“We found him loitering,” Mindy said, waving a hand with insouciance that told them she couldn’t care less. “Lacarre decided he might be of help.”
The foreign vampire didn’t look especially pleased to have been dragged inside, but nobody said no to an angel.
“Where are the two men?” Lacarre asked, keeping his wings several inches off the floor so they wouldn’t drag on the sticky mess of glass, blood, and alcohol that coated the varnished surface.
“One’s behind there.” She nodded at the closed door that led up to Marco’s apartment. “And the other’s in the basement.”
Mindy stroked a hand down Deacon’s arm. “Do they look like this one?” It was a sultry invitation.
Deacon said nothing, just watched her with eyes gone so cold, even Sara felt the chill. Deacon did scary really, really well. Mindy dropped her hand as if it had been singed and returned to Lacarre’s side quick-fast. Rodney was already cowering behind the angel’s wings.
“You’d make a good vampire,” the angel said to Deacon. “I might actually trust the city wouldn’t fall apart if I left you in charge.”
“I prefer hunting.”
The angel nodded. “Pity. Rodney, you know what you have to do?”
Rodney bobbed his head so fast, it was as if it were on springs. “Yes, Master.” He looked childishly eager to please.
“Come on.” Keeping her voice gentle, Sara held out her hand. “I didn’t hurt you last time, did I?”
Rodney took a moment to think about that before coming over to close his fingers around her own. “They won’t be able to get me, will they?”
“No.” She patted his arm with her free hand. “All I want you to do is listen to their voices and tell me which one sounds like the man who hurt you.”
They went to Marco first, Lacarre and Mindy following. It made the hairs on the back of her neck rise to have a powerful angel and his bloodthirsty vampire floozy behind her-she was able to bear it only because Deacon was bringing up the rear, with Silas’s friend in front of him. “Marco.” She banged on the door. “I want you to threaten to cut off Rodney’s head.”
Rodney shot her a wide-eyed look. She whispered, “It’s just pretend.”
Marco began yelling a second later. Eyes wide, Rodney skittered away from the door and Sara felt her stomach fall. “Is it him?” she asked, after Marco went quiet.
Rodney was shivering. “No, but he’s scary.”
Lacarre wasn’t fond of the basement idea, but he came down with them. And when Silas refused to do as ordered, the angel whispered, “Or would you rather I come in for a private… talk?” Silky sweet, dark as chocolate, and sharp as a stiletto sliding between your ribs.
If Sara had ever had any delusions about trying to become a vampire, they would’ve died a quick death then and there. She never wanted to be under the control of anyone who could put that much cruelty, that much pain, into a single sentence.
Chastened, Silas made a wooden threat. About as scary as a teddy bear. Sara was about to order him to do it with more feeling when Rodney turned around and tried to run back up the stairs. Deacon caught him. “Shh.”
To Sara’s surprise, the vampire clung to him as a child would to its father. “It was him. He’s the bad man.”
Lacarre stared at the back of Rodney’s head, then at Sara. “Bring this Silas upstairs. I will hear from the hunter as to what happened.”
Sara had her crossbow at the ready, but it proved unnecessary. Tall, dark, and striking Silas, his clothes torn and bloody, followed them meek as a lamb. Leaving him in front of Lacarre and Mindy-with the foreign vamp skulking in the background-she released Marco and walked with him to the others.
Silas glared at his ex-lover. “You kill and put the blame on me.”
Marco ignored him, staring straight ahead as he recited what Sara believed to be the truth. Around the time that he got to his rejection of Silas, the out-of-town vampire gasped and said, “I believed you!”
“Be quiet!” Silas screamed.
Lacarre raised an eyebrow. “No. Continue.”
“He has done this before,” the foreign vampire said. “Three decades ago, when a human he’d been romancing left him for another vampire, he killed four of our own kind.”
Sara met his eye. “Were they men with strong ties to humanity?”
“Yes.” A trembling answer. “He told me the bloodlust had gotten hold of him. He was young… I protected him.” The clearly shaken vampire took a deep breath and turned his back on his former friend. “I no longer do.”
Silas screamed and jumped up as if to attack, but Deacon brought him down with a single chop to the throat. The vamp went down like a tree. Marco flinched but didn’t turn even then.
“As I said,” Lacarre murmured,“it’s a great pity you don’t wish to be Made. If you ever change your mind, let me know.”
Deacon’s smile was faint. “No offense, but I like being my own master.”
“I’d tempt you with beauties like Mindy, but it seems you’ve made your choice.” He walked over to Silas’s unconscious body. “The Guild has the right to demand restitution and proffer punishment. What is your will?” A question aimed solely at Sara. As if she were already director.
Sara glanced at Marco, saw the struggle on his face and knew there could be only one answer. “Mercy,” she said. “Execute him with mercy.” For they all knew that Silas wouldn’t be allowed to live. “No torture, no pain.”
Lacarre shook his head. “So human.”
She knew it wasn’t a compliment. “It’s a flaw I can live with.” She never wanted to become anything close to what Lacarre was-so cold, even when he looked at her with such apparent interest.
“So be it.” Walking over to Silas, he bent and gathered the vampire in his arms with effortless strength. “It will be done as you asked.”
As he walked away, Mindy and the others trailing behind the wide sweep of his cream-colored wings, Sara saw Deacon put a hand on Marco’s shoulder. A single squeeze. Words whispered so low that she couldn’t hear what was said. But when Deacon moved back to her side, Marco no longer looked like he was dying a slow, painful death. Oh, he was hurting plenty, but there was also a glimmer of stubborn will, the kind that made humans into hunters.
He turned to Sara. “I’m withdrawing my resignation from the Guild. I thought… I hoped, but I can’t stay here anymore.”
“I’ll make sure Simon knows.”
“Not necessary, is it, Sara?” he said quietly. “So long as you do.”
Sara said good-bye to Deacon outside the hotel six hours later. He had his gear and she had hers. Ellie was waiting for her in a clean rental car, ready to start the drive to New York. One last road trip before she became bogged down in the myriad responsibilities that came along with running one of the most powerful and influential chapters of the Guild.
“The next year’s going to be brutal,” she said to Deacon as he sat sideways on his bike, his legs stretched out in front of him, and his arms folded. “Just as well you said no-I probably couldn’t carry on a secret affair even if I tried.” She should’ve laughed then, but she couldn’t find any laughter inside her.
He didn’t do anything sappy. He was Deacon. He stood, put his hand behind her neck, and kissed the breath out of her. Then he kissed her again. “I have some things to do. And you have a directorship waiting for you.”
She nodded, the whiskey and midnight taste of him in her mouth. “Yeah.”
“You better go. Ellie’s waiting.”
Squeezing him tight once more, she turned and walked away. He was right to do it this way. Whatever they had, the sweet, shining promise she could still see hovering on the horizon, it deserved to be left whole, instead of being crushed under the weight of unmet expectations.