Abraham was sitting in a chair in the corner of the room. Clutched in his hand was the book that Joss had seen him reading before. Judging by where Abraham’s thumb was wedged between the pages, he’d all but finished reading whatever it was. His uncle was looking at him expectantly. Almost impatiently. Joss cleared his throat. “It’s just that I can’t shake this feeling . . .”
“Gut feeling?” Abraham set the book on the small table next to him.
“More like a nervous feeling.” Joss resisted the urge to fidget. His uncle despised fidgeting, so he’d been working at holding his anxiousness inside. “Why are we going to the morgue to examine Boris’s body?”
Abraham seemed to size him up for a moment before speaking again. In that moment, Joss felt like his entire face was on fire with guilt. Not that he had any reason to feel guilty. He had, in fact, according to his own uncle, done what no one had expected, and rid the city of a serial killing vampire. After a moment, Abraham leaned closer and said, “Whenever there is doubt in how a person or vampire died—”
“But—”
“—or doubt in a Slayer’s loyalty, a body must be examined thoroughly.”
Joss’s stomach felt heavy, like a stone had been dropped into his center. Straightening his shoulders, he said, “Oh. I see.”
Abraham nodded. “It’s not just you, Joss. Any Slayer who’s under investigation has to be watched closely.”
“I understand, Uncle.” And Joss did understand. He just didn’t like it very much at all.
His uncle reached for his book again, the mildest of concerns leaking into his tone. Joss knew that he cared. He might be a tough, mean gruff of a man, but in his own way, Abraham cared deeply about those who were important to him. Even, Joss knew, about him. “You’ll be watched by Elysia now as well. You’ve taken down one of their own, and they won’t forgive you for it. Are you sure you can handle it?”
“I’m sure.” The lie escaped his lips so fast, he hadn’t been completely certain that he’d spoken it aloud.
Abraham opened his book once again and waved Joss casually away. “All right then.”
Joss still didn’t feel very hungry.
13
RETURN TO DEATH CITY
In comparison, Paty was much better at making light of the fact that they were going to examine a dead body than Morgan had been. Once they’d entered the cooler room and slipped on their gloves, Paty started humming a semi-happy tune. Then she rubbed some kind of balm on her upper lip, to which Joss raised a questioning eyebrow.
She held out the small container. “Want some? It helps combat the stench. I honestly couldn’t handle being in here without it. That, and the humming. Humming relaxes me.”
After a brief pause, Joss dabbed his fingers in the container and smeared the contents on his upper lip. It smelled like mint with a hint of rosemary.
Unlike Morgan, Paty didn’t even ask Joss to help in the examination. Not to touch anyway. But she did roll the body’s left wrist over, so that Joss could see a strange tattoo. When he questioned its meaning, Paty said, “Vampires mark themselves with their name in the vampire language. We’re not really sure why.”
“And you can read it?”
Paty nodded. “Much of it, yes. About fifty years ago the Society learned quite a bit from a vampire who’d seemingly defected to our side. He taught us quite a bit of the language, how vampires hunt, what to look for in identifying them.”
Joss mulled this over for a second. He wasn’t certain why he was at all surprised that the beasts had no sense of loyalty. “Why didn’t he teach you the entire language?”
“Because vampires killed him before he could.” Paty clucked her tongue and shook her head. “A shame, really. He was quite useful to our cause. His efforts advanced the Society by leaps and bounds. Funny, isn’t it? It took a vampire to teach us how to really kill vampires.”
On the right biceps, Joss spied another grouping of symbols, which looked similar to those on his wrist. Together, the symbols formed a square. “What’s that, then? If this is his name . . . what is that?”
Paty bent down, turning her head this way and that. “It says something about brothers in arms. Something about four sides joined. I can’t really read the rest.”
Paty’s cell phone rang and she put it to her ear. After a series of yeahs and mmhmms, she hung up and looked at Joss. “There’s been another death. They think it’s the same killer. This can’t be our guy, Joss.”
Joss cursed under his breath. He’d been so close. So close to being free of this task, and moving on to finding Cecile’s murderer. He couldn’t be wrong about Boris. He just couldn’t. “Who found the body? Are they sure it’s a vampire-caused death?”
As she returned her phone to her pocket, she said, “Morgan found it. And being that the head has been ripped clean off, and very little blood remained on the scene . . . yeah. It’s a vampire. But you can judge for yourself in a few minutes.”
Joss raised an eyebrow at her. “I can?”
“They’re bringing the body here.”
He gulped, and his heart picked up its pace. “Now?”
Paty offered a sympathetic smile. “What’s the matter, kid? Nervous? You’re already in a morgue with dead bodies. What difference will one more make?”
She was right, of course. It didn’t make a difference at all, not really. But the idea of seeing yet another corpse—especially a headless one—was tilting his world on its side. Paty grabbed him by the shoulders, steadying him, and held his gaze, wordlessly asking if he was okay. Joss nodded and steadied himself on the cold metal gurney that held Boris’s body.
The quiet keeper of the morgue opened the door to the cooler and barked, “Put it on the far gurney, the one that’s missing a wheel.”
He held the door open and Morgan backed into the room, carrying the broad end of a body bag. A moment later, Cratian entered, hefting the other end. They hoisted it onto the empty gurney with a sigh. Joss wondered exactly how much a dead body must weigh. He imagined it felt much heavier than a live one, but hoped he never had to find out.
But he wagered he would.
Cratian exited the room and returned with a small garbage bag. He dropped it on the gurney and met Joss’s questioning eyes with a stern nod. “That’s the head. Or rather, what was left of it. If you want anymore, go pick it off the sidewalk.”
As Cratian stormed off, Paty looked at Morgan, “What’s his problem? And why didn’t the cleanup crew bring the body in?”
Morgan leaned with both hands on the broken gurney. He sighed, letting his head hang for a while before answering. “This is the cleanup crew, Paty. Or rather, what’s left of it. The others . . . we couldn’t find enough pieces to even make out what was what or who was who. The Society said our cleanup crew failed to report after being called out to claim a suspected vampire victim in the Meatpacking District. They sent us out to investigate. This is what we found. It’s a message. Loud and clear. The serial killer knows we’re onto it, and it’s not at all happy about it.”
Joss swallowed hard. Their cleanup crew was dead. Not just dead. Obliterated. And whoever—whatever—had done it was coming for them next. How could he have been wrong about Boris? He’d been so sure. Unless . . .
He looked at the markings on Boris’s biceps again. “You guys. What if Boris wasn’t working alone? Everything he said, everything the vampire bartender told me about him said that he was our man, he was the killer. But what if he wasn’t the only killer?”
The room grew silent as Paty tried to grasp what he was saying. Her breath came out in small clouds. Joss pointed at the tattoo. “What if he had brothers? I mean, what if the tattoo was a literal meaning, not a figurative one? Brothers in arms. It could mean that he and his brothers stick together, no matter what. And ‘four sides joined’? Sounds like four brothers to me.”
Realization lit up Paty’s eyes, but overshadowing it was a dark cloud of concern. “If you’re right . . . do you know what that mea
ns, Joss?”
Joss opened his mouth to tell her that yes, he did know. But before he could speak the words aloud, her voice echoed his thoughts into the cold room. “It means that our job—your job—just got four times more difficult.”
He smiled a small smile—one that instantly drew a questioning glance from Paty. “No, it doesn’t. It’s only three times as hard. I’ve already killed one of them.”
Paty chuckled and ruffled his hair. “Always the optimist, kid. You might just make it in the Society yet.”
His chest felt warm and light, and only a little bit like his heart was glowing. “So what now?”
“Now . . .” Paty sighed. “You find Em. If she really is the oldest vampire in existence, she’ll have something to say about a team of vampires running rampant. Just be careful.”
Joss fought a yawn. It had already been a long day. The last thing he wanted was to seek out the world’s oldest vampire when he was exhausted from killing her kind. But he had no choice.
Duty called.
14
PERHAPS NOTHING AT ALL
Joss jerked awake on the subway train and sat up, wiping the drool from the corner of his mouth. He was surprised that the sudden movement hadn’t sliced through his neck with pain, but then his bite seemed to be healing at a ridiculously fast rate. In fact, he doubted that there would be any remnants of it left by the next morning.
He hadn’t meant to doze off, and if Uncle Abraham found out that Joss had fallen asleep—even for a moment—while on duty, he might just kill him. But Joss hadn’t been sleeping well, and could see no time in the future when he’d rest well at all. A killer was still on the loose. Maybe several killers.
The nightmare he’d had this time—something to do with fire and blood—left him, but not as quickly as he hoped. One image, Cecile’s mouth so large and strange and frightening, stuck with him the longest. Running a shaking hand over the back of his neck, Joss relaxed into his seat, cursing himself for having dozed off in public when killers were still on a rampage in the city.
“Everyone has bad dreams, Joss.”
He jolted slightly at the sound of Dorian’s voice. What was he doing here, in New York, and acting like Joss shouldn’t be surprised to see him at all? Joss looked him over, not speaking for a moment, and wondered what the man who’d mysteriously brought his stake to him against the Society’s wishes could possibly want from him. He felt on the defensive, until he looked into Dorian’s eyes. Something about Dorian’s expression told Joss that this man truly understood the torment that nightmares could bring. He cleared his throat, not wanting to talk about his dreams, and said, “I guess so.”
Dorian didn’t move, but instead sat very quietly, as if waiting for Joss to speak again. Joss shifted in his seat, wondering what Dorian was doing here, and how they just happened to end up sitting next to each other on the train. Dorian took a breath, let it out slowly, and said, “Like you, Joss, I frequently have terrible nightmares.”
Every muscle in Joss’s body tensed then. He had no idea how Dorian could know about Cecile. Did he? No. Of course not. Dorian couldn’t peer into his soul, couldn’t pierce his dreams and divulge the most private of details. But he had been sitting beside Joss as he’d dreamed. Maybe Joss had moved about. Maybe he’d talked in his sleep. It made sense. It also embarrassed him terribly. His nightmares were a secret—one between him and his dead sister. But then, he suspected, Dorian’s nightmares were probably pretty secret, too, judging by his hushed tone, and the haunted look in his eyes. Joss relaxed his muscles some and leaned closer, dropping his voice to a conspiring whisper. “What do you dream about, Dorian?”
“I dream about a boy. He murders me every time I go to sleep.” He sat very still for a moment, and when he moved at last, it was to wipe the smallest of tears from his right eye. “It’s frightening, really. Because I don’t know what the dreams mean exactly. And I’m not used to not knowing what my dreams mean.”
The train came to a stop and the doors opened, letting an old man and a businesswoman on board. The old man shuffled by Joss and Dorian, but the woman stayed near the door, holding onto the bar above. Once the car began to move again, Joss turned back to Dorian. “Why do you think the dreams mean anything? I mean, dreams are just your subconscious going on vacation. Meaningless images flashing through your brain while you’re asleep. They’re just . . . dreams, right?”
At this, Dorian straightened, as if the subject of dreams were a passionate cause of his. “Dreams, my young friend, particularly to someone like me, and someone like you, believe it or not, mean absolutely everything.”
Before the polite filter between his brain and his mouth could activate, Joss said, “Well, that sounds strangely ominous. What do you mean, exactly?”
As the train came to a stop, Dorian stood, his lips curled in a small smile. “We’re just more alike than I think you realize, Joss.”
Joss didn’t like that. Didn’t like the strange comparison between them when Dorian didn’t really know him at all. He pursed his lips in anger. “How did you come to acquire my stake, Dorian? And why did you give it to me without the Society’s permission?”
Dorian looked him over for a moment, like he’d been expecting Joss’s anger. As he responded, he moved his eyes to the doors, answering without looking back at Joss. “I’ll explain that soon enough. But first I think you should enjoy some of the nightlife my fair city has to offer. It would be far more advantageous to you than visiting V Bar. Especially considering the outrage you’ve created there. Might I suggest Element? Or perhaps The Vault? Both can be found in one building on East Houston and Essex Street.”
As the doors swished open, people poured out onto the platform. In a blink, Dorian was gone.
Joss sat up in his seat, his eyes heavy with sleep. He looked around the car, but was surprised to find he had it all to himself. Had the entire conversation he’d just had been a dream? Had Dorian really been here, or were his restless nights finally catching up with him? His memory burned with the names of the nightclubs that Dorian had mentioned, but he didn’t trust himself to recall them once he’d returned to base. So he withdrew a marker from his backpack and scribbled on his palm: ELEMENT/THE VAULT—East Houston and Essex Street. After a brief pause, he wrote: Why would he suggest this?
As Joss settled back into his seat, the buzz of curiosity filled him. Dorian had an intriguing way of popping into his world and back out again, of giving him things that he needed—like a stake, like a club name—and he never seemed to ask any questions. He simply knew things. Like how Joss had been experiencing a nightmare.
Joss wasn’t an idiot. He realized that Dorian had some very vampirelike traits. But Dorian wasn’t a vampire. Joss got the feeling that Dorian was something more. Something spectacular. He wasn’t afraid of Dorian. And strangely, he almost trusted him. But he had to remind himself that vampires could do some strange, otherworldly things. Like control your thoughts, your actions, your memories, your feelings. They could create within you the desire for friendship, and only truth could rip that haze to shreds. Dorian was something other than human, certainly. But he was not Joss’s friend.
As the train came to a stop, Joss stood, slipping the strap of his backpack over his right shoulder. He stepped off the car and navigated his way to the surface, slipping a pair of sunglasses on over his eyes to shade his vision from the afternoon glare. He moved down the street with a confident step, his peripheral vision always on the lookout for danger. The sounds of the city played out in his ears and Joss thought, not for the first time since he’d been here, that he could absolutely call Manhattan home. It was a busy place, a friendly place, with lots to see and do. The buildings were tall and interesting to look at, the people wearing kind smiles. In fact, if it weren’t for the rampant vampire infestation, Joss was fairly certain he could be happy living in this city. But as they say, location is everything—and the last location a Slayer wants is living among the very vampires he’s trying to ex
tinguish.
Dorian had said that Joss had created outrage at V Bar. What was he talking about? Had Otis caused a ruckus over him being there? And, if so, what was he supposed to do, just give up his mission because his presence had ruffled some feathers? No. That would be cowardly. And Slayers didn’t cower in fear in the face of danger. Slayers faced it head on.
It was this thought that carried him down the street and eventually, around the corner to V Bar. He hadn’t been headed there at first. In fact, he’d been planning on checking out Obscura one more time and questioning the shopkeeper there. But something inside of him said to go back to V Bar, and that maybe he’d find Em there. As he turned the corner, he was met by a large crowd standing outside its blue doors. The sight of it made his steps slow, but after a moment, he moved forward again, into the crowd.
“Please, please, my brethren! If you’ll all just calm down for a moment so that I may speak.” The man standing on the steps of V Bar was the vampire who’d been with Otis the other day. The owner of the establishment. Enrico. Joss slipped behind a tall vampire in the back so that he could hear well enough without being seen. Only Enrico didn’t speak. Not out loud, anyway.
Joss couldn’t hear the vampire’s telepathic words—not the way he’d been able to hear the bartender’s thoughts before. And he wasn’t entirely certain why he could hear one, but not the other. And he absolutely didn’t want to ask any of his team members. What if it meant that something was wrong with him? He couldn’t bear the idea of driving a wedge between himself and his Slayer family.
The crowd erupted in applause then, as if whatever it was that Enrico had thought to them had pleased them very much, and mutters raced through the group—mutters that spoke of vengeance and blood. Joss shrank inside himself. If they noticed him, he was as good as dead. “So please, ladies and gentlemen, allow your elders to handle this horrific situation. We promise to do so swiftly, and with the greatest of pleasures.”
Second Chance Page 10
