The Alexandru Chronicles: The Beginning

by Julienne Holmes

  After stooping down to retrieve the journal, she quickly shook off the ugly, creepy, crawlers that had already accumulated on the journal—from it laying there for that short time. And then, just by instinct, she withdrew her side arm from her unclasped holster.

  Slightly uncoordinated, she swiftly stepped over the bed-frame.

  Once she had made that short distance over to the right wall, adjacent to the bedroom door frame, she propped herself up against the wall, and rolling up the journal, she hastily stuffed it, in her back pocket.

  Before stepping out to confront her faint sound, she tried, unsuccessfully, to calm her nerves.

  As Genevieve stood there, just listening, she could only feel this overwhelming silence closing in around her – suffocating her to the point that she couldn't even breathe.

  Yet, while she couldn't hear anything more, not even the faint sounds of creaking floor boards, her gut, and the hairs on the back of her neck, were telling her that someone was outside this bedroom.

  So, with that in mind, she needed to stay on guard.

  She couldn't afford to become trigger happy, though. Shooting an innocence – such as a homeless man or child – would definitely not look good nor feel good for her conscience.

  After taking her finger off the trigger of her gun, she, letting her finger linger over the trigger, swiftly stepped out of the bedroom.

  Genevieve couldn't say what was more surprising. The fact, that what she was expecting wasn't what she was getting or that she...

  Ah, hell, she didn't know what to think.

  After the shock had worn off, it was quickly replaced with anger.

  “What are you doing here?!”

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  As her gaze wandered over the towering man in front of her, she was blown away by how good he looked. His platinum blonde hair glistened and his six foot two self was garbed all in black.

  If she wasn't puzzled by his black clothing, then it was his long black trench coat that did. In Tucson, during the triple digit summer, a person had to be truly insane to leave their home garbed all in black. Of course their were people out there – Exhibit A: the gorgeous man standing in front of her.

  When finally her gaze finished, pleasurably, scrutinizing his appearance, and she returned to his face, Genevieve couldn't help becoming very aroused at the dark stoic frown that was upon his handsome, chiseled, face.

  “What are you doing here?” her voice slightly shook.

  He didn't reply right away. His unseeing eyes just wandered around the apartment's living room.

  Once Cirpian had sniffed the air and listened to the unsettling silence, that had settled around the apartment's building, he finally said, “Genevieve..., what are you doing here?”

  “I asked you first...”

  It was the adamant stubbornness in Genevieve's voice, that had a small smile creeping to his handsome mouth; a mouth, that just the other night, had brought unbelievable pleasure to every inch of her.

  “Gen...” he began.

  When that smile of his broadened and he raked his fingers through that beautiful, silky, hair of his, Genevieve wanted nothing more than to go to him and feel his strong arms around her; and the feel of his hair, as it gently caressed her face.

  She was angry.

  Angry at herself, for not trying harder to keep her arousal under wraps. The guy was definitely trouble. Yet, oddly enough, her libido desperately wanted trouble. Besides, he was a change from the total rejects that she had dated in the past.

  “Cirpian, give me one good reason why I shouldn't haul your ass down to the precinct; for trespassing?”

  For that brief moment, he didn't say anything. His dark grayish blue gaze stared right through her; flusteredly arousing her even more than she was.

  “Because...” he said smoothy, “you are also trespassing..., Gen.”

  XXX

  It had taken Kyle, practically all day, to find out who that missing file, that had been on Genevieve's desk, had been pertaining to. During that time, he had paid close attention to his cell phone – hoping against hope that Genevieve would call him.

  As he now sat there, looking down at his pad, with only one name scrawled on it—James Sandman Fording—he found himself unbelievably curious on what had been in that file on their missing stiff from the morgue, that had Genevieve not just taking the file, but, for the rest of the day, not even bothering to check or call in.

  She had done a total Houdini.

  No one had seen her.

  A surprising turn of events, was how concerned their Captain was for her. He had called Kyle into his office and asked him, very politely, if he had seen Genevieve. If Kyle hadn't been shocked by the concern expression on his Captain's face, he was when his Captain used Genevieve's first name.

  Since Kyle had been working there, he had never heard the Captain call Genevieve anything other than Detective Freemen. Or he had angrily addressed her by calling her a pain in the ass or something far worse than that.

  For some, unsurprising, reason, Genevieve was always being chewed out by their Captain. She was like a little kid, that knew just the right buttons to push to piss him off – some times she remind Kyle of Dennis the Menace. She didn't all the time, intentionally do something wrong to get herself in trouble; all she had to do was sarcastically snicker at their Captain, and she ended up with her ass being handed to her.

  Yet, it was at that moment, of seeing that concern in their Captain's eyes, that had Kyle wondering if the Captain, actually, missed Genevieve and her sarcasm. Since that stiff had disappeared from the morgue, Genevieve's sarcastic smiles and comments had been put on hold; and she was treating the Captain as if he had the plague – avoiding him at every turn.

  As Kyle stared down at his pad, he whispered the name that he had written down upon it.

  “James Fording.”

  When he had requested more information on this guy, he had been instructed to look in the folder, that the North Carolina precinct had already faxed over to them; which just so happened, to have been put on Genevieve's desk.

  Knowing that his partner had taken that information with her, he found himself up against a hard place. He didn't want to say anything, because he was afraid that he would get Genevieve in trouble. Yet, he was impatient, for the information, that was in that file.

  He could wait for her to return with it and then look at it. Or, he could just do some simple searching on the Internet for this guy. If he was really impatient, he could call North Carolina's precinct; and have them fax the information over again.

  Yet, most likely if he did this, he would get not just a lot of lip from North Carolina, but it would take them forever and a day just to fax another file over on James Fording.

  Really Kyle didn't want to do the latter.

  Besides, what could that file possibly tell him, that he hadn't already figured out about the guy?

  James Fording was a dead drug dealer/user.

  A dead drug dealer/user, who had sailed under the radar in Arizona. Yet, he would have eventually ended up with a record of some sorts in Tucson. It would have just been a matter of time, before police had picked him up or pulled him over for distributing or purchasing drugs.

  Rubbing his face, Kyle sat back in his chair, and after stretching, he got up from his desk. Once he had torn away the piece of paper from his pad, and retrieved his lap top from next to his desk, he left the precinct and headed back toward his apartment.

  He needed some privacy to think about what it was, that had his partner missing for most of the day.

  Granted, Genevieve was mad at him; but it wasn't just that—she was on a lead. A lead that had her blood hound senses, so determined that she wouldn't report in or answer her phone until she successfully made it to the end.

  On many cases with Genevieve, Kyle had thought this trait a good incentive for a homicide detective; she was determined to get to the truth, and had no intention of stopping until she got there.
/>   Yet, now he was worried.

  What if the real reason behind her not answering her phone or even reporting in, was that she was hurt. Or worse...dead.

  Before driving to his apartment, he drove by Genevieve's. The first thing he noticed, when he pulled around to her side of the building, was that her vandalized car had already been hauled away and another car was in it's place. Yet, this car didn't look like one that Genevieve would have picked out—for one, it had a few dents and scratches on it.

  While Kyle circled the apartment complex's parking lot, he kept a vigilant eye out for any car that might be Genevieve's new car – he drove very slowly around the parking lot, keeping his eye out for any Chevy Cruzes or any car that might scream Genevieve. In the end, he wasn't entirely sure that one of those cars parked around her complex wasn't hers – possibly she had decided on going with something different than a Chevy Cruze.

  After, eventually, parking his car, he got out and made his way to her apartment. It took only two hard knuckle knocks, and him calling her through her door, for him to realize that Genevieve wasn't home.

  Granted she was still mad at him, and, he knew that because of this, she wouldn't have opened the door. Yet, he also knew that she wouldn't have missed that opportunity to express herself through the door – calling him a douche bag and telling him to get the hell off of her stoop.

  After tapping his knuckles one last time upon the hard wooden door and calling out to her again, Kyle finally turned on his heels and left.

  As he drove out of Genevieve's apartment complex's parking lot, he couldn't help feeling this, overwhelming, sense of dread.

  Kyle had suffer through enough funerals, to know that it hurt like hell to lose that person – be them a friend or a love one, the pain was indescribable.

  Before Genevieve had been assigned to be his partner, he had attended his last partner's funeral. Detective Felix Martin, had been like a brother to Kyle—he had loved the gentle giant. Yet, it had taken a bullet from some stupid sixteen year old gang member's gun, for Felix, one minute, to be happily talking about his family and inviting Kyle fishing; to that next split second, Felix lying there gurgling on his own blood.

  Felix's funeral had been hard enough. Yet, if he had to go to Genevieve's, it would definitely kill him – he wouldn't have any reason to live.

  His love for her, went so painfully deep; that it would have felt similar to someone ripping his heart out and chopping it into tiny pieces.

  As he pulled out into the congested Tucson traffic, he whispered to himself, “Where are you, babe?”

  XXX

  Men, you can't live with them; can't kill um either.

  Genevieve had had just enough of men. It was either she was dealing with whinny assholes – like her brother in-law – or she was trying to figure out the mysterious man that now sat next to her in her car.

  She couldn't win.

  No wonder some women decided on lesbianism – it was a constant struggle not to kill these pricks. Genevieve, herself, would have probably considered converting, if not for the fact, that she just couldn't see herself being attracted to another woman in that way. She enjoyed men..., that is, when they weren't pissing her off.

  Cirpian had silently refused to tell her why he had been, not just in a condemned building, but in her dead man's apartment. She could have arrested him, but then she would have had to explained to her Captain how she had found Cirpian trespassing on this condemned building; whose fence was supposedly chained up.

  Yea, that would go down real smooth.

  Her Captain would surely dig her a new ass hole; if the first one hadn't been painful enough, this one would be ten times worse.

  Nah..., she wasn't that stupid.

  For that brief moment, all she did, was quizzically stare, through her eye lashes, at the man that sat across from her.

  When finally she spoke, there was this abrasiveness to her voice, “Cirpian..., I want answers...First, off, I want to know what you were doing in that building?”

  Gazing at her sideways, he nonchalantly said, “Just looking...I like these old buildings.”

  “Bull shit!” when he frowned at her, she growled, “You want me to believe, that you were just out here admiring a building's structure!”

  “I don't care what you believe, Genevieve...Besides, you still haven't answered my question.”

  “And I wont...,” when he smiled at her, she said, “because I have just as much right to be here than you.”

  “Says who?”

  Leaning toward him, she irritably replied, “My badge.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  As Cirpian curiously looked over at his little warrior queen, he found himself utterly aroused by her. He could sense her anger, mixed with the alluring smell of her blood. Just those two combinations, had him tingling all over.

  When he smiled at her, he could tell by the hostile sigh that she uttered, that she was getting even more angry.

  Here was a woman, that was not accustomed to being angry – she hated it. She wanted to be in control of the situation.

  Yet, he was preventing her from being. Just from him not answering her question, kept her from achieving what she wanted.

  As Genevieve glared over at Cirpian, she found herself even more angry—she hated being angry.

  When she was angry, she couldn't control her other emotions as easily. To her, anger was one of those emotions that seemed to advertise how truly vulnerable a person was.

  She was just about to spout out some more vulgar curse words, when Cirpian leaned over and, taking her face in his hands, he skimmed his lips across hers.

  The kiss was so gentle, that she instantly forgot what it was that she was so angry about. It was like a feather was being rubbed against her lips.

  When his grip eventually relaxed on her face, she sighed. As she brought her hand up to touch his, it was then that she felt nothing – just air.

  Instantly opening her eyes, she stared at the empty space in front of her. Where Cirpian had been sitting..., there was now no one.

  He was gone.

  Swiftly turning around in her seat to see where he had gone, she finally stopped when she noticed her small cross, hanging from her rear-view mirror; shaking from her movements. Gingerly grabbing hold of it, Genevieve ran her fingers over the smooth surface of the silver cross. This was the only item in her old car, that hadn't been destroyed. The few CDs and even a little teddy bear, that Kyle had given her for her birthday, had been smashed or ripped to shreds. She had been angry about the bear, because it hadn't meant anything to the person, who had destroyed it; but it had meant a great deal to her.

  For a few minutes more, Genevieve sat there; utterly confused by what she should do next and where Cirpian had gone.

  What possibly had her even more confused, was that she had honestly not heard the door open or anyone even get out of the car.

  So, how was it that he had done it so silently?

  She was just about to put her key in the ignition, when she saw something, out of the corner of her eye; on the seat, where Cirpian had been sitting, was a pretty wooden carved box.

  Gingerly picking the box up, she hesitated before opening it.

  The box's craftsmanship was truly beautiful – durably beautiful. It had a cross on it, with a few little symbols that looked to be either a language of some sorts or possibly just etchings. As she held it, in her hands, she fingered the smooth surface – it was by far the most beautiful thing, that anyone had ever given her.

  Once she had opened the box, she was instantly surprised by the beautiful Celtic cross, that laid in it's middle. Yet, what had her even more astonished, was the strange vial that laid in the middle of the cross's chain.

  After gingerly taking the vial out and putting the box down, she held the vial in her hands and, holding it up against the light, she tried figuring out what it was that was inside the vial.

  It looked like water.

  Yet, it had a dif
ferent texture from the water she had seen around here; it was clearer, and there was this slight, pure, glow to it; which was hard to explain.

  Eventually returning the vial back to it's box, she looked in her rear-view mirror at the foreboding apartment complex. The sun was already going down and dusk was gradually creeping upon the ominous building. Already shadows and this deep, dense, fog, was wrapping itself around the building's structure.

  Shrugging away her anxiety, Genevieve started the car and, as she pulled away from the curb, she noticed how one of the shadows appeared to be chasing after her car.

  XXX

  He was almost there, he was just inches away from touching the trunk. Yet, when his fingers just skimmed the surface of her car, it was then that she sped up.

  “Stupid bitch!” he growled.

  He was so angry, he wanted to rip someone's head off. Preferably that dumb bitch that had left him. Once he had handled this bitch, he would go after the one that had thought it wise to go against him.

  When he heard this loud, inhuman, shriek, he knew it was time to head back to the others; that was the signal, that it was time to hunt for dinner.

  As he was turning to leave, it was then that he felt him.

  What was surprising, was that he hadn't saw the forewarning fog.

  Madeira's warning to them, about staying wary of strong vampires, had consisted of her telling all of them about the forewarning greenish or powerful fogs; that would alert them of an approaching superior vampire.

  Yet, because there was no fog, he had been momentarily taken off guard. That is, until he saw him: the slayer.

  The slayer was standing under a street light, just watching him; the eery yellowish glow, made him look even more menacing than he actually was.

  As he continued to warily watch the slayer, he tried stretching his abilities; especially his vampire sight. Yet, it was because of him still being a young fledgeling, that his new enhance sight made him unable to really see as good; as say a superior vampire.