“Because I need you to be.” He rose and brushed off his hands. “When you stop being useful, I’ll drive a stake into your heart.”
She didn’t see a stake on him. She pulled at her chains—no give.
“Your ... friend. The man who was with you in Mexico. . .”
She stared at him, not letting her expression alter.
“He’s your lover,” Carlos said.
She didn’t speak.
His nostrils flared. “I can smell him all over you! I know he’s been fucking you.”
“If you know, then why’d you ask?” Bastard.
“Because I’m still surprised an angel would fuck something like you.”
He knew about Keenan. Oh, that couldn’t be good. I’m in chains—how can anything about this be good? “Something like me?” She said carefully. “What, you mean compared to an animal like you? At least I don’t grow fur and piss on the ground when I—”
Ah, now the stake was out. He’d had it tucked in his boot. His right hand gripped the stake as he bared his fangs at her. “Maybe your dead body would be just as useful to me.”
The scent of flowers wafted to her nose.
She tilted her chin up. “Maybe.”
He shook his head. “You’re trying to push me, but that’s not going to work, querida.” He backed up a step. “You’ll get death, but only when I’m ready to give it.”
So why was he waiting?
“He’ll come for you.” His twisted lips mocked her. “As soon as he figures out where you are, anyway. If it takes too long, I’ll just have to make sure he gets a tip.”
“Why do you want Keenan?” If he knew Keenan was an angel, then Carlos had to realize that he didn’t want to tangle with her lover.
“The angel has something I need.” He gave a quick laugh. “Something you need, too.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“When I’m done with him ...” Carlos laughed. “Dust will be all that’s left.”
Angel’s Dust. Fear shoved into her gut as she understood. She needed Keenan’s blood to live. Hell, his blood was probably why she’d healed so quickly. An angel’s blood. And that vamp in the feeding room, he’d said demons could be killed by Angel’s Dust. But to make the Dust ...
“Guess you’ve already learned how powerful the new lover is, huh, vamp?”
She didn’t speak.
“I’ll have to drain him dry to get enough for the mix.” He lifted a brow. “Is he a bleeder? How long do you think it will take for him to—”
“Screw you!”
His gaze raked her. “Maybe. Later.” His claws tapped against his chin. “You know, I just thought you were another walking parasite, and then I learned you were strolling around with one very precious gift.”
Keenan.
“Do you know how many demons I’ll be able to kill with his blood? Do you know how many Other will fucking bow to me?”
The chains dug deeper into her flesh. “The stories ... they’re wrong.” Can’t let him get Keenan. “Demons came from the Fallen, so Keenan’s blood won’t do anything to them!”
“His blood will kill them.” Absolute certainty in his voice. “What creates—can destroy. You should know by now that’s the way of the Other world.”
She swallowed back that rising fear. “He’ll kill you.”
He tucked the stake back into his boot and sauntered toward the door. “I don’t think he will. He’ll be too worried about saving you.”
“You won’t be able to hurt him! You won’t—”
Carlos’s claws lifted, and they were wicked sharp. “Did you know that angels can’t be injured by most weapons?” He nodded, not waiting for her to respond. “Si, they’re like the ancient demons that way. But now I know your Keenan’s weaknesses.” He turned away from her. “Both of them.”
Then he yanked open the door, that echoing groan filled the tomb, and after he stalked out, she was left with silence.
She pulled at the chains. Nothing. “What did he mean?” She whispered to the shadows. Shadows that were too dark near the left wall, right where the floral scent was strongest.
Silence.
She pulled harder. The thick metal dug deeper into her wrists and blood began to drip onto the floor. “What did he mean?” She shouted. “Dammit, I know you’re there!”
The air shifted around her, as if a fan had been turned on. Or as if wings had flapped.
“Answer me!”
“He knows what can hurt Keenan,” came the dark, cold voice. Az. Like she’d ever forget the sound of his voice.
“The gunshots didn’t hurt him.” Was the chain starting to give? She tugged harder, rising to her knees and straining as she stretched forward. “There weren’t any bullet wounds, no—”
“Weapons forged by man can’t hurt him.” He’d moved. She couldn’t see him. She just had the impression of dark shadows shifting. “And he controls fire,” Az said, “fire can burn his flesh, but it can never kill him.”
Fire’s kiss could sure kill her. “Then what is it? What makes him—”
“You make him bleed easily enough.”
She swallowed. “Yes.” She did. Biting him was as easy as biting a human. A slice right through the flesh.
“Because your weapon wasn’t forged by mortal hands.”
Her weapon was her teeth.
Carlos’s weapons would be his very, very big claws—and his teeth. Teeth that were sharper than hers. Not weapons forged by man. Shit.
“Get me out of here!” The chains wouldn’t break. “Get me out!”
“I can’t.” Said flatly.
“You’re just going to stand there?” Her eyes narrowed as she strained to see. Az seemed to be a shadow.
“I’m going to wait,” he said. “My job is to wait and then to take.”
Her soul.
“Do you fear death?” He asked her, and she could have sworn the guy sounded curious. Great.
“What I fear is what is going to happen to Keenan!” If Carlos got to him, he could take Keenan’s head with a swipe of his razor-sharp claws.
No.
“You care.” Again, the faintest hint of curiosity or ... surprise? “I didn’t expect that.”
“Well, a year ago, I never expected I’d get turned into a vampire and I’d have an angel stand by and refuse to help me while I’m trapped in a crypt.”
Silence.
But he was still there. She could feel him.
“Don’t you ever get tired of watching people die?” She gritted. The chain was just locked too tightly around her wrist. She’d always had too-sharp, too-big wrist bones.
“I do what I was born to do. Watch. Shepherd.”
“Shepherd?” Yes, the bones were too big in her wrists and her hands ... That was the problem.
“I take the souls when they are ready to leave this plane.”
“And you’re never tempted? Never once do you think, hey, maybe this woman wants to live longer with her daughter and not die from cancer when she’s only twenty-eight. . .” Her mother and the pain still bled inside her. “Or maybe this guy wants to have a chance to see—”
“I know why you were at the church that night.”
That shut her up. Figured he’d know. “I never made it inside the church.” The doors had been barred to her. Talk about a big glowing sign of things to come.
“He watched you then.”
Keenan.
“He watched too much, I knew it, but ...”
“But you didn’t stop him.” Ah, sounded just like Mr. Hands Off. “You could have stopped him from falling!”
“If I had, you’d be dead.”
Right. There was no win-win in this game.
“He’s losing himself in you.”
She wasn’t sure what that meant. And the chains wouldn’t break, so that meant there was only one—
“If he goes too far, there will be no saving him. Once the line is crossed, he’s lost.”
What line? “Keena
n’s not lost! He’s had my back this whole time and, by damn, I will have his!” Once she got out of there.
“Carlos can kill him.”
The chain wouldn’t break.
“I can’t see a Fallen’s future, can’t see what will be, so I don’t know how quickly he’ll die.”
Screw this. She sucked in a deep breath and slammed her right hand and wrist into the concrete. Once. Twice.
The chain wouldn’t break, but she could. Her wrist bones were twisted, mangled, but now she could get them out of the chain. One hand down. It will heal.
“Why?” His voice, showing more emotion. This time, there was no mistaking the confusion.
“Because he’s not dying.” She pounded her other wrist against the cement and ignored the waves of pain that rolled through her. She and pain were starting to become good friends. Tears slipped down her cheeks but she didn’t realize she was crying until she tasted the salt on her lips. She rammed her hand into the ground. Once, twice more, and the bones shifted. Nicole slid that hand free. “He’s not dying.”
“How will you save him? You can’t even fight now, you can’t—”
“I’ll just get a little bite first ...” She rose, but almost staggered from the pain. “Then I’ll be ready.”
“Death is coming.”
Her shoulders straightened. “Death ... you ... can wait.” She made it to the door. Nicole didn’t even bother trying to push it open. Her hands were a mess. She needed blood, fast, in order to get the strength to heal, and even then, she wouldn’t fully recover until her next rising.
Carlos could be waiting right outside. He probably was.
Won’t get Keenan.
She kicked open the vault’s heavy metal door.
Sam had taken Keenan to a bar, one that looked like a dozen others. But this one was different—his prey waited inside.
“There.” Sam’s finger pointed to the right. The two bikers who’d escaped were at the bar, guzzling beers and acting like they didn’t have a care in the world.
He’d make them care.
As Keenan stalked across the bar, smart people got out of his way. Maybe they could feel his rage. It sure burned him.
“Don’t touch ’em, not yet,” Sam muttered. “We need ’em alive to talk, remember?”
He jerked his head in agreement. The idiots must have sensed trouble because they both spun around. When they saw him, their eyes widened and fear slipped over their thick faces.
“Didn’t think it was over, did you?” He braced his legs apart. The scrape of chairs filled the room. Folks were leaving as fast as they could. Guess they were used to trouble in this place, and they knew better than to stay around and watch the show.
The guy right in front of him, a burly guy with grizzled cheeks and a buzz cut, swallowed. “D-don’t know you.”
Keenan’s hand lifted. Oh, to touch ...
“Keenan,” Sam warned, “the dead can’t talk.”
The buzz-cut biker blanched.
His buddy, a tall, tattooed guy with a mop of curly red hair, startled to sidle away.
“I can kill you with less than a thought,” Keenan said.
Both men froze.
“Where is she?” he demanded.
The red-haired guy shook his head.
Wrong answer. Keenan grabbed a beer bottle, shattered the glass and pressed the jagged edge to buzz-cut’s throat. Since he wasn’t touching the guy directly, the biker wouldn’t die. Well, he wouldn’t die until Keenan sliced his throat wide open with that glass. “I’ll ask once more, then you’ll start bleeding.”
Sam reached for a glass of whiskey that had just been placed on the bar top. He drained it in one gulp, then swiped the back of his hand over his mouth. “Better tell him, he’s real good at killing.”
“Y-you talking about the vamp?” This came from the redhead.
“Shut up, Pete!” Buzz-cut snarled.
“They’ll kill us, Bo! I ain’t dying for—”
Ah, a weak link. Keenan kept his weapon on Bo, but turned his stare on Pete. “Are there a couple more members of your little gang still living? A member or two who took my vampire?”
Pete shook his head. “N-not us ...”
“Bullshit.” From Sam. “I think you should slice this one for lying. A long slice right down his cheek.”
“Pete, shut the hell up! The vamp bitch deserves to die after what she did—”
“I’m not r-ready to d-die,” Pete stammered. He was younger than Bo. He didn’t have that hardened, been-to-hell look yet. Pete’s breath whispered out. “The other one—he took her. It was all his idea, using the fire, coming to that house. He’s the one who knew where you were.”
Sam lunged forward and jerked Bo away from Keenan.
“What are you—” Keenan began.
Sam slammed Bo’s head into the bar. Bo’s eyes rolled back into his head and when Sam lifted his hands, Bo slid to the floor in a heap. “Now we only have to deal with one.”
One who looked very, very scared.
“Who knew?” Keenan asked Pete, struggling for control. Wasting time. He needed to hurry.
“S-some Mexican. Car-Carlos ... big guy, dark hair, said he’d been huntin’ the v-vamp.”
The thunder of Keenan’s heartbeat filled his ears.
“H-heard him t-tell Big Mike ... he’d t-take her to St. Louis Cemetery and leave her—leave h-her to rot.”
“Ummm ...” Sam lifted a brow. “I think that might be all he knows.”
Keenan’s fingers tightened around the bottle.
“Do we let him live?” Sam asked, eyeing the guy with a hard stare. “Or do we kill him?”
“Please ...” Pete begged and the guy’s eyes were filling with tears.
Keenan stared at him. “You burned her. Your gang attacked a woman. You burned her.”
“I-I didn’t throw my bottle! I-I didn’t—”
“But you didn’t stop the others, did you?” Sam leaned in close. “You were right there for the party, and you didn’t help her out.”
Pete started to shake.
“If she’s not in that cemetery, if she’s not still alive in that cemetery ...” Keenan ran the glass down Pete’s cheek and let the blood flow. “Then I’ll be back, and you will truly learn to beg.”
The guy’s face couldn’t get whiter. And he was one fast bleeder.
Keenan dropped the bottle.
But Sam caught it before the glass could shatter. Quick as a flash, he turned, and drove that broken bottle into Pete’s shoulder. Pete went down, screaming.
“That will teach you,” Sam said with his eyes slitting. “Next time, don’t just fucking watch while a woman burns.”
Keenan turned away from the screams. He’d taken two steps when the angel scent hit him. His gaze zeroed in on the shadows near the bar’s entrance. No, not near the entrance, blocking the entrance. “Don’t get in my way, Az.”
The shadows shifted. He glimpsed the wings. Az’s stark face. “You’re losing control,” Az warned.
Losing? Lost it.
“Soon you’ll be like him ...”
Sam laughed behind Keenan. “Wouldn’t that be damn great? Then you’d have two pissed off Fallen on your trail.”
Keenan rushed for the door. “Get out of my way.” Because if he had to, he’d pound his way through the angel. He’d do anything to get to her.
“She’s made you like this,” Az said. But the shadows lightened as he pulled back. “She’ll destroy you.”
“No,” Sam spoke with certainty behind him. “She’s just making him stronger—and that scares you, Az.”
The shadows vanished.
They screamed when Nicole kicked open the crypt door. A guy and his girlfriend, both dressed in goth black, whirled around, their cries filling her ears. They’d been leaning down, lighting candles near another crypt, leaving offerings—
Didn’t they realize the voodoo queen wasn’t even there anymore? Tourists.
“Look
at her teeth! Oh, Sean, look at—”
Okay, the girl didn’t sound scared. More like excited.
“Bite me,” Sean whispered. “Please.”
Well, if he was gonna be offering ... She lunged forward and sank her teeth into his throat. His blood spilled over her tongue and strength started to push back into her body.
“Sean?” A thread of fear entered the girl’s voice, banking that excitement. “Sean ... she’s ... really drinking your bl-blood.” Then the girl let out a shriek. Her footsteps thudded as she ran away.
Nicole took more blood from her donor. Not too much. Just enough to survive. When she let him go, her savior slipped to the ground. Not dead, but unconscious.
She pushed her hands against the nearest crypt. The bones popped and snapped back into place as she reset them. Not perfect, not yet, but she’d make it through the night. She’d—
“I can’t leave you alone for a minute, can I, querida?”
Nicole stiffened. Carlos. “No, I guess you can’t.” She licked the last of the blood away and turned toward him. “You should have used that stake when you had the chance.”
He stood between two stone vaults, his claws scraping over them. “I’ll take the chance now. Your angel can just mourn over your broken body.”
No, he wouldn’t.
“The bait’s already set. I wager one of the bikers broke by now and told him where you were.” He pulled out the stake. “Let’s see how fast you can die.”
He leapt at her.
But Nicole was ready for him. She jumped back and the stake missed her. She kicked out and caught his wrist with her foot. This time, the bone that snapped was his. When the stake flew from his hand, she scrambled after it, diving to her knees. Her fingers curled around the wood just as Carlos grabbed her legs and yanked her back.
“I’ll cut off your fucking head—”
She had the stake. She twisted and came up ready. Nicole drove the stake right into his chest. “And I’ll take your heart.” Her whisper.
Another kill. Another death.
What was one more stain on her black soul?
He stared at her, mouth open, eyes gaping, then he sagged back, slipping onto the ground as blood began to pool beneath him.
Killing again hadn’t been nearly as hard as she’d hoped.
Connor had been right. Perhaps she did have a talent for murder. Damn him.