The Shifting Price of Prey (28 page)

He hadn’t denied the possibility that the Emperor or his werewolves might be about. So, did that mean he knew something, but was going to stall me, or what? ‘Human, last I saw, but
that was nearly ten minutes ago.’

‘I see.’ He lifted his chin, nostrils flaring, then his frown cut deeper. ‘It is possible they have come this way, but I cannot tell conclusively.’

My frown joined his. It wasn’t the answer I expected. Or wanted. Annoyed, I stopped a few feet away from him. ‘Why not?’

‘A werewolf in human form does not carry enough of their wolf’s scent for them to be identified by smell alone; it is part of the magic that allows them to be two-natured. I would
need to have met them in their human form before I could pick out their scent from the myriad of others that permeate the air about us. As for scenting a werewolf in their wolf or beast form, there
are a number of scents upon the air that could be wolf, or a large canine of some description, but with the zoo and the Carnival nearby that is to be expected.’

Right. Good that he was giving me chapter and verse without any prevarication. It meant he was on the level and not trying to hide anything. For a change. My irritation dissipated and I took a
step closer. ‘So a werewolf in human form smells like a human, and in their wolf form smells like a wolf?’

‘Yes,’ he agreed, giving me a look that said he had his own questions but was prepared to answer mine. For now. ‘They are much more easily identified by sight, or by their
blood.’

I blinked. ‘They don’t smell different, but their blood does?’

He moved closer; his coat brushed against my jeans. I stuck my hands in my back pockets, resisting the urge to run my fingers down his black T-shirt where it stretched over his hard abs.
Later
.

‘Their blood has a certain tang to it, yes.’

Malik’s voice was low, intimate and turned my knees weak. Embarrassingly, it took me a moment to catch up with his words . . . Oh right, werewolf blood tasted different. Weird that
didn’t affect its smell . . . I got my brain back on to business and looked up at him. ‘Have you met any of the Emperor’s werewolves?’

A conflicted expression crossed his face, part sadness, part . . . anger, maybe? ‘I have. But not in more than five hundred years.’

Werewolves only live a human lifespan. So not much point describing the couple to him. Though really, since he’d tacitly admitted that the Emperor and his werewolves could be about, it
wasn’t
what
the couple were that was in question, but
where
they were, and
where
they might be going, so we could locate the victims. But if he couldn’t scent
them, we couldn’t follow them.

Damn. Looked like the werewolf trail was a dead end.

I cut Malik an enquiring look, and asked the big one. ‘What about the Emperor? Have you met him more recently?’

His eyes turned cold. ‘I have not.’

Nice unequivocal answer, even if his tone had sent a shiver down my spine. Malik really didn’t like the imperial vamp. ‘So does that mean you don’t know where his lair
is?’

‘I do not know where he might be if he is in London, which is the question you are asking, I believe?’

‘Yep.’

He stepped back and disappointment sifted in me. I sighed.
Well, I
was
the one who’d spoiled the moment
. ‘My question is, why do you want to know,
Genevieve?’

‘I told you. The tarot cards say the Emperor has the answer to releasing the fae’s trapped fertility.’

‘But what has that to do with the Bangladeshi ambassador?’

Something, but exactly what I didn’t know. And I wasn’t going to find out staying here. I hitched my small backpack higher. ‘How about I tell you on the way back to the mosque?
If I can’t find the werewolves, then I want to see what info I can get out of the ambassador.’

He pushed his hair back, elegant fingers sliding through its long length. ‘The ambassador is no longer there.’

‘Really?’

‘I looked for you at the mosque first. While there I overheard him having an altercation with his security chief. He had received an invitation for an immediate meeting with the British
Prime Minster. The security chief did not want the ambassador to go, but moments later the ambassador’s vehicle arrived and I saw him driven away.’

Crap. Tonight was a dead end all round. At least when it came to werewolves, the ambassador and finding his connection to the fae’s trapped fertility. I looked at Malik. Though maybe not
when it came to other things, like our date. Not that I wanted to head off to the Blue Heart vamp club, but maybe we didn’t have to. We could stay here. It was way better. Quiet, private, and
with the added advantage of no Autarch hanging around to play the psychotic gooseberry.

I gave Malik a bright smile. ‘How about I tell you what the ambassador has to do with this while we take a walk around the lake?’

M
alik slipped his coat off and hooked it over his shoulder. ‘A walk would be pleasing, Genevieve,’ he said, his voice taking on its
earlier intimate tone.

My pulse sped up. Pleasing wasn’t the half of it.

He moved closer and traced a line along my jaw, setting my skin tingling. ‘Or we could make use of the lake?’ Gentle pressure from his hand turned my gaze down towards the water, to
where one of the lake’s small wooden boats bobbed. I hadn’t noticed it before. A boat trip out on the moonlit water was heading into Hallmark romance territory. Not that I had anything
against that; in fact, I was all for it. The thought of Malik wielding a pair of oars, in the short-sleeved black T-shirt he was wearing, while I sat back and watched (preferably without any
embarrassing drooling on my part) had my heart thudding even faster in anticipation.

‘That would also be . . . very pleasing,’ I said, matching his cool, despite knowing his vamp supersenses had to have picked up the faster tempo of my heartbeat.

‘Shall we?’ He held out his hand, black eyes glinting with quiet amusement.

I gave him a mock quelling look and placed my hand in his. His cool fingers closed around mine as he led me down to the short slope and to the boat. As I stepped in the boat rocked gently then
settled. I sat on the low seat, my back to the pointy end (stern or the bow? I wasn’t sure: my knowledge of boats is sadly lacking), and tucked my backpack behind me as a cushion. I stretched
my legs out and found the small boat surprisingly comfortable.

Malik jumped in confidently. The boat didn’t move, not even the slightest rock. Dropping his coat behind the middle seat, he sat and faced me, legs either side of mine, forearms resting on
his thighs, clasped hands dangling mere inches above my jeans-clad legs. He smiled, a teasing lift of his lips and the boat pushed off and seemed to glide out onto the lake under its own power,
quiet ripples in the moon-silvered water following in its wake.

‘Show off,’ I murmured.

His smile widened into a grin with a glimpse of fang and my heart did a little happy flip. Not only was he gorgeous, I’d never seen him so relaxed before. But then most of the time
we’d spent together we’d been dealing with some crisis or I’d kept my suspicious barriers up between us. Not without reason; Malik usually knew far more about whatever was going
on than I did, and just as usually wasn’t keen on letting me in on it.

But for once, whatever was happening with the vamps, Malik seemed to be as out of the loop as I was.

The boat glided over the water, heading under the bridge towards where the lake narrowed and split around a small island covered in small trees and overgrown bushes. A home to the lake’s
herons.

Malik’s hand encircled my right ankle. As I jumped, he said, ‘May I?’

Slightly bemused, I nodded, made myself settle back and look relaxed.

He grasped my trainer and pulled it off. It thudded on the bottom of the boat and I had to force myself not to jump again at the cool touch of his hands on my bare skin. Within seconds warmth
spread throughout my body, warmth that turned my bones languid and simmered a delicious heat deep inside me. Gods, if he was this good with just my feet . . .

I swallowed and asked, ‘Reflexology?’ less from interest and more to stop my mouth moaning in pleasure.

‘It is similar. This is Sokushin Do. It is the ancient Indian tradition of foot massage for healing and pleasure, taught by monks in the temples in Japan. “Soku” means foot.
“Shin” means heart. “Do” means way.’

Well, his touch was certainly finding its way to my heart. And other places.

‘Now, Genevieve,’ he said, his voice weaving round me like silk, ‘tell me about this connection between the Emperor and the Bangladeshi ambassador.’

Was his Sokushin Do just a way of softening me up? If it were, I’d happily agree to be softened up like this any time he wanted. I stifled a sigh of bliss then, knowing I was probably
going to spoil the moment again, lifted my arm and regretfully released my bracelet. It appeared around my left wrist with its usual chinking of charms. As Malik raised one elegant brow I held it
up. ‘Don’t suppose you took your ring back the other night?’

His hands stilled in their tantalising caressing of my sole. ‘No.’

Delighted relief that he hadn’t washed through me, quickly followed by annoyance at Mad Max. ‘Then I’m pretty sure Maxim took it. I had a run-in with him after you
left.’

‘You ran into Maxim?’

‘Well, it was more the other way round,’ I said, thinking of Mad Max’s roundhouse kick. I propped myself on my elbows and told Malik everything about the leaking Fertility
spell and my night with Mad Max (which lit fires of rage in Malik’s pupils, though he didn’t bat an eye at Mad Max using magic, so the crazy sonofabitch had been truthful about keeping
his wizarding abilities). Then, after a side discussion assuring Malik I was fine despite Mad Max’s rough treatment and that the Poultice spell was actually working, I asked, ‘So is Max
following you or me? And on whose orders?’

‘I do not know.’ Malik’s expression hardened, his hand holding my ankle flexing with restrained strength. ‘Yet.’

For a moment, I was gleeful that Mad Max would end up at Malik’s mercy, then my glee muted to disappointment that whatever Mad Max was up to, Malik wasn’t up to speed with it. Still,
if he didn’t know about Mad Max, he had to know about my gatecrashing his dream of kneeling in the snow, and talking to someone about
sanguine lemures
– the blood of undead
ghosts. After all, he’d told me I had to leave the dream, had pulled me out of it, even. But knowing that didn’t make it easier to ask him; not when it suddenly hit me that my
dreamcrashing had been a huge invasion of privacy.

‘Something else weird happened last night,’ I said, pulse speeding nervously, ‘I think I accidentally ended up in your dream. Or memory . . .’ I trailed off as the boat
rocked, horror crossing his face and he released my foot, too quickly for me to stop it thumping down on the wooden planks. Then the boat settled and his usual enigmatic mask dropped like a shutter
over his face.

‘My apologies, Genevieve. I did not intend to bring you into my memories. I imagine that the spell you removed’ – he touched the faint scar on his forehead – ‘and
partly absorbed was responsible. The jellyfish organism had been feeding on my blood, which contained the power of Red Shamrock.’
Red Shamrock vamps could share or even steal
memories.
‘I will take more care in future.’

I scrambled to sit up. ‘I don’t think it was all down to you.’ I told him about the Morpheus Memory Aid and that the bizarre side-effect was no doubt brought on by my usual
iffy reaction to magic. ‘So really I’m the one who needs to apologise.’

He inclined his head in acknowledgement. ‘Then we should both endeavour to take more care in future, Genevieve.’

‘Probably a good idea,’ I agreed with a smile, then said tentatively, ‘Your memory didn’t feel happy . . .’ I trailed off as flames flared in his pupils, then
snuffed out, leaving his eyes black and opaque. Damn, was he mad? Or what? ‘I’m sorry, Malik. I didn’t mean to pry’ – the magic pricked at me for sort of lying –
‘well, not in a bad way. Maybe if you want to talk about it, I could help?’

Something indefinable darkened his eyes. ‘Thank you, but the incident happened in the past and it is not one I wish to discuss.’

Hurt flashed in me. Not that he wouldn’t clue me in about his memories, but that his tone was the same chill one he’d used before to push me away. Instinctively, I pulled my feet
under me. ‘Fair enough,’ I said, angry at myself, when my words came out less neutrally than I wanted.

He took in a breath, nostrils flaring, then his sorrow and regret slipped like a wisp of shadow over me –
mesma
. ‘I did not intend’ – he dipped his head, letting
his loose black hair obscure his face for a moment, reminding me of Katie when she was anxious, then a brisk wind blew his hair back to reveal his beautiful features set in a grim expression
– ‘I will tell you of the . . . memory, Genevieve. But it is one that is difficult for me to recount and I think it is more pertinent that we first talk of those matters that could be
of concern to us now. For the rest, we have the night before us, do we not?’