Chapter Six
Hayes
With Leonora on her way back to Cal’s, I was all-too happy to leave and avoid the temptation that came with her presence. She was safe for now, her friends keeping her grounded, and until the bond started to drive me insane again, I would keep my distance. There were a few spots in London that used magick to stay hidden from mortals, and others that blended the nightlife with a club hidden beneath the bar just for those with fangs. I had to assume that the mages were also welcome, but most of them were too uptight to know what the word fun meant, let alone actually try it out.
There had only been a few faces in the undead vampire’s mind that I’d recognised. One of them, an angel-faced woman, was a regular at a bar I’d once frequented.
Devil’s Delight was only a short ride away by train from Cal’s place and it was almost exactly as I remembered it. It was one of the places hidden in plain sight of the mortals, with spells set to divert and hide it from those who had no business seeing the supernatural world. The music was a thumping, driving bass that reverberated in my chest and the strobe lights were blue, painting me a somewhat ghostly figure with my white hair and pale skin.
Despite it being the middle of the week, the place was packed—then again, I supposed when you were immortal, the working week ceased to matter. As did the concept of day drinking.
The woman I’d come looking for was sitting at the far end of the bar, looking practically cherubic with her creamy skin and fine blonde hair in direct contrast to the shiny black of the floor and bar top. Her eyes were blue, like mine, but flat—an unmistakable sign of the undead. Not all of them turned cold, of course, but from the power crackling over my skin, she was old and that tended to turn even the mildest of vampires into something less than human.
A small, wide glass filled with ice and spiced rum clinked down in front of me and I looked up in surprise as the bartender nodded to the very woman I’d come to see. I knew better than to drink anything handed to me by a vampire, but I nodded my thanks before making a show of cowed hesitation. Another thing you learned quickly about old vampires—they liked it when the younger ones grovelled.
Leonora would probably pretend to die of shock to hear me say it, but I could be charming when I wanted to—or when the situation called for it. I let a hint of a smile play around my mouth as I stood and walked to the undead vampire watching me through hooded eyes completely at odds with her youthful, innocent face.
“May I join you?” I nodded to the empty bar stool next to her and the blue of her eyes deepened as she tilted her head with cat-like grace.
“You may,” she purred and I let my smile grow a fraction as I sat down beside her and sipped my drink. “Tell me, are you as young as you look?”
I knew she wasn’t really asking about my age. No, she wanted to know whether I was like her—undead or living. “My heart still beats, as I’m sure you well know.” I hid any edge in my voice behind a smooth deepness that made her flutter her eyes at me, like a teenager in thrall.
“Fascinating,” she said, leaning in closer and wetting her lips. It was only years of practice that kept my face blank, my body in place though it wanted to recoil. She smelled like death—like the old blood of rotting meat and dried flowers crumbling with age or mould. My nose was a little sharper than that of other vampires, in thanks, I assumed, to my wolf-side. Maybe a squirt of perfume would have fooled the others, but my senses were keen enough to scent the rot beneath the beauty.
Still, I smiled back at her and played the game. I needed to get her alone. That was where Nora and I differed—she didn’t much care for games in the shadows or the art of subtlety. But me? I thrived on it, had taken a necessity and turned it into a strength. Vampires, especially the old ones, liked to pretend they believed in honour, in fighting your battles in the open with strength as your champion rather than deceit. And yet, nobody knew how to lurk in the shadows quite as well as them either.
There was power on this one, in the controlled and precise movements of her limbs when she moved and a keen intelligence behind her eyes. I let her talk, responding only when necessary to keep the intrigue alive, and when she gestured to one of the private rooms available beyond the bar for a quick bite or fuck, I knew I had her. Now I only had to kill her without dying myself.
Her hips swayed as she walked ahead of me and I threw back the last of my drink and replaced the glass on the end of the bar as we passed. I had to play this right. She didn’t seem the type to bite without a little chit-chat, but I’d have to be on my guard regardless.
The corridor was dark and mostly silent, with only the occasional grunt or thump making its way out past the sound-proofed rooms. She moved with an ease that said she’d done this before and I had to appreciate her confidence, the anonymity of all of it. I knew her face, but not her name, and she knew nothing about me. The cynic in me wondered if she planned to kill me—easier to get away with it when there was nothing tying you together except a bartender who could undoubtedly be bought. Not that anyone would really be investigating my death except Leonora and, even then, she’d probably complain about the inconvenience. I smirked in the darkness and then winced when the bond flared, like it was urging me to go to her, to drink her in.
I pushed down the surge of emotion. I couldn’t afford to be distracted right then, not with a bigger predator breathing down my neck.
The black door swung open soundlessly to reveal a relatively small room with a red couch so big and deep it might as well have been a bed. A few low-light lamps were placed in the corners of the room and their yellow glow made the vampire in front of me look sick. Her delicate skin waxy, her blonde hair like straw, those blank blue eyes, lifeless. It was satisfying in a twisted way, like reality itself had bent for a second to show me the true face of the undead woman I’d come to kill.
“This is better, isn’t it?” she murmured as she folded herself elegantly onto the corner of the couch and patted the space next to her. “Quieter.” Her smile was a mockery of seduction, but her blank stare said all the better to kill you.
“Much,” I agreed and let my shoulders relax, my breaths come easily, as I sat next to her. “Is that your way of saying you’d like to get to know me better?”
She laughed, a light tinkling sound that grated across my nerves. “Of course.”
“That’s good,” I said, looking away and around the room as if anxious, “because I have some things I’d love to ask you.”
A pale eyebrow rose and the amusement on her mouth seemed genuine. “You young ones always do have questions.”
She expected me to ask her about being an undead, then. I smiled. “Have you ever been to court?”
The slight furrow of her brow gave away the answer before she spoke, “The catacombs? Yes. When you’ve lived as long as I have, you end up there from time to time.”
“I suppose a coup would be quite the occasion,” I said lightly and was already moving before she could do more than widen her eyes. The blade in my sleeve slid free easily and I didn’t hesitate, plunging it into her chest and momentarily incapacitating her. It would take more than a stab to the heart to kill an undead vampire as old as I could feel she was, though. But her shock bought me time. “A vampire of your age… That’s a survivable wound. If you tell me what I want to know, then you’ll live to heal.” I placed my hand on the hilt of the silver blade, twisting viciously as I looked into her eyes. “Or don’t, and I’ll get my answers another way.”
She coughed, the sound wet as her body tried to heal around the blade unsuccessfully. “What?—”
“The monarchs.” It was two words and yet, that was all I had to say. The vampire’s face seemed to drain of the little colour it had as she shook her head.
“I have nothing to tell you.”
I reached behind me and pulled the longer blade out from under my jacket where it was sheathed across my back. The ideal length for decapitation. “That’s unfortunate.”
“If I tell you, I’m dead anyway,” she protested, eyes on that larger blade as it loomed closer to her unprotected neck. I didn’t have much more time. The blow I’d dealt to her heart may have temporarily frozen her limbs as the shock worked its way through her, but any second that could fade and this would become… messy.
“Then I suppose it’s lose-lose for you,” I said gently as I pressed the blade to her throat. “You might as well tell me, if you’re going to die anyway.”
The rage I’d been waiting for finally showed on her face and I wasn’t even surprised when she stood in a blur of movement, the blade nicking the skin of her throat and sending a trickle of blood down her front. Now that was a challenge her vampire-instincts wouldn’t let lie.
She leapt for me, a snarl on her face and her halo of blonde hair smeared with her own blood. The dagger in her chest stayed put, the hilt brushing my stomach as she tried to tear out my throat. She may have been stronger, faster, but the problem with the undead is that they thought that was enough to make them the apex predator—relying on brute strength rather than skill. But me? I was strong, I was fast, and I actually knew how to fight.
I slapped aside her clumsy lunge and caught the arm that swung out at my face, trying to claw my skin, snapping it easily as my foot connected with her knee. Another snap. She crumpled and I followed her down. “Last chance.” My voice was a low rumble that held the promise of death and I saw my own glowing irises reflected in her eyes.
She shook her head, lips parting. “Impossible,” she breathed. “It’s you.”
“It’s me,” I confirmed and glanced at the door as I heard footsteps approaching outside. “This could have gone a whole other way.” I sighed and whatever words she’d been attempting choked and died as I shoved the long blade cleanly through her throat and severed her head. In truth, if she’d had anything to do with the disappearance of my family, then there was only ever one way this would end—with her blood on my hands.
I’d brought a duffel with me, flattened down and shoved into the back of my jeans beneath my jacket, and I dropped the head into the waiting darkness before zipping it up securely. At least I’d had the foresight to cover the inside in plastic wrap this time. Now it would only be a matter of seeing what Cal could get out of the memories left behind.
I tidied as best I could, hiding my blades again and making sure my face and clothes were as free of blood as possible—though some could be excused as just part of the fun that was had in these backrooms.
I closed the door behind me, not looking back at the body on the floor or the puddle of blood slowly forming. The footsteps I’d heard belonged to a dark-haired living vampire, the heat on his skin and thump of his heart giving him away as he walked into a room a few doors down from the one I’d just exited.
The bar had started to get busier by the time I re-emerged and nodded to the bartender, putting on an irritated expression like I was some kind of blood-jilted fanboy. “Bastard living vamp came and interrupted us. I guess she fancied him more because she kicked me out. Can you believe it?”
The bartender looked like he couldn’t give less of a fuck if he tried, nodding half-heartedly at me as I stomped away, bag thumping at my side as I moved, needing to get my grisly prize to Cal sooner rather than later. Everything on the outside looked exactly the same, Londoners passing by the magickally-shielded bar and none the wiser to the murder I’d just casually committed. It had been unavoidable, though. Blood and death were par for the course when you were a vampire, let alone the lost-heir to vampire royalty.