Black Moon Rising (DarkLife Saga) (3 page)

William laughed bitterly.  “So
, that’s that then.”  He waved his hand toward the door and turned away from us.  “Whatever.  Leave me to the prosecution. When they execute me, at least I’ll be with Fee again.”

I was just about to give Valerian a piece of my mind when I fel
t him buzzing in my head.  “
Give me some privacy, Val
.”

“
I’m supposed to stay with you the entire time, Vedo
.”

“
Yes, IF, the situation warrants it, but this doesn't. I‘m fine.”

I reluctantly agreed
, and left the room.  I wiggled my fingers at the ladies behind the nursing station, and strolled past the maintenance crew that was trying to repair the fried panel.  I couldn’t help but laugh at the confused look on one guy’s face as he held up a blackened panel with its melted wires and circuits for the others to see.  If the look of disbelief wasn’t so funny, I almost felt a little guilty.

I didn’t go far, just outside the doors to a chaise lounge that was against the wall.  I agreed to give him some space, but I wasn’t comfortable with being too far away from him when I was supposed to be guarding him.

No sooner than I sat down, Robyn began blaring from my phone.  A man, dressed in scrubs, shot me a disapproving look, and I shrugged.  “What,” I said defensively as I pulled the phone from my pocket.  “It’s my mate.”

I hurriedly slid my finge
r across the screen to silence it.  “Talk to me,” I said as quietly as I could.

“Val
, how many times…You know what, I give up.”

I chuckled and turned my back to the probing eyes of passerby
’s.  “I figured you would sooner or later.  So, what’s up, baby?”

Irulan huffed on the other end, and I smiled in spite of myself.  I could almost see her rose colored skin turning another shade of pink
, with frustration.  “Val, it’s ten baby.”

“Huh?”  I spared a glance at the face of my phone and frowned.  “Hump, we've been here longer than I thought.”

“What?”

“Nothing
, I’m just out of the office for a while, go figure.  I forgot to call and tell you.”  For the past few weeks, Irulan had been calling me every night at ten to break the monotony of my boring shifts.  “I was getting on Tam’s nerves, so he sent me out with Valerian as an escort.”

“Well
, that’s good, at least you're not stuck in your little cubby-hole, complaining.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“What’s the problem, Val, you don't sound as enthusiastic as I thought you would be at getting out.”

A nurse slowed down and cut her eyes in my direction.  I shooed her away and
cupped my hand over my mouth.  “It’s not that.  It's the case that Vedo is taking,” I whispered.

“Marcus didn’t give you any shit about being on the grounds did he?”

“That’s just it, Ire, we’re not at the CMS.  We're at a hospital, and the client is human.”

I could hear the sharp intake of Irulan’s surprise. 
Even without our bond I knew what she was going to say.  “Constantine asked him to defend the guy,” I said, cutting her off before she could ask.  “Without our father’s knowledge,” I added.  “This is going to be a tough case if he decides to pursue it.”

“W
hat do you mean if?  He's there.  Why would he turn it down?”

“I can't really explain here, but I’ll fill you when I get home.”

“Alright, baby, have a good night and come home as soon as you can.  David wants to talk with you before the day sleep takes him.”

I slipped my phone back into my pocket and stood to go and check on Valerian
, when he came walking out of the busted doors.  He passed me without a word.  The lines of his face were tense and rigid.  I could feel the edge rolling off of him.  I fell in place behind him, and for a second considered drawing away some of his tension, but decided against it.

Frying the doors was one thing.  I
f I tried to feed from Valerian and couldn’t control it, I could end up hurting him.  As we stood there waiting for an elevator, it took every ounce of control I had not to jump into his head and see what was bothering him.  All bets were off once we were behind closed doors.

“So
, are you going to tell me what happened?  Are you going to represent him or not?”

Valerian straightened his tie an
d frowned.  “Of course I’m going to represent him.  Would I have come here if I wasn’t?”

“So why the act, what purpose did it serve?”

“I needed to gauge his reaction, Val.”

“The man just lost his wife, Vedo, he's ready to die.  He doesn’t need you pulling his chain
, jerking him around.”

Valerian rounded on me, both eyes black as midnight
.  “And I don't need you telling me how to do my job, Valeria.  I don't stand over your shoulder and commentate on your fucking t.v. screens, do I?”  His voice was a few octaves short of yelling.

I hissed and took a step forward.  “No, but you didn’t have any probl
ems showing up on my door with Dad a few months ago and telling me what case I was and was not going to take.”

Valerian huffed, “Oh don't try that shit with me.  You would have been assigned to Tristan’s case anyway.”

“That may be true, but you took away my option to refuse.”  I pressed my palm to his chest and pushed him against the wall.  “You’re pissed at Constantine for putting you in this position.  You need to slow your roll and quit taking it out on me.  I‘m not your punching bag, Valerian Donatello Trumaine, I'm your sister.”

His back knocked into the wall as I pushed away from him with a little more force than I should have.  There was probably a dent in the elevator, but he deserved it.

We rode down the remaining floors on silence.  Valerian didn’t utter a single sound until we were in the truck, and well on our way back to the office.

“You’re right,” he finally admitted under his breath.  I
turned the radio up and continued ignoring him.  “Come on, Valeria.  I said I was sorry, alright.” 

I should have made him
suffer awhile longer, but I could never stay mad at him for long.

“You’re damn right, I’m right.  You care to tell me what else is bothering you?”

“William Baker is going to the gas chamber if I can't prove his innocence, but trying the case in a human court is going to make it damn near impossible.”

“So get it switched to the judicial system within the CMS.”

“I thought about that, but there has to be at least one member of our community involved for me request a change of venue.”  He pulled out a notepad and began copying information onto a fresh sheet.  “I need to ask you a favor, Val.”

“Whatever you need
”

“I need you to run an investigation, but it’s got to be on your own time
.  I don't want Father to know about this just yet.”

He didn’t have to ask.  I was already planning on looking into Williams coming
s and goings myself.  “Not a problem.”

We made it back to the parking garage, and I tossed Valerian the keys.  “I know my shift isn’t over yet, but would you mind covering for me with Tamerlane.  I need to get home early tonight.  David needs to talk.”

He snatched the keys out the air and waved me away.  “No problem. It's the least I can do after the way I acted tonight.”

I headed for my car, g
lad to be leaving work behind.

Chapter 3

I
t was well before eleven when I got home.  I pulled in next to Irulan’s Beetle and leaned back into the seat to order my thoughts.  I knew I would discuss Valerian’s case with her sooner or later, if she didn’t pull it out of my head first, but I wanted a few hours of peace before slipping back into work mode.

Lucky me
, that peace included a teenage vampire, who was for all purposes, my son.  I could hear David yelling clear through the house.  I rushed from my car, hopped up the few stairs to the living room, and headed for his bedroom.

When I got there his heavy iron door was closed, but I could hear Irulan on the other side telling him that everything was going to be
okay.  When I got inside I found David pacing back and forth, with what looked like the crushed remains of his cell phone in his hand.

“It’s not fair!”  He screamed as black and silver bits of plastic and circuitry fell to the ground.  “They wouldn’t have a problem if
I was like Mom, but no, I can't date her because I’m not good enough.”

I stepped into the room with both of my hands held up in front of me.  “Whoa, whoa, whoa, what’s going on
, and why did you have to take it out on your cell phone?”

David looked down in weird won
derment at his pulverized phone.  His bottom lip began to tremble as he stared at the broken device and before I could say another word, blood red tears began falling from him eyes.

I crossed the room and pulled him into my arms.  “David
, what’s wrong?  Whatever it is, we'll figure it out.  Don't cry.”  In a move that shattered my resolve not to join him in tears, David dropped the remains of his phone and threw his arms around my waist.  He burrowed his head into the crook of my arm, and his body began to shake with the force of his sobs.

Tears welled in my eyes, and I turned to Irulan with a mix of anger and sadness rolling inside of me.  “Why,” I
asked through clenched teeth, “is David crying?”

Irulan got up from her seat and held out a picture for me to take.  “Here, this is Rowan, the object of David’s affections.”

I took the picture and took a quick assessment of the floozy that was bringing my boy pain.  She was very pretty, in a girl next door kind of way.  She had long dark hair and beautiful eyes: eyes that were uncomfortably familiar. I flipped over the picture, but there was no name on the back.

I held David away from me and wiped his blood-tinted tears.  “David, honey, I need you to focus.”  He shook his head and took a few steps backward.  The worst of his tears were over.  Once I had his attention, I held up t
he picture.  “Who is this?”

He looked between me and Irulan before screwing his face up.  “That’s Rowan.  She's my girlfriend, or at least she was until her asshole father made her break up with me.”

I shook my head and waved the picture.  “I got that much, David, but WHO is she?  Who's her family, what is her father’s name?”

David dropped his head and began chewing on his bottom lip.  There was my answer.  “Oh for crap sake, David, was she the only girl at school?  We're paying a fortune to send you to an Extra
’s academy, and she's the only vampire there?!  Come on!”

Irulan pushed me back a few steps and grabbed the sides of my face.  “You will not brow beat him right now, Val; it wasn’t like he intentionally fell for the girl.  Besides, Thomas has already said enough.”

The mention of Thomas Meriwether was enough to shift my focus.  I walked back to David and lifted his chin.  “What did he say to you?”

David shook his head and tried to swallow his hurt, but his poker face was lacking.  “I called to talk with Rowan, and he took the phone.”  He sat plopped down on his bed and raked his fingers through his hair before continuing.

“He told me I wasn’t worthy of his daughter’s time, and that he knew who I was, what I was.  He called me the chew toy of his disgrace of a son, and said if I so much as looked in Rowan’s direction again that he'd make me sorry.”

David dropped his head and spoke to the ground.  “He also said that he should have called me to him when I first came to town.  That living with a Trumaine has left me unaware of my true position in life.”

When he looked up at me, there were fresh, blood-tinged tears in his eyes.  “Can he really do that?  Can he take me away from you?  Val, I don't want to leave you and Irulan.”

“Calm down, Valeria
” Irulan cautioned.

“I don't want to calm down,” I fumed.  I knew my eyes were gone.  That my thread bare control on my powers was under si
ege, but I didn’t give a fuck. “That pompous, antiquated-fuck threatened David, and you want me to calm down, really?!”

I felt Irulan’s energy b
uild in anticipation.  If I lose control, she might be the only one that can contain any power fallout.  “Valeria, I need you to focus, okay.  Going off on a tangent isn’t going to solve anything.  We need to focus on David.”

I saw the reflections of dancing lights on the wall and caught the flash of a crackle of energy from the corner of my eye.  I was so far gone I wasn’t sure if I would be able to stop myself.  “I am thinking about David.  I’m not going to let anyone threaten him an
d get away with it.  He's ours; nothing is going to change that.”

Irulan looked at David and motioned
toward the door.  "David, leave.  Go to Val’s old room and get in the crawl space under her bed.”  David didn’t waste time questioning; he got up and flashed from the room.  Once he was gone, Irulan dropped her glamour.  The blazing fire that surrounded her, combined with my own light show, lit David’s room up like the Las Vegas strip on steroids.

“Valeria, you need to calm the hell down.  Are you hearing me?”  She took a small step closer to me with her hand held out, just in case she needed to shield.

I heard her--I know I did. But the words didn’t register.  The only thing I could focus on was the threat Thomas Meriwether issued David.  I was going to make him suffer in so many ways.  I could firmly see in my head what I was going to do.  Somewhere in the split second between decision and indecision, I must have decided to act and Irulan caught it, because when I turned for the door I walked right into her wall.

“Let me go,” I said through clenched teeth.

“Not happening,” Irulan said, with her voice full of power.  “I’m not letting you make a bad situation even worse.  You know what the council will do to you.  Outright attacks on other houses are forbidden. Think, Val.”

I pressed my palms into her shield and began channeling energy into it.  “He made the first move by threatening David.  I’m justified
and have every right to defend-”

“No, you're not,” she said, flinching und
er the added strain.  “Damn it Valeria, David is Tristan’s turn.  Thomas has every right to call a deadborn of his blood into service, and you know it.”

I let my hands drop and cocked my head to the side.  “So you'd let him take David, whom we've watched over
, and taken care of for the past six months, away from us without putting up a fight?”

“Don’t put words in my mouth, Valeria.  I just need you to focus on what you're doing.”

“Valeria, damn it,” called out a voice from the living room.  “I told you earlier your shielding is for shit.”  It was Valerian and his voice was getting closer.  “My fucking head is killing me; it’s so bad that I had to leave work…”

His voice tapered off to nothing as he stood in the hall and looked at us.  “Whoa,” he breathed.  While I had tried to describe to him the changes I had gone through
, and he’d seen glimpses of what I looked like from Irulan's point of view in my head, my twin had yet to see me in all my glory.

“What in the hell happened after you left work?  Jesus, you look like you're ready to wrestle a bear with one hand and an alligator with the other.”

“Now’s not a good time Valerian.  Leave.”

“No,” called Irulan,
“Valerian, I need you to get through to your sister.  I’d try but I’m not as good with the mentals as you are.  I need all my focus to keep her here.”

“Where was she going like that?”  He asked pointing.

“To tear Thomas Meriwether apart.” I spat.

“Nowhere,”
Ire threw out a second later.

“Just do it
, Valerian!” Irulan shouted as she pushed more power into her shield.  “I can't hold her much longer.”

I tried to lock
my mind down in anticipation, but Valerian made it through before the shields slid into place.  “
Valeria, can you hear me
?”  He asked.  When I refused to answer him, he pushed harder until I could see him walking through my thoughts, heading for the small version of me that was trying to hide.

“
Get out of my head, Vedo.  I don't want you here.
”

“
If you want me gone, then push me out
.”  He got closer and closer until he was standing above me.  I was sitting on the floor, huddled in a corner with my hands wrapped around my knees.  I was so mad that I was trembling, barely able to contain the storm that was raging inside of me.  “
That’s what I thought
,” he smirked as he sat down beside me.  “
Care to tell me what brought this on
?”

“
No
.”

“
Fine then, I’ll see for myself
.”  Valerian flipped through my thoughts like he had a remote control to my brain.  “
Oh wow
,” he said after a few moments.  “
What do you need me to do?  Petition the council, go to the CMS and begin adoption procedures.  Hell, I’ll even go to human courts and file restraining orders if I have to.  We won’t let anyone near him, I promise.”

He pulled my mental image into his arms and I sagged against him.  “
There’s nothing you can do, Vedo.  Thomas can take him from me at any minute and the council won’t do a thing.  Blood trumps paperwork any day, and that‘s what‘s killing me.  As strong as I am, I‘m powerless to stop him if he really wants to push the issue.”

Tears began running from my eyes and Valerian growled.  “
There’s got to be a way.  Don't worry, I’ll find it.”

I shook my head and wiped my eyes; everything faded to blac
k for a fraction of a second, then we were in David’s room.  The both of us were on the floor, and my brother was stroking my hair trying to keep me calm.

“Your plate is full, Vedo.  You've got work cases, then this whole mess that Constantine has go
tten you into.  I can’t ask you-”

“You don't have to ask
, Val, you're my twin. When you're hurting, I hurt.  Believe me,” he said, rubbing his temple.  “Helping you is helping me.  I can’t focus on anything if you keep giving me headaches.”

“Is it safe?” Irulan asked.  I looked up and saw that we were still inside her barrier.

“Yeah, I think I’ve got a handle on it.”  I pulled back the energy, and the lights on the wall began to die down.

“Th
at was some display, Sis,” Valerian said as he got off the floor, pulling me along.

“That’s one show I c
an live without,” Irulan huffed, “at least in the middle of my home.  Do you know the damage she could have done to this place?”

“I’ve heard,” said Valerian
, as he left the room clutching his head.  His face was tight with pain.  I followed him out into the hall to find David poking his head out of my door.  “Is it safe?”

“Yeah
, David, you can come out now.”  Guilt flooded every inch of my person.  I flipped out and put not only my mate, but my son in danger and on top of that, my power outbursts were causing my brother headaches.  Sorry, Biggie, money isn't the only thing that brings more problems.

I huffed as I wat
ched David fly through the hall making a beeline for my brother.  He was crazy about Valerian, and vice versa.  Surprisingly enough, none of my older brothers had settled down and had any kids yet.  David’s inclusion into our family had sent my mother over the moon.  She finally had a grandkid to fuss over, and all of my brothers treated him like a nephew from day one.