Chapter 28
Chapter Twenty-Eight
STEWED LIKE A TOMATILLO
Anger fuels me, the city blurring into a smear of concrete and light as I push my speed past its limits. It’s good for me. It will be very, very bad for the greasy, balding worm who is about to learn what my wrath feels like.
I only slow down when I get to the same place as before the attack at Kallista’s apartment.
The nickname—Kallie—settles on my tongue, a sound too soft for a creature like me. It feels like a key turning in a lock I didn’t know existed, a claim staked without a single word.
Mine.
The possessive thought is immediate. Instinctive.
Dangerous.
Except Alek already used that name. And so did the hunter. The sound of it on their lips is a trespass, a theft of an intimacy that should have been mine to claim first.
We are going to have to settle this when I get back.
Later.
For now I have pesky leeches to take care of.
I stick to the shadows, my form melting into them as fangs descend and claws unsheathe. The man recedes; the predator takes over.
I peek through one window, then another, listening, watching, but something isn’t right. There’s no movement, no telltale feral hissing, no surprise attacks.
There’s not even a human in sight.
My fingers brush the antique pocket watch tucked inside my jacket.
Wrong.
Everything about this feels wrong.
Angelo is not subtle. He’s a creature of crude spectacle, one who would want his victory announced with trumpets and screams. This quiet, this vacancy… it’s the wrong shape for him. It’s a design, not a mess.
And it’s not his.
More than that, the air itself is a vile cocktail of cooling blood and the ozone burn of spent magic. A predator has been here. And a hunter.
A metal door in the old brick building stands ajar. I ease it open, expecting a creak of rusted metal, but the hinges move in perfect silence. This decay is a costume. The welcome is a lie.
Interesting.
As soon as it’s wide enough I speed through the large room, but it’s empty. Furniture strewn about like a large salon, but all cold from not being used for several hours at least.
Where did that fucker go?
The stench of dead bodies reaches me from the right. I follow it to a hallway, and the sight that greets me makes me stop short.
Bodies are strewn in grotesque arrangements, limbs twisted at impossible angles or severed entirely, marooned in their own cooling blood.
Human bodies, but marked. As I draw closer, the sulphur-like smell of Guild magic intensifies, clinging to the intricate ink carved into their cooling skin. Hunters.
I bend down to get a closer look, noticing all the wounds inflicted are claw marks, blades, but no punctures.
No bites.
What happened here?
Why in the hell are seven Guild hunters dead?
Doesn’t appear to be vampire inflicted, not with Angelo’s ferals biting everything they can sink their teeth into.
So why are they here in one of Angelo’s known hideouts?
I move to the next body, checking wounds and confirming the same as the first. They fought with Guild precision, every movement economical. But their enemy was faster, stronger. They were dismantled, not defeated.
But by whom? Or by what?
The air goes thin, tasting of sulphur and iron—Guild magic. A hunter’s ambush.
“You!” Zach lets out an angry growl and swipes at me with a dagger.
I sidestep it easily. We don’t have time for this.
“It appears something is targeting your kind, Hunter. These petty differences are a folly we can no longer afford.”
“Right. And you just happened to be here right after another attack on a Guild Faction.” He feints high with the dagger, a move designed to draw my eye, and when I shift to block, he drives a sharpened iron stake from his other sleeve into my side.
He digs it in between my ribs, right where a lung would be damaged, if I needed them to breathe. Too bad for him I don’t.
Still. It burns like a brand.
And it destroys yet another of my suits.
Fucker.
I sidestep him again, this time my voice carrying no pleasantries.
“They were already dead when I showed up. I was looking for someone else.”
He straightens up at that, going from offensive to alert.
“Who were you looking for? The Night Reaper?”
The name he uses stops something deep in my chest, a stillness that even my dead heart doesn’t usually manage, and for a moment I don’t bother calculating my next words.
“Who gave you that name?”
“Doesn’t matter. What matters is you know it too. Which means I’m on the right track.”
“You think he’s responsible for what happened here?”
“Maybe. Or maybe he’s another clue.” The hunter crosses his arms, a picture of nonchalance. But a pulse beats too fast in his throat, and the knuckles of his hidden hand are white. His eyes miss nothing.
Of all the hunters I have had the displeasure of meeting, reluctantly, this one is one of the most skilled. And the most dangerous. He’d sooner stake me through the heart at the very first wrong twitch than trust me with information.
Whatever truce we had agreed to, it’s a precarious one.
“I want to know if you saw him.”
So. He likes to trade in information. Fine. I have some he could use. Maybe it’ll keep him busy enough to stay away from my Daisy.
Although I still owe him for earlier.
I shake my head. But offer something else instead.
“The wounds inflicted on your brethren are not vampire in nature. No blood taken, no puncture wounds, only clean slices with either claws or blades.”
Zach looks around, now noticing what he hadn’t earlier in his anger and shock.
I can see him swallow back emotion, then steel himself with a clench of his jaw, anger resurfacing.
“There’s something else,” I add.
He refocuses his attention on me, one blue eye cold with assessment, the other dark with something feral.
“There’s more than just guild magic here too. There’s another kind. One I’m not familiar with.”
Zach presses a rune on his elbow, and it flares with a brief light. A fresh wave of that chemical scent washes over me—a poison to unmake my kind. Every instinct screams to retreat.
But I ignore them. After all, I am the bigger threat here. Even if the cocky asshole doesn’t believe it.
“It’s not demon magic. It feels and looks like Guild magic and yet…” He cocks his head, surveying something I cannot see, which makes me more curious than I should be.
Clearly this is Guild business, except it’s happening on vampire turf.
A cold certainty settles in my gut, heavy as a tombstone.
“It feels warped, different. Shifted.”
His choice of words—shifted—sends a jolt through me. Casey. The venom. It’s not a coincidence. It’s a message.
“There’s a message too. And it’s addressed to you.”
A stillness falls over me, the kind that precedes an earthquake. Very rarely do I get surprised. But this? This is all wrong.
Or perhaps it’s all going right in someone else’s plan.
I wait for the hunter to continue but he seems to enjoy his current upper hand.
A low growl builds in my chest, a pressure demanding release.
“Well, tell me what it says.”
“You need something from me?” He smirks, the bastard. He’s going to use this. “First, you still owe me for the Jeep. Second, this message comes with a price. I want something in return.”
“Name your price, hunter.”
“You know, I expected you to know my name by now.”
“I know your name. You simply haven’t earned the right for me to use it, Zachary Danti.” The mention of his full government name makes him scowl in disdain, all pretense dropping like stone.
“I want you to take me to where you’re hiding Kallie.”
I don’t even hesitate, don’t wait to consider, I already knew that’s what his demands would be.
He’s a nuisance.
An irritating, stubborn, occasionally useful nuisance.
“Done.”
His scowl deepens, his one dark eye narrowing to a slit, but he doesn’t question my quick response.
“The message says: The flower is mine.”
Surprise, then fear—a cold spike through the chest. I curse myself. I was lured away again, and this time, I’m out of range. I can’t reach Alek.
Mindspeak is useful… but limited.
And I left my phone behind—a novice error, a fatal one.
“Give me your phone,” I demand, already speeding out of the building and back onto the street.
He doesn’t miss a step and follows me, pace for pace.
Guild magic is efficient. I’ll give him that.
But he doesn’t reach for it like I expect him to.
My command would make a lesser man obey, but the hunter is immune to threats.
Good for him, but this is no time for posturing.
“Where the hell are we going? And why the sudden hurry?”
I pick up the pace, and the hunter falls temporarily behind before catching back up.
I’d be impressed if a cold dread wasn’t tightening its fist around my dead heart.
“He’s going to take Kallie.”