by J. R. Ward
"But...I'll pay you more. I can pay you double."
"Wow. You people..." Axe glanced in Elise's direction one last time. "I have to go. Training starts in an hour and I have to eat."
"I wish you'd reconsider." Felixe seemed deflated. "I need your help."
"You really don't. You need to talk with your daughter, not treat her like she's the enemy."
"I only want what's best for her."
"If there's anyone who's going to know what that is, though, it's her."
As Axe let himself out, Elise shut the slide and hopped off the steps. Gathering her robe, she raced for the hidden shelving.
--
Back at the Brotherhood mansion, in his and Mary's new bathroom, Rhage checked his pair of forties and made sure the clips were full. Then he put both of his black daggers into his holster, handles down, and verified his backup ammo.
"Merry Christmas," he said to the reflection in the mirror over the sinks.
Funny, that this human holiday was about the birth of a savior, and yet here he was, going out into the field, on the search for death.
And yeah, he looked like a killer, especially as he pulled on a leather duster and covered up his blond hair with a black skullcap.
Then again, he could have been in a pink bathrobe and fuzzy slippers and his eyes would have given him away.
Turning from himself, he went out into the bedroom beyond. When they had moved up to the third floor only two months ago, it had felt like home immediately because Bitty had been with them. Now the suite seemed like a hotel room, something that was lovely, but transitory.
If the girl left them, they were not staying here.
In fact, he would never again go up to the third floor.
Leaving their room, he went next door, and stopped in between the jambs. Mary and Bitty were sitting on the girl's bed, the pair of them in sweats, Bitty's hair still damp from the shower. Mary was brushing the long lengths, starting at the ends and working her way up, as Bitty chatted along about the Christmas party that Beth and Butch were organizing for the end of the evening.
"And so this big fat guy in a red velvet suit comes down the chimney?" the girl said.
"Yes. He leaves presents under the tree, and in the morning, everyone opens their stockings and packages. You eat too much at four in the afternoon. Watch football and fall asleep. Wake up at nine o'clock. Feel peckish. Eat more. Go to bed and pass out."
"Oh, that is Father's kind of holiday! But we should have done it at dawn this morning, then."
"We had to fit the schedule to what worked for the most people."
Yeah, there had been plans in place for weeks now, but with that male showing up at the Audience House? No one had been in the mood for celebrating. Rhage and Mary had insisted the gathering go forward, though.
Maybe it would be another good distraction along the lines of Lassiter's little miracle/balloon fight/perfectly timed show of excitement for the little girl.
Bitty went on to ask questions about Mary growing up, and Mary answered everything in the same way she was brushing that hair...slowly, gently...as if she were never going to have a chance to do it again.
"Oh, Father! Hi!"
As Bitty turned to him, her face was so open, her smile so genuine...that he wanted to lose it all over again. But he didn't. He walked in, as if it were any other night, and murmured something, smiled, patted Bitty's shoulder, kissed Mary on the mouth, said his goodbyes.
Bitty seemed worried.
Mary was resigned and sad.
He wanted to stay with them. He needed to go.
The beast may have stayed in its cage of flesh last night, but that wasn't going to last with all the high-flying tension--so he had to find a fight to burn the edge off. It was going to be his only salvation.
"Be careful," Bitty said as he took his leave.
"Always," he whispered over his shoulder.
Instead of going to the prearranged meeting spot and joining Z and Butch and the trainees for orientation, Rhage went straight to the alleys west of Caldie's financial district, proceeding directly into the heart of the field, to the pavement and shadows he had stalked for how long now?
The night was as cold as the previous one, but there was a humidity in the air that spoke of coming snow. The humans would like that. They would find it "seasonal" for their holiday.
There was no one wandering the stretch of deserted buildings he chose to hunt, nothing to mark the street but the burnt-out shell of an old sedan, a rotting couch, and a series of scrawny dead trees in the cracked sidewalk.
No Christmas trees twinkling in the windows. No ho-ho-ho's from partygoers. No carols, no sleigh bells, no reindeer, no presents.
Breathing in deep, he felt a great burn inside his chest...and it was as if he were back to square one.
Ever since Mary had come into his life for good, he had enjoyed the killing because thanks to the Scribe Virgin's good old breeding program, he had been designed since conception to protect and defend his race. But there had been none of this old-school desperation, this twitchy unhappiness, this...sad sense...that he was not a master of his destiny but subjugated to it because of his curse--
Cranking around, he tilted his nose up. Inhaled again.
Let out a growl.
Lessers were fewer and farther between now than ever, and there had been sightings, by others in the Brotherhood, of a very different kind of foe.
They were trying to determine who and what it was. Sea changes like that in the war were rarely good news--and clear evidence that the Omega was thinking again.
But the stench of baby powder that rushed up to greet him now?
It was like the one wish he'd needed to come true had been granted.
Well, the one other than Bitty staying where she belonged.
Baring his fangs, Rhage went on the hunt.
he only way that meeting could have been more offensive, Axe decided, was if Elise's father had suggested his daughter was dealing drugs on the side. Into prostitution after dark. Leading a second life taking candy from babies and kicking puppies.
Unbelievable, he thought as he let himself out the big fancy-ass door and strode away from the mansion--
About twenty feet off to the left, standing in the freezing cold wind in--wait, was that a pink fuzzy bathrobe?--Elise was like an apparition. Except she was oh, so very much alive, her hair swirling in the gusts, her scent filling his nose, her presence warming the night to tropical temperatures.
"What are you d--"
He didn't get any further than that. She ran up to him and threw herself into his arms, holding him around the neck and squeezing for all she was worth.
"Wait, what are you doing?" Or something like that. "Elise, you can't be seen like this."
Holding her up off the ground, he strode behind a big maple tree so that the trunk would give them some privacy.
"What are you doing out here?" he demanded as he lowered her down. "You'll end up getting pneumonia--"
"I just needed to thank you."
"For what--" He stopped. "It was you. You were behind that painting."
"I knew you were in the house. I just didn't know why. I heard what you told my father...thank you."
Axe wanted to say the right thing. Or hell, say anything. But the way she was staring up at him with those shining eyes, her hair all clean and fragrant, her body under that robe something that he could remember every single inch of...
He cupped her face and rubbed her cheek with his thumb. "I dreamed about you. All day long."
Elise smiled more widely. "Did you?"
"Mmm-hmm."
"What did you dream of?"
"This."
Tilting his head, he bent down and kissed her, working her lips with his own, wrapping his arms around her, pulling her close. The winter wind danced around them, snowflakes starting to fall, the dark velvet heavens above seeming to encourage lovers everywhere.
When he finally edged back, he mass
aged her shoulders. "I can't wait for this night to be over."
"Me, too."
She put her hands on the pads of his chest, massaging. "I wish you didn't have to go."
"I couldn't stay here anyway."
"You could--"
"I don't want to cause trouble for you."
"Never."
God, he couldn't get enough of her face, her throat, the feel of her waist under his palms. She was like a drug he needed another hit from, and the fact that that made him want to run in the opposite direction was ironic, given how he'd embraced heroin and cocaine. Sex. Violence.
But the screaming voice telling him to get the hell away from her and never look back was countered, punch for punch, by an even stronger need to be close and stay close.
From out of nowhere, an image of those figurines of his father's came to mind.
Axe stepped away abruptly. Missed the contact immediately.
Felt his head get even more scrambled.
"I'm sorry. I got to go."
"Be safe out there?" she whispered as she tucked her arms around herself.
Nodding, he took one last look at her...and then dematerialized to the meeting place west and south of where her family's estate was.
As he re-formed, a gust that made his sinuses hum hit him right in the face and he breathed deeply. All his life, he had had great success pushing emotions down deep and putting a cap on them. And he did the same now, banishing any feelings or thoughts about Elise.
Too bad he could still taste her.
Peyton was the next to show up, and as they faced off, Axe was ready for a fight, prepared to start shit if he had to to get things going.
But Craeg and Paradise arrived and stepped between them.
"Nope," Craeg said. "Not doing this. Waste of time, waste of effort--and out here in the real world, a dangerous goddamn distraction. What the hell is wrong with you two?"
"Nothing," Axe said without looking away. "Absolutely fucking nothing."
"Good." Craeg didn't move. "And you, Peyton?"
"I've got no problems."
Paradise hooked an arm through Pey-pey's elbow and pivoted him around. "So you were going to tell me about that female you went back to in the club last night, remember? Was she hot?"
Classic reroute move, and pretty fucking pathetic that it was required. But Mr. and Mrs. Training Program were right. The group of them were headed back out into the field tonight. None of that classroom work. No sparring in the gym.
Real guns and fun, as the Brothers called it.
Last thing anyone needed was interpersonal drama that got somebody dropped.
Into a grave.
--
Elise was floating on air as she went up the back staff stairs. The last thing she wanted was to be caught in her bathrobe, smelling of the night air and the male she had just kissed out in the front yard.
Funny, she had wanted exactly this tingling enticement when she had thought about being with Troy only nights ago. She had wanted this exact blossoming, even though she hadn't really known what it was. She had been searching, and she had been found. And it was beautiful.
Her bubble of happiness did not persist.
She reached the second floor and was padding quietly down the carpeted hall, going past the closed doors of the guest suites and her father's quarters, when she neared an open portal into a black room.
The voice of her uncle was distant, even though he had to be standing just inside the darkness. "...this eve? Mayhap I shall have a meal set upon a quiet table for the two of us?"
The response from her aunt was so quiet, Elise couldn't hear the words.
"Well...," her uncle murmured. "Yes, I shall come back then. Mayhap at some other, later time. I think there is--what?...Yes. I know you do not sleep...."
Elise crossed her arms around herself and walked quickly past him with her head down and her eyes on the carpet. But her uncle must have heard her or sensed her because just as she came up to their room, he wheeled around into the light.
His face was that of a skull, his skin gray from stress and suffering, his eyes hollow. "Elise," he said in a dead tone. "How fare thee this eve?"
She bowed and likewise used the Old Language. "I am well, mine uncle. And you?"
It was the customary response to the customary question that did not, in fact, request an honest reckoning of her state, but was more a polite gesture, as someone would utter "Bless you" after a sneeze.
"I am well. Thank you."
And then the door was closed.
She hadn't really seen her aunt since the tragedy, and could only guess the shape the female must be in.
Elise continued on to her own room, where she changed into comfy yoga pants and a fleece pullover her father did not approve of. A quick check of the clock suggested she had waaaaay too many hours before she was going to sneak out.
Leaving her phone behind, of course.
Thank you, Father.
Taking a seat at her French desk, there were scholarly articles to read and that draft lesson plan Troy had sent over early in the afternoon for the January seminar. But her mind was scattered and inefficient, snippets of Axe's conversation with her sire, her phone call with Peyton--and then the kiss on the lawn...as well as what she had just witnessed down the hall--jamming up her thought processes.
For some reason, she found herself back out in the hall...in front of Allishon's room.
This time, she went right in, but then she stalled out, unsure what she was doing, what she was looking for. After a moment, she proceeded over to the walk-in closet because there was nowhere else to go, really.
Shutting herself in, she looked around as the motion-activated lights came on. The lineup of hanging clothes was messy and there were piles of discarded things all over the floor.
God, it still smelled like Allishon and her signature perfume.
And the wardrobe of shirts and skirts and jeans and boots and high heels was nothing Elise would ever have worn, everything tight, short, leathered, studded, ripped on purpose. Where Elise followed the rules, Allishon had entirely resisted any kind of social expectation.
The classic good girl/bad girl dichotomy.
Clinically speaking, it wasn't a mystery why nobody was talking about the death. Her father felt guilty and maybe a little superior that his young, the "conservative" female, had been the one to survive; his brother was distraught and bitter that his daughter, the one who had been so resistant and hard to deal with, had come to the very end everybody had tried to scare her away from; and her aunt was likely suicidal.
Meanwhile, Elise was trying to live her own life in the morass, trapped between sorrow and a yearning for independence.
What a mess.
On that note...
She picked up a black blouse that was held together by safety pins and not much else and put it on a vacant hanger. And then she did the same with a flannel shirt that was mostly shredded. And a bodysuit that was black and had a blood-splatter pattern on the front like its wearer had been shot in the chest.
She wasn't sure why she was cleaning up--actually, that was bullcrap, she knew precisely why. She wanted to help her family and she could think of no other way to make even a marginal improvement. Her father couldn't stand her even offering him a hug. Her uncle would not look at her. Her aunt wasn't getting out of that bed of hers...not unless it was into her early grave.
This was all she had.
At some point--later this year, maybe next year, maybe a decade from now--someone was going to come in and box up these things, relegating them perhaps to the basement or the attic, as, in aristocratic families, nothing was ever given away or resold. It was considered bad luck.
Maybe they would burn it all somewhere on the property.
But at least if she did this, whoever it was wasn't going to see the mess.
Thinking back to what Peyton had said, she could only shake her head. Her father had always made it seem as if a human had killed
Allishon. But to find out it was another vampire?
What the hell had happened?
ith Novo's and Boone's arrivals in the fairly well-lit alley, the training class was complete--and shortly thereafter, a vehicle the size of a bank turned in at the far end. It was the Brotherhood's mobile surgical unit, and as it came to a stop, Axe assumed that this was it. Playtime was over.
The Brother Butch, a.k.a. the Dhestroyer, stepped out from the front passenger side. "No more training runs."
Yup.
"This is not a trial or a test." The Brother reached back in and brought out a duffel that was nearly the size of a bodyguard. "I'm going to be swapping out your ammo. These are hollow-tipped bullets with a little extra kick to them."
Boone, the class hand popper, naturally couldn't let that go. "What is it?"
"Water from the Scribe Virgin's Sanctuary. Or what had been her Sanctuary." Butch shut the door, banged his fist into the RV, and the thing trundled off. When it was out of sight, he dropped the bag and unzipped it. "Come on, move it."
Boone was first in line, kicking both clips out of the butts of his forties and exchanging them for new slides.
"Gimme what's on your belt, too," Butch demanded.
More swapping. And then Craeg, Paradise, Novo...Axe was the last one to do it, getting his new bullets and falling in line with the others. There were no humans around, not walking, stumbling, or even driving by in cars; whether that was on account of that holiday with the holly and the candy canes or the frigid temperatures, Axe didn't know. Didn't care.
But that didn't mean they were alone.
Zsadist was standing about ten feet away, his scarred face and pit-black eyes the kind of thing that made even Axe's bowels get a little loose. Tohrment was beside the Brother. And so were John Matthew, Blaylock, and Qhuinn.
Holy shit, Axe thought. They weren't fucking kidding about this.
Butch spoke up again. "We're getting close to the end of the war. That means lessers are becoming hard to find and easier to kill because the only ones left are brand-new recruits. Last field session for you all, things went tits up, so we are pairing you up with a Brother or a fighter. In concert with your mentor, you will go out in a grid pattern running west to east. Do not vary unless you engage, and then only as necessary. You and your mentor will both signal everyone else upon engagement. When a signal is received, we all will converge, returning to our search patterns only after an assessment of the engaged situation occurs. Do not go rogue. Do not think on your own. Do not get dead. Any questions? And may I remind you bunch of idiots that this is not a drill. Now is the time to back off and get the fuck out if you're going to. Any moment after this will be considered desertion and reason for dismissal from the program. I'd rather you bail now, not fuck us in the middle of a mission."
