The Darkness Within

T
HE
D
ARKNESS
W
ITHIN

A
N
OVELLA

J
AIME
R
USH

Contents

Chapter One

“T
HE MALE VICTIM,
according to witnesses, was torn apart and gutted like an animal.”

That line from the newscast drew Tucker Cane to the television, where the reporter shoved the microphone at a police officer and asked for more details.

“It looks like a wild animal attack, maybe wolf or panther. We can’t comment until we know more. For now, we advise residents of the Las Vegas suburbs not to wander into the desert areas after dark and to be on alert.”

From what Tucker could see in the churning red and blue colors and spotlights, the area looked like a typical suburban neighborhood.

A woman with tangled hair and wild eyes pushed her way in front of the camera. “It wasn’t no wild animal! I saw it. The man that did this turned into smoke, and then a werewolf! I told the police, but they won’t listen. The monsters are going to get us all!”

An officer took the woman by the arms and led her away as she struggled and continued to rant.

Every hair on the back of Tucker’s neck stood on end. He glanced to the kitchen and then the stairs going up. He already knew none of the Desert Rats—the D’Rats—were home yet. Their cars had been absent from their various places in the driveway when he’d come home fifteen minutes earlier. He’d turned on the news and gone into the kitchen to grab a beer.

In the seven years since he’d found those who were like him, gathered them and cobbled together their rag-tag family, Tucker was as close to a parental unit as they’d ever had. Not that he tried to be. What did he know about taking care of someone? He was only twenty-four, and he’d hardly had a parental role model himself. He did, however, know firsthand how shocking it was to discover how different you were, and the reason you had the skills you did.

He rewound the newscast to the part he’d missed while he’d been in the kitchen, and watched from the beginning. The attack had occurred three hours earlier, the victim identified only as a male in his twenties. Apparently this had been news for a while now. They had already spoken with a biologist called to the scene, trying to determine what kind of animal would commit this act and how the fine citizens of Las Vegas could avoid being next.

Typical hype, but the attack didn’t sound typical.

The biologist squinted in the light. “We haven’t seen an animal attack like this since a local man who was mauled twenty-three years ago, also in a residential area.”

“What kind of animal was responsible for that attack?”

“We couldn’t make a determination due to lack of evidence. We found no fur or distinguishable prints in the sand outside the house. The only thing we found, at both scenes, were bloody prints that
appear
to be paw prints. In this investigation, it’s still too early to rule out anything.”

The hairs on Tucker’s arms now joined the rest at attention. The man who was mauled back then was Del’s father. Supposedly Tucker’s father had killed him in a fit of jealousy.

Del. Damn, the thought of her cut into his chest even now. He finished half his beer in one long pull, pacing the living room. It hit Tuck then: the victim was a male in his twenties. He started calling the D’Rats . One was on his way home; the other, on a date. Tuck told them to get their asses home, now.

The door banged open, and Darius wheeled inside. He’d been with them only three years, the newest member of the family. Tucker still didn’t feel as though he knew him. The dude had been paralyzed in a car accident right before Tucker had found him. He wore his hair in a wavy, poufed style that reminded Tucker of a fifties ’do.

Darius spun his fancy new chair around and kicked the door closed. He grunted, obviously the only greeting he was going to give Tucker as he headed to his room.

“Been running?” Tucker let those words hang, taking in the sheen of sweat on Darius’s face, the damp hair at his neck.

Darius paused at the beginning of the hallway. “Yeah. Moon’s not up until three.”

Dark enough to camouflage him.

Tucker waved him over. “Come here. You need to see this.”

He played the newscast and watched Darius’s expression darken when the woman broke in with her hysterical account. Tucker paused at the end of the segment.

“We knew there might be others out there like us. The men responsible for what we are—our biological
fathers
—liked to visit prostitutes. Stands to reason our mothers weren’t the only ones who got pregnant.”

“I think it was a wild animal, and that that crazy broad reads too many vampire and werewolf novels . . . with her heroin.”

Tucker shook his head. “She said the guy turned to smoke first. That’s not something any werewolf or vampire I’ve ever heard about does.”

Darius wheeled down the hall to his room and shut the door with his usual kick. It always sounded like an angry slam.

Tucker had heard that sound enough as a child.

He called the one female in their group and asked her to come over. Time for a meeting. He paced, hoping the others would come home soon. He supposed this was how parents might feel—worrying about their kids—as the tightness coiled around his chest. But it wasn’t only their safety that had him knotted up. What they harbored inside could render any of them mad, vicious . . . uncontrollable. He knew it only as Darkness. Either there was another person out there with it . . . or one of the D’Rats had gone mad. That was the possibility he feared most.

E
LGIN WATCHED THE
newscast in his boss’s office, his mouth growing tighter with each revelation.

Torus looked just as grim. “You see why I called you in. Sounds like Darkness.”

Elgin nodded. “It wasn’t me or the others. We were playing Dead Man’s Poker when it happened.”

“My son was here last night. So likely it wasn’t one of ours, which means we have a larger problem. How long has it been since you and the others were doing the other kind of poking?”

Elgin’s shoulders grew rigid but he answered the question in a neutral voice. “Twenty-five years or so. You’re thinking it’s one of our offspring?”

“I would hate to think you had offspring. Is that possible? I want you to think back to when you went into Vegas and availed yourself of the pleasures there. I know you well remember the consequences of your actions. But there may be bigger consequences, ones that could expose us.” He walked in front of Elgin, assessing him with sharp, gray eyes. “When you had sex with those women, did you use protection?”

“I put on a condom,” Elgin said, his chin lifted, eyes staring just past Torus.

“Did you keep it on?”

Elgin mouth tightened. “No. I had a way of slipping it off during the act. Otherwise it felt artificial, like getting yourself off while wearing a glove. We can’t contract the humans’ diseases, so it seemed safe enough.”

“Did you think about pregnancy?”

“Those women wouldn’t lose their livelihood by having a baby.”

Torus slapped Elgin across the face. Elgin jerked from the impact but kept his expression passive, his posture respectful. He could Become, take out the man right there. Torus didn’t hold Darkness, but he had powers of his own. A mutiny would have further consequences.

“Taking the chance was foolish. We know Darkness can be passed on to offspring. Did the other two do the same?”

After a moment, Elgin nodded.

“Could you find those women again?”

“They’re probably no longer in the business.”

“If you sired a child who inherited Darkness, he or she would have no idea what it is that lurks inside them. One false move, one deception, and they become a beast. Perhaps in front of others, as was the case tonight. It presents a huge problem, one that started with you . . . and must end with you.”

Elgin swallowed hard. “We’ll track down the women. If there are any children, there won’t be many.”

“That should make your job easier. Get Bengle and go now. I’ll free up the other one from his duties and send him out. You must use your senses. Scour the city for anyone in their early twenties with our vibration.”

“What do we do when we find them?” Elgin asked.

“You each have skills for taking out someone quickly and quietly. They will have no idea what you are, so you have surprise on your side. Make it look like an ordinary street crime. If they were raised in that environment, they won’t be far from it.” Torus’s eyes narrowed. “Your former wife is dead, correct? You assured me of that when you went berserk and killed her lover.”

Torus’s recrimination was clear in his voice. He’d almost killed Elgin for that, but he’d suffered greatly for breaking the rule—and losing control.

Elgin nodded. “I took care of her body so it would not be found.”

“You said that, yes. Don’t let us find her alive, Elgin. It will be over for you.”

Chapter Two

D
EL HANDED THE
dark-haired boy in the chair across from her a stuffed bear. “Tucker, I want you to pretend that whatever has happened to you has also happened to this bear. What would you say to him? What would you do to comfort him?”

The boy frowned. “My name’s Taylor.”

Del blinked. “Of course, it is.”

“You called me Tucker.”

She flopped back in her chair, mentally replaying what she’d said. Then she covered her face in shame. “I did, didn’t I? I’m so sorry, Taylor.” She pulled her hand away and met his guarded gaze. “It’s just that you remind me of a boy I once cared very much about, and his name was—is—Tucker.” Could she have felt any smaller? Well, yeah. “Can you forgive me, sweetheart?”

The endearment had slipped out. She hadn’t gotten to the endearment phase with Taylor yet. She was really blowing it with this kid. A kid who looked like another lost boy with the ability to tug at her heart.

The boy shifted his blue eyes to the bear, and then slowly, heartbreakingly, he started pounding on the bear’s face. This was the hard part, having to stuff her outrage and grief so the children wouldn’t see it.

“Who does that to you?” she asked in a carefully modulated voice.

He told her, haltingly, and she took notes while keeping her fingers from tightening into fists.

After his foster mother came to take him, Del took a deep breath and held the bear to her chest. Everything the boy had told her flashed into her mind in pounding blasts of images and feelings. She gasped at what he hadn’t told her, the parts too dark to share with a stranger who couldn’t even get his name right.

She stumbled to her desk and typed in the notes she couldn’t share because she could tell no one how she’d come by them. Her skills helped her, though, to draw the truth from the children she saw at the Family Service Center. They could dump out all of that ugliness, and she could protect them. She knew what it was like to hold in secrets, though she’d never endured what these children had.

Tears slid down her cheeks as she translated what she’d seen, what that poor boy had suffered.
Pull it back. You can’t fall in the pit.

“Del.”

She jerked at the sound of her mother’s voice. “Mom. What are you doing here?” When she took in her mother’s pale face, she jumped to her feet and met her as she staggered into the small office. “What’s wrong?”

“Can you get to the internet from your computer?” Carrie asked, closing the door.

Del’s stomach dropped. “What is it? Did something happen?”

Carrie leaned against the desk. “Go to Thirteen Action News’s web site. There’s a story.”

Del brought a chair around and guided her mom into it, then pulled up the web site. Under the
TOP STORIES
banner was a frozen newscast, titled,
Man mauled in mysterious animal attack.
With her throat dry, Del clicked on the arrow to play the footage.

The reporter stood in front of a house with yellow tape strung out around the perimeter. “This morning we’re standing in front of a crime scene unlike most others. The victim, twenty-nine-year-old Fred Callahan, was found last night, mauled by what appears to be a wild animal. What makes it unusual? Investigators have found no evidence of an animal. One eyewitness told police a harrowing story.” They played a clip from the night before of a woman screaming about werewolves. “That woman, whose name has not been released, is the only witness. The police are reluctant to connect this death with the mysterious mauling death of Tony Stevens twenty-three years ago, but an unidentified source confirms the details of both cases are identical.”

Whimpering sounds came from Carrie’s throat. Del reached for her hand. Tony Stevens. Del’s father, who had died before she was born.

Del rubbed her mom’s back. Fortunately, she couldn’t pick up emotions or energy from people. She had, of course, felt the leftover energy from her mother’s grief and guilt over the years, and wished she could erase it somehow.

Carrie wiped her eyes. “One of them murdered that man, just like Elgin murdered Tony.”

One of
them.
The people she’d come here with, who had settled in northern Vegas. Carrie had come as a wife, not involved with the energy resources project they were here for.

“You think it was Elgin?”

Carrie started to nod but paused. “Elgin broke the rules, risked exposing the group when he attacked Tony. For all I know, he was executed for it. Torus, the group’s leader, kept a tight rein on us. We even lived in one neighborhood. I doubt that’s changed. So maybe it wasn’t one of the men who held Darkness. But it can be passed on to any children they might sire.” She looked at Del. “Like the boy my former husband sired. He has Elgin’s Darkness, Del. He could have—”

“No, it wasn’t Tucker.”

“You don’t know that.”

Del stood, releasing her mother’s hand. “I do know. Tucker lived with us for four years, Mom. I
knew
him. Beneath that street-smart exterior he had a good heart. Maybe if you hadn’t sent him away—”

“Maybe if
you
hadn’t given in to your damned hormones.” Carrie stood too, her voice sharpening, face contorting in anger. “I took that kid in off the streets as soon as I recognized he was Elgin’s offspring, gave him a home. You were the one who made me send him away.” She jabbed a finger at Del. “I told you not to get romantic with him. Then I walk in and find the two of you . . .” She shook her head, making her blond, fine hair fly out to the side. “So don’t you dare put that guilt trip on me. I’ve got enough to carry.”

Del put her hand to her chest to ease the pain. It had been more than hormones. So much more.

“I’m going to work.” Carrie stood, and her prickly energy wilted. She brushed a stray hair from Del’s face. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I loved Tucker, too, but I couldn’t take the chance of him going crazy and hurting you. I don’t know what Darkness is, other than something like black magic. What I do know is that it makes a man violently possessive of what he considers his.” She paused to drive that point home. “Someday when you’re in a relationship with a nice, normal man, you’ll see I did what was for the best.”

Del backed away from her touch. “How can I be with a nice, normal guy, Mom? I’m not normal.”

Carrie let out a soft sigh. “When you find the right guy, he’ll accept you as you are. It will happen, if you’ll just start dating. Stop comparing every guy who’s interested in you to Tucker.”

Del’s eyes widened. “I don’t—”

“Yes, you do. The first boy you fell for was gorgeous, haunted, and had a dangerous edge. I know he kept doing the street cons and that he was pulling you in, too. We’ll talk later.”

Del didn’t confirm or deny either allegation. While she had tried to reform Tucker’s penchant for making money by gambling, he
had
managed to draw her in, seducing her with the excitement and risk. But that she compared the men she met to him . . . ridiculous.

She watched the news video again after her mother left. That one of them was out there, killing, made her very uneasy.