New Regime (2 page)

After she’d been debriefed—one of the many activities put
into place by those who ran the Annex—she was too jittery to go home and sleep.

“Lex,” she said, grabbing the girl before she could exit the
building with the twins. “You tired?”

“Not even a little bit.” The blind Other nodded at the
twins. “I’ll ride home with Rune.”

Rune stared after them as they walked away, uneasiness
causing her chest to tighten. The twins, especially Levi, hadn’t recovered
fully from their abduction by COS. At least not mentally.

But then, neither had she.

“Fucking COS,” she whispered.

“Rune?” Lex wrapped her fingers around Rune’s wrist and
vibrated gently.

Rune shook Lex’s fingers from her arm out of habit. She
doubted Lex really needed to touch her to read her. They’d bonded closer than
ever since the battle with the demon. Or maybe it’d happened even earlier, when
Lex had pulled Rune and Strad into some sort of power circle.

Or maybe it was because her ties with Lex’s demon were
becoming stronger. If they could believe Simon Kelic, the new vampire master,
Lex was Rune’s demon to hold.

She and Lex hadn’t talked about that.

“Let’s go for a drive.” But still, she stood for a moment
longer, watching the activity inside the Annex building. It was never quiet,
never asleep. Operatives and techs and managers were constantly moving,
talking, working busily behind computer desks, rushing with closed faces and
downcast eyes through hallways and up metal stairs.

She didn’t belong there, not yet. The Annex was not RISC. It
just wasn’t.

Bill and Elizabeth were still Shiv Crew’s
bosses—technically—but they were under the strange, wide thumbs of Eugene Parish,
Iris, and the couple of heads Eugene sent in for talks and surprise visits.

The place ran smoothly, but there was always a feeling of
impending doom, of held breaths and hushed voices.

Of quiet authority and secrets and a place and people
controlled by fear. And it was getting more noticeable every day.

She drove Lex out of Spiritgrove and toward one of the long,
quiet backroads in Willowburg.

“Where are we going?” Lex asked.

“To fulfill a promise I made to you.” She smiled, even
though Lex couldn’t see her. Lex would know if Rune smiled whether she could
see it or not.

Lex cocked her head. “What promise?”

“You’ll see.” A few minutes later Rune stopped the car in
the middle of the empty road. She jumped out and jogged around to Lex’s side of
the car. “Get under the wheel.”

“Are you fucking serious?” Lex was in the driver’s seat
before Rune could blink. “Are you serious?” she asked again, her hands on the
wheel.

Rune settled back into the passenger seat. “Give it some
gas, baby.”

“If I wreck your new car—”

“Feel me.” Rune wrapped her fingers around Lex’s wrist. “See
through my eyes. You do it every time we fight. Do it now.”

“I’m not worried for me, but Eugene might ground you if I
drive into a hillside.”

“Fuck him,” Rune said. “I promised I’d teach you to drive.
I’m teaching you to drive.”

Lex smiled. “Then hang on.”

They rocketed down the quiet country road, trees flashing by
as Lex screamed out a half hysterical laugh.

The open windows let the warm summer wind of the night blow
through their hair and beat at their eardrums. “Woohoo,” Rune yelled. “Can you
see it?”

“I can feel it.”

“Left a little,” Rune said, her voice loud over Lex’s
giggles. “Now right a little. There you go. That’s perfect.” She didn’t tell
Lex to ease off the gas pedal, or to mind the ditches on either side of the
road.

She guided the blind Other with her words and let Lex do the
rest.

There were no other drivers on that long, lonely country
road, and at four in the morning, not likely to be. Had she spotted the lights
of one heading their way, she’d have taken the wheel.

She protected the citizens of River County—she didn’t put
them at risk.

Not always.

And at that moment, Lex was Lex again, carefree and happy.

She was the Lex she’d been before she’d discovered she was a
demon. Despite her words to the contrary, Lex was not cool with her monster.

But once its black wings had split the skin of her back, had
erupted into the air to make her even more different than she already was,
there was no going back.

Lex was a demon.

And understandably, that scared her.

Personally, Rune would rather have had a demon’s DNA than
Karin Love’s. Lex had the bad luck to be stuck with both.

“Left a little,” Rune murmured.

Lex sobered and eased her foot off the gas pedal. “What’s
wrong?”

She didn’t want to lie to Lex. “I was thinking about Karin
Love.”

“Bitch,” Lex growled. “Someday…”

Yeah.

“She’ll die,” she assured Lex. “It might take a while, but
someone will get to her in prison.”

Lex slowed the car to a crawl. “I’d give anything to kill
her. To have total control over her the way she controlled me and the twins.
I’d do anything for that.” She hit the steering wheel with her palm. “She’s
mine to kill. Mine.”

“Lex…” But she couldn’t tell the little Other that she’d
visited Leon, that if things worked out, Leon would see to it that Karin was
killed quietly and quickly in prison.

She hoped Lex didn’t pluck the knowledge out of her head and
discover what she’d done.

Lex might not ever forgive her.

So she said nothing.

Lex didn’t prompt her, because right then, Rune’s cell rang.
“Bill?”

“I just wanted to let you know the eighth body was found a
couple of hours ago,” Bill Rice said.

“Shit. Where?”

“In Hawthorne.”

“Shocker.”

“It’s a mess.” But he didn’t sound worried. On the
contrary—he sounded cheerful.

The tortured, hanging bodies, the work of River County’s
serial killer, were piling up. The guy seemed to be copying the murder of Lara
Book, the bird COS had killed for Cree Stark. The killer took pleasure in his
work—copycat or not. No one disputed that fact.

Eugene Parish thought the murders were the work of a man
with a grudge, and not worth his attention. He let Bill run with it and didn’t
interfere.

They’d thought at first the slayers were murdering people
and blaming the deaths on Others to garner more support. But while they
continued to find fingerprints seemingly left behind by sloppy COS members, they
now believed those prints were planted.

Still, it helped their cause against the slayers, and no
matter what Rice or the crew believed, they weren’t going to tell the world COS
might not actually be behind the killings. Better the humans believed COS was
responsible.

And really, they might well have been.

But since they’d lost their bet with the demon, COS had been
lying low. The world was beginning to hate them, and they were quietly but
desperately trying to figure their shit out.

“Why are you calling me?” she asked, suddenly tired. If he
needed her to go to the scene she’d be happy to do it, but after the Annex had
taken over, the crew—or field ops, as they were called—didn’t get sent to investigate
scenes. There were special operatives for that and Bill didn’t hesitate to use
them.

The crew was sent out to fight, to kill, or to capture. Not
investigate crime scenes.

Gradually, they’d gotten pushed out of the place they’d held
with Bill, pre-Annex.

They were muscle used by the higher-ups. Killing machines.

“I thought you should know. Besides,” he joked, “if I can’t
sleep, I don’t let my people sleep.” He paused, then cleared his throat. “I...”

“What is it?”

Lex had stopped the car, her body vibrating as she listened
in on Rune’s half of the conversation.

Bill hesitated.

“Bill,” she prompted. “What?” Her stomach started to hurt.
She pushed her fist into her abdomen and waited.

“I fear I’ve made a mistake, and it’s too late to rectify
it. I’m nearly certain the choice would have been taken from me anyway, but I
shouldn’t have made it so easy.”

She knew what he was talking about. The Annex.

“You never really had a choice, Bill. You know that. RISC didn’t
belong to you, you just managed it. Now we’re owned by the Annex, and we have
to…”

“We have to stay alive,” Bill finished.

“We’re on the same side. We might not agree with the Annex’s
tactics and their ways of getting what they want, but we all seek Other
equality.”

“I think it’s more than that,” he murmured.

“What do you mean?”

But he was done. “Nothing. Nothing at all.” The silence
stretched between their phones like taffy.

“Are you still at the murder scene?” she asked.

“On my way home.”

“I’m headed home as well. Tell me about it while I drive.”

“Sure.”

Once she was under the wheel, Rune put her phone on speaker.
“Go ahead, Bill. I’m listening.”

“This man was around fifty years old. He’d been beaten and
sodomized. After the perp or perps moved him and nailed him to the wall, they
tossed the murder weapon into the bushes. They didn’t really try to hide it.”

He dove enthusiastically into the details of the scene,
barely pausing for breath as he threw out hypotheses and hopes and gave her all
the information he had as he used her for a sounding board.

But when she pulled into her driveway and clicked off, they
were still no closer to solving the crimes than they’d been six months ago.

Whoever the doer was, he was smart. Or doers. It’d be too
difficult, if not impossible, for one dude to nail a heavy body to a wall.

No. The killer had help. Maybe not to commit the actual
murders, but afterward…

He had help.

He was a ghost. No one saw him. There were no clues, no
trails, nothing. Nothing but slayers’ fingerprints. And that didn’t mean shit.

“You coming in?” Lex asked, opening her door.

“You go on. I’ll be in.”

Lex didn’t argue. “Thanks for my first driving lesson.”

“You did pretty damn good for a blind girl who has never
driven.”

Lex smiled. “I guess I got that from you. Do you…” She
hesitated.

“Think our bond or whatever is getting stronger?”

“Yes. That.”

“Yeah,” Rune said. “I do.”

Lex nodded. “Goodnight.” She shut her door and headed into
the house, her steps sure and quick.

Rune rested the back of her head against her seat. She
needed to sleep, but she didn’t want to. Her dreams were bleak, dark, and
terrifying.

She dreamed of Strad’s little boy, of Cree Stark, of Llodra.

Worst of all, she dreamed of the rape. She relived it. Every
time she fell asleep she was there again, on the floor of that cage, helpless,
savaged, invaded.

She shuddered. Bastards.
Bastards.
She wondered about
Levi. The puffiness under his eyes was purple in the stark pallor of his face,
suggesting he was having as much trouble as she was.

They didn’t talk about it.

Someone rapped on her window, startling her so badly she
yelped. Simon Kelic, River County’s master vampire, stood at her window, as
still and unmoving as only a master could be.

As still as death.

She stared at him through the glass for a long moment before
finally opening her door and stepping out into the night. “What do you want?”

“I’ve discovered something you should know.” He looked as
perfectly coifed and neatly dressed as usual, with not so much as a wrinkle or
an unnoticed drop of blood marring his suit.

One of his vampires, an exotic black man named Iker,
appeared suddenly and stood at Simon’s side.

She gave him a nod. “Iker.” Then she put all her attention
back on Simon. “So tell me. What is it I need to know?”

He leaned toward her. “We heard you have an assassin after
you.” He lowered his voice until his whisper caressed her eardrums with a
softness no human could have heard. “And
I
know where he is.”

She dropped her fangs, an automatic reaction that brought a
smile of approval from Simon. “Why the fuck didn’t you bring him to me?”

“Two of my children discovered him,” Simon said,
unflappable. “They knew only to come to me.”

“Exactly as they’re taught to do,” Iker said, belligerent as
usual. “You don’t—”

“Iker,” Simon said, calmly. “Shut up.”

“Where is he?” Rune ignored the drama queen and kept her
stare on Simon.

“My children saw him lurking outside your house. They
followed him. He’s staying in Wormwood.”

She put her palm against her stake scars. “Wormwood? You’re
sure?” He couldn’t have been there long or Gunnar would have told her. “Why
would a human assassin hide in a cemetery full of Others?”

“Maybe he isn’t human.”

“He is. I caught his scent.” She narrowed her eyes and
stared into the dark distance. Gunnar would know where the assassin was hiding
if he was really using the graveyard for his hideout. And why were the Others
in Wormwood allowing him to hide there? They should have either tossed him out
or killed him.

It didn’t make sense.

“We’ll meet you there,” Simon said. “You may need backup.”

She climbed back inside her car. Did she seriously want to
owe the vampires? No. Not so much. “I can handle it. Dawn will break soon.”

He shrugged and stepped back. “As you wish.”

She sped to the graveyard, briefly considering leaving Lex a
voicemail letting her know where she’d be. In the end, though, she didn’t want
to wake the girl. The crew got little enough sleep as it was.

When at last she stood outside the gates of Wormwood she inhaled
deeply, searching for the scent of her would-be assassin.

Her nose caught nothing, but she registered the eerie,
normal sounds of Wormwood at night—murmurs, low moans, whispers.

And some sounds that were strangely out of place. A whistle,
a buzzing sound, and an abruptly hushed humming.

As she slipped through the gate and into the territory of
the Others, she caught the sound of running footsteps, a cry, a growl.

And even though she was Other, gooseflesh arose on her skin
at the sounds of the place. At the
feel
of the place.

Usually Gunnar the Ghoul was there to meet her, his hands
folded, his face serene. Waiting for his Baby Ruth candy bars.

“Shit.” She patted her pockets, but she knew they weren’t
full of chocolate. She’d forgotten, for probably the first time since she’d
understood Gunnar could be bought with Baby Ruth candy bars, to bring a treat
into Wormwood.

There was no help for it now. She’d bring him extra next
time. She walked deeper into the cemetery, swiveling her head from side to side
as she watched for the ghoul.

As she watched for the assassin.

“Gunnar,” she murmured. “Where are you?”

The residents of Wormwood were accustomed to her. She
visited the graveyard often. Still, something was different.

Wormwood waited, breath held.

She shivered, then dug her nails into her thigh. She refused
to fear a fucking human who’d been hired to take her out. The asshole should
fear her.

And though she wanted to wrap her fingers around her throat
in some semblance of protection, she did not.

She shoved away images of the spinning, sharp-edged blade
the assassin had tried to decapitate her with. She ignored thoughts of her head
rolling through the graveyard mud before thumping to a stop against one of the
crumbling tombstones.

She wasn’t concerned about dying. She really wasn’t. But she
wanted to be in control of her death. Some piece of shit human was not going to
be allowed to kill her.

That was
not
the way Rune Alexander was going out.

She couldn’t bear the thought of the enemy once more gaining
control of her. She pushed her palm against her stake scar. She’d rather die
than be forced to endure that again.

And she couldn’t find Gunnar.

She wished she hadn’t sent the vampires away. They could
have helped search for the ghoul. “Dammit, Gunnar,” she muttered.

She walked carefully, threading her way through tombstones
as she watched for movement. She couldn’t call out. If the mercenary were
there, she didn’t want to alert him to her presence.

But Wormwood was vast and the assassin could be hiding
anywhere. If she couldn’t find Gunnar, she didn’t have a very good chance of
finding the man who’d been sent to kill her.

Finally, she spotted a pair of glowing eyes peering around a
tall tombstone. She didn’t try to sneak up on the bright-eyed eavesdropper.
Patience wasn’t her strength—speed was.

She raced toward the sneaky Other, then jumped on his back as
he attempted to run. “Hold on,” she demanded. “I just want to talk to you.”

He was an unkempt, half-starved male Other. The muted lights
of the graveyard glinted off his too wide gaze.

She frowned. He
was
an Other.

Wasn’t he?

His scent was unfamiliar. It was the scent of a human, an
Other, and something else, something she couldn’t quite grasp.

She hung on with an arm around his neck as he tried to shake
her off him. “Calm down, baby. I’m not going to hurt you.”

He stopped struggling and dropped to the ground, then rolled
to his back to offer her his belly.

She ignored his act of submission and sat back on her heels.
“I need to ask you some questions.”

He curled in on himself, not looking at her, as though sure
she was going to start kicking him at any moment.

He couldn’t have been more than twenty, and from the
condition of his body he was accustomed to people hurting him. “Sit up, kid. I
told you I’m not going to hurt you.”

He sat up but kept his back hunched as he knelt there, his
arms folded across his belly, his eyes downcast. He said nothing.

The moonlight gleamed off puckered, pink scars twisting over
his knobby shoulder blades and prominent spine. His head was covered with tiny
spikes of greenish hair. A few bare patches were visible, and as she watched,
he scratched at one of them.

His cheekbones were sharp, his eyes long, dark, and large in
his thin face. His lips were dry and even as she watched, he darted out his
tongue to moisten them.

She had no idea what he was.

Anger made her harsher than she meant to be. “Who the fuck
is your alpha?”

He flinched. “Please don’t tell him.” His voice was soft and
pleading, and still, he didn’t look at her.

She understood he believed the mere act of meeting her stare
would have been too aggressive on his part, and might have earned him a punch.
“Shit, kid.” She rubbed her temples. “I’m searching for a ghoul named Gunnar.
Do you know him?”

He looked at her then, a quick glance full of surprise and
recognition.

“Good,” she said. “You do know him. Where he is tonight?”

“I don’t know.”

“What’s your name?”

He hesitated. “Alice,” he whispered.

She lifted an eyebrow. “I really doubt that.”

He twisted his hands together, then rolled his eyes up to
look at her. There was something desperate in the light brown depths. “My master
renamed me. I am Alice.”

For a second, she was sure she heard a spark of rage in his
low voice. But his admission and his haunted, hollow eyes broke her heart. “You
need a new leader, kid. Now tell me your name. Your real name.”

He swallowed, but kept his gaze glued to hers, seeming to
find comfort in her calm dominance. Again, he licked his lips. It did no good.
His lips remained dry and peeling. He opened his mouth, then shut it.

Whoever he belonged to had done a number on him. He was
afraid to say his own fucking name. “Kid—”

“Epic,” he said, then without waiting for her to speak, he
repeated the word, louder. “Epic. My name is Epic.”

She grinned. “Awesome name.”

“With a K,” he told her. “E-p-i-k.”

“Tell me about Gunnar, Epik.”

He continued, as though he hadn’t heard her. “I am Epik.” He
smiled at her then, and it took her breath. He was beautiful when he wasn’t
scared. Even with at least three of his top teeth missing.

She was nearly certain Epik wasn’t the name he’d been born
with, but she wasn’t going to question his answer. If he’d renamed himself Epik,
that was his right.

“Tell me what you know about Gunnar,” she prompted, gently.

His smile fell, and the light went out of his face. “Once he
gave me candy. I wasn’t supposed to eat, but he…” He shook his head. “He
insisted. And I was so hungry.” He glanced over his shoulder, as though to make
sure his bastard fuck of an alpha wasn’t standing there.

“Gunnar’s a good guy,” she said. “Please, Epik. I could use
your help.”

He twitched. “Can I stand?”

It took her a minute to realize he was asking her for
permission. “You can do anything you want.” Only he couldn’t. His pack was his
family. He had no one else. Even those pack members who weren’t so submissive
and beaten down wouldn’t go against their alpha—unless they wanted to fight for
position and likely die.

Epik didn’t have a chance. He was owned, and it was his bad
luck to be owned by an asshole.

She gave herself a few long seconds to regain control of her
emotions. “What’s your alpha’s name?”

He scuttled a few feet away from her, then rose to his feet.
Still, he remained bent over. Cringing. Afraid. “There’s a human. He’s as scary
as anyone I’ve ever seen and if you knew the scary ones I’ve seen, you’d
understand what that means. He’s bad. Too bad for the Others to mess with. Even
those in Wormwood.”

“What does he look like?”

He shook his head. “I haven’t gotten close enough to see
much of him. Both times I saw him he was wearing a black mask. You have to kill
him. The Others are afraid. He has too much power, this man.”

“He’s human,” she said. “How much power can he have?”

He swallowed hard. “The first time I saw him he was walking
the path by Poison Pond. One of my people stepped out to challenge him, since
he was a strange, lone human. Brian—my packmate—felt no threat. If he had, he
would have called the pack for backup.”

Epik’s skin dried a little more even as she watched. Patches
of peeling skin appeared on his face, his chest, and his arms. As he continued
speaking, tremors of pain flashed over his face as though his voice hurt his
throat. “Brian opened his mouth and the human filled it with a knife blade.
Buried it in Brian’s open mouth.”

“God,” she murmured. “That’s a hardass human.”

Epik scratched at his forehead with trembling fingers. “It’s
a hardass world.”

No shit.
“What happened the second time you saw him?”

He turned away from her, ready to bolt. “The second time I
saw him, he was dragging an Other through the mud. The Other’s hands and legs
were restrained by something I couldn’t see. He’d been staked with a black
blade. Another blade had been shoved through his forehead.” Epik held a hand to
his throat and backed away as he continued.

“He didn’t move or struggle. The human had tied a rope
around his feet and was using the end of that rope to pull him along. I don’t
know where he took him.”

“The Other,” she murmured. “Who was he?”

But she knew. Of course she knew.

“It was your ghoul,” he told her. “It was Gunnar.”