Harlequin Nocturne September 2014 Bundle: Beyond the MoonImmortal Obsession

by Michele Hauf

  She stopped rubbing.

  How could she have heard St. John? Surely not by any normal means, unless she had suddenly become adept at reading lips, and he had the same ability.

  And if not?

  If she took those oddities into Stewart’s world, of which that damn club was supposedly a part...did those things insinuate that Christopher St. John might be one of the creatures Stewart had been after?

  Could a vampire mesmerize her into wanting and giving in to that kiss?

  Laughable.

  What about the sex they’d nearly had on a side street?

  No, she was looking for an out, and setting all blame on Christopher St. John.

  All the same, her nerves spiked annoyingly as she looked at her hand, picturing a sharpened stake in it. Her beloved brother’s stake. A thing that belonged to Stewart, her twin, who seemed to believe wholeheartedly in his research. Not a hobby. Nothing like that. Who the hell else, other than a true believer, carried a weapon like that around?

  Absurd? Well...yes.

  Besides, what reason would Christopher St. John, as a man or as some other creature, have for thwarting her plans, when those plans were as simple as finding her brother, and reporting on those missing girls? What would he gain by distracting her?

  A more reasonable explanation was that Christopher St. John might just have been the right guy at the right time to tempt her, and it turned out that lust was blind to everything else going on.

  Still, once the ridiculous thoughts had taken root, Madison couldn’t dislodge them.

  In the backseat of the black London cab, sandwiched between the guys in her crew, and trying not to shake hard enough to draw attention to herself, Madison laid her head back, and closed her eyes.

  * * *

  “She saw her brother,” St. John said to Simon Monteforte on the street bordering Space. “My distraction worked, but what was he doing here? How did he get inside?”

  Simon Monteforte, a formidable creature, looked the part of the ancient vampire. He was as tall as St. John, and deceptively lean. Under his coat were several layers of steel.

  Stone-gray hair, worn straight and long, splayed out over the shoulders of a forest-green velvet tunic as dark as the night itself. Black form-fitting jeans covered all but the tips of expensive polished black boots. Born of French aristocracy, Monteforte retained his original patrician bearing and airs. He had never lost his accent. His love of luxury showed.

  He also owned half the block around Space.

  Because Monteforte had been around a long time, St. John continued to rein himself in—no easy feat when his heart was in that cab with Madison.

  He wanted to look at the street, and didn’t dare. Immortals as old as Monteforte could easily smell trouble. They scented lies and deceit like those things were simply new fragrances wafting in the air.

  St. John had centuries on Monteforte, and a strength that had once been the stuff of tales. There was no one amid the Hundred, here or anywhere else, for a Blood Knight to truly fear if he exposed his true nature. But he could not blow his cover.

  “Besides,” he said to Monteforte, “who are we to stop her brother? Stewart Chase killed two young rogues last night.”

  “So, my friend, did you.” Monteforte tilted his head in mock thought. “Or was it five fledglings you took down? I lose count these days when I’m not concentrating.”

  St. John smiled at the wily immortal’s obvious lie. The creature across from him, like himself, probably remembered everything he’d ever done and every idea he’d had. This was both a curse and a blessing for those who had lived so long, depending on the immortal’s outlook.

  Often, if he didn’t watch himself, St. John still heard the voices of the people in his own past, as well as the screams of those he had killed in battle, in the name of honor and the golden quest. After years of this kind of haunting, he had grown used to the whispers inside his head.

  At the moment though, those distant voices were silent. His heartbeat continued to echo Madison’s. His tattoos burned with cold blue fire.

  He willed himself to stay in the moment, knowing Madison was thinking about him, desiring him in a way she didn’t understand.

  Twitching his shoulders to ease the discomfort centered between them, St. John eyed the creature beside him. As he allowed his gaze to roam over Monteforte’s sullen face, the burn on his back became barely tolerable.

  Is it you, then, Simon? Is it possible that you’re the traitor? My marks think this might be so.

  “I suppose you can find her brother quite easily,” Monteforte said.

  “Why call him out when he does us a service?” St. John asked.

  “For the time being, that may be true. There are indeed too many unauthorized, random turnings lately. However, we wouldn’t want these kills to go to Stewart’s head, so that he desires bigger and better fare.”

  As Monteforte spoke those words, he stroked the sleeve of his velvet coat with a slender white hand, as if the sleeve were part of a lover’s limb.

  “It was wise to remove the fledglings from the club last night,” Monteforte continued. “Yet you took the woman with you.”

  St. John nodded. “As bait to get them out in the open.”

  The white hand stopped stroking the sleeve. “Did she see them?”

  “Thugs was the term she used, likely thinking they were after her purse. Since they were trained on her, getting her out of the club and out of the way seemed crucial.”

  So is this deception. What might you be hiding, Simon? Do I see something in your eyes?

  “Thugs.” Monteforte pulled a face. “A rather brutish American word, n’est ce pas? She doesn’t hold to the beliefs of her brother, then?”

  “She does not.” St. John knew he had to be careful now, when standing close to Simon Monteforte. He had to be sure the pain streaking across his shoulders was in honor of this ancient French immortal.

  “Nor does she know what you are?” Monteforte asked.

  “It’s doubtful that anyone knows.”

  More caution was necessary here, St. John realized after making that remark.

  He had tasted the edge of the secret buried inside Madison Chase. Last night had been a fantastic game to her, when thugs and vampires inherently were no part of her reality. But as a newscaster, she’d latch on to any oddities tossed her way. And as a Slayer, fully awakened to her skills, no vampire would be off her radar.

  If Madison believed she had seen her brother tonight, she would hunker down and pursue the issue with talons of steel. Simon Monteforte, the creature across from him, would see her again and perhaps glean her secrets as well.

  Another piercing stab between his shoulder blades brought St. John up from thought.

  Monteforte said, “You do realize that Miss Chase may become a liability?”

  “Any minute now,” St. John agreed, hating the need for such deceptions, but noting that the burning chill of his tattoos definitely seemed to be tied to the being across from him.

  He took a step closer to Monteforte, just to be sure.

  The tattoos screamed with distress.

  “You will take care of this?” Monteforte asked pointedly. “Take care of her?”

  “Of course,” St. John said, watching the old vampire carefully.

  “Then I’ll bid you adieu,” Monteforte concluded, and disappeared back into the club like the shadow he was.

  “Adieu,” St. John echoed, not to the immortal that had just tripped his alarms as a possible traitor to his kind, but to the street where Madison’s cab had taken her from him in the nick of time.

  One more moment in that heady embrace, out of the trillions of them he had endured since his death and rebirth as what he now was, and he wouldn’t have been responsible for his acti
ons.

  His fangs thrummed. His skin hurt. The sigils on his back were cold enough to frost the night. He was anxious for more of what the dazzling redhead had to offer, and couldn’t be allowed to trip her latent Slayer switches.

  Amid all that, he had to look into the fact that Monteforte had become a viable candidate for the term monster maker.

  Anxiety made him turn.

  The taillights of Madison’s cab were gone.

  He had to deal with Monteforte. That was his job, and he would do it. First, though, he’d make sure that Madison got back to her hotel safely.

  “Safe from everyone, other than myself, that is,” he said aloud as he took off at a run.

  Chapter 11

  She was bone-tired, flustered, and a detective was waiting for her in the lobby.

  Madison didn’t bother to hide her displeasure, and wondered why she couldn’t cut a break.

  D.I. Crane addressed her crew with a brief nod, and then turned to her. “Can I have a minute, Miss Chase?”

  “She’s been through a lot today,” Teddy said.

  “I understand that.” Crane took a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her.

  Madison glanced to Teddy, who shrugged, then nodded for her to use it.

  The white handkerchief she used to wipe her face and mouth with came back as red as the napkin at the club had. The detective’s white hankie was ruined.

  “It’s important,” Crane said. “Has to do with what we found today.”

  Sweet Lord, Madison thought. Had it only been that morning they had discovered Stewart’s leather jacket and what he’d hidden inside it? That awful weapon that seemed to haunt her?

  She smiled stiffly at Teddy. “I’ll be up in five.”

  “Better make it ten,” the detective said, earning a glare from her crew as they headed for the stairs.

  “I don’t think they like me,” he said.

  “Does anyone truly like cops?”

  “I find that unusual, since we’re the good guys.”

  “You bring bad news. People don’t like bad news. I’m assuming that’s the case here?”

  The detective shrugged. “We’ve stumbled upon something else I’d like you to take a look at.”

  “I’m not sure I can take more surprises.”

  “Oh, I’m fairly certain you’re able to stand a lot, Miss Chase. More than most.”

  Madison wondered what D.I. Crane would do if she asked him if he believed in vampires, and decided to let the question sit, since he was openly staring at the red marks on the handkerchief.

  “What is it you want to show me, Detective?”

  He removed an article from an evidence bag. It was her other silver shoe.

  “We needed to be alone for this unveiling?” Madison asked.

  “It’s more a case of where we found this shoe, than the shoe itself, that’s important.”

  “Where did you find it?”

  “Near an abandoned building by the water.”

  Madison raised an eyebrow.

  “Next to a pile of ashes,” the detective said.

  “Someone tried to burn my shoe?”

  “If that was their intention, they failed. No, Miss Chase, I’m afraid it was a person that burned up.”

  “What?” Madison’s chills returned. The knot in her stomach that she hadn’t been able to get to dissolve since landing in London, twisted. “What do you mean?”

  “The ash we analyzed appears at first glance to be the remains of a person.” He let that sink in for a minute. “The question I now have is why your shoe was found next to him?”

  “Him?”

  “Figure of speech,” D.I. Crane said. “It could just as easily be female.”

  Madison had a bad feeling about this. She had kicked off her shoes last night in order to ditch some lowlifes. True, the silver stilettos were expensive, but what would a bunch of hoodlums want with only one of them? Why hadn’t they picked up both while they were at it, since the detectives had found the other one right where she’d left it?

  The immediate reply she heard inside her head was totally insane, but the first answer that came to mind. Maybe that gang had used her discarded shoe to somehow aid their search for her.

  But the only instance in which a shoe could have helped in a chase, unless it had a directional chip in it, was if...

  Was if those young asses had been vampires, and had used the scent of her shoe to track her.

  Which would also mean that Christopher St. John had been right in his inferences about them.

  “Is something wrong?” D.I. Crane asked.

  Madison widened her stance as far as the hem of her tight skirt would allow in order to remain upright. What she was thinking was nightmarish and unutterable.

  “I don’t know how my shoe ended up anywhere but where I lost it,” she heard herself say. “I left them near the club called Space, as I explained earlier, when you gave me the first one. I don’t know anything about ashes, or a body.”

  She couldn’t go on. A paragraph in her brother’s notes had mentioned what happened to vampires when they suffered a final death. They were reduced to ash.

  Ash.

  Suddenly, she wanted to sit down.

  She dropped the handkerchief to the floor.

  “Miss Chase, were you alone last night?” the detective asked.

  “Do I need an alibi?”

  She’d have given anything to ask about the length of the teeth they’d found in that pile, but the detective was studying her intently. Being labeled loony by law enforcement wouldn’t help anyone here. She could not speak of vampires, and of chasing through the night, away from a pack of them.

  “I’d appreciate it if you’d answer the question,” the detective said.

  “No. I wasn’t alone.”

  “You were with your news crew?”

  Madison shook her head.

  “A friend?” the detective pressed.

  “I met a man at the club.”

  “His name?”

  “St. John. Christopher St. John.”

  D.I. Crane gave her an odd, unreadable look, then he nodded and let the subject drop, as if St. John’s name was some kind of magic password.

  “All right.” He glanced at the handkerchief on the floor by Madison’s feet. “I’ll have to keep this shoe.”

  “Fine.”

  The truth was that she didn’t want anything to do with that shoe. Maybe a vampire had touched it, and maybe it had just appeared at the scene of a homicide. She supposed there was no way that vampire ash could be checked for DNA, or if the police could track down someone who had died twice.

  She looked at the floor. To hell with you, Stewart, for that grisly thought.

  The detective continued to stare at the red-stained handkerchief. If he was wondering about that wooden stake in Stewart’s jacket, he might also be pondering if the Chase twins were homicidal maniacs.

  “A few years ago there were cases of homeless people being torched on the streets,” she said, needing to come up with an alternate explanation for the one ludicrously taking over her mind. Because if that pile of ash had been a vampire, the world as she and every other human on the planet had always imagined it was a fake.

  She put a hand to her forehead.

  “Yes,” the detective said. “That could be the case here as well. This kind of burn, however, would have required a flamethrower.”

  Or a wooden stake through the heart.

  Madison pressed her hair behind her ears with shaky hands. “Flamethrower,” she said. “God, I hope not.”

  The detective bent over to retrieve his handkerchief. “Well, you’re tired,” he said. “So, I’ll leave you with more advice
. It might be a good idea if you keep your crew with you tomorrow.”

  “You mean in case I might need another alibi?”

  Crane tucked the handkerchief into his pocket. She wondered if he was going to check it for DNA.

  “Shall I walk you upstairs?” he asked.

  “I can manage.”

  “I’ll see you tomorrow, Miss Chase.”

  “Hopefully not,” Madison muttered as he walked away.

  Somehow, she made it to the elevator, and heard the ping of its arrival. Before stepping in, she spun back. “Detective?”

  He stopped at the door.

  “Do you know Christopher St. John?”

  “Not personally,” he said.

  “Is he a credible alibi for last night?”

  “Most people around here would think so.”

  “Do you?”

  “What I think doesn’t matter. St. John is...highly regarded in important circles.”

  Trained to pick up on the importance of hesitant nuances, Madison said, “What circles would those be?”

  “Just about every one that counts these days,” the detective replied.

  “I really can’t figure out how my shoe got to where you found it,” she said.

  “I believe you.”

  With a polite wave of his hand, D.I. Crane exited the lobby, leaving Madison alone with all of the injustices of the world pressing in on her. A world that was shouting for her to consider the possibility that it might be populated by fanged dead men, even though she wanted to think she knew better.

  Pressing the button to her floor was a chore.

  The elevator, empty, small and ancient, seemed crowded with the thoughts plaguing her.

  But Stewart was alive.

  And she would find him, if she could keep herself on track.

  * * *

  When she got upstairs she found Teddy sitting on the floor outside her door. He got to his feet. “Everything okay?”

  “The good detective found one of my shoes,” Madison said.

  “He needed to see you in private to talk about a shoe?”

  She shrugged. “It’s mind-boggling.”

  “Well, I’ll say good night, then. I’m beat.” Teddy yawned. “I still have to go over some video footage.”