Crimson Hungers
Alecia Monaco
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Copyright ©2006 Alecia Monaco
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ISBN (10) 1-59596-542-4
ISBN (13) 978-1-59596-542-4
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Editor: Crystal Esau
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Chapter 1
“Sorry, we don’t open for another hour.”
The burly security guard stood in front of the blood red velvet rope, thickly muscled arms crossed in front of his chest. A black T-shirt with the words Crimson Hungers in a font styled to resemble dripping blood strained to contain his bulk.
An intimidating figure, but for one thing… a tattoo of an eight-pointed star emblazoned on one broad bicep, marking him as one of the good guys. The star was the symbol of the Church of St. Germain, the de facto religion of choice for vampires who wished to be law-abiding citizens. But at the moment, all he was to Katya was six foot four inches of undead annoyance.
She tried for a friendly tone. “I understand that you won’t be open to the public for another hour, but I’m here on official business.” She put a smile into her words that she was far from feeling.
He raised a thick eyebrow at her. “Define official.”
Katya sighed. She hadn’t wanted to do this, not before even getting through the front door. Reaching inside the pocket of her black leather jacket, she retrieved her badge and held it up for his inspection.
He bent his hulking form to study the contents of the small ID case. “Texas Slayer Squad?” His attitude decreased by a few notches.
“Yep.” Katya kept her face utterly expressionless.
“Who do you need to see?” He unhooked the velvet rope.
“The owner. I assume he’s risen for the night?”
“Just one thing.” The security guard regarded her with something edging on respect. “No guns inside the club.”
She stifled a sigh of annoyance. “I’m law enforcement.”
“Yeah, but you’re not police.” The security guard matched her scowl for scowl.
“This isn’t an actual firearm.” She showed him her holster. “It’s a tranquilizer gun. Liquid silver, in case I run across a vampire predator.”
“I guess I can let that slide.” The security guard nodded. “Right this way.”
Katya followed him through the steel and glass door. The theme of the bloody font from the security guard’s T-shirt was repeated on the entrance door. Crimson Hungers in dripping red script, followed by the slogan Whet Your Appetite beneath it.
Katya grimaced. She could only imagine the kinds of hungers that were sated in the VIP rooms of this place.
As they crossed the threshold into the coat check area, Katya blinked. The contrast made by the red and purple flashing overhead lights inside the otherwise dark interior of the bar was enough to give any human pause, even with supernatural abilities like Katya’s.
The security guard led her past the coat check area and into the main part of the bar. A large dance floor occupied the center of the massive room with small tables flanking the edges. Two mahogany bars stood at opposite ends of the room, with stools lined up as neatly as soldiers in formation.
From a set of speakers cleverly hidden somewhere in the club, Bauhaus droned the words to Bela Lugosi’s Dead playing on Vampire Radio, but the volume was low enough that Katya could still hear herself think.
Excellent. Thinking was exactly what she needed to do. Think, daydream, whistle along with Peter Murphy, whatever. Anything to keep her Psionic sense from kicking in before she had time to assess the situation.
She followed the security guard to the far side of the room, where a vamp wearing a black cowboy hat stood polishing the bar with a soft white cloth. She didn’t have to use her abilities to know that he was no garden variety vampire. She could sense his energy like a trickle of electricity crawling up her spine.
He was a master vampire, and a powerful one at that.
He raised his head, peering at her with impossibly light blue eyes from beneath the low brim of his hat. “Yes?” His gaze darted from her to the security guard and back again.
“Agent Katya Stern is here on official business.” The security guard cleared his throat. “Texas Slayer Squad.”
“I’d like to speak with the owner, if that’s possible.” She tried not to let the vamp’s penetrating stare unnerve her, with little success. She could feel him watching her with every fiber of her being.
She shook her head, trying to shake off the sense of confusion that accompanied his presence. What was up with that? She’d been dealing with master vampires since the day the Slayer Squad had recruited her. Usually her own highly refined abilities made her immune to all but the most powerful of mind games. But the sensation in question didn’t feel like glamoring, not quite. It was a form of energy she hadn’t tasted before, pressing against her like a force field.
The vampire interrupted her train of thought. “That would be me.” He spoke in perfectly unaccented English, a rarity among master vampires, who came from the Old World. He folded the polishing cloth and placed it somewhere under the bar. “Rex Fontainebleau.”
She nodded, knowing vampires preferred not to shake hands. Actually, she tried to avoid the practice herself. It was too easy to get an unwanted blast of someone else’s energy that way. “I need to ask you a few questions, Mr. Fontainebleau, and then I’d like to take a look around the club.”
“We can talk in my office.” He made his way around the bar and stepped through the swinging door before addressing the bartender. “Hold all my calls.”
“Yes, sir.”
“This way.” Rex gestured to a door a few feet away from where they stood, bearing the expected “employees only” sign. They walked toward the door. When they reached it, he turned the doorknob and headed down a dimly lit hall.
Katya followed at a careful distance behind him, doing her best not to notice the way his black jeans hugged a magnificently crafted ass. But with his ebony hair hanging like a satin curtain to his waist, the eye was naturally drawn to his spectacular posterior.
God, they just don’t make ’em like that anymore. She shook her head again and waited while he extracted a key ring from his front pocket -- she had no idea how he’d managed to fit anything in his pockets, with his jeans painted on like a second skin -- and unlocked the door to what she assumed was his office.
He flipped on a light switch, forcing her eyes to adjust once again to a sudden change in lighting. The room was decorated in rich burgundy, from the carpet to the sun-blocking drapes over the large window behind his walnut desk.
Rex took a seat in the velvet upholstered chair behind the desk and gestured to the armchair across from him. “Please.”
She eased down onto t
he chair, perching herself on the edge of her seat. The high-wattage overhead lighting allowed her to finally take her first good look at one Rex Fontainebleau.
She’d been wrong about his eyes. They weren’t merely light blue. They were so pale as to almost be silver, and the blue was just a hint of blue, like the deepest lake water peeping through a sheet of frost. They were set deeply in a face that was at once both masculine and yet beautiful. It was a face too seductive to be macho, but manly enough to remind every part of her anatomy that she was a woman.
A woman that had been alone, she reminded herself, for way too long.
His skin had the glow of the old ones, making him look like something carved from alabaster. The cowboy hat threw the planes of his face into sharp relief, and the black T-shirt that had looked common and tacky on the security guard fit Rex like a custom tailored garment. From the alligator cowboy boots she’d caught a glimpse of as she’d followed him to his office, to the frost-blue eyes gazing at her from across the desk, he could put any male, human or vampire, to shame in the looks department.
Rather unfortunate, she noted, that she had a strict policy about dating vampires. She didn’t do it. Ever. Otherwise, this particular specimen would’ve been like catnip to a very hungry pussy… and she meant that in more ways than one.
“How can I help you, Agent Stern?” The vampire leaned back in his chair, regarding her with the same piercing gaze that had rattled her just minutes earlier.
She shifted from her own personal train of thought to the case at hand, a skill she’d honed over the years, but one that had seldom been so severely tested. “The Slayer Squad is working in conjunction with a federal agency to investigate some local vamp-related killings.”
His face shut down, showing the same lack of expression that she herself had perfected. “I’m going to assume the vampire isn’t the victim in this case,” he said dryly.
“The two victims were both human, young females drained completely through only one bite mark.” The fact that their assailant had severed their femoral arteries was a fact that law enforcement had decided to keep quiet about, a little something they could use to verify any confessions that came their way.
“I read about the murders in the paper, but there was nothing about them being vampire vics.” He leaned forward, resting his arms on the top of his desk, and reached up to touch the eight-pointed pewter star hanging from a chain around his neck.
Another follower of St. Germain. At least she knew what she was dealing with.
“The Houston PD is doing their best to protect innocent local vampires.” She tried to avoid that blue gaze, unwilling to be pulled under by the almost tangible magnetism he exuded. “Can you imagine how many self-styled vigilantes would hit the streets, trying to inflict some Texas justice on you guys if the facts of this case were made public? The last thing the vampire community needs is for word of this to get out.” She let the effect of her statements sink in. “Besides, we’ve heard rumblings of some tensions in your community.” She waited for him to speak. When he didn’t, she continued. “Wouldn’t it be best to conduct this investigation as quietly as possible, for everyone concerned?”
Silence zinged between them like a livewire. She felt her heart skip a beat, then two. Why on earth was he affecting her that way? She wiped her suddenly damp palms on her black leggings, glad that the desk obstructed his view of such an obviously nervous gesture.
“I agree with you,” he finally said, breaking the silence. He paused again, this time looking at her the way a man would… as a woman, rather than prey. “And what does all of this have to do with my club?”
She drew a deep breath. “We have reason to believe that the killer is still in Houston.”
He held up a hand. “Look, Agent Stern, I run a law-abiding establishment.”
“That’s not at issue here, Mr. Fontainebleau --”
“Rex,” he corrected.
“I’d prefer to call you Mr. Fontainebleau.” No need to get cozy with him. Although, if anyone had ever given her a reason to rethink her ‘no vampires’ policy, it would have to be him. “As I said, the legality of your establishment is not in question.” She leaned forward on the velvet covered seat of her chair. “In fact, we have no reason to believe that any of your employees are involved.”
He arched his black brows. “Then why are you here?”
Another deep breath. She’d arrived at her least favorite part of the job. The explanation. “I’m here to read the energy patterns in your club.”
She waited for one of the standard reactions, which ranged from laughter to skepticism to out and out disbelief. She got none of the above.
“You’re a Psion,” he said. It wasn’t a question.
She felt her gut tighten with suspicion. “Yes, I am.” She studied his face. “What do you know about the subject?”
He shrugged. “My sire had Psionic… abilities.” He drummed his fingers on his desktop in an oddly human gesture.
She considered his words. “You say ‘had’ as if he’s no longer among the…” She caught herself before she used the word living. “… the undead,” she finished.
“Master Cain was my sire,” he said, averting his eyes.
The tension in the room thickened. “Master Cain met the dawn two weeks ago.”
“Yes,” he said simply. “And now you know why the vamp community is in such turmoil.”
Katya nodded slowly. “He was the oldest of the master vampires in the area.”
Rex reclined back in his chair. “Then there’s Melaina,” he said, referring to the Empress of the Gulf Coast Court. “With her getting married and moving back to Europe in a couple of months, there’s a huge battle brewing over who will be the new leader.”
“Didn’t Master Cain appoint a successor in his will?” She never allowed herself to get involved in vampire intrigue, but curiosity was getting the better of her.
“Yeah.” His laughter had a wry note. “Anyway, back to your case,” he said, changing tacks abruptly. “You’re looking for the energy signature of a rogue vamp?”
She nodded, relieved to be back on familiar conversational ground. “We have reason to suspect that House Minotaur may have been sheltering any number of rogues in the past year.”
He laughed, and it was not a pleasant sound. “Those bastards again.” He shook his head. “Always screwing things up for the rest of us.”
Privately she agreed with his assessment of House Minotaur, but she wasn’t about to delve deeper into local vampire politics by commenting. “I’m doing Psionic readings of every vampire establishment in the city, except the ones affiliated with House Minotaur.”
“Why doesn’t that omission surprise me?” Rex smirked.
“We don’t want anyone from Minotaur talking out of turn, if you know what I mean.” Katya cleared her throat for emphasis. “And we want to eliminate the rest of the vampire community as potential suspects before we head into House Minotaur territory.”
“Makes sense to me,” Rex agreed.
She nodded. “If our killer passed through any of the local haunts, I’ll detect the energy signature, and maybe get a read on what we’re dealing with here.”
He pushed his chair back and rose to his feet. “You have my full cooperation.” She stood and opened her mouth to thank him, but he held up a hand, silencing her. “After we agree to a couple of conditions.”
Katya tried to avoid agreeing to conditions whenever she could. But she’d already been to more vampire bars, clubs, and havens than she could count. She wasn’t about to stop now. What if Crimson Hungers was the missing piece of the puzzle, and she’d walked because she didn’t want to agree to Rex Fontainebleau’s terms?
“All right, Mr. Fontainebleau. I’m listening.” She folded her arms over her chest. “What are your conditions?”
He grinned, his teeth even more blindingly white than his skin. Sharp fangs grazed his bottom lip. “First, you will allow me to accompany you around my pr
operty while you do your reading.”
She started to protest, but he cut her off. “Secondly, when you’re finished with business, you’ll let me take you to dinner.” His pupils narrowed until they were a thin sliver of black, lost within the icy silver-blue of his eyes. “My treat.”
Treat was the last word she could think of to describe it.
Chapter 2
Katya Stern made his blood race like nobody’s business. Rex could feel his circulation heading south faster than the speed of light. Good thing he’d fed on several bottles of synthetic O Positive earlier, or there wouldn’t have been enough blood left in his brain to support basic life functions.
As if his attraction to her wasn’t enough, he knew she felt it too. She could deny it until Vlad Tepes rose from the grave, but that wouldn’t change a thing. Heat swirled between them like fog dancing in the beam of bright headlights. She wasn’t the only one who could sense and read energy. And her energy was burning with desire.
She narrowed her hazel eyes. “Perhaps you’ve failed to understand the purpose of my visit, Mr. Fontainebleau. I’m here as part of an investigation. This is not a social call.”
The pulse throbbing in her neck caught his attention, and he struggled to tear his gaze from it. He couldn’t help but wonder how it would taste. Hell, he would be willing to taste her from head to toe without stopping, like a five foot four buffet of fragrant blood and satiny freckled skin.
“I’m fully aware that you have a job to do, Katya.”
She frowned, her full lips forming a tempting pout. “I thought we agreed to keep this professional.”
“I haven’t agreed to anything yet, and neither have you,” he reminded her. He tracked her movements as one small hand moved up to brush her dark curls back from her face, filling his mind with an image of burying his face in those curls, inhaling their scent even as he buried his cock in other, more forbidden parts of her body.
“Look, Fontainebleau, I have an investigation to conduct.” She turned on her heel and headed for his office door. “If you want to pick up a little human companionship for the evening, I suggest you choose one of the many would-be swans that will be packing your dance floor any minute now.”
Crimson Hungers Page 1
