with the Order?”
“This is information I shouldn’t even have—”
“Tell them,” Danni insisted. “You have no alliance to the pack now. They were going to kill me, remember?”
Hart lifted his girlfriend’s hand and kissed it, displaying a tenderness that Domingos could relate to, yet he wasn’t going to give the wolf any slack.
Hart nodded. “Right. One of your knights has been providing the pack with vampires for the blood games for years.”
“Gunnar,” Domingos guessed.
The werewolf met his gaze, his pupils growing wider. “You know him?”
“He’s the knight currently assigned to stake me,” Domingos said. “And I suspect he’ll take Lark out, too, if given the chance.”
“A knight going after another knight?” Danni asked.
“I was the one who was originally assigned to stake Domingos,” Lark said. “I failed.” She planted a kiss on Domingos’s cheek, which made Danni smile and hug her wolf closer.
“So, what does Gunnar do?” Domingos asked. “Bring the vampires he’s supposed to slay to the pack?”
“I think so,” Hart said. “I was never in on it, not allowed access to that inner knowledge. But I saw him talking to Caufield a few times. And I did see him enter the compound with an unconscious vamp over his shoulder once. Had to unlock the cage to let him drop the bloodsucker inside.”
