Crimson Bayou (Things that go Bump in the Bayou Book 1)

by Alizabeth Lynn

  “Yeah, John, I’d like that one over there—the woman who keeps trying to rip her clothes off and howl at the constellation mobile over the puppy pen.”

  Carissa snorted again. If that wasn’t the weirdest idea for a pet ever, she didn’t know what was. She took a deep breath. She was losing her mind. First, a possible alien moved across the street, which became a possible vampire, and now werewolves surrounded her. When did my life become a Hollywood movie? She sighed. She could at least be grateful for one thing—none of her supernatural creatures sparkled. Another laugh bubbled out. She wasn’t doing a very good job of calming down.

  She took another deep breath. “Okay,” she whispered, “Pull yourself together. All myths have a basis in fact. This is just one of those things.” And it landed in your backyard.

  At least she was nearly certain Aden was more normal than she’d originally thought. He was sweet, kind, and endearingly clumsy—qualities she was sure did not personify supernatural entities. Except for the fairy-pires, she hadn’t seen too many stories where they were actually the good guys – or clumsy – so there was that. The chances of Aden being evil were about as high as her being attacked by a killer butterfly in the next two minutes. However, the jury was still out about whether he could be trusted.

  He had watched her from a distance for about a week before walking over to meet her—after nine o’clock at night. And then there was the glowing eye thing. She sat straight up. Oh God. Is my neighbor a werewolf? She groaned. Now her life sounded like an R.L. Stine book: The Werewolf of Crimson Bayou.

  She sat back and rolled her eyes. No, he can’t be. She closed her eyes for a moment. So, what if he is, anyway? It wouldn’t make him less of a person—just different, and different wasn’t evil. She heaved another sigh and rubbed her forehead. It seemed her panic attack was finally backing off, but she didn’t feel like she was thinking any clearer. She still felt like she was in some kind of horror movie, and before she knew it, someone would be tapping on their TV screen, telling her not to run upstairs like an idiot.

  And it was a full moon to boot.

  Her jaw dropped. A full moon. The night when werewolves had to shift. The night when they could be anywhere. The night when anyone outside could be food. The night when Aden didn’t come to the door even though he said he was almost always home at night, working. Hands shaking, Carissa switched her lights back on and pulled out of the parking lot, squealing her tires in the process. Home. She had to get home, as quickly as possible. She wasn’t running – not out of town – but she needed to get inside, where it was safe.

  Swearing, Carissa swung into her driveway, snagging the curb on the passenger side and rocking the Durango hard enough to slam her shoulder into her door. With another curse, she cut the engine and slammed out of the SUV. After the full moon was gone, it would be time to confront her sexy neighbor and find out whether he was a yummy take on E.T., Wolfman, or some other brand of supernatural weirdo. Which left her heart echoing the same question she’d asked herself when she put the note on his door:

  If he really is that different, will it change the fact that I’m falling in love with him?

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The next night Aden shocked into consciousness while still sitting in his dining room chair—a dangerous habit to continue with the window so close. Murderer. The word echoed throughout his traitorous body. He stood up and stretched. His hunger beckoned like a live thing in his belly, whirling about, begging to be sated, but he couldn’t bring himself to open another packet of blood. All he could think of was the misguided man who no longer had an ounce of the pure red liquid left to his unknown name. Aden glanced down, frowning. His computer screen continued to show the last page he’d looked up, and he didn’t care for what he saw. The woeful night had cumulated with a blatant example of just how good he was at his job—even when he wished he wasn’t.

  Aden sighed as he copied and pasted his findings into a hidden folder, then he shut all internet pages, except the history page—which he proceeded to erase, as he did after every investigation. This one, however, had the makings for much, much, more than anything he’d researched before. The information he’d found…. It was a stretch for him to believe, even as a vampire. If he interpreted his findings correctly, then he had a bad feeling his mentor was on the wrong side of the battle lines. And the older vampire knew a lot more about the slayers than he was letting on.

  Pushing that thought to the back of his mind, Aden stalked down the hallway to take a shower. Murderer. No amount of soap and water would ever cleanse his soul. But that didn’t stop him from trying. Murderer. The word pinged around the shower stall, slapping him in the heart as he rubbed his skin raw, cursing when it healed before his eyes. I can’t even wallow in self-pity without my body betraying me. He rested his forehead on the damp wall under the shower head, letting his punishing thoughts fly free to drown in the tepid water. What good am I to anyone, anyway?

  Aden shut the water off with an angry flick of his wrist, and pushed away from the wall. It didn’t do him any good to berate himself. He couldn’t go back and change his actions, no matter how much he wished he could. Letting out a deep sigh, a towel slung low at his hips, he walked out to grab a packet of blood before his stomach turned itself wrong side out in protest. He could only muster a low growl in his throat when he saw Daniel sitting on his couch. Eyes downcast, with a flush staining his cheeks, the man looked solemn and embarrassed, but Aden didn’t care.

  “You can go away, old man,” he bit out before Daniel could speak, “I’ve no use for your perverse praises tonight.”

  Dark clouds blocked out the meager moonlight coming through the kitchen window as Aden stalked to the refrigerator. He didn’t have to turn around to know he’d been followed. He slammed back the first cold packet like an alcoholic about to sign up for AA meetings. The shock did little to curb his internal struggle. Left with no other choice, he heated the next packet in the microwave, and turned to his mentor. Aden’s eyes snagged on his laptop in the process, reminding him to be cautious.

  “What do you want?” Aden asked quietly.

  His friend sighed. “I wanted to apologize for my actions. I was quite…insensitive.”

  Aden snorted. “I believe you meant to say you were being an asshole.”

  Wincing, Daniel grumbled, “That, too. It wasn’t intentional. I know your opposition to harming anyone, and I should have taken that into account.”

  Aden pulled his warm cup from the microwave and took a sip. Damn it. Daniel may have been hiding information, but his apology sounded sincere.

  Reluctantly, Aden waved his hand and sighed. “It’s no big deal. I know it’s something I’m going to have to get used to if I’m going to survive.” He gave Daniel a pointed look, “That doesn’t mean I have to be okay with it. I will never go out of my way to kill someone—no matter how you feel about the subject. Got it?”

  Daniel walked over and squeezed his shoulder. “You may not believe it, but I do understand. If there was a way to change what happened last night—” He broke off and shook his head as he sat down on the coffee table in front of Aden and steepled his fingers under his chin. “What did you find out about the slayers that are supposed to live around here?” he asked, changing the subject.

  Daniel’s hand shook, even after he pressed his fingertips together – a clear sign of his agitation – but Aden didn’t care. His own hands were clasped in his lap so that he didn’t reach up to mess with his ear. Lying was never his first option, but considering what he’d found online, this time it seemed unavoidable. With his friend’s attitude toward slayers, to tell Daniel all of the truth could put Carissa in danger – more so than simply being in a relationship with Aden. He frowned.

  “I searched for hours last night, but was only able to find information on one. His name was Ryan Blaine.”

  Daniel narrowed his eyes. “Was?”

  “Yeah.” Aden scratched his ear before he could catch himself. �
�He died in a car accident a little over a year ago. The pictures I found online weren’t pretty.”

  “Are you sure you identified the correct person?”

  Aden grimaced, his lips turning downward in a disgusted frown. “Positive. I’ll have a report for you by the end of tonight. I had a bit more trouble finding him than I expected. As good as he was at concealing his existence, he could have worked for the CIA,” he quipped dryly.

  Frowning as well, Daniel tapped his chin with his steepled fingers. “And you say he died—there were pictures, and you know it was him that died—for sure?”

  Aden nodded—of that he could be truthful. “I hacked into the police database to access the crime scene photos.”

  “That doesn’t mean anything.”

  “It does when you uncover pictures of the dead body.”

  “But did you see his face—actually confirm the deceased matched your information?”

  Aden closed his eyes and sighed, the images he’d seen the night before forever seared into his brain. “Yes. I am one hundred percent positive the body belonged to Ryan Blaine.”

  “But how—?”

  Aden shot to his feet, his temper surging forward to spew from his mouth. “Because, old man, his head was the only part of his body that survived the crash intact—and it was found fifty yards from the vehicle he was driving, impaled through the ear on a fucking tree limb. Believe me; I’m not forgetting that any time soon. He was the slayer, and he’s definitely dead. Now drop the damn questions, already.”

  Daniel’s gaped at him, blinking repeatedly for a few moments before he found his voice. “Well, erm…” He paused and cleared his throat. “That’s, um, well, that’s unfortunate for him.”

  “No shit.”

  His mentor shook his head and stood up. “Were there any others? Did he have any family?”

  It took all his concentration to keep his hand from traveling to his ear when Aden lied again – praying Daniel didn’t know enough about his neighbor to realize she and the slayer shared the same last name. “No one. He lived alone, and thankfully, died the same way.”

  Daniel paced around the room, muttering to himself. “Damn. So now we’re out of leads.” He stopped at the window and looked out at the night, speaking to Aden in a slightly louder voice. “What about the packs? Ninety percent of this town is werewolves. Maybe they’ll have more information.”

  Aden sat down, his mind winging back to his research. So, Daniel planned to tell him after all. He opened his mouth to answer, “yeah, maybe,” but something in the rigid stance of his mentor’s shoulders gave him pause. Choosing to continue his charade of innocence, he affected a shocked expression. “Werewolves? You never said anything about werewolves!” he blathered, hoping he sounded as convincing to Daniel as he did to his own ears.

  When his friend grinned, Aden breathed an internal sigh of relief. “What? Did you think vampires were the only preternatural beings in existence? Aden, there’s more to this world than you think—both the good, and the bad.”

  There was the rigidness again as the older vampire turned back toward the window. Aden let his face relax, keeping his tone the same—saturated with skepticism and disbelief. “But I figured we were just some weird fluke in nature—a kind of evolutionary joke.” He made a show of pausing, huffing out a breath as if the truth finally dawned. Aden did his best not to smile as he continued—until he got to the bottom of things, he would have to be just as deceptive as Daniel. “Okay, okay. I get it,” he said quickly, “If we exist, then it’s not hard to jump to the conclusion that other creatures exist as well. I just wasn’t expecting them in my backyard, howling at my moon.”

  “Well, it’s not like they socialize with us as a rule. We are technically dead, and werewolves are very virile and lively. They see us as freaks.”

  Aden couldn’t help but laugh at that. “Daniel, the whole world is full of freaks, but I’m starting to think we may be the tiniest fish in the pond.”

  After Daniel left, Aden returned to the kitchen for more blood. The fact that Daniel confirmed the existence of werewolves took a little of the weight off his shoulders, even though he knew his mentor was still hiding something. As he walked past, Aden switched on the TV sitting on the counter and set it to the news channel. He listened with half an ear as he booted up his computer and popped a packet of blood into a cup to warm it up. While the microwave ran, the news droned on in the background, and Aden found himself looking forward to the night’s work. It was time to delve a little deeper into the werewolves Daniel said – and Aden discovered – resided in Jaune.

  The microwave chimed, but the minute he sat down with his food, Aden’s attention was snagged by the slightly anxious voice of the nighttime news anchor. “…last spotted near the Arkansas border in Springhill; these two women are wanted in conjunction with a rash of thefts at local businesses around the Ark-La-Tex area. If you have any information, please contact Crime Stoppers using the number at the bottom of your screen.”

  Above the number flashed two pictures. The text described both women as mid-thirties, Caucasian, and between five-foot-one and five-foot-three, with each weighing about one hundred and fifty pounds. The newscast continued, citing the probable highway the criminals used to escape, before moving on to a segment about budget cuts and the School Lunch Program.

  Aden sat back in his chair, replaying the criminal’s faces in his mind. His gut told him something was off. He noticed that the news station hadn’t mentioned Jaune, which was the only place the criminals could have gone if they followed Highway 371, as the police suspected they did. If intuition could be trusted—and his was usually correct—there was a lot more to the story than the news station knew. Most people would be advised not to go out looking for clues to a criminal case, but Aden was not most people. If his gut told him he needed to investigate something, he rarely argued.

  That’s how he found the little girl when she went missing. Aden saw a newscast about her, and he listened to his intuition. Something told him, if he were to only step outside, his senses wouldn’t lead him astray—and they certainly did not. His nose had always been keen, and when he walked outside that night, he smelled barbeque—a bit unusual after midnight—even in his neighborhood. Therefore, he’d done what any good investigator would do, and followed his nose, which led him around his house to his backyard. He found the little girl playing on the other side of his fence, blissfully unaware that her parents were worried sick. The little girl was tired and hungry, but she’d liked the look of the wildflowers behind Aden’s yard, so she stopped to play in them.

  To this day, Aden was still surprised at how easily she’d trusted him, and with what he now knew about Jaune, he was grateful someone like him found her. He wondered idly if she’d been a young werewolf, and maybe sensed he was different, too. That didn’t change the current issue, though, and Daniel’s newest revelation had his guard up. Cursing, Aden shut his computer down and walked out into the night. Werewolves were all around him. The more he thought about it, the more interesting the idea became. If they could work together, maybe the slayers wouldn’t be such a huge issue. If they could trust him like the little girl had, maybe things would start looking up. Then all they’d need to do was figure out how to handle the council. After that, everything else would be gravy.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  After a restless night’s sleep, Carissa awoke late in the day determined to learn more from her husband’s files, but that evening, as she stared at the flickering computer screen, she couldn’t focus. She sat back and tried to catch her breath. She lived smack in the middle of Paranormal-ville, and her sexy neighbor was probably one of them—or an alien—and neither option was one she really wanted to visit. But I kissed him…and I liked it. She shook her head, closing the computer without bothering to shut any of the files. As she stood up, she looked out her window, noticing Aden step off his porch and walk down the street, his head swiveling back and forth as if he was searching for s
omething.

  Her curiosity piqued, Carissa didn’t give herself a chance to change her mind. She slipped her feet into the flats she kept beside her front door and headed out after him. She almost said something to him, but at the last moment decided to remain quiet. With stealth she hadn’t known she possessed, Carissa followed Aden to the edge of the trees at the end of the street. She watched as he crouched down, placing his hand on the ground, his body still and rigid. Then, with a jerk so quick it almost looked like he hadn’t moved at all, he was suddenly standing, staring just off to his right, where a narrow path disappeared into the trees.

  After a moment, Aden stalked toward it, his footsteps determined. Once he passed the tree line, Carissa crept toward the path. She couldn’t see worth a darn in the dark—unlike the man she followed. She hastened to catch up as he sped around the bend, upping her pace as her breath hitched under her exertions. Losing him in the woods at this point was not an option. Unfortunately, Aden had finally realized someone was behind him, and Carissa collided solidly with his chest as she ran around the curve in the path.

  “Carissa! What are you doing here?” Aden asked, rubbing his hands up and down her arms.

  Her face heated, but she couldn’t say she was surprised she’d been caught. There was something otherworldly about the man standing before her, and she doubted anyone could successfully sneak up on him. She steadied herself and stepped back, breaking contact. His fingers made her skin tingle, and she couldn’t think when he was touching her.

  “Me?” she retorted indignantly, “What are you doing in the woods in the middle of the night? This trail leads straight to the water.” Carissa crossed her arms, huffing out a frustrated breath at his blank stare. “Aden, you’ll be alligator bait if you get too close!”

  His smile flashed bright in the moonlight. “And yet you followed me. I’d say we’re both running a little low on intelligence tonight, wouldn’t you?”