Tempt (Ava Delaney #3) (7 page)

I
decided to get over there early, do some shopping, then drop in on
Daimhín as soon as it got dark. A rare sunny day, I embraced the
sunlight, knowing it was protection. We’d been through a bad
winter, and April wouldn’t be a scorcher, but a cloudless sky
opened up as soon as I left my street, and for some reason, it felt
like a blessing.

Walking
to Eddie’s bookshop, I mulled over the events of the previous
night. If anyone had been watching, it might have looked as though
I didn’t want to capture Becca at all. That wasn’t true, but I
didn’t think I was right for the job after all. I needed help to
take her down, and I didn’t work well with others.

Esther
hadn’t helped. She kept pushing me and taking over. Then again, she
probably thought the exact same thing about me. Except I was
pushing everyone away, and I wasn’t even sure why. Everything I had
been feeling, or rather everything I had been ignoring, kept coming
to the surface in ways I couldn’t control. If I didn’t hurry up and
deal with Becca, people would keep dying. Everything was depending
on me doing things right, and that made my throat dry up with a
raw, aching thirst.

I stood
outside Eddie’s shop for a few minutes, gulping air in an attempt
to calm myself. The sounds of distant heartbeats buzzed in the air,
tormenting me. Closing my eyes, I twisted the numbers of my birth
date until I boiled them down to one safe number. Five. That
worked.

Pushing
open the door, I held my breath as a distinctly citrus scent filled
my nostrils. “What are you doing here?” I blurted.

“
Kinda work here,” Carl said, grinning. “What are
you
doing
here?”

“
Job. Debt collecting. Making even more friends. Is he
here?”

“
He’s upstairs having lunch. Should be back down in a few.
Sticking around?”

I let
out a heavy sigh, knowing I should leave from the way my mouth kept
watering. Whatever the hell was in Carl’s blood tantalised my
senses, and for the first time in a while, I had no choice but to
grip the silver cross around my neck and hope the thirst would duck
its head again.

Still, I
needed to figure out why Carl was lying, and the only way to do
that was by asking questions. It wasn’t stalking. Just some
friendly queries. Peter probably wouldn’t approve, but he wasn’t
around to stop me.

“
I’ll wait,” I said when Carl appeared confused by my
silence.

“
Great! I want to show you something.”

Before I
could stop him, he jumped over the counter and dove into the
bookshelves, picking up a mini stack and carrying them back over to
me.

“
What’s all this?” I asked, fidgeting nervously.

He
dropped the books on the counter and flicked through one of them.
He shoved it at me, urging me to take a look while he went through
the rest of the musty-smelling books.

One word
caught my eye. Nephilim. The picture beside it made me gasp aloud.
Angels, men, demons, and gigantic warriors with flaming swords
covered the page.

“
I know,” Carl said, looking over at me. “You’re a little
small. Then again, you’re a mongrel.”

I made a
face, but it didn’t stop his laughter. “What’s this?”

“
You. Or rather, what you were meant to be. In theory. The
angels told them what to do, and they took out the demons and kept
the gates of hell closed to protect humans.”

“
Why?” I muttered.

“
The angels couldn’t bring the battle to Earth, but demons
could, by possessing humans. They wanted out of Hell, I suppose.
It’s really fascinating, makes you wonder how much of history is…”
He faltered, searching my face. “Is everything okay?” He scratched
his chest absentmindedly.

My mind
raced. Big shoes to fill. Huge. “Um, yeah.” I waved my hands as if
batting away the images. “What’s with you? Fleas?”

“
Silence, dwarfed giant. Seriously, you have to read this
stuff. The Nephilim were born to be warriors. You were practically
made to protect people. How cool is that?”

“
Except I’m not one of them, remember? Besides, could they
actually do anything… useful?” I felt shy all of a sudden that a
human who hadn’t known vampires or angels existed a couple of
months ago could tell me about my heritage.

“
Apart from saving the world? The books all disagree, I’m
afraid. Still interesting reading, though.” He slowly nudged one
book across the counter as if I couldn’t see him.

I ducked
under his arm, grabbed the book, and rushed behind the counter to
read it. He stood there helplessly, still scratching, his face
flooded with colour. I flicked through the pages, my heart
racing.

It was
all bad. The book called Nephilim the dark ones, the ones who
bridged the gap between Heaven and Hell. In so not a good way. The
ones who could end it all. Children of night, of darkness, of
Lucifer. The words blurred together in front of my eyes, and my
lungs felt as though the air had been sucked right from them. I
threw the book away from me as if it burned my fingers.

“
It’s just one book,” he said softly.

“
But it’s right,” I whispered, horrified by the tears in my
eyes. “I don’t even try to do the right thing anymore.”

“
What are you talking about?”

“
I can feel it,” I said, blurting out the secret things that
kept me so low. “There’s something dark in me. And it’s getting
stronger. I don’t care about anything because when I do, it hurts.
Everything’s worse when I feel like a human. The thirst, the
counting, everything. The only time I rein it in for good is when I
act like one of them. When I feel like one of them. I’m stronger
when I’m like them. I can’t even explain half the things I do. I
don’t know what’s happening to me.” His arm was around me before a
tear dropped. I let everything out. All of the things I had been
thinking just spewed out of my mouth. I was only sure of one thing,
that Carl wouldn’t judge me for it.

“
They said you had a choice,” Carl reminded me. “That you
could choose. You’re never going to choose… the wrong
thing.”

“
I don’t even know what’s right and wrong anymore. I’m working
for this stupid Council who can’t even protect children, and I’m
certain some of them are the kind of thing I should really be
hunting. And I’m working for a vampire queen, for feck’s sake. I
can’t even stop Becca from murdering people, and all I’m trying to
do is bring her in for what’s going to be more inhumane testing. I
forced my will on a policeman the other night. I don’t know what
I’m doing.”

“
You’re not bad, Ava.”

I
snorted through my tears and wiped my eyes. “You would never tell
me if I was bad.”

“
I wouldn’t lie to you.” Our eyes locked, and I remembered he
already had. He looked so sure, so steady and honest, that I almost
doubted myself. Almost. In the end, he was just another in a long
line of liars.

“
Yeah, well, what else is in those books, then?” I asked,
moving away from him.

He
scratched his chest. “There’s a couple here,”—he opened two next to
each other—“that talk about walking between worlds and
dimensions.”

“
Dimensions?” I grabbed one of the books to take a closer
look. “Astral projection? What’s that?”

“
It’s something like when your soul leaves your body to move
around elsewhere. This book, though, this is the interesting one.
It doesn’t mention astral projection, but it talks about the
ability to pass between dimensions. I don’t understand it really.
At first, I thought it was on about portals into another world or
something. But the more I read, the less sure I am.”

He stared at me, and I gulped at the serious expression on
his face. “Ava. It… it talks about being able to pass through the
gates of Hell, too, about
opening
gates.”

Before I
could react, a door slammed behind us.

“
Ava, I thought I heard your voice. Carl, you can head on now.
Thanks for your help.” Eddie approached me, a wide, but probably
fake, smile on his face. “How have you been?”

My
shoulders automatically hunched. “I’m here for Daimhín.”

He
didn’t look surprised, but he made a clucking sound. “Oh, dear. I
have no cash right now. How about you come here tonight to pick it
up? After dark, when the shop is closed.”

I
hesitated. I knew better than to trust Eddie when he was being
agreeable. Finally, I shrugged, not having much of an option.
“Fine. I’ll be back later. Carl, what are you doing right
now?”

Carl’s
heart rate spiked, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood. “I
promised my parents I’d go see them. You?”

“
I have some shopping to do,” I said, chewing on the inside of
my mouth.

“
So you’re not going home?”

“
No,” I said slowly.

Carl
scrambled to get his things. “Well, I’ll see you all soon.” He blew
out of the shop like a whirlwind. I stood frowning for a couple of
seconds.

“
You should hurry,” Eddie said in a matter-of-fact voice.
“That shopping sounded important.”

I ignored him, wondering if he knew something, but not
wanting to speak to him about anything other than business. I still
hadn’t forgiven him for lying to me, even though he
had
warned me I didn’t
know things I should. But I did hurry. I didn’t go shopping. I
trailed Carl. All the way to my building. That’s when it dawned on
me. That thing I hadn’t been seeing. Carl was sneaking around with
my next-door neighbour.

***

I
impatiently rapped on Eddie’s door, stamping my feet to get a
little feeling back into my numb toes. As usual, the clear day had
been followed by a bitterly cold evening.

Eddie
opened the door halfway, pulled me in, and slammed it behind
me.

“
Little edgy, aren’t we?” I began, then slowly turned around
to face possibly the oldest vampire I had ever seen. His eyes were
covered in the same filmy substance that diluted Daimhín’s scarlet
orbs, but the redness of his were flecked with dark brown, almost
black streaks. His long dark hair was tied back loosely, letting
strands fall over his eyes.

I
glanced back at Eddie, who tried to look reassuring. It didn’t
work. Every cell in my body wanted to get away from the ancient
vampire. I wanted to pull out my dagger against him. My fingers
trembled in my pockets, and my instincts went haywire.

“
This is Reuben, the vampire consultant to the Council,” Eddie
said hurriedly, as if he could read my thoughts. I tried to calm
myself, seeing why Eddie had introduced him before I flipped out
completely.

The
vampire nodded politely, and I realised I recognised him from the
trial. Exhaling loudly, I kept my eyes on Reuben while speaking to
Eddie. “I have to get back to Daimhín tonight.”

Reuben
turned and walked straight up the stairs without a word.

“
What’s going on?” I whispered. “Are you in trouble or
something?”

“
No, no. Reuben wants to speak to you, that’s all.”

“
To me? What for?”

“
Ava, he’s very old, and he knows more than most. Be polite to
this one. Do you understand? He’s not a resident, but he has quite
a bit of sway as a consultant. Watch yourself tonight.”

Feeling
like a scolded child, I threw my hands in the air and followed
Eddie upstairs. Everything involving Eddie had to turn into
something else, and I was absolutely certain he had planned the
meeting.

Reuben
was already sitting at the table when I walked into Eddie’s
kitchen. I sat across from him, eyeing him warily. His lips
twitched a little, as though I amused him. To me, a vampire’s smile
was way worse than his frown.

“
Any news on the beast?” he said slowly, each word a dusty
croaking sound that sent my nervous system into convulsive
twitching.

“
Not really.” I glanced at Eddie, who kept his back to
us.

“
It needs to be dealt with soon,” Reuben said.

“
I know,” I snapped. He narrowed his eyes, and I again felt
that cold sensation on my skin. Just like the time the black sheep
of Daimhín’s coven, Jules, had tried to control me. With Jules, it
felt like raindrops. With Reuben, it felt like ice-cold waves of
water dashing against my skin. Shivering, I gulped hard until the
feeling seeped away, but I was left rattled by the feeling he would
be able to control me if he really tried.

“
I’m doing the best I can,” I insisted.

“
What’s the problem?” he asked.

“
She knows I’m coming. She keeps running, and I can’t keep
up.”

“
Well, no wonder. Look at you. You’re puny. Are you even using
up your quota?”

Eddie
made a noise that sounded suspiciously like a snort. I sent
daggered glares at his back.

“
I don’t drink blood,” I said. “What’s your quota
like?”