by Amie Gibbons
“I think scars make a guy sexier,” I said, runnin’ my fingers down the line of his jaw. He chuckled and I grinned right back. “Not that you need the help.”
I glanced at the door. “I hope you know, I can’t ever leave this room.”
“I doubt anyone you’re worried about would want to listen at the door.”
“They’ll know,” I said. “We’ll go back out there and everyone will know and I can’t handle that. I’ll go to work and no one will say anything, scratch that, Dan will say something, but the others will just know, and it’ll be this big pink elephant in the room. I’m not the psychic or an agent anymore. I’m the agent who did a vamp at a work party after a demon attack while everyone waited outside.”
“No,” Quil said, staring into my eyes. “You’re the agent who got silver out of me, yet again, and got pounced on, yet again, for your troubles. I didn’t ask, sweets, I just rolled over and took you.”
“Yeah, let’s tell my boss that. Then I can try to pull him off you as he attacks you, probably with that silver whip the demon left, then watch as all the vamps jump on him, then as the other agents jump on them. Then have fun at their funerals because there will be a lot of dead people, and our alliance will go up in smoke. Just so I don’t have to be embarrassed. I don’t think so.”
“Does your mouth just do that or do you actually have to concentrate to talk that much so quickly?”
“Don’t tease me. What am I gonna do?”
“You’re going to suck it up. You’re going to get up, get your team to take you to the hospital. You’re going to tell them to take their opinions and shove them in whatever hole you think is anatomically appropriate, and if your boss fires you, I will hire you as a consultant for the nest so you and your many talents don’t go to waste. They loved you tonight. I saw you out there, talking and laughing. You fit here.”
I pulled back and looked at him. “I’m not working for you. That would be too weird. And they won’t fire me. The director won’t let them.”
I didn’t know what to say about the rest of it.
“Even after this, unprofessional behavior,” he said in a deep voice.
I giggled. He was doing a Grant impression.
“Yeah. She won’t care. Hell, she’ll probably say it’d be a good way to get intel from you.”
“So you’ll go back to work and just have to deal with everyone whispering behind your back?”
I nodded. “Pretty much. That plus the cold, disappointed shoulder from Grant, the snide comments from Dan, the worried looks from Jet. Kat will giggle with me over it, and Irish...” I paused. “I don’t know what Irish would say.”
A knock on the door cut off his laugh.
“What?” Quil yelled.
“Sorry,” Len yelled through the door. “But Agent Grant’s worried about Ariana. He said this shouldn’t be taking so long, and he’s worried you hurt her. He’s, well, we’ll have to subdue him in a second.”
I heard cursing in the hall and flinched.
“Tell him I don’t know how fast he is, but I’m not, and I like to snuggle after,” Quil yelled.
Actually, we were done pretty quickly, but that wasn’t the point.
“Don’t you dare tell him that,” I yelled, then said in a quieter voice to Quil, “Stop making trouble.”
“But I’m so good at it.” He pouted.
“Len, tell Grant I’m fine and I’m too embarrassed to come out yet,” I yelled.
“Ariana?”
My heart sank at Grant’s voice.
“I’m fine, General! I’m just resistin’ the urge to dig myself a hole and stay there, that’s all.”
“Agent Ryder, if you’re...” He paused. “Done, we need to check you out,” he said in a completely un-telling tone. “Deal with your embarrassment on your own time.”
“Why don’t y-” Quil yelled, and I clamped my hand over his mouth.
“Just a minute, General!” I lowered my voice. “Seriously? You owe me. So you are not gonna say anything else to make this situation worse.”
He nodded with big, innocent eyes. Then ruined it by licking my palm.
“You.” I shook my head as I stood up.
I paused as I saw myself in the full length mirror on the door. My hair looked like a haystack in tornado season, my clothes were torn and bloody, my mascara was streaked from crying, and my face was as red as a radish.
“Oh yeah,” I said. “I look great.”
“You do,” Quil said. I tossed him a look and shook out my hair, lookin’ around. Where the blazes did my hair clip go?
“I look like someone who was just in a fight then had sex,” I said, grabbing a tissue off the dresser. I dabbed it with spit and wiped under my eyes. “Or did both at the same time.”
“Exactly,” Quil said. “You look wonderful ravished like that.”
“You are not helping.”
“Wasn’t trying to,” he said. “I’ve got to go talk to my people. Let them see that I’m alive. Will you be okay for a minute?”
“Yes, I’ll be fine. You go do your thing. It’ll be easier for me to face Grant alone.”
“You can wait in here until I’m back.”
“No, I really can’t. Got to face the boss eventually.”
He nodded and opened the door, strollin’ out with a cocky, “Agent Grant.”
Grant came in and closed the door behind him.
He put my purse on the dresser, takin’ me in with a long look.
“You dropped your purse downstairs,” he said. “Still have your first aid kit in here?”
I nodded. “Box, probably near the bottom.”
He riffled through my purse and came out with the little white box. He nodded at the bed and I sat on it.
He pulled the cloth off my arm and made a small hiss of sympathy as I whimpered. It hurt! He didn’t say anything as he cleaned it off with the no pain antiseptic, then wrapped it with a real bandage.
“What was I supposed to do?” I asked once he was done.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I do know you’re not looking at me. So you think you did something wrong.”
I hardened my face and looked up into his eyes. He gave a ghost of a smile.
“That’s a start,” he said, then cleared his throat. “You should get out there. They’re all pretty grateful. And they don’t seem to have a problem with what you two did in here.”
“Do you? Have a problem, sir?” I asked.
He kissed my forehead and stood up. “Yes. You ready?”
“Grant, are you okay?”
“If you hadn’t wanted to…” He shook his head, holdin’ out the camera necklace. I put it on and looked around for my earbud. “Would he have stopped if you didn’t want to?”
“Yes,” I said. “If I said no, he would have stopped. I wouldn’t be with him if I wasn’t positive of that.”
“Okay.” He grabbed my earbud off the ground and handed it to me.
I put it in.
He took a breath and looked at me.
“Sir?” I finally asked. “Is there something else?”
He walked out.
We went back downstairs and the party could not have been more dead if they were zombies and not vamps.
“I didn’t get everyone, General,” I said.
He shook his head. “The vamps let it spill you were psychic. In this crowd, if anyone didn’t want to talk to you, they wouldn’t have to. This is what happens when you work with amateurs. We can leave another team to keep an eye on the place, but I’m calling it.”
“This has been one of the strangest nights of my life,” I said.
“Stranger than when you were kidnaped?” Quil asked, walkin’ up.
“No, that’s why I said one of, cuz honestly while that was horrible, tonight was surreal on the level of Dali. And I’m-”
He grabbed my face in his hands and pulled me into a deep kiss. I smushed my body into his and stood on tip-toes to get closer.
&nbs
p; That’s one way to shut me up.
Grant cleared his throat and I pulled back.
“Right, and I have to stay.” Quil rested his forehead on mine. “Can’t go with the pretty girl, can’t go with the pretty girl.”
I giggled. “That’s okay. Pretty girl needs a shower and can’t have another night like last. I have to work tomorrow and I’m already about to pass out.”
He nodded and backed away. “Make sure to get a lot of iron.”
“I will. But what if the summoner is still here?”
“Then the rest of the nest will jump him if he reveals himself or tries anything.” Quil turned to Grant. “Could you stay with her tonight? I know I took too much, and I don’t want her to be alone, just in case.”
Grant almost looked… surprised? Maybe. He nodded. “My thoughts exactly.”
“See, there the big guy goes again, gettin’ all protective and gettin’ a guy to watch me,” I said.
“Born four hundred years ago, sweets,” Quil said with a grin. “Don’t really care if I come off as sexist.”
We kissed goodbye and Grant drove us back to my place.
We didn’t say much in the van, and I didn’t dare say anything about grabbing my car from the office when Grant dropped off the van, got his, and opened the door for me.
Yep, he wasn’t leaving me alone for a second.
Considering the demon could’ve followed us, not a bad idea.
We got to my house and Grant went in after me.
Pyro barely had time to flop on the couch as Grant yanked off his boots at the door.
Grant looked up and around, squinting.
“Yeah General?” I asked as I walked into the kitchen and grabbed two bottles of water.
“Thought I saw something move,” he said.
“Then why isn’t your gun out?” I asked, grinnin’ so he’d know I was teasing as I handed him the water.
“I was seeing things.”
“Well, you are psychic or somethin’ too, aren’t you?”
“Nice try.”
“Come on, sir. You had to have known. That there’s something magic about you.”
He shot me a look. “Sometimes, Ryder, I get the strongest urge to slap you upside the head.”
“Haha. I’m gonna shower. You got clean clothes in your bag?”
“Always travel with a change of clothes, Ryder.”
“I’ll take that as a yes. Soooo, food and stuff, you know where it is. I’ll clean up, then while you do, I can get the guest room made up.”
I walked upstairs, pausing to look back as Grant sat on the couch next to Pyro. He stroked my rug, squintin’ at him.
“Sir?” I asked.
“Why are you always moving this rug, Ryder? Every time I’m over here, it’s in a different spot.”
I grinned. “He moves himself, General. Likes the change in scenery.”
He looked up at me. “Smart ass.”
“Yes, sir.”
I cleaned up pretty quick, didn’t want either of us to be up too late.
We still had a demon to catch and were no closer to figurin’ out who the summoner was.
“Sir?” I asked after he was cleaned up and his room was ready.
“Don’t go there, Ryder.”
“Huh? This is a question on the case, sir.”
“Go ahead then.”
What the blazes did he think I was gonna ask?
“How do we find the summoner? We’ve got demons who keep showin’ up, but this person, there’s no reason for them to come to any trap we set in person. And I don’t know… I don’t think the party tomorrow will do much good.”
“I do.”
“Really? Why?”
He met my eyes. “Because, tonight, the demon could have gone after anyone… easily. It didn’t. It went after Quil. And it wasn’t trying to kill him.”
I drew a sharp breath. “You don’t think it’s an attack against the nest.”
“Not per se. Tonight, whatever this is, Ryder, I saw it. It’s personal.”
“And if it’s personal… then they’re going to want to be there to see it go down?”
“More likely. Also narrows the grudge list down. I already called Crowley’s team and they’re getting an early start on the records tomorrow with the new focus.”
“Looking for someone who’d want to hurt Quil?”
“Yes.”
“Sir, I don’t know… I mean, the dead girls.”
“Ariana, whatever this plot is, they want to hurt the nest, yes, but if the demon just wanted to kill Quil, she would have. She was trying to kidnap him. It’s personal.”
“What happened to not assumin’ anything, sir?”
He smiled. “It’s not an assumption, Ryder. I can feel it.”
“You always say that and you always end up being right, it’s like you know…” I snapped and pointed at him. “You did know you were magic before!”
His smile didn’t waver. “And now we know what we’re looking for.”
“What are you?”
“No idea.”
“Sir!”
“Ryder, I don’t know. Now, if Quil’s the intended target, why kill the girls?”
I blew out a huff of air. “Fine. Well, Quil’s the nest investigator. You kill girls to get him on the case and then… kidnap him when he’s distracted because of it?”
“Possibly.”
“Were we not even supposed to be on the case? I was thinkin’ the bad guy was tryin’ to sic us on the nest, but maybe they didn’t even know about us.”
“No, I think we were exactly where they wanted us, until tonight.”
“Because the demon screwed up?”
“Yes.”
“But who would want to kidnap Quil and why?”
“That’s what we’re for, Ryder.” He pat my knee. “Get some sleep. We’re starting over tomorrow.” I couldn’t even ask why before he said, “We’ve been looking at this wrong. We start over to see the evidence in new light. Quil’s no longer another investigator. He’s the intended victim. Perspective is everything.”
Chapter sevenTEEN
When we walked in, everyone in the office paused and looked at us.
Correction, looked at me.
I went red faster than flippin’ a switch on a neon sign.
That one second was all it took for me to feel like I was naked and walkin’ into math class on finals day.
“Hey, Crowley,” I said as Grant and I walked past him and he gave me a wave. “Good job on cleaning up the scene.”
Team two had the job of staying up and processin’ the crime scene last night and jumped on the research today. They probably didn’t get a lick of sleep last night. I reached to pat his shoulder and he jerked away.
I know all kinds of emotions were swirlin’ on my face.
“Thanks,” he said, hightailing it to his desk.
He didn’t even want me to touch him?
I was a leper.
“Ryder, come on, you’re going to go through the evidence with Irish. Focus on Quil,” Grant said.
“Yes, sir.”
I put the coffees down on their owners’ desks, and gave Kat’s to her as she set up her laptop at Grant’s desk.
“What you doin’ up here?” I asked her.
“Forensic psychology,” she said. “Trying to get a sense of the summoner from the attacks.”
“Are you trained in that?”
“Only on the job, but it’s not a real profile, more looking for patterns.”
I nodded and went up to the lab with Grant and Sam from Team Three.
Sam walked back down with Grant.
What the quack? Did I need an escort or somethin’?
Irish looked up from a microscope and smiled at me.
At least one person was happy to see me.
“Hey, Irish!” I put our coffees down and hugged him.
“Hello, little darlin’,” he said. “You okay?”
“You heard?”
“Oh, I heard.”
I let him go and looked at him. “I’m so embarrassed.”
“Eh, don’t be. Two weeks from now, we’ll be on another case and no one will remember this.”
His cologne tickled my nose and I jerked away and turned to sneeze.
“Geez, Irish, what’s with the cologne?”
He grinned. “Sorry lass, with the age goes the nose. Didn’t realize it was so heavy.”
I eyed him. “You’re lyin’. Who is she?”
He blinked quickly. “How did you know!”
I giggled and slapped his arm. “You always do this when you have a date at night. So, what’s her name?”
He grinned. “Mandy, and she is a lovely little thing. Bit younger than me. She wants to go dancing.”
“That’s if Grant lets any of us leave tonight. He may want you at the party.”
Irish paled even more, not something I’d think was possible with his skin. “In the vampire nest? I’m not sure I can do that. And I’m a lab guy. I don’t do field work.”
I shrugged. “I was just sayin’, it’s possible. We might need you there to analyze stuff on the scene, to keep an eye on the evidence so I can have it with me, I don’t know. I’m just talkin’ here.”
He nodded. “Yeah, but Grant wouldn’t make me do that. I don’t do field work.”
Wow, he was scared.
“Are you scared of vampires, Irish?”
“Aye. A bit.”
“Quil’s a good guy, Irish. I swear he wouldn’t hurt you.”
“Yeah, but what about the thousands of others? And that queen, I don’t want to meet her.”
“Yeah. And she’ll be there tonight.” I shivered. “Geez, just got a chill. Well, I gotta get to work.”
I got the evidence from the lockup and made a little nest in the corner again as Irish went back to analyzin’ stuff I guessed was from last night.
I went over everything again, focusing on Quil, and got nothing for my troubles.
Grant came up to check after a couple of hours, Sam right behind him.
“Sorry, General. I have no clue why I can’t get anything. Kinda figured I would cuz it’s Quil, and last night I got that vision of him when I was just wonderin’ where he wandered off to. But I’m getting nothing.”
