Scorched

Caravelli. “Get the hell out of my way.”

He fell back a step and she swept toward the door. For the second time that night, the whole pub turned to stare.

Holly looked shell-shocked. “Oh, Goddess, what just happened?”

“We tried to reason with a madwoman,” Caravelli said, dropping to one knee beside her chair and raising a hand to her cheek. “I’m sorry, cara, but she won’t be happy until I’m dust.”

“She’s my sister,” Holly said quietly. “I want her to be the way she was when I was little. I want that Ashe, not this one.”

Caravelli hushed her.

It was time for Mac to go. He was a third wheel. He put money on the table for his dinner and got up. He touched Holly’s shoulder lightly, but he addressed Caravelli. “I’m going to make sure Buffy isn’t hanging around outside.”

The vampire nodded. “A sound idea.” His face was unreadable.

Mac headed for the door, pushing aside the headache bashing the inside of his skull. With all the angry energy flying around, his demon should have been straining against its leash, but instead it lay queasy and still.

The fresh night air felt delicious against his baking skin. It was doing the raining-but-not-quite routine, tiny droplets stinging the skin with icy pinpricks. Mac ducked into the pool of shadow beside the Empire’s door and scanned the street. A Ducati would be easy to spot. He didn’t see it, but it wouldn’t hurt to take a tour of the block to be sure. He’d been listening and hadn’t heard a motorcycle.

Hunching against the dark, he walked to the corner, turned left, and went as far as the alley that led past the Castle door. The iron gate stood open and Nanette’s neon sign blinked an antiseptic blue from the other end of the passage. The flashing light made the dark corners of the alley even blacker. He could smell the damp bricks and the heavy pall of age that seemed to rise out of the ground—or maybe that was his imagination adding color to the scene. He’d heard once that the old town gallows had stood nearby.

They knew how to get rid of troublemakers back then.

Mac nearly passed by, but he took one last, closer look into the alley. Ashe was standing in front of the Castle door. He’d nearly missed her, except the faint light had caught the sparkles on the front of her shirt. He started walking toward her, the old cedar bricks sounding hollow under his feet.

“You really don’t want to mess with that,” he said, using the firm-but-friendly community cop voice.

Ashe didn’t look up, but laid one hand against the door. “What do you want?”

She didn’t wait for an answer, but moved her hand over the surface of the door. “There’s power here. Even I can feel it.”

“If you snuggled up to a nuclear reactor core, maybe you could feel that, too.” Mac jammed his hands into his pockets. “It’s about as dangerous.”

She trailed one hand down the wood like a lover’s caress. “What’s behind the door?” she asked. “It feels amazing.”

He suddenly realized the hellhounds were absent. Don’t those guys ever work? “It’s the back entrance to Nanette’s,” he lied. “She had a sorcerer put a spell on the door so no one walks in to see the bondage shows for free.”

Ashe pulled away from the door with a disgusted noise.

“I’d thought maybe you’d like that sort of thing.”

“It’s no fun unless I get to hold the whip. Besides... werecats? That would be like watching a kitten play with duct tape.”

That surprised a laugh out of Mac. Ashe gave a warped smile.

“Speaking of werecats, I heard something on the radio,” she said. “I think it was the university station. Something about a door in an alley leading to a big secret called the Castle.”

“Leave it alone.”

“You shouldn’t lie. It doesn’t suit you,” she said, and walked toward the other end of the alley. Crap.

Mac watched her go past the kitchen exit of a Chinese restaurant, the door propped open with a big white pail. In the brief pool of light, her slim back and fall of blond hair looked like a teenager’s. The swing of her hips did not.

Mac had no reason to stay, but he lingered for a mo ment in front of the door, suddenly tired. It was time to go home and sleep off his headache, but he hesitated. What was Constance doing? Was she still in the Summer Room, thinking up new ways to bite him?

A twisted corner of his soul hoped so. It was a very stupid, twisted corner.

Mac bowed his head. He couldn’t need her. He shouldn’t want her. But he did. It wasn’t as simple as falling in lust with a set of fangs. There was also a woman there, just like he was still a man. He had looked into that woman’s eyes, and been smitten.

The same way, he was sure, Caravelli had once looked at Holly. They’d made it work, hadn’t they? He’d just seen them stand united against Ashe.

I so don’t need this. Even as he thought it, he felt a thread of resignation in his soul. Constance might not have gotten her teeth into him, but she was firmly on his radar, and she was in trouble beyond even the guardsmen-stole-my-baby problem. Crap.

It wasn’t in Mac to stand by and watch her flounder. Not that he was in favor of the whole Turning thing, but there had to be an easier way to go about it than jumping and biting a stranger. Unfortunately, Mac knew squat about the whole vampirization process. If she did manage to drink from a living victim, what exactly would happen? How would she change? Would her personality stay the same? Weren’t vampires supposed to have a sponsor, or a team leader, or whatever they called them? He should ask Caravelli. Maybe he could help.

He heard a motorcycle start up about a block away, the engine revving to life.

Would it work if Constance drank from a guy who was only part human? And that part is getting smaller and smaller. Mac pushed away the memory of his demon rising, trying to claim her. It won’t happen again. It can’t. I don’t trust myself with that dark side riding me.

He put his hand on the door, feeling the swirling energy of the magic all the way to the bottom of his uneasy stom ach. Maybe I can make a difference. Maybe I can save the incubus and kiss the girl, but what will be left of me by then?

Every time he went into the Castle, he came out less human. There was no denying it.

But there was work to be done. The kind he was good at and thrived on. If he didn’t go in and help Constance get Sylvius back, kick guardsman ass, and undo the crime that had been committed, Mac was denying the part of himself he valued most. The thing that made him human in the first place. The part that cared enough to become a cop.

Demoned if you do, damned if you don’t.

Lost in thought, he almost felt the velocity of the Ducati before he heard it. Mac spun around to see the bike barreling down the alley, Ashe perched on it like a Valkyrie on her steed. Mac’s headache cost him a split second of reaction time. He sprang aside.

He wasn’t even sure if she hit him, but it sure as hell felt like it. He bounced against the brick of the alley wall, smacking the back of his head.

Oh, God. Mac slid down the wall, his vision exploding in blasts of white. He heard the Ducati tearing away, the motor a distant snarl.

Now he finally had something in common with Caravelli. He hated that bitch.

Chapter 13

October 4, 7:00 a.m. Mac’s Apartment

“Good morning! Tnis is CSUP at seven o’clock for your local and world paranormal news bulletins...”