Tempt (Ava Delaney #3) (18 page)

I tried
to pace myself, tried to think, tried to remember everything I
should do, but being attacked by a human unnerved me. I let down my
guard for an instant and received a swift punch in the mouth for my
trouble. Without thinking, I struck back twice in quick succession.
The man’s bald head automatically rocked back, but he kept coming,
arms swinging.

I
dropped to the ground abruptly and used my feet to knock him back.
He fell over, and I leapt on top of him and squeezed his throat.
Using his bulk, he rolled us both over. I barely managed to escape
from under his dead weight.

I was
quicker to my feet, and by the time he had gotten to his, I was
prepared to jump on his back. Grasping his shoulders, I swung
myself up before digging my fingers into his Adam’s apple until I
managed to grip him with my arm.

He
pushed and pulled, and in the end, threw himself onto the ground,
me underneath him. I pressed on his neck, listening carefully for
his heartbeat to slow. Right before I let go, unwilling to risk his
death, he slumped unconscious, and his weight almost cracked my
ribs.

Not
knowing how much time I had, I carefully pushed him off. Rubbing my
hands together, I prayed it would work like last time. Using my
other sense, I saw the black shadows weaving around his essence,
suffocating his humanity. I lay his head on my lap to keep from
grinding his skin into glass or stones, then pressed my palms
against his forehead as hard as I could.

The
shadows were persistent. They held tight, entwined with his very
being. Sweat rolled down my back, and pain racked my entire body,
but I couldn’t let go. I couldn’t let him run around with such evil
inside him. I couldn’t let him attack anyone I knew.

Slowly,
the shadows loosened a little. I kept pulling at them with that
unknown power inside me. Every time I felt like I had a grip, they
fought to cling even tighter. Finally, one of the shadows seeped
away from him and into me. I imagined I heard screams, even though
it wasn’t possible.

I choked
down waves of nausea, but refused to break contact with his skin.
Desperation bubbled up inside me. I had to get rid of the shadows.
It was as though that was what I was born to do. The fear gripped
me as tight as the shadows had to the man lying before me. Too
late, I felt his heartbeat slowing dangerously.

“
No, no!” I cried out. “Stay with me! Stay with
me!”

The last
of the shadows left him. My hands flailed as if independent from my
body. I burned and stared at the flowing black swirls beneath my
skin in disbelief, feeling torment and pain dance around inside me.
The light came, highlighting my veins and searing through the
corrosive substance that invaded my being with the shadow. I wanted
to scream, to run, to hide. But I couldn’t.

By the
time the pain faded and my gasping breaths slowed down, he was
gone. I cradled him for a few minutes, almost surprised by how
heartbroken I felt at my part in his death. He had been used by
something evil to do something evil. When I destroyed the darkness,
I destroyed him, too. And I was still no closer to knowing exactly
what the shadows were or what they could do.

“
I’m sorry,” I whispered, hearing my words fly away on the
wind. I closed his eyes then fished my phone out of my pocket to
call for an ambulance. I knelt by him, holding his hand, unable to
control the shuddering of my body. I didn’t want to leave him alone
like that.

Not like
that.

When I
heard the wailing sirens of an ambulance in the distance, I lay his
head gently on the ground and ran in the opposite
direction.

I
couldn’t cry. I couldn’t think. Killing vampires—who technically
were already dead—unnerved me. The death of a human felt much more
real. Savage. When I got far enough away, I hid behind a bush to
vomit. I dry heaved over and over again, every time I thought of
his fading heartbeat, of his glazed-over eyes. If Coyle had sent
him, was that what he wanted?

I spent
the next day in bed, mourning the deaths of human men and reading
Eddie’s ridiculously scary books in an attempt to save another man
in my life from a succubus.

No
matter what I did, the man’s face kept coming back to me. Did he
have a family? Friends? People who would miss him? I watched the
news on the hour, but saw nothing about a body in the park. Plenty
on the Mary Celeste ferry. An empty, drifting boat was something to
talk about. Not a nameless man who had died in a park for no good
reason.

At least
I knew those shadows were gone, same with the ones that had
infected Peter. So, how many were there? On a whim, I spied on the
succubus with my other sight. No shadows, but her energy was almost
as ominous since I knew what she was.

I
listened for Carl, comforted by his pulsing presence. If only I
could help him. It all might have been worth something.

In the
early hours of the morning, a phone call awoke me.

“
We have a problem,” was all Daimhín said. Immediately, I
thought
succubus
and rushed to get ready to meet her.

I was
wrong.

In
Daimhín’s living room sat a group of vampires I had never seen
before.

“
Is this it?” a dark-haired male asked in a thick,
Liverpudlian accent.

Daimhín
sighed, shaking her head at me. “Yes, Victor. This is it. Ms.
Delaney, our friends here have a dilemma. It seems our recent beast
problem has made its way to Liverpool. The British Vampire
Association is insisting we deal with it. These three vampires are
their representatives, sent here to resolve the
situation.”

“
Liverpool? There’s been nothing in the news about mass murder
over there.” I eyed the trio with suspicion.

Victor
glared at me. “That’s because we don’t air our dirty laundry in
public.”

The
brunette female next to him nodded. “No point in causing hysteria.
We’ll deal with this quietly and then forget all about it. It
doesn’t have to be a big deal.”

“
If it’s not a big deal, then why haven’t you dealt with it
already?” I knew my question was a mistake the second the words
popped out of my mouth.

Victor
full-on growled, while the woman looked embarrassed. The third, a
bored-looking man with white hair, stared somewhere over my head as
though I didn’t exist.

“
We’ve tried,” the woman said snappishly. “It doesn’t
discriminate. It’s been draining vampires, too. Nasty business.
Nobody wants to risk it. You people caused the problem. You can fix
it.”

“
Actually, vampires in Spain created the formula. So
technically, they caused the problem,” I said, biting my lip when
Daimhín hissed at me.

“
We need to go to the Council now,” the older-looking vampire
said. “Cass has already arranged a meeting to see who else they’re
offering to send.”

The
female, Cass apparently, nodded. “We accept your offering,” she
said to Daimhín.

Offering? Great.

“
Are you sure this is it?” Victor persisted.

“
Positive,” Daimhín replied. “Ava will travel with me.
Winston, you may use one of my vehicles, along with your
colleagues, of course. My own bodyguard, Zion, is already waiting
to drive you.”

The
white-haired vampire nodded his thanks. The trio trooped out,
followed by docile humans that I hadn’t even noticed when I entered
the room.

Daimhín
waited a few minutes before gesturing for the vampires and me to
follow her outside. A stretch limo waited with the engine running.
Another pulled away as we stepped outside.

“
Are you kidding me?” I whispered to Daimhín once I was sure
the British trio wouldn’t hear me. “You’re sending me to
Liverpool?”

She inclined her head. “If need be. Don’t worry. The Council
will probably send them packing. They won’t be dictated to by
foreign vampires. But
we
can’t be the ones to say no.”

“
Exactly how powerful are these vampires?”

Daimhín
frowned. “Winston’s the overseer of the British Vampire
Association. All of the vampires in Britain are part of the BVA,
whether they like it or not. Winston spent many centuries
consolidating his power when others were still wreaking havoc like
barbarians. Victor is still a muck savage who happened to be lucky
enough to have a powerful creator. He hasn’t left Winston’s side
since his rebirth.”

“
What about the woman?”

“
Cass is a liaison of sorts, his voice to the ruling powers.
She’s managing their bid to bargain their way onto their version of
the Council. She’s a sneaky one. Be careful what you say in front
of her.”

“
But what do they want?” I couldn’t figure out why they would
come all the way to Ireland to kick up a fuss.

“
Winston’s essentially created an army of vampires. He’s just
waiting for his chance to unleash them on the weakest opponent.
He’s likely interested in spreading his domain across the water,
and we happen to be the easiest mark.”

“
Why does
he
have to come with us?” I asked, referring to Jules who kept
drooling a little too close to me.

“
Because he can’t be trusted on his own,” Eloise piped
up.

Other
vampires accompanied us, too, mostly bodyguards. I began to feel
claustrophobic.

“
Has anyone been to see the succubus yet?” I asked.

“
Yes. She refuses. Rudely, too.” Daimhín sucked her top teeth,
and I could see it pissed her off to be refused by a
demon.

“
So, what should I do?”

“
Own him,” Eloise said in a sing-song voice.

“
Don’t advise,” Daimhín snapped at her, but it got me
thinking. Could that be the answer? To take him out of the
ownership of a succubus, I just had to own him again? Perhaps the
original bond had some kind of precedence. Or another supernatural
term I had yet to learn.

“
Thanks, Eloise.” I tried not to wince when she gave me a
fanged smile in return.

We
seemed to be moving in the wrong direction, but I figured we were
heading to neutral territory. Perhaps other entities weren’t
supposed to enter the Council’s domain or some such nonsense. I
didn’t care. I just wanted the trip over and done with so I could
get back to dealing with Carl.

I was
soon bored and agitated. The lack of heartbeats and breathing was
positively irritating, an unusual side effect of being stuck in a
car with a group of vampires.

“
Have you ever heard of something infecting people, like
gripping onto their souls, and making them do bad things?” I asked,
trying to sound matter-of-fact.

“
De
-mons,” Eloise sang.

“
Haven’t I told you?” Daimhín chided before slapping Jules’s
hand away from mine. I rolled my eyes and inched away from the
dysfunctional vampire family.

I tried
to ask more questions about demons, but Daimhín refused to let
Eloise answer.

“
What about someone using a soul, like trapping it to them?” I
attempted to sound like a curious neophyte searching for the
strangest occurrences possible.

Daimhín
tutted. “That’s just one step away from necromancy.”

I
settled back into my seat and watched Eloise sing lullabies to
Jules. Every time I saw him, he acted even stranger than the
previous time. Eloise treated him like a doll or a puppy, and I
wondered how much of her was as childlike as the day she was
turned.

We
stopped shortly before I lost my mind. The meeting place was in a
closed restaurant. A sleepy-looking shifter was opening the doors
when we arrived. We all gathered inside and waited for the Council
to appear, the British vampires frequently checking the time in
disgust.

By the
time the Council traipsed in, the vampires were muttering
complaints and throwing dirty glances at each other. I was shocked
to see how frail Koda looked in comparison to how he had at the
trial. The transparency thing tended to make him look ancient, but
the opaque lapses showed tired eyes and a serious amount of
wrinkling. Fionnuala and Erossi appeared as haughty as ever, and
Gabe just looked pissed.

“
What’s this about?” Gabe snapped.

“
This is about you driving your mistakes onto our territory,”
Victor shouted, surprising everyone.

“
I’m sure you can deal with it,” Gabe said
sullenly.

“
No. We demand you send troops to take care of this,” the
vampire continued.

“
Troops?” Erossi laughed without humour. “We don’t need
troops. Look what we have.” He mockingly pointed at me. I knew
there was a reason I couldn’t stand him.

Victor
flexed his fingers as if in agitation, but when he spoke, his voice
was calm. “This mutation needs to be captured and tested. The
strain is warped. She drinks blood of her kind… that couldn’t have
been the plan. The Spanish deny knowledge. She’s the only real link
we have. As discussed with Daimhín, if we can study her, we can
figure out what exactly they’ve been doing. We’re in a much better
position for this.”