Fury Calls (14 page)

B
lake sensed anger the moment he stepped into the office of Otro Mundo for another meeting. So much anger that he was almost fearful of hearing what Diana Reyes had to say, and so he decided to hold his bit of news for later.

The FBI agent had been pacing back and forth in the room when he and Meghan entered, her strides clipped, tension gripping every line of her body. At his entry, she faced him and jammed her hands onto her hips.

“Do you have something to share?” Diana held his gaze for too long a moment, making him even more uncomfortable.

He shook his head and shot an anxious glance at Meghan, who in turn presented him with a puzzled look. She was as baffled as he by Diana's apparent animosity.

“Nothing to report,” he said.

“Really?” Diana challenged.

Ryder came to stand at her side and Diego on the other, the three of them clearly united against him.

“Did Melissa find out anything else about the drug?” Meghan asked, apparently trying to deflect their attention.

“The drug's a doozy,” Diana said, as Ryder placed his hand on Diana's shoulder to restrain her. “Melissa is still trying to find a way to keep the sanguinarium drug from causing the one cell strain to multiply out of control.”

“But she thinks she can find a way to stop it, right?” Meghan asked. In an almost surprising manifest show of unity, she slipped her hand onto Blake's as they sat side by side on the couch.

“Massive feeding from another vampire will supply enough of the delicate cell strain to absorb the drug in the vampire's system. It's why those vamps drained each other dry. The drug created the demand for the one thing that would neutralize its action.”

Blake considered what Diana had said and shook his head. “So human blood—”

“Won't bond with the drug and offset it. Turn a vamp on the drug loose in a crowd of humans and he could drain them dry but never find release from the effects of the drug,” Diego explained.

“Which brings us to you, Blake. What do you have to tell us?” Diana asked.

He didn't like the way the three of them were looking at him. He had faced those kinds of looks before and they generally didn't bode well. “We didn't learn a thing at the Blood Bank during the last few days.”

“Nothing,” Meghan confirmed, and anxiously squeezed his hand.

“Really?” Diana slipped from Ryder's grasp and began to pace once again, before whirling to face them. “Okay, let's start with this. Where were you on the night the first vampire couple fed to the death?”

He shrugged carelessly. “I was at the Blood Bank for the better part of the night.”

“And then in the alley. We met in the alley that night,” Meghan added.

He nodded in agreement, glad that Meghan had supported his alibi and wondering why he suddenly felt as if he needed one. He pressed on with his defense, however. “That's right. I came by—”

He stopped, not about to give up his real reasons for dropping in. “I just came by to see how things were going.”

Ryder laughed harshly. “And they were going much as you expected them to be.”

His comment was totally not good, Blake thought. He grew even more worried when Diana said, “You were the one who noticed the dead vampire in the alleyway a few days later.”

“I was putting out the trash and saw something move.” He glanced at Meghan, urging her to confirm his statement.

She immediately responded with, “When we walked to the end of the alley, we found the body.”

“But
you
didn't see anything or hear anything before that?” Diego insisted, directing his attention to Meghan.

“Nothing,” Meghan answered. Her hand twitched in his, filling him with unease. Their relationship was
still fragile. The trust that had developed between them untested.

Until now, he suspected and worried that it was too new to hold fast.

Ryder narrowed his eyes as he observed them and asked, “The night the young vampiress attacked her dining companion, you brought them their food and drink, didn't you?”

So totally not good, he thought.

Meghan pulled her hand from Blake's as she, no doubt, realized where the others were going with their line of questioning. She met his gaze, and he could see her searching his features for any signs of deception.

There were none, of course, but he still felt her unease.

“I have nothing to do with what's been happening,” Blake urged. He raised his hands and emphasized the point with a slash of his hands. “Nothing.”

“You said you saw something funky in the vampiress. How did you see that?” Meghan asked, hoping he would have a reasonable explanation to dispel the apprehension growing within her.

“Meghan, I didn't do anything wrong,” he insisted, but she just repeated her question.

“How did you know?”

He shrugged and shook his head, so forcefully it sent strands of his hair shifting forward onto his forehead. “I just knew. She had a crazy look in her eye. One I didn't like, kind of like I'm not liking the way all of you are looking at me right now.”

Diana stepped in front of him. She counted down on her fingers as she said, “There have been three incidents,
Blake. Surprisingly, you've been present at all three. While I don't want to believe you had a role in them—”

“I don't.” He rose from the sofa and faced Meghan, wordlessly asking her to believe in the man he had shown her the past few weeks.

But from the way her gaze had grown cold, Blake knew his plea might have gone unheard. He repeated yet again, his voice softer as the futility of his plea registered, “I have nothing to do with what's happened. It's just coincidence.”

“Coincidence, huh?” Diana pulled a plastic bag from the pocket of her loose-fitting jeans and held it up for all to see.

“Is this coincidence also?” she challenged as she jiggled the evidence bag in his face.

He snagged it from her grasp and examined the contents. Three glass vials wrapped in intricate golden webwork, much like the vial they had found on the out-of-control vampiress, were sealed in the bag.

“Where did you get these?” he asked, as he returned them to the FBI agent.

“You were out in the alley tonight?” Diego asked, but Blake scoffed at the question.

“Of course I was. You've had me hauling your sorry garbage for weeks now. Where did you think I would take it?”

Diego was on him in a flash, grabbing him by the throat and lifting him as if he weighed nothing. The force of his grip was punishing and cut off his air. Blake yanked at Diego's hand with his, fighting to be free, but Diego didn't relent until Meghan laid her hand on him and gently said, “Let him go, Diego. Please.”

At her request, Diego thrust Blake aside with so much force that he couldn't stop his fall.

Blake picked himself up from the floor, rubbing his throat as he looked at Diana and said with a rasp, “Where did you get those?”

“Don't play stupid,” Ryder replied, ready to go at him as well, only Diana stepped in front of him, blocking his path. Surprisingly strong for a human, Blake thought for only a second before concern for his own ass came to the forefront.

“Why don't you tell us where you got these?” Diana said, once again holding up the bag.

“I don't know what you're talking about. You have to believe me, Meghan.” He took a step toward her, but she backed away from him and toward the other vampires. She might as well have staked him through the heart, the pain was so great.

“One of the vampire busboys saw you at the end of the alley. They thought you were with someone else,” Diego offered up as explanation.

“I saw something going on. Money exchanged hands between two vamps, but by the time I got there, they were long gone—only I smelled something familiar. Something I smelled the night we found the dead vampire in the alley.” He dragged a hand through his hair in frustration, wishing he could put a name to the scent, but he couldn't. His mum had never been one for fancy fare like Meghan prepared.

Meghan, he thought. If anyone could identify the scent, it would be her. Pleading once more, he said, “You smelled it, didn't you? That night in the alley.”

“I smelled blood and garbage. Nothing else,” she said. The tone of her voice sounded sad, and the grim set of her lips damned him as a liar.

Something died inside of him. More dead than the demon within. More painful than anything he had ever experienced. Meghan believed the evidence the others had found. It had called to her doubt, the doubt that lay just below the surface, waiting for him to screw up once again. It was the excuse she needed to push him away.

Although it was a useless protest, he repeated, “I don't know anything about those vials.”

“Then why were they in your locker?” Ryder asked.

“My locker? What about the Fourth Amendment and all that? Or is it the Fifth? You law-enforcement types must know you can't just look in someone's locker.”

“Is that why you had them there? Because you thought we wouldn't look there? Because you thought we would trust you?” Meghan asked. Anger sparked in her eyes as she confronted him. Her hands were clenched at her sides, her knuckles white from the pressure of her grip.

“After everything we've shared, how can you believe the worst of me so quickly?” he said testily. At the same time, he realized that only a guilty man would start quoting legalities.

Her stance softened then, but only a bit. Lifting her glittering gaze to his, she said, “Why won't you tell us anything that would make us think otherwise?”

He shook his head and gave a harsh laugh. Meeting her gaze directly, he said, “Because I thought that all I've done for you would speak louder than words.”

Then he shifted his gaze to the other three. “I don't know how the drugs got in my locker. But I have my suspicions about who might be involved.”

Surprisingly, Diana slackened her attack at his words and with that, the others seemed to lose some of their aggressiveness as well. She glanced at him and said, “Who do you think is involved?”

“I suspect Foley might have a connection to whoever is doing this. Whatever that odor is, I've smelled it around Foley,” he explained.

Diego shook his head. “Foley isn't old enough to know about the drug.”

“But he's got all kinds of badass vamps hanging out at the Blood Bank,” he offered. “We've become friends, Foley and I. Give me a chance to talk to him and find out what he knows.”

Diana looked to Ryder and Diego before nodding. “One chance, Blake. Convince us that we're wrong to doubt you.”

One chance, he thought, but as he met Meghan's gaze and she looked away, he realized that she had already given him his one chance and found him lacking.

Regardless, he intended to prove his innocence. To show her how wrong she had been to lose her faith in him so easily.

Meghan watched as with a burst of vampire speed, Blake escaped from the office. After he did so, Diego came up to her and consoled her with a reassuring squeeze on her shoulder. “I'm sorry,
niña
.”

She shrugged off his touch and faced the others.

“What if he was telling the truth?” she asked, confusion and guilt tumbling together within her. She wanted to doubt him as much as she wanted to believe that Blake hadn't been lying. He had no reason to cause them such problems, after all. No motive to want to harm them.

“I want to give him the benefit of the doubt because of all that he's done for us in the past,” Diana began, a chill tone coloring her words. “But if he is involved in this, he may lead us to whoever provided him with the drug. It's why we let him go.”

“And if he's innocent, whoever is behind this may cap his ass if he gets too close to them,” she shot back.

“You can still care for him even thinking that he might be behind this?” Diego asked, disdain filling his voice.

Did she still care? Meghan wondered. Could she still feel something for him, even with the damning evidence they had discovered?

Her confusion evaporated as she dejectedly realized the answer might be yes. Despite everything, a part of her continued to believe in him. At that, her shame rose even more sharply. When he had asked for her support, she had failed to provide it. Instead she had given in to her fears and jumped on the first thing she could to drive him away.

“We can't just use him as chum and hope that somehow he can survive to prove his innocence.”

Surprisingly, it was Diana who approached her and gently laid a hand on her shoulder. “You're worried he can't handle whatever happens?”

Meghan shook her head and inhaled deeply. “Foley has a lot of backup. I'm not sure Blake…I hope he can…”

She didn't say it, but as her gaze met the other woman's, Diana knew. They both wanted to believe that love could make anything possible.