The Wolf Within (7 page)

“Didn’t ask.”

“Some assistant you are. You were probably too busy staring at her face.” It came out snippier than I intended.

Jase shrugged. “She’s pretty, if you like that thin blonde look. I’ve always preferred brunettes. Or I would if I liked girls.” He grinned.

“Enough with the sucking up. What else did she say?”

“Something about the files being delivered later today.”

“Good. Then we have time for lunch.” I stood, trying to ease the kinks in my back and looked at my watch. It was nearly four. “Let’s hit Wash’s. I need a burger.” Wash’s sold synthetic blood and served it in frosted milk shake glasses so it didn’t look like blood. Jase would drink and I’d stuff my face and Jase would steal some of my fries. Vamps can eat human food but they don’t need to.

The information about Tate arrived about an hour after I got back from my red meat and grease fix. An unsmiling guy in a boring dark suit that practically screamed ‘government agent’ delivered a box of printouts and a small pile of gleaming data discs neatly labeled ‘Tate’. The name alone was enough to make me wish I’d taken Esme’s advice, an echo of the nausea I’d felt from the photos swirling in my stomach as I lined up the information neatly on my desk.

“Stop being a wimp, Keenan.” I muttered to myself. I’d taken the job, so now I had to suck it up and try to help catch the bastard.

Something told me it wasn’t going to be quite that simple.

An hour into it, I knew it for sure. The data was old and tangled and Tate’s accounts were slickly set up. Expressly designed to baffle the sort of investigation I was attempting. Which was a good thing. The challenge made it easier to forget about the vampire and the werewolf and focus on the purity of numbers and the data trail.

I just finished wading through the first stack of printouts when my phone rang. I hit the speaker button while I started slotting the printouts in files. “Ashley Keenan.”

“Is that any way to answer the phone? What happened to ‘hello’?”

“Hello, Aunt Bug.”

“Hello yourself,” she said tartly.

“What’s up?”

“Just letting you know I’m in town early. I got a ticket to the matinee of that play I was telling you about. Are you free for dinner tonight?”

Aunt Bug was a theatre nut. I tried to keep her away from Jase. Every time the two of them got together, the talk turned to musical numbers, composers and choreographers. It made me want to stab my eyes out and only encouraged Jase’s obsession with writing the first great vampire musical.

Given his musical talent was limited to a pleasant but not spectacular singing voice, this mainly consisted of him inserting ‘vampire’ in the title of the show and the lyrics. So far I’d suffered through renditions of
Funny Vamp
,
My Fair Vampire
and
The Vampire of the Opera
. Which was way above the call of duty. I didn’t want him getting inspired all over again.

Plus I was still full of burger. “Let me check.”

Aunt Bug hardly ever tried to alter our plans. I wondered if something was wrong and tried to pull my brain away from Tate to think about my calendar. Between the FBI and my usual clients, it was looking a bit chaotic. “Not really, Aunty. Work is just crazy. But tomorrow I’m all yours.”

She sniffed. “You work too hard.”

“Someone’s got to keep me in shoes.”

“You should find yourself a man—”

“I’m sorry, Aunty.” I wasn’t ready to have this conversation for the umpty-thousandth time. “I’ve got to go. There’s a client waiting.” I crossed my fingers, hoping she wouldn’t call me on my little white lie.

She made a disbelieving humph noise but said goodbye. Lucky escape. Any discussion about men I have with Bug always ends back at ‘why I was an idiot to leave Dan’. Mules have nothing on her when she makes up her mind. She’d lost the man she’d loved to illness too young. Which left her with very pointed views on not wasting love. She’d never remarried, said she’d just never met another man who made her feel the same way as her husband. I think that’s why she became a teacher—so she’d have more children than she could ever had herself to watch over and nurture. Of all those children, I was the one she cared most about. So I got the most grief.

I replaced the phone and tried to settle back down to Tate. I had an hour before my next appointment, so I might as well dig in. Who knew? Maybe I’d get lucky and stumble across something right away that the FBI had missed. But something told me that was about as likely as Jase turning straight and Aunt Bug never bringing up Dan again.

Chapter Five

By the time I left work just after midnight, I was looking forward to spending my Saturday with Bug and not thinking about numbers at all. Tate’s accounts were convoluted in a way only a sick mind could have devised. So far I hadn’t found anything the FBI had missed.

No way was I going to Dan with
nothing
.

I hoped that a day of shopping, great food and good booze might give my subconscious time to work on things and shake something loose.

After a good night’s sleep, of course.

I spotted the car as soon as I turned down my street. It stuck out. I live on Mercer Island—Mercedes Island as it’s known. The residents are well off, to put it nicely. The moms drive expensive SUVs, the dads drive sports cars or even more expensive SUVs and the teens have whatever the cool car of the month is.

Nobody drives the sort of boring white sedan parked a few houses up from mine. The windows were tinted and I couldn’t see who was inside but I guessed it was one of Daniel’s agents. It should’ve made me feel safe. Instead, it pissed me off. Upgrading my security arrangements was one thing but I hadn’t agreed to be kept under constant surveillance.

Jase had already spotted two guys with earpieces in our lobby during the day. That much I could live with but I didn’t like the thought of Daniel knowing my every move. I almost pulled up next to the car then thought better of it. The agent was just doing his job.

Daniel, on the other hand, was being annoying.

I pulled into my drive in a worse mood than I’d started the day in. I needed a bath, some ice-cream and some sleep. By morning I’d be in the right frame of mind to yell at Dan before heading out to join Aunt Bug. I bumped my front door shut behind me, not bothering to turn on the hall light. Then I froze. Something about the house felt strange.

My heart bumping crazily, I held my breath and listened. Nothing. Silence. My ears picked out a vague hum of traffic, the louder gurgling of my refrigerator and the tick of the clock on the wall above my hall table. Nothing to cause the hairs on the back of my neck to stand up the way they were.

Not that I was likely to hear a vamp or were if they lay in wait. Jase or Dan would know in a second but I had to rely on human senses. I waited, straining to hear, trying to keep my breathing soft despite the panicked thumping of my heart. The house smelled normal, like the lilies on my hall table and a faint hint of coffee from breakfast. Nothing out of the ordinary. No subtle buzz in the air that might mean a were nearby.

“There’s an agent right outside,” I told myself firmly. I was just being jumpy. Dan had spooked me more than I’d known. I took a deep breath, reached out carefully and flicked the light switch.

The weird feeling vanished as warm yellow light flooded the hall, and I sighed with relief. Then froze as another sensation replaced the weirdness. One just as disquieting.
Loneliness
. My house felt empty. No warmth. No life. No other person to give me a hug and tell me I was okay. That I didn’t have to do it all alone. I’d had that once but now there was just me and an empty house. Empty enough to make me do something stupid.

Like haul out my cell and dial Dan.

He answered before I had a chance to think better of it. “Hello?”

I’d expected a sleepy voice but he sounded wide awake. And there was noise in the background. Voices and laughter and music.

Was he out?

“It’s Ashley. I—”

“Is everything okay?” His agent voice, all controlled and professional. Suddenly I felt foolish.

“Yes, I—” I stopped as more laughter bubbled up in the background. Female laughter. My hand curled tight around the phone. Now I
really
wanted to know where he was. “Sorry, I’m interrupting.”

“It’s fine. I’m. . . .” he hesitated, just for a second. “I’m at a pack meeting.”

A pack meeting. With the other werewolves. With female werewolves, presumably. Ones who probably didn’t mind at all that
he
was a werewolf. For a moment I had an insane urge to cry. But, somehow, I kept it together. “Isn’t it kind of late?”

“We had a couple of successful First Changes last week. We’re still celebrating.”

“Oh.” First Change. That was a big deal. For the kids, it happened around puberty. For those who got bitten—voluntarily or not—the first full moon after they got infected. Not everyone survived, so successful transitions were cause for joy. And week long parties, it seemed.

“I should let you go.”

“Ash, why did you call?”

I’d bite my tongue off before saying ‘I’m lonely and I miss you’. Not when he was out partying with the very people who’d taken him from me. I focused on the anger in that thought. Anger was easy. I was used to it. And it helped keep the other stuff away. “I just wanted to tell you that if you don’t want me to know I’m under surveillance, you’d better tell your boys to pick more appropriate vehicles for their location.”

“Who says I didn’t want you to know?”

“For Christ’s sake, Daniel. I’m not a child.”

“What’s that got to do with anything? Tate might be out there. He won’t care how mature you are when he rips your throat out.”

I knew he was right. I was more than happy someone was watching out for me. I just hated the fact it was Daniel. And it was turning me into a four year old. A four year old thoroughly creeped-out by the image he’d just put in my mind. “And if he finds me then whose fault is that?” Which was completely unfair. If the pictures were anything to go by, Tate had no trouble keeping track of anyone he wanted to.

Dan swore. “You know, this is fun but if you’re just calling to bitch at me, then perhaps it can wait until morning.”

“Fine.”

All I got in reply was silence. My cell showed he’d disconnected. Great. I slid down the wall till I was sitting then tipped my head back to bang it gently against the plaster a few times.

I had to stay away from Daniel. All the energy between us had to go somewhere and if it wasn’t being used for sex then it would drive us both crazy as we took swipes at each other.

After I’d finished calling myself five kinds of idiot, I hauled myself to my feet and walked to my bedroom. Every light in the house was blazing by the time I’d finished the trip and I’d satisfied myself no monsters were hiding in the closets or under the bed.

But despite the evidence of my eyes, I couldn’t shake the unease, probably due to Dan’s latest charming image. I kept picturing Tate looming out of the darkness. Kept picturing someone finding me in the sort of dark clotted pool of blood I’d found my parents lying in.

I wasn’t getting to sleep any time soon. And I didn’t want to work. I wanted contact.
Any
kind of contact.

So I changed into my slinkiest jeans, spiked heels a dominatrix would be proud of and a silver halter top Jase had given me for my last birthday. It had about as much material in it as a handkerchief, so I’d never actually worn it in public until tonight. But tonight I was feeling defiant. I needed to do something alive. Needed to
feel
alive.

I slicked on eye shadow, a double coat of mascara and my favorite red lipstick then picked up the phone again to make another call. To someone I knew would be awake and up for whatever wildness it would take to soothe me.

Forty-five minutes later, the cab dropped me in front of Plasma and I smiled as Jase opened the door for me. “Remind me to give you a bonus this year.”

Jase grinned, then whistled as he looked me up and down approvingly. “You give me a bonus every year. Looks like someone else might be getting one tonight. You look fab. I have great taste.”

I grinned back, feeling some of my fears recede as we moved toward the club. Even from the sidewalk music pounded. “Sometimes.” We bypassed the shorter than normal queue presided over by a vamp bouncer. Jase always got into the best clubs, straight or gay, living or dead.

“What are we drinking?” Jase yelled as the music swirled around us, a funky pop beat that was just what the doctor ordered.

I shrugged at him. “Surprise me.”

He laughed and vanished into the crowd toward the bar. I made my way to a tiny table near the dance floor and watched the crowd flow to the beat. Plasma is a neutral club—sure it plays up the blood theme with black walls, neon red dance floor and gimmicky drinks served in blood packs but that’s as dangerous as it got. Open to humans and non-humans as long as everyone behaved, it attracted the curious, the hip and the just-out-for-a-good-time. Vamps like Jase who had little interest in snacking on humans, the occasional were, and humans who were fine with supernaturals who weren’t scary.

The no biting, no nonsense policy was strictly enforced by the club’s owner and his crew of vamp bouncers. Anyone who didn’t want to play nice, or was interested in playing the sorts of games that went on in the dark clubs, was quickly weeded out and sent on their way.

It was crazy and fun and full of beautiful people who knew how to shake their asses. And relatively quiet for a Friday. Normally a table by the dance floor would be prime real estate. I frowned slightly, scanning the crowd. Plenty of humans. A good sprinkling of weres, which made sense given the moon had been full last week. Not so many vamps.

Fine by me. Maybe there was a party on at one of the other clubs. Jase reappeared with two glasses brimming with bright green fluid.

I took a cautious sniff. “What’s in that?”

He wrinkled his nose. “Don’t ask.”

Fair enough. I didn’t really care. I drained half the glass and dragged Jase onto the dance floor as the music grew louder.