Deliver Me from Temptation (3 page)

Damn.

He became aware of Valin eyeing him oddly. No wonder. He’d been off in la-la land. Forcing his grip from the chair arms, he straightened, turning his attention to the other Paladin in the room. Alexander sat up but remained hunched over, his hand splayed protectively over the white bandage binding his ribs. That bandage was just another reminder of what a fuck-up the night had been. They really needed to convince the council to allow them to carry their weapons out on the street. He understood their concerns over detection—knives and swords were not exactly commonplace anymore—but it was getting too damn dangerous to go without them. Between the war and their own diluted gene pool, the Paladins’ numbers were dwindling, along with them the power of their various gifts. And no gift was without cost. Even Logan’s ability to call His purging light was not a cure-all, the time and personal energy needed to pull from His realm not always possible during the heat of the battle—not to mention it was a one-shot deal until his personal reserves could be restored. But one scratch from a Paladin’s empowered knife, and subduing the succubus wouldn’t have been nearly so challenging. The weapons had been forged to consume all things evil. As it stood, the bitch not only got away, but she’d managed to injure two out of the three Paladins who hunted her.

“Are you okay?” Logan asked.

Alexander straightened, grimacing, but nodded. “Fine, just…” He fingered his sore ribs, grunting. “I can’t believe she got the best of me. Twice.”

“She kicked my ass too.” And he still had the headache to prove it.

Alexander perked up a bit at this, then grunted, scowling. “I had her, dammit. But that redhead could sure pack a punch.”

“Red? You sure?” Valin sat up straighter, his bourbon eyes narrowing. “I could’ve sworn she was a brunette.”

“She wore a wig. It slipped a bit in our last scuffle.”

Valin sat back in his chair, a pensive frown marring his finely sculpted features. Logan opened his mouth to ask what he was thinking when Alex spoke again. “You get the human taken care of?”

He turned back to the big man, trying to determine if there was anything more to the question than the obvious, but the Paladin didn’t seem to be anything but mildly curious. “Yeah. Her address was on her registration, her key on her ring.”

“Anyone see you?”

“No one that will remember.”

“Good. That’s one complication we don’t need.”

Logan turned back to find Valin staring at the far wall. Logan nudged the chair to get his attention. “While you were ghosting, did you notice anything strange about the succubus?”

Valin looked at him oddly. “What could I have noticed while I was in the shade that I couldn’t otherwise?”

“I don’t know. It just seems odd that she always seemed to sense when you neared. And for her to get through my defenses like that?”

Valin smiled, his eyes dancing as he watched Logan rub the back of his head where the headache was the worst. “What did she take you down with, a frying pan or something?”

“She got through my mental shields.”

“She did what?” Alexander stood up quickly. Too quickly. He swore, grabbing at his side as he doubled over. Logan stepped toward him to offer his aid, but Alex waved him off, carefully settling back down again.

“Logan?” Valin prompted.

“I said she broke through my shields. Practically knocked me out for the count without even touching me.”

“A succubus can’t do that.”

“Not if that was all she was.”

Silence descended over the room, each keeping his own council as he mulled over possibilities. Logan found each thought more alarming than the last. He couldn’t let go of the idea that the succubus had been leading them into a trap—the presence of those vampires seemed too much of a coincidence.

But how did Jessica Waters fit in? He sighed, running his hand through his hair. He would probably never know. Suspicious coincidences aside, he thought it probable that she’d merely stumbled into the situation. The vampires could’ve been in that alley already, part of the trap for them, and it was pure chance the cop had been there. Wrong place. Wrong time. Simple.

Logan frowned.

“Logan?”

Logan blinked at Alexander and saw the furrow in the man’s brow. Belatedly he realized it wasn’t the first time the Paladin had called his name, just the first time it penetrated his deep brain fog.

“Wow, you’re really out of it.”

He shook his head, rubbing at his eyes with the heels of his hands. “Just tired.”

“It was a long night.” Alexander cocked his head to the side. “What took you so long to get back, anyway?”

Logan glanced up to see Valin eyeing him also. Nope. No way was Logan going to admit he’d spent the last couple hours standing vigil over a sleeping Jessica. Simply staring at her as the moonlight drifted in through her blinds to catch the highlights in her hair. In the soft light, she looked so delicate. At the time, he told himself he hung around simply to ensure she was all right after his necessary meddling with her memories. But even after she slipped into true sleep he hadn’t been able to tear himself away.

Because
you
want
her. You could have her too. Just go back over there and use those dimples of yours and…

Shit. It was that kind of thinking that was going to get him in trouble. He was the future head of the council and couldn’t afford the head-fuck that would come with getting involved with a human…especially a cop. And using her to scratch his itch would be just plain wrong. Neither Alexander nor Valin would understand that though. None of the Paladin would understand. So he stared into Alexander’s probing gaze and deadpanned, “Traffic.”

Logan’s head barely hit the pillow when his cell phone went skittering across the bedside table and plopped onto the floor. With a groan he leaned over the side of the bed and scooped up the phone, pressing “answer.”

“’Ello?”

“It’s Karissa.”

“Problem?” he asked and rubbed the heel of his hand into his eyes, trying to vanquish the residual sleepiness. There’d been no “Hey, how are you?” Which set all his alarms ringing. Roland might converse in short, to-the-point sentences, but in the couple months he’d known his half-sister, he’d learned that she was, in general, more chatty.

“You could say that.”

Logan rolled over, squinting at the digital readout on his bedside alarm/radio. Three—in the afternoon. “Isn’t it a bit early to be getting into trouble?”

Just because Roland could now go out during the day didn’t mean he did so often. And Karissa, being bonded to Roland, tended to follow his schedule. Their need to be close, the mutual feeding of mood and energy through the mate-bond, was almost frightening in its intensity. Which was something Logan kept reminding himself when he woke alone in his bed.

Two hundred and ninety-five years. Not quite eternity but, damn, it sometimes seemed like it.

He ran his hands over his face, wiping away both sleep and morose thoughts. His sister wasn’t an alarmist. She wouldn’t be calling for something petty. “So what happened?”

“There was a damn kitten on the ledge. All fluffy and cute and yowling up a storm.” She made a sound kind of like a growl. “Bleeding heart had to rescue it.”

Thoughts of Roland’s current popularity with the media had Logan swearing. There had been an incident over the summer. A middle-aged banker preying on coeds and Roland, righteous fucker that he was, couldn’t just stand by and watch a woman get raped. And though any Paladin worth his weight—even an exiled one like Roland—wouldn’t have stood for that kind of shit, Roland seemed to attract bad luck. The rapist later turned up dead and the woman Roland saved gave Roland’s description down to a T. So much for gratitude. Now a sketch was showing up on the evening news.

“In broad daylight?” he asked.

Karissa’s silence was answer enough. Logan groaned, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. “I take it he stopped traffic and drew in the fire department.”

“Nothing like that. But that nosey woman in Twelve D saw him.”

“Crap.”

“Yup. And guess what she does when she’s not sticking her nose in other people’s business?”

“Let me guess…”

“…she watches the news,” they finished together.

“Fucking spectacular.” He plopped back down on the bed, trying to hold his brain in with one hand against his temple. It had obviously swollen from trying to process the full extent of his friend’s stupidity and was attempting to explode out of his skull.

He resisted the urge to say I told you so. After Roland’s penthouse had been trashed over the summer, Logan tried to encourage Roland and Karissa to move out of the city. Fewer people to tempt Karissa’s new vampire instincts and fewer enemies to upend the happy couple’s world. But his concerns were overruled. He knew why, of course. The Paladin may have turned their back on Roland long ago, but Roland would not turn his back on them. He’d stay and fight to the end. And Karissa? Well, she wanted to remain close to the only family she had left—her newly discovered half-brother, Logan.

And
you’re not secretly glad to have them both here?

Logan sighed, letting his hand drop to the mattress. “Why didn’t you just do what everyone else does?”

“What’s that?”

“Open the window, crack a can of tuna fish, and set it on the sill.”

“Tuna fish, huh?”

Logan mentally chastised himself. They were vampires. Their cupboards weren’t exactly stocked with tuna. And his ill-spoken words had rubbed her nose in the fact that she would never be normal again. “I’m sorry, Karissa. I’m an idiot at times. Forgive me?”

“Of course,” she replied easily, though he wasn’t fool enough to ignore the tension in her voice. Come to think of it, there was a lot of background noise. More than what could be explained by the TV or an open window. “Karissa, where are you now?”

There was a shuffle, then Karissa’s voice came across the line, kind of muffled and echoic all at the same time, as if she were cupping the mouthpiece. “Well, see, Roland didn’t know the woman called the police. And when they showed up one of them was, well, different.”

Different? He hoped to hell she meant another human with diluted Paladin blood and not a merker. Those half-demon bastards of Ganelon’s would have no qualms about sticking a shank in a Paladin’s heart if the chance arose—even a disgraced one like Roland.

“Roland knew he wouldn’t respond to a thrall and he didn’t want to hurt someone who was only doing his job so he uh…” she trailed off, the background commotion of phone, wailing and bellowed orders telling the rest of her story.

“You’re at the police station, aren’t you?”

The phone crackled, like she had shifted, and her voice lowered further. “Don’t suppose you know a good lawyer.”

Logan was already up, stuffing his legs into a pair of clean jeans. “Hang tight. I’ll see what I can do.”

***

Thirty minutes later Logan pushed through the front doors of the 41st precinct with Alex, the warrior’s shoulder-length hair tamed in a queue, five o’clock shadow gone, and bulging muscles trimmed down by the professionally cut lines of his suit. As soon as they were inside, Alexander took over, his grim expression revealing only professionalism and showing no sign of the fact that he’d been in a fight which had cracked a rib just hours before. A quick flash of a business card and a low-toned conversation with the front desk clerk, and Logan was waved through the metal detectors and into the waiting room, while Alex was ushered through another set of doors.

As much as Logan would’ve liked to go with Alex to see how Roland was holding up, he didn’t press the issue. Better to let Alex do his thing, and besides, one look at Karissa, hugging her body tight as she sat in the corner, told him he had more than just his friend to worry about.

Logan worked his way across the room, avoiding two bored kids who were making a game of scooting in between the various table and chairs and the numerous sets of legs that stretched out into the narrow pathways. Karissa didn’t say anything as Logan slipped into the chair beside her, but when he wrapped his arm around her narrow shoulders and he drew her close, she sighed and dropped her head against his shoulder.

“Was that Alex I saw with you?” she asked.

Logan nodded, his chin brushing the top of her head.

“He’s a lawyer?”

Logan felt his mouth drawing into a curve before he was able to straighten it. “A damn good one, too. But no one expects there to be a brain behind the big muscles and Irish smile. Yet you get him in the courtroom, and he’s as much of a warrior as he is on the streets.”

She nodded, but he could tell she wasn’t really listening. She’d closed her eyes and was concentrating on breathing evenly through her slightly parted lips.

“What’s wrong, Karissa?”

“Their pain and misery. I can feel it.”

He looked sharply around the room, taking in the drawn faces, the others blank with hopeless despair. “Even though you aren’t touching anyone?”

She shook her head. “Doesn’t matter anymore. Just being near is enough.”

He shifted, drawing her closer as if he could somehow shield her from the turbulent emotions of the room. Maybe if he
were
to shield her…but he didn’t dare. Not if Karissa was right and one of the cops here was sensitive.

Of all the luck. Why did it seem like there were so many of them around recently? Pairing with humans for anything but a night or two of company had gone out of practice with the decline in the Paladin’s gifted lines. Logan figured the resulting years would have diluted the resultant offspring’s blood to the point that their Paladin heritage would be negligible. But lately the Paladin seemed to be running into sensitive humans everywhere.

Maybe
dear
dad
wasn’t the only one spreading his genes around.

He rubbed his face, pushing thoughts of his father and the friction between them aside.

“Tell me about the cop Roland thought was different.” He’d pretty much concluded the man wasn’t a merker—Roland wouldn’t have allowed them to take him otherwise, not when it meant leaving his bond mate alone and unprotected—but he wanted to hear Karissa’s take on the human. Besides, it kept Karissa occupied and not thinking about the other emotions in the room.

Karissa seemed to cling to the distraction, her breathing easing as she spoke. “Detective Ward. About Roland’s height, brown hair, brown eyes, goatee. Pretty average looking, but in good shape. I couldn’t tell much about him other than I wasn’t getting a lot of feedback on the emotional scale but I could tell Roland’s gift was telling him something.”

“Roland didn’t tell you what?”

She shook her head slightly. “You know he’s not great with projective thought, and I don’t think he dared communicate through our bond for fear of alerting the detective.”

Logan mulled that over. If Roland wouldn’t even use their bond mate link around the detective, then the man must be more than just a bit sensitive. Logan would love to get a good look at the guy, though he supposed the person best suited for measuring the man’s abilities was already in there.

There really wasn’t a good term for what Alex’s gift did, but basically he was a power sink. When near, he could measure, utilize, and if he so wished, drain another’s energy—handy if your enemy didn’t have stellar shields, though evil energy did have the tendency to make the Paladin extremely sick. Regardless, if the cop had a measure of power, Alex would sense it, and furthermore, would be able to tell whether it was a lot or a little.

Logan was so busy thinking that he hardly noticed Karissa shift away from him, her little foot slamming down on the peeling linoleum tiles as she swiveled in her seat. He shifted around to see what she sensed just as the doors opened and Alexander stalked out, striding toward them.

Karissa leapt up, wringing her hands as she searched the warrior’s stoic face. “You aren’t happy.”

Alexander grabbed her elbow, urging her back into her seat in the corner. “And you need to keep your abilities in check.”

“So he does have power,” Logan said.

Alexander looked around, then took two giant steps over the kids who’d taken to wrestling on the floor and grabbed another chair from between two sweatpant-clad men who looked and smelled like they hadn’t showered in days. He came back over, the chair’s metal legs grinding on the dirty tile as he set it down and then plopped into it.

“Damn cop. I couldn’t get within ten feet of him without him eyeing me suspiciously.”

“Could you tell what his gift was?” Karissa perched on the edge of her seat, her voice low enough to not carry past their small circle.

“No idea. I’m not sure he knows either. He was puzzled by me, but he never once said or did anything to indicate he even subconsciously acknowledged his own power.”

“Are you going to be able to help Roland or should I start looking for another lawyer?”

“I think things should be okay. Right now we’re in a holding pattern. The witness who placed him at the bar with Thomas Rhodes and provided them with the sketch isn’t going to be here for another half hour, so they’re going to keep him until she arrives in order to do a lineup.”

“Can they make him?”

“Unfortunately, yes. Lineups, fingerprints, blood samples…none of these are considered a violation of rights as it is physical evidence and he has not been asked to provide testimonial or communicate self-incrimination.”

“That’s…that’s…”

“How the system works.” He shrugged. “Don’t worry. It’s been months since she was in that bar and she’d had enough to drink that any identification is going to be questionable.”

“Still…”

Alex patted her shoulder. “We should have him out of here soon. Detective Ward isn’t actually the lead detective on this case, but once both witness and lead are here and the lineup is done, we should be able to process Roland through and get him out with the standard don’t-leave-town bullshit.”

Logan leaned forward to ask another question when he caught sight of a head of flyaway brown curls through the dividing glass separating those who’d been screened for weapons from those coming in off the streets. He didn’t even have to look at her face to place her. He knew. Jessica Waters. She didn’t hesitate, striding toward the front desk clerk like she was more than familiar with the place like, shit, maybe she worked here.

“Logan?”

Karissa’s voice, questioning, brought Logan’s attention back around. He cleared his throat, carefully keeping his head turned away from the front foyer. “We may have a problem.”

“Oh?” Alex twisted in his seat, then immediately snapped back around, leaning forward on his knees. “Crap. That can’t be her, can it?”

Logan nodded.

“Just how good was that memory wipe you did on her?”

Karissa sat straighter, her brown eyes widening. “Memory wipe?”

Logan patted her knee. “Nothing big. Just one of those wrong place/wrong time things.” He turned toward Alexander. “And it’s not a wipe. Just a shield.”

“I don’t care what you and your dad call it. I want to know if it worked. And if it will continue to work if she sees us.”

“It did. It should.” As long as he or Alexander didn’t do anything to set off any internal bells. Like, say, have
prolonged
periods of interaction with her.

Shit. He should’ve looked closer at her ID, found out what precinct she worked at and what she did there.

Not homicide. She couldn’t be homicide. That would be too …yeah. It would be how his luck was running.

Alexander grunted. “Stay here, keep your head down. I’m going to see how much longer this is going to take.”

With a grimace Alexander lumbered out of the room and pushed through the double doors leading into the inner sanctum of the station.