“Hang on.” She placed her hand on his chest as her other hand rested on the doorknob. His muscles flexed beneath her fingers, and much to her relief, he didn’t flinch or shrink away, but held her gaze, meeting her challenge. “Stay behind me, and follow my lead.”
“I’ve been in the medical examiner’s office more times than I care to count, and I know my way around. I may not have been supernatural, but I managed just fine.”
“I know that.” Olivia dropped her hand and cursed herself for not saying the right thing. She turned her back on him as she opened the door. “I just think it would be wise to avoid contact with the humans. Your ex-girlfriend might freak the fuck out if her presumed-dead ex walked into her autopsy room in the middle of the night.” She tried to keep the hurt and jealousy out of her voice but failed miserably. “Let’s make it quick, and then we’re heading back down to the Village.”
“How did you know about Miranda?” Doug’s fingers curled around her bicep, and Olivia fought the rush of lust that followed as his hand pressed into her arm. He furrowed his brow as he loomed over her, his mouth temptingly close. “You seem to know a lot more about me than you’ve let on. Why is that?”
“We don’t have time for this.” She tugged her arm free and yanked the door open. “Stay close and follow me.”
“Whatever you say,” Doug bit out. “But this conversation isn’t over by a long shot.”
Olivia flew down the empty stairwell to the bottom floor with Doug hot on her heels. As soon as she opened the door, the distinct scent of Rogue One slammed into them violently, knocking every other thought out of her head.
Her fangs erupted, and Doug growled in her ear before he pushed past her and raced to the double doors of the autopsy room with his gun drawn. Olivia swore under her breath and flew down the hallway after him.
She blew through the double doors and found Doug on the floor cradling the lifeless, bloodied body of Dr. Miranda Kelly. Sadness tore at her for the loss that Doug was suffering, but the scent of the rogue lingered, not allowing any time for mourning. Gun drawn, she surveyed the surroundings.
“They fucking slaughtered her,” he growled. “Why? Why did they come here and kill her? What possible motivation could they have had to hurt Miranda?”
Olivia watched through sympathetic eyes as Doug placed a kiss on her hair and gently laid her broken body on the floor—anger carved deep into his features as he rose to his feet slowly.
“I can still smell that piece of shit, and when I find him, he’s going to pray for sunrise and a quick death. I’m going to dissect his ass like a frog in a high school biology class.”
“The blood doesn’t bother you?” Olivia watched him carefully and noted that he seemed immune to the overwhelming scent of blood, which was unheard of for newly turned vampires. By all accounts, it should have triggered his bloodlust and hunger, driving him mad with thirst, but the only emotion he experienced was rage.
“No,” he rasped. Doug looked around the room with his usual inspecting, intent gaze. “The place is destroyed. Maybe they were looking for something. What could she possibly have had that they would’ve killed her for?”
The computer was smashed, her files were strewn around the room, and blood spattered much of the floor. She glanced to the camera in the corner. It was torn from the wall, so whoever was in here knew enough to take out the camera. Olivia glanced at the autopsy table.
“The blood in these drains is fresh.” Olivia leaned closer to get a clean scent. “It’s not Miranda’s blood. Maybe Rogue One let one of the rogues get picked up by accident?”
“What do you mean?” Doug squatted next to Miranda.
“The healing doesn’t usually start for almost twenty-four hours. If Rogue One has been busy making new vamps, or his rogues have, then maybe they got sloppy, and a vampire that was in the middle of the change got picked up and mistaken by the humans for dead.”
“Maybe.” He stood, his face stamped with anger. “Or maybe it woke up on the table and killed her?”
Doug went to Miranda’s desk and picked up the open file.
“Son of a bitch,” he whispered before turning to face her. “Moriarty. He was the guy she was working on.”
Olivia nodded, but before she could say anything, the subtle sound of wind whistling down a tunnel captured her attention as she swung her gun in the direction of the refrigerator compartments. Doug drew his gun right along with her, and they moved toward the noise.
One of the square stainless steel doors was open a crack. Olivia knew it led to the network of tunnels beneath the city. She pressed one finger to her lips and motioned to the partially opened door before yanking on it. It was empty, and the trap door that led into the tunnels was wide open.
“Sloppy and frantic,” she whispered. “They killed her and escaped through there. Come on. We’ll track them.”
Doug didn’t move. He was looking at Miranda’s lifeless body, and Olivia knew he hated the idea of leaving her. She couldn’t blame him, but they didn’t have the luxury of taking her with them.
“We have to go, Doug.” Olivia laid a hand over his. “The only thing you can do to help her now is find the vamps that murdered her and put them down.”
His intense blue eyes filled with fury and flicked to hers briefly before he dived into the open drawer and slipped into the tunnel below. Olivia slid in behind him and closed the trap door, shutting it securely. The last disruption they needed was a human to stumble upon their network.
He crouched low and moved silently down the tunnel in front of her. They followed the scent for what felt like forever, but Doug stopped when they came to an intersection with five passages. She scanned the area not only with the enhanced night vision of a vampire, but also with the sonar vision that allowed her to sense far beyond where she could actually see.
Doug closed his eyes and held his gun out as he absorbed the subtle sounds around them. Olivia squatted down on her heels and watched him with genuine awe because he figured it out himself.
She didn’t have to tell him about reading sound waves, and she didn’t want to overwhelm him with information. Doug Paxton was full of surprises, and the most natural vampire she had ever met.
They’re down there. His voice touched hers on a whisper. His eyes flicked open, and he pointed to the corridor to the right. I sense movement, and it feels like something big. Not rats. I think there are two or three.
Once a cop, always a cop. Olivia looked at him with pride, and a smile played at her lips. It makes sense. This tunnel will take us to the Village, and there’s an entrance to the street by Washington Square Park. Stay sharp. Chances are their nest is somewhere around here.
Doug nodded, and as they moved toward the inevitable battle, Olivia prayed he would be as deft at kicking ass as he had been at everything else.
Chapter 12
The need to kill pulled at him and hung around his neck like a fucking albatross. The image of Miranda’s mutilated body flashed through his mind as he and Olivia made their way through the network of tunnels. He used his rage to drive him forward as they followed the stink of the rogues—the monsters that killed two of the only people he cared about.
He didn’t love Miranda, but she was a good woman and didn’t deserve to die. But then again, neither did Tom, Brittany, or Ronald Davis. He vowed that if it was the last thing he did, he would eviscerate the motherfuckers who were responsible.