by Faith Hunter
He smiled slowly, watching her face. “He allows you freedom and leeway that he allows no others.” When her expression didn’t change, he added, “I think perhaps he cares for you.”
Jane leaned in slowly, her scent wild and untamed, feral as a hungry predator. She smelled of deep woods, and danger, and long hunts beneath a full moon. He didn’t know what she was, and he wanted to. He wanted to know everything. Jane said, “Leo Pellissier cares for nobody and no one except those he drinks from . . . and owns,” she added carefully, watching his reaction to her insult. George smiled, amused at the words. He had heard much worse over the decades. She said, “Leo doesn’t own me. He has no control over me. None at all. And I could give a rat’s hairy backside what he wants. I am a free agent, not one of his dinners.”
George chuckled and curled his fingers under to keep from reaching out and caressing her face. “Then I pray he never drinks from you, Jane Yellowrock. I like this freedom of yours. This splendid, wonderful freedom.”
“Yeah. Whatever. I got your e-mail with the request from His Royal Fanghead about the disturbance at the club. You got any more details than a rogue, but sane, vamp trying to drain the lead singer?”
“Yes. We’ve had two different attacks this week, incidents when we’ve found employees passed out, blood-drunk, but who claimed they had no memory of a Mithran accosting them. Such complete compulsion suggests an older, masterful Mithran, and none have come forward.”
“And no one smelled a new vamp? I mean, I know the odors in the Royal Mojo Blues Company can be overwhelming, but vamps can smell other predators.”
“Leo would like for you to inspect the premises and give us your opinion.”
Her eyes narrowed, the amber irises constricting with her thoughts. “So he knows or guesses who it is, but he’s playing politics. He can’t move against the person himself, but I can.”
“You are learning how Mithrans operate,” he said with approval in his voice.
“Yeah. Back to that rat’s hairy—”
“And you don’t care about Mithran politics,” he interrupted. “I know. Would you like to ride with me or follow on your bike?”
“I’ll meet you there,” she said. She finished the omelet with quick, economical bites and drank down the tea. Standing, she left the restaurant and he followed, watching her legs move beneath the jeans. Her legs were, arguably, the most incredible part of her. Her long braid bounced against her marvelous bottom, begging to differ with his assessment.
Behind him, the waiter cleaned the table. He would add the bill to Leo’s account along with his customary thirty percent tip. Bruiser knew how hard most people worked to make a living, and he wasn’t miserly.
• • •
He pulled his car in behind Jane and parked next to the bike she called Bitsa. He’d learned when she explained that the Harley was made from bitsa this and bitsa that, by a Harley Zen master, mostly from two old rusted bikes. He’d been a motorcycle man in his day. Someday he would show her his collection, and perhaps offer her one of the older pan heads. But not until she was already his.
With the key, he unlocked the restaurant and held the door for her. She lifted her eyebrows at the gallantry and he smiled, waiting for a comment about her being strong enough to open her own doors. But this time she said nothing as she moved into the dark of the club. She stood in the shadows, sniffing in long bursts, breathing in that odd way she had, so like a wild animal. Upon their first meeting, she had growled at him. He smiled to himself as he turned on the lights. She had taken both him and Leo down fast. It was one of his best memories of her—and he had many.
Lights on, the bar was revealed for what it was. An old building renovated to current standards for bathrooms, sprinkler systems, and wheelchair access, with a long bar, food service and kitchen, storeroom, and bandstand stage in front of a dance floor. He had watched Jane dance there several times, her body lissome and supple and exceedingly flexible. His smile widened as he remembered.
Jane moved across the room, smelling everything, going into bathrooms, checking out every part of the empty building. She ended up at the back door, and when she called he met her there. “Open this?”
He hadn’t checked this entrance himself. It was a fire escape, and was unlocked from the inside during business hours. There was no way for anyone to use it without an alarm going off. But Jane didn’t know that, and so she’d found something he had missed. Fresh eyes and better-than-human nose. What is she?
Using another key, he turned off the alarm and unlocked the door, which opened onto a narrow alley, no more than three feet wide.
When the door was open, Jane dropped to one knee and studied the filthy ground, sniffing, studying the alleyway. “Female vamp. Old. She stood in the alley for a while, then came in through here,” she said. “Someone turned off the alarm for her and opened the door, so she has an accomplice. Human, I’d say, male, healthy, possibly a new blood-servant, blood-drunk, complaisant enough to do anything she wants.” She pointed at the paved alley and George knelt beside her. “See these marks? Heels. Stilettos. Tiny feet, maybe a size five.”
George saw what she was pointing to. He’d studied tracking with an old Arapaho Indian many years ago, but learning gained from a moccasin-wearing teacher was difficult to apply to modern footwear in a paved alley. He made a soft hmmm as he followed the footprints with his eyes, losing the print about ten feet down. Jane stood and moved along the alley, avoiding piles of trash and feces and wet spots that indicated vagrants had used the alley as a public toilet. He grimaced. He’d see it was hosed down after this was over.
She stopped in front of a recessed area in the brick of the building beside her. Like RMBC it had been many things over years, once a dress shop, once an art gallery, once even a strip club, back when this part of the French Quarter had catered mostly to the flesh.
Jane bent and studied the door, and once again he thought she was smelling it. Satisfied, she said, “I’ll be right back. I’m going to walk around it.” She moved into the daylight at the front of the building. Shortly she appeared at the back of the building, navigating the narrow space. Her jeans were dirty. Her T-shirt was dusty. Her boots were caked with something he didn’t want to inspect too closely.
“She lairs here”—she thumbed at the building—“coming and going through this door most of the time, though she accessed the front door a few times too. The human who lets her in lives with her. And I believe she’s there now. Do you want me to take her?”
“No. Not now. I’ll pass the information to Leo. He’ll make the final decision.”
Jane shrugged. “We’re done here, then.” She looked at her boots. “Is there an outside spigot in back?”
“Yes. I’ll let you back in from there and out through the front, to your bike.”
“Ducky.” She turned on her filthy heel and moved, catlike, back into the shadows.
• • •
When she came in the back door, she smelled fine, and he looked the question at her.
“It wasn’t anything too nasty. Just an old, squishy hamburger.”
She had washed her hands and brushed off her jeans and T-shirt, and looked . . . wonderful. Acutely aware of her, George locked the door and led her through the kitchens to the main room, where he had left an old seventies rock-and-roll LP on the record player in back. The music coming through the speakers was smooth and rich with a full-bodied sound, as only old vinyl and an excellent speaker system can make it.
Jane walked to the center of the dance floor and stopped, her head back, her braid dangling free. She seemed to inhale the music, her chest rising and falling. “Good sound. Allman Brothers?”
“From their Decade of Hits album.”
“I like,” she said. “Hey, Bruiser. Dance?” She held out her arm, her head still back, her eyes still closed.
His heart did a small thump
, and he moved across the floor to take her in his arms, thinking about the beat, the sort of dance that might work with the music. He pulled her into a slow, easy number, part waltz, part something else that his feet seemed to find as he held her in a close embrace, the closed position of dance, which forced her to follow more intimately. With a subtle transfer of weight, he turned her beneath his arm, her body brushing his suggestively. Eyes still closed, she smiled, relaxed into his arms, and let him lead her through the dance. He thought she didn’t relax often, and perhaps never with her eyes closed while another held her. There was a sensation of trust in the way her body moved. Of . . . giving in.
The music changed. He didn’t listen to the music, though it was one of his favorite LPs; he adjusted the rhythm of the dance, slowing, and pulled her even closer, releasing her hand and sliding both arms around her, one hand flat on her back, between her shoulder blades, the other rising to rest against the back of her neck, under her braid. He could feel her breathing against his chest, her ribs moving slowly, her breasts pressing against him. She was hard and muscular, all angles and solid planes, but she was also all woman. He dropped his head to her neck and breathed in, controlling his arousal for fear of frightening her away. He’d lived many years with Mithrans, and had learned how to control his body, his reactions to fear and desire and delight and hunger. Jane brought out all of these in him. He wanted her.
And then the record ended, far too soon.
Jane slid a hand from his waist and up, between their bodies, and pressed him away.
George almost complied, but . . . he could not. He stilled his steps, sliding his hand around to cup her jaw, his thumb on her chin, and tilted her head up. Her eyes came open and she met his. So close. Dropped his mouth. Closer. Her lips opened. Her irises grew wide and black. He breathed her breath and gave it back to her. Lips nearly touching. So close.
She tilted her head, bringing her mouth to his. Lips to his. And she laughed softly, a sound that was pure desire, a purr of need and want, vibrating through him.
He felt it to his core. An electric flame sped through him, hot as a flash fire. He pulled her to him and kissed her as she laughed, rising on her toes, pressing hard to him. Her laughter softened as his tongue touched hers. Standing in the silent, empty bar, he danced a different kind of dance, pouring everything he knew about love and need and desire into the kiss. His body responded, growing hard. Demanding.
He dropped his hand and cupped her bottom, lifting her closer, pressing himself into the heat of her.
And her cell phone rang. It was a simple chime but insistent. She sighed into his mouth, a soft moan of longing and frustration. Without breaking the kiss, she pressed his chest away while reaching back and removing the cell from her back pocket. And she broke the kiss. Her eyes held his as the cell chimed, and she smiled, her lips full and slightly bruised. She answered the call.
“Jane Yellowrock.” And she turned away, moving to the front door of the Royal Mojo Blues Company and out into the sunlight.
Yes. He’d have her. Of her own free will and her own need and her own trust. And this one he would share with no one. No one at all.
Golden Delicious
Rick’s face was still tender, though the bruising was already yellow and the scabs had fallen off, revealing pink, healed skin. When he was human, it would have taken days to reach this stage of healing, but it had been less than twenty-four hours since he was sucker punched. There were very few good things about being infected with were-taint, but fast healing was on that short list.
“He was trying to hurt you, yet you held back.” Soul glanced at him from the corners of her eyes. “It didn’t go unnoticed.”
He pushed on his teeth. They were no longer loose. “I’m betting he was a bully in high school,” he said. “Not used to a guy forty pounds lighter and three inches shorter taking him down.”
Soul’s full lips lifted slowly. “Without breaking his jaw, his knees, or dislocating his shoulder, all of which you could have done.” She made a left, turning onto a side road. Shadows covered them in the dim confines of the company car. “You taught him a valuable lesson. There are things out there that are bigger, faster, and won’t care if he carries a PsyLED badge.
“Speaking of things bigger and faster than human, walk me through it again,” she said, shifting their discussion as easily as she shifted gears.
“Human sense evaluation, initial technology, followed by enhanced senses,” Rick said. “Then the pets and more tech as needed.”
From the back, Pea twittered and Brute growled. Pea was a juvenile grindylow, Rick’s pet and death sentence rolled up in one neon green–furred, steel-clawed, kitten-like cutie. The werewolf taking up the backseat was stuck in wolf form, thanks to contact with an angel, and he didn’t like being called a pet, which meant that Rick did so every chance he got. The wolf hated leashes, his traveling cage, and eating from a bowl on the floor, but it wasn’t like he had a choice. Since Brute couldn’t shift back to human and had no thumbs, he had two choices: accept the leash and being treated like a dangerous dog, or sit in a cage all day. He’d gone for the partial freedom route, which meant partnering Rick LaFleur. Rick, who hadn’t been human in two months himself, was at the training facility for the Psychometry Law Enforcement Division of Homeland Security—called PsyLED Spook School by the trainees.
The three composed a ready-made unit, a triumvirate of nonhuman specialists. If they could learn to work together. So far that didn’t look likely. The werewolf might not be responsible for Rick’s loss of humanity, job, and girlfriend, nor for the total FUBARed mess his life had become, but Brute had been part of the pack that kidnapped and tortured him. Rick didn’t like the wolf or want him around, but like Brute, he had no choice right now. PsyLED had specifically requested them together, and had refused to accept Rick as a solo trainee. It was a package deal or no deal.
Soul said, “Treat this as if it’s a paranormal crime and you’re the first investigator on-site. If you spot something out of the accepted order, hold it for the proper time. You’ll find that by training your investigative skills to work to a specific but fluid formula, you’ll actually gain a freedom of thought processes that will work well in the field.” Soul pulled into a driveway.
“This training site is the most difficult you will encounter during your time here. In the last two months, three students signed their quit forms and left the program after seeing the site.” Her eyes narrowed, the skin around them crinkling. “And I can’t explain why this particular crime scene has been so difficult on them.” She turned off the car.
The small ranch house was dark, crime scene tape over the sealed doors, plywood over the windows. The grass was six inches high, the flower beds needed weeding. “Assuming that the grass was cut in the week prior,” Rick said, “we’re looking at maybe eight weeks since the crime.”
Soul looked at him strangely. “You’re the only one who even looked at the outside of the house.”
“I was a cop,” he said, feeling the loss in his bones. “We look at everything.”
Soul grinned, losing years and making him wonder again about her. She could have been thirty or fifty, tribal American, gypsy, mixed African and European, or a combo. “I knew getting an undercover cop in this program was going to work. That’s why I asked to be your mentor.”
That was news. Soul was one of the top three mentors at Spook School, and Rick hadn’t known how he’d been paired with her.
Soul opened her door, using the interior lights to twist a scrunchie around her platinum hair to keep it out of the way. “The neighbors called nine-one-one when they heard screaming and a dog howling. It was the second night of the full moon, nearly eight weeks ago. The first officers on the scene secured the area, called medics, made arrests based on the evidence, and then called PsyLED.”
Rick stepped to the driveway and opened the back door for the pets. Brute
leaped out—leash-free this time because there were no humans around—his white fur bright in the nearly full moon. Pea clung to his back, smiling, showing fangs as big as Brute’s. Most people saw a green-dyed kitten when they saw her. It. Whatever. Pea was playful as a kitten and could get lost chasing a ball of twine for hours, but if he or Brute stepped out of line and risked passing along the were-taint to a human, she’d kill them without hesitation. That was her job.
“You stay by the door until I’m ready,” Rick instructed. Brute scowled and emitted a low growl. This wasn’t the first time they’d been over this. The last time Rick had brought it up, Brute had walked over to his instruction manual and lifted a leg. Rick had just barely saved the manual from a nasty drenching. Now, he held the wolf’s eyes as the growl began to build.
Eventually, they’d have to deal with the question of who was in charge, and the wolf would have to accept beta status, acquiesce to Rick as alpha. Soul looked down at the wolf. “You’re part of Rick’s investigative team,” she said, her tone cold. “I will not have silliness.” Brute dropped his ears and whined, submissive, and Rick shook his head, wishing he knew her trick. Soul lifted her long skirts above the dew-damp grass and led the way to the door. She unlocked it and stood back, her fingers laced together.
Rick pulled on a pair of black nitrile gloves and flipped on the inside light. There was no furniture in the room, but it was far from empty. “It’s a witch working, salt circle, internal pentagram composed of feathers, river-worn rocks, tiny moonstones, and dead plants. Two pools of blood in the pentagram suggest a blood rite, but it’s an odd combo for one. Blood rites usually require full, five-element mixed covens.” He stepped away from the front door, moving sun-wise, or clockwise, a foot outside the circle, to avoid activating any latent spells. “We have five practitioners, from four of the elements—air, water, two moon witches, and oddly, the death-magic branch of earth witches.” Blood magic was rare, little known, and almost never practiced. Adepts were considered dangerous by other witches, because they used dying things to power workings, and when nothing around was dying, they would steal the life force of the living. In Spook School, he had learned how they worked. They were not nice people.
