Bad Blood (2 page)

He wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake some sense into her.
Do it. Bite her. Drain her.
“Your signum had been stripped off your back in two bloody filets. By
Rennata
. You were bleeding out faster than any of us knew how to deal with. And then there’s that whole thing where
you’re not comarré anymore
.”

Her clear, blue gaze pierced him. “Not with your blood in me.” She pulled herself up a little taller. “I may be disavowed, but I am as much comarré as you are vampire. If you’ve ruined things for me, I will kill you myself.”

“Ruined what things? Is this some fever madness?”
Maybe he should call Velimai, get Chrysabelle back to bed.

“I have to go back to the Aurelian.”

“Yes on the fever, then. Why would you go back to her? She’s the reason you almost died.”

“No.” She walked around him and took a seat on the edge of a chaise, resting the cane beneath the folds of her flowing white robe. “You and Creek are. Following me to the Aurelian was what got me disavowed. Now I have to find a way back to her to ask who my brother is.”

“Following you was an accident. You know that. And we’ll find your brother together. Creek isn’t without skills. Dominic might know someone to talk to as well. The man’s better connected than anyone I know. You can’t go back to her. It’s too dangerous.”
Not as dangerous as you.

“There you go again, telling me what to do.” She shook her head and looked away but not before the reading lamp caught the glitter of angry tears in her eyes. “I hate this life. Always on guard, always waiting for the next attack. It’s no way to live. I’m done with it. Done waiting for Tatiana to show up again. I’m taking control and doing things my way, and you can’t stop me.”

“Chrysabelle, please—”

“Shut up, Mal. Every time you patronize me, I just want to stick something sharp through you.”

Smart girl.
“I wasn’t patronizing you.” He backed up a step, her demeanor more serious than he’d seen before. “There’s not a sword hidden in that cane, is there?”

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

“I’ll put money on maybe.”

The shadow of a smile danced across her face, quickly replaced by stern determination again.

It was enough of an opening for him. He kneeled at her feet. The position grated against every fiber of his being but seemed the perfect way to show his sincerity. It also put him in striking range. If she chose to lash out with a hidden blade, she could do him real harm. Even kill him. “I am sorry that putting my blood into your body has upset you so much. My intention was to save your life, not further complicate it. You must know that.”
An apology. Someone’s in love.

“I do,” she said with a heavy sigh. She lifted her hand like she might touch him, then dropped it back to her lap. “I appreciate that you and Creek saved my life, but I wish you’d found another way. What happened to me happened because you two interfered, plain and simple. And now, once again, I am left to deal with the consequences of your actions. You don’t think. You just do. Both of you.”

At least she was mad at Creek, too. “I don’t blame you for being upset, but as far as saving your life… there was no other way that we could see. So you know, I would have done anything to make sure you lived that night.”

She stared intently into his eyes. Almost challenging him. “Why is my life so important to you?”

The true answer that came into his head made him dizzy. He couldn’t say what he felt. Wouldn’t give it words like the voices in his head. She’d threatened to kill him once already. She didn’t need ammunition. “For the same reasons you wouldn’t let me remain mortal and age to death. We’re… friends.” What a strange way to describe what they were. “More than friends. There was no way I was going to watch you die knowing I could have prevented it.”

She narrowed her eyes, assessing him. “Dominic’s mortality potion made you soft.”

Yes
, the voices chimed.
No
, he wanted to say.
Knowing you has given me a heart again.
It was a weakness, but one he was willing to bear.
Fool. Fool in love.
“Then he’s the one to blame for giving it to me in the first place.”

She stared at him as if she were seeing him for the first time. “I refuse to be scared anymore.”

“You shouldn’t have to be.” He hated that she was.
Then stay away from her.

“I need to find my brother. He’s the only family I have.”

“I know.” An impossible task, the way he saw it.

“I need the Aurelian for that.”

She was too determined for him to keep her from doing it. “If you think you’re going without me—”

“After what happened last time, you shouldn’t even ask.”

“So what’s your plan?” He almost didn’t want to know.

She held up one finger. “First, to see the Aurelian.”

“How are you going to get there without the signum on your back?”

“Dominic has a signumist. I’ve already sent him a message that I’m coming to talk to him tonight. I don’t know if the man’s any good, but I’m hoping he can put the correct sequence of signum into my skin again.”

Mal’s jaw dropped open and he sank back onto his heels. “Bloody hell. You’re in no shape to undergo something like that. Are you crazy?”

“Crazy mad, and I’m in fine shape.” Her hands tightened into fists, and a tarnished spark lit her eyes. “Once I get to the Aurelian, I’ll obtain the information I need, then slip out of the Primoris Domus undetected and find Tatiana.”

The name of his ex-wife and the woman who’d put him
under his curse was like salt on an open wound. “Why would you want to find Tatiana?”

“Why else?” She held up a second finger. “To kill her.”

Mal ground his back teeth together. “I’m going with you—”

“I already said—”

He pushed to his feet and held up his hands. “Try to stop me and I’ll prevent you from going at all. You’d insist the same of me. You know you would.”

Chrysabelle was silent for an uncomfortably long time. “Fine.” She stared up at him expectantly. “I’m surprised you haven’t asked about the Aurelian’s answer.”

“I’m biding my time.”

“Because you think I’m not going to tell you?”

“The possibility had occurred to me.”

She eased back into the chaise, her chest rising slowly with a lengthy inhale. She let the air out again before she spoke. “She had a way to remove your curse, but”—a second sigh and she shook her head—“it’s almost not an answer at all.”

Tremors of possibility ran through him. “What? Tell me.” He’d do
anything
, anything at all to break free of the hellish weight pressing him into darkness.
Even kill your pretty little blood whore?
His jaw tightened, his anger at the voices almost unbearable. He forced the emotion off his face as her head came up.

Her eyes focused on him and yet looked emptier than he’d ever seen them. An unnatural coldness settled in his belly as she began to speak. “You must right a number of wrongs equal to the names on your skin. One for every life you’ve taken.”

He reached for something to steady himself. Finding
nothing, he collapsed into the chaise beside her. “It’s impossible,” he whispered. A hurricane of laughter shook his bones. Even the voices knew what a herculean task that was. “I am never going to be free.”

“Mal, stop.” She grabbed his hands, her touch white-hot on his freezing skin.

He looked down. Beneath her pale fingers, blood seeped from his tightly clenched fists. He opened them. Deep gouges marked his palms. They healed as he watched, but the blood that dripped onto the carpet was there to stay. Like his curse.

“You vow not to prevent me from getting to the Aurelian and to Tatiana, and I will do everything I can to help you with this.”

Focusing on her was the best thing he could do right now. “I have a better plan. You go alone to see the Aurelian then come back through the portal and give yourself time to heal properly. Then, when you’re ready, we go together to Corvinestri and take care of Tatiana.” If Chrysabelle meant to kill his ex-wife, there was no way he wasn’t going to help. The voices cried out. He knew they believed Tatiana to be the cure to his curse. He knew better. “You know how dangerous she is. This isn’t something you should do alone. Not to mention I have enough of my own reasons to want her dead.”

She was quiet for a few moments, probably thinking. “Agreed. But we will also find a way to remove your curse.”

He closed his hands again, looking away from her. “No. We won’t. Because there isn’t one.” He stood and walked to the door. “Let’s go see Dominic about this signumist.”

D
olores Linley Diaz-White, Lola to her friends and family, pinched the bridge of her nose and inhaled the well-conditioned air of her city hall office. The report open on her desk was one of a hundred, maybe two, that had come in since the beginning of the week. Every day brought new ones, but they were all basically the same. Strange, unexplainable creatures had begun showing up in her city. The kind of creatures people called
vampires
and
shape-shifters
and
bogeymen
.

She glanced up as something swooped past her window. Something that looked very much like one of the gargoyles carved into the corners of the building. But she wouldn’t think that, because acknowledging that such a thing was even possible meant the things in her reports were possible, too. Instead, she shifted her gaze to the panel of wall monitors positioned across from her desk, the left side currently showing live feeds from Jacksonville, Tallahassee, Orlando, and Pensacola, the right showing feeds from various cities through the Southern Union. These creatures weren’t special to Paradise City. They were in every city in New Florida. All of the Southern
Union, actually. New Orleans seemed oddly quiet, but then it had been that way since the rebuild after 2054’s Hurricane Edmund. As the mayor of a city that often took the brunt of such storms, she paid attention to those kinds of things.

She closed the report and added it to the stack of those waiting to be reviewed. Another hour of reading them wasn’t going to make the problem go away.

A knock on the door startled her. She checked the time. Almost nine. Was Valerie, her secretary, still here? Couldn’t be, Lola had sent her home two hours ago. Must be John Havoc, her bodyguard. But why? The man was as silent as a ghost. Followed orders like a born soldier and had already saved her life twice. In the last few weeks, he’d become more distant than usual and had taken to wearing sunglasses night and day. There was something else about him, too. Something that fell into the same category as the reports and the gargoyles. Something she kept pushing from her mind every time it reared its ugly head. But what she thought didn’t matter. He did his job. He could dye his hair blue if he wanted. His position was secure. “Come in.”

The door opened, and John stepped in, his shades securely in place. Behind him, a uniformed police officer entered. The officer cast a wary gaze at John, who waited for her nod of approval.

“Thank you, John.”

He grunted softly and left, back to his post.

“Sorry to disturb you at this hour, Madam Mayor, but the chief said you’d probably still be here.”

“No problem, Officer…”

He removed his hat. “Rodriguez, ma’am.”

“
Hola
, Officer Rodriguez. What can I do for you at this hour?”

He glanced quickly at the floor, then back to her. He was young, probably hadn’t been on the job long. Whatever he had to tell her, it wasn’t good news. Regardless, she could take it. She hadn’t been mayor this long without some rough patches.

“We believe we’ve found your daughter.”

St. Petersburg, Russia, 2067

Times like this, the need to kill coated her mouth like the remnants of a lover’s kiss.

Tatiana tapped her head against the high-backed wooden bench. One hundred ninety-two hours wasted. Eight bloody days they’d made her wait. She hadn’t even had a chance to deal with the two runaway comarrés. Madame Rennata would replace them gratis or Tatiana would find a way to make her pay.

Which reminded Tatiana that she could have returned to New Florida and done away with that other comarré whore by now, but no, she’d been trapped in St. Petersburg at the whim of Lord Grigor and under the watchful eyes of the rest of the House of Rasputin. Because of the powers this house possessed, she’d been forced to leave Octavian behind in Corvinestri. He was just a vampling, far too young and inexperienced to guard his mind against the likes of Grigor and his ilk. She couldn’t have Grigor tapping into Octavian’s thoughts and gathering information to use against her. Like Zafir’s death. Or that of his brother, Nasir.