Caught in Darkness Read online

  His arms had locked around her, holding her tightly to his chest as he took control of the kiss. One of his hands was tangled in her loose blonde hair, the other curled over her hip, and his tongue wasted no time in sweeping into her mouth. He was taking his time mapping out the terrain of her mouth, stroking each surface in a way that made her moan against his lips. Without even realizing it she had wound her own arms around his shoulders and was clinging to him like a lifeline, her toes curling in her shoes.

  She wanted so desperately to return the pleasure he was bringing her with his kiss, but by the time she was able to process that desire he was pulling way, his chest heaving just as visibly as hers.

  “You don’t need to thank me,” Seth declared, voice slightly uneven and heavier than usual. “But feel free to kiss me whenever the mood strikes you. Starting tomorrow.”

  Veronica blinked at him, for a moment thrown off by his words, until her brain finally caught up with her ears. “Right. You still need to go.” She pulled in another deep breath and smiled before adding, “Good luck.”

  His delectable lips lifted and he replied, “Good night.”

  ****

  “What do you mean you lost your keys?” Allison Drake demanded later that night. Veronica had called to make sure that Allison’s ridiculously-busy schedule hadn’t changed and ruined their plans for the next day, and while she had her on the phone she’d ended up telling her about having a new spare key for her, too. It was entirely possible that she hadn’t thought that part all the way through.

  Cringing with guilt, Veronica shifted on her couch and replied, “I mean they must’ve fallen out of my purse while I was out yesterday. I had the locks changed today and so I’ve got a new key for you.” It was also possible that she’d been hoping the call would, at least briefly, distract her from sitting alone in her living room and wondering if she’d find herself with any unwanted visitors. Only that part wasn’t going so well at this point, either.

  “You said that part already,” Allison reminded. “Is there something you’re not telling me? Did something happen?”

  “Wow, Ali,” Veronica teased, “has anyone ever told you that you’ve become a lot more paranoid since you started those MD courses?”

  “Ha ha,” Allison replied, her tone indicating that she may very well be rolling her eyes. “Don’t think I’m falling for that distraction-tactic, Veronica. What’s going on?”

  Now Veronica wasn’t sure what to say. She couldn’t tell her friend the truth—not the details, anyway, and Ali would insist she run straight to the police if she told her the non-detailed version. This was a problem. She hadn’t counted on Allison pushing for answers (not that she knew why, because that was exactly what Allison would do). The longer she stalled, though, the worse the situation was going to become and she knew it.

  “I swear I will put down this highlighter and drive over there right this minute if you don’t start talking,” Allison threatened.

  “You don’t have to do that,” Veronica said quickly. She paused then before asking, “Are you seriously studying while we’re talking?”

  “Of course,” Allison replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “Now stay on track for five seconds, will you?”

  Sighing, Veronica said, “Okay, so there is more to the story than what I told you. And maybe I do know how I lost my keys. But I can’t get into all of that right now, so I just need you to trust me and not worry about it. The point is that I have new locks, new keys, and tomorrow I can say the same for my car.”

  “Wait, you mean you lost your car keys, too?” Allison asked incredulously.

  “Yes,” Veronica replied. “They were in my purse, which I briefly lost, and when my purse was returned to me it was sans key-ring and wallet.”

  There was a moment of heavy silence on the line, and Veronica knew that Allison’s genius brain was trying to solve the blank spots in the story like a detective.

  At length, Allison asked, “Do you completely trust the person who returned your purse to you?”

  “Yes,” Veronica repeated without hesitation. It was almost frightening how much she trusted him.

  “And when you say ‘lost’,” Allison began, “do you mean lost as in forgotten in a public place or lost as in stolen?”

  Pulling her lip between her teeth for a moment, Veronica hesitated. How much could she tell without saying too much? At what point would Allison forget to trust her and somehow find a way to drag her to the police station instead? Here’s hoping. “Stolen, but not in the traditional sense. The only things that left my house are the keys and wallet.”

  Again, a stretch of silence. Most likely Allison hadn’t considered that this event had taken place inside Veronica’s private residence.

  Before Allison could ask more questions, Veronica added, “We’re pretty much at the ‘please trust me’ part, Ali. I can’t say more, at least not right now, but I promise I’m fine and it’s all going to be taken care of.”

  Allison released a heavy breath, clearly unhappy with Veronica’s insistence on keeping quiet on the subject, but finally relented. “Okay. I’ll trust your judgment on this, at least for now. But I want you to promise to tell me if this whatever-it-is gets out of hand. I’m your friend, V. You can trust me, too.”

  As the tension fled from her chest (and the guilt eased in), Veronica smiled and leaned back into her couch. “I know, and I do. Everything’s just really complicated, and it’s not entirely about me. I’m sorry, Ali.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Allison replied. “Anyway, I need to get through this chapter before I go to bed, so I’ll see you tomorrow?”

  An easy grin lifting her lips, Veronica replied, “You know it.”

  ****

  It would be accurate to say that Seth’s mind was not entirely focused on his hunt. It would be more accurate to say that his mind was largely focused on Veronica’s kiss. He certainly hadn’t expected her to kiss him, but he wasn’t sorry that she had. And it hadn’t taken his body any time at all to react to the taste of her. His reaction was verging on dangerous, and it occurred to him to be concerned about what he might do if she opted to kiss him again, but he couldn’t quite get there. Neither could he guarantee that he’d wait for her to initiate another kiss.

  The vibration of his phone in his pocket drew him from his thoughts, and fear that it might be Veronica in need of a rescue had him snatching the device up to his ear without a glance at the Caller ID. “What is it?”

  There was a beat of silence, followed by faint, distinctly male chuckling. “Well, I’m not sure I’ve ever heard you answer the phone quite like that. I catch you on a bad night? Or day…depending on which time zone you’re in.”

  The voice belonged to Corbin Lee, one of the few vampires Seth genuinely considered his friend. Suddenly, for the first time in decades, Seth found he was embarrassed. He felt like he’d been caught doing something he shouldn’t. “Night, and no, not really. I was just…distracted.”

  “Distracted? You? That’s surprising,” Corbin commented.

  “I’ll tell you about it later,” Seth offered as he stepped out of the building he’d been searching through. Another dead-end, like every other possibility he’d investigated so far. “I wasn’t expecting to hear from you. Is everything all right?”

  “Yeah,” Corbin assured him. “I just got to thinking that it’s been a while since we talked. Or, you know, a comparative while. Are you on a job?”

  “I am,” Seth replied. “But it’s going slow.” Although that was suddenly not so bad thanks to Veronica.

  “Sorry to hear it,” Corbin said. “I won’t keep you, though. Just thought I’d check in, make sure you were still kicking. We should meet up sometime when you’re not busy, if only so that we’ll remember what the other looks like.”

  Seth chuckled faintly, pausing mid-stride to turn his gaze up to the dark, clear sky. The stars were bright and their shine reminded him of Veronica. “I have a fairly goo
d memory, actually. But you might be right. I’ll call you when I’m off the clock.”

  “Fair enough. Happy hunting, old friend.”

  “Likewise,” Seth said before pulling the phone from his ear and disconnecting. It was good to hear his friend’s voice from time to time—it was a good reminder of his humanity. Sometimes he felt like he’d forgotten it, good memory or not. Although, tonight, it doesn’t seem so far away.

  Shaking his head, Seth deposited his phone back into his pocket and took a step forward before freezing. Suddenly the messages his vampire-enhanced senses were sending him were actually connecting with his brain, but it might already be too late. That depended entirely on what kind of human he smelled behind him. A question that was answered as quickly as he’d thought it, when the human—male—opened his mouth.

  “Vampire,” the man called abruptly. His tone made it clear that he wasn’t particularly fond of vampires, and the age in his voice indicated that he’d come across one or two over the years. Without even laying eyes on the man Seth knew he was a Slayer.

  “If we’re going to communicate,” Seth began slowly, holding absolutely still, “it might be easier if I turned around.”

  “As long as you keep it at a pace I can see,” the Slayer replied coldly.

  Seth carefully held his hands up, palms open, and turned at a deliberately slow pace. The last thing he needed was to have to deal with a trigger-happy Slayer. It was several tense seconds before he was actually able to see the man, and he was unsurprised to note that he didn’t recognize him. He could count the number of Slayers he’d encountered, who were likely still alive, on one hand. That number was one, and the number existed at all because Seth had seen a power and potential in that then-boy that he hadn’t seen in half of the vampires he knew.

  This Slayer was older, somewhere in his mid-forties, which was actually rather impressive. He was only slightly shorter than Seth, meaning he was just shy of six-foot, and he had dirty blonde hair with not a small amount of natural silver highlights. His hair was beginning to thin and he had far too many wrinkles around his faded, weary blue eyes. He was missing half of his left eyebrow and that eye was locked in a permanent squint, but he stood proudly. He was past the prime of his life, he knew it, and he wasn’t afraid to prove that he’d lived as long as he had for a reason.

  Seth almost hoped he could find a reason to like this man.

  “Tell me,” Seth began, letting his arms fall back to his sides. The Slayer’s loaded crossbow was aimed at the ground, but he wasn’t a fool—he’d seen many a vampire fall to their pride. “Is there a reason you didn’t shoot first?”

  “I’m new in town,” the Slayer declared. “Still working out the lay of the land. You answer my questions, maybe I let you live.”

  ‘Maybe’ always equaled ‘not in this lifetime’ when it came to Slayers, but Seth opted to pretend that he was green enough not to know that. The nameless Slayer wasn’t the only one who had questions. “I’ll tell you what I can.”

  Slayer’s eyes narrowed at the faint undertone of suspicion he heard in Seth’s words, but he refrained from pointing it out. “How big is your Family?”

  Good question; that depends on how you define it. Aloud, Seth replied, “You know I can’t give you a number. But it’s established.”

  “Nearest Pack?”

  “Not sure.” That much, at least, was the complete truth. He hadn’t bothered to research the location or size of the nearest werewolf Pack. If they were a problem, after all, there wouldn’t be such a solidly-established Family in the area.

  “Have you seen other Slayers in the area?”

  Interesting question. Slayers weren’t the tightest-knit group, but they certainly communicated with each other more regularly than they did with the enemy. Seth was beginning to think this Slayer was looking for someone or something specific. “No.”

  “Well, you’re not very useful, are you?” Slayer asked, a mocking smirk curving his lips.

  “You’re asking odd questions,” Seth returned pointedly. “I always assumed that Slayers did their homework before moving somewhere new.”

  Slayer’s eyes narrowed darkly. It was obvious that Seth hadn’t exactly earned any points with that comment. “And I always assumed vamps had the good sense to run while they could.” He lifted his crossbow fluidly, finger squeezing the trigger before it was even level.

  The slim, pointy piece of wood tore free of its resting place, aimed straight for Seth’s heart.

  Seth dashed to the side and forward, spinning around the Slayer until he had the other man’s trigger wrist in his hand. The wooden arrow buried itself in the dirt well beyond where Seth had been standing a full second later.

  Tightening his grip pointedly over the Slayer’s wrist, Seth said, “I’ll give you one warning: don’t push your luck. I won’t bother you without reason, but if you come after me rest assured I will fight back.”

  “Burn in Hell, fang,” the Slayer spat, reaching behind his lightweight coat for something that smelled suspiciously wooden.

  Seth wasn’t particularly surprised by his response, and he felt only a twinge of remorse as he tightened his grip enough to snap the man’s wrist. It was a clean break, but it would slow him down. All he wanted was time to get away.

  The Slayer cried out, cursing, and dropped his crossbow. He spun in, toward Seth, and tried valiantly to stab him with the stake in his other hand, but Seth moved back and the stake sliced through air.

  “This is your warning,” Seth reminded him, holding the Slayer’s angry gaze with one of his own for a long moment before dashing out of sight. And all the way back to his car he was cursing himself. It had been sloppy to let the human sneak up on him. Not to mention having a Slayer prowling the city was going to make his life a lot more complicated.

  He could only hope this didn’t somehow come back on Veronica.

  ****

  Veronica and Allison stepped out of the karaoke bar near eleven o’clock on Tuesday night, laughing. “Oh my god,” Allison gasped, a big smile splitting her perfectly-tanned cheeks and lighting her hazel eyes, “I can’t believe I never did that before!”

  “Neither can I. How did I ever let you get away with bailing on all those college-karaoke nights?” Veronica teased, walking half a step ahead of her friend as they rounded the first corner between them and the public parking lot. The bar had its own parking, of course, but it was sparse and had been full when they arrived, so they’d been forced to park in the metered lot across the street and down a block.

  “I was definitely missing out,” Allison agreed. “But thank you for not giving me the chance to maintain my ignorance.”

  Veronica rolled her eyes at her friend’s choice of words, saying, “You’re welcome, Ali. And I really am sorry about missing your party.”

  Allison shook her head, smile still curving her lips, and replied, “Don’t be. This way I sort of got two parties!”

  “You make a good point,” Veronica decided, turning enough to grin over at her friend. “So you’ve sort of made up for skipping last year, but don’t use this as an excuse to skip next year, got that?”

  Allison gasped dramatically, coming to a stop and holding a hand over her heart, exclaiming, “Bite your tongue! I would never do such a thing!”

  Veronica was stopped as well, and she lifted her loosely-curled fists to her hips as she prepared to mock-lecture her friend, but her comeback was interrupted by a distantly-familiar male voice.

  “Veronica Wyndham.”

  The girls’ laughter died in their throats at the heavy tone and both turned their attention forward, to the man who had just stepped up in front of them. He was only a couple of inches over Veronica’s five-six, appeared to be in his mid-to-late-thirties, and had thinning brown hair. But none of these were the details that jumped out at Veronica, whose eyes widened almost as soon as they’d landed on him. She’d seen him before—at the park on Saturday. He was one of the Wilson brothers—the one the ot
her two had been talking to.

  Allison stepped properly up to Veronica’s side, a somber, curious expression on her face, and casually asked, “Who are you?”

  Wilson cut his dark, shaded eyes to her and scowled. “No one,” he replied shortly. He returned his attention to Veronica and thrust a torn-off piece of paper at her. “This is for you.”

  Finally finding her voice, Veronica asked, “What do you want?”

  His scowl darkened and he shook the paper pointedly, saying, “To deliver a message. Take the damn paper.”

  Allison was looking between them, her expression slowly shifting to confusion, and she carefully asked, “Veronica?”

  Swallowing, Veronica reached out and took the paper. Her eyes automatically drifted down to it, and from what she could make out in the glow of the building lights it looked like an address. “What…is this for?”

  “You’ll figure it out if you go there,” Wilson replied, arm falling back to his side. He turned without another word and started walking away.

  “Hey,” Allison began, still sounding confused, “wait a second! What’s going—?” She cut herself off when Veronica’s free hand landed on her shoulder pointedly.

  “Ali, let it go,” Veronica said quietly.

  Allison turned her attention to Veronica, frowning now, and demanded, “What’s going on, V? Do you know that guy?”

  “Not really,” Veronica mumbled, her eyes drifting to the scrap of paper she still held. “I’ve seen him before…once.” She fell silent for a beat, her mind racing. Why had one of them approached her? What was the significance of the address? Were they taunting her? What should I do about this address? There was a pit quickly building in her stomach as she considered numerous—and largely extreme—reasons that they would be trying to get her to go somewhere specific. She needed to call Seth.