Bad Blood (21 page)

“You have no response?”

“I’m sure the police will come up with something.”

“Don’t vampires turn to ash when they’re killed? Or is that just a myth, too?”

He hesitated. Lying wasn’t going to make things better. “No. Not a myth.”

She said something, but a noise at the end of the alley pulled his attention. John was focused in that direction, too. He held a hand up to the mayor, then pointed down the alley. Quietly, he said, “We’ve got company.”

Was this the vampire who’d killed Julia returning to the scene? If so, Creek would end this game here and now before Lola had a chance to declare martial law. “Stay here,” Creek whispered. He pointed behind a stack of pallets. “There. Get down.”

Lola moved toward the pallets, and he joined Havoc near the alley opening. The bitter scent he’d smelled earlier increased, confirming what he’d already thought. “Vampire.”

Havoc nodded, his voice low. “Three, I think. Maybe more.”

“Youngbloods?” Creek asked, referring to the gang name some of the fringe had lately taken to sporting on the back of leather jackets and tagging on abandoned buildings.

“Probably.”

Creek nodded, freeing his crossbow from its holster. “You stay with the mayor. I’ll see if I can draw them away.”

A dark shape dropped into the alley in front of them.

“Too late,” Havoc answered, whipping out his pistol and charging the vampire, his nails and teeth bared. He fired off a few shots, striking the creature but not bringing it down. One more reason guns were so inefficient when it came to killing bloodsuckers. Smoke rose from the bullet holes, where the hot silver had made its mark. At least Havoc’s ammo caused some pain.

A soft thud behind Creek twisted him around. A second vamp. Lola let out a short yelp. Creek snapped his crossbow up and fired off a bolt as the creature turned toward the mayor. It tagged the vampire’s shoulder, knocking him to the ground. Creek was on top of him a
second later. He yanked out the bolt and drove it straight through the vampire’s heart. It went to ash beneath his feet.

“You okay?” he asked Lola.

She sat against the alley wall, her face pale, her eyes round. “No,” she whispered.

“Stay where you are. We’ll have this over in a minute and get you home.” He ran back toward Havoc, who now fought three vampires. A female clung to his back. Creek put a bolt in her first. She was ash before she hit the ground.

Havoc took down another, pinning him to the asphalt. He planted the gun’s muzzle against the creature’s chest and pulled the trigger. A third pile of ash joined the other two. The last vampire, realizing he was outmanned, ran.

Havoc got up, brushed himself off, and extended a hand to Creek. “Thanks.”

Creek shook it, surprised. “You too.”

Havoc tipped his head toward the mayor. “Guess she’ll believe you now, huh?”

Creek shrugged and tried to lighten things up. “You never know with women. Let’s get her back home. She’s probably had all the reality she can handle for one night.”

Tatiana woke before Laurent did, but only by force, not because she felt rested. Wearing Daciana’s image for so long made her weary to her bones. Too weary to be bothered killing Laurent off. Just staying awake during the car ride to the hangar had been a struggle. She’d dropped into bed almost the minute they’d entered the plane. She didn’t even remember takeoff. If only she could be herself, gain
her full strength back. But they had a few hours yet before they landed and she could be rid of Laurent and the charade.

She glanced at him, naked and sleeping beside her. In a small way, it was too bad she had to kill him. He might be overbearing with his wife, but he was quick, crafty. And he’d captured the comarré with what seemed like very little effort. She should hate him for that, but he’d made her life so much easier by doing it. Maybe she could explain what she’d done, get him and Daciana to understand the necessity of it. Let them live. They would, after all, be in her service for as long as she was Dominus. If the Castus ever showed up and made that happen.

She rolled her eyes and threw off the covers. If only she could stay herself; but she couldn’t let Laurent catch her as Tatiana. Not before she’d had a chance to explain, if that was the route she was going to take.

Reaching for her locket, she remembered that it was back in Corvinestri with the rest of her things. She let out a half sob, so completely and utterly drained, but forced herself to assume Daciana’s identity, then dressed and went out to check on the comarré. Laurent should have locked the girl in the coat closet like they’d discussed on the way to the plane.

Had he taken her out of the body bag? Probably. Tatiana hadn’t heard any screaming. Not that she would have, considering how deeply she’d slept. She tried the closet door. Locked. She listened. Breath and heart sounds and the scent of comarré blood. She smiled and reached for the key in the overhead compartment. She grabbed the small pistol she’d brought along as well. Comarré were human enough that bullets could still be persuasive.

She unlocked the door and opened it, keeping the gun aimed forward. The full body bag was huddled against one wall. So he hadn’t let her out after all. “Well, well, comarré. You’re mine now.” Tatiana reached for the zipper and tugged it down a few inches. “And once I have the ring, I’m going to take great pleasure in—”

Bright blue terror-stricken eyes stared back at Tatiana. She pulled the zipper down farther. The face was familiar, but not because it belonged to the comarré whore who had taken up with her former husband, Malkolm. It was the comarré she’d purchased for Nasir, the one who had run away from her with her own comar, Damian.

The girl gasped. “Please, whoever you are, you must get me back to my patron, Nasir, or the vampiress Tatiana. I was forced to run away with her comar, but I didn’t want to and—”

“Bloody hell,” Tatiana whispered. She shut the closet door and locked it, then tossed the key and the pistol back into the overhead, wishing she could slam it shut. Bloody, bloody hell. She stomped up to the cockpit and went inside. “How far are we?”

“Less than three hours,” the pilot answered.

Tatiana stifled another curse. “Turn around and go back.”

The pilot made a face like she’d lost her mind. “We can’t. Not enough fuel.”

She clenched her fist but somehow managed not to maim the pilot. No wonder Laurent had taken the girl with such ease. She was the wrong damn one. Tatiana forced her body to relax. Killing Laurent now meant no chance of sending him back to Paradise City to rectify his mistake. And since Tatiana was supposed to be Daciana,
she couldn’t say a single bloody word without giving herself away.

Mal waited until the SUV pulled away. At least the rain had stopped. They’d dropped him in a residential area off of I-10, far enough away from the checkpoints masked as tollbooths so that there was no chance of him being caught. Sun would be up in about an hour. Plenty of time to make it from Jefferson Parish into Orleans Parish.
Or die.
Then he just had to wind his way through the city, down into the French Quarter to Jackson Square, and find Chrysabelle and Mortalis.
If they haven’t ditched you.

He walked at an easy gait, scanning the working-class neighborhood, but the few people he saw were more interested in the coffee clutched in their hands or getting to work on time. Despite Mal’s long black coat and sunglasses, he drew no stares. Still, he kept to the shadows for a few more blocks until, confident there were no fae patrols in the area, he picked up his pace and followed the directions Mortalis had mapped out for crossing the parish border.

Half an hour later, the pale gold blush of dawn—a rare color in his world—edged the horizon. It reminded him of the glow that surrounded Chrysabelle. And how much he was willing to do to keep her in his life.
Bite her, drain her.

He crossed street after street, angling farther away from the interstate until he came to the canal he’d been anticipating. He just hadn’t expected it to be so wide. Looked like a hundred and fifty feet, maybe more. Too far for him to jump and there was no way he was swimming
through that brown, murky soup.
Try it. Maybe you’ll drown.

Mortalis had told him to get across the canal before the sun came up or seek shelter. Time was running out. So he started running. He kept between the water’s edge and Orpheum Road, which ran parallel to the canal. Traffic was light but picking up.

He’d hoped to be lost in the city streets by now, not out in the open of the residential area. He pushed himself to go faster, but he’d been slack about feeding the last week and the blood he’d had at Chrysabelle’s had been old and done little for him. Not that he would have expected her to give him fresh while she was recovering. As a result, he was slower, less powerful, and faster to fatigue.
Easier to kill.

The road veered off but the neighborhoods remained. He ran under an overpass, the noise of the passing cars drowning out the sounds of the city waking up. The sky brightened with each minute, urging him forward faster and faster. The voices started to howl. At last, a train bridge appeared. He sped forward, using the last of his immediate strength to traverse the tracks.

His feet touched land on the other side just as the sun’s brilliant light cast its first rays on his body. He flinched, but no fire burst off his skin. He’d made it.

Tipping his face toward the sky, he took a moment to breathe in the air and smell the earth. The sun made it all different somehow. Except for the brief hours he’d spent under the influence of Dominic’s daywalking potion, he hadn’t spent time in the sun in almost five hundred years. And now he could do it without the threat of aging. Or dying.
Too bad.

Cracking the thinnest of smiles, he headed off to find
Chrysabelle. Today was going to be a very good day.
A good day to die.

He found his way to Canal Street and, flipping his collar up, did his best to be invisible. Keeping his head down was harder than he thought. The urge to look at the clear blue October sky was almost as great as the desire to stand still and drink in the daylight. But he kept going, thankful he had a place to be or he might have disappeared down a side street after the tantalizing scent of warm humans.
Blood blood blood…
He was hungry. And suddenly very aware of it.

His mind drifted as he walked, back to the last time he’d been here: 1926. Two years before the ban. The memories had been fuzzy, but stepping onto New Orleans soil had lifted the fog.

He’d been a killing machine, sticking to the French Quarter, which then had been a slum, full of easy pickings if you could stomach the sickly sweet aroma of too-ripe bananas being carted in from the nearby port. He remembered the crimson-lipped prostitute he’d lured into the hedges surrounding Jackson Square and there, amid the other working girls earning their pay, he’d drained her and walked away from her corpse like a discarded newspaper. Now he wore her name across his left thigh.

Had he been that much a monster? Yes.
Oh yes.
But not anymore.
Still
. He couldn’t imagine doing the same thing today.
Yes, you could.
Chrysabelle was right not to want him to lose the curse that kept him bound. The moment it was gone, he had no doubt he’d return to that life.
Blood blood blood…

He checked traffic and the people around him. The prickling sensation of being watched had crept onto his
skin a few blocks back. Seeing no one, he crossed to the other side of Canal and ducked down Chartres Street. He sidestepped a man hosing down the sidewalk, paying little attention to the way the man’s heartbeat filled his head or the warm scent of his blood curled into his nostrils. Beyond that, the aromas of chicory coffee and frying beignets mingled with the garbage waiting to be carted away.

Just a few more blocks and Jackson Square would open up before him. He crossed Conti, and a fae stepped into his path. He had short gray horns, silvery skin, and lavender eyes. Smokesinger maybe. Low against his side, he held a blade. From the sour tang, the powdery coating on it was laudanum. “Far enough, vampire.”

Mal’s peripheral vision showed two more fae of the same variety at his back. Son of a priest, he had been followed. His whole being wavered with the slip-switch decision between fight or flight, but with Chrysabelle’s reason for being here, neither one made good sense. He didn’t want to be the cause of her not getting the ring back, and without being able to make eye contact with all three of the fae, using his power of persuasion wasn’t an option. Not that he was even sure it worked on fae, but since it worked on varcolai, trying it out was a chance he’d take at the right opportunity.

He held his hands up casually. “I’m sure we can work something out.”

Interest crackled over the fae’s face. “Like what?”

Chrysabelle had slipped him a fat roll of bills before they’d parted ways. He loathed giving up her money, even if that’s what it was for. “Cash.”

The fae behind Mal tightened in. “How much?” one of them asked.

“A thou.” Mal had separated the slick plastic bills into smaller rolls ahead of time.

The fae in front of him snorted. “We look cheap to you?”

“Each,” Mal added. He could almost hear wheels turning in the heads of the two behind him. What he actually heard over the thrum in his head was their heartbeats kicking up. They wanted the money. Probably needed it if the desperation wafting off them was a clue.