His chest rose and fell in a sigh as he pulled me closer. “Midnight is a mess. Arcadia is a mess. This isn’t how things are supposed to be.”
“Then how are they supposed to be?” Did he know something? Did he know about the outside? “What do you know? Tell me.”
He reached up to caress my face. “Trust me, Serenity. Sometimes it’s best not to know what you’re missing. That way you can’t crave it.”
Oh, God. He was looking at me in that way again—the one that made my knees weak and my pulse race. Was he talking about Arcadia or us?
“One day, you’ll understand. One day, it will all make sense. And all this will have been worth it. One day, you’ll know why you’re here.”
“Do you know why I’m here?” The words came out breathless and whispery.
He smiled and shook his head. “No, but I know there’s a reason.” His gaze was a caress wandering across my face. “There has to be. I don’t believe in chance and coincidence. I believe in tests and orchestrated maneuvers. I believe that you’re here because you have a purpose.”
What was he trying to tell me? “So, how do we fit into that? You and me. If it’s not chance and not coincidence, then what is this?” I reached up to stroke his chin. Bold move, but fuck it, I was in a bold kinda mood.
His eyes fluttered closed and his face tightened as if he was in pain. “There can be no us, and that, Harker, is a cruel twist of fate.” He released me and stepped away. “We should go.”
When he looked at me now, his beautiful brown eyes were guarded, and my chest ached with a loss that made no sense, because I’d never had anything to lose in the first place.
***
The drive to The Deep was a silent one, which was fine by me. It was time to reflect and get my head in order for the kelpie showdown. No doubt sparks would fly when the two harrases got together.
The building was as busy as the last time we’d visited, but there was no sign of the kelpies yet. Drayton sidled up to the bar and had a quick word with Jonah. It was impossible to hear what they were saying, so I did a quick survey of the dance floor. Like the last time, it was packed with bodies moving in sync. Laughter and harmony in a twisted landscape. The Deep really was a haven for neph and human unions, because now that I studied it closely, there were more than a few mixed couples on the dance floor. The crowd parted for a second, and my gaze skimmed over a tall guy wearing a black turtleneck sweater. He lounged against a pillar, drink clutched casually in his hand. He was alone and people-watching just like me. Our gazes locked for a second, and he raised his glass in a silent greeting. Then the crowd shifted, and he was gone.
“They’re not here yet.” Drayton’s breath tickled my ear.
Damn him and his scent. “So, what shall we do? Wait in the car?”
Drayton’s gaze slipped over my head and onto the main floor, where a slow, crooning number was playing. The corner of his mouth turned up almost wistfully.
He slipped his hand into mine. “We could dance?”
Butterflies bloomed in my chest. He’d said there would be no us, that there could never be an us, so why was he looking at me like that? “Dance?”
His smile widened. “Yes, you know that thing where you shuffle from side to side to the music.”
My misgivings melted and I grinned. “Well, if that’s the only move you have, then I think I’ll pass.”
He leaned in. “Oh, honey. You have no idea what moves I have.”
My pulse fluttered. What was he playing at? And why was I considering playing along? “Well, in that case, you’ll just have to demonstrate.”
We slipped onto the dance floor and he pulled me against him. My body pressed flush against his for the first time. We’d kissed twice, but both times it had been to feed. This … this contact was intimate and spine-melting. His hand came to rest on the base of my spine, fingers splayed. I tilted my chin to look up into his face, and my heart climbed into my throat and sat there, beating wildly, because in that moment there was no barrier, just uncensored, unbridled adoration. This wasn’t desire, this … Oh, God. He closed his eyes, exhaled through his nostrils, and tucked in his chin to press his forehead to mine.
We swayed to the love song, shuffling from side to side just like he’d predicted, and I finally understood why this move worked. It was perfect.
The track changed, and the spell was broken. Drayton gently pulled back and extricated himself from me.
His throat bobbed, and he tore his gaze away and looked over my head. “The sea riders just walked in.”
It was time to get down to business.
Chapter 6
Looked like the gangs had hired a private room, and Jonah wasn’t too happy about letting us back there. But Drayton played the MPD card and Jonah caved. We slipped into the room-for-hire, and the noise hit me first. Curses and threats and accusations were being traded. Sea riders faced off with ocean hunters—Juno with her four henchmen and Finlay and his backup. It was about to descend into chaos.
“Hey!” Drayton clapped his hands. “Hey.”
The noise level dropped a notch then tapered off as all inhuman eyes turned on us as one. It was like looking into a shoal of piranha.
“This is a private meeting,” Juno snapped. “Get out.”
“We know,” Drayton said. “And we’re sorry for intruding. But we want to help.”
Finlay’s lip curled. “Really? Then you can tell the ocean hunters to give back my riders.”
Juno rounded on him. “Fuck you, Finlay. I have already told you I do not have your men. Maybe this is all you. You took Leo and asked Killion to lay low to make it look like you are a victim too.”
Finlay pointed at the necklace on her wrist. “You have my brother’s fucking chain. He never takes that off.”
Juno rolled her eyes and flicked her blonde tresses over her shoulder. “I told you, I found it. If I had taken him, I would not be so stupid as to parade his shit in your face, would I?”
Finlay snapped his mouth closed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’re right. Damn it. We shouldn’t be fighting amongst ourselves, we should be pooling our efforts and searching for our missing people.”
Finally, some sense.
Juno nodded, and then, once again, all eyes were on us.
“Why are you here? Really?” Finlay asked.
Recalling Drayton’s earlier words about not demanding answers and respect and all that, I licked my lips. “We’d really like to help.”
Juno snorted and turned her head away. “This is kelpie business, and we take care of our own shit.”
Finlay didn’t contradict her, but then he didn’t back her up either.
“I understand that, I do, but you’re also a neph. You’re one of us, and if someone is taking nephs, then we want to help get them back.”
“More eyes, more hands,” Finlay said. “Plus, they can scour inland, something we can’t do effectively.”
Juno tilted her chin to look up at the ceiling. “They could be somewhere inland. Yes.” Her lips peeled back from her gums. “Held hostage, away from the sea, in pain. Wait. If they were hostages, surely we’d have received some kind of demands?” Her body went still as she made the neural connections. “No demands means whoever took them does not intend to return them. It means they could be dead.”
“No,” Finlay said. “If Killion was dead, I would know.” He thumped his chest. “I would know here.”
Juno nodded, suddenly less monster and more adrift female eager for a life raft. Her voice descended into a menacing growl. “I want Leo found, and I want the bastard who took him to pay.”
That was all very well, but if we were going to find the missing kelpie we needed to figure out a motive for them being taken. “Is there anyone who has a grudge against either harras? Or someone who’d like to cause a fight between the ocean hunters and the sea riders?”
Finlay and Juno exchanged glances and then shook their heads.
This was going to be
harder than expected. Okay, so I technically still had a case sitting in the car in a brown file, but maybe if I worked this one, it would warm me up for the cold case.
I ran a hand over my forehead. “Right, so we make a list of any connections between the missing kelpies—where they went and who they spoke to on the days leading up to their disappearance. We look for patterns, any aspects in common. Drayton and I can then check out any inland leads, and you guys can deal with the coast. Agreed?”
Once again, Finlay and Juno exchanged glances and nodded. Now that we had a direction, a working method, the atmosphere had calmed considerably.
“And the ripper activity?” Juno asked. “We cannot ignore that.”
“It could be related, but it’s most likely a coincidence,” Drayton said. “The scourge has been acting strange lately. Things are changing, and it’s something the Protectorate is looking into.”
He was referring to Arachne’s revelation that cracks had formed in the magic surrounding Arcadia and her assertion that something was coming.
Juno pouted in thought. “Very well. We will discuss and have the information ready for tomorrow.”
Finlay inclined his head. “We accept your offer of aid.”
But you can piss off now, was the unspoken second half of that sentence. “We’ll leave you to it then.”
Drayton held the door open for me, and I escaped back into the lively, carefree air of the club.
Drayton let out a low whistle. “Looks like we have two cases to go over now.”
And I wasn’t going to neglect my cold case. “Hey, the cold case is MED, so their medical examiner would have dealt with the body, right?”
“Right.” Drayton’s eyes lit up. “You think we need to start from scratch and examine all the evidence with a trained neph eye?”
I grinned. “Yep. I think we need to go see Tristan.”
***
“Good call on the cold case, by the way,” Drayton said. “You’re a natural at this investigative stuff. Ryker usually does that side of things when we partner up.”
“Let me guess, you’re the negotiator?”
He chuckled. “Something like that. And if that fails, we both kick some ass.”
The road whizzed by, a lonely stretch that linked onto the main road that would lead us to the heart of the district. The street lights were few and far between, but that didn’t seem to bother Drayton. He probably had preternatural vision anyway.
This was nice. This was good. Working with Drayton felt right. Being held by him felt right. No. Don’t think about that. Think about the case, the job, and the next steps. Damn, how was I going to see him every day, be near him every day, and not ache for him? Stupid question. I’d probably be doing a lot of aching, simply to no avail.
He cleared his throat and flicked a glance my way. “Look, about earlier, on the dance floor, I—”
Something darted out into the road. Drayton yanked on the wheel, swerving to try and avoid hitting the creature, but something smashed into the windscreen. A pop and hiss filled the air, and then the car went into a tailspin. The world seemed to spin forever before careening to a screeching halt. The smell of burned rubber was sharp and hot in my nostrils.
“Serenity? Are you all right?”
I pressed a hand to my forehead. “Yeah. Just really bad déjà vu.”
He unbuckled his seat belt. “I think we hit something. I need to check.”
My skin prickled with foreboding, sudden and unexpected. “Wait.” I gripped his arm. “Don’t.”
“What?”
It was impossible to see outside through the cracked windscreen. There was very little light, and smoke was billowing up around us. Where was the smoke coming from? Wait. There’d been several loud pops. Punctures.
“The tires are punctured.” I stared at him wide-eyed. “This was deliberate.”
His brow cleared in realization, and he reached into the back seat for his sword. My phone began to buzz, Cassie’s name flashing urgently on caller ID.
“Cassie?”
“Harker. Thank fuck you’re okay. Look, get back here now. I have a bad feeling. I need you both back here now.”
My hands began to burn.
“Serenity, watch out.”
My passenger side window exploded inwards.
“Harker!” Cassie’s voice was a screech on the other end of the line.
Drayton tugged me toward him. His eyes fixed on our attacker. His face contorted with a mixture of wrath and horror, and then the air grew thick, stinging my nostrils and my throat. It was a familiar feeling, an awful feeling. Drayton’s arms slipped from around me, and then the world fell into darkness.
Chapter 7
“Serenity, wake up.”
My head felt fuzzy and throbbed dully, and my lids were super heavy. I pulled them open to find Drayton’s face staring at me from between bars.
Bars!
I sat up so fast my head spun. “What happened?”
A cage, we were in a cage. Separate cages. We were bathed in a weird green glow, but the room around us was shrouded in darkness. Fucking hell with the aversion to light in this damned district.
Drayton reached for my hand through the bars of his cell. “Listen to me carefully. We don’t have much time.” His throat bobbed. “The Breed have us. They want to hurt me.” He was breathing hard. “Things will happen. Things I can’t control.” His voice cracked. “I don’t want to hurt you. Please, do whatever you need to in order to protect yourself.” He grabbed my wrist. “Whatever it takes, Serenity.”
What did he mean? The Breed … Wait, this was something to do with why he hated them. They wanted to hurt him. We needed to get out of here. My daggers.
“I can cut through the bars. I just need to make the daggers appear.”
His eyes lit up. “You can do that?”
“The voice said I could.” Although I hadn’t wanted to believe it. “He said I need to assimilate with the darkness.”
“Do you know how?”
I grabbed the bars between us to quell the quiver in my stomach. “No. But I can try.”
Drayton’s fingers curled around mine. “Do it.”
I nodded and dropped my shields all the way. Ambrosius had said that the darkness was my subconscious and that it controlled the daggers. If connected with it, I’d be in control of the blades. It surged up to meet me now. The hunger burned steadily. It flooded my limbs as if searching for something. Come on, where were the daggers? I’d let the darkness out, relinquished the leash, what now? The darkness crawled up to caress the back of my neck and trickle over my scalp, testing and teasing. My pulse raced as panic gripped me. The darkness ran its fingers over my brain, preparing… Preparing for what? Panic was a vise around my heart, squeezing painfully so it was impossible to draw breath.
“Serenity, it’s okay. You’re okay?”
My eyes burned, and I slammed my fists against the bars. “I want to do this. I can do this.”
But my body had other ideas, rebelling at the thought of the invasion.
Drayton slipped a hand through the bars and cupped my cheek. “Look at me, Serenity Harker. You are the most amazing woman I have ever had the pleasure to know. Your strength of character, your convictions, and your morality never cease to stun me. You’ve spent your whole life protecting yourself from your demon, and assimilating won’t be so easy. This, whatever happens here, is not your responsibility and it’s not your fault. Remember that.”
“What?”
His hand slid to the back of my neck. He tugged me forward and leaned in to press his lips to mine through the gap in the metal. It was a soft, tender kiss, a kiss filled with possibilities of what could have been. Hot tears stung my eyes and the back of my nose, and fear unfurled in my chest.
I pulled back. “Drayton? What do they want?”
“Well, well. Isn’t this the touching scene.”
Drayton’s fingers slid from my cheek, his eyes shadowing with sorrow. He sat
back, and his mask slipped back into place—the lazy, cocky mask that I’d seen when we’d first met.
“Hello, Max,” Drayton drawled. “Any chance of an upgrade in accommodations?”
A man stepped out of the shadows—tall, lithe, and dressed in a black turtleneck sweater. It was the man from The Deep.
His smile was humorless. “Hello, Drayton. You know why you’re here, don’t you?”
Drayton shrugged a shoulder. “You missed me?”
Max’s eyes narrowed. “Drop the act, incubus. I can smell your fear.”
Drayton winced. “Nope, that’s probably just my new cologne. I’ll need to change it once I get out of here.”
Max’s lips parted in a toothy smile. “Yes. Once you get out.” He turned his attention to me. “But you won’t be going anywhere.”
My heart thudded hard against my ribs. “What do you want from us?”
Max cocked his head. “You don’t know.” He waved a finger between Drayton and me. “He didn’t tell you?”
“Max…” Drayton’s tone was saturated with warning.
Max ignored him. “Drayton and I go way back, several years actually. We have a bond. You see, he killed my mate.”
Drayton sat forward. “Your mate was a killer.”
Max shrugged. “Maybe. But he was mine. You took him away from me, and I made you a promise. I promised to make you pay.”
Drayton’s control snapped. “And you did. You fucking did.”
“Yes. I thought I had. I thought I’d ripped out your heart and left you broken, but then I saw you with her. That look on your face, one you never had for your beloved human, Viola. It occurred to me then that I’d acted hastily in my grief. Viola was never in your heart.”
“Viola meant the world to me.”
“Yes. Yes, I believe that, and maybe you even loved her in a way, the way a master loves a pet. But this woman, this nephilim … she is different. She has your heart, and tonight, I will crush it. I will—” He broke off and tilted his head as if listening to something, his gaze growing unfocused as he nodded. “You may call us savage for taking what we need. For satiating our carnal pleasures and hunger as we see fit. But that is the nature of the beast, of the predator. But the beauty of The Breed is the ability to be both beast and man, and I will do you this one small courtesy. Something you did not offer me. I will give you the chance to say goodbye.”
Champion of Midnight Page 5
