Secrets in the Shadows

by Jenna Black

  In her desperate search for rescue, the girl’s eyes locked on Drake’s. He held her gaze, reaching out with his glamour. Her eyes went dull and she stopped struggling.

  Camille put her hands on her hips and turned to Drake. “Release her. I want her to feel herself die.”

  It was all he could do not to charge across the room and seize Camille by the throat. But attacking her would do no one any good. He had to find some other way to help the poor girl.

  “Don’t take out your anger with us on an innocent,” he said. “I won’t interfere with your feeding, but—”

  Camille laughed. “Why, how generous of you to allow me to feed. I’m glad to know it will bother you to see her suffer. You’ve caused me no end of grief already. Now, I would like to cause you some as well.” She stepped back and gestured at the girl, who stood unresisting in the arms of one of her captors, her eyes glazed over. “If you hadn’t come to call and chased my son away, he’d have argued for a merciful kill, and I would have granted it. No matter what he says, he is squeamish about hurting mortals, especially females. A lesson he learned from his father and has never been able to set aside. So in a way, you are personally responsible for her suffering.”

  Camille licked her lips and gazed at him eagerly. “Unless you’d care to kill her yourself. I think I’d very much enjoy that.”

  Drake’s heart sank. If he kept the girl protected by his glamour, he could kill her painlessly and she wouldn’t even be afraid. He’d never killed an innocent, and he wasn’t sure how his conscience would absorb the sin.

  He took one step toward the girl, then stopped and shook his head to clear it. What was he thinking? If he killed this girl, he’d succeed in making her death painless, but Camille would simply find another victim for her evening meal. Two would die instead of one.

  Camille laughed. “Poor fool. You really do have an excess of conscience. Either kill her or release her from your glamour. Those are your choices. Now hurry up. I’m going to be late for the opera as it is.”

  He glared at the beautiful, inhuman creature and wished with all his might that Eli hadn’t sent him down here. If he could turn the clock back twenty-four hours and erase all his newfound knowledge, he would gladly do it. But that wasn’t an option. He cursed Camille for her cruelty, and he cursed Eli for making her. Then he dropped his gaze to the floor and released the girl from his glamour.

  HANNAH WAS HUNGRY ENOUGH to eat a horse, but the Harborside Inn didn’t exactly do room service. At least, not any kind of room service she was interested in. She and Jules agreed—what a surprise!—that wandering into a restaurant for a casual dinner wasn’t the brightest idea, so she settled for a lukewarm hotdog on a stale bun from some no-name convenience store. Given the neighborhood, she attracted way more attention than she would have liked and was very glad to have Jules at her side.

  Even so, when they left the convenience store, she noticed a couple of thuggish teens peel away from the shadows and amble in their direction. She could almost feel their hostile eyes boring through her back. She glanced over at Jules, who was as usual wearing a full-length cashmere coat and a rakish black felt hat. He looked good enough to eat. But he also looked like a tempting target. Not good. Her gun was a solid, comforting weight in her coat pocket, but she sure as hell didn’t want to have to use it.

  A police car cruised slowly down the street. Hannah glanced at it from the corner of her eye and saw one of the cops giving her and Jules the once over. Great. They were drawing attention from all corners. Perhaps this wasn’t the best part of town for them to go incognito after all.

  Jules’s face was closed and shuttered, his eyes strangely distant. She didn’t think he could afford to be lost in thought just this moment, so she gave him a gentle poke with her elbow.

  “Carolyn called this afternoon,” she said. That got his attention. He blinked and came back from la-la land.

  “What did you tell her?”

  Hannah sighed. “I didn’t tell her Eli’s little secret, if that’s what you’re asking.” She hadn’t liked keeping secrets from her best friend, but she figured she couldn’t drop a bombshell like that over the phone. “She asked me what you’re planning to do next, and I told her it beat the hell out of me. So, what’s your grand plan? Or are we still making this up as we go along?”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “Well work fast. I don’t think hanging around this neighborhood has good long-term prospects.” Not unless Jules planned to go on a killing spree. The two punks from the convenience store were still shadowing them, no doubt waiting for the right opportunity to attack. They’d get a rude surprise if they did.

  Jules glanced over his shoulder, making no attempt to be subtle. “You’re not afraid of those two, are you?”

  So he hadn’t been completely oblivious to his surroundings after all. “I’m sure you could take them, but do we really need the hassle? It’s not like we don’t have enough problems already.”

  She would have loved to get out of town the moment the sun set, but they were still without wheels. She’d called the impound lot, and they’d insisted she had to pick up the car between the hours of nine and five. At the Harbor Court, she’d have felt safe enough leaving Jules alone for an hour or two while she went to the impound lot. At the Harborside Inn, she wouldn’t feel safe leaving him alone for five minutes. So, no car.

  “True,” Jules agreed. “Let’s just stay on the main street until they lose interest.”

  She doubted the punks were going to lose interest when the two of them looked like easy money, but she didn’t say so. “Regardless, we can’t stay here indefinitely. Street punks aren’t the only problem. You’ve got to figure out where you want to go, then we’ll have to figure out how to get you there.” And even when they figured all that out, Jules would still have some serious issues to work through.

  “Of course,” she continued, “that’s easier said than done. How can you pick a place to live where you won’t be trespassing on a Killer’s territory?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “And what about food? You’ve got a nice stash in that cooler of yours, but it won’t last forever. And keeping the cooler iced up was a pain in the ass when we were in a nice hotel with an ice maker. How will you—”

  “I don’t know,” he said again, more abruptly. “One problem at a time, if you please.”

  She swallowed about a half-dozen more questions. She already knew the answer would be “I don’t know.” She liked Eli less and less the more she learned about him, but he was still seeming like the lesser of about a hundred evils right this minute. Jules seemed unlikely to agree.

  “We have to get your car back,” Jules said. “Or can you just rent another one?”

  She might be able to, if she went to a different rental company. She honestly didn’t know. But she also knew she had to get that rental back, unless she wanted to be arrested as a car thief. “We’ll just have to go by the lot and hope we can persuade someone to give us a break.”

  “And how will we do that?”

  “I’m sure you’ll think of something.”

  He got the hint and nodded briefly. They were almost back to the hotel. “Do you suppose we can get a cab to come pick us up at this miserable place?” she asked. It had taken a touch of Jules’s glamour to persuade last night’s cabbie to venture into this part of town, but it wasn’t like he could use his glamour over the phone.

  “I suppose there’s only one way to find out.”

  Hannah breathed a sigh of relief when the two punks who were following them veered off. One hurdle down, nine hundred ninety-nine left to go.

  CAMILLE LET THE GIRL’S body drop heavily to the floor. Drake tried not to wince. This death would gnaw at him more than all his own kills combined. That there had been nothing he could do to prevent it didn’t ease the sting.

  Her fawning mortal henchmen removed the body from the room while Camille licked the last drops of the girl’s blood from her
lips. She flashed Drake an evil, self-satisfied smile, then crossed the room and picked up a small evening bag that lay on a side table. He felt a renewed urge to kill her when she plucked a lipstick and a compact from that purse and proceeded to fix her makeup.

  “I’ll give you another three days,” she said, still gazing raptly at her own reflection. Her lips glistened red, her lipstick the color of fresh blood. Drake doubted that was a coincidence. “Anyone who’s still here on the fourth day is fair game.” She flashed another of her unpleasant smiles. “Of course, under the circumstances, I cannot guarantee that Gabriel will give you the same three days. I’ll do what I can to reel him in, but …” She shrugged as if it hardly mattered.

  Though he knew that a wise man would keep his mouth shut, Drake couldn’t resist his sudden desire to hurt her right back. “You’ll never reel Gabriel in, not all the way. He’s tasted rebellion, and he likes it.”

  An expression he might almost have labeled as worry flickered over Camille’s face, then was gone. “My son is not a fool. He will come to his senses. The quicker you and your friends get out of Baltimore, the sooner things will return to normal.” She sounded like she was trying to convince herself.

  Drake wasn’t proud of the malicious pleasure he felt at seeing her uncertainty. “Does he know that you’ll kill him if he doesn’t toe the line? Or does he think that as your son he’s immune?”

  She dropped her lipstick and compact back into her evening bag, then tossed the bag aside. Before he even had a chance to blink, she was behind him. Her hand tangled in his hair, pulling his head sharply to the side, leaving his neck exposed. He tried to twist out of her grip, but glamour held him completely immobilized. Her breath was warm and moist against the skin of his neck. He smelled the poor mortal girl’s blood and hated the hint of hunger the scent evoked.

  “I promised Eli not to kill you,” Camille said. Her tongue flicked out to taste the skin of his throat, and he felt the prick of her fangs. “I didn’t promise him I wouldn’t hurt you.”

  A chill passed down Drake’s spine as he stood statue-still. She certainly couldn’t kill him by biting him, and there were far worse pains she could inflict. But some ancient instinct greatly disliked the sensation of her fangs against his throat.

  She nipped lightly, fangs breaking the skin. He smelled his own blood in the air before he felt the trickle crawl down his neck. Camille’s tongue was an obscene warmth against his skin as she licked away that lone droplet.

  “Don’t toy with me, Drake,” she warned. “I can hurt you more than you’ve ever imagined being hurt. My son thinks he’s the master of torture, but I’m far more skilled than he. I could have you begging for death in minutes, and not grant you that relief for days. Weeks, even. I’m sentimental enough to spare you for Eli’s sake, but my sentimentality has its limits. Have I made myself clear?”

  “Yes.” Drake forced the word out, hating his own helplessness. Maybe Jules had been right all along. Maybe the Guardians should come down to Baltimore. Only it wasn’t Ian they needed to kill. How could Eli allow this … creature … to live? How could he retain even the slightest thread of attachment to her?

  Camille released him from her glamour and stepped away. He didn’t turn to look at her, didn’t want to see the look in her eyes.

  “Go find your friends,” she said. “I have an opera to attend.”

  Drake couldn’t have been more eager to get the hell out of her house. Even so, he reached out with his senses as he approached the door. Gabriel was still out there somewhere, and he was as great a threat as Camille. Perhaps more so, for Camille’s control over her son was slipping, whether she wanted to believe it or not. Open rebellion seemed an almost foregone conclusion.

  Drake halted in the doorway. He’d been searching for a hint of Gabriel’s presence. Instead, he felt something even more disturbing. He turned to the butler who was waiting for him to leave.

  “Is Camille expecting visitors?” he asked.

  “Visitors, sir?”

  “Yes, visitors. As in about a dozen vampires who are heading in this direction.”

  The butler blanched, giving Drake his answer. He tried to dart out the door, wanting no part of whatever was to come next, but Camille must have sensed the approaching vampires. She appeared in the hallway, her smug, malicious smile a thing of the distant past.

  “Stay here!” she ordered, her glamour yanking Drake back in the door.

  It was Drake’s turn to smile, though he refrained from gloating. Even a vampire as strong as Camille would have a hard time fighting off a dozen foes. Especially if one of those foes was Gabriel himself.

  “Stand with me and I will give you a full week to find your friends,” she said. She was scared. He could feel her fear in the air, though her face showed nothing and her voice was calm.

  “If I stand with you, you’ll give me as much time as I need.” It didn’t matter what she offered him—he’d decide to stand with or against her when he saw who was leading this attack. If he had hopes for his own survival and for that of Jules and Hannah, he had to pick the winning side.

  “As much time as you need,” Camille agreed. She turned to her butler. “You may wish to go to the back for the duration, Roger.”

  Almost as pale as a vampire, Roger nodded and beat a hasty retreat. Camille stepped up to the door and opened it wide, ignoring the chill air that swept into the house. Wishing he could be anywhere but here, Drake stood behind her, his nostrils flaring, his pulse racing, and his eyes straining into the night.

  13

  STRANGELY, ALL THE CAB companies seemed to be “busy” tonight. Hannah glared at the phone as she hung up. They tended not to notice how strained their schedule was until she told them the address. Then, suddenly, the nearest available cab was in freakin’ Idaho.

  After the third phone call, she lost any semblance of patience. “It’s a lovely night for a walk,” she grumbled. Jules snorted. They could both hear the patter of rain. And according to the map Jules had picked up, the impound lot was a hell of a long way away.

  Jules stepped to the window and pushed the curtain aside. “I don’t suppose you brought an umbrella.”

  Hannah laughed. “You mean you practically packed your whole house in those suitcases, but you forgot an umbrella?”

  “Well, did you?”

  “No.” For half a second, she tried to resist yanking his chain. But she didn’t try very hard. “What’s the matter? Afraid a little rain will ruin your coat?”

  He glanced at his coat with a look of horror on his face. “I’d never dream of wearing that out in the rain.”

  She thought he was joking, but it was hard to be sure. “Well, let’s hit the road before the rain gets any worse.”

  Jules rummaged through his luggage until he found a heavy sweater in the perfect shade of green to complement his auburn hair. Hannah smothered a laugh. He really was serious—he wouldn’t wear his cashmere coat out in the rain.

  Her own down-stuffed parka had been through far worse than a little rain, and she put it on with no hesitation. Jules frowned at her.

  “What?” she asked. “Does my coat violate the sensibilities of the fashion police?”

  He chuckled. “Yes, but that’s beside the point. I’m just wondering if it’s waterproof.”

  In a light drizzle, she’d stay dry. In a steady rain, she’d be soaked through in five minutes. “Hey, I won’t melt if I get wet. And I bet that sweater isn’t waterproof either.”

  “True, but since vampires don’t catch cold I’m not overly concerned.”

  Something warm glowed in her chest, even as she waved away his concern. “I hardly ever get sick.” What was the matter with her, that his concern would make her feel good? Her usual reaction to male protective instincts was to give the chauvinist pig a piece of her mind.

  Jules shrugged. He perched his hat on his head at a jaunty angle, then opened the door and motioned Hannah through.

  As soon as they stepped out o
f the protection of the hotel and into the rain, Hannah regretted the decision to walk. The rain fell short of a torrential downpour, but only just. And the temperature was barely above freezing. Icy water trickled down the back of her neck, making her shiver, and though she kept her head down, her glasses needed windshield wipers. She took them off and stuck them in a coat pocket.

  “Can you see without those?” Jules asked.

  She squinted at him in the dim light of a street lamp. Her vision wasn’t that bad, as long as no one expected her to read street signs from a hundred yards away. Water dripped from her lashes like tears, stinging her eyes. Great. Acid rain.

  “I can see just fine.” She made a show of groping for his arm, as if she couldn’t see it.

  He chuckled, then shocked the hell out of her by taking off his hat and sticking it on her head. It was too big for her—what a surprise! Jules had a big head—and came to rest just above her eyebrows. It was still warm from his body heat. The warmth caused a paradoxical shiver. Jules’s auburn hair was transformed almost instantly into stringy, bedraggled locks that clung to his skin.

  “There,” he said, patting the hat down a little farther. “That ought to keep your glasses dry.”

  “Thanks.” She fished her glasses back out of her pocket and did her best to wipe away the water droplets. Jules was staring straight ahead, the look on his face suggesting that he was embarrassed by his own gallantry. And once again, she felt that little glow of warmth in her center. She was beginning to think there was a good heart buried beneath that façade of vanity and arrogance.

  Not to mention, he looked damn good when he wasn’t quite so perfect.

  Hannah rolled her eyes at herself and forced her attention away from Mr. Beautiful. She had perfectly good things to think about other than what he would look like after she’d thoroughly mussed him up in bed. Like, for instance, she could think about how the cold rain had already soaked through her coat and clothes and was now trying to soak through her skin. Or how her shoes squished with every step. Or how the wind was picking up, dropping the wind chill to somewhere around absolute zero. She hunched her shoulders and lowered her head, wishing she could fast-forward about half an hour.