Masters of the Night (15 page)

“You’re a poet,
Anjanette
!” he teased
pleasantly as he took a deep draught of wine. “And I am enthralled with your
passion for life.”

Life.
When their victims
throbbed with it, embraced it with passion, it would increase their hunger and
they would crave.

His eyes began searching hers again, and she sensed his frustration at
not being able to reach into the portals of mysticism.

The abstracted look deepened …

He was going to use the darker strength within him to open those
portals!

His eyes became coffee colored and shone with splintery light as he
began to penetrate her sight with optic thrusts, thrusts that were all too
familiar. She had traveled this path before …

Henri’s thoughts passed close to her, to give her the strength to
resist the master standing across from her swilling wine and wealth. And she
could sense a power rising within Henri, magnificent but terrifying in its
strength.

He was ready to kill to protect her.

I might as well give up on the wine,
Angie sighed
inwardly, resignedly, setting it down. Mystic heat burned through the very
marrow in her bones from the bombardment of power all around her—and now she
was sensing another vamp within the house.

A pair of black, five-inch heels sidled into the library.

The black-eyed vamp with inky, swingy short hair and long bangs greeted
Nicholas with a strong Russian accent. “Are we having a party?” she asked
Nicholas, her pale eyes lighting up as she gazed at Henri with intense
curiosity, then at Angie, the sole mortal in the room.

Hungrily, it seemed to Angie. And she was the party.

“No,” Nicholas said firmly. “These are business acquaintances.”

Flippant, flirty, flamboyant, she presented herself as “Natalia, just
an ‘old friend’,” and squeezed his hand into hers, then ran her hand along the
back of his shoulder. But Angie knew when she shrank a little before the
displeasure in his eyes that she was in awe of him. Was he her master?

Bending her knee, she brushed a bit of dust from the toe of her shoe,
told them with a tight smile that she was glad to have met them, then she
wished him a pleasant evening, tugged at her tiny dress and left.

“Natalia’s really not quite that bad,” Nicholas said with a warm laugh
as she left, “when you get to know her. She was just curious. She’s very
loyal.”

I’ll bet,
Angie thought.

The “business acquaintances” finished their wine quickly, just in case
any more “old” friends were hanging around the mansion.

But as Nicholas moved to the library entrance, to escort them to the
front door, Angie realized she was going to have to walk uncomfortably close to
him.
If they touched …

They touched.

As she tried to maneuver around him, he casually stepped back and
brushed briefly but fully against her.

Hell was so raw within him she wanted to scream. Her mystic senses came
alive and turned scathing. An ordinary person would have felt no more than a slight
curious trace of something odd, something different about him, a difference
that would have been unconsciously dismissed as quickly as it had come, like a
blink of an eye. But Angie was fast becoming skilled in her remarkable talent,
enhanced by the
vampirical
force that shook her
inwardly from head to toe like an 8.9 earthquake when it surged.

And it was surging. In case she needed to defend herself.

“Sorry,” the
vampyre
said as he glanced
softly back at her.

Biting back the sharp sensation of those Nicholas had killed,
perceptions of terror that threatened to strangle her, Angie forced herself to
walk calmly down the hall.

If he had felt her reaction to him, he did not show it. He held the
front door open for them and said goodnight.

“That was
godawful
,” she exclaimed in an
exhalation of disgust as she fell into the back seat.

“Don’t want to catch your—reaction,” she said in response to Kathryn’s
questioning glance because she chose the back seat.
With
Henri.

“He’s not just a master. He’s a vanguard,” Henri said softly as he
pulled her into his arms to stop her trembling. “You might as well know what he
can do. Are you all right?”

“Just a little—unsettled,” she said shakily. Henri’s embrace was warm,
protective. She pressed closer to him, letting her body language and her eyes
tell him that him if Kathryn wasn’t in the truck, they could pull into the
woods and enjoy that back seat.

“From what I could hear, it didn’t sound to me like things were going
too badly. What happened to you?” Kathryn asked, glancing at Angie in the rear
view mirror, eager for the details of their visit.

“Hell,” Angie answered. “Hell is what happened.”

As they sped away from the mansion that was too well lit, too well
kept, too—pure, Henri pulled her gaze into his blue pools under their black
waterfalls of lashes. “You are with me, now, m’ lady,” he said softly, his eyes
moist as he massaged her hand, sending streams of sweetness around her wrist.

“I didn’t know you knew French so well,” Kathryn tossed toward Angie,
while tossing Henri a frown in the rear view mirror. “An inner talent you
inherited, I suppose?”

“Henri thinks I should learn foreign languages and have fun,” Angie
responded with a light smile, flirtatiously glancing at him. Then her tone
sobered. “Andre’s certainly going to have his hands full with old Nicholas
Dudley
DoRight
, isn’t he?” she said. “He seems rather
comfortable in his world of darkness.”

“Andre’s going to have his hands full with Han Solo and
Leia
,” Kathryn clipped from the front as she eased the
pickup into maximum speed.

“Who?”

“You and Henri.”

She sneezed again.

“Should a’ had the soup,” Angie said.

15.

Angie began
searching the pages of the journal that supposedly had belonged Kara
Milstead
, a school teacher.

“Here it is,” Angie said, effused by an entry marked, “June 12, 1984.”

“Today promised to be balmy and glorious. Little did I know it would
end in horror … To begin with, I almost missed the train. But finally I was
there on my way to visit Aunt Sarah. We were chugging along when I began to
feel a little dizzy. The man across the aisle, Mr. Browning, gave me some cold
water and asked if I was all right, seeing I was so pregnant. He’s kind of
strange, but nice. He’s really pissed with the young woman sitting next to him,
though. They’ve argued since boarding. A man several seats behind them
seems
to be watching them intently. He is, I believe, named
Mr.
Cranville
. The Weston woman speaks with an
English accent …”

“The next entries are of the train wreck,” Angie said.
“Filled in at a later date.”

“The train fell at about midnight. I don’t recall exactly what
happened. It all happened so fast. The car tipped. I felt it leave the tracks.
I screamed, I think. My last thought was for my baby. When I came to, Mr.
Cranville
was leaning over an unconscious Miss Weston.
There was something in his hand—a railroad spike? I passed out again, weak with
pain. I seemed to be lying in the aisle. The next time I opened my eyes, Mr.
Browning was holding Miss Weston in his arms, and I fainted as I saw the spike.
And the blood.
She was bleeding a river. Her blouse
was soaked. I will never forget her stark gaze. When I awoke again he was
carrying me from the train, from the coach that was now on fire. I have never
felt such strength as he carried me to safety. I was no more than a feather in
his grasp. His eyes were so strange … or perhaps I was simply overcome by pain
and weakness. I had not been able to think clearly through the whole ordeal. He
laid me on the ground on his coat,
then
searched for a
doctor. More than likely, he saved my life. I did not know I was also bleeding.
I have decided to name my baby Nicholas in his honor. I wish he knew …”

The entries trailed off after that. In the last entry the teacher had
written that she was becoming too busy with the baby to keep up.

Angie closed the journal from the back cover side.

That’s odd,
she thought, staring at the cover. A bit of sales
sticker with a partial bar code was still stuck to the back as though it had
been difficult to peel off, a trait of products from cheaper stores. The
letters
Wa
…
rt
were still somewhat visible, and a date had not been
completely scratched out.

This journal was purchased from Wal-Mart, no more than a week or so
ago.

What the hell was going on?

Angie’s heart was suddenly a lava flow of misgivings. She re-opened the
journal and lightly traced the handwritten, inked script with her fingertips. A
chill traveled from the paper through her hand and up through her arm.

The
vampyre
wearing the robes of atonement
had lied to them. Flat out lied. A
vampira
had
written these journal passages.

With a quill.

By nightfall the next day, the Shadows were packing up their office.
James was packing the last box, the fax machine, and Angie was sweeping the
back room. The narrow shop was empty, the counter bare.

They were headed for Seattle.

Angie wanted to search the box of papers and books she had stuffed in
the coat closet of her apartment, the box her grandmother had given her. Andre
had continued to pay her rent for her, for the time when she would be able to
face returning, and get her belongings.

One of those belongings was a locked diary.

Her mother’s diary.

She had never opened it because she couldn’t find the key.

But she wanted it opened now, even if she had to rip it apart.

She had wanted to tell Henri what she had felt mystically from the
journal.

But those strange glances he had kept exchanging with Nicholas …

As though warning him to be careful of what he said.

What was that all about?

To hell with them all.
She would find her
past on her own.

Damned
vampyres
.

She swept harder, sending the bits of dirt flying in all directions,
her thoughts of uncertainty about the
vampyre
she
loved clouding her eyes with unshed tears.

Almost tripping James as he walked past her broom to go to the van and
get more packing tape, Angie did not see the black wrinkle on the sidewalk that
seeped in through the open door.
A puddle of pure evil.

The black slippery thing flowed unseen onto the side of the fax machine
box, then slithered in between the unsealed flaps.

Angie stopped her broom abruptly, her eyes darting around the room.

“What’s wrong,
Anj
?” James asked, returning
with the tape.

“I—I’m not sure,” she said.

He pressed the sides of the box lid together, taped them shut, and took
the box out to the van. Then he came back to lock up.

“The feeling’s gone now,” Angie said with relief. “For a moment I
thought something wicked was lurking again.”

“Andre is wise wanting us to move swiftly on this one,” James said. “He
didn’t care much for the degenerates who were hanging around here spying on
us.”

Angie went into the supply room to put the broom away, but as she
turned, James was in the doorway close.

“How do you feel, Angie, about returning?” he asked, concerned. Fate
seemed to be moving her in uncertain directions.

“I’m a little nervous,” she admitted.

He lowered his voice. “Look, I know you’ve probably wondered why we
didn’t go whooping and hollering and chasing after Henri, and waving our stakes
in the air like idiots looking for him …”

“No … I—”

“Angie, Henri De
LaCroix
is one of the most
powerful master
vampyres
in existence. He would
simply elude us, or in open battle, kill some of us. Secondly, we’re stealth
fighters, not combat soldiers. You need to know Andre is hoping to use you in
Seattle, to sense Henri in the mists he left in your heart and see where he
hides. We can take him out when he is weakened by
daysleep
.”

At the moment, in this hour, on this night, there was not even a
smidgeon of mercy in the crossbow slayer’s eyes.

Angie felt her heart tighten. Would they find Henri—through her, and
destroy him?! Not even Kathryn could be her ally. There was no proof he was in
atonement or that he had saved her life. She still could not remember much of
that ill-fated night.

“Of course, there is the possibility that the telepathic link may have
been broken by now,” James added.

Angie averted her gaze. What Henri had done could not be broken.

“That’s it. We’re finished,” Mack called out. “Let’s head for Seattle,
folks!”

Andre pulled his SUV in behind the pickup.

The SUV pulled away from the curb, and Angie climbed into the pickup
beside James. She had slept late that morning from fighting a cold—she had
caught Kathryn’s “reaction”—and was going to have to return to the house they’d
rented to finish packing.

As she reached in her handbag for a cough drop, Angie stole a glance
toward the van’s driver.

James Lauren’s hands were strong as steel as they gripped the steering
wheel with ease, and she knew they held his crossbow just as easily. Could
Henri be quick enough to sidestep his deadly bolt?

“What happens now?” she asked.

“If the Bowler Hat is sincerely trying to find his way back and fleeing
the world of the damned, if he is in atonement, Kathryn will be his spiritual
guide and warrior while she leads him back into the world of mortals. And
hopefully, he will help you learn more about your mother. On the other hand, if
Kathryn decrees the Bowler Hat deadly, Andre will use the entire Shadow troupe
to bring him down and possibly also use other envoys to assist. He is Old
World, and could command a legion of phantoms and followers, including
mortals.”

He pulled up to the house. She packed. And they were soon pulling her
suitcases down the hall. As they rolled her luggage past the room James had
occupied, she slowed her steps a little and glanced inside as a strange
sensation swept over her.
A sensation of emptiness.

A cross and chain had been left on the dresser top.

“My cross!” she cried.

“That’s weird. Why would it be in my room?” James said. “It wasn’t
there earlier.”

It wasn’t anywhere earlier. It was in a rabbit!

Her heart trembled.

She picked up the chain and sensed strongly within the room’s stillness
that the future was boding evil. And something very evil had touched this
chain.

A mystical forewarning.
Angie was at long
last grasping the significance of her “gift.”

Angie slipped the cross inside her handbag, but as they left the now
silent house, a chill akin to the one she had felt in the English woods gripped
her. She glanced back toward the second story toward her window.

Partially concealed behind the plain green curtains hanging in the
window, the ghost was looking down at her.

He backed away into the recesses of the room.

But she heard clearly the words whispered in his vanishing wisps …

“Dreams have the power to poison, if we sleep.”

•

Henri sailed past the capitol building under a full moon and headed for
the house where Andre had sequestered Angie and his troupe. Maybe he could send
a thread to Angie, and the precocious mystic thief could “pilfer” some cow
blood for him from Kathryn’s stash, the way she had stolen newspapers right out
from under a librarian’s nose. After a night of hunting or more accurately,
scrounging for food along the river, he had rousted very little of anything
tasty.

It was still dark, still a couple of hours before dawn. He glanced
toward the mystic’s window. Angie would still be sleeping, safe for the moment
at least with her slayers, her breathing soft and even. He would have liked to
have popped in and sat on her bed and taken her into his arms to wake her with
a kiss, but he didn’t want to rouse a house full of slayers, so he opted to pop
a few pebbles at her window.

Odd.
He could not hear
her breathing.

Or anyone else’s.

Shape-shifting into a starling, he flew to her window sill and peered
in.

The room was empty. The bed had not been slept in.

Soaring from bedroom window to window, panic rising higher within him
with each wing flap, Henri peered into the rooms. Not a shoe by a bed, not a
thread of clothes in the closets.

Not a footstep in the hallway.

Bracing for what he might find in the emptiness of a house suddenly
hushed, he opened the locked window latch with a single thought and flew
inside.

There was no blood, not even a spatter on the walls of any room. No
dead slayers on the floors. No one lying
about,
bled
out. He felt a rush of relief.

The pantry porch and the kitchen were also spotless.

From the kitchen side window he could see the garage and the driveway.

All the cars were gone.

The slayers had left.
With the mystic.

Perplexed by the suddenness of the departure, Henri wondered if the
storefront “headquarters” would be as abandoned. Gliding above the city streets
still sparkling with a bit of yellow lamp light and a scattering of car lights,
he made his way to the Shadow’s headquarters.