Tempt (Ava Delaney #3) (2 page)

Far off,
I heard the squealing of tyres and vaguely remembered we were in
the middle of a road. Great, the car might finish me off
quicker.

A dark
green car ran right over Becca, barely missing my ankle. She let go
of me with a shriek as the wheels pulled her along with the
vehicle. I could only close my eyes and savour the relief of the
pain drifting away. With Becca’s fangs came agony, once she let go,
the throbbing dissipated quickly.

“
Are you okay?” I scented Peter’s aftershave and almost wished
a car really had run over me.

“
Where?” I rolled and tried to stand, but I was too shaky.
Feeling slowly came back to the rest of my body. I preferred the
numbness.

“
She’s gone. Ran off. What the hell, Ava?”

I raised
a palm. “Not now. Help me up. Her poison screwed with my whole
body.”

Peter
took my hand, reached for the other, and pulled me to my feet,
ignoring my moans of pain. His fingers trembled as I met his eyes.
His face was rigid with livid fury, and I knew he was scared. Peter
always acted angry the second he felt afraid. One thing we had in
common.

“
Get in the car,” was all he said.

I limped
over to the car, not bothering to argue about giving up before
sunrise. I was in bad shape, not the worst I’d ever been, but
definitely not in a condition suitable to capture Becca. Or to win
an argument with Peter Brannigan.

I stared
at the empty streets as he drove me home, hating the way Becca had
made my hometown a no-go area. Concealing a groan, I tried to look
bored as Peter pulled into a checkpoint.

A young
Garda approached the car, shining his torch in at both of us.
“There’s a curfew,” he reminded us.

“
I was just driving her home,” Peter said. “I took a bad
shortcut. You know how it is.”

“
Actually, I don’t,” the Garda said, his lips tightening. He
leaned over, resting his arm on the roof of the car as he peered
inside. “Licence?”

I
snapped my head around and stared at him. After the night I had
just had, I wasn’t in the mood to go easy on anyone. Narrowing my
eyes, I sent a persuasive thought his way. I felt as though I were
floating, and the Garda blinked a couple of times before muttering
under his breath and heading back to the checkpoint to wave us
on.

I sensed
Peter shaking and knew it was only a matter of time before he
exploded. As soon as we pulled away from the checkpoint, he smacked
his hand on the steering wheel in annoyance.

“
What the hell was that?”

“
I’m tired. I want to go to bed.”

“
There was no need to do that to him, no need at
all.”

“
He was shining his stupid torch in my face. The idiot’s going
to get himself killed if he keeps that up. I was doing him a
favour.”

“
He’s just doing his job, Ava.”

“
Don’t even get me started.”

He
heaved a weary sigh. “Since when do you do that to people? And it’s
not just that. I’m talking about the whole screw-up with Becca
tonight, too.”

I
shrugged. “She’s pretty strong.”

“
No. Not that, Ava. I’m talking about your head. The stupid
mistakes you’re making. This isn’t you. Are you trying to get
yourself killed?” His voice was low and scary, but I was past
caring.

“
Of course not. You try and fight her, see how far you
get.”

“
Don’t be a smartarse, Delaney. You know what I’m talking
about. You’ve been like this for weeks now. Ever since the trial,
and we’re all sick of it.”

I threw
my hands in the air. “Oh, well, as long as you all are happy
bitching about me, you—”

“
Stop that. You’re worrying the people who care about you, and
you know it. You’ve closed yourself up since the trial. You won’t
talk. You won’t deal with whatever’s bothering you. All you do is
track Becca. Then, when you come across her, your mind isn’t even
there.”

I
scowled, mostly because he was right. I could see the worry in his
eyes, and that just made everything worse.

“
Look, I know you’re going through something right now, but
you need to focus. You can’t let her get that close to you again.
Not when your mind is elsewhere. There’s something more important
going on here, Ava. You have to deal with this first.”

I stared
out the window. I didn’t have an answer.

He tried
a different tact. “If you don’t catch her soon, the Council could
turn nasty. You have to be useful.”

“
What, like you?” I stared at him, watching his jaw twitch as
he tried to control his temper.

“
Exactly like me.” His voice softened. “And I’m sorry about
that.”

A shiver
ran through me. I preferred his anger. “I’ll get her next
time.”

“
Will you? Or will she get you? Will you even fight back next
time?”

“
I said I’d get her.” Every frustrating word of his made
absolute sense, but it wouldn’t sink in properly. I was becoming a
spectator of my own life, I felt so detached from everything.
Attaching myself led to pain, to fear, to confusion. My own
messed-up emotions combined with the unwieldy consequences of
uncontrolled empathy left me absolutely terrified to
feel.

“
Talk to me, Ava,” he said, a note of urgency in his
voice.

“
Nothing to talk about.” I folded my arms and concentrated on
trying to make out the graffiti sprawled on the blocks of flats we
passed. Too many boarded-up windows. Left to rot. Like so many
things.

“
Don’t do that. Don’t shut everyone out. Let us help you get
through this.” He touched my arm, but I brushed him off and sank
against the door.
This
covered a multitude of things, finding out my life had been a
lie, that my grandmother had allowed me to think I was protecting a
secret—
one
that
wasn’t even real
—with my life, that my
mother had been something very special, someone I could never live
up to. Nobody could help me through
this
.

“
Fine,” he snapped. “But you’re not wriggling your way out of
training this time.”

I whirled around to gape at him. “I
can’t
train. There’s no one able to
train me, you know that.”

The
Council had made it their mission to train me in accepted methods
of fighting. That required a partner to spar against. Finding
anyone willing to fight me, even sparring, had been surprisingly
hard. Scaring anyone who tried to take on the job into giving up
had been surprisingly amusing. Eddie had warned me to be docile,
but in some ways, the idea I might be unpredictable kept me as safe
as Peter. I was slowly earning myself a reputation, whether I liked
it or not. People thought I could do something. What that was
exactly, I didn’t have a clue.

“
Stop making excuses. You’re training with me until we can
figure out other arrangements. End of discussion.” He wouldn’t look
at me, and I saw him taking on that stubborn streak of his, the one
that made my life awkward whenever it showed itself. Spending so
much time with him lately had been enlightening.

“
I can’t train with you. You’re human. I’ll bite.” I flashed
my fangs, but he ignored me. Getting a rise out of him was harder
than it used to be. He was a lot less freaked out by my lack of
humanity since we found out my mother had been an angel, of
sorts.

“
Did you at least learn anything new?”

I tried
to think. Even my mistakes sometimes helped. “Her bite did
something to me. Sort of paralysed me while she was biting. The
pain was worse than a vampire bite but didn’t last as long.” I
rubbed the still-tender scar on my hand.

“
At least that’s something.” He didn’t sound
impressed.

“
And you were right. The cross still hurts her. Won’t kill her
but could come in handy.”

“
I’ll pass it on.” I glanced at him. Exactly how tied in with
the Council was he? He had been our go-between most of the time,
and I couldn’t tell if the Council wanted to keep their distance,
or if Peter kept me away from them himself. I wasn’t sure if he was
my babysitter or their spy. Either way, I wasn’t exactly
comfortable with the setup. Still, working with him had proved far
better than working with the Guardians the Council had tried to
lumber me with in the first few nights.

“
Something else,” I said, remembering. “Don’t spread this
around, but the dagger doesn’t work on her.”

He
almost swerved, and I steadied the steering wheel, rolling my eyes
at his overly-dramatic reaction.

“
What do you mean, it doesn’t work on her?” He had been
counting on the dagger keeping me out of trouble. I could see it in
his eyes. He thought I was screwed without it. Maybe I
was.

“
It hurts her, but not like the vampires. It doesn’t burn her;
she’s not afraid of it. Keep it to yourself.”

“
You know I will, Ava. But we need to figure this
out.”

I didn’t
bother answering, and he tutted his disapproval. I closed my eyes
and let the movement of the car buoy me into a relaxed state until
we got to my place.

Peter
pulled in right outside my building. I stepped out of the car, but
he followed and made me face him. I couldn’t look him in the eye
anymore. We’d had too many intense moments together for me to be
totally comfortable with him. His ordinary hazel eyes seemed
capable of reading my soul. I wasn’t sure he’d see anything
good.

He laid
a hand on my shoulder. “You can’t push us all away. Not when you’re
like this. Even Carl can sneak up on you. We’re worried about you.
You’re making too many mistakes, and if you don’t want to talk to
us, we can’t make you. But training might help you focus. Help you
forget about everything.”

I stared
at the scar on his chin, wondering for the millionth time what had
caused it. Peter’s solid presence comforted me, but I couldn’t
forget how Esther had warned me about him. I could never truly
trust him because, in some ways, I was his enemy. Peter made sure I
knew he would sacrifice me if it meant getting to the demon who had
taken his son and murdered his family. I understood his bitterness,
especially now that I had more than my fair share of things to be
bitter about.

I had so
much I wanted to say, but my weaknesses were my own to shield. I
couldn’t find the words, so I simply nodded and turned my back on
him. He didn’t follow, and I was glad.

Although
it was dark, no vampires lurked outside my home. The Council had
put an end to that drama. I wasn’t exactly grateful because, like
the vampires, they could turn on me at any time. As soon as I
stopped being useful. And I hadn’t been particularly useful so far.
Becca had been murdering people for close to a month. The papers
screamed, “Serial killer,” the Gardaí remained baffled, and the
members of the Guardian Circles who came across Becca ended up
dead, mostly.

I was
the one Becca feared, the one who had the least trouble finding her
trail. I was the only one who had fought her more than
once.

I had no
idea why I kept surviving, why I kept finding her, why I was able
to do what trained Guardians couldn’t. Even the vampires hadn’t
been able to track her down. I shouldn’t have been surprised when
the Council called me in to help.

Hunting
Becca gave me a purpose, but all of the things I had learned about
myself still tormented me. The presence that followed me around had
disappeared weeks prior, and I spent too much time alone in my own
head. I’d let my business fall apart, but I didn’t urgently need
the money because the Council’s payment had been more than enough
to cover my rent for a few months. A whispering voice kept calling
me a sell-out.

Opening
the door to my flat, I caught a noxious whiff of my slutty
next-door neighbour’s perfume and hurried inside before I inhaled
too much of it. I cleaned my wounds quickly, wincing at the sting
of Eddie’s special ointment. It worked fast, so I wouldn’t need to
wear a bandage for more than a couple of days. Swallowing two of
his disgusting, but effective, green homemade painkillers, I felt
better within minutes.

Changing
into a pair of fleece pyjamas and disposing of yet another pair of
ruined jeans, I cursed the ridiculous chill of Irish spring. My
flat had to be in the coldest, darkest pocket of the
city.

Husky noises filtered through the thin walls of the flat. I
knew my neighbour was having one of
those
nights, so I sat by the window
and used my other sense to search the nearby world. Touching the
supernatural domain with an ability I couldn’t explain bordered on
addictive. I reached out further every time. I had no idea if the
things I could do came from a vampire or an angel. Or if they were
my own special brand of strange.

I didn’t
know who I was anymore.

Miles
away, I found Becca alongside a rapidly fading human. I couldn’t
bring myself to care.