SEDUCTIVE SUPERNATURALS: 12 Tales of Shapeshifters, Vampires & Sexy Spirits (55 page)

Custo opened the door and used one of the cartons as a doorstop. A phone warbled within the room. Probably that Adam he’d called earlier.

Oh, shit…her phone was still off.

Custo darted inside and left her to follow. She fumbled to get out her mobile phone and hit the power button. As it turned on and searched for a signal, she peeked in the room. The air was similarly stale, but the space was open, meticulously clean, and—thank goodness—furnished. Every corner of the place was brightly lit. A wraparound desk edged one wall, topped with a computer, the monitor blank. Another door led to a tidy modern bathroom. And beyond a gray partition, she spotted the foot of a low queen-size bed. One bed, huh?

He’d be on the floor.

“I swear it’s me,” Custo was saying into the phone. “Who else would know about the Shelby clocks?”

A pause.

“But I didn’t turn wraith. You know I would never—”

Another pause.

“Stranger things have happened, Adam. Hear me out.”

Custo dragged out a chair from the desk and sat. “We’ll be here. We’ll wait for you. And, uh, we’ve got a situation.”

He frowned again, and then lifted his gaze to Annabella. “Me and a friend. I’ll tell you when you get here.”

Annabella raised her eyebrows after he hung up. “Well?”

“Adam is on his way.”

Another crazy person. She leaned against the open doorway, sighing. “He thinks you’re a wraith?”

Fan-freakin’-tastic.
The past couple of years wraiths had been all over the Internet and occasionally on the news, though she had never seen one (or wanted to) herself. She didn’t know much about them except they were murderous, insane, and really strong. One Internet clip showed some wicked-looking teeth as well. But what they really were and where they came from, she had no idea.

Annabella sized up Custo. He was definitely crazy enough and strong enough. She didn’t want to think about the murderous part. At least his teeth seemed normal.

“He’s entertaining the possibility.” Custo stood and moved toward a cabinet. He rummaged inside a drawer and drew out some kind of anorak, which he dropped on the floor. He dug deeper and retrieved a pile of black clothing. “I want to grab a quick shower. Do you mind? I’ll answer all your questions when I get out.”

Her list was growing longer.

Annabella glanced around. The place was bright and the flashlight was heavy in her hand. No shadows here. Plus the message light was blinking on her phone. Probably her mom. “Yeah, okay.”

Custo disappeared into the bathroom, but he left the door cracked.

Annabella retrieved her messages. She had one strange hang-up—Adam, most likely—and, sure enough, a call from her mom. Annabella called her, soothed her worries—no mad dogs tonight, lied about an impromptu date with a cute guy, and finished with a “can’t talk now,” heavy with meaning. Her mom was so happy she was on a date that she agreed to hang up on the provision she’d get details later. That conversation would be interesting.

Annabella ended the call, done and done, then reconsidered and dialed her own number. The call went straight to voice mail. “I am out with a slightly imbalanced man named Custo, who…uh…might be a wraith. He is tall, about six three, well built, with green eyes and dark blond hair. He has taken me back to a place owned by the Segue Institute, whatever that is. He had the codes to get in anyway. It’s on the ground floor of a brick building near West Thirty-sixth and Fifth. Oh, and he placed a call to a man named Adam from my mobile phone. If I should disappear or wind up dead, start there.”

“Smart girl,” Custo said from the bathroom doorway. “Next time, get a building number, even if it’s next door or across the street. Or any identifying marker of some kind.”

“Well you can’t blame me for playing it safe.” She pocketed her phone and stepped back, hitting the desk with her thighs.
Uh…Wow.
Custo in ugly, too-small clothes was good-looking. Custo in a form-fitting, long-sleeve black tee, each ripple of his body hugged by the soft cloth, was devastating. And she knew good bodies. He wore black fatigues, but she couldn’t help imagining him in ballet tights. She almost laughed: This man? In tights? Wouldn’t happen in a million years.

“I wasn’t blaming you, I was commending you. I like that you can think on your feet. I like that you had the foresight to get that flashlight. Must be awkward to lug around. I assume you have extra batteries?”

She tilted up her chin. “In my bag.”

He grinned at her, and she stopped thinking altogether. The smile finally reached his eyes, brightening them with humor. A super-scary wolf was stalking her, and this man was
happy?

“Everything is going to be fine now. I’d tell you to go ahead and bed down, but Adam will be here shortly. Good thing he was in New York. He could have easily been back in West Virginia…” Custo’s smile faltered. “…unless they abandoned that facility after the attack.”

“What facility? Who is Adam?”

“Adam Thorne. He runs the Segue Institute. It’s a research facility whose chief focus is the growing wraith population, though it occasionally extends to include other paranormal phenomena as well.”

“Wraiths again.” And paranormal phenomena. The guy was loco, but then again she was seeing imaginary wolves, so she couldn’t exactly point any fingers.

“Predators that look like you and me,” Custo explained. “But inhumanly strong and immortal. They feed on the souls of their human prey. I’ve been working with Adam to control their spread for…over six years.”

Sounded to her from Custo’s call that his employment was in question. She bit her tongue on that one. She didn’t seem to have very many options. “This Adam will look into my wolf?”

“Yes. Absolutely.”

“Tonight?”

“We’ll do what we can tonight. Segue has a significant intelligence operation, we should be able—”

Custo tilted his head, as if listening. Then he moved in a blur, grabbed her arm—the flashlight had her wrist twisting painfully—and pulled her behind him. “It’s going to be fine,” he said too calmly.

“Where is it?” Annabella’s heart jumped. She grabbed his waist to steady herself and peeked around his trunk, flashlight on, searching for the hulk of the wolf.

She couldn’t see anything but crates.

“Hold your fire. I am unarmed,” Custo yelled, “and I have an innocent woman here.”

So not the wolf. She kept the flashlight pointed at the door anyway.

Custo glanced down at her. “Don’t resist. I expected this. Adam is only being careful.”

“On the floor,” a gravelly male voice called back.

Custo nodded, as if he thought that was the right course of action. “Down,” he said. “They won’t hurt you.”

“But I thought—” She didn’t know what she had thought. Maybe that they’d be spending the night here. Maybe that he’d have some quick fix to her problem, like Jasper’s hot screw. Maybe that she’d be safe enough to rest so she could be ready for her performance. If she didn’t put her head down soon, she was going to fall down anyway.

“On the floor now!”

Custo pushed her to her knees as he lowered himself. “No sudden movements. Just lie on the floor. Everything is going to be all right.”

No sooner had her cheek touched cold linoleum than several pairs of black combat boots ran into view. One pressed on Custo’s neck, the tip of a gun at his head. Other boots had him at his arms, the small of his back, his legs.

“No, no, no,” Annabella yelled as her body trembled with fear and anger. This was a mistake. A mistake to share a cab. A mistake to trust a strange man. A mistake that might cost her
Giselle
. “He called
you!
He called
you!
”

Custo had the perverse nerve to attempt a smile at that, boot rubber in his face, but he remained silent, the rest of him still.

Rough hands hauled Annabella up from under her armpits. Her flashlight clattered to the floor. From the corner of her eye, she spied a soldier dumping the contents of her bag into a messy pile and dissecting her stuff. She was driven up against a wall, held with her arms twisted behind her. Whatever idiot was doing this to her probably thought the arm hold hurt, but he’d be wrong. She’d been dancing since she was four; flexibility was no problem for her. She could have gotten out of it if she wanted, but she took her cues from Custo.

Let it happen.

A hand roved her body, dipping between her boobs, as if they were big enough to hide anything. Then the jerk swept the juncture at her thighs. Totally humiliating. He located her mobile phone—didn’t take a genius to put a hand in her pocket. Then suddenly she was yanked back and propelled out the doorway. “If he twitches,” her captor called, “shoot him.”

“He was helping me,” Annabella said, finally getting a glimpse of the infamous Adam. Dark hair, chiseled face, clenched jaw. Might be good-looking if he weren’t such an asshole.

“I doubt that very much.” Adam directed her to a black SUV idling in front of the building.

The street was otherwise dark, shadows shifting with her quick glance. If she couldn’t have Custo, she at least wanted her flashlight, though she doubted Adam would run back in and get it for her. Someone inside the SUV opened the side door.

“No, you don’t understand,” she said, “he’s a little crazy, but I swear he hasn’t done anything wrong.” She tried to twist out of Adam’s cruel grasp while he propelled her into the vehicle.

“No,
you
don’t understand, Ms. Ames.”

How did he know her name?

“That couldn’t be Custo Santovari.” Adam’s eyes were flinty, his mouth cruelly twisted with strong emotion. “The Custo I know died over two years ago.”

Shadow Fall: Chapter Four

Blood ran off Custo’s arm into crimson splatters on the cold concrete floor of his holding cell. His forearm was a scream of pain from a deep diagonal slice through skin and muscle—a parting gift from one of Adam’s men, and a test: wraiths heal rapidly, humans do not.

Not that Custo had expected a welcome parade; Adam had to take all due precautions. Custo leaned against the cell wall—his butt was already going numb from his seat on the hard floor—and rested his lower arm on his knees in plain sight. His sleeve was bunched over his elbow. Easiest way to safely ID a wraith was to watch him regenerate, a bracing combination of nightmare and miracle.

Custo was more than a little curious himself. Did an AWOL angel heal rapidly, too?

A long two-inch sliver of thick Plexiglas broke up the monotonous gray of his prison. No way to get food in without unsealing the two-foot-thick steel-reinforced door. No place to piss. Aside from the metallic scent of blood, the air had a wet earth smell, as if he were underground, but laced by the peculiar funk of the walking dead. A wraith’s cell.

Custo knew the three Segue facilities in the northeastern U.S. by heart—he’d been involved in the construction of them all—but this place wasn’t familiar. Had to be new, and if it was new, then the wraith war continued and at least several months had passed since his death. Actually, since he’d picked up from Annabella’s thoughts a general awareness of wraiths, the threat had to be public as well. He did a little mental math. Probably over a year had passed. It made sense that Adam was so suspicious.

“I’m not a wraith, Adam,” Custo called. His voice bounced back at him.

As expected, no answer.

Custo stretched his consciousness to locate Adam. He was there, on the other side of the cell. Custo touched his mind: his friend was determined to wait out the test. Custo pushed harder, trying to unlock Adam’s deeper thinking, but as always, only immediate intent was discernible, and even that was unreliable. People changed their minds all the time.

He extended himself further and found Annabella, not far away. Her thoughts were a muddle. Probably scared, worried, angry. But safe. There was no better place for her than Segue, both for her protection and for the resolution of her problem. The sooner he settled the wraith question with Adam, the sooner he could put her at ease. He didn’t want her frightened any longer than necessary. She was feisty, which he liked, but too delicate to fight a creature of Shadow. He’d take care of everything.

An image flashed in his mind: Annabella wrapped around him while he was buried deep within her, the heat of their friction, hearts pounding against each other, his mouth on the apple of her shoulder, the sweet taste of her skin…

A sharp sizzle, white-hot, brought Custo’s attention back to his arm. Pain cleared his fantasy from his mind. He blinked hard and examined his wound.

The deepest layers of rent tissue were obscured by congealing blood, the gape in his skin cracking slightly like a wide, lipless mouth. The shallow edges of the cut, however, had gone from scarlet to pink as the skin came back together, sealing with the pucker of a scar. It was a miracle of millimeters, but Custo had no doubt he was healing—fast.

Shit.
His heart tightened like a fist.

Adam would have only one conclusion—wraith. And on the subject of wraiths, Adam had always been blindly resolute. Kill them, kill them all. Custo couldn’t blame him. Adam’s own brother, Jacob, had made the choice to become a wraith, trading humanity for immortality, then murdered Adam’s mother and father, fed on them to make himself stronger, and mocked Adam for being too human, too weak to stop him. Jacob should have known better, should have known Adam wouldn’t break and would never forgive the destruction of his family. The Segue Institute was born with a single clearly defined purpose—find a way to end Jacob.

The heat in Custo’s arm was now bone-deep, aching with the weave and knit of his flesh. The healing wasn’t nearly as fast as a wraith’s, who could recover in minutes from what should’ve been mortal wounds, but it far exceeded a normal man’s. Therefore, damn it, wraith.

Custo lifted his uninjured arm, licked his thumb, and cleaned away the dried blood at one edge of the wound. It was obvious now that he was healing supernaturally. No point hiding the truth.

He turned the closing wound toward the slit in the wall, so there would be no mistake. “I’m not a wraith, Adam. I’m—” He broke off. Still couldn’t say the ridiculous word out loud. He groaned inwardly and took a deep breath. Tried again. “I’m an
angel.
”