Chapter 5
FIVE
CHANEL
“Why do you seem so distracted?” Regan’s voice cut into my thoughts.
“I’m not distracted,” I countered.
“You literally stopped talking midsentence.” She narrowed her eyes at me. “It was like your brain died for a whole minute.”
I sighed. “Maybe it did.”
“Yeah, I know. So, what’s your problem?” She nudged me with her elbow.
“Because we have to hunt, and I feel like we have to be on point with this one. Zuriel was acting all, you need to do this now.” She made her face go completely void of emotion, doing her best impression of how cold Zuriel could be.
“No, more like this.” I chuckled and forced my smile to drop, then I narrowed my eyes at her. I made my voice deeper. “No, you are not my favorite.”
She pointed at my face and giggled. “That’s it. That’s the one.”
I nodded. “I know. I’m good.”
“So, what’s on your mind then?” She gazed out over the city as we sat on the rooftop of The Emerald.
Our legs dangled over the edge, and we kicked them back and forth in unison.
Cool air whipped around us, sending fall leaves flying from Central Park to flutter in the air like a choreographed dance.
I always told Regan the truth, but something made me hesitate.
The idea of mobster vampires didn’t seem so bad the longer I thought about it.
He was witty, handsome, and cocky . . . all the things I liked in a guy.
The words bad boy could’ve been tattooed across his chest and I still would’ve been drawn to him.
Add to that the suit and I found myself too curious about him.
“Do you miss hooking up?”
Her eyebrows shot up in surprise, then her face smoothed into a light smirk. “Oh yeaaaaa.”
“So it’s not just me then?” It made me feel better knowing I wasn’t the only Virtue who thought about getting physical.
She shook her head, and those sandy blonde waves fell in messy strands down past her shoulders. “You know, sometimes it’s like scratching an itch. It’s been a long time since I’ve done that.”
“That makes two of us.”
“Oh, I know.”
I rolled my eyes at her. “Are you keeping track of my love life now?”
“Yeah, it makes me feel better about the lack of my own love life.” She kicked her legs as she gazed out over the city. It wasn’t that we were forbidden from having a love life, but after such long lives it was impossible not to be picky at this point.
A burst of laughter came from my chest. “I mean . . . fair.”
“So you’re thinking about the flirty guy? And that’s what’s distracting you?”
I sighed. It was difficult to keep a secret from Regan. We knew each other as well as we knew ourselves. “He was like old-school mobster kind of hot.”
“I’m not surprised.” She sighed. “You loveeeee bad boys.”
“I love them as much as you love nerds,” I teased.
“Hey, no. I’m changing my type.” She pursed her lips and shook her head. “I’m not dating anymore Shreks.”
“Shreks?” I had no idea what she was talking about.
“Yeah, the not cute ones who you think will be nice because they’re not so cute, but really they turn out to be an ogre. Hence the no more Shreks.”
“Noted.”
“So your mobster . . . what’s he like?”
I nudged her with my shoulder and let my eyes fall to Columbus Circle. “It was such a short interaction. I don’t think it was anything at all. Maybe I’m making it out to be something more than it was.”
“And that right there is the overthinking talking.” She arched her eyebrows at me.
“Yeah, maybe.” I blew out a deep breath. “Doesn’t matter anyway. That’s probably the last time I’ll see him.”
“Yeah, maybe,” she answered, shooting my own words back at me.
We fell silent for a moment just watching the hustle and bustle of the city below.
We saw everything that everyone else did: the taxis, the people running to and from the mall, the street vendors.
But it was all bathed in a glowing light that was like looking at a translucent opal.
Faint rainbow colors covered every part of the earth.
It was the Serenity we were born to protect.
At any given point in time, the Serenity was like watching the northern lights.
It danced and flickered as far as the eye could see.
The colors were dazzling and changed throughout the day.
In the day they were light, almost pastel-colored and glimmering.
At night they grew more vibrant with the colors darkening and wavering.
It was easy for us to see when the Serenity was pure and undisturbed, meaning all the supernaturals in First Realm were behaving.
But when one of them broke the rules of the realm, it was easy to see within the Serenity.
There would be a spot of darkness among the light which usually led us to our prey.
Tonight, we sat here watching for a glitch in the Serenity and hoped it’d lead us to Christopher Thompson. As if on cue, a dark spot spread to the southwest of us. But the black spot was amidst a riot of wild colors.
Regan squinted her eyes, looking into the distance. “Is that Nola?”
I nodded. “Looks like it.”
“Could just be MoVaun or the vampires hanging out there. You know they like to walk the line.” MoVaun was a priestess who resided in Nola.
“Bit early for them.”
MoVaun preferred the night, as did the vampires. Not many of them lurked around during the day. Though the sun had set in New York, it still might be too early for any of the supernaturals in NOLA.
Regan jumped to her feet and opened her hands. Aqua magic surrounded them and then daggers appeared in her palms. “Want to check it out?”
“We’d better.” I glanced back at the black spot. “Quickly.”
We walked through the doors on the roof and took the elevator down to where the doors to the portals all stood.
We bypassed the portals that led to the other realms and walked right to the one that travelled anywhere in this realm.
I pressed my hand to the door, and it slid open, bathing us in glowing light.
I motioned to the door. “You first.”
“You only want me to go first because you know she’ll be there waiting near the portal.” She stepped through and I followed right behind her. One moment we were in The Emerald, and in the next, we stood in muddy water.
Regan took one step forward and a ball of fire flew right at her face. She tilted her head to the side and caught the ball effortlessly. “Hi, Mom.”
She tossed the ball of fire up and down as if it were a baseball. I held my hand out and pink magic flowed out from us and toward the shoreline of the riverbank. The water spread around us and gave us a nice dry path leading out of the river and onto land. “Hey, Eloa.”
“I could’ve killed you.” Eloa melted from the shadows and walked toward us. “You need to be more on guard.”
“I literally caught your fire ball, Mom.” Regan stepped up to her and wrapped her in a hug. “I think I was on guard.”
Eloa was a very, very, very old angel, older than us, which meant she was damn old.
Though she looked younger than Regan, she knew a time when there were no humans.
Her bright-red hair was pulled back from her face into a high, messy bun.
A curtain of bangs fell across her forehead.
She was the reason why Regan was so beautiful.
Her lips were full and nearly as red as her hair.
Black jeans covered in multiple zippers hung low on her hips, exposing her lower stomach.
Regan looked her up and down. “Are those my pants?”
Eloa smirked and took a sip of her drink. “No.”
“You’re lying.” She hooked her finger into one of the belt loops and turned Eloa from left to right, then shoved her away. “You’re an angel. You're not supposed to lie.”
“I do what I want.” With her one free hand, she pulled up the jeans, the silver bands stacked on her wrist making a little jingling sound.
I chuckled and shook my head. “Now we know where you get it from.”
Eloa sighed. “Yeah, awesome is usually genetic.”
Regan gave her a high five and nodded. “Noice, Mom.”
“So why are you in Nola? More specifically, why are you in Jackson Square?”
I licked my lips. “There was a darkening in the Serenity. We were in New York when we spotted it, and it was fastest to take the portal to get here.”
“We were thinking it might be MoVaun,” Regan added.
Eloa shook her head. “Nah, she hasn’t been around for a little while. We have no idea where she disappeared to, but I can tell you for sure it’s not her.”
MoVaun was powerful in her own right, and no one knew if she fell on the side of good or evil. No matter which side she was on, if anyone needed something from her, it would cost them dearly. If she wasn’t in town, there was a good possibility that the darkening in the Serenity wasn’t her.
I spread my wings and Regan followed suit. “Then game on.”
Eloa took a step back and gave us a little wave. “Happy hunting.”
“See you in a bit, Mom.” Regan pumped her wings and took off into the night sky.
We always moved so effortlessly together.
It was as easy as breathing. She swooped and I dipped.
We flew over New Orleans, gazing down at the French Quarter.
The streets weren’t as full as they were during Mardi Gras, but it was still busy.
The smell of liquor tickled my nose along with the noise from the clubs.
Music and voices filled the night, and the sound of reverie was on every street.
I turned to the side and spotted a line of darkness in the Serenity.
It was coming from a little hole in the wall club that was off the main road.
I pointed it out to Regan and drifted down toward the alleyway just behind the building.
She landed right beside me and pulled her wings in. “Hey, how do I look?”
“We probably should’ve asked ourselves that before we left.”
Regan pursed her lips and stared at her outfit. She wore a burgundy leather jacket, dark black jeans, and a black T-shirt. It wasn’t as glitzy or glamorous as our costumes, but it was comfortable and we were able to move freely. I wasn’t dressed much differently in my baggy T-shirt and jeans.
I shrugged. “But I think we’re good.”
She nodded and we strolled from the alley around to the front of the building. From the outside it looked like there was nothing inside. There were no windows and only a single door in the center of the building. The sign above the door said a single word ‘Leave’.
I nodded up toward it. “We could take it once we’re done and put it above our door at home?”
“I’m so here for it,” she agreed as she reached for the door and yanked it open.
I stepped through the door, and the music instantly stopped.
Booths were set up on the side of the room while small tables were spread throughout the middle of the club.
Across from the booths stood a long bar with top-shelf liquor displayed on glass shelves behind the bar.
Dim lights shined down on them. The patrons were all dressed to the nines—the men in suits and the women in skintight full-length gowns.
The tangy smell of blood tickled my senses, and I knew these were all vampires.
The bartender looked at the two of us. “You’re in the wrong place.”
“I don’t think so.” I walked up to the bar and placed my hand on the mahogany top. “We’re looking for someone.”
He glanced at Regan and then to me. “Not in here you’re not.”
Still the music hadn’t started back up and no one moved.
I held my hand up and let my pink magic flow around my fingers, drawing drops of water to float toward me from the condensation on the glasses and gathering them into a small floating sphere just above my hand.
I glanced to my cousin. “Don’t you think we’d know who we’re looking for? ”
Regan too held her hand up. Aqua power seeped from her fingers and a single flame danced on the tip of each one. “I’m pretty sure we’d know.”
His jaw dropped as he whispered, “Virtues.”
“That’s right.” I kept my gaze steady on his. “So, are you going to let us do our job, or are you gonna make it difficult and become part of our job?”
With his vampire speed he darted from behind the bar and right out the door. Every single table and booth emptied just as quickly. The vampires were all but a blur as they abandoned the club. Glass fell to the floor and shattered, leaving spiked blood in messy puddles all over the floor.
Regan snorted. “Now that’s the kind of reaction I was looking for.”
“It never gets old.” I sighed and walked toward a door on the same wall as the bar.
It was tucked into a corner and was painted the same color as the wall to blend in nearly perfectly, but I saw the darkening coming from right behind that door. I wrapped my hand around the knob and nodded toward Regan.
At the same time we mouthed the words one .
. . two . . . three. I yanked the door open on three and Regan leapt inside with two balls of fire in her hands.
I darted in behind her, and we stood there taking in the scene.
The room was completely empty except for a single table that sat at the center of it.
A cigar sat in an ashtray with a plume of smoke rising from it.
A beam of light shone down, highlighting a plate just beside the ashtray.
I slowly approached it and narrowed my eyes.
Regan moved on the other side of the room, looking around with the same amount of caution.
I wrinkled my nose at the contents of the plate. “Cheese and crackers?”
“Since when do vampires eat cheese and crackers in a club like this?” Her voice sounded as perplexed as mine.
A white piece of paper was folded next to the plate, so I grabbed it up, reading the five words twice before I could believe what I was seeing. “Oh, this fucker has all the audacity.”
Regan grabbed the note, and her eyes widened as she read it out loud. “Catch me if you can.”
“He’s a cocky bastard. I'll give him that.”
No one had ever dared to taunt us. Mostly they just ran . . . or begged . . . or pleaded. But taunting? Hell no. That never happened.
Regan chuckled. “We’ll just have to make him bleed twice as much for that.”
I nodded. “Oh hell yeah.”