Most Wanted - A Fantasy Romance Novel (The Shadow Blade Series) (10 page)

Ariel pulled
open the door to the street and bumped straight into Jax’s chest.

‘What are you
doing?’ she hissed, taking him by the arm and dragging him away from the
entrance. ‘Do you want to get killed?’

Jax shrugged at
her but the relief was rolling off him in waves. ‘You were gone ages. I was
worried,’ he explained.

She glanced
sideways at him. He had been worried about her? ‘I’m fine. I’m not going to be
fine however if they see me hanging out with a Blade.’

Looking sheepish
Jax climbed on his bike and turned to hand her a helmet. As Ariel reached for
it he snatched it from her hands. She frowned at him, frustrated. She didn’t
have time for games. What was he doing?

‘Say please,’ he
taunted.

Ariel blinked at
him in astonishment. He had a cocky smile playing on his lips and his eyes were
lit up with amusement. The bastard was laughing at her. She snatched the helmet
from his grip. ‘Asshole,’ she mumbled as she climbed on behind him, her cheeks
flaming with embarrassment. She couldn’t believe he had brought that up. She
was going to kill him.

Refusing to hold
him around the waist she sat rigid, gripping the seat. Jax growled under his
breath, reached back and grabbed her wrists. He wrenched her forwards so she
was pressed against his back and folded her arms around his waist.

‘Asshole,’ she
said louder into his ear. His shoulders shook with laughter as he revved the
engine and sped off.

Half an hour
later they were back on the Venice boardwalk. ‘So, tell me again what we’re
doing here?’ Jax asked drolly.

‘We’re going to
capture one of them and find out where their maker is,’ Ariel snarked back at
him.

‘Maker? What do
you mean?’ Jax asked. ‘You mean the Sucker who gave them the virus?’

Ariel shook her
head. ‘You’ve heard of Originals, right?’

Jax stopped
abruptly in his tracks. ‘They were destroyed. Ten years ago. A group of rogue
Blades killed them.’

‘Hey,’ Ariel
hissed in annoyance. ‘It wasn’t just Blades. They had some help.’

Jax paused. The
tale went that a group of Blades worked with a group of demons, Shadows
included, to take out a nest of a dozen Originals that were planning on
overrunning the human realm.

‘So you’re
saying they’re back and making more?’ he asked.

Ariel nodded at
him daring him to argue. ‘One is.’

Jax took that
in. He never would have imagined that was the scenario they were up against.
The rumors about Original vampires were terrifying. More Blades than he could
count had been killed trying to stop them in the past. ‘And you want to find
this one and kill it?’ he asked Ariel, trying to keep his voice down.

‘Yes,’ she
answered.

‘But they’re
almost impossible to kill without –‘

‘Without a
Shadow blade,’ Ariel finished for him, smiling smugly and drawing out a ruby-hilted
knife.

It gleamed
iridescent in the moonlight. Jax reached to touch it, but she pulled it away.
‘Careful,’ she whispered in the darkness.

‘It’s
beautiful,’ he murmured, his eyes locking on hers. He wasn’t talking about the
blade.

‘And sharper
than a razor,’ she whispered back.

‘Just like it’s
owner,’ he answered, laughing under his breath.

‘Where’d you
find that?’ he asked. He was fairly sure she hadn’t had it on her earlier.

‘I borrowed it back
from Jimmy. It was my father’s,’ she added in a quieter voice.

Jax felt a
little better knowing that they had a weapon that could make a dent in an
Original but still not good about the situation. As far as he was aware there
was no other way of killing them than by severing their heads with Shadow
steel.

Silently they
edged closer to the pier. There was no shrieking or cackling tonight, but he
could sense something was there, lurking in the shadows. His guess was that
there were at least one or two, but they’d need to get closer and check.

‘I wonder how
that girl is,’ Ariel mused as they got edged closer, ‘the one who got away.’

‘She’ll be a
Sucker by now,’ Jax answered, scanning the beach, checking they weren’t being
followed. Occasionally the cops liked to run a patrol through the area, though
so infrequently Jax often wondered if the police commissioner was in cahoots
with the demons. ‘We should have killed her while we had the chance, put her
out of her misery.’

Ariel made a
sound like a grunt. He didn’t know whether or not she agreed with him. He just
knew that if he was ever infected he’d want to be killed. Rather death than
become a Sucker.

 
‘Hey, I have an idea,’ he said, pushing
the thought aside. It was a Blade’s worst nightmare, worse even than the
thought of being killed. ‘Let’s see if we can lure one out,’ he whispered
across to Ariel. ‘Come here.’

Ariel stepped
towards him and Jax tripped her with his foot. The moment she dropped to the
sand, Jax fell too, covering her with his body, pushing her down, pinning her
to the ground. Instantly she tried to push him off.

‘Shhhh,’ Jax
whispered, his hand resting on her stomach. She calmed instantly and he
wondered at how his touch seemed to command something over her, even if she
wasn’t happy about it. She scowled at him in the darkness but her body told a
different tune. He could feel her heart rate speeding up, sense her body
trembling beneath his. ‘Let’s just pretend we’re having a little make-out
session,’ he murmured. ‘That should get their attention.’

She looked like
she was about to argue. Her hands pressed against his chest. Jax leaned down,
unable to resist the pull of those lips. As soon as he touched his mouth to
hers he felt her whole body sigh, the words of protest instantly cut off. His
arms tightened around her waist, gripping her tight. All thoughts of the
Suckers beneath the pier vanished. There was just Ariel, the sweet taste of her
tongue, the feel of her soft skin, her rushing blood and thundering heartbeat.
Her arms snaked around his neck and as his tongue probed further into her
mouth, playing with hers, he felt her surrendering beneath him, softening. His
cock stiffened against her thigh and he brushed his lips along her jaw, just
beneath her ear. Images of her wet pussy flashed across his mind, the
remembrance of thrusting into her, how it had felt as she gripped onto him with
her thighs and drove him in deeper. He couldn’t stop remembering either the way
she’d begged him to fuck her.

‘I like hearing
you beg,’ he whispered into her ear.

Beneath him he
felt Ariel’s heart spike at an un-human level. She pushed against him but Jax
felt the desire jolt through her, and even as she pushed against his chest her
hands twined in his hair.

His hand reached
between her legs, cupping her sex. He applied the gentlest pressure and felt
her muscles lock and her back arch. She was trying to suppress a groan and he
wondered at how she kept fighting him, even as her body screamed for his touch.
He kissed her lips, breathing her in. Her hand suddenly moved to grip his shaft
through the thick denim of his jeans. She squeezed him and blood surged and
engorged him, driving every thought from his brain. He rubbed her clit and felt
the spreading heat of her body. Fuck, he could only think about tearing off her
jeans and having his way with her, driving into her, making her come. But there
was a dim awareness in the back of his mind that he was in danger, that they
were getting dangerously distracted. There would be time later for them to take
their fill of each other. He took a deep breath, nudged her jaw with his chin.

‘After tonight,
I’m going to have you again,’ he murmured in her ear. ‘I’m going to fuck you
like you’ve never been fucked.’

Instantly she
moved her hand away from his cock, knotting it in his hair, then tugged his
head away from her neck. In the sliver of moonlight peeking through the clouds
he could just make out the glimmer in her eyes.

‘Only if you beg
me,’ she whispered with a hard smile.

He smiled in
answer then nipped at her bottom lip. Game on.

Suddenly Ariel
was rolling out from under him, yelling. Shit. He spun off her, turning his
side to take the brunt of whatever blow he could sense coming and reaching for
his blade simultaneously. Damn. How had he let himself get so distracted that
he’d forgotten about the Suckers partying beneath the pier?

Before he could
even swing around and block the blow he saw Ariel – a dark blur spinning
in front of him and the slash of her blade, severing the air around them and
making it sing.

They were being
attacked by two Suckers. Ariel’s Shadow blade sliced through the first one’s
neck, severing his spinal cord. A head thumped like a meteor into the sand at
Jax’s feet. He stared down at it in shock. That was one way to kill them he
guessed. He glanced around for Ariel but she had vanished.

The second
Sucker had come to a flying stop at the sight of her friend’s head in the sand.
Her eyes were enormous pools of red and she was whipping her head left to
right, trying to figure out who her invisible attacker was and how her buddy
had ended up headless.

Spotting Jax she
lunged forwards, but before she could get close she was flung up into the air
as though lifted by an invisible current. Her arms were yanked behind her back
and then Ariel suddenly re-appeared. She was holding the Sucker from behind,
her Shadow blade pressed to the girl’s neck.

‘Any sudden
movements and you’ll end up like your friend,’ she growled, nodding at the head
lying by Jax’s foot.

The girl froze
instantly. Jax couldn’t help feeling a rush of pride.

Ariel had
bargained with Jimmy for the blade back. He wanted five grand for it, but she
figured if she killed the Original she’d have money to spare and could pay him
back. If not, well that wasn’t a scenario she wanted to contemplate. Having two
moneylenders on her back rather than one wasn’t that appealing. She was pleased
to have the blade back though as it had belonged to her father and parting with
it in the first place had been one of the hardest things she’d ever had to do.
And besides, with the blade she was fairly sure she had the advantage over the
other bounty hunters.

She pressed the
blade closer against the Sucker’s neck and felt it bite through the first layer
of her skin. She needed to be careful. It would be as easy to slice through the
girl’s neck with this blade as to slice through a gossamer thread.

‘We have a few
questions we’d like to ask you,’ Jax said, stepping closer.

Ariel rolled her
eyes. Jax was treating it like a job interview. There was a way of making
people talk Ariel knew from long experience, and it was never by playing good
cop.

‘Tell us where
your maker is,’ Ariel hissed, pressing the blade through another layer of skin
until she felt it bite against cartilage. She had always been much better at
playing bad cop.

‘Have you ever
killed one before?’ Jax asked her as they scouted out the perimeter of the
house.

Ariel glanced at
him over her shoulder. ‘Of course I’ve never killed one before,’ she said. ‘No
one’s killed one in years. Because they aren’t supposed to still exist.’

Jax made a noise
in the back of his throat. She ignored him. They were in Hancock Park. The
Sucker had given them a thorough description of the house that the Original had
adopted as his lair. Ariel stared up at the front of it, hoping this was the
right one. It fit the description, but if the Sucker had lied to them they were
screwed. They couldn’t go back and ask her again because after their little
Q&A, Ariel had cut off her head and Jax had weighted it down and sunk it to
the bottom of the ocean. It turned out that there was a way to kill them after
all.

Jax’s hand found
hers in the darkness and he pulled her back into the shadows of a neighboring
yard. ‘Listen,’ he said, ‘I’m going to go first. You wait out here.’

She dragged her
hand free of his grip. ‘I don’t think so,’ she told him. ‘I’m the Shadow.
You’re just a Blade.’

He scowled at
her. Ariel shrugged and rolled her eyes, though it was dark so she doubted he
could see. The fact was though that she was also the one with the Shadow blade.
Jax’s puny looking knife wasn’t going to be any good.

‘Don’t roll your
eyes at me,’ he growled in annoyance. ‘I can see you, you know.’

Ariel scrunched
her nose up. She kept forgetting what good senses Blades had, better than your
average human. He was better than your average human at a lot of things it had
to be said. ‘Listen, demons can sense you like catnip,’ Ariel explained
patiently, hoping he’d take the hint. ‘You wait here and I’ll go take a look.’

She could see
him pursing his lips, but she didn’t bother to wait for his answer, she just
slipped from his side and started edging her way through the bushes towards the
house. She didn’t want Jax accompanying her on this. She didn’t want to put him
in any danger.

The house was a
monstrous affair. It was as if someone with a split personality had designed
it. It was half modern, half craftsman and totally hideous. Not that Ariel was
in a position to throw stones, but after spending time around Jax she was
starting to appreciate the finer things in life, especially when it came to
appearances.

Just then
something brushed her leg and she jumped around, blade already slashing.

‘Goddamn!’ she
hissed, as Jax ducked out of the way. ‘I told you to stay back and wait,’ she
glowered, her heart slamming into her ribs. ‘I could have killed you.’

‘I’ve been doing
this for fifteen years,’ he said by way of answer. ‘And I’m still here. You
demons can’t be that good at sniffing me out.’

You
demons
? What was he saying?

‘We’re a team,
in case you’d forgotten,’ Jax said, glaring at her through the darkness. His
eyes were wolf-like in their intensity, luminous in the darkness, reminding her
briefly of how he had looked when he had her at his mercy in his bed.
 

‘How could I
forget,’ she whispered harshly.

‘You want the
bounty on this guy or not?’ Jax asked, sighing impatiently.

It was Ariel’s
turn to glare and purse her lips.

‘You’re going to
need my help, admit it.’

‘Fine,’ Ariel
huffed. ‘But if you screw this up for me I’m going to be dropping
your
head to the bottom of the ocean.’

She saw the
flash of his teeth. He was grinning at her. She almost punched him. Don’t grin,
she thought silently to herself. She wasn’t joking. She’d drop his head to the
bottom of the ocean and deliver his body to the Brothers to collect a reward.

Even as she
thought the thought though, guilt spiraled through her, making her swallow
uncomfortably. She elbowed Jax aside. His abs were like blocks of granite
though and he refused to budge. She shoved against him with all her weight,
making him stumble backwards, and then burst out of the bushes.

‘You always rush
on in?’ Jax demanded, grabbing her elbow and hauling her back under the cover
of the bushes.

‘You always hang
back and let the girls go first?’ Ariel countered, knowing exactly what to say
to push his buttons and quite enjoying doing so. If it was possible, Jax’s jaw
seemed to clench even tighter and his scowl to become even more scowley.

‘You go around
the front. I’ll take the back,’ he whispered, letting go of her arm and
striding out from the shadows. ‘Let’s circle around, meet at the north east
corner and decide the best way in.’

Whatever. Ariel
shook her head and watched him slide noiselessly up to the fence and then hop
it like a black panther. Damn he was athletic for a human. Just watching him move
made her smile and her stomach knot. She inched along around to the front of
the house, trying to still her heartbeat and feel into her senses. Maybe he was
right and she was rushing in. She was known for her impulsiveness and sometimes
it had got her into sticky situations.

From all she
could remember, Originals were ancient Suckers. They had supposedly been killed
off by a group of Blades and demons working together to put them down. This had
been a few years back. The Blades had tried to close the portals to the other
dimensions and banish every demon from the human realm. There had been some
prophecy, some stuff and nonsense about a Blade who was meant to sever the
realms, divide the dimensions and bring peace back to the human world. Ariel
snickered, that hadn’t exactly worked out. Sears weren’t known for their
accurate readings of the future. Ariel tended to think of them as like tarot
card readers, mostly making it up.

The Originals
had wanted to take over LA or something equally as apocryphal; it was of course
all hearsay now, and the last decade had seen an influx of all sorts of demons
from various dimensions to take their place. You put one species down and it
was never long before others swarmed in to take their place. LA on the surface
might still appear to humans to be the center of all things celebrity and
Hollywood, but all you had to do was tap the surface and you’d find a writhing
quagmire of demon filth beneath. Half the actors in movies were demons. Even
some of the most prominent A-listers in town were Shapeshifters. They were
fully infiltrated into every strata of life, including the police and politics.

The police
thought the murder rate was up because of drugs and guns and gangs, but it
wasn’t. It was up because Suckers and Saw Demons and Chameleons and all sorts
were roaming around at night treating the city like their own personal
Disneyland.