A Bloody Good Secret: Secret McQueen, Book 2 (19 page)

“You almost broke him.”

Brigit shrugged, and I found it disconcerting how easily she had adapted to the vampire mentality. Maybe there was something in the blood that made it easy to ignore the well-being of humans, or maybe it was something specific to her maker’s line. That I shared a dark and bloody history with Brigit’s sire wasn’t a secret. He’d turned her into a vampire to goad me into fighting him, which I didn’t view as fair play.

At the time Brigit had been inconsolable about the loss of her mortality. Now, only a few short months later, she had begun to conform to the vampire way of life. She was still new, and as such was still receiving her blood primarily from Calliope like I did. But in spite of her overzealousness tonight, she had proven she might be ready to feed on live humans.

We parted ways for the night, but not without a few more curses on my part about her toeing the line too closely. If I was going to be her warden, I wanted to be just as irritating and pushy with her as Holden had been with me.

Holden.

I continued to walk north to Hell’s Kitchen, the night air as warm as a lover’s breath whispering dirty little secrets to me in the swell of each breeze. I closed my eyes, willing myself to fall into the dreamlike state where he could find me. I walked without seeing, guided by memory. He did not come to me in a dream.

I opened my eyes when I felt him physically.

“You look awfully silly walking around with your eyes closed, you know?”

I smiled at him, somehow unsurprised he’d found me.

“How long have you been following me?”

“I like to stay close,” he replied vaguely.

“Were you at Havana?”

He smiled but shook his head. “I want to keep an eye on you, Secret, but not to my own downfall. If I went anywhere near Havana, they’d have found me.”

I nodded, and we kept walking. I wondered about this ability he had to appear and disappear at a moment’s notice from my side, and how Sig seemed capable of the exact same thing. If the two of them had the same vampiric homing device on me, how was it they hadn’t accidentally crossed paths with each other this whole time?

My theory that Sig had no desire whatsoever to catch Holden gained a little momentum with that thought. Surely if a two-thousand-year-old vampire could find me in Central Park without a problem and my two-hundred-year-old warden could find me south of Hell’s Kitchen, one must be able to find the other.

“If Sig wanted to, he could find you, couldn’t he?” I asked out loud.

“Possibly.”

“But he can find
me
as easily as you can.”

Holden stopped walking, and I was forced to do the same if we were to continue our conversation. He asked, “How many times has Sig come to you?”

“This week?”

“He’s come to you enough you need to ask that question?”

“Twice, I guess. Why?”

“And he always knows where you are?”

“Well, to be fair, one time he hired someone to have me where he wanted me. But yesterday he found me in the park.”

“Secret, I need you to be honest. Have you given him your blood?”

I recalled how close Sig had been to biting my neck the night before, and how willingly I would have given in if he had. My cheeks flushed. “No.”

“
Honestly
.” His tone was accusatory.

“I said no,” I replied hotly. “And what does that have to do with it anyway? I’ve never let you feed off me, either, but you have no trouble finding me.”

“That’s because of our bond,” he said, referring to the warden-ward bond he’d recently revealed to me. “You shouldn’t have the same bond with Sig. Not unless he’s marked you somehow.”

I didn’t like the sound of that. “What do you mean
marked
?”

His shoulders sagged slightly. Between Holden and Lucas, I was getting tired of the men in my life pointing out how ignorant I was about things. Lucas had a valid reason to be irritated, because I’d spent my first twenty-odd years ignoring the werewolf part of my life. Holden, however, had only himself and his council to blame. The vampires kept me in the dark about a great deal of the inner workings of their world, so my ignorance was entirely their fault. So for him to be giving me the shoulder sag of disappointment pushed my buttons, and not for the better.

I scowled. “Either tell me, or bugger off. I’ve had my fill of vampire crap for the night, thanks. And I’d like to point out you’re to blame for most of it.” I felt the unfairness of my statement, considering how much of his situation I was responsible for.

“What happened at Havana?” he asked.

“Don’t think I don’t see how you’re ignoring me.”

“Secret.”

We were walking down a quiet residential street somewhere between the good and bad of the city’s areas. It was the kind of place where you could still get mugged at night, but people would pretend to be surprised by it. Two boys in oversize sweatshirts and low caps swaggered past us, but Holden and I both ignored them. Had I been walking alone dressed as I was, I’d probably have had to deal with them in some fashion, but with Holden beside me they seemed content to walk past.

I didn’t know what it was about Holden that made thugs stay away from him. He was good looking, well dressed, and almost always on his own. Yet somehow they recognized the predator in him and avoided crossing his path. Maybe vampires gave off a pheromone that told others to fuck off, unless eating was involved. I wish I had a screw-off pheromone. It would have saved me a lot of hassle some nights in the city.

“Okay,” I acquiesced. “I spoke to a council elder named Rebecca.”

He sucked in a breath through his teeth.

“I take it you know her.”

“Yes.”

“Pretty well?”

“You could say that.”

“I
did
.” I was trying to get him to give me more to go on. I wanted whatever story was lurking behind his comment, but Holden was too savvy for my attempt.

“What did Rebecca have to say?”

“She doesn’t seem to think you’re guilty.”

“Well that’s something, I suppose.”

We were passing West 48th Street on 8th Avenue, so we were almost back to my block. Night had moved past its apex and was cooling with each passing moment. The sky had lost all the yellow tones of its former self and was now a deep, rich blue.

I was so tired of this night.

“Holden, Sig told me something about you last night.” I waited a beat, but he didn’t reply so I continued. “He told me about your journals?”

By phrasing it as a question, I left it open for him to decide how much of the blanks to fill in. To be honest, what Sig had told me about Holden’s journals left me with more questions than answers, so anything Holden himself could clarify might offer me some help.

“My journals.”

“Yeah. He said you were meticulous. And then he said something about certain dates. One of them was December sixth.”

“Your birthday?”

My cheeks flushed with a warm glow. Sure, my birthday had meaning to me, but dates rarely meant anything to vampires. That Holden remembered the day was my birthday flattered me more than I cared to admit.

“I don’t know what he—” I was thinking out loud as I started to walk ahead, but Holden stopped me.

“Secret.” He grabbed my arm and pulled me close to him. We were pressed face-to-face, he had one hand looped around my waist and the other held my arm. Breath whooshed out from my lips as my lungs compressed against his chest. My eyes were reflected in his, and for a brief, sweet second all we did was look at each other. My heart thrummed.

When I thought about the kiss we’d shared in my apartment, my stupid knees buckled a little. His hold on my waist was firm, and I righted myself before I fell. I wished I was still wearing heels so I could have blamed them.

“What did Rebecca tell you?” His lips were caressing my ear, but the intimacy of our embrace didn’t match the words coming out of his mouth.

“Wuh?” At the best of times I am ineloquent. I am especially challenged when in the arms of a beautiful man. Maybe I was human after all.

His voice was a low whisper, so low I understood now the meaning of our unusual position. He was holding me in a lover’s embrace, his lips brushing my neck, his fingers trailing a dangerous path down my spine. To anyone passing by, we were a couple in love. But that wasn’t his motivation.

No. Holden was masking our conversation from any potential eavesdroppers. By holding me this close he could speak lower than any human ears could hear. So low even paranormal hearing wouldn’t pick up on it. He was barely uttering the words. It was as if the movement of his lips alone told me what he was saying.

If anyone was following us, they would have no idea what we were talking about.

“She told me what you’ve been accused of.”

His hand spasmed on my back, and all pretense of breathing left his body. “What?”

“There are claims you’re responsible for the death of several protected council elders.”

“Well.” He pulled his head back from my ear and looked at my face. “We knew it had to be something serious. I didn’t think it would be something so…impressive.”

“She doesn’t think you did it. Neither does Sig.”

His eyes widened, and I watched as something lit up within them. The brightness of a realization dawning. Where his hand was holding my arm I felt a sudden pain, but I didn’t interrupt his thoughts.

“Of course,” he said.

“Share with the class?”

He released my arm and cupped my chin with his cool palm. “I need to get something. But once I bring it to you, I think everything will be clear.” He kissed my lips delicately, with such aching softness I almost thought it was the summer breeze.

When I opened my eyes again he was gone, and I stood alone on the sidewalk.

The rest of the walk home passed in a daze. I moved by Calliope’s Starbucks without the slightest inclination to stop. I just dragged myself the rest of the way back to my apartment.

And that’s when shit got weird.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Waiting for me in the foyer of my apartment was a wolf roughly the size of an Irish wolfhound.

On steroids.

I was so taken aback by the presence of the animal, I tripped backwards over something and smacked my head against the exterior door. My vision swam and pain dazzled the space around me with pinpoints of brightness. Dazed, I slumped to the ground.

When I reached for my fallen purse to grab my gun, I saw what I’d tripped over. A large duffel bag was near the entrance, and next to it a pair of navy, men’s Vans slip-on shoes—the object I’d taken a backwards tumble on. Beneath the wolf’s feet was a pair of jeans and a well-worn navy blue New York Yankees T-shirt. None of the clothing was ripped, and there was no blood or any signs of struggle.

The wolf sat back on its haunches and fixed its gray eyes on me, with its large ears upright and alert. Its huge jaws gaped open, flashing a daunting set of teeth, and the wolf actually grinned at me with its big tongue dangling out the corner of its mouth. As if it were nothing more than a house pet.

As the panic started to melt away from me, my hand wandered to the back of my head to feel the goose egg growing there. I’d hit the door pretty hard and was still feeling woozy. That must have been why I thought I
knew
the animal sitting less than five feet away from me.

I licked my dry lips and tasted citrus. The reality of it hit me harder than the door, and my gun slipped from my fingers.

“Desmond?”

Not only did I know the wolf, I knew him carnally. I should have recognized it was him. The violet-gray eyes, the deep black coat. He came closer and licked my face. When I didn’t flinch away, he pushed his nose under my arm and whined. I took the hint and used his stability to push myself back up to my feet.

He padded over to my door and scratched at it. I was still too perplexed to ask questions. It wasn’t like he could answer them in his current form, so I unlocked the door and held it open for him while he walked into the apartment, sniffing around until he vanished into my bedroom.

Rio hissed and Desmond growled in response. The white demon bolted out of my room and took up residence under the loveseat. When Desmond didn’t come back, I grabbed the bag from the hallway, along with his discarded clothing, and tossed them inside my front door, then locked the door and latched the deadbolt.

From my bedroom I heard the most disturbing array of noises. At first it was just a racket of popping I couldn’t put a name to, but by the time I realized it was the sound of joints bursting out of their sockets, it had already changed. The wolf made a low, rumbly growl, followed by the resonance of cracking bone and tearing flesh.

My blood ran cold, and though the last thing in the world I wanted to do was see with my eyes what I was hearing, I couldn’t stand there and ignore it. I walked to the door of my bedroom with the apprehension of a horror-movie heroine.

The transformation was already almost done, but what remained was gruesome. Desmond was curled into a fetal position on the ground, with the skin of his fingers split open, long claws retracting back into the exposed bones of his hands. Under the now-hairless surface of his skin I could see bones shifting, altering their position and configuration, and with each adjustment came the unnatural
crack-pop
noise I’d heard earlier. Watching the bones of his face move was hardest. The canine snout broke itself down, elongating his jaw and flattening his cheeks before he was restored to his lovely, human face.

His mouth opened but the fangs of a wolf were still there. For a moment he looked like a vampire, and then the fangs retracted, blunted, and it was over. He was left naked and panting on my bedroom floor, covered in a sheen of sweat, his eyelids clamped shut against the pain.

I unzipped my dress, letting it fall to the floor. I stepped out of the satiny puddle and sank to all fours, crawling to where he was, then I lay down behind him so my front melted against the slick surface of his back. He released a shuddering sigh when I wrapped my arms and legs around him, and for a long while we just lay quiet on the floor, until his breathing returned to normal and he was my Desmond again.