Phoenix Rising (6 page)

Instead, she felt his hand on her back, as his other hand reached above her for the door.

“Miles, goddamnit! I ….
I don’t want you to see me cry.”

Abruptly, Miles yanked her around to face him. “You think I want to see, Kels? That this is somehow easy for me?” His face was tight, his jaw working as he took in her tear-streaked face. “But I can
not
leave you alone right now. You are going into shock. It isn’t easy the first time. The pain of being blooded… the other….

"And I drank far more than I should have. You need something to eat and drink, and then sleep. Someone has to watch over you for awhile.”

“I’ll sleep here. And I can take care of myself.”

Kelsey hated sleeping in the office. But it wasn’t like she hadn’t done it before and she was far too shaky to try and get home. Especially if he would insist on seeing her there himself. And he would.

“
Non
.”

“Oui,
you stubborn French bastard!
”

“You are shaking like a leaf, you won’t even make it through the door.” He pulled it wide with a flourish, “Care to try, you stubborn American woman?”

She glared at him through her tears, but moved forward determinedly.

And crumpled after three steps. Miles caught her before she hit the stone entryway floor, but not before the blackness took her away.

Miles walked down the hallway he'd traversed the day before with quick, almost mechanical strides, Kelsey limp in his arms.

Kicked open the door to her office and deposited her on the settee. Located a bottle of sparkling water in the mini-fridge and some sort of energy bar or whatnot in bowels of her huge desk.

The split wood leered up at him as he rummaged, reminding him how easily things got out of hand with this woman. As if he needed reminding. He was going to leave, and god willing, never return to the States again.

Miles roused her enough to force half the bottle of water down her, plus the whole energy bar, bite by bite. She refused to look at him, but didn’t fight about it. He watched as she curled up on the settee, tugging her dress down as she told him to go again, her words slow and slurred as she struggled against the exhaustion.

“Where is a blanket?”

Kelsey grumbled a protest. When he just folded his arms and glared at her, she finally said, “Jules always leaves a spare coat in the closet, that’ll have to work.”

Miles’
felt a muscle in his jaw tic in and out as he found her large friend’s coat and draped it over her. It did indeed cover her from head to toe, but he didn’t like it. Seeing her draped in another man clothes, whatever the context, made him feel all kinds of things he had no business feeling.

He had laid that out beyond all doubt for both of them.

Miles strode around her office restlessly, waiting for her to give into sleep so he could leave in good conscience. Or at least pretend to.

He looked at the paintings again. Glared at the Van Gogh, and then his eyes fell to examine the one photograph on her desk. He had noticed it earlier but hadn’t been in the mood to ask.

Now Miles picked it up, studying the laughing woman with the gold eyes. He had a pretty good idea who it must be, but asked anyway.

“Who is this?”

Kelsey’s voice was ragged with exhaustion and the roughness of unshed tears. “My mother.”

She had told him about her mother, not a lot but little things here and there. Like you do.

Like how her mother planted huge plots of flowers every spring in a fit of energy, so deliriously happy for the end of winter. Then how she would forget to weed or water them because she’d get distracted by other projects, so that Kelsey said their place always looked like a toddler had finger painted their yard with a mad riot of flowers and weeds.

Her mother also painted, he remembered. And sang. And danced. And apparently anything that took her fancy for more than five minutes. Dabbling, Kelsey said her mother called it.
Always find time to dabble, Kelsey. It keeps the blues away.
Her stories about her mother had always made him smile.

Miles knew Kelsey’s dad had died when she was very small and that her mother had never remarried. Kelsey had said once her mom had told her, you only get one chance at sharing a soul, but that once was enough if it was the right soul.

Miles had liked those words. And the other tidbits Kesley had shared.

Later, of course, he had wondered if it all was a lie.

Looking at this picture now, he thought what he had heard of Angelina Daeger was probably true. She looked like a dreamer and a dabbler and someone who had seen both great sadness and great joy. There was a depth of beauty and pain in those wild honey eyes so like her daughters’.

“Do you get to see her often then?” Indiana was close to Chicago, was it not?

Kelsey was almost asleep, but she stirred at his question. “No… not anymore.”
Sleep slurred her final words into a faint whisper. “Mom…. She’s …been dead a long time now, Miles.”

He frowned and put the picture back in its spot carefully, feeling lost without knowing why. “I’m very sorry, Kels.”

Only a deep steady breathing answered him.

He stayed and watched her sleep for far too long; leaning back against her ruined desk, his long legs crossed, his head bowed. Only his eyes moved, tracing her features over and over for the better part of an hour, his mind utterly blank. Finally, Miles forced himself to straighten and leave Kelsey’s office. He wanted to say he didn’t look back.

But Miles didn’t lie, not even to himself.

'Change is certain. Peace is followed by disturbances; departure of evil men by their return........'~P. Shelley

Two weeks later, Kelsey found herself back in Paris.

She had gone through customs in a daze, Jules at her elbow every step of the way.  Sammy frowning at her white and drawn face. She hadn’t wanted to come, hadn’t cared to see Miles face to face ever again, but there had been no choice.

There had been another murder, again in France, though this time in Auvergne. She still suspected Reegan and Jules agreed but they had no proof. Because even though she was quite familiar with her old handler’s essence, she hadn’t been able to get a trace of him anywhere.

Kelsey used psychic residue, or what she had always labeled ‘essence’ to track someone. The imprint people left on the world, good or bad, determined the depth of essence they left behind. Distance could be a mitigating factor, but not much of one. And no matter how far away Reegan might be, she should have been able to catch something with him murdering shades left and right. Murder left such a vast dark imprint it should have been like tracking a bloody trail through the snow.

Instead, they had nothing.

They were headed to Miles' estate now, then on to the murder site, hoping proximity would kick something loose. Kelsey was fighting off memories left and right, trying not to let Jules see her hands shake as she went over the photos of the murdered vamps yet again as he turned on to Pont Neuf. He had insisted on driving and she didn't trust her nerves enough to argue with him.

Coming back here was bothering her even more than she'd expected it to.

She'd definitely expected it to. The hazy blue skyline of the city, the voices raised in melodious French, the delicious smells of
the
boulangerie
, the silky feel of the very air
.

It brought her back to her time working for the Cleaners and betraying Miles all too clearly. She shook her head, the sleek swing of her dark hair momentarily hiding the sluggish Seine from her eyes.

The past was past, for God's sake. Miles had told her that in
no
uncertain terms.
Get over it, Kels,
she berated herself as they started slowly over the ancient bridge.

"What the hell are you doing, J?!" Sammy's voice from the back seat raised in uncharacteristic alarm as Kelsey felt the little car slide suddenly, sickeningly to the right.

Jules' voice was strained as he fought the wheel with his big dark hands. "I don’t know. Kelsey ...what the fuck?”

Kelsey's shocked gaze tracked the sway of the cars ahead of them, swinging like beads on a wide gray ribbon. The day was clear, there was only the barest breath of wind. And Pont Neuf was the oldest bridge in Paris, it had stood for nearly half a millennium...!

There was a deafening rumble of something heavy crumpling. Kelsey's stomach dropped to her toes as they slid toward the low, curved wall of the bridge. The car's high center of gravity was their undoing as she felt her body careen toward the passenger door.

The vehicle flipped sideways and dropped into the Seine like a stone.

Miles was restless. He stood in front of the high arch of his study window looking out over the Loire Valley, its verdant green expanse smudged blue as the last dregs of twilight drained into night. He'd slept little today, but prowled the rooms of his estate like a caged panther, trapped by the sun and memories.

He could close his eyes and see Kelsey in this room, laughing with a glass of wine in hand. Tossing her night black hair over one shoulder, those golden eyes flashing at him like a dare he could never resist…

He growled and tossed the book he'd been holding onto the cushions of the azure silk of the divan with an oath.

Chance is a word void of sense; nothing can exist without a cause.

Blah, the man was nothing more than a failed politician.

Or was it just that Voltaire was a poor choice for his mood tonight? Knowing Kelsey was in Paris right now. On her way here at this very moment. Not chance that, but murder was the only
cause
. There was nothing more.

When the murders were solved and he had the bastard, or bastards responsible in hand, Kelsey would leave. And he would never see her again. Which is how he wanted it.

Didn’t he?

Miles sighed and slipped from the study almost faster than his own shadow, but the memories were unescapable. Memories of her. In every room of the house.

He cursed, as he passed the spot where they'd first spoken, long void of Degas’s red-headed wench. He'd ordered the painting hidden away the day he'd had her thrown from the estate and he'd never looked at it again.

In a dark temper, Miles flung open the door to his bedroom.

It was worse here. Here she was
everywhere.
He would swear he could still smell her in his sheets, except he knew that was impossible, even for his powers. He could see her falling back into the massive four-poster bed, her hair tumbling about her face, her laughter ringing through the room.

Miles hadn’t realized he’d loved her until he was told of her betrayal. Hadn’t faced it until the instant it was taken from him. In this very room.

A quoi bon mean.

That was a scene he would never forget, even if he lived to see the end of another millennium. Justin, his head of security, had come to him that day. Any other man would have been terrified, but Justin would do his duty always, damn the consequences. He had handed Miles the papers that proved Kelsey’s duplicity. Miles could still hear the ring of the man’s delicate opening words.

“My lord, I have some disturbing news....”

Miles closed his eyes and leaned his head against the cool, roughness of one high bedpost. The knock on his door didn’t stir him.

“Entre,”
Miles cracked his eyes as the door opened and felt a cold shiver run down his spine.

It was only a little unassuming man in an elegant pin-striped suit, but suddenly the past was all too close.

Justin.

When the security agent’s mouth opened, the overwhelming rush of
deja vu
made Miles’ vision ripple, but this time the words were different.

“Lord
Saintonge
, I’m afraid there’s been an accident.”

‘At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness

Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone
.’~TS Eliot

It was a testament to Miles' power and influence that within thirty minutes of Justin's announcement they were standing on the remnants of the Pont Neuf's east side, looking out into the muddy Seine.

A dripping and twisted hunk of metal was resting insidiously in the blinking lights on the banks of the dark river, making Miles' stomach knot.

"Things aren't always what they seem." Justin spoke from his right elbow, his voice cautious, but calm. He knew very well his employer's temper was kept in line by slimmest of margins, and that Miles was by far the most dangerous creature imaginable at the moment, but Justin was ever
d'un calme à toute épreuve
. A very cool customer indeed, as Miles had reason enough to know.

"Tell me.”

If Justin noticed Miles' eyes had an unholy sheen as he looked down on him, it didn't show in his voice.

"That is the car the airport has registered to Phoenix Inc., but there were no bodies found inside of it or near its position in the river. Or so the Gendarmerie say. They are not pleased at our intrusion."

"Fuck them."

"As you say, my Lord.” Justin's voice was beyond blasé as he held up something sparkly one of the divers had scooped up from the river bottom. "But they did find this. Do you recognize it?"

The security officer dropped the piece of delicately worked silver into Miles’ upturned hand.

Miles didn't answer.

His thoughts slid back as he stared down at his palm.

That perfect Paris night, both of them slightly drunk. There had been a gallery opening, an artist who was obsessed with hot-air balloons and had a silly name that made Kelsey giggle. The critics hated him, but Kelsey had been angry at their cruelty.

‘Aw, but they are so fun and beautiful!’ she'd said, tossing her head and studying the riot of colorful canvases. All Miles had been able to think, as he looked at her, was that he would never see beautiful the same way again. Kelsey had rewritten the meaning of that word for him.

That was the first night they had made love. He'd had the charm made for her the very next day.

He’d had no idea she still wore it.

The tiny bunch of silver balloons dangled and dripped over his fingers as he finally raised his eyes to Justin. This time even the tough little security guard’s insides quivered in cold watery fear as he saw the white-blue flash of Miles' eyes.

"Find her."

The wind was moaning. Kelsey wished it would be quiet and let her sleep. God, but her head hurt so bad. She tried to shift it just a little and the wind got louder.

Oh okay…so that wasn't the wind moaning.

It was her.

Kelsey blinked and almost screamed at the faint light of the sliver moon against her eyes. Kelsey suddenly realized that she hurt literally everywhere, but her head was so excruciatingly sensitive it was dulling everything else.

And something was wrong. Not just in her body, but in her
mind.
Something was muffling the gossamer threads of her psychic powers, like a hand on guitar strings. They were silent, trying to tremble, but stifled.

She cracked her eyes cautiously again. It was a garden. The type of walled stone garden one often finds in Paris. Trellis flowers and a fountain that would undoubtedly splash summertime fun for all on a heated August day. But now it was night.

And cold. And silent.

The marble statues seemed to gleam like bone. Dragons with bared teeth and goblins with leering faces and werewolves with wild eyes....oh my.

They forgot the vampires
, she thought woozily. The trellis dripped with eerie, white night-blooming jasmine that sent their heavy scent into the air and the fountain splashed over a demon's wide open mouth.

Okay, totally creepy. Let's go.

Kelsey tried to rise from the icy bench she seemed to be lying on, only to have a voice freeze her in place. It was whispering, high and screechy, a man, yes...but off somehow in a way that was very familiar.

"She dies, but I dearly want to enjoy this."

A deeper, stronger voice tinged with disgust. "Your indulgence could mean our lives. Kill her now...or he will find her—and
us.
" The tone of the second voice had colored ever so slightly with fear.

"He loved her once, he will come."

"Sure of that, are you?" The deeper voice roughened again with blatant sarcasm.

"Silly Felix, hate and love are the flip sides of the same tarnished coin."

There was a snort. “And no matter which side it lands on, we’re dead. Rousseau is one bad-ass vampire, mate. I didn’t sign up for suicide.”

“Oh, I think we can avoid that, don’t you?”

“You are betting our lives that he will give himself up for her? I don’t back that bet, asshole.”

There was a chilling laugh that rang off the stone garden like a death toll. “You don’t have a choice, you left your blood at the scene, Felix. Go ahead,
try
hiding from him now. Run and your death is assured, stay and we are destined to succeed.”

And suddenly Kelsey’s drugged and panicked mind locked on exactly who that awful voice belonged to.

Oh shit.

Ten years previously

New York City

She hadn‘t sleep on the flight. Not a wink. She was still wearing the damp clothes she‘d been tossed in the Parisian streets in, her nails were broken and bleeding from where she’d clung to Alain’s arm and he’d tore loose. Her eyes were blank and dry and staring.

There were no more tears left.

Kels leaned against the door of the cab and numbly turned on her cell phone for the first time since her brief, horrifying conversation with Jules before running to Miles’ estate.

It took monumental effort but she dialed the numbers one by one and listened to the tones clanging far away in Indiana. It was too late, she knew that. Jules had already told her what to expect, he had been crying. She’d never heard Jules cry before, so it had to be true.

But she still couldn’t believe...couldn’t let herself believe…

Her mother had been taken from the safe house at nearly the same time the papers implicating her duplicity must have been delivered to Miles. The Cleaners had systematically overwhelmed Jules with a team over a dozen strong, then left him unconscious and blooded, but alive. Even if by some miracle her mother had gotten away from them, home was the last place she would run to.

But .....Kelsey had to know.

She pictured her mother’s cozy rural Victorian, the warm yellow lights, the smell of coffee and burnt toast that was the essence of her childhood. Her mother had always been hopeless at anything to do with cooking, even with a timer.

Kels closed her eyes as the phone was picked up.

“Why, hello, darling....”

Her eyes snapped open and she stared in horror at the phone in her hand, the obscenely sweet, high voice slithering from it. Not
him
. She could hear his smile in the next second of silence, see the twisted mockery in it. “We came home for dinner, too bad you won’t be able to join us, righ
t—
my dear Angelina?”

Her mother’s voice; soft, resigned, but unbroken. “Goodbye, darling. Don’t blame yourself—“

A wet sickening gurgle cut off her mother’s last words and Kelsey retched even as her whole body let out a silent scream, the putrid flood of Reegan’s septic essence washing her entire psychic core as he cut off her mother’s life.

Of course,
him
. Kelsey rolled down the window and threw the cell as far as she could, ignoring the cabbie’s wondering eyes in the rearview mirror as she sank to her knees between the seats and found there could
always
be more tears.

The sickle moon burned cold against her eyes as Kels shivered.

Reegan.

She hadn’t wanted it to be true, but of course it was. Not dead. The son of a bitch was
not dead! Goddamn it.

The one thing she had thought she'd done right.

"I think it's time you opened your eyes, child. You know you can't fool me."

The high voice was smug. Defiantly, Kelsey keep her eyes closed and opened her mouth instead. "How did—"

Fire exploded along her ribcage and she tumbled off the stone bench she'd been laid upon, hitting the cold ground on her hands and knees. She tossed her hair out of her face, gasping at the shock of pain.

Kelsey looked up to see Reegan above her, a lowered staff in his hands. He was smiling. The faint moonlight traced his dark, hulking form and she could see the glint of his eyes as he stared down at her.

"Jesu, how I have longed to do that—for years! Please, continue to defy me. I don't care how many pieces you are in before he arrives, as long as you still breathe." He spun and laughed at his companion, who reclined against a grotesque statue of a werewolf in mid-morph.

“This is going to be much too fun, Felix. You have to make sure I don’t go overboard with self-indulgence and kill her too soon.”

The man in the shadows grunted and tugged on the fedora Kelsey could barely make out.

Before she could take a breath, Reegan had spun again and the staff cracked over her back, echoing through the stone garden along with her scream at the burst of pain.

“Oh yes,
scream
for me, Ghost Girl!”

Reegan took a seat on the bench Kels had just fallen off of. She could feel his eyes on the back of her neck as she writhed on the stone, trying to conquer the agony.

“I must admit it was so very hard not to search for you directly, after you and that pig, Jules, destroyed my life’s work.” He reached down with one pale hand, his skin glimmering in the dark as he seized her hair and yanked her head up. More bright pain flamed, hot and liquid, down Kels’s already throbbing spine.

“Were you both really so stupid as to think you’d destroyed me in that fire? You forgot my lessons, child—evidence is
essential
. If you can’t prove it, it never happened. You should have sifted the ashes for my bones. Bah, my teaching was wasted on the likes of you two!”

Kelsey could taste blood, metallic and salty in her throat. It contrasted sharply with the scent of lavender and bleach filling her nose.

“Never properly grateful, any of you. The opportunities you wasted!!”

His fingers tore at her hair, ripping out clumps as Kelsey gritted her teeth against the assault. She was going to die at the hands of this psychopath, just like her mother, but she
had
to know how he hidden from her.

“How did you do it?” Kelsey forced the words out as her head reeled dizzily. If Reegan hadn’t been holding her up, she would have collapsed. Whatever he had injected her with was almost worse than the pain, it made her stupid and slow …and psychically blind and deaf.

She remembered going through this once in training, a psychic suppressant that rendered most paras’ powers useless for at least an hour or two. It had been terrifying enough then, in a controlled environment.

The psyche drug didn’t explain why she hadn’t felt him before, not since the day she and Jules had blown the Cleaners off the planet—or thought they had.

“I found a shield, you stupid girl. He can absorb that precious essence you track, bottle it up inside himself, if you will.” Reegan’s head jerked toward the man, Felix, leaning casually against the statue, apparently content to watch Reegan work at a distance. “And even better, he can track, just like
you.

"He found me the nasty little shades
and
hid me from them. He hid me from
you
, Ghost Girl. And your precious Marquis.” Reegan shoved his face down into Kelsey’s, a horrible grimace twisting his face. “Combined with my ability to read thoughts, even vampire thoughts...
it was easy
. You should have heard the bloodsuckers’ scream! Gods, if I can manage it you will get to hear Rousseau scream.”

Panic swept through her dazed brain. Miles? He was still after Miles? Trying to complete the damn mission after all this time? The murders had only been
practice
for the real thing, hadn't they?

But that was impossible, nobody could hope to get that close to Miles, let alone think they could distract him long enough to….

Unless they had bait. Or what they thought was bait.

Oh. My.
God.

Kelsey took a deep breath and spit in Reegan’s face, rewarded with seeing her saliva dripping down his shocked face before he smashed her head down in the cobblestones and everything faded to black.