Waiting for Darkness (Blood Martyr) Read online

  I groped around for the aluminum baseball bat one of my human bartenders, Kel, kept underneath the counter and cautiously poked out my head to survey the dance floor.

  Everyone had changed. I couldn’t see a single man, but a mass of gigantic wolves, thick beads of saliva dripping from their muzzles.

  Kieran was completely silver, a rarity in its own right, but even from where I crouched, I saw his eyes shifted hues as well, from a cerulean blue to a silver so light they were almost white. He stuck out like a bent nail on a plank among those dark bodies, and I noticed Phoenix was a very common brown. Hah.

  Why weren’t they moving? By this time, I thought to see blood flashing in the air, fur flying in tufts, to hear yelps and other general wolf noises.

  But nothing.

  The ranks were cleanly delineated, and it was obvious that while Kieran’s boys clearly outnumbered Phoenix’s by at least a good dozen, Phoenix’s pack members looked a bit...bigger. In fact, a few in Kieran’s pack looked downright runty. Kind of like a pack of Davids versus of pack of Goliaths. But David had won, hadn’t he?

  Then again, David wasn’t a wolf. At least, I didn’t think he was.

  Phoenix growled and started to move, his feet silent on the floor except the clicking of massive claws the length of my hand. Wow. One hit from those suckers and you’d be picking up your intestines from the floor. I fought him before but he was in human form then and now, I couldn’t help but get a little impressed.

  Still, Kieran didn’t move.

  While Phoenix and his pack took one step after another, closer and closer to Kieran and his men, Kieran just stood there. Was he waiting? I had to admit, for runty werewolves, his men were very well disciplined. Having seen them as a rather motley crew, I didn’t know they could do self-control as well as any great army.

  My hand tightened around the bat. Aluminum wasn’t very good; the bat would bend right in half as soon as I hit someone, but that split second of impact was all I needed. I regretted cutting my nails the night before. Didn’t quite seem fair I had nails no longer than one and a half centimeters while Phoenix could literally cut his way through bars of steel. Ah well. Better luck next time?

  “Come on...move. Move it, before he bites you in half, you idiot,” I muttered.

  Closer and closer...Phoenix padded towards Kieran, lips curled back, showing off frighteningly sharp teeth.

  Why wasn’t Kieran moving?

  Phoenix took a running leap, and I jumped over the bar counter, the bat ridiculously light in my hands.

  “Kieran!” I screamed, unable to keep quiet any longer.

  He moved.

  Almost too fast for my eyes to follow, he rose up from a low crouch, powerful back legs propelling him into the air like he’d been shot from cannon.

  They met in a flurry of brown and silver fur, and then the entire floor rolled with a teeming mass of Weres, yowling, snarling, snapping, biting, scratching. I’d never seen anything like it, and for a moment I was struck dumb by the entire spectacle.

  Chaotic.

  That was the only word that rose in my mind. The bat fell out of my hands, and I couldn’t look away. Every wolf looked the same. How could they tell each other apart? It wasn’t as though they could talk. Could they?

  At the edge of the floor, a flash of white danced before it disappeared under a heap of brown and black fur. Kieran was being targeted not only by Phoenix, but one of Phoenix’s pack mates.

  He yelped, and I felt it pierce my heart harder than someone shoving a dagger through that exact spot.

  No.

  Had to get there.

  Had to help!

  I kicked a large Were out of the way, and it hit one of the pillars at the edge of the dance floor. The pillar cracked, and the top leaned precariously over a pile of Weres duking it out.

  “Kieran!”

  I tripped over the body of a Were, its eyes glazed and blood already clotting from a massive slash across its neck. A big Were. I hoped it wasn’t one of Kieran’s.

  The sounds got worse. Screams, sounding far too human for my liking, echoed through the club, and I wanted to stuff my fingers into my ears. Anything to stop hearing those eerie cries. I was no stranger to pain, inflicting or receiving, but this kind of screaming...scared me.

  Kieran yelped once more as Phoenix ripped savagely into his back with those gigantic claws, while his pack mate held Kieran down.

  It was unfair. It was cowardly, and just fucking wrong, but since when did Phoenix actually adhere to any code of chivalry and fair play?

  A huge Were, black fur tinged with red, lunged towards me, teeth and muzzle stained with someone else’s blood. Without thinking, I reached out and grabbed his ears. I hooked an arm around the Were’s neck, its claws scoring deeply into my back. But I didn’t, couldn’t feel the pain. I could only think of Kieran’s suffering. And this Were was keeping me away from him.

  He was going to die for his foolishness.

  My arm tightened around his neck, and I exerted a swift pressure with my elbow. Bones cracked under the force, and the Were stopped struggling.

  And all the while, my mind was blank. Completely white.

  This was it. I was killing something, someone.

  A promise made long ago to a red-headed witch, a promise I would kill no more, faded from my mind like the morning mist after a storm.

  “I’m so sorry,” I whispered. “Forgive me.”

  I didn’t know who I was asking forgiveness from: myself, Jamison, the Were I just killed, or God himself.

  Did it even matter?

  Blood dripped down my bare hand and stained my white pants, dyeing them crimson.

  I dropped the wolf, hating the feel of its oily fur on my fingers.

  Phoenix continued to lay Kieran open, and I caught a glimmer of white among all that red. Bone.

  Kieran was the Were King, but he wasn’t immortal.

  He could still die.

  No.

  I couldn’t let it happen.

  I grabbed out for a tail, any tail, and by luck managed to snag the black Were pushing Kieran down.

  “Get the fuck off Kieran, now!” I screamed.

  The wolf reared up, its teeth snapping dangerously close to my face. More through desperation than any kind of fighting finesse, I punched down, my fist connecting solidly with his muzzle. The rigid harness of his bones collapsed under the blow. The wolf didn’t make a sound and fell to the floor, its stomach working furiously to pull air through a body that could no longer suck it in.

  I knocked the wolf back, letting it slide away in its own bodily fluids.

  A cry sounded behind me, and I whirled around, ready to finally kill Phoenix, even if it meant being seriously wounded...or worse. Because, at that point, it didn’t seem to matter how badly I was hurt. The only thing that mattered was that Kieran would be alive. That was all. Alive.

  But the yelp didn’t come from Kieran.

  It would be the last noise Phoenix would make in this life.

  Kieran, free of the wolf holding him down, somehow managed to work his way from under Phoenix’s claws and got his teeth around the darker Were’s neck.

  I watched, half in triumph, half in fearfulness, as he closed his jaws and snapped Phoenix’s neck in half.

  The sound was awful, even more horrible than the howling and keening that had been going on until a second ago.

  It filled the room and seemed to grow in magnitude until I had to sit down because my legs had suddenly lost the ability to keep my body up.

  The fighting stopped.

  The few remaining Weres from Phoenix’s pack took one look at their leader’s neck lying slack in Kieran’s jaws and promptly rolled onto their backs, paws up in the air. It might’ve even been a little cute if it wasn’t for all the blood.

  Kieran, bloodstained and looking like a ghoul hound from Hell, dropped Phoenix to the floor and limped heavily to me, his muzzle dripping blood...and other things.

  Whining
softly, he fell at my feet and laid his head onto my lap. His eyes closed, and he huffed out a breath.

  And that’s when the police officers darted in.

  “Freeze!”

  One of them, dressed in full SWAT armor, sighted down his rifle at me as if he thought I could stand up and wallop him one. He wasn’t far off. I would’ve, if I wasn’t so damn tired.

  “You’re a bit late,” I said dryly as he flicked up his helmet’s visor. “How’s the wife and kid, Teddy?”

  “Not bad. They’re still waiting for you to come by for dinner,” he answered and then grimaced. “Jesus. Mind telling me what the fuck went on down here? HQ got a frantic call from some lady saying people were getting slaughtered. You should’ve heard her. She was screaming for the National Guard and everything. I’m surprised she hasn’t asked for the Secret Service. Oh, and I think our dispatcher’s deaf in one ear now.”

  Theodore Montes was a friend, someone I helped out a few years back, at Jamison’s insistence, when a vamp went psychotic and murdered four children before I stepped in. I didn't do much. All I did was taste some of the blood left by the vamp and trace the metaphysical scent that still lingered at the crime scene. Not a lot of vampires can do that, but it’s one of my skills. Sorry—few skills.

  Either way, it had garnered me a friend in the police department, and that was good enough for me. Having a friend in a place like that was awfully...beneficial.

  A stupid grin spread my lips. “I’m pretty sure she would’ve if she thought it was possible. And, yeah, Eileen does tend to get a little...pitchy.”

  He guffawed. “Pitchy? Try telling that to Mae. You’ll be lucky if she doesn’t sue.”

  “Sir!” cried one of the uniformed officers. “Sergeant Montes, sir!”

  A naked man staggered to his feet, looking dazed and dripping copious amounts of blood from his chest and arms. “Fuck...what the...?”

  Teddy quirked an eyebrow at him and me. “You sure know how to hold a party, Tanith.”

  I grinned.

  “I try, Ted. I try.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  “Hell is not to love anymore, Madame. Not to love anymore!”

  Officer Malachi Campbell stared down at the clipboard in his hands and then back at us. Kieran smiled at him from the hospital bed, and I mentally counted how many hours we had left until sunrise. I cursed my stupidity of not thinking to bring a pair of very strong sunglasses.

  “Uh. Right. So.”

  “Exactly as I said. It was just a minor fight. Nothing to worry about,” Kieran said with a winsome grin.

  Officer Campbell ran a hand through his thinning hair. He looked much too young to have gray hair, but I guessed it was just an occupational hazard, what with being a police officer in such a freak-infested town like Centennial City.

  “Just a minor fight? Sir, there are over twenty dead men in the club. Twenty dead men with maybe fifteen more in this hospital right now. You better have a damn good reason as to why I shouldn’t take you in. I’ve got seventeen witnesses all willing to testify that you killed Phoenix Harrison.”

  I didn’t like to butt in other people’s conversations, but there were times when one had to speak up.

  This was one of them.

  “Officer Campbell, all seventeen of them will also testify that it was strictly in self-defense. Had Kieran not done what he did, you and I would be having this conversation in the morgue. Over his dead body,” I said, trying not to sound impatient.

  Which I was. It was past four. The sun would start rising at around five-thirty, and I needed to be back home before that happened.

  The police officer sighed and scratched his head. It almost made me feel sorry for him. Almost.

  “Fine. I’ll be needing a statement from you as well, Ms….” He stared down at the clipboard. “Er…Ms…?”

  “Quinn. It’s Tanith Quinn.” Quinn wasn’t my birth name, but I used it for so long, it was starting to feel like one.

  “Right. Ms. Quinn.” He spared a tired smile, scrawled on the clipboard. “Sergeant Montes speaks highly of you.”

  I inclined my head, the very picture of modesty. “As he does of you, Officer Campbell.”

  And for a moment, it looked like he was going to laugh, but barely managed to restrain himself in time. Pity. I thought Kieran and I could’ve done with a bit of laughter right about then.

  “Well...then. Ms. Quinn, Mr. Black.”

  He nodded to the both of us before exiting the hospital room.

  “A bit…picky, isn’t he?” Kieran drawled from his position on the bed.

  I resisted rolling my eyes. I heard about Malachi Campbell, heard about the volunteer work he’d done for the city orphanage and the cancer ward here for the children. He was a good guy, and I wouldn’t have minded making another friend in the force.

  I sat back down on the hard, plastic seat next to Kieran’s head and tried not to look too worried. “How are you feeling?”

  “Oh. After about twenty-seven stitches and numerous skin grafts, or so the doctors say, I’ll be back in action. Maybe not as good as before, but everything’s in working order. And I do mean everything.” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively, and I had to laugh, even though the situation was all but laughable.

  Club Dragonne had been closed down by the City Board, pending further investigation about the brawl that left half of Phoenix’s pack dead and nearly all of them wounded.

  Surprisingly enough, Kieran’s men emerged relatively unscathed, the worst injury being that of a broken leg. That would have explained his unusually jovial mood.

  I would’ve worried about being able to pay my employees, but I made up a fund just for situations like this. As long as the club was allowed to open in four weeks, everything was going to be okay.

  “Tanith.”

  “Hm?” I answered, still half in my thoughts about what I was going to do about the deep gouges on the dance floor.

  “You knew Phoenix and I were going to meet there, didn’t you? Why didn’t you close the club?”

  I avoided looking into his eyes. I wasn't sure if I wanted to continue seeing the emotion flitting in them.

  It was obvious Kieran didn't hate me anymore.

  This wasn't about revenge anymore.

  I had fought for him and he had seen it.

  Was I still a foe? Or was I a friend?

  And if I was a friend, what kind of friend?

  You giving my girlfriend any trouble, Phoenix?

  That sentence repeated itself over and over in my head, no matter how hard I tried to think of something else.

  "Tanith?"

  I cleared my throat and decided to forge on and damn the consequences.

  “Because. I heard you and Phoenix had been playing cops and robbers for over a decade. Your packs had been engaged in little spats here and there, and there had to be a final reckoning. To settle everything. There had to be an end to it. I merely provided the place. Although, to be honest, I didn't think there'd be an actual fight. Like an idiot, I thought maybe I could do some talking. Of course, that's not what happened,” I said and managed a smile. “Anyways, I didn’t like Phoenix. Having you dispose of him was sort of like killing two birds with one stone, don’t you think?”

  The smile began in his eyes and then flowed to his lips. “Why, you conniving little bitch.”

  “A compliment is always appreciated.”

  He shifted in the rickety hospital bed and winced. “Shit. He really tore me up. How long do I have to stay here?”

  I would’ve thought the answer was obvious.

  “Um, gee, let me think. Until you feel better and no longer have to wince every time you move? Honestly, what were you thinking? He nearly killed you. You’ve been here for a total of two hours and you’re already chomping at the bit to get out. How long do you think you have until everything...heals?”

  He looked down at his bandage-swathed chest. “Hm...maybe a few hours. The doctors think the injuries are worse than
they are.”

  “And right they should be! And quit moving around so much!”

  I hated getting angry over a man. But coupled with anger at Kieran’s recklessness was a deep worry for Jamison. I sent some friends to ask about for him, and so far none of them had any news about where he was hiding.

  “I’m sorry, Mother. I’ll be a nice boy,” he said and pulled the sheet up to his nose, blinking owlishly at me.

  “Thank you, Kieran.”

  “What are my boys up to?”

  “Besides scaring away half the people in the waiting room? They’d storm up here if I let them.” I tried to keep my voice light, but I wasn’t too sure if I sounded convincing enough. “I noticed most of them are still scared of me.”

  I thought he would’ve shrugged if it wasn’t for the state of his back. “What can I say? Humans have their bogeymen to deal with. We’ve got you.”

  “Yeah. Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

  Back then, I wouldn’t have minded. Hell, I might’ve even enjoyed the reputation and milked it for all it was worth. But now, now that I was finally humanized…being thought of as a monster didn’t make me feel too hot.

  “But for what it’s worth, you really impressed the boys. They didn’t think you’d be fighting on our side. They say you killed two on your own.”

  Another sin, another stain to deal with. I sort of wanted to go to the nearest church I could find and confess my sins to the father there. Two things stopped me: the nearest church was over twenty minutes away by car, and if I ever stepped over the threshold of a holy building, I was bound to come away with some serious physical damage. I wouldn’t burst into flames, but I’d get burned pretty badly.

  “They were in the way,” I said, trying not to think about how their bones had shattered under my fists. I hadn’t killed in years and couldn’t remember why I loved doing it in the first place.

  Even in life, before I was turned, I was a lady of privilege. I spent my days with a needle and embroidery hoop. I was always followed around by four ladies-in-waiting. My father held the king’s ear in all business and religious affairs. I was supposed to get married to the Earl of Sandringham. How did I change from a quiet, retiring thing…to a complete monster?