Something Wanton (Mystics & Mayhem) (46 page)

“Then, Mick’s mate, Moira, took a liking to me one night in a pub and we became friends,” Kellum continued, giving me the story I guess he knew I was going to ask for eventually.  “She was just a girl, Moira, but Mick had done something to her to keep her from aging.  She wasn’t a vampire, but she wasn’t human anymore, either.  She truly loved Mick, though, and I believe he loved her.  When she asked him to turn me so she would have someone to talk to when he was away, he did it without even blinking.  He never denied her anything.”

“Nathan’s father was higher up on the aristocratic totem pole than my father was, so when my father went to him for his assistance after I disappeared he took up arms and went on the hunt, taking his sons along for the fun.”  His voice turned hard and angry, and I saw deep sadness fill his eyes.  “Nate refused to join them.  He wouldn’t play a part in them finding me.  He knew, you see.  He knew what I had become.  He was my only real friend, and I had gone to him, scared and dying of thirst, right after I was turned.”

“I guess you know what happened after that,” he murmured, quietly. 

Yeah, I knew.  I shuddered as I remembered Nathan’s expression the day he told me that story.  I had never seen that kind of agony or anger before.  It had left a lasting impression.

“If it hadn’t been for Nate, I would have deserted after what Mick did to Lady Lisette and the girls,” Kellum said, his voice whisper soft.  “Lady Lisette was the kindest woman I have ever met, and the girls were the mirror image of her, pure sweetness and light all three of them.  They were innocent.  He had no right to do what he did.”

Raised voices coming
up the front steps drew our attention then, and we turned in time to see the most amazingly beautiful woman I had ever seen come through the door, shouting orders as she walked.  Her golden hair was piled on top of her head with wisps coming down to caress her neck and cheeks.  She was wearing a low cut silk blouse the exact gold of her hair and a long, white, wool coat paired with the shortest skirt she could possibly find, leaving her long legs bare to the knee.  Leather boots with heels that had to be six inches high completed her ensemble, making her even taller than she already was. 

Her aura was less than appealing, however.  It was this awful jaundice-yellow color and the stench coming off of it reminded me of Stacy’s.  Really, when they call some people ‘spoiled rotten’ it’s not just a figure of speech.  This chick was just as foul as my human nemesis was—and then some.  Seriously, she
reeked
.

She stopped when she spotted me and Kellum
in the corner of the entryway and sniffed disdainfully.  “My boys are going to need some help with my bags,” she said, imperiously.  “See to it, and be quick about it.”

See to it? 
Seriously
?  When Kellum and I just stood there, exchanging a ‘Who the hell does she think
she
is?’ kind of look, she let out an impatient huff and clapped her hands sharply. “Now, infants!  Chop, chop!”

Infants?  Oh,
hell
no!  She did
not
just call me an infant!

“Sure I will,” I chirped sweetly, with the coldest smile I could muster up.

“Then get
on
with it, wench,” she said, lifting her chin imperiously.

“You didn’t let me finish,” I told her, my voice losing all that sweetness real fast.  First infant, now wench?  Oh, she was
so
asking for an attitude adjustment.  “What I meant to say is that I will carry your luggage in just as soon as Hell gets air conditioning and ice cubes.  You want your bags brought in?  Carry your arrogant ass back out there and get them.”

Kellum choked on his laughter as her mouth fell open in shock.  She reached up to slide her shades down, revealing pale green eyes that were beginning to glow with anger, like that was going to intimidate me.  I guess it wasn’t
her
fault that she was too stupid to know who she was dealing with.  These older vamps really needed someone to take them down a peg or two. 

Weren’t they lucky they had me to help them out?

“Little girl, do you know who I am?” she asked icily, removing her shades so she could really glare at me.

“
Nope,” I said, shrugging.  “And I really don’t care.”

“I am Blaire
Dubois, you wretched child,” she growled.

The smile on my face died like a rose in winter.  This foul-tempered prima donna was Zan’s maker, the one who killed people on a whim when she didn’t get her way.  If I remembered correctly, she hadn’t been invited.  At least, no one had told
me
they’d invited her.

“And my name is Ember Blaylock,” I told her coldly, letting her see the dislike in my eyes.  “Around here, that puts me a little higher on the totem pole than you, Barbie, so I suggest you watch your step.”

“Why you insolent little—!” she hissed, stepping toward me.  Before she could make a
real
mistake and piss me off, salvation—for her, not me—arrived dressed in the form of Zan himself.

“Play nice, Firecracker,” Zan said, as he came
through the door with his hands full of suitcases, followed by what looked like quadruplets.  Seriously they all looked alike, like someone had cloned a dark-haired cabana boy.  “Blaire, stop that damned hissing.  It won’t do you any good, anyway.  Ember’s not like everyone else you step on.  She has a tendency to bite.  Hard.”

I smiled at him.  That was high praise, coming from Zan.  I was suddenly very proud of my smart mouth and bad attitude.

“Did you hear what she said to me, Zander?” Blaire wailed, causing me to roll my eyes again.  “She suggested that I should carry my own luggage!  Can you believe it?  Do something!”

“You did?” Zan asked me, chuckling.  “You really
suggested
that?”

“No, I didn’t,” I told him, raising my voice so he could hear me over Kellum’s howling laughter and Blaire’s continued whining.  “What I said was that if she wanted her luggage brought in, she could carry her arrogant ass out there and get it.  See?  I didn’t
suggest
anything.”

“Zander!” Blaire screeched when Zan started laughing, too.

She was shrieking loud enough to wake the dead and more than a few of them were peeking in to see what was up.  That was another thing I’d noticed over the years.  Ghosts
love
drama.  I’ve always wondered if that’s because being dead is just plain boring.  The dead weren’t the only ones interested in the show she was putting on, though.  A few of the living were starting to stick their heads over the banister to watch the show, too.

“What the blazes is that racket?” Skippy roared, appearing at the door of
the library.  He stopped when he saw the gathering crowd, my satisfied smirk, and Blaire’s furiously glowing eyes.  “Oh, this looks interesting,” he crooned, grinning and crossing his arms over his chest as he took in the situation and made all the correct assumptions.  Winking at me, he asked, “Are you making new friends, my sweet?”

“You know how it is, Skippy,” I told him, returning his wink.  I saw more than one mouth fall open in shock.  “People just flock around me.  It
must
be my charm.”

“Skippy?” Blaire whined, turning on him with her lips already poking out in a pout.  “Why does
she
get to call you Skippy?  You wouldn’t let
me
!”

“I like her more than I like you,” Skippy told her, one eyebrow arched.  Suddenly, he didn’t sound quite so friendly.  “And for the record, you are still not allowed to address me as such.  I will tolerate that kind of insolence only from her.  Is that understood, Blaire?”

“Yes, Skipper,” she muttered, lowering her eyes respectfully.  “I meant no disrespect.”

“Of course not.”  He noticed Kellum then and I was surprised when his eyes narrowed dangerously.  “Ember, my love, can I assume that Mikhail and his team have arrived?”

“Yes, sir, we arrived barely half an hour ago,” Kellum said before I could answer.  The respect in
his
voice would have been hard to miss.  “I’m sure Mick will be in to see you shortly.  I believe he’s discussing the situation with Nate.”

“See to it that he does,” Skippy said shortly.  The chill in his tone was enough to make everyone in the hall shiver just a little.  “He is not to make a single move without
my permission.  Is
that
understood?”

“Yes, sir.  I’ll let him know immediately.”

I gave Skippy a sour look for being such an ass to Kellum and he winked at me again.  Skippy was such a show-off.  Since I had already reduced him to putty in my hands, I decided to let his attitude with Kellum go.  For all I knew, he had a good reason for it.

“Oh, and Ember?” he called over his shoulder, already walking back into
the library.

“Yeah, Skippy?”

“Try not to make any more friends,” he said, grinning impishly.  “I believe it is becoming a hazard to your health, darling.”

Nobody seemed to know what to make of the exchange between me and Skippy.  Kellum looked incredulous, Blaire looked pissed,
the cabana boys looked amazed, and Zan looked proud.  Personally, I couldn’t see what the big deal was.  So Skippy liked me?  Surely I wasn’t the
only
person he’d liked in seven centuries.

Was I?

Blaire gave me one more evil look before stomping up the stairs like a three year old, followed by her cabana boy entourage.  Shrugging, Zan dropped Blaire’s luggage in the middle of the hall and sauntered over to where Kellum and I were standing.  Seeing that the drama had come to an end, the people who’d been watching over the banister started drifting away. 

“
What
is she
doing
here?” I demanded with a scowl as Zan slouched against the wall next to me.

“Looking for Hamilton,” he answered with another shrug.  “
Well, she’s looking for
a
Hamilton, at any rate.  Seems good old Benny killed one of her favorite toys a while back.  Blaire likes to kill her toys herself, you see.  She’s a little put out with him, and a pissed off Blaire is not someone you want to meet up with in a dark alley.”

“But that still doesn’t explain what she’s doing
here
,” I huffed in exasperation. 

“She’s expecting him to come back up his big brother,” Zan said, examining the nails on his right hand. 

“And why would he do that?” I asked, noticing that Kellum wasn’t really looking at me anymore, either.

After sharing a loaded look with Kellum, Zan finally sighed and said, “Because Benjamin Hamilton is a demon hunter, Firecracker.”
’

A demon… Oh, hell.

“Anyway,” Zan hurried on.  “She’s here, so we may as well let her make herself useful.”  When he saw the stormy expression on my face and the slight glow of irritation in my eyes, he started backing toward the closest door.  “I think I’ll go check on Nate.  I’ll catch you kids later.”

I blinked and he was gone.  Growling softly, I turned back to Kellum only to find him watching me with
a startled expression on his handsome face.

“
You really bring out the best in guys, huh?” he asked with a shaky laugh.  “Zan’s not easily won over, you know.  And what’s with you and the Boss?  He actually seems to
like
you.”

“I was mean to him,” I told him
honestly with a shrug.  “We got off on the wrong foot, me and Skippy, but we worked it out in the end and now we adore one another.  And it only took me one day!  That
has
to be some kind of record, right?”

“You were
mean
to him?”  I smiled at the way Kellum was looking at me.  I swear, he looked like he wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry.

“Yep.  Weird, huh?” 

He looked at me for a second, then laughed and started walking down the hall in the same direction Zan had gone.

“Where are you going?” I called after him, confused.

“To see if Skipper has a chapel in this mausoleum,” he called back without missing a beat.  “I haven’t prayed in a while but I think I can remember how.  I spent a decade studying with a Buddhist monk.  Then another two with a Wiccan high priestess—though, I admit, in her case I was mostly studying
her
rather than learning anything spiritual.  Hell, I might even have to dig down deep, back to childhood when I was a good little Catholic boy, and light a candle or two for good measure.  Yeah, and maybe say a few Hail Mary’s, just to make sure I’m getting through to the right people.”

“Who on earth are you praying for?” I asked as I ran to catch up with him, astonished by the list he had just
rattled off.

“Nate,” he said, really laughing now.  “I was wrong.  He isn’t lucky, he’s cursed.  With you as a mate, he’s going to need all the help he can get.” 

I made it through the rest of the night without pissing anyone else off.  It wasn’t easy, especially with Mikhail’s bunch of jerks roaming around like they owned the place, Mikhail himself hogging all my boyfriend’s time, and Blaire glaring daggers at me every time we happened to be in the same room together, but I managed it. 

It was after two in the morning when I decided I’d had all of the undead I could take and retreated back to the room Kim and I had
decided to share.  Kim was out cold on the sofa, so I picked out a comfy piece of carpet next to the window, wrapped myself in a thick blanket so my ghosts wouldn’t freeze me to death, and pulled the curtains back so I could watch the snow fall. 

It took longer than usual to clear my mind.  I couldn’t stop thinking about Dragon Lady Cantrell.   I know.  Weird, right?  But, for some reason, even after everything else was neatly stored away in little mental drawers, she just refused to let me rest. 

So much about her suddenly made sense to me.  Her bitterness, her lack of emotion, all of it.  She had shut it all off.  She had forced herself to stop feeling after her one true love had marked her and abandoned her.  I couldn’t fault her for that.  I could
envy
her, but not fault her.  I knew what that felt like, that terrible, soul-bruising agony of losing your other half.  I had felt it for months, and it had nearly destroyed me. 

But
refusing
to feel it had destroyed Ms. Cantrell, too.  She had stopped living when she lost her mate.  As I thought about that, I was glad I hadn’t taken that road.  The ability to truly
feel
was the only human trait I had left.  Even if what I’d felt was so painful I had wished I could die, at least I’d been able to feel it.  I couldn’t help but wonder if Ms. Cantrell still could.  And that thought made me sad.  

I was still sitting there thinking about how the choices we make change us when the door creaked open and Tyler slipped in, scanning the room until he found me.  I wanted to kick myself when my heart gave a happy little leap at the sight of him. 

“What’s up?” I asked, keeping my voice down so I wouldn’t wake Kim up, as he slid down the wall next to me.

“I’m on guard duty,” he whispered with a grin—and a shiver, seeing as I was still surrounded by the dead.  “You might not believe this, but Nate asked me to come keep an eye on you.  I get the distinct impression he doesn’t trust his creator where you’re concerned.”

“Yeah?  Well, that makes two of us,” I admitted, turning back to the window and the snow.  “You should have seen the way he looked at me, Ty.  It gave me a seriously nasty case of the heebie-jeebies.  Just between me and you?  Mikhail scares the shit out of me.  He’s up to something, I know he is.  I just don’t know what yet.”

“Well, whatever he’s planning, he won’t be putting it into action tonight,” Tyler said, putting his arm around my shoulders and pulling me closer to his warm body.  “He’d have to kill me to get to you.  If I’m not mistaken, I believe that’s why Nate sent me to watch you instead of one of the others.  He might become a jealous caveman every time I get near you, but he knows I’d never let anything happen to you.”

Because you love me,
I finished for him, laying my head on his shoulder with a sigh. 
You love me and Nathan knows it. 

We sat there for a long time, both of us watching the snow, lost in our own thoughts.  And, for the first time since the night we met, I couldn’t seem to relax.  Everything had changed.  The Tyler I’d known was gone.  In his place was a guy who was in love with me—and who I just
might
love in return.  He had gone from being my friend to something more, something romantic, and I didn’t know how to handle that.

As if he could sense the tension building inside me, Tyler leaned down to whisper, “What’s going on in that beautiful head of yours, Em?  Something’s wrong.  I can feel it.  Did I do something to upset you?”

I glanced up at him, into the golden eyes that had always been so warm and familiar to me.  I could see it there, in his gaze, that he was ready to have ‘The Talk’, the one that would end our friendship forever—and I couldn’t do it.  I just couldn’t.  I wasn’t ready to have that conversation yet.  Because I knew, once we laid all our cards on the table, I was going to lose him.

So, selfish cow that I am, I forced a smile and murmured, “Not lately.”

“Then what has you so fidgety?”  I saw the disappointment in his eyes and felt even worse than I had before.  “You’ve never been nervous with me.  What’s going on?”

“I was thinking about
Hamilton,” I lied, spitting out the first excuse I could think of.  And really, that’s what I should have been thinking about—not my love life.  “Speaking of which, I couldn’t help but notice you didn’t look very happy about your angel buddies coming to help out.”

Tyler sighed, his eyes drifting back to the snow beyond the glass next to us.  Finally, though, he admitted, “I’m not.”

“Why?” I asked, really confused. 

“Because Lark is one of them,” he said, not really telling me anything.  When I frowned up at him, he sighed again.  “He knows me very well and has for a long time.  Let’s just say I’m not really in the mood to hear ‘I told you so’.”

“I told you so?” I repeated, arching an eyebrow.  “Why would he say that?”

“
Because of you.”

Oh, hell.  We were back to that.  And, for some reason, I didn’t think Tyler was going to let me brush him off again.  So when Blake came crashing through the door like a rhino on crack, I could have kissed him.

“Bad news, guys,” he said, ignoring Kim’s shriek of surprise as his noisy arrival jarred her awake.  “Ms. Cantrell is gone.”

“Gone?” Tyler snapped, springing to his feet.  “What the bloody hell do you mean she’s
gone
?”

“As in,
not here,” Blake snapped back, sounding tired and irritated.  “You know?  Like she
escaped
?”

“Damn,” I muttered, already headed for the door. 

I marched down the stairs and into the elevator, mumbling every expletive I knew under my breath.  I ignored the eyes that followed my foulmouthed progress down the hall of the hospital ward like they weren’t even there.  When I reached the room Ms. Cantrell had been in, it was to find Skippy and Grams interrogating the guard who’d been on duty. 

The poor guy—one of
Mikhail’s, believe it or not—had no idea what happened. He said one minute he was sitting there, trying to ignore Ms. Cantrell, and the next he was waking up with his head throbbing and she was gone.  Grams was sure he’d been hexed, but we couldn’t figure out how that had happened, either.

How had she
hexed someone with no powers?

Ms. Cantrell’s disappearing act was just the first incident of the Morning From Hell.  An hour after that
, Blake and another one of Mikhail’s guys went at it because he grabbed Kim’s ass when she was walking by.  Nathan and Mikhail broke them up before anyone died, but it was becoming very obvious that tempers were wearing thin.  Mikhail dragged his guy out, looking none too pleased, and Grams and Mrs. Val gave Blake hell for being so childish.

I thought that was a bit harsh.  If he had grabbed
my
ass, Nathan would have put the sexually-harassing little creep through the wall.  Blake had just scorched him a little. In my opinion, he’d had it coming.

And then, just when it looked like everything was about to calm down, I got in a fist fight with an archangel.

Yeah, I know.  Only me…

I totally blame Tyler.  Why?  Because
Tyler
called the fallen angels in without telling them everything—everything meaning the fact that the place was crawling with the undead who, oddly enough, they don’t like.  Because
Tyler
hadn’t told
me
that it might be best if Kim and I kept our distance because they were going to throw a fit about our little chemistry experiment—which he also hadn’t bothered to tell them about.

Like I said, it was
all Tyler’s fault
!

Okay, so it wasn’t like I
intentionally
set out to brawl with an angel.  In fact, everything was fine at first.  Everyone present, including me, took a collective breath of relief when they arrived.  I mean, if you’re going into battle you can’t get any better than having a couple of archangels fighting on your side, fallen or otherwise.

The female angel, the one who refused to fight, was a really pretty, really tiny, brunette with a sweet calming voice.  She was the only one of the three of them who didn’t seem to mind the vampires.  Her name was Erin, and she and Ainsley hit it off immediately.  By noon they were inseparable—a fact that had Zan grumbling about the lack of privacy in our current quarters.
  He was
so
preaching to the choir on that one.  I hadn’t seen Nathan alone for more than ten seconds since Mikhail had arrived.

The archangels, Ryan and Lark, were even bigger than Nathan and Mikhail.  Seriously, these guys were
huge
.  Like Tyler, they were both beautiful in their own unique way.  Ryan was golden-haired and blue-eyed with the same deeply bronzed skin as Tyler.  Lark was a soft-spoken black guy with no hair and the deepest brown eyes.  You could have fallen into them and drowned.

Kim and I were so busy with all the other drama going on that we didn’t even get to meet the two archangels until after lunch.  We probably wouldn’t have gotten to meet them then if they hadn’t been coming down the hall as we were leaving the kitchen with our seventh cup of coffee of the day.

They didn’t make the best first impression.  They were talking in low, unhappy voices as they walked down the hall and something one of them said caught my attention.  At first, I couldn’t believe it, but then, the big, golden-haired egomaniac that was doing most of the grumbling said something I just couldn’t dismiss.  I felt my temper start to rise when I realized they were muttering about being surrounded by ‘bloodsucking cockroaches’ and calling in ‘exterminators’.

“Excuse me?” I snapped, stopping and blocking the door so they couldn’t go through.  “What did you just say?”

“Oh,
goody
,” Ryan grumbled, giving me a disdainful look, “First vampires, now demon wannabes.  When I find Jordan, I’m going to wring his neck.  He said we were coming to help
people,
not parasites.  Do they breed the damned around here?”

“Depends,” I told him coldly.  “Do they breed jackasses where you come from?”

“Em, let it go,” Kim hissed next to me, trying to pull me away from the giant in front of me.  “Come on, it’s not worth it!  You’re going to lose your temper, then
everyone
is going to know about you!”

“I don’t think she
is
a darkling, Ryan.”  Lark studied me closely, looking more confused by the second.  “There is a demonic taint to her, true, but it is not predominant.”  Hell, that was news to me.  Then, I was a walking science experiment, so I really couldn’t say he was wrong, either.  “I’ve never seen anything like her, to be perfectly honest.  She has amazing power, like nothing I’ve ever encountered before.  If I didn’t know better, I would say she’s some kind of Nephilim.  And so is the other one, only her blood is much more diluted.  The power I sense in her is bandraoi through and through, only slightly enhanced by an infusion of our blood.”

Slightly
enhanced?  Oh, they had
no
idea.  I was never going to forget that door flying across the room, or the look on Kim’s face afterwards.  If that was considered only being slightly enhanced, I was probably the equivalent of a volcano with hair.

“Nice detective work, boys,” I told them, smiling at Ryan and making a point to flash my glowing eyes in his direction.  “Congratulations!  You’re both right!  Tell them what they’ve won, Kim!”

“You
are
a darkling!” Ryan growled, giving me a disgusted look. 

“And you
are
a jackass,” I growled back.  “Now, if you’ll excuse us—”

“But, you
feel
like Nephilim,” Lark interrupted me, his eyes narrowed suspiciously.

“Yeah, I’m that, too,” I told him.  “Oh, and a bandraoi.  I guess you could just think of me as supernatural soup.”

“And where did you come by our blood, little one?” Lark asked on a sigh.  Yeah, like he didn’t already know.  The resigned look on his face pretty much said he had a damn good idea, anyway.

“Transfusion,” I told him, shrugging.

“That’s what I was afraid you were going to say,” he groaned, flicking another resigned glance at his big-headed friend. 

Ryan looked like he was about to explode. He was breathing heavily and his nostrils were flaring out like an angry bull. His face was red and growing redder by the second. He sucked in a deep breath, but it didn’t seem to
help much.  His skin was turning kind of a mottled purple color and the vein in his temple looked like it was about to burst. The next time he opened his mouth, he didn’t suck in a breath, he let out the one he was already holding in a bellow of outrage.