The Better to Eat You With: The Red Journals (30 page)

“No.”
Blood…

“Killing a species that, in England, was already
considered endangered. Nearly extinct.”

“Stop it!”

“We have the survivors’ accounts, Red,” he told me
softly, and I stared at him. “You are welcome to read them.”

Read eye-witness accounts of how the man I loved
butchered innocent creatures that ultimately brought about his death and the
end of my world as I knew it? Somehow I think… No.

“So, my husband is a wolf-killer.” I swallowed past
the dryness in my mouth, past the lump in my throat, as I remembered the band
of gold he gave me on our third anniversary. “Why?” The thick woven blankets
from the market. The new axe he bought himself. The shawls, dresses and cloaks.
“Oh, God.” My cherry wood trunk…

“The night you were bitten, a pack of Weres went after
the men in your village responsible for the death of a teenager who’d wondered
beyond our safe zone. Glenn was one of those men. The teenager had been missing
nearly a whole day when they’d found her. She’d been caught in a bear trap—,”

I swallowed convulsively.

“—then had her throat slit and her pelt removed.”

I might throw up at any moment.

“Her body was found by our search party, the rot
scented out, in a cave high up in the cliff face, along with the remains of
several other wolves. Immortal and wild.”

Our cabin repairs and new furniture, acquired over
time, but excessive in those times. How could I not have seen? Luxuries bought
at the expense of innocent lives.

And yet…

And yet,
if
you think back three hundred years, Glenn thought he was only hunting wild
wolves. Not only was he making a profit, but he was keeping safe the people he
loved. Wolf attacks weren't common, but a predator in the area is enough to freak
out any human, especially one as fond of children as Glenn was. So, in his
mind, was he evil, or was he just ignorant? Glenn’s heart had always been in
the right place. I couldn’t believe he’d intentionally go out and murder… He
was a good man. I have no doubt of that.

Ambrose,
however, was a whole different kettle of fish.

“Why does
Des call
me
wolf-killer?” My voice was void of emotion, my expression
blank.

Vince
stared right back at me. “Many believe you were aware of your husband’s
activities.” His hand brushed my hair again, a slight tugging where he pulled
my braid free, and I tilted my head at him.

“But you
don’t believe that.”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because
I could smell your honesty and your grief, and your heartbeat told me you
weren’t lying.” He leaned toward me, and cupped my face in warm, calloused
hands. “When the wolves went to take their blood feud, they were too late. When
they got to your cottage, a Vampire was there.”

I stared
at him, uncomprehending as his fingers threaded through my now-loose hair.

“A wolf
didn’t rip out your husband’s throat, Red. A Vampire did.”

Black
hair, pale skin, a voice as rich as wine and as smooth as honey. He bit me too,
feeding on the blood weeping from the wolf’s bite. He fed me his blood when I
was too weak to act on my disgust to refuse him. All the strength I had left
went into lifting the axe and ramming it into his face. He’d staggered back,
cursing words I didn’t understand.

“But—”

“The wolf
who bit you was trying to save you.”

My mind
flashed through my memories of that night. They zipped past behind my eyes as
fast as I could process them. I never saw the wolf rip out Glenn’s throat, and
I always thought the Vampire was trying to save us from the wolf. Not the other
way around. “But I saw him—”

“Did you?”
Vince interrupted, his ice-blue eyes never leaving mine. “Or did you only think
you did?”

The dark
blur sitting low over Glenn’s body…
it had been the wolf…right?

“How did
the wolf get from Glenn to you so fast? You said the wolf ran off before you
got to it, then tackled you from the side. Weres are quick, but not that
quick.” He tugged a wavy strand of my hair.

I think
his constant touching was all that was grounding me. Gentling…
Clever puppy.

“What if
the wolf was trying to save you from the Vampire?”

The image
of something dark hovering over Glenn kept flaring in my mind, along with the
memory of the impact of the wolf hitting me. The blurred, pale face only inches
from mine and that voice that lulled… It had been over three hundred years ago,
my memories could be flawed but…something in my gut said Vince might be onto
something, but I would never be sure.

Hindsight
is a bitch. “Why was a Vampire after Glenn?”

Vince
shrugged. “Why did he bite you after the wolf did?”

“Probably
because I was dying.”

“True,”
Vince conceded, “but that doesn’t explain his interest in Glenn.”

“Do you
know who the Vampire is?”

“His name
is probably in the archive with the statements. We have a lot of Vampires on
file that have had direct interaction with our ancestors.”

“Like a
government database?” I perked up with interest.
What kind of pack keeps Vampire
records?
Once again, I got the impression that Vince and his lieutenants
were more than they presented themselves to be. “Vampires and their Sires on
file, eh?”

And then
something clicked.

Look
to the sire.
Natasha’s
last words slammed through my brain so hard and fast that for a moment I was
giddy with realization.  I gripped Vince’s sleeve. “The buried file!” I jumped
to my feet, dragged Vince with me, and bellowed, “Fletch!” Just as the back
screen door flew open and narrowly missed my nose.

“I broke
it!” Fletch grinned breathlessly. “I broke the code!” I grabbed his shirt and
stared intently into his bloodshot eyes.

“What is
it?” I demanded, practically shaking him.

His smile
dropped. “Now there’s the thing.”

Bloody
hell.

Jade and
Fletch’s rented house was bigger than I had thought. Not only did they have
four bedrooms upstairs, each with an en suite, but two of them had balconies. Downstairs,
in addition to the lovely kitchen I’d made a mess of, and the roomy lounge
where a dozen people could laze about quite comfortably, it also had a pantry,
a utilities room, and two additional large rooms that they used as offices.

I had a
brief chat with Jade about the state of her club and the health of her
employees. Some had taken themselves off to healers, such as the snake Shifters
who had had the misfortune to be dancing right in front of the bomb blasts.
After that, I headed off to find Fletch’s little hide-away.

Fletch’s
office-away-from-the-office smelled like lemons, pomegranates and the clinical
spice that technology has. His new toy, which he took great pleasure in telling
me was my next security up-grade, was a veritable portable interface. It
reacted to some snazzy little two-finger gloves that glowed blue when he
touched the screen, and a little head unit that looked like a really
light-weight pair of blue-lit spectacles. I was starting to think Fletch had a
thing for blue. They made him look like a handsome geek and turned his lavender
eyes a funky shade of pink. His hands flew through the stream of data running
over a section of the interface lit up before him, and if I hadn’t been so
utterly baffled by what I was seeing, I might have been overwhelmingly awed.

I stared
at the screen scrolling random numbers and letters like something from “The
Matrix”, and felt my brain slowly begin to implode as it struggled to make
sense of the gibberish.

Fletch
was rambling on about the technicalities of decoding a half-file, flicking bits
and pieces in and out of the stream with his fingers, and it only seemed to add
to my complete and unreserved confusion. I blinked and tried to convince myself
that this stream of gibberish might just lead us to what I was hoping; the reason
Natasha wanted us to go after Ambrose’s sire.
My sire.
There was no
proof, according to what Vince could recall from the wolfy archive, that the Vampire
had ever been killed. Despite rumors, he might still be out there somewhere,
incognito. If he was out there, I’d find him.

“So, the
code is incomplete?” I asked slowly, enunciating each word as my mind tried to
unscramble itself.

“Everything
on this stick is complete,” Fletch insisted. “But it’s only half of the whole.”

“What
does that mean?” Felix asked, leaning on the back of my chair, smelling like
the coffee he was drinking and anise, as well as the impatience he was trying
to shove down.

I looked
up at him, wanting to touch him and get some attention, some touch-hungry
affection. But a useless sense of obligation to the husband I once had, and
guilt for my one and only kiss with Felix, kept me still. The Vampire’s
attention remained focused solely on Fletch and his interface.

“Basically,
there’s another USB out there with the other half of this mystery encrypted on
it.” Fletch gestured at the gap-filled muddle of figures on his screen. “Once I
have the other half, we’ll know what your friend was trying to keep secret.”

And
I’ll know if my theory is right.

Felix
looked down at me and I met his jade-colored eyes, and by the brief flare of
heat that sparkled a bright lime in them, I wasn’t the only one feeling hungry.

“Clever
girl,” I said, voice husky. I cleared my throat. “Breaking it in half and
hiding each half separately.”

“She
enjoyed stories that always had the broken maps scattered across the world.” He
smiled softly.

“Hopefully,
in this case, it’s just Chicago,” Vince murmured from the other side of Fletch,
and Felix’s grin flashed broadly for an instantly. “So, where would your vamp
contact hide her info?”

There was
a long stretch of silence, then, “Bloody hell.” Felix leaned his hands on the
corners of my chair and dropped his head down, exhaling loudly as he stilled in
thought. The urge to reach up and touch him grew. “It has to be at her office.”

“There’s
nowhere else it could possibly be?” I asked, watching him, longing and guilt
intermingling. Those two emotions seemed to be doing that every time I looked
at him, and I don’t think I was the only one who noticed, if Vince’s fidgeting
was anything to go by. “Nowhere else she would hide it where only you would
know?”

“Knowing
Natasha, she was probably more concerned with keeping the information away from
Ambrose and anyone loyal to him.”

“And you
think it’s at her office?” I asked, brows raised.

He gave a
sardonic grin, a dimple flashing briefly and making my heart flutter. “Hidden
in plain sight, just like the last one.”

“Then I
guess that’s where we go tonight.”

Felix
straightened and eyed me warily, Vince stiffening almost as fast. “We?” he asked.

I scowled
and said in a warning tone, “Yes.”

“I can do
this perfectly well on my own.”

“But you
won’t have to.” I smiled wolfishly; all teeth. “Isn’t that nice?”

“Then
I’ll take a Werewolf.”

“Oh, no
you won’t,” I snapped.

Vince
growled. Though I didn’t know if he growled at me or at Felix.

“Red—“
Felix started, glancing at Fletch, who had his gazed fixed doggedly on his
screen and was sifting as quietly as possible. “I don’t think it would be
appropriate—“

“That
your partner accompany you on a B and E?” I asked, blinking innocently, as if
breaking and entering were more important than the fact that we were hunting
the man who used to be my husband. “Why ever not?”

Felix
frowned. Hard. It was like having strips of skin removed like a fast band aid.

“You know
that’s not what I was going to say.”

“I
haven’t the faintest
what
you were going to say, Vampire.” I replied,
pushing myself to my feet and turning for the door. “Most of what you say
lately takes me completely by surprise.”

Felix was suddenly by my side, his hand pressed to my
stomach, halting me. I looked up to find his eyes faintly glittering gold as
his intense gaze bore down on me, heat flooding out from my belly button at the
press of his hand. I swallowed and held utterly still, the warning in that
stare as personal as the touch on my middle.

“We need to have a discussion,” Felix growled, low,
smooth as chocolate. “Alone.”

The low rumbling growl that rolled through the room
was a physical wave of challenge and aggression, and as my hair rose on the
back of my neck, I glanced behind me to see Vince’s eyes go wolf-pale and lips
curl back from elongated canines. Waves of Alpha power lapped at my skin, but
Felix didn’t take his hand off my stomach, or his eyes off my face.

“Felix—”

“I suggest you reign in your wolf, Alpha.” Felix
interrupted, his tone flat and dominant and enough to make Vince snarl louder.

The Were flew forward, flowing with lethal intent
across the room.

I spun away from Felix and slapped my hand into
Vince’s chest. It was like hitting steal, but the Were stopped dead, lips still
pulled back and eyes glowing an icy near-white.

“I’m okay.” I murmured softly, and Vince’s fingers
threaded through the loose strands of hair hanging down towards the base of my
spine before he finally looked away from Felix. The dismissal was clear. Vince
was basically saying that Felix wasn’t a threat, and from the stark burst of
sourness in the air, it irritated Felix all too well.

“He should not touch you unless invited,” Vince told
me, his voice gravelly and low, his hand lifting to brush my unbound hair back
from my face.

“I know, and he won’t again.” I looked over my
shoulder at the Vampire who had my emotions all buggered up. “Will you?”

Felix flared his nostrils in annoyance. “Unless
invited.”

I swallowed. That statement left the definition of
‘invited’ totally un-clarified. If I did something that he considered an
invitation, I doubt I had the strength or will to deny him, however strong my
guilt.

“We’ll be in one of the spare rooms,” he said, and then
the Vampire turned his back, feeding Vince the same insult he’d sent earlier.

You are no threat to me.

I rolled my eyes as I turned away from the Alpha and
followed the Vampire out of the office.
Men. All as bad as each other.

I followed Felix up the stairs and turned left to the
spare rooms, rather than right to Fletch and Jade’s. I could smell them
faintly, all white orchid, lemons and pomegranates. The musky scent of wolves
came from the first door we passed, layered with Mark’s spicy aroma, Des’s shockingly
delicate enticement, and Vince’s potent Alpha sensuality. And through it all I
could smell Felix. I could smell the predator in him coming to the fore,
enhancing the icy crispness in his scent while sharpening the anise.

As he swung the door open, an intense wash of his
scent smoothed over me, and I had to grit my teeth from giving a shuddering
sigh of delight. Damn Vampires and their damn intoxicating perfumes. One sniff
and you can see why Mina was helpless against Vlad.

The instant the door closed, Felix began to close in,
never taking his eyes off me. But I couldn’t look at him at all. I looked at
everything but. The room was simple, tidy, all teals and chocolates and little
accents of both in the wallpaper and accessories, the dark wood furniture all
matching and the bed a four poster…which made me blush right up to the tips of
my ears. The carpet squished under my feet, and I couldn’t help but admire the
thick curtains and the plush down comforter lying across the foot of the bed. I
stared longingly at the little arm chair tucked into the corner, and then Felix
was too close to ignore.

Leaning back away from him wasn’t an option, since his
arm snaked around me the moment I thought of it, so all I could do was peer up
at him through my lashes, inhale his aroma, and wait to see what he would do.

“He’s not the man you married anymore, Red.”

I stiffened, all thoughts of possibly being seduced
gone in an instant. No need to point out exactly who ‘he’ was. “I am overly
aware of that, Vampire.”

“You may be aware,” his breath puffed over my face,
his lips close enough to brush mine, “but I very much doubt you are
unaffected.”

“Of course I’m not unaffected!” I hissed. “I mourned
him for three hundred years.”

“And that is exactly why I don’t think you should go.”

I yanked myself out of his hold, wrenching my shoulder
with the force it took to shove away, but not showing it as I glared at him. “I
may have mourned the man that I married, who happens to bare a passing
resemblance to Ambrose, but my Glenn was never a murderer.”

“The face of a loved one will always make you
hesitate, even when it’s the murderer wearing that face.”

“This isn’t my first hunt, Felix.”

“No, but it’s the first one that directly affects your
perspective.”

“My husband is dead. He isn’t Ambrose.”

“Are you telling me or you?”

“You, damn it! My husband was not a killer.”

“But he’s honed his skinning skills.”

The crack of my hand hitting his face was loud in the
quiet of the room, and rang in my ears like the throb through my hand. I didn’t
even know I’d lifted my hand to slap him until I’d done it. I covered my mouth
and stared at Felix’s turned cheek, at the pink stain of my hand print coming
up on his pale skin. I’d lashed out, angry, not at him, but at myself. The realization
was instant and icy cold.

Because I know he’s right.

“Oh, my God,” I whispered. “I’m so sorry. Felix, I’m
so sorry.”

Slowly his head turned back to me, and his eyes were
downcast. He lifted his hand and snaked his fingers behind my nape and pulled
me to him, wrapping his arms around me even as I mumbled apologies into my
hands, into his shoulder.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” was his only reply.

My hand stung even as I gripped the dark material of
his shirt, my eyes burning as I blinked furiously to keep from crying. “Oh, but
you had every right too,” I whispered, on a shuddering breath. “You don’t ‘alf
bring out the worst in me, Vampire.”

I felt him smile briefly against my neck. “Feeling’s
mutual, pet.” He lifted his head, and when I met his gaze, his face was drawn in
serious lines, despite his lighter tone.

Before he could speak though, I interrupted him. “I’m
still going with you.”

He snapped his mouth shut, then said after a moment,
“On one condition.”

I frowned at him suspiciously.

“You drink from me again.” The flush that shot through
my body was instant and undeniable. My brain might be saying ‘fuck, no’ but my
body was all for the ‘hell, yeah!’

Traitorous body.

“Felix,” I said, very slowly, gently extricating
myself from his arms, culpability making my blood cool quick. “I
really
don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“You need to be at maximum strength and if you don’t
drink you aren’t going.”

I scowled. “You can’t stop me.”

“Maybe not on my own, but I bet three Weres, two Shifters,
plus me could.”

I couldn’t believe he would do that. And I couldn’t
believe the others would do that.

Then again…

“I want it in a glass then—”

“It’s better from the source.”