Читать книгу The Vampire Hunter - Michele Hauf - Страница 8

Chapter 2

Leather coat draped over one arm, Kaspar—or rather, the man who allowed those he kissed to call him Kaz—stood in her doorway, not crossing the threshold. Zoë could usually feel her wards tingle when an unwanted visitor activated them. Not even a ting in the air. He was human; she was sure of it.

Yet it was well past midnight. She never received such late callers.

“You found me,” she stupidly said, glancing over her shoulder and up the stairs. The dust mix needed to sit for an hour before she reduced it, so she could manage a chat.

He rapped the bright door. “Figured out what cerulean looks like. It’s so bright it glows even in the dark. Nobody could miss it. You going to invite me in?”

“Depends on what you want.”

“I like a cautious woman. Smart. Especially this time of night. I’ve already said what I want. Another kiss. In fact, I figure I should get one kiss for every one of those bastards I laid flat. Four down. Four kisses.”

“You’ve already taken two kisses.”

He stepped up to the threshold, towering over her, but not making her feel small in any way. “Two left.”

And too many ways she imagined those kisses. Long and lush, deep and delving, hot and achy. But she hardly knew the guy.

Zoë leaned up and kissed him quickly. “There’s one.”

“That wasn’t a kiss!”

“You didn’t specify length.”

He beat the door frame with a fist, but as a sign of his own frustration, nothing threatening.

“We’ll call that one half a kiss,” Zoë conceded, because she wasn’t going to deny herself this man’s delicious kisses. She may be a bit of a recluse, but she wasn’t a hermit. And oh, but this felt like some kind of faery tale when the handsome prince showed up to woo the princess with glass slipper in hand.

Not that there was any slipper she could see. What girl could walk on glass, anyway, without breaking it? She preferred to keep bloodshed out of her faery tales.

Zoë crooked her finger, inviting him inside with a silent dare. Her normal cautionary inhibitions slipped away as she stood in Kaz’s intent brown gaze. Sort of brown and gold blended together, she decided of his eye color. Freckled eyes alive with expression. She could stare into them all night long.

Kaz walked her up against the wall, and braced a forearm against it, paralleling her head.

“Your hair is interesting,” he noted in a bemused tone. He swept his gaze down the white streak that spilled from roots to tips in an inch-wide swath.

“Does it bother you?”

“Not at all. It’s pretty to look at. Like your mouth. Your lips are soft and pink and when you dash out the tip of your tongue like that I want to taste it.”

“What’s stopping you?”

Kiss number three landed on her mouth with a sigh and a press of skin to skin, yet it encompassed things about her that felt needy and wanting. Kissing usually happened in the dark, and during a heated race to sex. She rarely enjoyed a kiss merely for the sake of it. And the thought of starting a race felt wrong.

Such luxury he gifted her. And wrapped in a dreamy kind of faery tale she wanted to read all night long.

Inviting him to taste her breaths, Zoë opened her mouth a little wider. Kaz’s tongue explored and caressed hers. Slow, lazy, he moaned as he placed his palm against her back, gently affirming his control.

And then suddenly the kiss was not there. Instead, Kaz beat the wall beside her head with a fist.

Rudely startled from the amazing fall into bliss, Zoë gaped up at the stranger she had foolishly allowed across her threshold.

“There’s another reason I’m here,” he said. Now his look admonished, yet curiously. “About a matter of something gone missing from my, er...person.”

Zoë flashed him her best innocent cat-burglar smile, and followed with a flutter of how-can-you-not-forgive-me lashes tossed in for good measure. “Something you were carrying before the fight?”

“Yes.”

“Whatever it was, you probably dropped it while beating on those idiots.”

“Possibly, but I looked around and couldn’t find the missing item. I’m inclined to believe this a case of sticky fingers.”

“Huh.” Zoë made a show of looking at her fingers. “My fingers are not at all sticky and—” Was that faery dust embedded in the whorls on her fingertips?

“Sparkly?” Kaz noted the shimmer despite the spare light in the hallway.

She rubbed her hands down her pants legs. “You know us women. Always putting sparkly stuff on our faces and skin. Just some glitter.”

“Give me back what you took, Zoë. Please?”

He said it so gently, and yet with a sure tone of command, she simply nodded and pointed over her shoulder.

“Up there?” he asked.

With a guilty shrug, she offered, “Sometimes I can’t help myself. It’s a habit.” It was also fun, daring and the only way she could find a thrill lately.

“I need it back. Can’t buy those things at the supermarket.”

“I’ll uh, go get it. You wait here.”

But he didn’t wait in the foyer, and instead, followed her up the spiral staircase. Zoë ran the steps, beating him to the fuchsia door and turning to put up her palm.

“This is my private—” She couldn’t call it her spell room. Kisses aside, she didn’t know him well enough for that yet. “Uh—study. You can’t go in there. You’ll mess up, uh...like my vibes and stuff. I’ll grab it and come right out.”

There was no belief in the doubting look he gave her. The things she did to protect the magic were very necessary.

She opened the door and slipped inside, locking it behind her as she did. “Just give me a minute to find it!”

The thing she had taken sat on the floor beside her backpack. Too bad she had to return it. Whatever it was, she liked it. And well—it was his. He had held it in his wide, strong hand. She stroked the column, imagining his grip about it, and then her thoughts strolled to Kaz’s fingers stroking her skin. Slow and soft, like his kiss. Yet also needy, as his kiss had proven.

She clutched the metal column to her chest. Could he be the rescuing knight she’d never known she needed? Did she need rescuing? Well, no. She was perfectly fine, not in any danger. But the idea of him, so masculine and take-charge—who would shove that out their front door?

A rap on the door spoke his impatience. If she were going to claim kiss number four, she’d better play nice and give him back his toy. Besides, the clock was ticking. She needed to tend the ichor blend soon.

Slipping out, without opening the door so wide he might glimpse her spell work, Zoë held out the thing with a sheepish grin.

“The tip popped out accidentally. Sorry. Is it some kind of weapon?”

He claimed it with a snatch, and compressing the side paddles, the stake part snapped back inside the column. “Something like that.”

“You always carry such an interesting weapon on you?”

“Always.”

“Have you...ever used it on anyone?”

“Many times.”

So he was more than an innocent stranger who had happened to pick a fight with four idiots. The man knew how to handle a dangerous situation. So much so, he was always armed.

“Are you like some kind of avenging angel who rescues those in need? Have you ever killed anyone with that thing? The point is very sharp. It’s less like a blade than something you would stab—”

He silenced her curiosity with a punishing yet much-desired kiss. Don’t mess with me, the kiss seemed to say, and don’t ask stupid questions. But do let me take what I want.

Zoë was cool with that. Very cool with that.

The man’s hand glided along her jaw, sending titters of heat down her neck and chest where her nipples tightened in a pleasurable squeeze. He dived deep inside her mouth with his tongue, tasting, touching and divining. She gave him all that he wanted, and he wanted a lot.

She knew nothing about Kaspar who liked to be called Kaz by friends and those who tended to kiss him. Save that his mouth knew exactly how to fit against hers for maximum pleasure. And that the heat of his body against hers, so wide, hard and strong, felt like some kind of ridiculous fantasy in which she was granted everything she had ever desired.

It never worked like that in real life. Not even with a healthy dose of magic tossed in for good measure.

But who was she to argue a moment of serendipity? Because truly, the stars had aligned above her home and the clouds were clearing. Never in her life had Zoë felt so connected to a man she didn’t even know. The thought should frighten her, but instead, it made her want to race to the end to get to the happily-ever-after part because she didn’t want to go through all that harrowing middle stuff.

It was always the middle stuff that screwed up the relationship. Secrets were revealed, bad habits discovered, kinky quirks—

Don’t move so quickly forward. Stay in the here and now, Zoë.

And so she would.

Sighing into the kiss, she tilted her body toward Kaz’s aggressive stance and as their hips met, he drew his fingers down her spine, coaxing her even closer with his touch. Chest to chest, she melted against his heat and strength. He made her feel delicate and pretty and so, so desirable.

A girl could become bewitched by such a kiss. And a bewitched witch was certainly a rare thing.

I want to know bewitchment.

Kaz slowly pulled away, holding her gaze as if the connection of their lips could continue in their eyes. As his thumb traced the scar on her cheek, he studied it, but didn’t say anything or ask the usual questions. She didn’t mind answering, but was impressed that he wasn’t so hung up on the outer surface. Or maybe he was being polite.

Finally, he exhaled, stepped back and tucked away the weapon inside his coat.

“Thanks for the kisses. I’ve work to do,” he declared in that deep, commanding tone that cued her to nod and touch her kiss-burnished lips.

He skipped down the stairs, leaving her floating on a euphoric cloud of desire and wonder, and stretching out a proverbial hand for him to return to her arms.

She was on her way to happily ever after. Her rescuing knight needed to get on the same page as her.

Once at the door, Kaz called up, “I’ll be back!”

“Uh...” What to say to make him stay?

After the front door shut, Zoë fisted the air and growled. Way to drop the ball. She’d had him, and then she had not. He’d wandered out as casually and as quickly as he had appeared.

She shifted her body against the spell-room door, bending her legs to squat, and sat with her legs sprawled out across the floor. Sid nuzzled against her thigh, rubbing a kitty hug along her black pants.

She touched her mouth, still warm from Kaz’s remarkable kisses. She could feel him there and imagined the sensation would not soon leave. Not if she fixed it to memory. Memory was a special kind of magic that anyone could access but few could master. The key was in sorting the good memories from the bad and never letting them intertwine.

She had her share of bad memories. A mother gone too soon, a father forced to leave her life, a friend who had once been a tormentor. But some new memories were forming, and those could only be filed under “spectacular.”

Standing on his back legs, Sid nudged his head along her jaw until Zoë patted him and pulled the fat ball of fur onto her lap to snuggle.

“That man certainly knows how to kiss, Sid. And he will be back, because he won’t be able to stop thinking about me. And that’s not magic, that’s just—” she sighed “—wishful thinking.”

Sid agreed with a meow.

And Zoë decided that the bewitchment had commenced.

* * *

Kaz double-stepped it down the sidewalk that paralleled the street before the Moulin Rouge. The red-and-gold neon lights spinning round the iconic mill wheel flashed across the faces of passersby. As he turned to walk along a row of buildings that reflected the pink, green and yellow neon, he spied the informant he had earlier in the day arranged to meet walking across the Boulevard de Clichy.

He knew he was late. He should count his luck the vamp was still in the area.

Hustling and turning the corner by the Magnum club, Kaz gained on the vampire, who strolled down the Rue Lepic, hands in his pockets, oblivious to the stares he received from the passing women dressed for a night of flirtation and fun. Kaz could have called out, but he wasn’t stupid. Shuffling around a couple walking hand in hand, he landed beside the vampire and slowed his stride.

“You’re late,” the vampire said, not glancing aside.

“Apologies. I got sidetracked.”

Sidetracked kissing a gorgeous kleptomaniac. She could roam those sticky fingers all over him so long as she didn’t steal the merchandise.

And why the hell hadn’t he turned tail and run from her arms? He never followed a woman he’d just met around like a puppy dog. That was not his MO. The job always came first.

“Don’t rush off,” he tried. “I need a few minutes of your time.”

The vampire stopped before a black Aston Martin. Kaz eyed the gorgeous vehicle and deeply regretted his decision to remain carless.

“V12 Zagato,” the vamp offered. “Hot off the production line less than a month ago.”

The curves were insane, not to mention the deep color inlaid with mica flecks that captured the glowing neon lights and flashed like some kind of supernatural conveyance.

“That is—was—a sweet ride,” Kaz corrected as his gaze landed on the smashed front quarter panel, and followed the scrape that arced over the wheel well to end in a crunched side mirror.

“Still is sweet,” the vampire offered. “Just a few dents.”

Dents? More like a major crash. Kaz couldn’t believe the tire was still attached to the axle, let alone in the shape of a circle.

“Get in before someone sees me talking to you, hunter.”

Thankful for the invite, Kaz slid inside the car and had to bend his knees and shift a hip to the side to fit properly. He almost reached to adjust the seat back, but a man never touched another man’s car unless he was directed to do so. Folding his hands across his knees and curling his shoulders slightly forward, he decided to mark this particular model off his wish list. Not that he needed a car to get around Paris. The Metro served him just fine. And a hunter who took the time to find a parking spot would never claim a kill.

Before he could ask a question, Kaz suddenly remembered an important detail about this particular vampire.

Twisting a frantic look over his shoulder, he scanned the backseat, down to the floor and then up along the center divider, and somehow managed to check near his feet, though it was difficult to bend too far forward.

“Green Snake is at home,” the vampire provided. “Chill out, man. Don’t tell me you’re afraid of reptiles?”

Kaz dropped his shoulders, yet they remained slightly curled forward in the cozy confines. “I don’t like surprise reptiles, is all.”

The first time he’d met the vampire, a green mamba snake had curled about his ankle as he’d unknowingly sat in the back of a limousine talking about local vampire tribes. Those things were poisonous. Apparently, though, not to vampires.

“So, Vail—”

“No names!”

He met the vampire’s blue gaze, and did not miss the warning glint of fang between his compressed lips.

“Fine. Sorry.”

It wasn’t as if he hadn’t talked to Vaillant before, and had once even had a drink with him at the Lizard Lounge, sans reptiles. Kaz made a premeditated choice to cater to this vampire’s quirks to stay on his good side. Besides, they weren’t all evil.

“So, Mysterious, Dark-Haired Man Who Has Never Taken A Driving Lesson And Who Wants to Give Me Information, what do you have for me?”

Vail tapped the steering wheel with fingers bejeweled in dark metal and diamonds. Black clothed him from boots to slicked-back hair. He was a vampire who had grown up in Faery (not by choice) and had returned to the mortal realm to claim a dysfunctional family (including a werewolf twin brother) and a faery dust addiction. He was supposedly clean now. If anyone had a finger on the pulse of what was going on with vampires and the dust connection, it was Vaillant.

“This dust blend you told me about is very new.”

“Weeks,” Kaz said. “Just hitting the market. Not many know about it.”

“Exactly. Not sure there even is a market for it yet. When I mention the purple stuff fellow vamps give me a wonky look. Though the one vamp who did know what it was called it Magic Dust. And he was anxious for more. Had to beat him off with a stick.”

Yep, that was the way it worked on vampires. Normal faery dust caused instant addiction. This new stuff compounded that addiction with an unreal craving for sparkly stuff. Only, sometimes the sparklies the dust freaks went after were pieces of jewelry attached to innocent humans.

“Magic Dust. Is that what they call it?”

“Yep.”

Kaz hated that the substance carried an appealing name. Of course, that’s how most drugs were named, to attract attention.

“You know it drives vampires crazy for anything that sparkles?”

Vail studied his knuckles, the diamonds glinting. “Nothing wrong with sparkly stuff.”

“Unless it’s wrapped around some human’s neck, and the vampire decides to tear through it—and skin and bones—in an attempt to feed their addiction.”

“You told me about your friends. I’m sorry, man. That’s rough.”

Robert and Ellen Horst had been murdered last week while in Paris on their honeymoon. They’d called the morning of their arrival, hoping to meet Kaz in a café to catch up. Kaz and Robert had both hung around Madame du Monde’s Dance Emporium a decade earlier for reasons they’d kept to themselves.

Kaz had only arrived at the hospital five minutes before Robert had died. His friend had told him the attacker had fangs and had been crazy for his wife’s diamonds and had growled about needing more dust to keep the high. As he’d exhaled his dying breath, Robert’s hand had fallen open to reveal the fang he’d knocked out of his attacker’s jaw as he’d fought for his and his wife’s lives.

That tooth now sat in Kaz’s front pocket.

“I have no clue where it’s coming from,” Vail offered. “None of the known dealers in FaeryTown, that’s for sure. They’re all sanctioned through the higher-ups, if you know what I mean.”

“What does that mean, exactly? Does someone control all sales of faery dust and ichor?”

Kaz hadn’t a clue about illicit drugs sold amongst the paranormal breeds, and the Order certainly hadn’t an interest in it, either.

“Dust and ichor are two different highs, man. Do you even know how it all works?”

“It’s a drug that makes my job a pain in the ass. What more do I need to know?”

Vail sighed and tapped the steering wheel, then turned to him. “So you’ve got faery dust and faery ichor. The dust is easy to obtain, and it gives a quick high. Very addictive. You get dust directly from the faery, but can also do something to the ichor to make it turn to dust. I’m not sure how that works. But it’s dust form. Right?”

Kaz nodded. He understood that much.

“Vamps deal dust. But not ichor. The Sidhe Cortège controls that.”

“Do I want to know what that is?”

“You should. They’re sort of faery mafia that exist only in the mortal realm.”

“Great.” Yet another wrench tossed into his investigation. “So all ichor goes through this cortège?”

Vail nodded. “A vampire can only get ichor by going to FaeryTown and checking into an ichor den. Or he can find a willing faery and bite her. Ichor straight from the vein is amazing. Or it was. I’m clean now, man. And then there’s the ultimate. The Neverland Fix.”

“Explain.”

“That’s when a vampire has sex with a faery—you know when a faery comes they sort of explode dust all over, right?”

He had not known that. Kaz wasn’t sure he’d ever get the image from his brain.

“So if you bite them and suck out their ichor while they are coming in a cloud of dust it’s like Neverland,” Vail said. “Except, you ain’t never coming back from that one. Total oblivion for the vamp. No chance of returning to sanity. But I’ve heard it’s worth it.”

“Is that so?” Kaz eyed his informant. He knew the vampire was a father and had many friends in the paranormal community. But how much was he keeping to himself? Did he have reason to protect those vamps who dealt dust?

“You going to some kind of AA, Dark One?”

Vail nodded. “Don’t worry about me. Addiction is tough. Since I’ve gotten clean, I fight it every day. Good thing I have Lyric. She’s a million times more appealing than ichor. But still...” He heaved out a sigh.

Kaz had never touched drugs or alcohol, himself. Too many bad memories harbored by those illicit substances. Vail’s sigh said so much that didn’t require words.

Kaz understood addiction because his father was an alcoholic. Okay, so he didn’t understand it, but he did know it when it hit him in the face. The bastard was always ready to punch him whenever he got wasted, which had been all the time. Kaz hadn’t seen him in almost fourteen years, and had no desire for a reunion anytime soon.

“Now that I let my mind wander,” Vail started, “there is a vamp chick who slinks about under the radar. Always into something new. Not attached to a particular tribe, though she does tend to date tribe leaders. She deals dust and has been known to do wet work, as well.”

Sex, drugs and murder? Sounded like a piece of work. “Name?”

Vail held up his palm between the two of them. “There are only two or three vamps who have permission to deal dust in this city. Give me your word that this information did not come from me.”

Kaz slapped his hand into Vail’s in a gentleman’s agreement. “You have my word. I know you supply me with information because you care about your breed. You don’t want to see any of them addicted to the stuff.”

“The vampire’s name is Switch,” Vail said. “I don’t know where to find her, only that she moves around. She’s tall and slender. Aggressive, but attractive in a hooker kind of way.”

“Great. That describes half the female vampires in Paris.”

“Yeah, but you should be able to pick her out by her hair. Half black, half pink, like some kind of cotton-candy machine gone over to the dark side.”

A distinguishing hairstyle? Perfect. It would give Kaz a place to start.

“So you know the names of those two or three who sell the dust? They would be the ones giving Switch the work, right?”

“Yes, but...I don’t have names. Isn’t what I’ve already told you enough?”

It would be a start. “Thanks, Vail—er, Dark Stranger. Give my regards to your wife.” He recalled the Order notes he’d reviewed before coming here tonight. “Did she just have a baby?”

“Our second,” Vail offered with a note of pride. “Sweet little girl. I love her, even when she wakes in the middle of the night yowling like a banshee. Yeah, I’ll tell Lyric you said hello. If you need me...I’ll find you.”

“Cool.”

At the thought of a vampire baby, Kaz quelled the shudder that wanted to give his bones a good shake. Then he prayed he wouldn’t have to stake the little flesh pricker someday.

After shaking Vail’s hand, Kaz got out of the car, stroked the smashed front panel and walked away, hands in his coat pockets, without giving the vampire a glance back.

He lived on the left bank, far from the eighteenth arrondissement. Hopping onto the Metro at the Blanche station, he settled in for the ride.

Once home, he activated the inner wards by closing the four sliding locks on his front door. The Order ensured all their knights’ homes were warded against vampires, werewolves and sometimes, if the knight requested it, witches. Between that and some personal wards he’d had tattooed on his body, Kaz felt relatively safe, even knowing the city of millions was populated with tens of thousands of paranormal critters.

Standing before the living room wall, plastered with a large Paris city map, he darted his gaze from the red pins, which indicated the location of tribal nests, to the white— individual vamps, to the few green pins—known wolf packs.

Plucking out a silver pin from the nearby pin box, he poked it in place in the eighteenth arrondissement.

“Zoë,” he muttered. A smile was unstoppable.

* * *

“Will you find the source of the Magic Dust, little one?”

Coyote flinched at Riské’s use of the possessive moniker. Yes, she was small. But she was anything but little.

“It’s tainting our supply,” Riské continued. The faery elder’s feather headdress listed in the summer breeze that always surrounded him, even on brisk winter nights. “The idiot bloodsuckers are selling on our turf. This mortal realm is convoluted with lacking intelligence and those who would sell their very souls for another coin in their pocket.”

“I’ve Whim sniffing out the trail,” she answered, preening her left wing over her shoulder. Living in the mortal realm zapped her vitality, and she was ever concerned about her faded wings. “He’s an excellent tracker.”

“And what about the other one who is often stumbling about in your wake? Ever? Sever?”

“His name is Never. And he does not stumble. He’s an ace marksman. My secret weapon.”

“I thought you were my secret weapon?”

“I am, mon Grand Sidhe,” she said, using the respectful title. Lately, Riské had been ignoring her for his many other consorts. She was fine with that. The sidhe lord was a fickle lover. She preferred those with a bit more devotion— and vita, which could restore the color to her wings that living in the mortal realm had drained. “I suspect the dealer is a vampire.”

“Of course.” He said it as if admonishing her for stating the obvious.

“I don’t want to unsettle the fragile balance we have with the vampire community,” she said.

“See that you do not. But do not allow this one who deems to step on my feet one moment longer of triumph. I will not accept failure from you, Coyote.”

Meaning, he’d strike her dead with a look that could stop her heart if she returned without the vampire’s head. Easy enough. Coyote always got her man. Or vampire. She just had to let loose her hounds, Whim and Never, and follow the trail.