Into the Woods (19 page)

“Mmmm, it smells good in here,” she said, the adrenaline high scouring through her because
she
was in control. She was in control of this monster who could kill her with a backhanded slap, who could rip out her throat and end her life, who could make her powerless under him—and who couldn’t touch her blood until she allowed him, bound by tradition and unwritten law. And if he tried, she’d have his ass and a better job both.

Pulse fast, she took a step closer. He wanted her—he was so ready, his shoulders were rock hard and his hands were fists to keep from reaching for her. His inner struggle was showing on his face, and he wasn’t breathing anymore. There was a reason Piscary indulged her. This was part of it, but Art would never taste it all.

“Can’t have . . . this,” she said, her hand sliding up from her inner thigh, fingers spread wide as they crossed her middle to her chest until they lay provocatively to hide her neck. She felt her pulse lift and fall against them, stirring herself as much as Art. Her eyes were on the vampire before her. He would be savagely magnificent. She exhaled, imagining his teeth sinking into her, reminding her she was alive with the promise of death in his lips.

Almost . . . it might be worth letting him have his way.

Art read her thought in the very air. In a flash of motion too fast for her to follow, he moved. Ivy gasped, her core pulsing with fear. He jerked her to him. His hand gripped the back of her neck, the other twisted her arm painfully behind her. He hesitated as he caught himself, his eyes black and pained with the control needed to stop. She laughed, low and husky.

“Can’t have this,” she taunted, wishing he would take it as she lolled her head back to expose the length of her neck.
Oh God. If only he would . . .
she thought, a faint tickling in her thoughts warning her a war had started between her hunger and will.

“Give it to me,” Art managed, his voice strained, and she smiled as he started to weaken. “Give this to me . . .”

“No,” she breathed. Her pulse lifted under his hand, and her eyes closed. Her body demanded she say yes, she wanted to say yes.
Why
, she thought, hunger driving through her as she found his hard shoulders,
why didn’t she say yes? Such a small thing . . . And he was so deliciously beautiful, even if he didn’t stir her soul
.

Art sensed her falter, a low growl rising up through him. He pressed her to him, almost supporting her weight. With a new resolve, he nuzzled the base of her neck.

Ivy sucked in her air, clutching him closer. Fire. This was fire, burning promises from her neck to her groin.

“Give this to me,” he demanded, his lips brushing the words against her skin. His hand slipped farther, edging between her coat and shirt, cupping her breast. “Everything . . .” he breathed, his exhalation filling her, making her whole.

In a breathless wave, instinct rose, crushing her will.
No!
she panicked even as her body writhed for it. It would turn her into a whore, break her will and crack the lie that kept her sane. But with a frightened jolt, Ivy realized her lips had parted to say yes.

Reality flashed through her, and with a surge of fear, she kneed him in the crotch.

Art let go, falling to kneel before her, his hands covering himself. Not waiting, she fell back a step and snapped a front kick to his jaw. His head rocked back and he hit the floor beside the bed. “You stupid bitch,” he gasped.

“Ass,” she panted, trembling as her body rebelled at the sudden shift of passions. She stood above him, fighting the desire to fall on him, sink her teeth into him while he knelt helpless before her. Damn it, she had to get out of this room. Two unrequited plays for her blood in one night was pushing it.

Slowly Art lost his hunched position and started to chuckle. Ivy felt her face flame. “Get off the floor,” she snapped, backing up. “They haven’t vacuumed yet.”

Still laughing, Art rolled onto his side. “This is going to be one hell of a week,” he said, then hesitated, eyes on the carpet just beyond the bedspread knocked askew. “Give me a collection bag,” he said, reaching into his back pocket.

Bloodlust still ringing in her, Ivy came forward, pulled by his intent tone. “What is it?”

“Give me a bag,” he repeated, his expensive suit clashing with the ugly carpet.

She hesitated, then scooped up the bags from where they had fallen. Checking the time, Ivy jotted down the date and location before handing it to Art. Still on the floor, Art reached under the bed and rolled something shiny into the light with a pen from his pocket. With an eerie quickness, he flicked it into the bag and stood. The growing brown rim about his pupils said he was in control, and smiling to show his teeth, he lifted the bag to the light.

Seeing his confidence, Ivy felt a flash of despair. It had been a game to him. He had never been in danger of losing his restraint.
Shit,
she thought, the first fingers of doubt she could do this slithering about her heart.

But then she saw what he held, and her worry turned to understanding—and then true concern. “A banshee tear?” she asked, recognizing the tear-shaped black crystal.

Suddenly the words of the distraught man in the car had a new meaning.
I didn’t mean to hurt her. It wasn’t me
. Pity came from nowhere, making the slice of low-income misery surrounding her all the more distasteful. He probably
had
loved her. It had been a banshee, feeding him rage until he killed his wife, whereupon the banshee wallowed in her death energy.

It was still murder, but the man had been a tool, not the perpetrator. The murderer was at large somewhere in Cincinnati, with the alibi of time and distance making it hard to link her to the crime. That’s why the tear had been left as a conduit. The banshee had targeted the couple, followed them home, left a tear when they were out, and when sparks flew, added to the man’s rage until he truly wasn’t capable of resisting. It wasn’t an excuse; it was murder by magic—a magic older than vampires. Perhaps older than witches or demons.

Art shook the bag to make the black jewel glitter before letting his arm drop. “We have every banshee on record. We’ll run the tear through the computer and get the bitch.”

Ivy nodded, feeling her pupils contract. The I.S. kept close tabs on the small population of banshees, and if one was feeding indiscriminately in Cincinnati, they could expect more deaths before they caught her.

“Now, where were we,” Art said, slipping an arm about her waist.

“Bastard,” Ivy said, elbowing him in the gut and stepping away. But the strike never landed, and she schooled her face to no emotion when he chuckled at her a good eight feet back. God, he made her feel like a child. “Why don’t you go home after the sun comes up,” she snarled.

“You offering to tuck me in?”

“Go to hell.”

From the hallway came the sounds of soft conversation. The collection van was here. Art breathed deep, bringing the scents of the room into him. His eyes closed and his thin lips curled upward as he exhaled, apparently happy with what he sensed. Ivy didn’t need to breathe to know that the room stank of her fear now, mixing with the dead woman’s until it was impossible to tell them apart.

“See you back at the tower, Ivy.”

Not if I stake you first
, she thought, wondering if calling in sick tomorrow was worth the harassment she’d get the next day. She could say she’d been to the doctor about her case of STD—tell everyone she got it from Art.

Art sauntered out of the room, one hand in his pocket, the other dropping the banshee tear onto the entering officer’s clipboard. The werewolf’s eyes widened, but then he looked up, eyes watering. “Whoa!” he said, nose wrinkling. “What have you two been doing in here?”

“Nothing.” Ivy felt cold and small in her leather pants and short coat as she stood in the center of the room and listened to Art say good-bye to Rat and Tia. She forced her hands from her neck to prove it was unmarked.

“Doesn’t smell like nothing,” the man scoffed. “Smells like someone—”

Ivy glared at him as his words cut off. Adrenaline pulsed, this time from worry. She had contaminated a crime scene with her fear, but the man’s eyes held pity, not disgust.

“Are you okay?” he asked softly, his clipboard held to himself as he obviously guessed what had happened. There was too much fear in here for just one person, even a murdered one.

“Fine,” she said shortly. Psychic fear levels weren’t recorded unless a banshee was involved. That she hadn’t known one was, wasn’t an excuse. She’d get reprimanded at the least, worse if Art wanted to blackmail her. And he would. Damn it, could she make this any easier for him? Flushed, she scooped up the rest of the collection bags and gave them to the Were.

“I don’t know how you can work with the dead ones,” the man said, trying to catch her eyes, but Ivy wouldn’t let him. “Hell, they scare my tail over my balls just looking at me.”

“I said, I’m fine,” she muttered. “I want it vacuumed, dusted, and photographed. Don’t bother with a fear level profile. I contaminated it.” She could keep quiet about it, but she’d rather suffer an earned reprimand than Art’s blackmail. “Keep the tear from the press,” she added, glancing at it, small and innocuous on his clipboard. “The last thing we need is the city in a panic, calling us every time a high schooler cries over her boyfriend.”

The man nodded. His stubble was thick, and stifling the thought of how it would feel to rake her fingers and then her teeth over it, Ivy strode from the room, fleeing the stink of the dead woman’s fear. She didn’t like how it smelled exactly like her own.

Ivy passed quickly through the living room and into the hallway, trying not to breathe. She should have planned this, not made a fool of herself by acting on impulse. Because of her assumptions, Art had her by the short hairs. Avoiding him the rest of her day was going to be impossible. Maybe she could spend it researching banshees. The files were stored in the upper levels. Art might follow her, but the Inderlander ratio would be slanted to witch and Were, not only reducing the pheromone levels, but also making it easier to pull out early since the entire tower above ground emptied at midnight with their three to twelve shift. Only the belowground offices maintained the variable sunset to sunrise schedule.

Wine
, she thought, forcing herself to look confident and casual when she emerged on the stoop and found the lights of a news crew already illuminating the parking lot. She’d pick up two bottles on the way home so Kisten would be drunk enough not to care if she hurt him.

THREE

E
ven with her intentions to leave at midnight, the sun was up by the time Ivy was idling her bike through the Hollows’s rush-hour traffic, winding her way to the waterfront and the spacious apartment she and Kisten shared above Piscary’s restaurant. That she worked for the force that policed the underground he controlled wasn’t surprising or unintentional, but prudent planning. Though not on the payroll, Piscary ran the I.S. through a complicated system of favors. He still had to obey the laws—or at least not get caught breaking them lest he get hauled in like anyone else. It reminded Ivy of what Camelot had probably really been like.

Her mother had worked in the top of the I.S. hierarchy until she died, and Ivy knew that was where she and Piscary wanted Ivy to be. Piscary dealt in gambling and protection—on paper, both legal ways to make his money—and the master vampire had more finesse than to put her where she’d have to choose between doing what he wanted and what her job required. The corruption was that bad.

Or that good
, Ivy thought, checking to see that the guy behind her was watching before she slowed and turned left into the restaurant’s parking lot. If it hadn’t been for the threat of Piscary coming down on aggressive vampires in backstreet justice, the I.S. wouldn’t be able to cope. She was sure that was why most people, including the FIB, looked the other way. The I.S. was corrupt, but the people actually in charge of the city did a good job keeping it civilized.

Ivy slowed her bike by the door to the kitchen and cut the engine, scanning the empty lot. It was Wednesday, and whereas any other day of the week the restaurant would be emptying out of the last stragglers, today it was deserted. Piscary liked a day of rest. At least she wouldn’t have to dodge the waitstaff and their questions as to why her eyes were half dilated. She needed either a long bubble bath before bed, or Kisten, or both.

The breeze off the nearby river was cool and carried the scent of oil and gas. Taking a breath to clear her mind, she pushed the service door open with the wheel of her bike. It didn’t even have a lock to let the produce trucks make their deliveries at all hours. No one would steal from Piscary. For all appearances he obeyed the law, but somehow, you’d find yourself dead anyway.

Purse and twin wine bottles in hand, she left her bike beside the crates of tomatoes and mushrooms and took the cement steps to the kitchen two at a time. She passed the dark counters and cold ovens without seeing them. The faint odor of rising yeast mixed with the lingering odors of the vampires who worked here, and she felt herself relax, her boots making a soft cadence on the tiled floor. The scent brought to memory thoughts of her summers working in the kitchen and, when old enough, on the floor as a waitress. She hadn’t been innocent, but then the ugliness had been lost in the glare of the thrill. Now it just made her tired.

Her pulse quickened when she passed the thick door that led to the elevator and Piscary’s underground apartments. The thought that he would meet her with soothing hands and calculated sympathy was enough to bring her blood to the surface, but her irritation that he was manipulating her kept her moving into the bar. He wouldn’t call her to him, knowing it would cause her more mental anguish to come begging to him when she could take no more, desperate for the reassurance that he still loved her.

It was comfortingly silent in the restaurant proper, and the low ceilings and dim atmosphere seemed to follow her into the closed-party rooms in the back. A wide stairway behind a door led to the private second floor. Her hand traced the wall for balance as she rose up the wide, black-wood stairs, eager to find Kisten and an understanding ear that wasn’t attached to a manipulating mind.