Phoenix Fallen (5 page)

Hell, maybe it was time for him to get some help. But not from a vamp, and not from some inane, 'Hello, my name is Jules and I am a vampire' ring-around-the-monsters therapy group.

No. He needed his family. The only ones he had left.

Just past dusk the next night Jules walked up the drive of a cute, light-blue suburban home, distinguished only by the riotous flowers spilling from containers lining the flagged walkway and the lushness of the grass.

The couple that opened the door together was a striking one. Tangled together, laughing. She was a slender, black woman of medium-height, he was tall, green-eyed and very white. They both had rather extreme hair. Fannie's was a thick explosion of natural coils in deepest brown, Scott's a less impressive, but still utterly wild blonde mop.

Fannie had said half-jokingly for years—though Jules wondered sometimes if there was more truth in there that he wanted to know— 'The first thing I thought when I saw that man was what beautiful babies we would make. Of course I had to marry him. Our gift to the world; perfect, genetically-engineered hair.'

It was true, too. The twins were almost four and they were too gorgeous by half. Identical from their sweet button noses (Scott) and adorable upside-down mouths (Fannie), with skin that split the difference between both parents; a rich, fine caramel that everyone sighed over. Oh, and the hair was as perfect as Fannie could have ever dreamed, corkscrews in paroxysms of matching gold-brushed chocolate.

Tobias and Latisha, or Toby and Tish, or as Jules liked to call them—Thing 1 and Thing 2—were sweet as sugar and more trouble than a three-ring circus crammed into one ring.

Fannie was his best friend in the city besides Kelsey. She was a low-level empath, but what she lacked in psychic power, she made up for with a powerful and generous heart. He'd have never survived the guilt and rage he'd felt over Kelsey's mom's murder without Fannie. Never.

He kissed her cheek and bumped fists with Scott.

It hadn't taken long for Jules to like Scott, despite the long history between him and Fannie. Not that they'd ever had
that
kind of history. Well, only almost.

Once.

Right after Angelina, Kelsey's mom, had been kidnapped while under his guard, then murdered, Jules had hit a serious rough patch. He hadn't been able to deal with the guilt he felt. He’d been drowning in it. Reaching out to Kelsey had not been an option. Jules was too ashamed, and afraid of adding to her own overwhelming grief, despite the fact that, as far as he could tell, Kelsey had never once blamed him.

Fannie had helped him through that. They'd met at one of the secret para meetings that had been popular back then. Jules had been scouting them, using his powers as his ticket in, then scoping for paras that would be suitable for his and Kelsey's idea; an idea of a foundation that had been more of a wispy dream at that point than anything.

Fannie never became a part of Phoenix, but she became a part of Jules' life. As a friend. There had been only one time, one rough night, both of them lonely and down, that they had come close to anything else.

Close enough that Fannie had been on his lap. That had been in his old crappy apartment, a Friday night in the dead of winter, with his heat barely working. One minute she had been next to him on the couch, the next she was straddling him and he was kissing her. He remembered feeling ambivalent. Willing, but ambivalent. Then Fannie pulled back. She had looked at him for a long moment, her hands cupping his face.

"If I have sex with you, we aren't gonna be able to be friends anymore. Not like we are now. And damnit, Jules, I want to be your friend more than I want to fuck you."

She got off him, got them both a beer from the kitchen and that was pretty much that. They fell asleep together on the couch watching old movies and the subject had never come up again.

He wondered if she had ever told Scott about that night. And decided she probably had. As far as he could tell Scott and Fannie shared the same soul, two halves of the most complete couple he had ever known.

It was beautiful, but the downside was how the hell were you supposed to live up to that shit? It set the bar so high, it was clean out of sight.

Fannie looked him up and down, her eyes narrowing. "What's wrong with you?"

"I'm undead, I'm a goddamn shade and I may lose my company." He quipped dryly. She shrugged that off, cocking her head as she studied him.

"Besides that." Then her eyes lit up. "Oh, you got that 'I need to get laid' look on your face." Scott laughed and Jules shot him a warning frown.

"Bullshit."

"Oh come off it, Jules. I can always tell. Who is it this time?"

And so he told her. Sitting around her comfortable kitchen counter, the twins zooming around in the living room while Scott rode herd and let them have some one-on-one time.

He told Fannie all of it. The part about Rissa being a vamp didn't even phase her. Though something else did.

“Jeez, Jules! A white girl? Are you shittin’ me? You just broke the hearts of half the sisters in the city!” Fannie had her hands on her hips, glaring at him from over the gleaming black-and-white kitchen counter.

“Jesus, Fan. It's not like that. Anyway, so speaks the woman who married a honky.”

“Scott is not a honky. He’s not even white, he’s just a little…beige.”

Scott wrinkled his nose as he came up behind Fannie. “That makes me sound like a goddamn paint chip, woman.”

“You can paint me anytime, baby.”

Jules groaned and covered his ears. “Shut the hell up, you two.”

After some unnecessary, in Jules opinion, smacking, kissing and squeezing on Fannie and Scott’s part, Fannie got back to business.

“I want to meet her. Bring her ‘round for dinner.”

“Fannie.” He gave her a look and she gave him one right back.

“I’m serious, Jules. You bring her over. Next Saturday evening will work just fine."

"I don't think she's speaking to me right now. I made her feel like shit."

"So, do something that will make her not feel like shit. For heaven's sake, women aren't rocket science, Jules." Behind her, Scott choked on the beer he'd just opened. He went back to the kids hastily, before Fannie could do more than glare at him.

She turned back to Jules.

He opened his mouth but Fannie shushed him with a look that brooked no argument. “Just do it, Jules.

"Now.
Have you heard when Kelsey and her man are gonna have this damn wedding? Oh my god, I'm just dying to find out the exact date. A vampire wedding! And you know that man of hers will go to town. All out gorgeous, I just know it.

"It's still set for Paris, right?” She gazed at Jules as if daring him to tell her otherwise. Fannie was over the moon about getting to go to France for Kesley’s wedding. There was an almost maniacal glint in her eye.

“Yes. Paris.” He sighed. He wasn’t nearly as excited as Fannie about going back to that city. Not after his last visit had gone so swimmingly. “It’ll be the end of September, beginning of October, Kelsey thinks.

"Goodie, I won't be too fat to wear a great dress by then." She patted her tummy and smiled. Scott's arm slung around her neck, her fingers laced in his as she gave Jules an expectant look.

It took him a minute. "Say what?"

"Ready to be a godfather again, Jules?" This from Scott, who had a knowing grin on his stupidly happy face.

"Hell no. Jesus Christ, you two." How do you find the energy?, he wondered as Thing 1 and Thing 2 ran into the kitchen and seized his legs. "Congrats and all that." He knocked beers with Scott and kissed Fannie on the cheek. "Is this gonna be another excuse to have me babysit more often?"

"Not everything is about you, dumbass." Fannie said so sternly he blinked at her. Only to have her bust out laughing at the look on his face. "But since you asked, next Thursday would be lovely."

Jules rolled his eyes as Scott snorted and the twins started their deafening babysitting cheer involving his name and pizza. Fannie yelled for them to hush their mouths before she got the stick out. Then she pushed him and Scott outside to the lighted patio and told them to get cracking on the steaks.

Five minutes later, Beyoncé was on the stereo and Scott was doing an alarmingly apt impression of her booty shimmy as he slapped raw beef on the hot grill and sang along.

Scott was weird. He acted like some goofy kid with an artistic streak, but Jules knew better. Scott was the strongest elemental para Jules had ever met. Only Gordy, a water elemental who worked full-time for Phoenix came close to Scott’s strength. As an ex-Marine, he'd also been in both North Korea Conflicts and Jules suspected he'd spent some time in Russia. Possibly during the Dark Days, when shades had taken over Moscow for nearly a month and thousands had died.

Scott Davidson had worked more than a few highly-sensitive jobs for Phoenix Inc. as a free-lancer after becoming a civilian. And he'd done them damn well. It may not sound like much, being able to control plants, but if you'd ever been in a forest at night, imagining that the trees were alive, alive and angry…well, Scott was capable of doing that for
real.

You didn't want to mess with a man who could set a forest on you.

Scott was a bad-ass disguised behind a hippie, tree-hugger exterior. Jules watched the man sing
Love On Top
in a surprisingly smooth tenor and shook his head. You never could tell.

Between the music, the sizzle of the steaks, the noise of the kids and Fannie singing along in the kitchen, Jules leaned back into the warm brick wall and smiled almost contentedly.

It came as no surprise to him his near-constant headache and the tension in his shoulders had vanished. The Davidsons were his family now, the only ones he had left….

Except Kelsey.

Kelsey felt so distant lately. A distance that had nothing to do with the ocean between them. Jules sighed and rubbed his forehead. Nope. The gulf had everything to do with Miles. Her damn bloodsucking fiancé.

Hell, he'd always known she'd loved Miles. Who better? He'd been Kelsey's best friend for more than half her life.

He'd been there for her descent into agony after her mom had been killed, when Miles' lack of trust had shattered not only her heart, but her family. Of course, Jules put that death squarely on his own shoulders, not Miles'.

He did, however, blame the French vamp for ripping Kelsey's heart out.

Jules loved Kelsey. They were like twins of circumstance; gender didn't matter, background didn't matter, color didn't matter. They had been birthed in the blood and fire of their kidnapping as children by the Cleaners, the sick cult backed by the government at one time to eliminate shades using talented paras raised as assassins.

The Cleaners were long gone. Kelsey had destroyed the last of them that night in Paris. Jules' loyalty to Kelsey and the bond between them was something that would never die. He didn't begrudge her and Miles their love, though he did question their mysterious ability to forgive each other. Both of their sins had been huge; Kelsey targeting Miles per the Cleaners' orders, then falling for him instead, Miles not hearing her out when he'd found out the truth, cutting her out of his home, his life, but apparently not his heart.

It was crazy, but for them, even though it had taken over a decade, the story had a happy ending.

Jules had thankfully never looked at Kelsey in
that
way either, even less so than Fan, cause she was like his sister, but he might never get over the fact that Miles had turned him.

Lost in his thoughts, Jules jumped when on her way outside, Fannie hip-checked him hard, a tray full of cut veggies and dip in her hands.

"Have a broccoli tree, Jules. You need your greens."

He declined to point out that as a vamp, he didn't
need
food at all, because he also didn't need another dose of Fannie's sharp tongue.

"Yeah, especially with all the abuse handed out around here." He ran a hand down his side where she'd banged into him before grudgingly looting the tray.

"You'll survive." Her eyes were dark and wise and loving on his. "If you take care of yourself."

"That's what I have you for, right?"

She snorted. "I am not your mama, mister." Then she sighed at the flash of pain she must have seen in his eyes. "God knows, I love you though, Jules. Bring this damn woman over, you hear me? No excuses. Maybe she's what you need. Even if it's just for a little while. There's no shame in that, sweetie. You could use the distraction."

"I could use something, but a damn vampire isn't likely to do me any good, Fan."

"You never know. Seems to me one saved your life not so long ago." Fannie gave his shoulder a squeeze before moving off to pimp the veggies out to her little monsters.

Jules watched her go, shaking his head. Everyone who loved him seemed grateful to Miles for 'saving' him, even when they knew about those screams from his past.

But how was he supposed be thankful he had a future as the very creature that had destroyed his past?