Luther's Return (Scanguards Vampires Book 10) (3 page)

“You want me to switch roles with you?”

“Please.”

“You really like Cameron, don’t you?”

Isabelle nodded.

“Does he know?”

“No.”

“Why don’t you tell him?”

“I don’t know whether he likes me.”

“So you figured if you kiss him at the end of the play, you might find out?”

Isabelle shrugged. “No harm in that.”

Katie reached for Isabelle’s hand. “Well, we’d better get changed then. I’ve got everything in my private dressing room.”

It wasn’t really a dressing room, more a combination office/prop room she’d managed to borrow from the football coach for the duration of rehearsals.

“You’re the best!” Isabelle said.

Smiling, Katie steered her to the second door on the right and entered the windowless room, letting the door snap shut behind them.

3

“Never did mockers waste more idle breath,”
Katie said, dressed as Helena in the long blue dress that Isabelle had worn before the performance, while looking back and forth between the two students who played Lysander and Demetrius.

The lights illuminated the three of them on the old creaking wooden stage of the university. In the chairs below in the auditorium, vampires and their families mixed with humans, who had no inkling about the preternatural creatures in their midst.

Before the performance, Katie had peeked through the curtain and scanned the audience. Both her brothers were in attendance; Haven had brought Yvette and their son and daughter. In the front row, Samson and Delilah sat proudly, flanked by their sons, Grayson and Patrick. Zane and the entire Eisenberg family were sitting in the back, while Amaury and Nina and their twins, eighteen-year old Damian and Benjamin, sat near the windows, which were covered by thick velvet curtains.

Quinn Ralston and his clan, which included his wife Rose, his protégé Oliver as well as Oliver’s mate Ursula and their ten-year old boy, Sebastian, sat in the row behind Samson. Blake, who was also part of the Ralston clan, had taken up a post near the entrance door, scanning the room, while occasionally speaking quietly into his intercom and listening to the mic in his ear. Tasked with guarding thirteen Scanguards minors, ranging from ages ten to twenty, he definitely had his hands full, despite the fact that all of them were accompanied by their parents.

Gabriel and Maya were surrounded by their brood, two teenage boys and a girl. Maya was responsible for vampire females being able to conceive, though they were normally infertile. Her medical and research background had finally paid off when she’d developed a treatment that allowed a vampire female to become pregnant and carry a child to term. It had made waves in the vampire community.

Her mate Gabriel, a vampire with a vicious scar marring the left side of his face, was scanning the crowd. As Scanguards’ number two, he never forgot his duty. Mixed among the Scanguards people sat the families of the other student actors, as well as many friends who’d come to support their classmates’ thespian passions.

“Lysander, keep thy Hermia; I will none: if e’er I lov’d her, all that love is gone. My heart to her but as guest-wise sojoun’d; and now to Helena is it home return’d, there to remain.”

Demetrius’s delivery was a little wooden, but Katie had to admit he’d proven to be faithful to his character, and she was pleased with the performance so far. Even though she’d slipped into the part of Helena—and as much as she wanted to immerse herself in the character—she was still aware of her role as the director and teacher.

“Helena, it is not so,”
Lysander responded.

“Disparage not the faith thou dost not know, lest, to thy peril, though aby it dear,”
Demetrius replied and looked to stage left, pointing his hand in the same direction.
“Look where thy love comes; yonder is thy dear.”

Silence greeted Demetrius’s announcement.

“Yonder is thy dear,”
he repeated, a little louder this time.

Katie’s pulse kicked up, while her eyes searched the darkness to the side of the stage from where Isabelle was supposed to reappear as Hermia, Lysander’s lover. But all she saw was one of her students dressed as a fairy waiting in the wings. She exchanged a look with the girl, but only got a helpless shrug as a response.

Isabelle had missed her cue! Embarrassed for her star student, Katie cringed. Had Isabelle forgotten her lines under the stress of the performance, or had she mistimed her next appearance on stage? Had she taken a bathroom break and forgotten the time?

From the auditorium, whispers drifted to Katie. The crowd was getting restless, sensing that something wasn’t going according to plan. Her gaze shot to the first row. She didn’t have to be able to see in the dark like the vampires watching to see Samson’s eyes, because they were glowing red now, pointing at her like beacons.

What’s going on?
he mouthed, his entire face a mask of concern.

Katie had no problem reading his lips. It was a skill she’d learned during her professional acting career, when assistants off camera or off stage would prompt her.

She gave a quick shake of her head at Samson, then stared back at the side of the stage from which the actors entered. Still nothing.

An uncomfortable prickling sensation traveled up her arms. Something was wrong. Isabelle was a responsible person, despite her young age. She was an adult and didn’t flake out on her commitments.

The two students playing Lysander and Demetrius stared at her for guidance.

“What now?” Lysander murmured.

Katie didn’t reply. Instead she stalked to where the fairy waited in the wings, leaving the stage. She grabbed the chubby girl by the shoulders. “Where is Isabelle?”

“I don’t know.” Cindy choked down some food, powdered sugar rimming her lips. “She was here just a few minutes ago.”

“Go, run to the bathrooms and see if she’s there, quickly!”

Cindy instantly followed the command.

From the auditorium, more voices drifted to Katie. People were talking, wondering what was the problem. Just like she was.

“Where is she, where is Isabelle?”

Katie whirled her head in the direction of the voice and saw Blake rushing toward her, entering the backstage area from the corridor.

“I don’t know. She missed her cue. She might be in the bathroom. I’ve already sent somebody there to look for her. Maybe she got nervous.”

Blake pressed his finger to the mic in his ear. “Secure the perimeter. Find Isabelle Woodford. I repeat: secure all exits. Nobody gets in or out of this place without me knowing. Got that?”

Before she could tell Blake that he was probably overreacting, heavy footsteps came through the darkness backstage.

“Isabelle?” Samson pushed past Blake, his hazel eyes pinning Katie with a look that could have outclassed the Spanish Inquisition. “Where is my daughter?”

For a moment, Katie was paralyzed. The over six foot tall vampire made an imposing figure. He was power personified. She’d always known that, though she’d also seen his kind side, had experienced it personally many years earlier. But tonight he was something else: a concerned father.

“Check the dressing rooms and the bathrooms!” Blake barked into his mic.

“I don’t know where she is; she was supposed to come back on stage,” Katie said, replying to Samson. She wrung her hands in front of her stomach, anxiety building inside her.

The sound of somebody running in sandals came closer and Katie peered past the Scanguards boss.

“She’s not in the bathroom,” Cindy called to her, an expression of regret on her face. “I can’t find her.”

Blake barked more orders into his mic, some of them so low that Katie couldn’t understand them. Past the curtain that separated the backstage area from the stage and the auditorium she heard people running around. Blake’s team was seemingly at work to search every corner of the building.

“Cindy, assemble all the other students in the men’s dressing room. Go!” Katie ordered. “And stay there until we know what’s going on.”

The girl looked frightened, but nodded and disappeared.

Samson looked at his chief of personal security. “Anything?”

“My guys are still searching. But there’s no sign of her in the bathrooms or the dressing rooms.”

“Maybe my dressing room? We were getting changed in there earlier,” Katie offered, desperate to be of help.

Blake charged outside.

“What the fuck’s going on?” a voice came out of the dark.

A second later, Grayson appeared from between the curtains. He was the mirror image of his father. His hair was as dark as a raven, though he’d gotten his eyes from his mother Delilah: green, just like Katie’s. Grayson’s green eyes were now flickering red as if he had a hard time controlling his vampire side. “Where is my sister?”

“We don’t know yet,” Samson said, his voice tight.

Blake came running. “Nothing in Katie’s dressing room. We also checked all the closets on this level. My guys are working their way up to the other floors.”

“And the exits?” Samson demanded.

“Nobody’s getting in or out of this building without me knowing,” Blake confirmed.

Grayson took a step toward Blake. “Then why the fuck can’t you find her? You’re supposed to know where she is at all times. You’re supposed to protect her!”

Grayson was a hothead, just like Blake had been in his youth, but deep down he was like his father: fiercely protective of his family. If Katie had ever had any doubts about Grayson’s loyalty to his siblings despite their constant rivalry, his anger at Blake now expunged them entirely.

Blake peeled his lips back from his gums, flashing the nineteen-year-old just enough fang to demand respect. “Isabelle was playing a different part from the one she was supposed to.”

Katie expected Blake to point the finger at her, but to her surprise, he didn’t. Instead he took the blame on himself. “I didn’t adjust her security detail in time.” He narrowed his eyes at the hybrid. “But I can assure you, Grayson, I
will
find your sister. She’s my responsibility, and I don’t—”

“It’s my fault,” Katie cut in, putting her hand on Blake’s forearm. “I’m to blame. She begged me to change roles with her. And I agreed.” She turned her head to Samson. “I’m sorry. It was all last minute. I—”

Samson cut her off with an abrupt movement of his hand. Then he looked back at Blake. “Search every inch of this building and the grounds. She has to be here. She
has
to.”

“Samson!” Delilah’s strained voice came from behind him.

He spun around.

Katie noticed their wordless exchange. As a blood-bonded couple they were able to communicate telepathically. Seconds passed in silence. It made Katie even more aware of the goings-on around her: stagehands rummaged through the area where spare furniture was kept, turning over each item. Scanguards staff rushed through the corridors, opened every door, checked every closet. Different voices calling for Isabelle could be heard throughout the building. Katie knew that others would be outside the building, searching the surrounding parking lot, adjacent buildings, and streets. There was any number of hiding places, though Katie knew that Isabelle wasn’t hiding. She sensed it in her gut. Could feel it in her veins. Just like Samson and Delilah sensed it.

With every second that passed, reality encroached on the make-believe world of the stage behind her: Isabelle was gone.

Katie watched as Samson pulled his wife into his arms and pressed her to him, gently caressing her head.

“We’ll find her, sweetness,” he promised.

More people now crowded into the backstage area. Zane, the bald vampire who could scare the living daylights out of anybody, marched toward Samson, clearly agitated. He had a special connection to Isabelle: he was her godfather, the first person Isabelle had ever bitten. Besides her parents, he was the closest confidant she had.

A sob tore from Delilah, and Grayson exchanged a look with his father. Samson nodded and transferred his wife into his son’s arms.

“She has to be here, Mom,” Grayson comforted her.

“Nothing in the basement,” Zane reported to Samson, then turned to Blake. “How about the surveillance cameras?”

“I’ve already sent Eddie to check the video footage,” Blake replied, just as Amaury joined them.

The linebacker-sized vampire with the shoulder-long hair exchanged a quick glance with Samson. “The upper floors are clear, too.”

Blake touched his mic and listened for a moment. Then, “Bring him in! What are you waiting for? Now!”

Instantly, Katie could see all the vampires backstage go on alert. Their eyes started to glow, and she could see their mouths become fuller as their fangs extended.

“Who?” Samson asked Blake.

“My guys found an unknown vampire lurking in the parking lot. They’re bringing him in now.”

When the assembled vampires’ eyes narrowed a few moments later, Katie realized that they could already hear the intruder being dragged in, though it took another few seconds for Katie’s ears to perceive the sound of the struggling individual.

Everybody was rushing toward the door, anticipating the suspect’s arrival. Their broad backs obstructed Katie’s view. Anxious to find out what was going on, Katie stepped onto a footstool and looked over the vampires’ heads, just as three of Blake’s men brought in a defiant vampire.

Oh my God! He looked ferocious, and the black hair, black lashes, and dark complexion made him look like the devil. His eyes glared red, and his fangs were extended. He was big, broad-shouldered and muscular. He wore casual clothes, but there was nothing casual about his demeanor. Power and strength radiated from every pore of his body. She was inexplicably drawn to that power. Drawn to the vampire beneath the surface.

The sudden silence in the room pulled her out of her observation and made her snap her gaze upward, back to the captive’s face. The strange vampire had stopped struggling and was staring at Samson.

“Luther!” Samson hissed.