“A vampire drank your blood,” Lawrence said calmly. “Of course you poisoned him.”
“I don’t want him poisoned, damn it! Get over here! We’re at Ariel’s!” she added. “Can’t you hear him screaming? Please come quick!”
But the line had already gone dead. Beep, beep, beep filled one ear. Christopher’s distant pain filled the other.
Ivy sank to her knees, crying. Let them be on the way! Please let them be on their way!
chapter thirty-three
This is all my fault,” Ivy told the witch and vampire when they found her outside the bedroom door.
She barely remembered making her way up the stairs to crouch as close as she dared get to the monster. She didn’t know how long she listened to him whimpering and groaning until she tried to reach him.
She crawled inside the room, moving slowly and carefully, trying to get to him. He’d crawled toward her and sank claws into her calf. She’d managed to kick him hard enough to get away, to get out the door, and slam it. She was surprised that he hadn’t followed and deeply afraid that he was too weak to.
“You’re covered in blood,” Aunt Cate said.
“It’s hers,” Lawrence said. “And it smells bad. Wrong.”
“I told you it’s my fault.”
Lawrence continued sniffing her spilled blood. “Poison. More poison than demon in her blood mix.”
“Demon blood used as a catalyst for poison,” Aunt Cate said.
Ivy rose to her feet, pointed toward the bedroom. “Help him!”
It hurt to stand.
“Where’s the poison?”
“In my purse. Grandma gave it to me— Shit! Damn! Fuck!”
Aunt Cate was already gone.
Lawrence patted Ivy’s shoulder. “What did the old witch tell you it was? An aphrodisiac?”
“No! Well, maybe I thought it was. She makes love to a demon, so…She said…” Ivy brought up Grandma’s exact words and could have beaten her head against the floor when she remembered. “Grandma never lies, but you have to listen carefully to what she says. She said, To neutralize your vampire problem. Take a pinch of this for vampires if you think he’s going to taste your blood. It will blend with your demon essence, overshadow it. It should pack quite a kick.”
“If he dies, that will certainly neutralize your problem.”
Ivy winced at Lawrence’s angry sarcasm. Which she richly deserved. “I’m sorry. Grandma said to take a pinch. That’s all I did. He tasted me before and didn’t even throw up, so I hoped—”
“That he could survive Poison Ivy’s bite?” Lawrence patted her again. “Hon, he already could take as much of you as he wants. He can drink you down and come back for more. He’s not like most of us. Don’t you know what he is?”
A monster.
She didn’t say it, but the words passed between her and the vampire.
“He doesn’t look like a vampire in his hunter’s mask,” Lawrence said. “Right now his true form is showing.”
She knew what a vampire’s hunting mask looked like, and that wasn’t it. Vampire fangs grew longer when they hunted than they did for drawing sex blood, but they were always recognizably humanoid. No vampire ever sprouted that kind of muzzle, that many HUGE fangs. Those claws! Christopher called himself a freak. She’d thought he’d been talking about his synesthesia, which certainly wasn’t freakish at all.
“He is a monster, isn’t he?”
“I won’t disagree with that,” Lawrence answered. “I’m a regular old strigoi myself, but your boy Christopher is the type of vampire we normal vampires fear. We eat people. They eat us,” he added.
His meaning took her like a punch in the gut. Christopher had scared her a few times since they met, but she hadn’t once been truly frightened of him until now. “He’s an Enforcer.”
“Enforcer of the Law,” Lawrence told her. “Nighthawk. Hunter. Protector. Defender. Bubo, or Tytan in older languages. He’s a vampire who hunts vampires. Our own Officer Friendly.”
“But—Ariel…?” Her thoughts and memories tumbled over each other. She’d been through so much with Christopher, but he’d never really answered her questions about who he was and why he was in Chicago. “I suspect he’s been sent to check up on Ariel.”
Lawrence didn’t seem surprised. He didn’t ask who had sent Christopher, or why. Ivy had to accept that only a little bit of what went on in the strigoi community was any of her business.
But Christopher was her business. His life mattered to her. More than she’d even realized before she accidentally tried to kill him.
“Get in here!” Aunt Cate called.
Ivy was terrified of the monster in the bedroom, but she ran in without hesitating. He was her monster and she was going to do everything she could to help him. Even if it meant opening her veins—no, giving him her blood was what caused this situation in the first place.
“I’m sorry, Christopher. I’m so sorry.”
Aunt Cate slapped her on the back of the head when Ivy knelt beside her over Christopher’s body. “You trusted your grandmother?”
“I think she really was trying to save me from a vampire,” Ivy said. “Helping me in her own way.”
Cate snorted in disbelief. “Hold his mouth open,” she directed Ivy. “Sit on him, Lawrence, to keep him still.”
Lawrence did as he was directed, but said, “If he rips my heart out, you are not getting the diamonds I promised you for Yule.”
“I know where you hid the box. Ivy—mouth.”
What Ivy reached for was called a mouth, but it was a cross between big bad wolf and great white shark. My fault. My Christopher. She feared this creature, but she wasn’t going to be repulsed by him.
Holding on to his mouth hurt, serrated teeth pressed against her skin, but Ivy managed to avoid any of the razor-sharp fangs drawing her blood when she pulled Christopher’s jaws open. He made low, gurgling, whimpering sounds that broke her heart. But the look of pure hatred when he turned eyes he could barely keep open on her chilled her to the bone.
Apologizing at that point wasn’t going to do any good. She concentrated on doing exactly what her aunt told her.
“Hold his head up a little. Rub his throat, it will help him swallow.”
Aunt Cate held a bathroom glass to Christopher’s mouth. She began slowly and carefully pouring a cloudy, fizzing liquid into his gaping, hideous maw.
Ivy held on tight when he tried to jerk his head away. She made stupid, cooing, encouraging, helpful sounds every time the Enforcer swallowed a little bit of the potion. Eventually, it all went down. Christopher’s stiff muscles went limp. His hate-filled eyes closed.
Aunt Cate stood up. “He needs to rest now.”
Lawrence got to his feet. “No, he doesn’t.”
Ivy watched the lovers, vampire and white witch, give each other a long, serious look. She figured out their silent argument.
“He needs to hunt, doesn’t he?”
Ivy supposed he was probably going to kill her when he woke up. But that wouldn’t help him recover despite the emotional satisfaction he might get from tearing her limb from limb.
Oh, no. Death is far too good for you.
The voice that floated weakly through her head was Christopher’s, but it was likely also only her imagination providing its own twisted version of hope that he was pulling through.
“He has to make a kill,” Lawrence acknowledged. “He needs to feed.”
“But—Ariel isn’t here,” Aunt Cate said. “We can’t let him out on the street to bring down any human he chooses. There are already demons killing out there.”
“Not to mention all the normal, vicious, thoughtless bastard mortals killing people right now because killing each other is easier for your kind than it is for mine,” Lawrence said. “Using magic is difficult, but buying guns is easy.”
“Should we call Selena?” Ivy asked.
Lawrence shook his head. “She’s not a vampire. She’s the protector of magical
mortals, and I respect her. But she’s not a vampire yet. And this one”—he pointed at Christopher—“would never forgive her intruding on his rightful kill.”
“I don’t like this,” Cate said. “I didn’t save his life for him to—”
“He doesn’t kill mortals,” Ivy said.
“I am aware of that,” Cate snapped. “But not all vampires deserve to die.”
“I know one that does,” Lawrence said. “There’s a strig pimp Ariel’s been saving for killing on Blessing Day. Total parasitic loser the territory can do without. He makes girls into slaves and turns his slaves out on the street to hook for him.”
“Charming,” Cate murmured.
Lawrence nodded. “Ariel can do without the holiday treat if taking out this strig helps Ivy’s boy get better.”
“Do I get a say in this?” Christopher asked.
He was leaning on his elbows, looking up at them. He looked like death warmed over, but he didn’t look like a monster anymore. Ivy was so happy, she would have dropped down on her knees to kiss him, but the acid look she got from him made her take a step back instead.
“Put on some clothes, woman,” he said as he got to his feet. He looked down the long length of his body. “And I’ll do the same. “Thank you, ma’am,” he added to Aunt Cate. Most of his attention remained on Lawrence.
Ivy thought that Christopher looked hungry.
I am hungry. I’ll try not to eat your friend.
His voice in her head was tight, furious, and made Ivy shudder.
Ivy decided that it might be best to keep quiet and do as she was told. Best. Of course. But not possible. She hurried to put her clothes back on. She’d been too upset to notice or care about being naked until Christopher mentioned it. Her leg had stopped bleeding. Still hurt.
“I am going with you,” she told Christopher, when they were dressed.
“You don’t want to see this,” he said.
“I didn’t want to see my grandfather naked. I don’t want to be a demon hunter. I do intend to go with you. Yes. What happened is my fault. You can yell at me about it later.”
“Or rip your throat out.”
“Or—that. But I am not allowing you out of my sight.”
“You. Not. Allowing. Me?” Christopher shook his head. “That isn’t how it works between strigoi and companion.”
“I’m. Not. Your. Companion.” She put her hand on his cheek. He was so pale. Barely under control. She had nearly killed him. “I am not letting you out of my sight. I’m not running the risk of losing—”
He laughed. Loud and wild. “Demon child, I don’t need backup.”
“You’re not at one hundred percent yet. Strigs have nothing to lose, no laws to obey. You don’t know the territory.”
“What’s your plan? To let him bite you?”
“You are not at one hundred percent,” she repeated stubbornly.
“My fifty percent is better— Oh, never mind.” He grabbed her wrist. “Come along.” He looked to Lawrence. “Take me to this strig.”
chapter thirty-four
Here he was in an American slum hunting for an unaffiliated vampire accompanied by another strig and the woman who had tried to kill him. What a lovely evening it was.
At least they’d taken Ivy’s aunt’s car. Ivy drove. And, thankfully, the good witch had opted out of the expedition. Christopher did not like it that Lawrence gave route instructions to Ivy. He didn’t like having another vampire talking to her. It didn’t matter to him that Ivy and the American vampire had known each other for a long time. It didn’t matter that Lawrence was involved with the witch. Ivy belonged to him. No other strigoi, voice, mind, or hand should touch her.
But Ivy was correct that he was still weak.
He sat in the backseat, his attention switching from Ivy to Lawrence and back again. He kept his hands clenched at his sides, his lips firmly shut. He wanted to kill them. First one. Then the other. Then back again. He imagined the details. The more his hunger grew, the more gruesome the details became.
And they knew exactly what he was thinking. He couldn’t have hid his longings if he wanted to. And he didn’t want to. The pair were tense. They didn’t speak to him, and they kept their thoughts as quiet as they could as well. He wanted to run inside their brains, to rip and tear and eat their minds.
Ivy flinched at this imagery, and swerved the car nervously.
Careful, slave.
Christopher was still in terrible pain.
You poisoned me.
If I wanted you dead would I have called for help?
Her intentions didn’t matter to him—he hurt too badly. His blood burned. His heart pounded. It felt like an elephant was sitting on his chest, and bouncing. His freakish extra senses simply weren’t there. He didn’t love the freak, but he was furious at having this part of himself numbed, maybe even stripped away.
Oh, yes, he needed to kill. Consume.
And once he did— Just wait until I get you home, Ivy McCoy.
Bailey, she dared to think back. Never mind what it says on my driver’s license. My name is Bailey.
Slave, Ivy. I don’t like your name. I’m going to change it.
Oh, fuck off.
Perhaps Ivy wasn’t quite as frightened as she should be. Later, she would be.
He stopped thinking about her, about Lawrence. He set his senses out hunting. Weak or not, he was Nighthawk, Hunter. He would find his prey himself.
“Stop,” he said after a few minutes of seeking dark blood through the night.
Ivy braked instantly.
Christopher slammed the car door behind him. He took a few steps, stood in front of the car’s headlamps and continued his telepathic search. The stench of the strig wound all through the neighborhood. The fainter tendrils of slave minds and the strig’s blood flowing in them wasn’t strong enough to confuse the trail.
Christopher went around to open the driver’s side door. He grasped Ivy’s wrist and ran a thumb across bruised skin. His smile showed fangs. “You wanted to come with me. You might as well make yourself useful.”
Bait. Her vampire master had set her out as bait to attract his prey. Thanks a bunch, Chris.
Ivy took another tentative step along the broken, cracked sidewalk. The cool November air helped tamp down a pervasive smell of rot, but it was still there. No streetlights gave any illumination along the block. The cars going by were few and far between, and she was glad of that. One driver did slow down and ask her how much for a blow job. She told him she was on her break. She still felt totally filthy from that brief encounter. Dealing with vampires and demons was one thing, but hooking? Euww!
And there was a strig out there forcing women to prostitute themselves for him? Christopher had set her up as bait to attract this strig because he was pissed at her, when she would have volunteered to help take the pimp bastard out if he’d bothered to ask.
She didn’t turn to look when the shadow glided up behind her. A normal person wouldn’t see, hear, or feel it at all. The type of person she was pretending to be might have a feeling like someone had just stepped on her grave—a vague apprehension. She projected that, a bit of worry, a bit of psychic nervousness. Just enough vulnerable psychic energy to whet the vampire’s interest, to make him think he had a candidate for slavery in his sights.
To keep him from noticing the vampire that was following him.
Hunters following hunters. Wasn’t that how she and Christopher had met?
Ivy wondered what it would be like to go on a normal date, go to a movie, how about a candlelit dinner with wine and roses instead of blood and guts? Preferably not your own. Oh, well, hers was not the normal world.
“Are you lost, little girl?” the vampire suddenly walking beside her asked.
There was nothing fake about Ivy’s startled jump. Her genuine squeak of surprise embarrassed her, but it amused the vampire beside her. She bet it amused Christopher, too.
The strig put his hand on her arm and t
urned her to face him. She got a good look at his normal features for a moment. Good-looking guy. Their gazes met, then the magic happened. The shift was mostly hypnotic, but there was some physical shifting in his looks as well. His eyes softened, took on an intense glitter. His skin became smoother, his lips fuller, sexy. He exuded pheromone perfume. This was the beautiful, irresistible lover’s mask, the seductive face vampires showed their sexual prey.
Christopher had never tried that trick on her.
“My boyfriend’s kind of ugly,” she told the strig. “I like him that way.”
Happy to hear it,” Christopher said as he grabbed the strig by the scruff of the neck.
The other vampire pulled away, changed into fanged and clawed hunter form. He leapt at Christopher, snarling and snapping.
“Didn’t say I was talking about you,” Ivy said. She quickly stepped back out of the way.
Christopher concentrated on the strig. He could have killed this pup already, just jumped on him and ripped his heart out, but a fight was better. Inflict a little pain for the hell of it—and mostly because this piece-of-scum pimp had dared turn his attention on Ivy.
“If you hadn’t taken the bait, you might not have to suffer,” he told the strig.
Christopher dodged raking claws, let the strig jump back and move in for another attempted strike.
Who the hell are you? What are you doing on my street? I saw the bitch first.
Christopher raked his own claws across the strig’s face. Language.
He touched the tip of his tongue to his claws’ bloodied tips. Energy instantly lessened his pain. Lovely, lovely vampire blood.
Christopher backed the vampire up against a wall. By now the strig was terrified. Christopher hadn’t changed to Nighthawk mask, but the renegade vampire recognized what he was.
Christopher settled one big hand around the strig’s throat. He pressed his other hand on the strig’s chest, claws pricking flesh over his heart. The strig scratched, kicked, and snapped. Fighting for his life.
I haven’t done anything! Damn it, Ariel, I can help you!
Christopher didn’t point out that he wasn’t Ariel. Living outside the Laws of the Blood makes your life forfeit whenever I want.
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