Authors: Todd Gregory
Need (12 page)
“Mr. Narcisse?” Rachel asked smoothly, not missing a beat. “My name is Rachel Dufour, and I'm a special agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, working in tandem with the New Orleans Police Department. May we come up? I'd like to ask you some questions about your brother.”
She was really an accomplished liar. She sounded completely convincing. I gaped at her, and she winked at me and gave a slight little shrug.
“That's something else you need to work on, Baby Vamp. You need to lose the Christian brainwashing about telling lies. They're a necessary part of life as a vampire in the human's world.”
I just nodded, and she gave me a playful punch in the shoulder.
There was a buzzing sound, and Rachel pulled the door open. She gestured for me to go inside. I made a face and walked in. It smelled dead insideâlike urine and stale alcohol. There was a rickety-looking staircase a few yards inside the door. The banister didn't look stable, and the stairs were worn, sagging in places, and badly in need of paint. The stairwell wasn't particularly well litâthere was a naked bulb just inside the door, but the bulb at the landing was burned out. About hallway up, the stairs were enveloped in darkness. Of course, that didn't bother me with my nonhuman eyesight, but I didn't understand how the humans stood it. Before I changed, it would have made me incredibly uncomfortable to climb stairs in darkness. I started climbing. At the first landing there was a worn-looking warped door, and I kept going up. The landing on the second floor was well lit with a yellow bulb, and I breathed a slight sigh of relief as I stepped into the warmth of the light.
“You really need to let go of your human superstitions,” Rachel said from behind me. “It should be pretty clear to you by now that the dark is your friend, and clearly, the religion you were raised in was wrong about pretty much everything.”
I didn't answer her; there wasn't really any point, so I kept my mouth shut and kept climbing the stairs. Several of them sagged under my weight, and finally I reached the third landing. It was also lit, but there was a white globe over the lightbulb so the light was softer and not quite as harsh as at the lower landing. The door was open, and the man was leaning against the door frame. He smiled at me, and in spite of myself I felt my knees go a little weak.
“Get a grip, idiot,”
Rachel's voice sneered in my head.
Rachel's voice sneered in my head.
This close, the resemblance to Sebastian was so remarkable it took all of my control not to gasp. His golden-brown skin gleamed in the light like it was lightly oiled, and his reddish gold hair was plastered down to the scalp. His eyes were brown with gold flecks, just as Sebastian's had been, and were wide set on either side of his strong nose. His skin was free of blemishes, and unlike Sebastian, his eyes were warm and friendly. There were other, subtler differences that weren't so obvious at first. There had been a deep dimple in Sebastian's chinâthis young man didn't have one. This young man had the same type of frame as Sebastianâwide-shouldered and narrow-hipped, but Q. Narcisse's muscles were thicker and better defined than Sebastian's had been. There were deep crevices between his eight pronounced abdominal muscles. Thick veins lined his forearms, and I could see almost every fiber of muscle in his chest, shoulders, and arms. His neck was also thicker, and he seemed to radiate sexuality in a way Sebastian hadn't. His jeans still hung loosely off his hips, and there was a dark line of dampness just below the waistband of his red underwearâUnico, according to the emblem on the elastic. “You're a cop?” he asked, raising an eyebrow at me.
“I'm a special agent with the FBI, not a cop,” Rachel said from behind me. She flashed a badge.
Where the hell did she get that?
I wondered.
I wondered.
She went on, “My friend here is not a cop. He's more of a consultant. I brought him with me because he's an expert on the supernatural.” Her tone was no-nonsense, I'm-in-charge-here.
I wondered if she'd impersonated a federal agent before.
The young man closed his eyes and barked out a harsh laugh. “You might as well come in, then.” He stood aside so we could walk in. He shut the door behind us and crossed his arms. “I knew Sebastian's death was too good to be true.”
I glanced over at Rachel. It was a strange thing to say. How could a death be too good to be true?
She gave a little shrug.
The apartment was incredibly neat and tidy. It was really just one large room, with a nook area that served as a galley kitchen. There was another door on the opposite side of the front door, which I assumed was a closet. There was a set of French doors directly opposite to the galley kitchen, leading out to the balconyâwhich was a lot smaller than it looked from the sidewalk. There was a double bed pushed up against one wall, an armoire, and a flat-screen television mounted on the wall. He unfolded two chairs and gestured for us to have a seat. Once we sat down, he hopped up onto the bed and crossed his legs. Every muscle in his torso rippled as he made himself comfortable.
“So, I'm right? This is about Sebastian?” He leaned back on the bed, and the muscles of his stomach flexed under that gorgeous, smooth golden-brown skin. There was a trail of wiry reddish gold hair running from his navel into the waistband of his underwear. “I've spent my entire adult life distancing myself from himâfrom my whole damned familyâand no matter what I do . . .” He shook his head. “Sebastian told me once I'd never fully escape. I guess he was right.”
“You wanted to escape from your family?” Rachel replied, pulling out a little notepad and pen from her jacket pocket. I was impressedâit was very official-looking. “I'm sorry, Mr. Narcisse. I didn't catch your first name.”
“It's Quentin.” He leaned forward, sticking his hand out toward me. “You said your name is Rachel, but I didn't catch your supernatural guy's.” He flashed a smile at me that made me tingle a bit inside.
“You're acting like a schoolgirl,”
Rachel's voice mocked inside my head.
“Yes, he's very sexy, but if you're going to go all goofy every time we're around a hot manâ”
Rachel's voice mocked inside my head.
“Yes, he's very sexy, but if you're going to go all goofy every time we're around a hot manâ”
“Cord Logan,” I said without thinking, cutting her off and instantly wanting to bite off my tongue.
Cord Logan was supposed to be deadâbut it didn't matter, really.
He raised an eyebrow. “That name sounds familiar,” he replied, offering me his hand.
I took it, almost losing mine inside his grip. His hands were much larger than mine, powerful and strong. His skin was warm but dry. I felt an electrical current flow through my entire body from the skin contact. My cock began to harden inside my pants.
“Can't you keep your mind on the business at hand for a fucking change?”
Her voice echoed angrily around the inside of my head.
“If you want to fuck him, worry about that later.”
Her voice echoed angrily around the inside of my head.
“If you want to fuck him, worry about that later.”
Out loud, she said, “You said you've tried to distance yourself from your brother, from your family. Why exactly is that, Quentin?”
He took a deep breath and let go of my hand. “If you've got a supernatural expert with you”âhis eyes flicked over to me brieflyâ“then you already know about my family.”
“Why don't you just go ahead and tell me?” She gave him a brittle smile.
He sighed. His tongue flicked over his lower lip, and he glanced over at me. “The Narcisses are witches, of course. Always have been, for as far back as anyone can rememberâback before the Civil War, even. The story is that we came from HaitiâSaint-Domingueâand it was there that our family . . . one of my ancestors, he supposedly made a pact with the devil, if you can believe that.” He shrugged.
“You don't believe in the devil?” I blurted out.
He smiled at me. “I don't think weâany of us, reallyâcan know what happens after death, so we make up stories so we can sleep at night, so that we can accept the deaths of loved ones.” He shrugged again. “But deals with the devil? Trading your soul for power?” He laughed. “All I know for sure is that the people in my family . . . we have weird powers, powers that other people don't have.” He rubbed his head. “I don't want any part of that, never did, not even when I was a kid. My
grandmere
always said I didn't have a choice, that we'd been marked centuries ago, and turning our backs on our”âhe swallowedâ“powers was like turning our backs on God, which was of course a sin. I don't know, it all sounded like justification to me, you know? I don't see these powers as a gift, you know? I've seen members of my family who embraced their power consumed by it. Power corrupts. I've seen it.” He shook his head. “I choose to embrace God and his light, not the darkness. We all have a choiceâmy choice was to not use the power. Once I was old enough, I broke away from the family.” He gave us both a brittle smile. “I went to college. I have a job. And I have no powers. I renounced them.”
grandmere
always said I didn't have a choice, that we'd been marked centuries ago, and turning our backs on our”âhe swallowedâ“powers was like turning our backs on God, which was of course a sin. I don't know, it all sounded like justification to me, you know? I don't see these powers as a gift, you know? I've seen members of my family who embraced their power consumed by it. Power corrupts. I've seen it.” He shook his head. “I choose to embrace God and his light, not the darkness. We all have a choiceâmy choice was to not use the power. Once I was old enough, I broke away from the family.” He gave us both a brittle smile. “I went to college. I have a job. And I have no powers. I renounced them.”
“I saw you come out of Sebastian's house a little while ago,” I said.
He shrugged. “For some perverse reason, he left me his house. I'm rebuilding it so I can sell it. I want no part of that house.”
“Because of the murder?” Rachel leaned forward.
Quentin's face flushed. “Of course you know about that.” He sighed. “That poor kid, his poor parentsâhe was their only child, you know.”
It took me a second to realize he was talking about
me.
“I can't imagine what kind of pain that must be,” he went on. “But that was Sebastian all over. He never gave a shit about anyone else. He probably thought it was funny to leave me that damned house.” He scratched his head. “I guess I'll never know why he did it. I mean, I'd like to think he did it to, you know, try to reach out to meâmake amends of a kind, I guess.”
me.
“I can't imagine what kind of pain that must be,” he went on. “But that was Sebastian all over. He never gave a shit about anyone else. He probably thought it was funny to leave me that damned house.” He scratched his head. “I guess I'll never know why he did it. I mean, I'd like to think he did it to, you know, try to reach out to meâmake amends of a kind, I guess.”
“He's lying,”
Rachel whispered in my head.
“He knows more than he's saying.”
Rachel whispered in my head.
“He knows more than he's saying.”
“How can you be so sure if you can't read his thoughts?”
She gave me a look. “So, you don't know what your brother was up to before he died?”
He looked away. “It sounds crazy when you say it out loud.”
“See? He didn't cut his family off completely.”
“Trust me, Mr. Narcisse,” Rachel said, “there's nothing you can say that will shock or surprise us.” She gave him a very thin smile. “You wouldn't believe the things we've seen.”
“Trust me, Mr. Narcisse,” Rachel said, “there's nothing you can say that will shock or surprise us.” She gave him a very thin smile. “You wouldn't believe the things we've seen.”
Quentin got up and walked over to the French doors. He stood there for a moment, framed in the light from the street, before he turned back around and gave us both a terribly sad smile. “I never believed in any of the family stories, you know.” He folded his arms and shuddered. “The notion that we were destined to rule over all the witches . . . no, I couldn't believe that.” He shook his head. “If the Narcisse family truly had such a destiny, then why had we spent so many generations living on boats in the swamp?” He laughed bitterly. “Delusions of grandeurâstories spun at night after dinner to make sense of a poverty so intense . . . What good had witchcraft done my family? So much death and destruction, none of it made any sense to me, but Sebastian ?” He walked back and sat again on the edge of the bed, leaning forward. “He believed it. He believed every bit of it. He thought our family was stupid to sit around and wait for it to happen. He thought weâ
he
âcould make it happen. . . .” His voice trailed off for a moment. “I don't know what he did to get his money, how he came to own that house. But he left the swamp when I went to college. I came here to go to schoolâand he came too. We shared an apartment at first, up near the campus on the lakeshore. I had hoped coming to New Orleans would change his mind, once he saw there was a life, that there were possibilities outside the swamp.” He shook his head and gave us both a little smile. “We used to dance, you knowâat the Brass Rail. It was what we did for money. For me, it paid my way through college. Sebastian? He moved into his own placeâsaid he needed to have his privacy.”
he
âcould make it happen. . . .” His voice trailed off for a moment. “I don't know what he did to get his money, how he came to own that house. But he left the swamp when I went to college. I came here to go to schoolâand he came too. We shared an apartment at first, up near the campus on the lakeshore. I had hoped coming to New Orleans would change his mind, once he saw there was a life, that there were possibilities outside the swamp.” He shook his head and gave us both a little smile. “We used to dance, you knowâat the Brass Rail. It was what we did for money. For me, it paid my way through college. Sebastian? He moved into his own placeâsaid he needed to have his privacy.”
“Why?” I asked, although I thought I knew.
“You want to fuck him, don't you? Should I leave you to it, then?”
“Get out of my head, you bitch!”
“I don't know,” he replied with a shrug of his muscular shoulders. “I figured he was branching out into escorting.” His face flushed. “We both got offers at the Brass Rail when we danced there, but he stopped dancing once he got his own place.” Quentin laughed harshly. “He told me once it was his powers that provided for him when I warned him about it, you knowâthat he needed to be using condoms and taking care of himself.” He absently scratched his stomach. “But even after I got out of school and got a jobâI work at the Whitney Bank as a loan officerâSebastian . . . I don't know. Does this all sound as crazy to you as it does to me?”
“What about your parents?” Rachel asked, giving me a warning glance.
“We never knew our parents. They died when we were young. We were raised by our grandmother Narcisse, on a houseboat in the swamp.” He made a face. “We were the last of the Narcisse. Our father was the only son of an only son. And she supported us by telling fortunes, lifting curses, performing exorcisms on ignorant swamp people. Our powers.” He laughed. “The demented ravings of a sad old woman living on the edge of a swamp and Sebastian trying to tell me he was using his powers here in New Orleans. The last time I saw him was a week or so before he died. He was all excitedâhe'd figured out a way to become even more powerful and wanted me to join him in his plan. Because we were identical twins, together we could obtain even more power. He was insane, of course. And he killed that college boy.” His voice was bitter. “And you wonder why I wanted no part of him or his life?”
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