Dark Obsession

by Amanda Stevens

“Let me go first,” he said, stepping past her and entering the apartment.

  Erin retrieved her purse, then followed him inside, watching as he strode across the living room and tested the knob on the French door. She was amazed as always how he seemed to dominate the immediate area.

  Maybe it was because he was so tall, well over six foot, with the kind of hard, muscular body that seemed to exude power and strength. Or maybe it was the long, black leather coat he always wore. Or the dark glasses. Or…was it something else about him that intrigued her?

  What kind of woman would be drawn to the thing that frightened her the most?

  “Well?”

  His deep voice startled her. Erin’s hand fluttered to her throat, but once again she found only the empty space where the cross had once hung. “What?”

  “I asked if you’d gotten this lock fixed?”

  “No, not yet. The super was supposed to come by yesterday, but he never showed up.”

  “Does he live here in the building?”

  “Yes. He has an apartment on the ground floor.”

  “I’ll speak to him on my way out.” Slade walked away from the window and browsed through the photos displayed on the mantel. Then he turned toward her, and Erin’s heart flip-flopped inside her chest. He was staring at her neck, much as the man on the street had earlier, and Erin shivered. Slade took another step toward her, and she had to fight the overwhelming urge to retreat. “Why did you put your cross in your sister’s grave?” His voice was low and chilling. Deeply compelling.

  Erin swallowed, her throat suddenly dry. “I wanted her to be protected.”

  “From what?”

  “From the darkness,” she whispered.

  “You should have kept it,” he said. “You should have kept it for yourself.”

  “Why? Vampires don’t really exist,” she said.

  “But evil does,” he said. “And the danger out there is very real.”

  Their gazes locked for the longest moment. Erin couldn’t see his eyes, but knew without a doubt that his gaze had dropped again to her bare neck. Never had she felt so helpless, so unprotected as she did at that moment.

  “I have to go,” he said almost reluctantly. “My shift starts soon.” He took a card from the inside pocket of his coat and handed it to her. “If you hear any disturbances, see anything suspicious, call me. Don’t take any foolish chances. I don’t care if you even hear a mouse in the kitchen, you call me. If I’m not in, ask for Detective Christopher. You understand me?”

  Erin plucked the card from his fingers. “I understand. Perfectly.” She glanced at the card. Nick. His first name was Nick.

  He opened the front door, then paused on the threshold to turn back and repeat the warning he’d issued the first night she’d met him, the night Megan had died. “Keep all your doors and windows locked. Don’t go out after dark. And whatever you do, don’t invite anyone inside.” His voice was even, but the emphasis was unmistakable. “Talk to them through the door, on the phone, whatever, but don’t ever invite anyone in here.”

  Then he was gone. And the apartment seemed cold and empty. Menacing.

  Erin stared at the closed door for several minutes. His warning echoed in the stillness. Don’t invite anyone inside. Vampires couldn’t enter your home without an invitation. She’d learned that rule years and years ago, and it had given her a small amount of comfort during those dark, sleepless nights when her nightmares had seemed more real than reality. Just don’t invite them inside, she’d tell herself.

  But now a chilling thought seeped into her mind. Vampires did not exist. And yet…She had already invited two people inside the apartment. Racine DiMeneci and Detective Slade. But surely that legendary rule only applied to strangers. Surely it didn’t mean people she knew.

  But then, how much did she actually know about Racine? How much did she know about Detective Slade…Nick?

  Erin’s fingers trembled as she shot home the bolt on the front door because the answer to both questions was exactly the same.

  She didn’t know anything about either of them.

  * * *

  Slade sat at a table in Nosferatu’s, the nightclub Racine DiMeneci had told him and Erin about yesterday. Nosferatu’s was also the club where he had first seen Megan Ramsey a few weeks ago.

  He gazed around the darkened club as the decadent music swirled around him. Everyone inside the place wore dark glasses and, ironically, Slade’s own need to hide his eyes made him blend in even more effectively, made it difficult to distinguish between him and those he hunted.

  Actually, he had also seen Racine here with Megan one night and he wondered now when the redhead would make the connection. Things could start getting sticky for him if too many people began asking too many questions. Racine and Dr. Traymore would both eventually have to be dealt with, but Erin Ramsey was his first concern. He had to keep the truth from her at all costs, but already he knew she had suspicions. She couldn’t write the stories she wrote without at least halfway believing.

  He thought about her assertion that she wanted to help in the investigation, and his mouth thinned. It was his job to make sure she stayed safe, but that meant he’d have to see her again. And if he saw her again, he knew he’d want to touch her, to test for himself the softness of her skin, the silkiness of her hair. And if he touched her once…

  Don’t, he warned himself. Don’t think about her that way.

  She was exactly the kind of woman who could prove dangerous to a man like him. The kind of woman who could look into his eyes and gaze deeply into his soul. The kind of woman who could learn all his secrets, no matter how hard he tried to guard himself against her.

  There had been another woman like that once…another woman a lifetime ago….

  A vision materialized in his mind, and for a moment, Slade allowed himself to remember Simone’s face. But he didn’t remember the innocence. Nor the youth and the beauty and the trust that had once radiated from her visage when she’d looked at him. What he saw—what he made himself see—was the evil she had become.

  Because of him.

  Slade’s fists clenched tightly as he tried to shut off the memories, but they were coming back stronger than ever tonight. Erin Ramsey had done that to him. She had made him remember who and what he was. She had reminded him of what could never be again.

  He ripped off his dark glasses and passed a weary hand over his eyes. But almost immediately he replaced the glasses. He didn’t want people looking into his eyes. Didn’t want people staring into his soul. Didn’t want people reading the truth about him.

  The music swirled around him, sensuous and seductive, and he watched the bodies writhing on the dance floor. How many of them would leave here, their souls untouched? How many of them were even now fighting the blood lust that tormented their every waking moment, from sundown to sunup? What truths would be revealed if everyone removed their dark glasses?

  He sighed deeply, feeling the gloom of the place settle over him. He always felt depressed, coming here, and yet he couldn’t stay away. Couldn’t keep from warning the innocent young women who strayed in here, looking for thrills. Couldn’t help trying to protect others as he hadn’t been able to protect Simone.

  Eight years ago, he thought, staring down at his scarred hands. Eight years ago he’d come here with Simone, the night they’d gotten engaged. She’d been so young then. So beautiful and innocent.

  Or so he’d thought.

  But Simone had been taken with Nosferatu’s the moment they’d stepped inside. The dark, eerie atmosphere. The loud, erotic music. The curtained alcoves that hid only God knew what. She’d been drawn to it all in a way Slade hadn’t understood. Then.

  They’d met Drake D’Angelo here that night. He’d appeared out of nowhere, a tall, gaunt stranger who had captivated Simone the moment he’d touched her hand.

  Slade squeezed his eyes closed, trying to stem the memories, but try as he might, he couldn’t keep them away. He knew that. Every
time he set foot in this place, it was his way of making restitution for Simone’s life. For her soul.

  That night, after they’d gotten home, Slade remembered how wildly passionate Simone had been. How…untamed her lovemaking had been. He’d never seen her like that, and the next day he’d started to wonder why. Had she been thinking about him when they were making love, or had she been thinking of D’Angelo? Had she been dreaming about that dark stranger? Wanting him as Slade had held her in his arms?

  And then, a few days after they’d met D’Angelo, Slade’s worst fears came true. Simone told him she was in love with someone else.

  For days after she’d left him, the pain and jealousy festered inside Slade until he could stand it no longer. He knew he had to see Simone again, appeal to her one last time before he could turn loose the past.

  He got the address from the police department files, then drove to D’Angelo’s house on Riverside Drive. The mansion was dark and the air around it damp and rife with decay. The door was open, as if D’Angelo had somehow known he was coming. Letting his eyes adjust to the gloom, Slade walked cautiously down first one corridor, then the next.

  In a candlelit room that overlooked the river, he found the lovers together. Simone wore a filmy red dress that hid nothing of her lush figure, and her long dark hair cascaded down her back in thick, wanton curls. If anything, she looked even more beautiful than Slade remembered as she lay with her head tilted back, her slim white neck exposed to D’Angelo’s kisses.

  “Simone!”

  She gasped and whirled, her hand automatically going to her mouth. Something red was smeared across her lips and two trickles of blood coursed down her neck. Slowly she stood and faced Slade. The gossamer gown she wore billowed around her legs and plunged low at her breasts. She looked beautiful, seductive, feral.

  And evil.

  There was a strange glow in her eyes, an eerie half smile on her red-stained lips. As Slade watched, she lifted a fingertip to her neck, wiped away the blood, then raised the finger to her lips. Slade’s stomach rolled sickeningly.

  Simone smiled. “Nicholas. How sweet of you to visit us,” she purred, and D’Angelo, reclining on the bed, laughed, a deep, dark, mirthless sound that chilled Slade to the bone.

  “Yes, come in, by all means. Simone, aren’t you going to welcome your old friend with a kiss?”

  Simone was still smiling at Slade in a way that made him shudder. Slowly she walked across the room toward him, the sheer fabric of her gown rippling in the breeze from the open terrace doorway. She lifted a hand and touched his face. Slade had to fight the urge to flinch from her. Her touch was cold, lifeless. No longer human.

  “Simone,” he whispered, forcing his hand to close around hers, “what has he done to you?”

  “Kiss me,” she pleaded. Slade fought to keep the contents of his stomach from rebelling. Something was not right here. Almost against his will, he took a step back, away from her.

  Simone pursed her red lips, pouting. “Oh, Nick, don’t. Don’t run away from me. Remember the way it used to be? The way you used to kiss me? It was so good. Do it again. Do it now. Kiss me, Nick. Just one last kiss…”

  Dear God, how he wanted to! Even as repulsed as he was by her, a part of him still yearned to take her in his arms, to pretend the last few days had only been a nightmare. Simone belonged to him. She was his first love, his only love. They could still be together, still have the life they had planned for so long. Without her, his life was meaningless, a wasteland.

  “We can still be together,” she whispered as if reading his mind.

  “Simone.” He murmured her name, brushed her cold, flawless cheek with his knuckles. “I still love you. I still want you.”

  “Then kiss me, my love.”

  How could he resist? He loved her so much. Wanted her so much. Slade bent toward her. Her eyes drifted closed as she waited for him, waited for his kiss. A tear coursed down her cheek, and Slade realized that it had fallen from his own eyes. “Simone,” he whispered. “Dear God…”

  Over Simone’s shoulder, Slade saw D’Angelo move in the shadows. His eyes gleamed like silver moondrops in the darkness, and for the first time since he’d entered D’Angelo’s house, Slade felt afraid. Terrified. Not for himself, but for Simone.

  “What have you done to her?” he demanded.

  “You pathetic human,” D’Angelo growled. “I did nothing to Simone that she didn’t want. She and I are meant to be together. I’ve waited centuries for someone like her. She loves the darkness. Craves it. There’s nothing you can do to keep us apart.”

  “We’ll see about that,” Slade shouted. He grabbed Simone’s hand. “We’re getting out of here. Now! You don’t know what he is, what he can do to you.” Neither did Slade. But he knew without a doubt that D’Angelo was evil, and he had to get Simone away from him.

  Simone lifted her dazed eyes to his. “Oh, but I do. I know exactly who and what he is. He’s given me eternal life, and I can give it to you. I can make you one of us.” She opened her mouth and laughed, revealing long fangs that gleamed in the candlelight.

  “Dear God,” Slade gasped in horror.

  Simone reached for him, her teeth growing even longer, sharper, more deadly as she lifted her mouth to his neck. Terrified, Slade tried to shove her back, but she was too strong. Her arms closed around him, holding him to her even as he felt those deadly fangs graze his flesh.

  He experienced little more than two pinpricks of pain, but he felt the darkness almost immediately seeping into his soul. Felt the coldness of her touch draining away his warmth, and for a moment, dear God, for one split second, he welcomed it. Desired it. Craved it.

  Then somehow he managed to summon the courage to fling her away from him. To tear himself away from that sinister pleasure that beckoned so strongly. Simone’s arms flailed wide, upsetting one of the silver candelabras on the table near the window.

  Instantly the drapery caught fire, and the breeze fanned the flames. The blaze raced across the carpet. Within seconds, an inferno separated Slade and Simone from D’Angelo. The vampire roared in rage. “Simone!”

  Simone turned on Slade. “You fool! Look what you made me do!”

  Slade grabbed her arm. “Leave him,” he pleaded. “Come with me, Simone. We’ll find someone who can help us. It’s not too late. It can’t be too late.”

  “Don’t you understand?” she screamed. “It’s too late for both of us now!” Her fangs had disappeared and she looked lovely and innocent, exactly like the Simone he had fallen in love with years ago. “I belong to him now.”

  Before Slade could stop her, Simone had turned and plunged into the wall of fire. Slade ran after her, tried to reach her, tried to draw her back. The pain in his seared hands was nothing compared to the torment in his heart. Before his very eyes, he saw Simone’s gossamer gown erupt in flames, but somehow she continued through the blaze, trying in vain to reach D’Angelo’s outstretched arms.

  “Slade!” D’Angelo screamed, his own flesh blazing as he clutched Simone in his arms. “I’ll see you in hell, Slade!”

  Whether from the burns on his hands or from Simone’s last deadly kiss, Slade never knew, but he blacked out then. When he came to, he found himself outside on the grass as the mansion blazed like a gigantic torch in the night. Lying there watching the fire, Slade felt his world turn to ashes around him.

  When it was all over, nothing remained but Slade’s guilt and the endless questions he’d had to face from the department. What was he doing at D’Angelo’s mansion? How did he know the man? Did he go there with the intent to harm him?

  The questions very nearly ended Slade’s career with the force because he couldn’t answer them. How could he? How could he make people believe what he still couldn’t understand himself? If not for Simone’s father, the police commissioner, Slade’s career would have been finished.

  But the commissioner had witnessed the changes in his daughter. Convinced that what Slade had told him was true
, Thomas Delaney then formed a very special, very elite, very secret organization within the police department. And Slade had been his first recruit.

  But Slade’s devotion to the Mission, his own personal crusade to wipe out the vampire population in New York City had not been without a price. What he saw when he looked in the mirror now was a creature almost as soulless as the monsters he stalked at night. What he saw was a man who belonged neither to the light nor to the dark, but one who skirted the very brink of each. He saw a man who had been branded by the evil of Simone’s kiss, his eyes now too sensitive to light. A man who was forced to live his life almost exclusively in the night.

  Just like the creatures he sought to obliterate.

  What if someone had seen him with Megan Ramsey that night? All those old questions would surface again, and that whole mess from his past would be dredged up. The Mission could be threatened. The one thing that gave Slade’s life any meaning at all could be destroyed. And without that, there was nothing to set him apart from the other creatures who hunted the night.

  “Nick?” Fighting the memories and the terrible guilt descending over him, Slade looked up. A young woman stood at his table, gazing down at him from behind her own dark glasses. “May I sit down?”

  “What are you doing here, Christina?” Slade asked harshly as she slipped into a chair, facing him. “How many times have I told you to stay away from this place?”

  “I know,” Christina said. “I know you promised to help me, but I had to come here tonight. I had to see you.” She pulled off her dark glasses, and Slade noticed with relief that her eyes were still very clear and very blue. Not silver. Not glowing. Her blond hair gleamed with life as she leaned across the table toward him, and when she tentatively smiled, deep dimples graced the corners of her mouth. She was barely eighteen, and her appearance remained childlike and innocent. Christina Harris seemed the epitome of the girl next door. Except for the fact that, for some unknown reason, she was increasingly drawn to the darkness.

  “I gave you my number,” Slade said angrily. “We could have met somewhere else.”