Dark Side of the Moon (24 page)

As they rounded a corner, they were almost run over by Erika.

“Sorry,” she said as she started past them.

“Where are you going?” Ravyn asked. Her father would have Ravyn's head if something happened to her while he was in Hawaii.

“Out.”

“Out where?”

She sighed heavily. “To the dance floor, if you must know. I want to boogie till I puke.”

He gave her a suspicious glare. “Don't you have school tomorrow?”

“Relax, Dad. Leo said that I should stay here until the threat is over. They're afraid I might get nabbed by one of the Doulosi.”

“The what?” Susan asked.

Ravyn turned toward her. “It's a term for the humans who help the Apollites or Daimons.”

“Oh.”

Erika took a step toward the door that led to the club, then paused. “Oh hey, if you guys get hungry, tell the woman in the kitchen, Terra, and she'll make you something. I have to say the burgers here are delish.”

“Thanks,” Susan said, but Erika was already gone.

Ravyn took the box from Susan's hands. “Why don't you get us something to eat and I'll get this laid out in our room below so we can examine it.”

“Okay.”

Susan watched as Ravyn headed down the stairs, then followed the sounds of pans and glasses clanking until she located the kitchen. She wasn't sure if the people working in here were human or not. It was really weird to never know anymore.

“Can I help you?”

She turned to see a tall brunette woman. She reminded Susan of a chic model with extremely intense eyes. Crystal blue, they seemed to glow as they watched her like a predator in the wild.

Susan refused to be intimidated even though the woman was doing her best. “Erika said we could get something to eat.”

The woman looked a bit reluctant as she glanced around the room in a very catlike manner. After a minute, she slid her gaze back to Susan. “All right, but don't let Dori know I fed you. The last thing I want is to hear about it from him.”

This must be Terra and she was grateful that Terra had a heart. “Thanks.”

“No problem.”

Susan stood back as the woman made two plates of burgers and fries for them. “Are you part of the Kontis family?”

She held her palm up to show Susan a really cool geometric sign on her palm. “Dorian's my mate. I'm Terra.”

So that's what the sign looked like. It was lovely. “Nice to meet you.”

Terra snorted. “Yeah, right. You don't like being here any more than we like your being here—I can smell your emotions bleeding out of your pores. But that's okay. At least we all know where we stand.” Terra handed her the plates. “You want a couple of beers?”

“That would be heaven.”

Terra brushed her hands off on her apron, then pulled out two bottles from an ice tub behind her. She put them on the tray and indicated for Susan to place the plates there, too.

As soon as Susan did, Terra handed the tray to her. “You got it?”

“Yes, thanks.”

Terra nodded before she went back to instructing one of the waiters to take an order of pretzels out to a table.

Susan took the tray and headed back downstairs to their room. Ravyn was already booting up the laptop. When he saw the beers, his face actually lit up like a child seeing Santa for the first time.

“You must have read my mind.”

Susan smiled at him as she handed him a beer. “Terra did.”

“Terra?”

“It appears your brother Dorian has a mate.”

His jaw actually dropped. “Really?”

“Yep. She's an interesting woman. Kind of rough around the edges, but at least she fed us.”

“I won't argue that, especially as good as it smells.”

Susan set the tray on the floor before she pulled Jimmy's laptop toward her. “So what all did you find in his office?”

“Not too much. Some letters, a few file folders, a couple of leather journals, and the laptop.”

And one picture that he didn't mention. Disregarding that thought, she started looking through his laptop file folders, but as she did so a wave of unbelievable pain engulfed her. These were Jimmy's private files. His whole life was on this computer. His tax records, family photos, e-mails to friends, jokes …

Everything.

She felt Ravyn's hand on her shoulder. “You want me to do it?”

“No,” she said past the stinging lump in her throat as her anger returned. “I owe this to him.”

Ravyn was amazed by her strength and resolve. He'd never seen anything like it. “Okay, while you search, I'm going to call the other Dark-Hunters and check in with them.”

She nodded.

Not sure if she'd really heard him or not, he pulled his phone out and called Acheron. As before, there was no answer. Damn. He could really use some advice from the head honcho about how to handle this situation. If there was one thing in life Acheron seemed to understand, it was the Daimon mind-set.

Then one by one, Ravyn called the rest of the Seattle-based Dark-Hunters to find out that they were all on patrol, being vigilant.

The only one who didn't answer was Aloysius. A Scottish Dark-Hunter who'd been in Seattle since 1875.

Ravyn cursed.

“You okay?”

He looked at Susan and nodded even though he felt ill about it. “I think I know who they killed … he was a good man.” Shaking his head in disgust, he moved closer to her. “Have you found anything?”

“Not yet. Just a few notes about things that disappeared out of his files at work. Some missing evidence. But no theory about who's behind it or why.”

Ravyn leaned forward to read, but before he could, he heard something slam shut above.

More than that, he felt a wave of mass rage and fear in the air. The scent of it was overwhelming.

There was serious trouble above.…

CHAPTER TEN

Ravyn rushed upstairs, then froze with Susan one step behind him. He held her back with one arm while he stared through the crack in the door. He could see three uniformed officers and a tall, beautiful blond woman who was dressed all in black with the demeanor of a fighter. She appeared to be their leader. If not for the fact that she didn't have fangs and didn't set off his Dark-Hunter senses, he would think her a Daimon or Apollite.

“What is this?” Dorian asked as he looked at a piece of paper. Phoenix and their father stood just behind him.

The woman narrowed her gaze on Dorian. “It's a search warrant for this club. We have reason to believe that you're harboring a wanted fugitive.”

Ravyn felt as ill as Dorian looked. They'd been so concerned about the Daimons coming after them that they hadn't even thought about what the humans could do. A search warrant was the one thing they couldn't hide from. One of the rules of a sanctuary was that they had to abide by human law.

Dorian would be arrested as well as him and Susan.…

“There's nothing here,” his father said angrily. “This is total bullshit.”

Ignoring his outburst, the woman turned to the officer on her right. “Get the others and tell them to be careful while they search. Remember both of them are wanted for murder and they could very easily be armed. If anyone gets in the way, arrest them.”

Dorian lifted his hand in the gesture that said he was trying to manipulate the woman's thoughts. “There's no need to search our club. There's nothing here for you.”

The woman gave him a peeved stare. “We'll see about that, won't we?”

Damn, she was too strong for them to tamper with her will. This seriously sucked.

His father turned and glared at the crack where Ravyn watched as if he knew exactly where Ravyn was while Phoenix told his father they should hand them over in Arcadian.

The cop turned, walked over to the door that led outside, and opened it. As he did so, Ravyn did a double take. Instead of a human standing there, he saw the one person he hadn't seen in centuries … and he meant
centuries.

Susan pushed past Ravyn so that she could peer through the crack to see what was going on. She frowned as she saw the woman in front of Dorian and her heart stopped beating. “She was at the Happy Hunting Ground.”

Ravyn scowled at Susan. “What?”

She lowered her tone so that only Ravyn could hear. “She was with the group of Daimons who tranked you.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.” And she was, too. She'd never forget the woman who actually put Cael's wife to shame in terms of beauty and grace.

But Susan's gaze was snagged away from the woman to the man who came into the back room with an aura so powerful that it instantly commanded everyone's rapt attention. Not to mention he had the determined stride of hell wrath and damnation. It was obvious he was here for blood and making no attempt to hide it. Wearing a black and blue scuba suit that showed off a lean, ripped body, and dripping wet, that man had a face that was both beautifully chiseled and rugged. He had at least a week's growth of whiskers and shoulder-length dark brown hair.

“You,” he said to the cop on his left as he stopped beside the woman, “go outside and have a donut with your buddies.”

The woman scowled her displeasure at him.

She raked him with a sneer that said she held him in the same estimation as something stuck to the bottom of her shoe. “Who do you think you are?”

His lips twisted into a mocking grin. “Oh, baby, don't ask
me
that question. I know exactly who and what I am … and more to the point, what I'm capable of.” He wiped at a bead of water on his cheek before he spoke again. This time, his low, feral tone was sinister and cold and filled with his anger. “How dare you bring your prissy little ass into one of my clubs and pull this shit. You're lucky you're still breathing.”

She was aghast at him. “I will have you arrested.”

“And I will have your ass for breakfast, little girl,” he sneered. “I'm not Stryker. There's no fraternal love in my heart for you. In fact, there's no love in my heart for anyone … much.” He brushed his wet bangs back from his dark brown eyes. “Now, I just sent your boys in the alley off to Bainbridge Island. They're not sure how they got there and lucky for you, they have no memory of ever seeing you. For your sake, and that of your half-ass brother, let's keep it that way. You pull this shit again, and I don't care who you serve or who you think you know, you're dead. Got me?”

The woman appeared a bit subdued. “How do you know about Stryker?”

He gave her a dry stare. “I know everything about everything and before I dry off completely, which is something I truly hate, you better go outside, collect Trates, and have both your asses out of here or I'm going to lose what little patience I have.” The air around him seemed to snap with powerful energy that appeared to be emanating from within him. “You will play by the rules I've set up for sanctuary, or I'll use your entrails for armbands. Understand me? Don't you
ever
chance exposing the Weres to the humans again.”

The anger returned to her as she stiffened her spine. “If you know everything as you claim, then you know you can't stop me.”

He laughed at her. “Yeah, and the next time you're fetching for Auntie, tell her Savitar said hi and watch her bitch slap you for even bringing her to my attention.”

“How do you—”

He cut her words off by moving to stand so close to her that she had to take a step back and crane her neck to look up at him. “I told you, little Satara, I know everything about everything. I even know about the goddess who really does scare the shit out of you. And you should be afraid of her. Trust me. The Destroyer earned her name for a reason, and it wasn't by posing. You might win this little battle you're trying to fight, but ask yourself if it's going to be worth the cost of it.”

“I don't know what you're talking about.”

An evil laugh emanated from deep within his throat. “Yes, you do. And when you find yourself back in Kalosis in a few seconds with a wide-eyed Trates and a pissed-off Stryker, remember that I'm watching you and that the Weres are off-limits in this game. You want to fuck with Artemis, fuck with Artemis. You want to fuck with me … make out your will.”

The woman instantly vanished.

Savitar looked past Dorian, Phoenix, and their father, to the door where Susan and Ravyn were. “You two can come out now. They're gone.”

Susan walked out first, but as she approached Savitar, the hair on the back of her neck rose. There was something so powerful and scary about him that it actually made her want to run for the door. The very air around him crackled with some kind of unholy energy. It was like standing next to a thrumming nuclear generator … that could explode and destroy you and the entire city at any second.

“Savitar,” Ravyn said in a surprisingly friendly tone, extending his hand out to him. “It's been a while.”

“Yes, it has.” He shook Ravyn's hand, then turned to look at Dorian and his family. “No offense, Dorian. Oh, what the hell, take all the offense you want, it's not like I give a shit.” He looked back at Ravyn. “I miss the days before you crossed over to the dark side. Back when you sat on the Omegrion, Rave. You were actually highly entertaining. Dorian, on the other hand, has a major stick up his ass.”

“Glad to know I had some purpose.”

A strange light darkened Savitar's eyes. “You have more than you've ever dreamed of.”

Ravyn stiffened. “What do you mean?”

Savitar tilted his head. “Dorian and others, take a break.” Before they could speak or move, they vanished.

Susan widened her eyes at the way Savitar seemed to be able to do whatever he wanted with people regardless of their will.

“Don't worry,” Savitar said to her as if he knew her thoughts. “I won't send you off without warning. Just stand there and be awed by my beauty. It's the safest mode around me.”