Winter Wolf (28 page)

“He’ll probably find some way to approach us and ask one—or both—of us out for an evening of fun,” Amber replied, setting her menu down. “Are you sure about this?”

“He’s dangerous,” I replied.

“That’s why I’m asking if you’re sure about this.”

“Already bought the shoes and purse,” I pointed out. When the waiter came, we ordered. Amber nodded her acceptance, and we talked about harmless things, like her car and my work, while I studied our target.

~Prey,~
the book whispered. I nudged my messenger bag with my toe.
~Kill the monster.~

The book and I agreed on that much, at least: monsters needed to be hunted. If I had to buy a frilly dress to kill the man stalking and raping women, I decided it was worth the price—even if Richard’s bank account paid for it.

Even if it meant I had to become a monster myself in the process.

~You’re not like that thing,~
the book informed me.
~You protect your pack. Alpha. It hunts prey, not to protect, but to devour.~

But I wasn’t a Fenerec and I didn’t have a pack. It didn’t change the fact if I had a chance at him, I’d take it. While I watched him under the guise of fiddling with the dessert menu, he spent his time observing the women nearby, his eyes those of a predator. I clenched my teeth, my anger rising. He wouldn’t hurt anyone else, not me, and definitely not Amber.

There wouldn’t be any more victims.

Just like that, I understood the Inquisition. They hunted those who preyed on those who couldn’t defend themselves. In some cases, like mine, they went further than normal, equipping me to defend myself. But unlike the other women he preyed on, I had power. If I wanted to, with all of the electricity around me, I could kill the killer. My power waited for me to unleash it on the monster seated near the statues. I could end our hunt within moments, but I didn’t.

If I did, the Inquisition would hunt me as I hunted him, and its lethal gaze would turn on Amber.

So I waited.

~~*~~

Our prey stalked us from Caesar’s Palace to the Bellagio, where we both bought dresses for a night on the town. I picked mine to cover my scars. Amber picked hers to show off her lithe figure.

Both of them had slits up the sides so we could strap guns to our legs. I couldn’t help but giggle at the thought of posing for pictures in the dress, showing off my legs and my Beretta at the same time.

If Richard wanted a photograph in exchange for the dress, I would oblige.

“You’re in a good mood,” Amber said as we waited in line to catch a cab back to the Venetian. “What’s up?”

“Does your phone have a timer for the pictures?”

“What?” She glanced at me, baffled.

“Action poses.”

She was still laughing when it was our turn to get a cab. “The Venetian,” I told the employee organizing the line for the taxis. He blew his whistle and when the next cab pulled up, he opened the door for us while the driver popped his trunk for our things.

Like everything else, we paid with Richard’s card. When we arrived, we hurried to the elevator, making sure our stalker didn’t follow us into the hotel. I grinned at Amber as the door shut, leaving us alone. “Evasion successful.”

“Except he knows which hotel we’re staying at now,” Amber grumbled.

“I thought that was a good thing. He might show up tonight.” I pressed the button for our floor, whistling a little tune to myself. We went up silence, dragging our bags to the room.

“He might, but I don’t like hunting him so close to home base,” Amber grumbled.

“I like it, gives me time to set up.” Without knowing what tricks the serial killer had in his arsenal, I wanted time to prepare for him. If we lured him to the penthouse suite, I suspected I could have a few surprises waiting for him.

~I can help,~
the book said cheerfully.

“I was counting on it,” I mumbled to the book as I dropped my messenger bag on the table.

“Did you say something?” Amber looked up from sorting through our shopping bags.

“Do you think the Inquisition wants this guy alive?” I asked.

Amber shook her head. “No. If they wanted him alive, they would have sent a team to retrieve him. And anyway, it’d be cruel not to kill him. The Inquisition would torture him to find out what he was up to and why.”

“So he doesn’t even get a trial?”

“No trial, not jury, just a judge and executioner—in this case, me. It bothers me. I don’t even know what he is and I won’t find out.”

“There’s nothing normal about what he’s done. I mean, take a look at women’s faces,” I replied with a shrug. “There’s nothing normal about that.”

Amber grimaced, shaking her head. “There’s has to be something more to it than that. Too simple. Who kills so many women without a
reason
? He had to have a reason for it. Could he be a Normal and we’re just assuming he’s not?”

I pulled the book out of my bag, as well as my stones and
debens
, setting them aside before unloading my Beretta. “One or two I could believe, but eight or nine of them? All with that same expression? I don’t think so. Did the files mention anything about drugs? Drugs could do that, I guess.”

“They were clean,” Amber replied.

I considered using the book to do as I had done for Scott, but shuddered at the thought of experiencing another death. Maybe I could learn what the killer had done to the women, but I couldn’t bring myself to actually do it. It was one thing to speculate and another to experience.

I didn’t want to remember what it felt like to die again.

“He knows this is our hotel. We play the high stakes here tonight, and we lure him here. Then we deal with him, if he proves to be our killer.”

“He is,” Amber said, her voice full of conviction.

“How do you know?”

“I’m a fire witch, Nicole. Some of us deal with heat and flame. Others see souls.” She shuddered, hugging herself.

“What did you see?”

“Darkness and lots of it. Evil. That’s all I can think of. He was pure evil.”

“A monster, then. Does it matter if he’s a Normal or supernatural?” I picked up my rhodonite, rolling it between my hands. The gypsy believed it would bring luck, but in my hands, it would bring nothing but death. Would my calculated murder of a murderer make me a monster, too?

~No. You’re protecting the weak.~

I ignored the book’s opinion, continuing to roll the stone from hand to hand. The moonstone and citrine were pretty, but there was something warm and soothing about the rhodonite. Did I favor it or did it favor me?

Setting aside the mottled sphere, I picked up the moonstone. It chilled in my hands, as if it reached the conclusion it didn’t like me. I couldn’t blame it. Soon enough, I would have blood on my hands, even if I wasn’t the one to pull the trigger. I didn’t know or care what the moonstone represented, but I got the feeling death wasn’t its domain.

~A healing stone,~
the book agreed.
~Put it on my cover. I’ll talk to it.~

Startled, I obeyed the book, setting the sphere on its stand and placing it on the blue leather.

Healing was what I needed; a cure, a hope for the Fenerec, something to make up for my inability to save Scott, and something to atone for the sin I would commit when I murdered the serial killer at Amber’s side.

No wonder it didn’t like me. Maybe I wasn’t a monster yet, but would that change when I killed another human being?

Even if that ‘human’ was a murdering rapist.

“What do you want to set up?” Amber asked, watching me.

Electricity was my domain, and I still remembered the jolting agony of being tased. I picked up the rhodonite and the citrine, carrying them to the smaller bedroom. Without knowing what our prey would do, I needed to make certain I set traps everywhere. I doubted I’d be able to charge the stones with enough power to kill someone, but if all else failed, maybe I could immobilize him long enough to execute him. I shivered at the unpleasant thought.

If my stones fired, it meant we were too close to being victims, just like the women from the photographs.

I halted at the threshold, staring at the bed. “Hey, Amber?”

“What is it?”

“You’re the trial, judge, and jury, aren’t you?”

The witch sighed, joining me in the hallway. “Sometimes. By the time the Inquisition sends me out, all I am is an executioner. They don’t send a fire witch after someone when they aren’t sure of their mark. We can see the truth, usually. Sometimes the Inquisition is wrong, but it’s rare. But that’s why they send us. To make sure they get the right person. Sometimes I’m grateful I can see what I see. I can go to bed knowing I helped people.”

“But it doesn’t change anything, does it? You’ve still killed someone.”

“It’ll change you, as it did me. But you decide how you change, Nicole. Will you walk away broken, or will you be able to accept what you’ve done and why you did it? That’s all on you. You’ve seen the photos of what he’s done. You’ve seen the purposeful way he’s stalking for targets. He means to kill again. Us, if he has his way. If it helps, don’t think about him as a human anymore. To me, he’s a rabid animal needing to be put down before he hurts someone. What will he be to you?”

I didn’t have an answer, so I stepped into the bedroom and placed the citrine on the nightstand next to the bed. “Come touch this.”

Amber joined me, setting her fingertips on the stone. “What are you doing?”

“Ever been tased?” I asked.

Her wince told me she had, so instead of waiting for her answer, I channeled some of the electricity I’d harvested into the stone into her. She jerked away with a yelp.

“Ouch.” She rubbed her hands together. “That’s not going to stop anyone.”

“Touch it again, I won’t hurt you. I’m going to turn this into a taser,” I explained, adjusting how I held the stone. While hesitant, Amber rested her fingertips on the top of the sphere. “I don’t want it to hit you, so you need to be here so the stone recognizes you.”

“You act like it’s sentient.”

I smiled a little. “Who says it isn’t?”

“What do I need to do?”

“Just keep touching the stone.” I sat on the bed without letting go of the rhodonite. Then I closed my eyes and focused on the electricity around me. Ever since I had witnessed Scott’s death, gathering energy had ceased being automatic. It felt strange purposefully drawing the energy from the hotel into me so I could channel it into the rhodonite. With the same hunger of a cell phone, the stone ate all of the energy I fed it. I didn’t use a spell to communicate my desire to the rhodonite, I remembered the debilitating agony of electricity coursing through me, robbing me of my ability to move or thing, quelling me with pain. I also poured all of my hopes and worries into it.

The stone warmed and while it couldn’t speak, I felt its satisfaction, as if it understood it was meant to protect us—even if it meant hurting another to do it.

I directed energy into the rhodonite until I doubted it could contain any more. Opening my eyes, I let out my breath in a sigh.

The rhodonite glowed with a faint rosy light and Amber was staring at the rock with wide eyes. “It’s
alive,
” she whispered.

“Is it?” I couldn’t help myself; I smiled and patted the stone affectionately. “This one likes me. The next one doesn’t. Hopefully it’ll agree to cooperate.”

~It will,~
the book announced.
~I took the liberty of showing it your memories of what this monster has done. It hates him more than it hates you.~

“Why not?”

I shrugged. “You’d have to ask it. I’m a wizard. Maybe that’s why.”

~It is,~
the book confirmed.
~You are not the first wizard it has met.~

“I never thought stones could have feelings,” she said, her tone a little awed. “I never even thought to look. They’re
rocks.
I mean, sure, we use them to store energy, but they’ve never felt anything like
this
.”

“That rock is far, far older than you and I will ever be. Old things have power.” I stared at Amber, amazed she wasn’t aware of that simple fact.

~You are a wizard. She is not. You do not see the world with the same eyes. You are a hunter. She is forced to hunt. It is not her nature. It is yours.~

Considering my version of hunting involved the fridge, I ignored the book’s words as nonsense.

“You’d think a witch would have noticed by now. We use focal crystals all of the time.”

I shrugged. “It’s a tool to you, nothing more. Maybe that’s why you couldn’t see it, or feel it. Why look for something you don’t believe is there? It’s a stone. It doesn’t breathe or move. Science says they’re non-living matter. Have you ever tried looking?”

“No, I haven’t,” Amber admitted.

“I don’t see anything either,” I confessed, heading to the sitting room to retrieve the moonstone. While it still felt hostile, it warmed in my hand a little, as if willing to bend to my will—this time. Amber followed me. I considered the opalescent sphere. Of all of the stones, it was likely the most powerful. But where to put it? The citrine needed to be close to be effective. That left the large sitting room, where the moonstone’s influence could reach as much of the penthouse suite as possible. “I feel them.”