The City Beneath (14 page)

The article was gone from the screen now, but if he could read as fast as he could move, he might have glimpsed the screen's contents before the document closed. My heart pounded sickeningly against my chest.

Very slowly, I rotated my chair to face Dominic. The edge of my seat brushed against his pants leg. I looked up. Each individual feature of his face and the set of his expression—eyes, lips, nose, and complexion—was exactly how I remembered, even the anger. But now, somehow, looking at his features as a whole, he appeared completely different, like whatever he'd been missing during our first few encounters was now present. The difference was transformative, so much so that without his scar, I might not have even recognized him. He'd always appeared emaciated despite his strength and speed, but the man standing beside me now filled out his suit quite nicely. I noticed his muscles shift beneath the fabric as he moved, and chided myself for noticing.

“Hello, Cassidy DiRocco,” Dominic said, amusement slowly overtaking the anger. “Is something amiss?”

“You. I don't know. . . . I can't. . . .” I bit my lip. “I didn't recognize you at first,” I admitted in a soft whisper.

“Ah,” Dominic said, somehow seeming to understand. “You have only seen me at my worst: burned, malnourished, and hunting. I've never had the opportunity to feed before seeing you, so you've never had the opportunity to see my true appearance.” He spread out his arms as if for my approval.

I narrowed my eyes. I'd seen him look human, but admittedly, I'd never seen him look attractive. Like someone who had achieved massive weight loss and was now unrecognizable as his former self, Dominic no longer resembled a vampire. Where his body had been emaciated and skeletal-like, his limbs now had muscles. Where his face had been gaunt, his cheeks were now full, his jawline stubbornly sculpted and boldly masculine, and I, God help me, was attracted.

I reminded myself that he had fangs and pulled myself together. “Are you trying to tell me that you attacked someone in the”—I shifted my eyes to glance at the clock on my monitor—“seven minutes between sunset and now?”

“No, I'm telling you that I fed in the seven minutes between sunset and now.”

“The manner in which you feed is attacking,” I hissed. “I know firsthand.”

“Ask her yourself. She does not feel attacked,” Dominic said calmly.

My body suddenly washed cold. “Who? Greta?”

He shook his head, but his eyes flicked to the door.

“The receptionist?” I asked, shocked. I'd just spoken to her! “Deborah?” I tensed to run to her, but before I could leverage to my feet, Dominic was behind me and bound me against the back of my chair with one arm. I struggled, but my efforts were, as usual, useless against him.

“You may ask her later,” he breathed against my neck. “I have need of you now.”

“Please,” I said softly, desperately. “She probably can't sustain the blood loss I can and still survive. Let me go to her. Let me get help for her.”

Dominic's steely arm tightened uncomfortably. “How do you know how much blood loss you can sustain?”

“She could be dying,” I countered, trying a different tack. “She's just another scene you'll have to clean and camouflage.”

“She is in no danger of dying, I assure you. In fact, she enjoyed herself.”

“You don't know how she feels,” I snapped.

“Yes, I do. I can taste it.”

I paused, slightly mortified. “In her blood?”

“Yes, in her blood. In the air. Her scent. In her mind. I can feel her in every way if I choose to.” He tucked his face into the back of my neck and breathed deeply. I squirmed. “Who have you been talking to, Cassidy DiRocco?”

“I'll answer your questions when you let me see for myself that Deborah is well and whole,” I said, attempting to stay calm and focused even as my hair fluttered rhythmically from his breaths.

I shivered, and he made a noise, although not the same rattling I'd grown accustomed to hearing. The noise was more male than vampire.

“You will not run, scream, attempt escape, or otherwise renege on your word. You will confirm the woman's health, and you will return to this chair. Agreed?” Dominic asked.

I sighed. “Agreed.”

A moment later, faster than my synapses could fire, Dominic released me and was seated in the chair across from my desk. He crossed one leg casually over the other and looped his clasped hands over one knee, at ease and waiting for my move. I stood slowly and walked to the door. Dominic looked good in his suit because he looked human, but he wasn't. He was a murdering, life-sucking animal. My hand shook as I placed it on the door's handle because I obviously needed the reminder.

The images of Monday's crime scene and the bodies from the morgue sprang through my head like a grotesque slide show. But now, as I prepared myself for the possibilities outside the office door, the bodies all had Deborah's face. In my mind's eye, her short, springy gray hair, pointed chin, and terminally accusatory expression frowned back at me from a ravaged body. Ragged slices split her legs and arms, tore through muscle, and revealed a popped socket of glistening bone. The cloying scent of rot was pungent, so even when I closed my eyes, I couldn't escape from the guilt and grief and overwhelming responsibility of her death. The stink of my negligence filled the room, and when I opened my eyes, she looked back at me with her wide, unblinking, unseeing gaze.

I swung the door open, fully panicked, my heart bursting, my lungs gasping, and Deborah looked up from her monitor, smiling.

“Do you need anything, Ms. DiRocco?” she asked, almost dreamily.

I gaped.

“Is something wrong?” She leaned forward, mouthed the word
security
, and lifted her eyebrows in question. I saw her arm shift, so it hovered near the panic button tucked under the lip of her desk.

“Not at all,” I ground out with false cheer. “Did Detective Greta Wahl stop in? She was supposed to meet me tonight, too.”

Deborah folded her arms on top of her desk. Her body shifted away from the panic button, and I felt a sense of doom close in around me. Deborah was safe and healthy, but I certainly wasn't. I would face Dominic alone.

“Yes, she was here a few minutes ago. Around eight o'clock.”

I glanced down the empty hall. “Is she waiting for me outside?”

“I told her that you were gone for the day, as you instructed, and she left.”

“As I instructed,” I repeated blandly, knowing damn well I had not instructed. I had a sneaking suspicion who had, and his eyes were burning two welts in the back of my head, like a sniper's laser.

“Yes, as you instructed.” An annoyed edge crept into Deborah's voice. She pursed her lips. “Honestly, hon, you don't look well. You should probably reschedule all these meetings, and call it a night.”

“Actually, I was wondering how
you're
feeling.”

She lifted her eyebrows, her fingers dancing eighty words a minute. “Me? Honestly?”

“Of course.”

She stopped typing and frowned at me. “I've been at this damn office since seven this morning. My ex-husband's an ass, I haven't had a cigarette in over fifteen minutes, and I have a knot in my back the size of a grapefruit. Not to mention it's past eight o'clock, and I'm still here.” Deborah's face was deadpan. “So it's pretty much a normal night.”

“Right,” I said.

Deborah returned to her keyboard.

I forced myself to step back into the office area and shut the door. I stared at the closed door, equally relieved, confused, and terrified. Deborah wasn't dead. She was whole and alive and if nothing else, physically unaffected by Dominic.

His eyes were still hot on the back of my head. I turned to meet his gaze, my hand still gripping the door's handle as if I could bolt without him catching me. He grinned knowingly and patted the seat of my chair.

I crossed the room, feeling a kinship to those on death row who'd walked their final steps. I forced myself forward toward Dominic in a silent, clenched, unwilling sort of determination.

Once I was seated, Dominic spoke. “Are you satisfied?”

“Not nearly,” I muttered. “But in terms of Deborah's
physical
health, yes.”

Dominic cocked his head. “Her health is good in every way.”

“She doesn't remember the attack, and she thinks I gave her instructions that I never gave her,” I said, pointedly. “She's not mentally well.”

“We can quibble over the particulars later,” Dominic said, dismissing my concerns. “Do you agree that you've confirmed the woman's health?”

“Yes,” I gritted.

“Wonderful.” Dominic smiled. “Who have you been talking to?”

I licked my lips. “I talk to innumerable people throughout the day. I'm a reporter. It's my job to talk.”

Dominic lost his smile. “Who have you been talking to in particular about being a night blood? There are only two beings to whom you could divulge such information about yourself—vampire or fellow night blood—one of which you didn't have access to during the day and the other of which you are unlikely to have found.”

I shrugged. If Walker, Nathan, and myself were any indication, perhaps night bloods weren't as rare as everyone believed.

“The man who helped you escape is a night blood,” Dominic accused. His voice was barely audible, but somehow more cutting for its reduced volume.

I raised my eyebrows, struggling for a casual response. “I escaped on my own.”

Dominic tutted and shook his head. “You think I didn't know the moment the man entered my coven? You think I didn't hear him pick the lock on my enclosure, or your hushed voices as you whispered to one another? You think I didn't prevent my vampires from descending on you as you fled through the tunnels?”

I swallowed, not wanting to admit that I'd suspected as much. The reporter in me itched. “So you can remain awake during the day?”

“We do not succumb to a death-like coma during the day, as much of your lore indicates, if that's what you're implying.” Dominic narrowed his eyes to slits, and I realized that he hadn't appreciated my question.

“I just—”

Dominic held up a hand. “You refer to my coven as having
slaughtered
humans during their hunt. I'm not sure what word could sufficiently describe the ensuing violence should you encounter a vampire during the day. Even me. I allowed both of you to escape, and by doing so, I allowed you to live. I deserve your gratitude, not your speculation.”

Leaving had been so extraordinarily easy that I'd suspected something was amiss. But I'd wanted our escape to be real. I'd wanted to believe we'd exerted a measure of control over our fate, that we weren't simply puppets in a show for the vampires' amusement.

I shook my head. We weren't even the puppets. We were the snack that the vampires munched on while enjoying the show.

Dominic leaned forward. “No?” he asked, his voice a mask of civility.

“Everything is just speculation when nothing makes sense. Why would you just allow me to leave after kidnapping me?” I snapped, anger overpowering common sense. “Did you laugh as we snuck off, tiptoeing down corridors and dodging around corners in what we thought was our silent and successful escape? Did you think we were just hilarious, the silly, weak, simple humans who thought they had outsmarted you, who thought they had beaten the odds?”

“I didn't kidnap you. If you remember correctly, I was protecting you,” Dominic said. His lips pulled in a sudden curve. “Your skin smells like cinnamon.”

“Excuse me?” I asked, attempting to regroup. The way he was staring at my throat was disconcerting.

He leaned over my desk, his eyes half-closed in pleasure as he inhaled. “Your skin. It smells delicious when you're angry.”

I jerked away from him. “So you've said.”

“No, I thought it was just your fear. Your anger and pleasure have tinges of that sharp poignancy, as well. If I were to breathe you in too deeply and too quickly, it might burn.”

“Okay,” I murmured, still attempting to achieve some distance, but the more I cringed back in my chair, the closer he leaned across my desk. “Your point?”

Dominic smiled widely enough to flash his long fangs. “My point is that your scent is likely the reason Neil lost his control so easily. Your skin short-circuits our self-preservation instincts, temping us to breathe you in, to bite, and to suck that burning spice deep within ourselves, despite the silver bars that may stand in our way. Night blood always has that quality, but your blood is so seasoned that its scent wafts through your pores. It's why, having tasted you, they'll continue to hunt you. They'll be relentless until they get what they want.”

“You mean Kaden and his rebel vampires?”

Dominic nodded.

“Their only intent last night was to kill me,” I whispered. “What else could they want? To turn me? To transform me into what you are?”

Dominic shook his head. “Only a Master can successfully transform a night blood into a vampire. Had Kaden been rational and loyal, he would've brought you directly to me upon tasting you. But the vampires in my coven who no longer want to live in secrecy no longer value anything but that ultimate goal. They want complete freedom to drink and hunt and kill at their leisure more than they want to increase our dwindling population. They would've feasted upon you until you were drained dry, night blood or not, but because you're a night blood, they would've enjoyed the taste a little more.”