On board the ferries, she could be part of the crowd and anonymous all at once. In the world but not of it. Besides, they had Ivar’s clam chowder in the cafeteria tonight. She’d had a celebratory bowlful for dinner, then brought her coffee up to the top deck where it was too windy and cold for even the tourists to go. Up here she could gloat a little without anyone being any the wiser.
I really am an Enforcer. When I had to act, it just came to me. I’ve been so scared it was some kind of mistake. Well, hot damn! As Mr. Haven would say.
“Jebel, baby, I owe you.” Not that he was anybody’s baby, of course.
Last night she’d been too busy to savor her victory. In fact, she’d been too angry at first at the vampire’s presumption at attacking Haven, then too concerned with seeing to Jebel’s injuries to even realize what she’d done. Then during the day, the daymare had been too vivid to let in any echoes of last night’s events.
Char shook her head, sobered by the knowledge that another mortal had been ritually murdered while she was frozen in her bed today. She finished the coffee and studied the lights of the city. Somewhere down near the water, a man had died horribly. She couldn’t pinpoint exactly where, but she’d felt it happen. She studied the docks, gantries, and warehouses down by the shoreline. Somewhere in there was a sorcerer, a demon, and a dangerous buildup of energy that was likely to blow the city apart if she didn’t stop the fools soon. Laws or no Laws, she couldn’t just find Daniel and walk away. Fortunately, she had a plan.
Char checked her watch. She had a plan, but a big part of it had better show up soon. She didn’t have all night.
She tapped her foot impatiently and concentrated on the city once more. It seemed to her that she should somehow be able to see the stored magic, that all that power should set off a huge, pulsing, hot glow. So far, the sorcerer had been able to hide a lot from her, and she didn’t like that one little bit.
Char gripped the railing and kept up her solitary watch for a few minutes longer. Then she decided that the combination of elation and trepidation had made her hungry. Maybe she’d get a hamburger from the cafeteria.
A woman rose with serene grace from a seat on one of the outside benches when Char came down the stairs to the next deck. There was no one near her. Char met the strigoi’s gaze, nodded slightly, and came to join her. “Hi, Connie,” Char greeted the nest leader of Carnation breezily.
She almost apologized for her tone when the nest leader frowned. Char knew very well that the reserved Constance ran a tight, old-fashioned household and didn’t go in for informality. In fact, Constance politely waited for Char to invite her to take a seat on the bench.
Char sat down and graciously gestured for Constance to join her. Then she held out her hand. Constance placed a heavy gold coin in Char’s palm.
Char looked at the incised image of a stooping owl on the coin, and her light mood sobered with the seriousness of the moment. She clutched the coin in her fist. It was still warm from Constance’s hand. This was treasure indeed, the first acknowledgment that she was indeed Nighthawk, Enforcer of the Laws. Enforcer of the City. She gazed out once again on the skyline of Seattle, shaken with the wonder and rightness of it all. She’d been born here, twice. It was right that she would come into her own in the place that was her home.
In the meantime, it was time to put ceremony and sentimentality aside. She slipped the coin into a velvet pouch she’d brought for the occasion and tucked the pouch into her pocket. Char folded her hands in her lap, looked at the waiting Constance, and said, “Thank you for coming.”
Constance gave a slight nod. “I am at your disposal, Hunter.” She added, “Pascal sends his apologies for interfering in your affairs. He thanks you for his life.”
“He lives to hunt again.” Char smiled. “Soon.”
Constance tilted her elegant head to one side. She had high cheekbones and uptilted eyes. Char would have killed for the nest leader’s makeup secrets. Constance lifted one beautifully shaped eyebrow in question. Her serene expression hadn’t changed one bit, but Char was well aware of the woman’s intense interest. “You’re declaring a hunt?”
“Pascal mentioned that your nest is aware of a mortal sorcerer practicing in Seattle. How?”
“We don’t live that far from the city, Hunter. We come into Seattle sometimes. It’s hard not to be aware of the. . . dark spots. Not very pleasant. We’ve been avoiding Seattle for the last two months because of it.”
“You know about the serial killings?”
“Only what’s been mentioned on the local news.” Constance made a slight gesture. “None of our affair.”
It is now, sister. Char said, “Do you know anything about a missing nestling? Or a demon?” Constance shook her head. “Didn’t think so. Never mind them. What I need from your nest is a hunt.”
Constance favored Char with a wide smile. “In time for the holiday. Happy to oblige, Hunter. Who do we hit?”
Char didn’t know exactly how many members belonged to the sorcerer’s cult, but there would be a great many fewer loyal minions for her and Haven to have to deal with after the Carnation vampires got in on the act. She’d had a few qualms about the deaths of so many mortals when she’d come up with the plan last night. That was before she’d felt today’s ritual. The minions had all been there. They’d participated. Maybe they were slaves to a vampire, but they were also helping a mortal commit vicious, dangerous crimes. Besides, Daniel was too young to have slaves.
“There’s a nut cult called the Angel’s Children. I want them all dead.”
Hunger flared in Constance’s eyes. “We’re a small nest, Hunter, but we’ll do our best. When do we hunt?”
The ferry was coming into the Seattle dock. Char stood up. “You have a place in town?” Constance nodded and told her a phone number. Char memorized it. “I’ll get back to you soon,” she told the nest leader and walked away. She thought she did a credible job of disappearing mysteriously in the crowd heading for the pedestrian exits.
Chapter 19
“THERE’S A SPLATTER pattern on the back wall, Haven.” Novak swept the tight beam of the small flashlight she’d taken from her purse from the wall to the ground. “Bloodstains here. But nothing in the crime scene bears any resemblance to the serial killer’s signature. Local homicide isn’t my problem . . . even if you’re the perp. What happened to the body? I suppose the cult members took it,” she answered her own question. “More importantly, what did the attack have to do with Danny?” A hint of excitement entered her voice. “You must be onto something after all.”
“After all?” Haven asked.
“Don’t see any scorch marks,” Santini said, drawing Haven away from confronting the woman. Santini squatted and ran his fingers over the ground. “No ashes.” He sniffed, shrugged, and bounced to his feet again. Haven knew that his partner wasn’t going to say anything more in front of Special Agent Novak. Santini stepped back into the alley and walked into the darkness at the end of it instead. He came back in a few seconds. “Nothing in there.”
“How can you tell?” Novak asked.
“He can tell.”
“Walked in and had a look around,” Santini said.
Novak rubbed her upper arms, chilled from the inside out, Haven knew. “I can barely look in that direction. It’s like there’s a hole in my vision.”
“You’ll get used to it.”
“It’s spooky.”
After the seriously sick shit he’d heard FBI profilers got involved with, the last thing he expected was one to be spooked. He guessed the magic worked on Agent Novak as much as it did on him.
“Safe house, maybe,” Santini suggested. “Or a decoy.” He gestured to the blood-streaked wall. “Trap.”
“Sprung and survived.” Haven took a drag of his cigarette and tossed the butt away. It sizzled out in the nearest puddle. This town had plenty of puddles. With all the rain in this part of the world, it made him wonder how the ruins he stood in could have burned down.
“Arson,” Novak said.
He knew he hadn’t spoken aloud, but she didn’t seem to notice. He’d gotten to expect any kind of weirdness since blowing into Seattle, even an FBI agent reading his mind didn’t faze him at the moment. It was too dark in the ruined building. He stepped out into the alley, closer to streetlights and car headlights. Novak followed him.
Her angry glare as she stepped over a pile of bricks to stand in front of him didn’t disturb him, either. “Don’t tell me, Novak, you don’t care about missing bodies or empty buildings you can’t quite see.”
“I don’t care about where Danny isn’t. I want to find out where my son is.”
Fine with him. He hadn’t wanted her to tag along when he brought Santini back to the scene. She insisted when he mentioned being attacked near what he thought was the cult’s new headquarters. After all, she was the expert at forensic analysis. She’d grown impatient waiting for them to deliver sonny boy and had come to help. Novak wanted a look at the crime scene. He hadn’t mentioned anything about vampires—or Charlotte—to the FBI agent.
“You’ve come up with some leads,” she said. “I’m grateful for what you’ve done. But it’s time I followed up on those leads myself.” Santini came up to stand beside them, and she turned to him. “I want to talk to this woman you said put you onto the cult.”
“Della.”
She nodded. “I’d like to meet her this evening, Santini.”
Santini looked at Haven.
“Take her.” Haven very much wanted Novak away from the alley and burned-out building. He glanced back into the deep darkness by the broken wall. “Go on,” he told Santini. “I’ve got other plans.”
Once Santini and Novak were out of earshot, he turned back to the deep darkness a few feet inside the alley mouth. “You can come out now, Charlotte.”
Char unwrapped herself from the shadows and took a step toward Haven.
“How do you do that?”
She couldn’t help but notice he’d slipped a small cross out of his pocket. “Is that silver?”
“Yes.”
She held out her hand. “May I?” He frowned as he handed her the cross. He flinched, as if he expected her to go up in flames when her fingers closed on the metal. She balanced it on her palm “Heavy. Solid silver, I think. Beautiful workmanship.” She held it up before her eyes. “Spanish, isn’t it? And very old. Silver doesn’t bother me,” she added, handing the cross back. “Why would you think it would?”
“You’re not human.” He didn’t sound happy.
“I most certainly am human.”
Haven’s wide shoulders blocked the alley entrance. Char stepped forward, then moved with immortal’s speed to duck past him.
He whirled, still holding the cross, but no other weapons that she could see. He showed no surprise at her maneuver, nor did she feel any surprise from him. He was, indeed, a very cool customer. He asked, “What are you? A werewolf?”
“I’m a vampire hunter, Mr. Haven.”
“Why’d you attack me?”
She didn’t try to deny she knew what he was talking about. “Because you shot me.”
“I thought you were the killer.”
“I thought the same about you at the time. We were both drawn to the body. The dead woman called us there. I attacked you, Jebel, because you hurt me, but I managed to calm down before I caught you. If I hadn’t gotten myself under control, I would have killed you. But I gave you the benefit of the doubt. I realized that you assumed I was a bad guy when you fired. It was a reasonable assumption.”
His expression remained hard, uncompromising. He gestured behind them. “What happened to the vampire?”
“Burned up by the sunlight?” she suggested.
“In this town?”
“There is daylight in Seattle at this time of year.”
“That wasn’t wood you stabbed it with.”
“But it was effective.”
“He didn’t burn up when the sun came up.”
She smiled. “Perhaps the rain washed his ashes away.”
“His blood should have burned, too. That’s how it works when vampires are staked. Everything goes up in smoke. No evidence left.”
“Convenient. But I told you urban vampires are different.” She thrust her hands in her raincoat pockets. “Let it drop, Jebel. We’re on the same side.”
“You’re not human.”
“I’m not mortal.” She tried hard to hide her exasperation; it tended to make her fangs come out. “But I am human.”
“If you’re not mortal, you’re a monster.”
She gave a sarcastic laugh. “Excuse, me, Mr. Haven, but I’ve never done time for multiple felonies. Nor have I escaped from prison, kidnapped anyone, or even so much as jaywalked.” She discovered that her hands were on her hips. She definitely sounded self-righteous. How hypocritical for someone who’d just arranged for a mass murder talking to a man she planned to kill! “I do not fire shotguns at strangers, either,” she finished. “Unlike some people I know.”
“We aren’t strangers now.”
And that was a problem, especially where the killing him after she used him part came in. “Are you planning on using something more personal than a shotgun now that we’re on a first-name basis?”
He shrugged. “What kills a werewolf?”
Char shrugged back. “Rabies?”
Haven didn’t want ambiguities in his life. It bothered him a little that he even knew what the word meant. Made him wish he hadn’t started taking college classes before he broke out of prison the last time. She was a monster—of some sort. His life had been nice, simple, laid out for him until he met Charlotte McCairn. If it grew fangs, he killed it. Nice girls didn’t grow fangs. He protected the nice girls of the world. That was how he paid the world back. It was his redemption, his purpose, his quest for goodness and honor and all that other crap.
“You’ve screwed up my life, girl,” he told her. “Big time.”
“I’ve broadened your perspective. You could look at it that way.”
“What am I going to do with you?” What would Baker say? What would Santini do? He could almost hear Sara laughing at him from beyond the grave. Charlotte was like no one he’d ever met. Oh, yeah, this was complicated, all right. He rubbed the back of his neck. “What happened to you? You got bit and now you’re out to get even?”
Char considered for a moment and tapped a finger against her lips. “Something like that,” she said at last. “It’s not catching, if that’s what you’re worried about.” Unless I bite you, she added to herself.
“Unless you bite me.”
She didn’t think he’d picked up the thought. Just a good guess. “You’re not my type,” she told him. “Now, will you relax so we can get to work?”
“I’m not going to relax.”
He smiled at her: that shoulders hunched, head tilted, looking up through those thick eyelashes, boyish, disarming, charming smile thing he did. She didn’t understand why he smiled at her like that, but the tension that stretched out between them shifted dramatically without lessening one little bit.
Then he was kissing her, turning them back into the dark alley and pressing her against a wall. Char didn’t know how he had moved that fast. His mouth was hard on hers, smothering her gasp of surprise and using it. His tongue thrust deep inside her open lips. His body was hard and heavy, pinning her, and Char molded herself against him, caught in a chaotic rush of pleasure. This was the last way she’d expected this confrontation to go. That he ran his tongue over her teeth did not surprise her, but it felt very nice indeed. She wanted to let it go on until their heartbeats matched and her mating fangs erupted, but she shifted her head just a fraction, and her tongue danced with his, refocusing the pleasure. His temperature rose and his scent deepened, intense enough to make her giddy. Char clutched Haven’s back. If she tasted the warm blood rushing beneath his skin—
Big if. Big fat not-going-to-happen if.
&nb
sp; It wasn’t easy to stop kissing him, but Char was nothing if not stubborn once she’d made up her mind. There would be no vampire sex with Jebel Haven. Not tonight.
But that wasn’t to say there wouldn’t be sex.
She didn’t stop him from moving his mouth down to kiss her throat. If Haven bit her on the neck, she would have laughed and enjoyed it, but he sent aching pleasure through her without having to take a nip. His hands moved over her, frantically pushing aside clothing, and she helped him. They were uneasy allies, playing with fire by coupling against a wet wall in a filthy back alley. It was sleazy, disgusting, and a complete rush.
Her one concession to propriety as Char reached for Haven’s zipper was to draw the darkest, deepest shadows she could conjure around them for a few wild minutes.
Think. He had to think. The Disciple pressed his fists to his temples while he paced the hallway outside the Angel’s room. There were two girls in the Angel’s bed. The Disciple could hear them panting and groaning, hear the creak of the bedsprings. He could smell their musky sweat and the sweet scent of blood. The Angel’s pleasure thrummed on the edge of his senses, just beyond his reach, as thrilling as it was taunting.
They’d locked him out of the room, the Demon and the Prophet, to punish him, but he didn’t mind. He had to think. The Vessel was drunk, full of the magic they stored in him, sated from taking another life. Poor, stupid Vessel. He didn’t understand that he was going to die. That was his purpose, to be another, grander sacrifice.
The Disciple was beginning to make out the pattern of how the Prophet and Demon were going to bring about life eternal. They were planning a great work of magic. He must bring them more sacrifices. They had to drain all the magic in the city to do their work, steal it for themselves.
They needed magic to protect the Angel. That was all that mattered to the Disciple. He had to think. Where could he find more magic? There was someone. . . someone . . . somewhere . . . he knew . . . What was the image he was trying to catch? He paced and beat his fists against his head and prayed to the fucking Angel.
Laws of the Blood 2: Partners Page 16
