Crimson City Part 17

"What are you talking about? Where's the G.o.dd.a.m.n body?" he bellowed. "Where's the body?"

Somebody put their hand on his back. He shook it off. "Where's Cyd?" He walked around the crime scene, gesturing to the evidence of violence at their feet. "JB? Trask? Anybody? Where is she?"

Trask took a step forward. "We've got teams canva.s.sing the-"

"What the h.e.l.l are you talking about? Are you telling me that whoever did this, killed her and took her G.o.dd.a.m.n body?" Dain pressed his fingers to his temple; it felt like someone had stuck an ice pick through his head.

"We don't know, sir, but it looks that way. It could have been anything, anybody. Vampire, werewolf, human. And it could have been... something else entirely. Forensics has already been alerted-"

Dain put up his palm for silence. He didn't want to hear empty, useless theories. They didn't answer questions. What did anything matter when the people you cared about were gone? The disappearances, the deaths... these were supposed to make him want revenge. Especially with what he knew. His job was about protecting humans from attacks like this, and the horrible disappearance of Cyd was supposed to be an incentive for maintaining a clear line between the species. All it did was make him feel just how pointless such lines were. Who you loved was all that mattered, human or not. Fleur mattered, human or not. Right?

"I don't know if I can do this anymore," he whispered, staring down at the pile of gla.s.s and metal.

JB put out his hand. "Dain..."

"Just stop!" Dain bellowed, nearly blinded by the intensity of his rage. He wheeled around and slammed his fists down on the hood of JB's squad car. Just took his fists and smashed them down again and again and again...

Chapter Twenty-one.

Dain stood on the sidewalk in front of Dumont Towers, staring high up at the crest etched into the gla.s.s doors. All he could think about was Fleur. If he could just get to her, find some excuse to put his arms around her and pull her in, hold her and close his eyes and shut out the reality that was his life...

The world suddenly seemed so small, though really it had been getting smaller for a long time. Serena was gone, along with the promise of that future. And now Cyd was gone, who'd been his lifeline since. His memory was so spotty after the accident. Which would be better-to remember the things he'd lost more clearly, or consider himself lucky that his mind had dulled?

Losing Cyd hurt so badly that he was beginning to think having such little clarity about his past was a blessing. But at the end of the day, he wanted something real, wanted something lasting, wanted something he could touch. And it was Fleur Du-mont's face he saw when he thought of those things.

The doorman, dressed in a gray silk top hat and a jaunty gray and red coat with s.h.i.+ny gold b.u.t.tons, carried a machine gun strapped over one shoulder and an umbrella in the opposite hand. His carefully neutral expression never wavered as Dain walked toward him, but he c.o.c.ked his head slightly and murmured something into the microphone on his lapel. Under a gilded plaque engraved in gothic Script--COME NOT HERE IF YOU DO NOT BELONG--the vamp doorman widened his stance and made no move to open the door.

Without missing a beat, Dain stopped, pulled out his gun, and shoved the barrel into the vamp's cheek. "I'm here to see Fleur Dumont, and I don't feel like climbing up the side of this building to do it. So you can either let me in or suffer the consequences."

The doorman blinked in surprise, then spoke into the microphone once more. After a pause, the front door clicked and the vamp pushed it open. "Start climbing," he said nastily as Dain stepped over the threshold.

The dim lobby was almost impossibly magnificent, pointedly poised on the knife edge between good taste and insanity. Wet and muddy, the soles of Dain's boots slid erratically along the heavily polished parquet floor. He steadied himself with his hand against the wall and turned to look around. Satyrs, madonnas, and kings gazed down from their carefully illuminated canvases, like sentries from another time. A chandelier dipped down into the en-tryway, its crystal strands still tinkling faintly from the wind Dain had shut out behind him. And the centerpiece of the foyer, an enormous velvet-covered staircase cascading in a ribbon of crimson into the entryway, rose and curled its way up into the heart of the vampire world.

This was a place where everything, every detail, every object, was done with purpose, was the best of its kind and the finest in its cla.s.s. And the message was not lost on Dain as his hand curled around the edge of the gilded banister and he began to climb up through the heart of the building toward the last person in this crumbling city he truly cared about.

"Dain!" Fleur looked down over the banister from way on high, and his heart just about stopped as she opened a gate in the railing and leaped down. The diaphanous silver fabric of her dress swirled around her legs as she drifted through the center hollow. "What happened?" she murmured, landing beside him.

Dain just stared at her. She looked so much like an angel, and he'd never in his life felt more like he needed to be saved than right at this minute.

He hardly paid attention to where she was taking him as she grasped his hand and led him away from the landing to an elevator in a side corridor. The doors opened immediately and she pulled him in. As they ascended up through the tower, Fleur took his face in her hands. "What's happened to you?" she whispered.

"Cyd's... gone." He shook his head, unable to explain all of the things that were racing through his mind. She's gone, he wanted to say, and I don't ever want you to go, too.

Her lips parted in surprise, but it was clear she understood what he meant. And when she looked deep into his eyes, he could tell she was searching for clues. Could she see what he was feeling? He felt transparent under her gaze. How could she not know even the things he hadn't said aloud?

The elevator doors opened before either one could speak again, and she led him through the doors and down the hall, just a blur of crimson and gold in his peripheral vision. He only had eyes for her.

He snapped out of his spell when Fleur brought him inside what must be her personal quarters. It was something about the whole picture-Fleur, in full dress, in context of her magnificent rooms. He remembered how different she'd looked on the street, down in Dogtown.

Dain ran his hand over his face, conscious of how dirty and damp he was, how anathema to what stood before him. Fleur looked as if she'd been called from a party, a far cry from the hard, battle-ready beauty he'd grown to respect. Delicate and lethal. She was like a doll. Perfect hair, perfect makeup, perfect dress-and he was so wrong for her and her world.

"Don't look at me like that," she said, reading his mind. "I'm the same person."

"You're beautiful. And right now..." He gestured to her getup. She carefully removed his jacket, and he stood there in the middle of the room, spattering mud and rain onto the ivory hardwood floor. "I'm such a mess, and you... you're so, so... I'm sorry," he whispered hoa.r.s.ely. "I don't know what I'm doing here."

She smiled. "It's all right. I do."

"Fleur, I lied. They all die. And the truth is, I never get over it." Dain searched her face. "Tell me to leave. Tell me to turn around and walk away."

"No."

"Tell me to leave. I'm begging you."

She put her hand to his cheek and it was all he could take.

"Oh s.h.i.+t, Fleur. I'll buy you another dress," he said roughly as he closed his eyes and fell to his knees before her.

She pulled him hard against her and he surrendered, wrapping his arms around her body as her fingers worked gently through his hair. His soaked s.h.i.+rt pressed against the thin silvery lace and silk of her skirt, molding the dress to her legs. He slid his hands along her curves as he pressed his mouth against her body, streaking dirt across the exquisite fabric and marking her as his own.

For he was marking her. He wanted her as his own.

He stood up suddenly, curling his fingers around her neck, touching his forehead to hers, their mouths a kiss away. Fleur took a step backward. "Come here," she commanded.

Dain didn't move, his thoughts wild as she backed up toward the canopy bed. She held out her arm, her fingers reaching for him. Like a rescue. Dain swallowed hard. He desperately needed a rescue.

"I'm not what you think," he said. "I'm not a good man."

"You wouldn't be here if you were," Fleur said, her voice thick with emotion. "Neither would I." Her eyes shone an intense blue that seemed to penetrate his very soul. Dain imagined he saw love in their depths, but he didn't dare ask. Not yet. Because he couldn't be sure of what was to come. And because he had enough feeling for both of them tonight.

"I'm warning you," he said, stalking her and pulling the jeweled combs from her hair. He crowded up to her. "I'm warning you."

"No more warnings," she barely had time to say as he pushed her down on the bed.

She reached out to grasp his s.h.i.+rt. Dain slapped her hand away and pinned it above her head. He could tell that excited her. Giving her a pointed look, warning her not to try again, he released her and grabbed a froth of skirt, slowly pus.h.i.+ng it up to expose the tops of her stockings affixed by a white lace garter. Then his hand slid along the smooth silk of her leg.

He lifted one of her legs up, hooking it over his shoulder, and Fleur gasped and arched her back. The heel of her party shoe was sharp enough to kill with one well-placed kick, and he liked that. The danger of making himself even more vulnerable to her spurred his desire yet higher.

Her delicate panties barely covered anything at all. He slid his hand up her leg once more, and it seemed as though his fingers ignited her flesh. Watching her face, he ran an index finger over the satin, then slipped it under the fabric. She arched back, moaning his name and moving against his hand. The sound of her, the feel of her... It was everything.

"You rescue me, Fleur. Everytime I see your face, it's like you save me from myself."

And she did, lying there with her arms flung wantonly above her head, her hair a gorgeous ma.s.s splayed out behind her on the bedsheets. She curled her fingers, summoning him to her.

With his free hand he released his slacks and moved up her body, landing greedy kisses along her skin as he went.

"There must be a way for us," she murmured. "Just seeing you, I feel such a connection, and when you touch me like this, it's-"

He silenced her with a kiss. She moved her hips beneath him and he could feel his body nearly join with hers. She wanted it as much as he. That was all he needed, and he drove himself inside her; Fleur arched her back with the intensity of a pleasure that showed in her smile.

And still he wasn't close enough. He pushed her farther up the bed and wrapped his arms around her, holding her as tightly as he could while taking her mouth with his mouth and her body with his body. The sense of belonging, of this being right, was so strong; and Dain held on to Fleur with their bodies joined as if she were the last thing that had any meaning at all in his life.

She opened her eyes and looked at him, her mouth full and swollen with excitement, and she put her hand behind his neck and kissed him like she owned him. He snaked his hand down between her legs once more, and she came very suddenly, her entire body clenching, her face an expression of delirious joy.

She turned her mouth away from his, setting her fangs against his throat. The feel of it was exciting, thrilling. A wave of adrenaline shot through him as she pressed her fangs down harder and drove him toward climax. Dain lost his mind, his senses reeling with the feel of his body inside hers, driving him, driving him... and the pain at his throat. She pressed down harder, but the pleasure and adrenaline only increased.

And on the edge of ecstasy, he opened his eyes and found a moment of clarity-her dainty teeth had just barely cut through his flesh. Like a paper cut, that's all it was. But it was enough. Dain regained reality and tried to will himself to stop pumping inside of her. "Fleur," he gasped out in a kind of agony. Aroused beyond belief yet far too aware to ignore his fear, he turned his head away, suddenly struggling.

But she didn't understand the mixed signals, and she didn't let him go.

"Fleur, stop!" Dain pushed off her, off the bed, grabbing onto the canopy gauze for some sort of support and coming away with it in his hand as he stumbled away. Fleur sat up, her eyes wide, her expression a muddle as the white fabric fluttered down around her. It was obvious his body was still hard and wanting, and she didn't understand at all.

"What's wrong?"

He shook his head, absolutely reeling, tormented in body and mind. "I'm dark, sweetheart, but I'm not this dark." The look on her face proved the words hurt, but he ignored what he saw. He couldn't afford to go easy.

Fleur pushed her skirts down, angry and fl.u.s.tered. "I wasn't going to do it," she ground out harshly. "It was play. I wasn't going to do anything."

"How do you know?" Dain snarled as he pulled his clothes on. "Your self-control is as bad as mine."

Her eyes narrowed. "Fine. Let's pretend that I was going to do it. Let's just pretend that, for a moment.

What would you expect, Dain? You know what I am. What would you expect?" She stepped forward to engage him further, but he held up his palm, effectively stopping her in her tracks.

"You came here to me," she finally said.

"It was a mistake. I'm sorry," Dain said roughly. He looked her straight in the eye. "It was all a mistake. You know it as well as I do."

Dain practically sprinted to the elevator. It arrived quickly and descended without stopping-not exactly surprising, given that he was likely the only one in the building who needed to use it. There was a reason for that; he didn't belong here. Come not here if you do not belong.

I don't belong here. I don't belong anywhere.

Dain stumbled out of the lobby into the hazy, raining dawn, and turned his face up to let the cold raindrops cool his blood. Rush hour was in full force, and the blaring lights, sounds, and colors combined into a pulsing pain in his temples.

He slipped down a side street and leaned against the wrought iron gate across a storefront, letting his knees bend and his body slide to the dirty ground. He put his head in his hands and tried to calm his emotions. Why had he reacted so strongly against Fleur's action? Why did the human in him still fight, even now when there was nothing left to fight for? He wanted to indulge. He wanted to revel in the blackest part of his soul, to let go of all that was human and just rage. He wanted revenge for Cyd, and he wanted some way to physically express all of the feelings and sensations he wouldn't allow himself. But what exactly would that do? What would it get him, and how would he accomplish it?

Humans like his bosses liked to think they owned the term humanity. They were always preaching about maintaining it, about how it separated the species. But they were all just the same-the vamps, the dogs, and the humans. It was a joke, believing humans were somehow better, that they somehow set the standard. The fact of the matter was: When you stripped away race, n.o.body measured up. Everyone in Crimson City was just trying to get by, trying to tamp back their own darkness, and whatever quant.i.ty of humanity Dain thought he'd held on to all this time was a joke. It was leaching out of him. The end result was nothing better than living in a sort of no-man's-land.

So, what did all that make him? What in G.o.d's name did it make him? It was time to admit that he'd given up on his wife. Blurred memory and hazy moments aside, all he ever saw in his mind anymore was Fleur. Serena's image was literally wiped away, and he actually had to take out a photograph and stare at it to revive her memory. What did that make him? He was forgetting his past. And without a past, what the h.e.l.l were you?

"Narcos?"

Dain started and stood up, noting with some relief that he had a good foot and fifty pounds or so on the pockmarked individual nearly drowning in a trench coat before him. A grubby hand held out a small device that looked a bit like one of those things used to p.r.i.c.k a hole in an eggsh.e.l.l-Cyd's method of choice for using. Was the universe trying to tell him something?

Dain shook his head and pushed away. He darted into the street and hailed a taxi by way of getting into the vehicle while it was just beginning to accelerate.

"s.h.i.+t, man. Scared me," the driver said. He shook his head but turned his meter on, then settled in for the fare. His eyes met Dain's in the rearview mirror, and the driver smiled, but Dain imagined he saw traces of desperation and deadness there.

Dain sat forward. Silently, he took a pistol out of his boot and pointed it silently against the cracked pleather upholstery, right at the level of the driver's heart.

"Bang," he said.

The driver glanced over his shoulder. "You say something?"

Dain just lowered the gun and put it away, then turned his head and stared out the window for the rest of the ride home.

Fleur curled up in a ball on her bed, clutching the bedsheets to her body, willing her frantic heartbeat to slow and her tears to stop. Dain was gone, running from the room like the last man she'd allowed inside. Every sense still burned with his scent, his feel, his taste.

One such mistake she could have chalked up to an error in judgment, and looked forward to better luck next time. This second time, she had to admit there was something much deeper and more complicated at work. What Marius suffered, Fleur now understood. The wanting. The intense wanting and the impossibility of having. And the wish that maybe there really was just a single person out there to whom you simply belonged. Even if it was a human.

Would she have stopped her fangs against Dain's neck? Was the blood she'd drawn truly an accident, or had she been courting the result she really wanted? What if he'd asked her to do it, to bite deep and hard?

Fleur closed her eyes and fisted her hands. Hayden had asked her to do it. He'd said he couldn't live without her. That was the ultimate fantasy: a human so besotted with love that he'd beg you to make him vampire. But he'd played with fire he didn't comprehend, and he'd burned them both.

She'd been so consumed by that fire. It had washed over her, felt so right. But it had been a terrible mistake. Fleur had lost the respect of her peers and herself, and had lost Hayden as well. Now Dain was making her come dangerously close to losing herself in that fire once more. No, that wasn't true; she already had lost herself. But just how far had she gone?

It was wrong to make humans vampire. Rogues were proof of the consequences, and her very own mistake still roamed out there somewhere, a reminder that Dain could never fully be hers. And the irony of it was that she had finally found the man who could heal the damage. Dain understood her anguish over Hayden, and she his over Serena.

What she felt for Dain made her realize that what had existed between her and Hayden could not have truly been love. Whether she did the same for Dain's memories of Serena was doubtful, but then, he and Serena had not parted in a flurry of hateful accusations and with broken hearts.

And though the thought should have been irrelevant, part of Fleur wondered whether, if it had truly been love between them, Hayden would have felt such horror after she'd turned him. For that thought alone might give hope for a future with Dain.

If he loved her... Fleur squeezed her eyes shut, as if she could wish away the night. Dain didn't love her. He was intrigued by her, aroused by her. But now he was fully aware that they'd been playing a dangerous game.

Would she turn a human to vampire again if she had the choice? No. Not Dain. Not even if he begged. For not only was it wrong, but he would end up resenting her just as Hayden had. There weren't many made vampires who hadn't ultimately turned rogue. There just weren't enough who made the transition without regret.

She would have controlled herself this time. She would have.

Chapter Twenty-two.

As dawn began to filter through the city, Jillian Cooper was walking her beat. The sirens had woken her up again, as they had on and off for the last week-a week that she already wished she could forget, and the d.a.m.n thing wasn't over yet.

She'd heard of various trouble spots in the city from an illegal scanner she'd swiped. The Crimson City Police Department had their hands full. She'd tried to hail a cab to the site of one of the disturbances, but private transport seemed to be shut down for the night, as if everyone had a sense that things were taking a turn for the worse. It was like a vacuum had sucked the life out of the city, closing the doors on all the business and letting chaos, suspicion, and fear reign.