“Because I have no other damn choice, that’s why. Look, I’ll explain everything later. Right now, we have a murderer to hunt, and Ris has to be in on it.”
“Is this something I can help with? I have more experience than Ris—”
“Yeah, but that’s not going to help in this case. She made contact with the killer on the astral plane before she knew we were after him, and now he won’t deal with anyone else.”
“He’s a murderer. He should be dead, not dealing with anyone, least of all Risa.”
“The problem is, he’s a fucking ghost and we can’t find him. We have to use Risa to have any hope of tracking him down, but trust me, we’ll take good care of her.”
“I trust you, Rhoan. I just don’t trust the killers you hunt.”
She squeezed my shoulder, then walked away, leaving me feeling warm deep inside. I might have lost my real mom, but in very many ways, I still had another.
“I’ll send you the address,” Rhoan said. “Meet me there in twenty minutes.”
“Will do.”
I hung up, then grabbed the last sandwich as I stood.
“To repeat myself, be careful,” Riley said, her expression concerned.
I smiled grimly. “As Azriel has already noted, I’ve lost more than enough blood for one day. I’m not intending to lose any more.”
“I don’t think it’s your intentions she’s concerned about,” Quinn noted.
I half smiled, then walked around the table, kissed them both, and said, “I’ll be fine. I won’t do anything stupid. I promise.”
And I hoped like hell it was a promise I could actually keep.
The address Rhoan sent me was for a small house in Campbellfield. It was off a busy main street, on one of those long blocks that had been subdivided years ago, with a second dwelling built at the back. That was the one we were interested in.
I sat on a brick fence on the opposite side of the road. The rumble of trucks and cars going past was so damn loud that the clatter of a helicopter overhead was almost lost to it. The air was an unpleasant mix of exhaust, rubber, and the various scents coming from the fast-food shops down the road, and my nose twitched against the need to sneeze.
I glanced at my watch. We still had a couple of minutes to wait, and frustration swirled through me. It was tempting—very tempting—to just head in myself, but I’d promised Riley to be careful an cbe instd that wasn’t exactly careful-type behavior. Besides, I wasn’t at the top of my game right now—in fact, a gnat could probably overpower me with very little effort. I needed sleep, and I needed more food despite everything I’d already eaten. But most of all, I needed the bad guys to be sensible and give me a break.
And seeing as I couldn’t control them in any way, shape, or form, I guessed the sensible had to come from me.
I sighed wearily and leaned against Azriel’s shoulder. He didn’t move, didn’t react, didn’t wrap his arm around me and pull me closer, but the skin-on-skin contact was still oddly comforting.
“Is there anyone inside?” I asked eventually.
“A woman, a man, and a child in the first house. No one alive in the second.” Amusement warmed his otherwise formal tones as he added, “And before you ask, there’s no one dead, either.”
“So if this is the next victim’s address, he might already have her.”
“That is more than possible.”
I glanced left as a black Ford turned into the street. Rhoan. Given the Directorate plates, it couldn’t be anyone else.
The car slid to a halt in front of us. There were two men inside, but only Rhoan climbed out. He didn’t look happy.
The trepidation that had been up until now little more than a muted background buzz suddenly sharpened. I straightened. “What’s up?”
“This whole setup. He’s deviating from his previous MO and I’m not liking the possible reason.”
“You think it’s some sort of trap?”
“It can’t be anything else,” he growled. “We’ve done a quick background check on Vonda. She turned vamp about one hundred years ago, and has been leading a relatively low-profile life ever since. She works the night shift at the Ford vehicle factory in Broadmeadows and doesn’t socialize much.”
I frowned. “What about feeding? How does she cope with that if she doesn’t socialize much?”
He shrugged. “She probably uses synth blood. They’ve gotten better at manufacturing it in recent years.”
A fact he knew because his vampire half sometimes demanded blood, even if he didn’t have the teeth to go with the hunger. “So Vonda has nothing in common with the other victims?”
“Other than that she seems the least likely target for a serial killer, no.” He spun around and studied the houses on the opposite side of the road. “She lives with her sister, who also works at Ford. We had an infrared- equipped helicopter sweep the area a few moments ago. There’s three people in the first house, but no one is at home in our target house.”
He was half vampire and had infrared vision himself, so he didn’t really need the helicopter to tell him that. Maybe he just didn’t want to get too close to the house and spook our quarry—not that he was inside from the sound of it.
“It’s not much of a trap if there’s no one inside.”
ont>
'2em'>Rhoan glanced at me. “Just because we can’t detect any form of body heat doesn’t mean there’s nothing waiting.”
Like a spell of some kind. I shivered and rubbed my arms. “What did he say when he rang?”
“He gave us the name, and said for you to be in the house—alone—by two p.m. if we wish to save his next victim.”
I glanced at my watch again. “Then I’d better get moving. We’ve only got a few minutes left.”
“I know.” He studied me, expression worried. “Are you sure you’re up to this?”
I touched his arm. “I’m fine. Azriel will be with me, and he can’t afford to let anything happen to me.”
Rhoan’s gaze went past me briefly. “Okay. But you’re wearing these, so I know what is going on.”
He pulled two blue stones out of his pocket, and I studied them with interest. “I’m gathering they’re not just earrings.”
“One is a camera, the other is a mic. Until this case is over, I want you to wear them.”
My gaze jumped to his. “Um, you know I love you and all, but there’s certain parts of my life I have no desire for you to see or hear.”
“And I’m sure I wouldn’t want to know about them, either.” Amusement briefly crinkled the corners of his gray eyes. “You can turn them off easily enough—you just press the left stone once. Two presses activates them again.”
“What about when I shower? Do I have to take them off?”
“No.”
“Oh. Okay.”
He pressed the two stones onto my earlobes. They had to be some form of nanotechnology, because the stones warmed the instant they touched my skin, and they clung to my earlobes without anything to actually secure them. He lightly squeezed the right stone, then stepped back. “Karl, you getting the picture?”
“Yeah,” the man inside the car said. “Sound, too.”
“Good.” His gaze came back to me. “At the first sign of trouble, I’ll be in there.”
“I’ll be fine. Really.”
He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t need to. He wasn’t worried about my ability to protect myself; he just didn’t want to see me hurt.
I headed across the road. My gaze swept the first building, but came to a halt at the security camera.
“Azriel, you might want to become invisible.”
He did so immediately, then said, You suspect he might have hacked into the security system?
