Mixed Blessing (Mixed Blessing Mystery, Book 1) (29 page)

"When she bathed me in her Light and brought me under her line, I felt free for the first time in my life. I'm over one-hundred-and-fifty years old, Gigi. I haven't been free for that entire time. But Lucinda set me free. I am of her line, I
do
answer to her, but I am also free." His hand came up and cupped my cheek. "You can be two things and still have freedom. I am. The Dark is still there, I know it, but I have no use for it now that Light fills my soul."

"My vampire is all Dark," I admitted, haltingly. "But I am all Light."

He nodded and pulled me into his embrace, laying his head on my shoulder. He smelled so good.

"Pete knows what you are," he whispered in my ear. I stiffened and tried to pull away, he wouldn't let me. Just continued to stroke a reassuring hand down my back and up into my hair. "He had guessed. He hears so much that sooner or later it would have come out, but your actions tonight confirmed it." I hissed, but he still wouldn't let me go. "He considers this to be exceptionally worthy payment. You may not have intended it that way, but the information was ascertained during a formally arranged exchange of knowledge. It is therefore considered payment by his kind."

I let a breath of air out, feeling defeated, lost, beaten and just so damn tired. Tired of it all. Tired of hiding. Tired of the fear when my secrets came out. Fucking tired. I felt myself lean into Samson's hold, he had already taken some of my weight in his arms anyway.

"He told me who the Rogue is and what the connection to you is." He stopped talking then, but his arms tightened around me as though he was preparing for my reaction, my response to what Pete had divulged.

"I'm so sorry," he whispered against the skin at my ear. "I truly am, but just remember you are more than a vampire. You are more than that. There is Light in you as well as Dark. Use the Light if you feel threatened, cornered, if you think the Dark is winning. Just use your Light, babe."

"Tell me," I said, my voice sounding hollow, but I'd had enough of the pep talk.

There was a pause, as if he hadn't already drawn this out longer than he should have. I knew he wasn't being intentionally mean, he clearly did
not
want to tell me what the connection to this murdering bastard was.

Eventually, he found his courage, or maybe the growl gaining voice in my throat made him aware he had hesitated too long. Whatever it was, he finally said the words that would change everything. The words that turned this murder case into something altogether different from what it was.

"He is your Sire, Gigi. The Rogue who tried to turn you. He's back."

Images came cascading through my mind, unbidden, harsh in their reality, so raw. I had no conscious memory of being turned. Only vague pictures from what Samson and Lucinda had told me in the past, but nothing of my own recollections of the event. I should have. It was perhaps the single most important event that would ever happen in my life.

My death.

But I can't remember everything, couldn't remember much in fact. But Samson's words just now caused a series of flashes to appear behind my closed eyelids. Unfamiliar, broken, but images nonetheless of my final moments as a human.

A dishevelled figure standing over me. Fangs in his grimacing mouth. My reaction. I didn't scream, I laughed. Who laughs at their attacker, the harbinger of death? But it was hysterical laughter. I
was
afraid. The pain, the sensation of losing my grip on reality, on life. I had known I was going to die. I had fought for a while, I had scratched and hit and kicked and struggled, but at some point I had realised the futility of it all and I had accepted my fate.

I don't remember this, any of it. But it was obviously still inside my mind, because it came out now, from its hidden spot deep within my subconscious. I had thought my Sire had abandoned me, not that I was complaining about that, but Lucinda and Samson had said if he didn't stick around to see me through the turning, then he had forsaken all connection to me. He probably knew it had failed and with a vampire hunter on the scene, he didn't think it was worth sticking around to make sure.

But now he was back.

Not just back, but back and killing innocents, leaving me gruesome messages in their cadavers, framing my best friend's cousin and what else? Taunting me? Testing me? I wasn't sure, but I knew, without actually knowing, that him being here, doing this, had something to do with me.

I doubled over expecting the blood I had consumed earlier to come hurtling back up my throat and land at my feet. I was vaguely aware of Samson rubbing my back, saying soothing words in his soft English accent, just staying near. He hadn't run, he hadn't abandoned me when he realised these deaths were all because of me. Me and my fucked up Sire and the games he was playing to get to me. It was all my fault and Samson didn't say a thing.

He just stayed at my side. Stayed with me.

I wasn't sure I wanted his compassion, his careful attention. His kindness. I was sure I didn't deserve it, but more than that. The more Samson made me remember what it was I loved about him before my world changed, the harder it was for me to fight those buried feelings. They were bubbling up from the pit I had tossed them into and like a festering wound, they sizzled and spat and caused immeasurable pain.

I squeezed my eyes closed and held my breath. Counted to ten and when that didn't work, counted to twenty. Then righted myself with a shake of my head and a roll of my shoulders.

OK. So he was back and he was playing with me. Even more reason to figure this all out and stake the bastard once and for all. Lucinda had been unable to capture him when she found him standing over my dying body. But Lucinda is just a Nosferatin. I am a Nothus. This blood-sucking scum-bag had no idea who he was toying with.

I pulled my cellphone out of my pocket and thumbed through my contacts.

"What are you going to do?" Samson asked quietly at my side.

"Figuring this out," I replied curtly and put the cell to my ear. It was answered in two rings.

"Georgia." I guessed I wouldn't be Gigi to Mark ever again.

"What time can I see Stu?" My voice was firm and level. I thought it sounded pretty good, actually. No hint of the turmoil I was feeling inside.

"What's wrong?" OK, so maybe Mark knew me better than I thought.

"Nothing. The night is progressing and the murderer may strike again." No way was I admitting to Mark that the murderer was my Sire. "We don't have much time left."

"He won't strike again," Mark answered, sounding weary and worn-out, but defiant all the same.

"How do you know he won't?" I demanded.

"The last of the market research group has been secured, all are being watched over by uniformed officers. Nothing can get to them."

I blinked slowly. I hadn't thought about that. The Rogue - and I was
not
going to call him anything other than that - had been targeting those who attended the premarket testing of Vive La Vodka, of course the police could work out the next victims on his list.

But...

"You do realise you're not working with a human murderer here, don't you, Mark?"

There was a pause, then, "You think he can get past cops?"

"Are they armed?"

A sigh. "Pepper spray, batons and tasers. They're all uniformed constabulary, no firearms among them."

Pepper spray, batons and tasers. Shit. If they sharpened the batons they could immobilise for a few minutes, not much, there's no silver to incapacitate further than that. And that is only if they get close enough to the heart. But pepper spray and tasers were just going to piss the Rogue off.

"Can you arm them?" I asked, already knowing what his answer would be.

"I can't put detectives on a victim watch and I doubt my superintendent would call this a serious incident requiring an armed response. Our presence in uniform alone is enough to deter most criminals."

I ground my teeth together. "He is not most criminals, Mark. This is absurd!" I started pacing. "Text me the locations of those left on the list and I'll arrange appropriate protection." I had no idea if Jett would go for that, but I could at least try and if there weren't too many left to protect, I could involve Lucinda, should Jett block me out. With her vampires and Michel's, we'd no doubt be able to cover the numbers.

"I can't do that." Mark's words broke into my strategic planning.

"What do you mean, you can't do that?"

Another sigh. "Georgia, you're a consultant, a psychic one at that, this information is protected, sensitive. I couldn't divulge it to a consultant."

I let a breath of air out on a huff. "Are you mad? You don't have the resources, the experience to combat this, Mark. I do. We do. Now, if I am your psychic advisor, I'm advising you that I
foresee
a problem with your protection of the potential victims tonight. And I
advise
that telling me their locations will avoid this problem."

My voice had risen and from the corner of my eye I could see Samson had moved closer. I wasn't sure what he thought he was going to do, it's not as though I'd let him touch me in my current frame of mind. It didn't take long, however, for me to figure out his motives. His
Sanguis Vitam
washed over my skin in an intimate caress. Not to soothe, not to warn me to calm down and chill, but to shield us both from prying eyes and ears.

My gaze flicked up to his impassive one. He wasn't interfering, he was supporting. So damn Samson. He couldn't even piss me off when I was on a rant. He knew exactly what I needed and did no more than that. I blinked at his calm stare, but didn't acknowledge his efforts.

"Come on, Mark," I said in an effort to get my mind back on the task at hand and not the effect of Samson's actions coupled with the effect of his
Sanguis Vitam
against my skin. "You know I'm right."

"I don't know that at all, Georgia!" he bit back. "Hell, I have no idea what you bloody well are, let alone what you can do. You scare the hell out of me and yet here I am talking to you about an ongoing investigation, that I'm not entirely sure you're not involved with to some degree. Cut me some fucking slack here!"

Whoa. Where did that all come from? I had stopped breathing as soon as he'd started to raise his voice. My own
Sanguis Vitam
trying futilely to calm him through the cell connection. It wouldn't work, he was immune, but it didn't stop me from trying.

I was vaguely aware of Samson's
Sanguis Vitam
wrapping around mine. I ignored it for now.

I cleared my throat instead. "So, you're going to stick with your uniforms being able to protect them, then?"

"Yes," he snapped. Discussion over.

I shook my head. I knew the Rogue had escalated his attacks. Last night he had progressed to two victims, that meant tonight he'd try either two again - which was my preferred option of the sucked-to-be-a-victim options available - or he'd escalate further to three.

"At least tell me this, because you know me, Mark, and I have not changed. And therefore I am not a murderer or an accomplice of one." I took a breath in, before speaking again. "How many names left on the Vive La Vodka premarket group testing list?"

The pause was longer this time and the sigh almost inaudible. If I hadn't have been half-vampire, I would have missed it. He wanted to believe I was still me, he really did. I had no way of knowing if I had succeeded in convincing him. But I knew Mark too and he was a decent man. He always had been.

"Twelve," he said whisper quiet, as though saying it louder would make his transgression worse. Or maybe he just had ears nearby he needed to avoid.

Twelve. "Are they all in the central city?"

"I'm not answering that," came his prompt reply.

I sighed this time and didn't try to hide it. "I ask, because the Rogue will want to stick to the centre of town. To Vampire Central. He will be opposed to going into the suburbs, it will go against his natural hunting instincts and right now I would guess he is still acting on impulse." Although this was debatable. He wasn't acting as a Rogue should, so why act as a vampire should? I was only guessing and hoping. Neither of which is an admirable investigator's trait. I soldiered on anyway. "Concentrate your uniforms on those within the Auckland CBD, it's more likely he will target there first. The night is moving along, so he doesn't have enough time to go further afield, commit the murders and then go to ground for the day."

I noticed Samson withdrawing his cellphone from his pocket and taking a step away to start to talk into it. I didn't have time to offer anything other than a scowl in his direction. If he wanted to keep Lucinda abreast of my antics then he could have at it. I was acting on the orders of the Master of Auckland City. Even Lucinda couldn't haul me over the coals for that.

"That's helpful intel, Georgia," Mark offered in a somewhat subdued voice. I just hoped my
helpful intel
was correct. So far this Rogue was not working within normal parameters, but I had to start somewhere.

"I could help more, if you let me. Vampires are not easy to kill. They are faster and stronger than your uniforms. Some have... skills, which you couldn't even comprehend. I'm not sure what this Rogue can do, but he is intelligent and resourceful. There is a reason why he is doing all of this and to be Rogue and still behave in this fashion, I would hazard he is also powerful." Of course I knew he was. Lucinda had said as much. I also knew he had remarkable talents. Disappearing into thin air being one of them. Maybe I got my Shadow Walking ability from him. "What I'm saying, Mark, is your uniforms need to take care. They don't stand a chance against this vampire if he chooses to attack the person they are guarding."

This time the silence went on for over a minute. I had nothing else to say, I just prayed Mark did the right thing and let me help. He had to see the police were outmatched here, they had no hope of stopping a supernatural creature hell bent on murder and mayhem. I couldn't believe that the man I knew Mark to be would place his colleagues in such a precarious and dangerous position.

But then I also knew Mark was honourable and disclosing this information went against the cop in him. It broke the rules. Detective Mark Anderson did not break rules.

I was only now realising how different he was from me and it had nothing to do with the fact I was an
other
species now. It had everything to do with character. Mark Anderson was good. Georgia Deverell would never be that kind of good ever again.

"I'll bear that in mind." I closed my eyes and forced myself not to break the cellphone in my hand. "Be at Mt Eden in an hour. You can see your man then." The line went dead and I slowly lowered the cell from my ear.

"Moral, law-abiding, idiot," I muttered and turned to see Samson ending his call too.

I slid my phone into my jacket pocket and crossed my arms over my chest to glare at Samson. He offered a gorgeous smile in return with the cock of his head and raised eyebrows. I continued to glare.

"You going to tell me who you phoned?" I demanded, quietly. I was going for ominously, I think I failed when his lips twitched further.

"Michel." My eyebrows rose at that. Michel, not Lucinda. Why?

"Why?" I asked before I could stop myself, I had also taken a step closer and uncrossed my arms. I quickly replaced them in their former position, but forced myself not to retreat. His lips twitched even further.

"He has access to a larger number of vampires than Lucinda, they can congregate in the CBD, keep an ear out for any disturbances and be nearby when the Rogue attacks. I have also got Matthias on the police scanner, as soon as something pops up there we'll know about it and be in a position to move in and
assist
the police." He didn't stop there, even though my mouth was hanging open and again my arms had uncrossed. "I can also try to infiltrate the Police Department computers, see if we can find out the addresses currently being guarded. It shouldn't be hard, I won't need to delve into their deeper secured network, just the dispatch. They'll have active
on scene
locations posted on file there."