Dayhunter (13 page)

“Bitch!” she spat at me.

“What are you doing? We’re alone,” I said, pushing off of Danaus. But even as I said it, I noticed the second lycanthrope stepping from the entrance of the bar. His broad shoulders briefly blocked the square of golden light pouring from the open doorway. He was either a member of her pack or assigned to her as backup should she run into any problems when dealing with my kind. Either way, I wasn’t overly concerned. He was of her race and thus would protect her.

“That was for what you said,” Alex told me, giving my shoulder a little shove with her index finger. Her narrowed eyes glittered in the faint light from a nearby pub but otherwise remained brown. “That Omega comment was a low blow and you know it.”

I shrugged. “It had to be convincing. I’m not particularly popular at the moment and I didn’t want any backlash to hit you if they thought we were friends.”

“Yeah, you always had a way with people,” Alex said. Her full lips eased from a hard, angry slash to a reluctant smile. “Who’s this?” she asked, jerking her chin toward my dark shadow. I turned and put an arm around her slim shoulders.

“Alexandra Brooks, this is Danaus, the hunter,” I said, introducing her. She twisted out of my grasp so she could look up at me, her eyes widening to the point I thought I would have to catch them when they fell from their sockets.

“Are you crazy, girl?” she gasped. She looked over at Danaus then back at me. “There’ve been some rumors, but I didn’t believe them. What’s going on?”

“I’ll explain soon,” I said with a slight shake of my head. “Who’s your golden companion? Pack member?”

Alex looked at me strangely, her brows drawn together over her pert nose. “I thought you knew,” she softly said. “He belongs to Jabari.”

“What?” I gasped. “No.” The growl of frustration rumbled in my throat a second before I started moving, but my nails never made it into the lycan’s bronze throat. Danaus quickly wrapped a strong arm around my waist and held me close, keeping me from ripping the man’s throat out before a crowd of humans.

“Not here,” Danaus snapped, tightening his arm around my waist, nearly cracking a rib.

“He’s going to tell Jabari that I spoke with Alex. He’ll know…he’ll know we’re friends,” I said. Both my hands gripped the arm around my waist but I’d stopped struggling, my eyes never wavering from the lycan’s face. He stared at me with a look of such sympathy and compassion that I could almost believe he cared for my plight.

“I don’t understand,” Alex interjected, drawing my gaze back to her troubled features. “I thought you and Jabari…Well, you’ve never made any secret of your—”

“Jabari wants me dead,” I said in a rush. “He wants my head on a pike and my heart on his mantel.” Saying the words out loud suddenly made me feel very tired. My body went extremely still, as if I were made of stone, and I leaned back into Danaus, letting his warmth seep into me, calm my mind. Jabari had been my beloved mentor and guide through the night for nearly five centuries. He had been a companion when the emptiness threatened to consume me. And now he accused me of betrayal while he stank of it. I had been his puppet, his toy, his own personal assassin and servant. I had believed he would protect nightwalkers and that he would do what was right for our race.

But I’d been wrong about him; about a lot of things. Unfortunately, my blindness and ignorance were getting people killed. It couldn’t continue.

“I won’t say anything to the Coven about your meeting with Ms. Brooks,” the man said, his deep voice like a distant drum beat waking me from my growing lethargy. “I may belong to the vampire, but my loyalty will always be to my own kind.”

“Thank you…”

“Nico,” he supplied.

“Nico?” I repeated, crinkling my nose at him. He definitely didn’t look like a Nico. He was more like a John or Bruce. Maybe even Adonis, but that was guessing he looked as delicious naked as he did standing there in his cotton slacks and soft, hunter green button-up shirt. The sleeves of his shirt were rolled up past his elbows, revealing strong tanned arms covered in light blond hairs. I was willing to bet naked was better.

“Nicolai Gromenko,” he replied, crushing the name with his clenched teeth.

“You’re not Russian,” I snapped, sounding equally irritated.

“Fourth generation. Nicolai is a family name. I’m from Phoenix. Anything else? Shoe size? Boxers versus briefs?”

“Don’t worry,” I purred, a grin slinking across my mouth. “There’s always time to find out.” The comment instantly erased the irritation from Nicolai’s expression, causing a surprised smile to brighten his handsome features.

Danaus suddenly released me, a snort of disgust escaping him while Alexandra laughed. My attention snapped back to my companions and I winked at my old friend. I couldn’t help myself.

“Lord! You had me worried for a minute,” Alex said as she gave me a quick hug. “Between the hunter and Jabari, I seriously thought you were losing it.”

“She has,” Danaus grumbled.

My eyes darted from Danaus back to my friend, who noticed the smile that was crumbling from my face. “We have to talk,” I said. Threading a loose strand of hair behind my ear, I swept my gaze over the area. This was going to take a while, but it would be worth it. “Hungry?” I asked, my eyes snagging on a pleasant-looking restaurant with a scattering of tables on the rim of the square.

“Starved,” Alex said with a half sigh. She tilted her head toward Danaus while plopping her hands on her hips. “He need babysitting while you hunt?”

“She’s eaten already,” Danaus interjected, oozing disapproval.

Alex arched one eyebrow at me and threw a “What’s his problem?” look my way. She had long ago adjusted to the fact that I drank of the blood of humans and thought nothing of the hunt.

Threading my arm through hers, I guided her over to the restaurant, with Danaus and Nicolai following close behind. I motioned to the maître d’ that we would be taking one of the tables in the courtyard. He nodded, then disappeared inside the building to find a server.

When we were all comfortably seated and our drink order taken, I relaxed in my chair, staring out across the quiet square. A pair of lovers walked arm in arm, whispering to each other. Three young children chased pigeons, their squeals of laughter skipping ahead of them. From inside the restaurant, loud boisterous Italian tumbled into the plaza. It was all pleasant and blissfully normal.

“Let’s start with something simple,” Alex announced as she scanned the menu. “Was that you I felt earlier?”

“I lost my temper,” I murmured, my eyes falling to the tabletop. It had been stupid and irresponsible. Now that I was calm, I could admit as much. My actions had been careless and irresponsible, just like when I convinced Tristan to help me attack the naturi in England. We had been outnumbered and outgunned. I knew that when we spotted them, but I went ahead anyway. As a result, I barely escaped with my life, endangering Danaus and Tristan unnecessarily.

I knew better than to take these stupid risks and risk the lives of those I had sworn to protect. Shame and guilt burned away in my stomach. Fear of the naturi was driving me to make one bad decision after another, and it couldn’t go on. I had already lost Michael. I refused to lose anyone else in my life because of my stupidity.

Drawing in a steadying breath, I lifted my eyes from the glass tabletop to look over at Danaus, who sat to my right with his arms folded over his chest. “Do you eat?”

“Yes,” he said, frowning at me.

“Then find something to eat,” I said, tapping his untouched menu with the index finger of my right hand. “Order something big. I’m putting it on the Coven gold card.”

“That’s petty,” he chided, but he still picked up his menu.

“I regret to say that I’m feeling very petty right now,” I said with a dramatic sigh, relaxing in my chair. Alex chuckled, shaking her head behind her menu. Her dark hair cascaded over one shoulder, caressing her cheek.

We let the conversation die while Alex, Nicolai, and Danaus perused their menus. I contented myself with twirling the stem of my glass of red wine. After what had happened to Thorne, I wasn’t going to even sip it. Ingesting anything other than human blood had effectively lost its appeal. After the server returned and the others placed their orders, I reopened the conversation.

“How did you get stuck with Coven duty? Piss off one of the big dogs?” I teased, looking at Alex. She was frowning at me but there was no real anger in her eyes.

“Just rotten luck, I guess,” she confessed with a shrug. “I had been in London on business for the past week. When news hit of the strange piles of ashes, phones calls were made and e-mails were flying. I was sent to a small town outside of London to check it out. I swear, Mira, the second I saw it I thought of you, but I’ve never seen you do anything like that. Their bodies were reduced to ash, but the ground around them was completely untouched. Some are talking warlocks and spontaneous combustion, but there are still too many holes in the theories.”

“They’ll cover it up,” I said indifferently. “In a few days they’ll think of some very simple explanation and blast it across all the news agencies. It may have holes, but people will buy it because they want to. They need everything to make sense.”

“You think?” she said skeptically. She stared down at her short but perfectly manicured nails. “I wish I had your confidence.”

I shook my head, not liking to see her so shaken. Alex exuded confidence and strength in her own pack or when on her own, but when faced with issues outside her own control, her confidence and strength wilted like a flower with too little water. “Don’t get me wrong,” I said. “You were right when you said this moves up the timetable. Too many things have been happening lately, and science has gotten too far too fast to keep hiding.”

“Damn it, Mira!” she suddenly exploded, shattering her mien of calm. “Fifty years was a nice number. I was hoping to be dead and buried before the Great Awakening. It’s going to be ugly, and I don’t want to be around for it.” She leaned her forehead on her hands, her frame tense and her teeth clenched.

“It’ll be fun!” I laughed, trying to cheer her up. “Just think of all the groupies we’ll gain. These people are completely enamored of the idea of the occult.”

“What about the Daylight Coalition?” she demanded. “What about him?” She jerked her thumb at Danaus.

“I’m not saying it’ll be easy, but I don’t think it will be that bad either. We’ve been preparing these people for a few centuries. It’s not like it’s going to come as a complete shock.”

“Preparing? What’s this Great Awakening you mentioned?” Danaus interrupted.

My gaze jerked over to the hunter and it was all I could do to keep from saying something incredibly rude, but I held back. Frowning, I shoved one hand through my hair, pushing it back from where it had fallen about my face. “You can’t stay with them,” I said in a low voice. I knew the others could hear me, but the comment was directed solely at Danaus. “Ryan should have told you a long time ago.”

I wasn’t the only one being kept in the dark by those I trusted and needed to trust. Themis was supposed to be a great society that studied the various other races, but they remained bogged down by archaic ideas and old myths that had no basis in reality. To make matter worse, the group was led by Ryan, an extremely powerful warlock who refused to set his flock straight, even if it meant the lives of my kind and the lives of members of the other races.

Danaus refused to meet my gaze, his dark blue eyes focused on the fountain at the edge of the square. But he didn’t have to say anything. I could feel his frustration bubbling below his unmovable exterior of indifference. His time with me had proven on more than one occasion that he’d been operating under some false assumptions, and Ryan—the man he relied on for correct information—hadn’t done anything to see that Danaus knew the truth.

“A few centuries ago, the various groups got together—”

“What groups?” Danaus demanded.

“Warlocks, witches, nightwalkers, lycanthropes, and a few other heavy hitters,” Alex supplied, counting off each group on her fingers.

“The naturi?”

“No!” we both shouted. I held up my hand before Alex could continue to berate him for what I’m sure Danaus thought was a valid question. After what we saw at the main hall, it was actually a valid question, but Alex didn’t know that yet.

“No,” I repeated calmly. “The leaders of the various groups met and came to the agreement that mankind isn’t as stupid as we would hope. One day, people are going to figure out that this whole other world exists. So in an attempt to control the chaos, the various groups agreed that mankind would come to this realization on our terms. A timetable was designed, with a date set for what is being called the Great Awakening—the day mankind wakes up and realizes that it’s not alone on this planet.”

“Along the timetable there are several stages where we try to prepare man for the idea that vampires and lycans are real,” Nicolai interjected. “Things have picked up in the past hundred years with stories in the tabloids, major motion pictures, books, and now a large number of Web sites.”

“Propaganda?” Danaus asked, sounding absolutely horrified by the thought.

“Of course,” I laughed. I stretched out my legs and crossed them at the ankles as I relaxed in my seat. “Nightwalkers own three major publishing companies and half a dozen small press companies. We also own more than a dozen movie production firms around the world. We are constantly churning out positive propaganda for the cause.”

Frowning, he shifted in his chair, sitting on the edge of his seat. “Promoting vampires.” Such a thing would not make his job of hunting us any easier if we succeeded in winning the support of a large portion of humans when the Great Awakening finally arrived.

“Not just nightwalkers,” Alex quickly said, drawing his glare to her. “The various groups agreed that anything put out by one of our companies would not intentionally cast another race in a negative light. We’re in this together. If one goes down, we all fall.”

But then, even that lovely idea had fallen into question following the appearance of a lycan and a witch with a member of the Daylight Coalition.