Half Truths (A Helheim Wolf Pack Tale) (20 page)

‘The Vics have
had their throats cut. Their bodies are drained of blood and their chests have
been carved with a symbol. We’ve had two bodies turn up so far—both at “The Imp
and Impaler”.’

‘Male or
female?’ asked Sabel.

‘Male.’

‘What was the
symbol on their chest?’ Antain asked, rubbing his chin, absorbing all the
information.

Vaile’s jaw
tightened. ‘It’s a rune—the same ones the vampire royalty use to brand their
kin.’

‘What is it?’
Colton asked.

Vaile blew out a
frustrated breath. ‘It’s the serpent.’

The serpent.
Eirawen. Eirawen had come to seek revenge on them for killing her lover. Rhett
stood up, his hands clenched into tight fists.

‘Rhett, sit
down. It might not mean what you think it does,’ Antain said, rolling his empty
whiskey glass between his fingertips.

‘She’s come to
take revenge on us for killing Nox,’ he gritted out.

‘If that were
true, why is she hiding from us? Surely she would have shown herself to us.
Vampires are, after all, incredibly egotistical.’

Colton said, ‘So
maybe it’s not Eirawen. Maybe it’s just some power-hungry
immara
wanting
to make a name for himself.’

‘It’s a
possibility, I suppose,’ Antain said. Looking back at Vaile, he asked, ‘You
said the blood was drained from the bodies?’

‘It appears that
way.’

‘And only two
humans have been killed so far?’ Vaile nodded. ‘Keep us informed. We don’t know
anything for sure, and conjecture never got anyone far.’

‘What if the
Seer gets wind of this?’ Colton asked.

Antain’s mouth
thinned to a hard line; his hands cranking down on the glass in his hands. ‘We
have to pray that she doesn’t. Our hold on Indi is tenuous as it is. If we have
vampire problems to add to it, the Seer would have just cause to remove her
from our care.’

‘Even if she’s
living here with us?’ Rhett asked.

Antain’s nod was
shallow, and Rhett heard his molars grinding against one another. ‘Now, we’ve
had a lead on getting Eaton back,’ Antain added. Everyone’s eyes fixed on him.
Antain took his time explaining what had happened with Leona, fielding the
questions fired at him easily. Both Vaile and Sabel asked the same questions as
Rhett had. Eventually, Vaile conceded that while Leona was still useful, they
would hold up their end of the bargain. In the meantime though, all they could
do was wait.

Vaile had literally had twenty-five
minutes sleep before his phone rang. It was vibrating on his bedside table. He
palmed it and barked a reply into the receiver. After being given the details,
he looked at his clock: two in the morning. It was
two
in the fucking
morning. He cursed and slid out of bed, reaching behind him to pull his holster
from around the headboard.

He walked to his
wardrobe and opened the doors. He ignored the suits he had lined up on the
left, running his eyes over the sweaters and chinos until he reached the black
slacks and button-down Oxfords. Sliding into a fresh pair of slacks, he snagged
a white Oxford from the wooden hanger and a pair of black socks. His Gucci
loafers went on next before shrugging into his holster. He checked his weapon,
snapped on his badge, and left the farmhouse.

The streets were
empty except for a few taxis ferrying the drunk back home. He sneered at the
thought. At least the fuckers weren’t endangering anyone else’s life with their
own stupidity. He pulled up in front of Grey’s apartment; the name of the apartment
block glittering under the glare of heavy-handed spotlighting. He walked
towards the entrance where a doorman quickly stood a little straighter.

‘May I help you,
sir?’ he asked. The doorman was only a punk college kid.

‘I’m here to see
Grey,’ he replied. ‘Larissa Grey,’ he amended when the kid gave him a puzzled
look.

‘Oh,’ he smiled.
Vaile had the urge to wipe it off his face with his fist if he was thinking
about Grey in the way he thought he was. ‘Miss Grey lives in apartment
four-forty-five.’

Vaile grunted a
thanks and hoofed it up the stairs to the fourth floor. The hallways were
slit-your-wrists boring—decorated in the same shade of paint as in the lobby.
There were paintings hung up between the different apartments, but they were
just cheap reproduction copies. He came to Grey’s apartment, running his hand
through his short hair and making sure his clothes were straight and unwrinkled
before he knocked.

He glanced at
his watch between knocks. It was nearly three in the morning. He should have just
fucking called and asked her to meet him down at The Imp. He was about to turn
away, pulling his phone from his pocket when the door opened. Vaile took a step
back.

Grey was
clutching the sides of her black silk robe together with one hand while rubbing
her eyes with the other. Honey-blonde hair cascaded over her shoulders, inching
closer and closer to the small mounds of her breasts beneath the silk. Her face
had little crease lines in it from the pillow, and his heart thumped
irregularly in response.

‘Vaile?’ she
asked.

He cleared his
throat. ‘Ah, sorry. I should have called first.’

‘It’s fine.
What’s wrong?’

‘Another murder.
I’ll wait out here while you get dressed.’

She shook her
head. ‘Don’t be silly. Come in and sit down. I won’t be long.’

Vaile was going
to protest, but Grey just turned and walked in the other direction; her thin
hips swaying under the curtain of black silk. Vaile’s cock jerked, forcing him
into the apartment and closing the door. He inhaled deeply, taking in the smell
of the place. Roses lingered everywhere, driving him insane.

‘Coffee?’ Grey
asked, holding up the glass coffee pot from her machine.

‘No … thanks,’
he replied gruffly.

She smiled at
him. ‘Well, I’m going to need some. I only managed a few hours of sleep.’ She started
the machine before slinking into her bedroom. Vaile thought she was doing it on
purpose—teasing him like she was—but there was nothing he could do about it
right now. He looked towards her bedroom door which had been left open just a
crack. It was enough of a space for Vaile to see her walking backwards and
forwards in her silk robe. She walked to the left and when she returned, her
hair was done in the knot she put it in for work. The smell of coffee permeated
through the apartment, but all Vaile could smell was her.

Grey appeared at
the door, her robe undone and revealing a black, silk negligee that matched the
robe. Vaile’s eyes gravitated down, drinking in her body with a hunger he
hadn’t felt in a long, long time. She blushed, catching the ends, and drew them
together. ‘Could you pour some coffee into my travel thermos, please? I’ll
drink it in the car.’

Vaile knew his
jaw was slack. He tried twice before any words came out. ‘Sure. Where is it?’

‘In the cupboard
above the fridge. Thanks.’ She smiled shyly, turned and closed the door all the
way. Vaile stood and stalked into her black granite kitchen and retrieved the
thermos. He was pouring some coffee in when something brushed past his leg. He
looked down, letting a growl escape his lips. A pair of citrine-yellow eyes
stared up at him. The cat meowed softly and made another pass through his legs,
rubbing its head and arching its back against him.

He took a step
back. ‘Knock it off. You’ll get fur all over my pants,’ he growled, letting his
wolf slip just a little. The cat watched him carefully, but chose to ignore the
threats both from the man and the wolf. It jumped up on the counter and stood
in front of Vaile, eyeing him off.

‘Quit looking at
me,’ he snapped.

The cat blinked
back at him slowly. Vaile was about to step away from the bench when the cat
placed its front paws onto his chest; leaning in to sniff his clothes and face.
Vaile could feel his wolf snapping at the cat. They were natural enemies. All
animals sensed the wolf inside him, usually running a mile in the opposite
direction, but this cat had balls. It wasn’t scared of Vaile. It was curious.

It meowed again
and rubbed its face against his holster—finding the rough texture just about
perfect. Vaile lifted his hand slowly, placing it between the cat’s shoulder
blades and running his hand down the length of its spine. The cat purred,
arching into his hand. He was scratching its head when Grey came out of the
bedroom and into the kitchen.

‘Oh!’ she
exclaimed, her hand going to her mouth.

Vaile dropped
his hand like he’d just been caught jerking off. His head snapped around, and
taking a quick step away from the cat said, ‘What?’

A small crease
formed between her brows before it was replaced by a smile. ‘I see you’ve met
Oscar then.’

‘Oscar?’

‘My cat.’ She
walked over to them, tugging the cat off the bench top and placing him on the
floor. ‘He doesn’t really like people. Normally he just bites them and runs
off.’

She was looking
at him with a curiosity that Vaile didn’t feel comfortable with. Thrusting the
thermos into her hands, he said gruffly, ‘We’d better get going. You can ride
with me and I’ll drop you home afterwards.’

They walked down
the hallway together in silence, coming to the elevators at the end of the
hall. Vaile took the door just to the left, waiting for Grey to protest. But
she didn’t. She even kept up with his pace as he powered down the stairs.

Vaile growled a
warning at the doorman when he smiled at Grey for just a second too long,
ushering her into his car and slamming her door shut. Walking around to the
driver’s side, he glanced up to see the kid staring at Grey from his position
at the doors. The breeze brought over the scent of lust, and Vaile ground his
teeth.

‘If you’re
thinking about jerking off while thinking of her, I’ll hunt you down and tear
off your balls,’ he snarled from across the top of the car, not caring if Grey
heard him or not. The kid blanched—his eyes wide and mouth slack. Eventually he
nodded and Vaile got into the car.

‘What did you
say to him?’ Grey asked, looking over at him with the most beautiful green
eyes.

‘He asked where
we were going. I told him to a murder scene,’ Vaile lied. Grey glanced back out
the window at the doorman who quickly averted his gaze to his shoes. Vaile
started the car and made the sickeningly familiar drive to The Imp.

When they pulled up, there was a
large group milling around the front of the club. When they herded together
like that, they were just a mass of people in black clothes with faces painted white
and metal through their ears and faces. On any exposed bits of skin, Vaile
could see tattoos ranging from crosses to fairies to athames.

Flapping in the
frigid breeze behind the group was yellow police tape strung up between the
black, velvet ropes. A couple of uniformed cops stood around stamping their
feet against the cold or shoving their hands into the pockets of their
police-issued jackets. A whistle caught Vaile’s attention.

Suleman was
standing on the other side of the tape with a cigarette in his hand. ‘When are
you guys going to catch this fucker?’ he asked, taking a puff from the
cigarette. ‘Although, maybe you shouldn’t,’ he added. ‘Business has tripled
since news got out that the murders were happening here.’

‘Where’s the
body?’ Vaile’s voice was cold and dark. Suleman’s heart tripped in his chest.

‘This one was in
plain sight; back of the club in the VIP section.’ Suleman ground out the
cigarette on the heel of his Versace leather boot and sauntered into his club.
Vaile ushered Grey through the door before him and stepped into the too-bright
lights of a club that should never see the light of day. The smell of alcohol,
cigarettes and sweat assaulted his senses, sending Vaile’s wolf pacing under
his skin.

They were
walking to the back corner of the club where another set of black velvet ropes
were suspended on brass railings in front of an honest-to-God black velvet
curtain.

‘Ever think
about changing the colour scheme?’ Vaile asked. Suleman just looked at him.
Vaile shrugged. Suleman shook his head and lifted up the curtain to reveal the
murder scene. CSI were crawling all over the place; the flash of the
photographer’s camera illuminating sections of the club with seizure-inducing
frequency.

‘Drop it,’ Vaile
said curtly. Suleman shrugged and let the velvet drape fall.

‘Staff or
customer?’ Grey asked softly, already palming her notebook and pen.

‘A regular. His
name’s Scott Green. The punk was a dot-com billionaire by the time he was
twenty-one. He came in every Friday and Saturday night, usually with a new
woman on his arm, but tonight he was alone.’

‘Who else was in
here tonight?’

‘The usual
crowd. Wright was in here with a whole group of his associates.’

‘Philip Wright?’

‘Yeah, him. It
was the first time he’d been in here since his whole,’ Suleman shrugged and
held up his hand, wiggling his fingers. ‘You know.’

‘And was he in
here while Green was in here?’

‘No. He left
maybe a few minutes before with his entourage in tow. I checked Green for a
drink just after, and nobody else was back here except for one of my waitresses
who serves our exclusive customers.’

Vaile kept his
sardonic laugh to himself. Suleman’s “waitresses” were nothing more than
high-end whores who trawled the VIP section. His customers were safe here. He
had his girls contractually bound so they couldn’t talk. If they did, they’d
find themselves in a dark alleyway staring down the barrel of a gun.

‘So nobody came
in through the curtain after you left?’ Vaile pressed.

He shrugged.
‘Dunno. Maybe.’