Waiting for Darkness (Blood Martyr) (13 page)

“
And the owner of this establishment?”

The outside
light glinted off the silk of her pale rose dressing gown, turning it dark red one moment, and then palest pink the next. “That I am not. Won’t you come in?”

She ushered us into a flawlessly decorated entryway, complete with nondescript paintings of ladie
s and landscape. Hard to believe we waited in the threshold of a slap and tickle club.

“
Please. What can I do for you this early morning?”

Shit. It was almost five, and the sun would be up in no less than twenty minutes. Unless someone had a pair of ultra-
dark sunglasses, there was no way I was leaving this place until tonight. Fuck. I’d really been hoping I could’ve gotten this shit done before the sun rose. Guess not.

Mitch pulled out a picture of Jamison from his coat pocket. The black and white one of h
im that I loved the most. In it, he smiled widely and radiated so much good charm it made me happy just looking at it.

But not this time.

“This is the man we are looking for.”

A flicker of emotion graced her face before she schooled her features into blan
d politeness. He’d either been here, or was still here. But whatever it was, she had seen him, and that was all I needed to know.

“
I’m sorry, but I’m afraid I’ve not seen that man here,” she said with a courteous smile, but by then, it was already too late.

Mitch exchanged a glance with me. He
’d seen the way her face changed too. He knew she was lying, and he tucked the picture back into his pocket. “I see. Then I see there is not much else we can do.”

Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion, red lips set into a
n O. “Excuse me?”

I didn
’t even know my hands were around her throat and that I backed her into a wall until the deed was done, until I stared into blue eyes that looked back at me, fear clear in the way her gaze flitted back and forth, unable to focus on me for more than a few seconds.

“
Now, you listen, and listen good. We could do this the hard way or the easy way. Hard way being me letting you go and bringing Jamison to me, and the easy way being me just ripping the head off your shoulders and tearing through every goddamned room in this hellhole before I find him.” I showed her my fangs, and she blanched. “So? What’s it going to be? Easy or hard?”

She froze, lips trembling like petals blowing in the wind, and I squeezed harder, her bones shifting under m
y hands. “Well?”

“
Tanith!” Mitch barked.

“
Well, look who’s here. If it isn’t the bitch witch from the West.”

I last heard that high, feminine voice sixty years ago, and sixty years ago I thought it was going to be the last time I would ever hear it.

Not bothering to lessen the hold on Madame Gabriella’s neck, I turned around to face the one vampire who turned my undead life into a living hell before I finally did her in. Or so I thought. She was partially responsible for my transformation into a beast, before Jamison came into my life and civilized me again.

“
Hello, Raylene. Nice to know you’re fucking with my life. Again,” I said sweetly, and then gave a quick squeeze that made the madam gurgle. “I could’ve sworn I killed you, but I guess you’re like a goddamn cockroach. They just never know when to die and stay dead, you know?”

She simpered back at me, completely naked except for a pair of white stilettos with wickedly sharp heels. Even with the six-inch height boost, she was still shorter than me, and I li
ked that. I liked smiling down at her.

“
Oh, now that’s a bit harsh, don’t you think, Tanith? I’d like to think of my miraculous return to life as a phoenix that’s been consumed in flames, only to emerge from it, a mere fledging…destined to become a great phoenix again.”

I snorted. “
Great phoenix? You’re fucking kidding me, right?” I turned to Mitch. “Go and look for Jamison.”

Raylene cleared her throat. “
I don’t think so. Both of you are going to stay here. Both of you are going to die here.”

I killed her b
efore. I could do it again. “Mitch, just go.”

He nodded and disappeared around the corner, leaving me alone with a slowly asphyxiating madam and a naked vampire.

“So. Is this piece of shit place yours?” To be honest, the mansion was beautiful in all respects, but I enjoyed pushing all her buttons in all the wrong ways. “God, your interior decorator sucks ass, Raylene.”

By the way her lips thinned into a barely visible line, I figured she was the one to decorate the scarlet tinted walls with gold embossed bo
rders set near the ceilings. If there was anything good I could say about her, it was that she had an eye for color.

I sighed. God. I just wanted to find Jamison and go home.

“Look, Raylene. I didn’t come here spoiling for a fight. My friend’s missing, and I was told he was here. In fact, I’d already be out of here if your fucking madam didn’t lie to me.”

Said madam gasped, and I relaxed my hands a bit. I didn
’t want her to die. Not just then, in any case.

Raylene laughed then. She had a charming laugh, al
l tinkling bells and wind chimes. I almost forgot the entire reason of coming here, and I thought back to a time when we weren’t always like this. We were, hard as it was to believe, friends. Rather good friends. Until a man had to come between us and screwed us over. Men. They do it all the goddamn time.

“
Are you talking about that pretty boy? The one with the long red hair all the way down his back? Oh, he’s so fun to play with!”

Unconsciously, my entire body tensed, and the madam managed one tiny squeak
before the bones in her neck collapsed under the sudden pressure. I let go, but it was already too late. She slid down the wall, blood trickling from her nose and mouth. I killed her, and I felt bad. Not because it was murder, but because I could’ve used her as a bargaining chip. Her for Jamison.

Now I didn
’t have a bargaining chip, so I was going to have to kill Raylene.

And this time I was going to make sure she stayed dead.

Four deaths. In one night. It
had
to be a record.

“
Oh, did you have to do that?” Raylene stamped her foot, like a girl who lost a doll instead of having an employee die on her. Her having been turned at the age of sixteen only solidified that illusion. “Finding women like her is terribly hard.”

I wiped my hands on my pants, feeling di
rty beyond all redemption.

“
Tell me where Jamison is, and I’ll think about letting you live.”

Her eyes widened, mouth gaping open. “
You’re kidding me, right? You’re in my home, Tanith. Do you really think you can kill me? Don’t you think you ought to be the one groveling on your knees?” She winked, and something horrible rose in me. “By the way, he has such delicious blood! I was hard pressed not to take it all. So addicting. I can see why you would want him back.”

No. No. No. Not Jamison!

I didn’t know I had spoken aloud until she laughed, head thrown back in unrestrained mirth.

“
Yes. Yes, yes! Of course, Jamison! You could just imagine how unbelievably lucky I felt when he showed up on my front door! He said he wanted to be stronger…to be stronger than someone else, to be their dominant. I knew he was talking about you. I could smell you all over him. Not to mention he still had the marks on his neck.”

Her arms went around her stomach as she bent over double, shrieking with laughter. “
I really am the luckiest girl, don’t you agree?”

“
Shut up.” My body grew cold, and my hands clenched tight into fists, nails digging deep into my palm, deep enough that blood started to drip down my hands. I couldn’t remember the last time I wanted to kill someone this badly. But I had enough common sense to know I couldn’t just throw myself at her. I was stronger, but she was far more ruthless and cunning.

Wiping blood tears from the corners of her large brown eyes, she continued to giggle softly.

“So much fun I had. Of course, I knew he was a witch. That damned smell of trees. I had Gabriella draw a circle of protection around the bed so he couldn’t do any magic.”

My knees buckled from the sheer shock, from the utter horror. No magic. No weapons. No way to defend himself.

She could have killed him, and he couldn’t have done anything about it.

Images of a dead Jamison, of a blood-covered Jamison, of a Jamison with unblinking eyes, flies flying over his mutilated body, maggots weaving in and out of his disemboweled stomach ran th
rough my mind, and I hit the carpet on my knees, the impact jarring me back into reality.

“
Now, that’s what I like to see. You on your knees. So? Will you beg for your life and the lives of your two friends?” she asked in honeyed tones, inspecting her fingernails.

Forget common sense.

Forget sensibility.

Forget about everything else but the anger.

Let the anger in.

Let it consume.

I struggled back to my feet, vision spinning, the vivid red of the hallway the only thing I could focus on.

There was no way Ray
lene was going to get away from me.

No way in bloody fucking hell.

CHAPTER TWELVE

“Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.”

She stood there, hands on her narrow, girlish hips that had not yet begun to bloss
om and never would. She was turned right as she was going through puberty and would forever look underaged. I didn’t think there could be anything worse than looking fourteen forever. I mean, at least I’d never get carded if I ever walked into a place that served alcohol.

Her on the other hand…
I could sort of see why she turned out the way she did.

“
I never expected to meet you in this fashion, Tanith. Of course, I knew you’d come for your pretty boy, but I never thought, well….” She waved a hand vaguely in the air, and her nails sparkled crimson in the soft candlelight. So red. What the hell did she use? Something that vivid could not have come from a bottle. “So, are you not going to get back on your knees and beg? Because I was rather expecting you to.”

I shifted on my feet, spacing them out just a little bit. If I had to fight to get Mitch and Jamison out of here, alive, then I
’d do it. If I had to kill Raylene, then I’d do that too.

“
Sorry to disappoint, Raylene. But I’m not going to grovel.”

Her smile
grew frigid. “Is that so? Well, I suppose I’ll have to make you.”

She moved, and I darted back
—too late. Her knifelike nails slashed into my side, tearing through my clothes and biting deeply into my skin.

It hurt. It really fucking hurt, and my legs weake
ned as I staggered back, clamping a hand to the wound. Blood seeped through the gaps of my fingers and dripped down on my pants. Ugh, blood was so hard to get out of clothes.

“
Aw, that’s no fun. Too easy. I was expecting you to dodge that. I guess it’s true what they say about you turning civilized.” She licked at her bloody fingertips and then promptly spat on the carpet. “Disgusting! I just don’t understand how humans can taste so sweet, but our blood is just so bitter. I mean, you’d think what with us taking their blood…but I guess our body just processes it in a different way, don’t you think?”

This felt positively unreal, to be having a conversation like this, with her crouching in nothing but stilettos, and me up against a wall, my wound not clotting.
Fuck. It should’ve healed by now.

I needed blood. If I didn
’t get blood in me soon, I just might bleed to death.

But there was no one there. The madam was already dead, and I couldn
’t very well drink Raylene’s blood.