by Tina Folsom
Thomas felt a shiver run down his spine. Could he trust his ears? Had it really been Keegan who’d committed all those atrocities? Was Kasper blameless? He shook his head.
“Please don’t tell me you were a choirboy. You weren’t a saint back then, and you’re not a saint now! The way Sergio and his mate were killed has your handwriting all over it. Don’t deny it!”
“Ah, yes, a very unfortunate incident. And the one who is responsible for it has been punished. I’m afraid some of my followers still cling to methods that my brother instilled in them. I’ve been trying to retrain them since his demise, but some of these ways are so ingrained that they’re hard to eradicate. I prefer cleaner methods to achieve my goal.”
“Yes, and what is your goal, Kasper?” Thomas asked, still suspicious of his maker and former lover’s motives.
“You know what it is. I told you the night I met you. It is for our kind to be accepted. To be free to live the way we choose, without persecution, without restraints. I thought you wanted that too. That’s why you joined me back then. Has that changed?”
Thomas didn’t answer immediately. His deepest wish was still the same: to be loved for what he was and not be judged just because he was different. “I have the respect of my colleagues.”
“Are you so sure about that?”
Thomas narrowed his eyes. “What are you insinuating?”
“Did you know that Samson held a secret meeting at Zane’s house the other night?”
He didn’t know, but it didn’t have to mean anything. “That’s irrelevant.”
“You say that because you don’t know what was discussed at the meeting. Did you know that Samson told your colleagues about your secret?”
“He would never break his promise,” Thomas protested without hesitating.
“Don’t be so naive. See, that’s your problem. You always assume the best in people when you should assume the worst. Samson betrayed you just like Eddie did.”
“No! You can’t prove that!” Thomas desperately tried to cling to his belief that his oldest friend and colleague was keeping his word.
“Just like I couldn’t prove that Eddie betrayed you?” Kasper let out a bitter laugh and raised his iPhone again. “Care to listen to what Samson told them?”
Don’t do it! a voice inside him pleaded. Don’t listen to it. It’ll only make it worse. Eddie betrayed you. They all betrayed you. You’re nothing to them. Nothing. It was all a lie.
He sucked in a breath.
Feel the power! It’s yours!
Thomas sensed a bolt of electricity shoot through him and felt the dark power physically now. It was all around him, cocooning him, keeping him safe, protecting him. It was all he could trust in now, because his trust in Scanguards and his old friends had vanished.
He put his hand over Kasper’s iPhone. “No. There’s no need.”
Kasper released a sigh of relief and let the tension flow from his body. It always took a lot of energy to influence another vampire without triggering his self-defense instincts and his fighting back with mind control. Luckily, he’d provoked Thomas long enough for his dark power to emerge, and thus given him a way in. Kasper had allowed his own power to connect with Thomas’s so his former lover would accept the thoughts Kasper had sent to his mind as his own.
It had only taken a little shove to push him over the edge.
When Thomas had continued to question him and his motives, he’d had to think fast to turn the situation around. Because despite the fact that Eddie had betrayed him, Thomas had still clung to his association with Scanguards.
No longer.
By the time Thomas found out that Samson hadn’t betrayed his confidence, he’d be so deep within the pull of the dark power that he wouldn’t find a way out of it anymore, even if he tried.
Kasper would make sure of it. Thomas would be surrounded by him and his followers day and night, and the collective dark powers that swirled around them would drug Thomas and make his own power stronger so that he wouldn’t have the strength to fight against it anymore.
Nothing would be strong enough to pull him back. He’d seen it before with his other protégés, the ones who’d fought against it at first, only to lose the fight. They had become loyal and docile, just as Thomas would. Maybe not docile, though, since for Thomas, he had other plans. Because Thomas was stronger than all of them together. Thomas just didn’t know it yet.
Luring Thomas back into his bed would take longer, but Kasper was nothing if not patient.
He’d waited over a hundred years for this; he could wait a few weeks longer. And once they had blood-bonded, Thomas’s power would be his, and together they would be invincible.
“Come home now, Thomas, where you belong.”
36
He hadn’t slept a wink all day. Thomas hadn’t come home after storming out of Quinn’s house. Eddie had waited up for him all day, pacing in the living room and listening for the familiar sound of Thomas’s bike approaching the property. But Thomas had not returned. With every hour, Eddie’s mood had turned grimmer. Had Thomas gone out to the Castro to pick up some willing human to have sex with?
Jealousy made his gut burn from the inside, when he knew he had no right to feel such emotion. After all, he’d been the one driving Thomas away, and most likely into the arms of another man. He hadn’t been prepared for Thomas’s demand to commit to him right there and then. It wasn’t the right time or the right place. He hadn’t expected Thomas to react like this and simply leave and stay away all day. Clearly he’d hurt Thomas more than he’d realized.
And one other thing was clear now too: he didn’t want his relationship with his lover to end.
And for sure he didn’t want Thomas to find another lover. At that thought, his fangs itched for a vicious bite. If he found Thomas with another lover, he’d rip that stranger’s throat out. He hoped for both his and Thomas’s sake that Thomas had spent the day in his office at Scanguards to cool off, rather than fucking another man.
As soon as the sun set, Eddie jumped onto his motorcycle and raced down the hill, ignoring all rules of traffic on his way to Scanguards’ headquarters. After parking his bike, he charged past the security guy at the door, flashing his ID, and took the stairs to the top floor, too impatient to wait for the elevator.
On the executive floor, he walked down the long corridor and headed for Thomas’s office.
The door was closed. Without knocking, he opened it and entered.
The office was empty. He sniffed, but there was no fresh scent that would indicate that Thomas had been here in the last twenty-four hours.
“Fuck!” he cursed.
He took a few steadying breaths and reached for his cell, then paused. Would Thomas even pick it up if he knew it was he? And besides, what would he even say to him on the phone? This was a conversation where he needed to look him in the eye. Frustrated, he shoved the phone back into his pocket and left the office, shutting the door behind him.
In the hallway, he rushed past Cain.
“Hey, Eddie, what’s up?”
Eddie didn’t even look back at him and continued walking. “Nothing. Gotta run an errand.”
Then he pushed the door to the stairs open and ran downstairs and out a side exit, not wanting to run into anybody else and be delayed. He had to find Thomas before the situation escalated even more.
It took him only minutes to reach the Castro, where Thomas’s favorite hangouts were located. This would be where he would pick up guys. The area was teeming with gay men of all ages. With Thomas’s handsome looks, he wouldn’t have any problem finding a willing bedmate within seconds. Guys were always coming on to him. Eddie had seen it often enough when they’d been out on patrol together. It had always annoyed Eddie, and he wondered now if even back then he’d been jealous. He could admit it to himself now: the thought that right now, Thomas was in the arms of another man was eating him up from the inside.
One by one, Eddie searched the bars in the Cast
ro and kept his eyes open for a sign of Thomas’s motorcycle. At the bars where Thomas was known, he even asked the bartenders if they’d seen him, but the answer was always the same.
“Not in a while.”
Deflated, Eddie left the last bar in the Castro and walked back to his bike. When he reached it, he closed his eyes for a moment. Where had Thomas disappeared to? If he hadn’t been in the Castro to pick up some guy, then where was he?
A terrible thought invaded his mind. What if Thomas had harmed himself? What if the rejection had been too much for him? His hands shaking now, he jerked his cell phone from his jacket and dialed Thomas’s number.
“Please pick up,” he whispered to himself.
But the phone only rang and rang until Thomas’s voicemail kicked in.
***
Gabriel typed his password a second time, but the notice flashed on his computer once more: password expired.
“Crap!” he cursed. Security procedures around IT were so tight at Scanguards that all employees had to change their password every month, and if they missed the two-day grace period, they had to get IT to reset the password.
Gabriel dialed the number for the IT desk and drummed his fingers on the desk.
“IT support,” a bored male voice answered.
“Yeah, this is Gabriel Giles. I need you to reset my password.”
“One moment,” he said.
“Don’t put me on hold!” Gabriel answered, but it was too late. There was already a click in the line, and insipid elevator music sounded in his ears.
Gabriel growled. Did this idiot in IT not know who he was dealing with?
Seconds ticked by, then suddenly there was another click in the line.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Giles, but I don’t have access to the executives’ security profiles. Those are handled exclusively by Thomas. I can put you through to him.”
“Don’t bother!”
Gabriel slammed the phone down and shot up from his desk. As a director, he shouldn’t have to jump through hoops just to access the system. Grumbling to himself, he left his office and turned to the one next to him. Thomas Brown, Director, IT, it said on the plaque next to it.
Gabriel knocked impatiently and opened the door without waiting for a reply.
“Thomas, you’ve gotta—” He stopped in his tracks. The office was empty.
Annoyed he turned back and pulled his cell phone from his pocket, speed dialing Thomas’s number. It rang several times.
“You’ve reached Thomas. Leave me a message,” the voice recording echoed in his ear.
“Where are you?” Gabriel bellowed into the phone. “I need that fucking password reset.”
He disconnected the phone and looked down the corridor, seeing Cain come around the corner.
“You seen Thomas?” he called out to Cain.
“No, I haven’t. Have you asked Eddie? He came out of Thomas’s office earlier.”
Gabriel nodded his thanks and dialed Eddie’s cell phone.
It took several rings before Eddie finally picked up.
“Gabriel? What can I do?”
“Where’s Thomas? My fucking password expired and he’s the only one who can reset it.”
There was a pause, and Gabriel almost thought that the cell connection had been interrupted.
“Eddie?”
“Uhm, Gabriel. Thomas didn’t come home yesterday. I haven’t seen him since the party at Quinn’s house.”
“What?” Disbelief coursed through him.
“I don’t know where Thomas is, and he’s not picking up his phone.”
From the corner of his eyes he noticed Cain approach, curiosity flashing over his face.
“And you didn’t report that?”
“Hey, he’s got a right to privacy.”
Anger shot through Gabriel. “There’s no fucking privacy! If somebody from Scanguards disappears, there’s a protocol to adhere to. You should know better!”
Pissed off, he disconnected the call and met Cain’s inquisitive stare.
“What’s going on?”
Gabriel motioned to the phone. “Thomas didn’t come home. He disappeared after the party.”
“You mean not even Eddie knows where he is?” Cain’s voice was colored with surprise.
“But . . . ”
“We have to find him.”
“You think something happened to him?” Cain asked.
Gabriel ignored the question, not wanting to think of the many possibilities of what could have happened. He hoped that Thomas was simply out on a binge, enjoying a day of sex and blood, and was still in some guy’s bed, even though Thomas was too conscientious to not have called the office and told somebody where he could be found in an emergency.
“Find out if he left any messages with the front desk,” Gabriel instructed Cain.
“I’m on it.”
37
Samson sat in his office at Scanguards, having been alerted to Thomas’s disappearance hours earlier, when the door flung open.
“Now tell me what’s really going on!” Gabriel thundered, charging inside and pounding his fist onto Samson’s desk. “And no more bullshit!”
Samson jumped up, glaring at him. “What the fuck is this?”
“I’ll tell you what it is: Cain just called from his patrol. He saw Thomas at Xander’s headquarters in Chinatown. And he looked like he was there of his own free will.”
“Ah shit!” Samson cursed. “I was afraid this would happen.” He ran his hand through his thick, dark hair.
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
Samson pointed to a chair. “Sit down, Gabriel.”
Gabriel folded his arms over his chest. “I’d rather stand.”
“Suit yourself.” Samson paused. “Thomas came to me the other night. After he’d confronted Xander. Everything I told you and the others when we met at Zane’s house is true. But I left something out. I’m afraid Thomas carries a dark power in him, the same dark power his maker had. The same that’s ruling Xander and his people. Thomas has struggled to suppress this power for all his life. But now that these vampires have come here, his power senses them, and is drawn to them. He told me that it’s getting harder and harder for him not to act on it, not to succumb to its pull.”
“Fuck!” Gabriel hissed. “Why didn’t you warn us? We could have had somebody watch Thomas day and night. We could have prevented this!”
“I couldn’t tell you. I gave him my word!”
“Fuck that! Look where that got us! Thomas has joined them!”
“We can’t know that for certain,” Samson protested, but he knew he spoke more out of hope than conviction.
“We have to do something,” Gabriel urged him.
Samson nodded, his shoulders feeling the weight of responsibility on them. “We have to convince him to come back to us.”
***
Samson stepped out of the shadows when he finally saw the door open. He’d sent Thomas several messages to his cell, and later emailed him after realizing that Thomas had switched his phone off. It appeared that Thomas was finally responding by leaving the house in Chinatown.
Behind Samson, his friends Amaury, Gabriel, and Zane remained in the background, even though he realized that Thomas would be able to sense them, just as Samson realized that Thomas wasn’t alone. Remaining in the shadow of the covered entry, too far back to see his face, stood another vampire.
Samson crossed the street halfway and perused his surroundings once more. There was barely any traffic this time of night, and since the shops on this small side street were closed, nobody else seemed to be around.
“What do you want?” Thomas asked, his words clipped, the friendliness that normally colored his voice wiped from it as if they were strangers. No, worse: as if they were enemies.
“We need to talk, alone.” Samson motioned his head to the stranger in the shadows.
“If that were the case, you would have come alone too,” Thomas retorted, his
gaze drifting past Samson’s shoulders.
“We’re all friends—”
“Friends don’t break promises,” Thomas interrupted. A snarl ripped from his throat. “Friends don’t betray friends.”
“I didn’t betray you! It’s the dark power in you talking. You have to fight it, Thomas!”
“No, on the contrary. I don’t have to fight it anymore. Because I’ve got nothing left to lose.”
His jaw set into a hard line as if he were choking back an emotion so powerful it was about to overwhelm him.
“That’s not true, Thomas. You have a great life with us. Everybody at Scanguards loves you and respects you. We need you!”
Thomas expelled a bitter laugh. “A great life? That’s easy for you to say, Samson. And for all of you too,” he added and looked toward the shadows where his three colleagues stood in silence. “You all have somebody who loves you. A mate. I have nothing! You understand?
Nothing! The one person I loved betrayed me. Do you know what that feels like?”
For a second, Samson didn’t understand who Thomas was talking about. Then he ventured a guess. “Eddie?”
The pain in Thomas’s eyes confirmed that he was right.
“But you always knew that Eddie could never be yours. He’s straight.” And Thomas had always accepted that. Samson knew that for a fact. So why was this suddenly an issue?
“Leave me alone, Samson. I can’t do this any longer. I can’t live the way you want me to live.”
“Don’t do this, Thomas! That’s not you!” He pointed to the person behind Thomas. “You’re not like them. You’re not cruel. You’re not evil.”
“How would you know? I’ve never shown you what I’ve hidden all my life. You’ve only seen what I allowed you to see. All of you! You don’t know me at all!” Thomas turned.
