To Love and Serve (17 page)

Chapter Twenty-nine

Michaela awoke slowly. She knew she was alive from the sharp, throbbing pain in her side. She was alone in the darkness, in a room with rough walls that glistened with wetness. It was as if the stones were weeping. Maybe they were tears for Benjamin and her.

She had no doubt Bartholomew was holding his brother captive.

She had no doubt he intended to hurt him. Kill him.

She had to help, somehow. She tried to rise, but the pain was unbearable and threatened to pull her back under. Gulping in short, deep breaths, all that she could manage without screaming, she chastised herself.

She’d been such a fool, falling for the fake injury. The slayer power she’d sensed had been less than full force, but not because of injury. It was because Bartholomew had not reached complete slayer potential.

The Slayer Council had warned her during her training that she had too much compassion. That it made her weak. They had impressed upon her to fight her kindness if she really wanted to embrace all that being a slayer meant. But she’d rebelled at being as cold-hearted as they were. Damn it, they’d been right.

Fuck
. She rolled onto her back again. When Bartholomew had dumped her on the floor, the hard landing had helped to partially drive out the stake. She glanced down at her side where the bloodied, gleaming wood stuck out of her ribs. A stinging numbness spread outward through her flesh from the silver nitrate saturating the stake.

With her hybrid physiology, the poison was not as lethal as it would have been for a vampire, but it seriously inhibited her healing. If she yanked out the stake in one pull, she’d likely bleed to death. But if she didn’t get it out, the poison would do more and more damage to her system, with the same result.

Maybe if she extricated it a little at a time, she could heal in slow spurts along the path of the stake. Then extract it fully after a few pulls, and find a way out of wherever it was Bartholomew had tossed her.

Find Benjamin. Help Benjamin.

Gripping the stake with one hand, she pulled.

Her tortured scream echoed against the stone walls.

The sound chased her down into the darkness.

…

“Single stab wound to the heart. A quick kill. In and out, and you’re done, normally,” Diana said as she stared at the lifeless body of the female Council member.

Evangeline stood at the foot of the bed, waves of anger radiating from her body, emotion chipping away at her control over her slayer power. Her gaze darted to where Jesus crouched over bloodstains on the polished wooden floor, and then returned to lock on Diana. “Why do you say ‘normally’?”

Diana pointed to the almost surgically neat knife wound just beneath Aja’s sternum. “He drove up in one swift move, but kept the knife there until the very last beat of her heart. Maybe for minutes after. That’s why there’s only a small amount of blood. The heart had stopped beating when the knife was extracted.”

“There’s more blood here, and splatter against the wall.” Jesus rose, and walked to examine the pattern on the otherwise meticulous white of the modern-looking bedroom.

Diego, who had joined them when they called with their report, strode to the wall and took a sniff. “It’s not Aja’s.”

Diana nodded. “It can’t be. This knife wound would not produce that kind of spatter pattern. Plus it’s too high for a woman of this height, or Michaela’s height, for that matter.”

“Do you think that’s Benjamin’s blood?” Evangeline asked. “He told me he’d already spoken to Aja. Do you think she’s the one he came back to see?” She gave Diana a little shove to move her away, then bent to modestly cover Aja with the robe.

“If Benjamin is about six foot two, it’s a strong possibility,” Jesus answered.

“There’s more blood here.” Ryder pointed to a series of droplets about a foot and a half from the wall and directly in front of a large mirrored panel.

Diana scanned the floor from the more obvious blotch of blood Jesus had identified earlier to the scattered droplets leading to where Ryder stood. Facing Jesus, she said, “He was standing not far from where you are. Then he fell there.” She motioned to the larger patch of blood on the floor.

Jesus nodded and marked the likely scenario. “He came in through the door and saw Aja. He started walking over to her, and something surprised him.”

Diana continued, studying the wall, “He turned, and was struck across the head with something heavy and vicious. It must have cut him severely to cause that kind of spatter.”

She examined the stains on the floor. “He landed here, but he was moved. The blood pattern over here is smudged. These other droplets would indicate that Bartholomew picked him up and carried him toward that mirror.”

“What about these?” Ryder asked. She walked to where he stood, careful to not disturb any of the blood evidence on the floor. “He stopped here for something. There are more drops on the ground because Benjamin was still bleeding.”

She leaned forward, scanning the edges of the mirror. It was framed with ornately carved wood, making it hard to pick up on any hand or fingerprints. Pulling her jacket sleeve down so she wouldn’t leave trace behind, she pushed against one edge of the mirror. It gave just a little, and the panel shifted away from the wall.

“Damn.” Shooting an accusatory look at Evangeline, she said, “It would have saved us some time if you’d told us about this.”

The other woman lifted a negligent shoulder. “We all have secret escape routes in case of attack. We don’t share where they are, to protect their secrecy.”

Using a sleeve-covered hand, Diana pulled open the mirrored door to reveal a short hallway leading to what she assumed was a hidden stairway. The floor and stairs were made of cement and the blood trail was more visible there, as was a partial boot print.

Jesus had come up behind her and looked over her shoulder. “Michaela showed me some crime scene photos from NYPD. That boot print looks familiar.”

Ryder peeked into the hallway and nodded. “It’s a big size, just like in the photos. That’s about all I can tell.”

“This is the case Daly is working?” Diana asked, starting to put together all the various pieces. All the calls made in the last couple of days.

Diego considered her for a moment, then said, “We believe Bartholomew slashed and staked two vampires, then murdered a homeless man in one of the Central Park tunnels. Daly is working the human case.”

“We’ll have to call him in on this,” Jesus said.

“No, you won’t,” Evangeline said firmly. “Whatever she’s done, Aja was a slayer, and we take care of our own.”

Diana was almost afraid to ask what that meant, but decided it wasn’t the time to argue. Each second they delayed could cost someone their life. And her boss his happiness, if anything happened to Michaela.

“Care to tell where this tunnel leads?” she asked Evangeline.

Another careless shrug came from the woman. “To an exit far from this building. A hard-to-find exit, to avoid discovery.”

“Down we go, then.” Diana led the way for the group, Ryder and Jesus just behind her. Evangeline and Diego hung to the rear, almost shoulder to shoulder, neither one trusting the other enough to be last and expose their back.

Most people thought that walking up fifteen stories was hard, but going down was no walk in the park, either. By the time she was halfway down the hidden staircase, Diana’s legs were trembling from the exertion and sweat trickled down her back beneath her jacket. The chill in her gut was spreading outward, and as she rounded one landing, a spurt of nausea dizzied her. She fought it back and kept up the pace, anxious to hit the secret exit and hopefully determine which way Bartholomew had gone with Benjamin. She had no doubt they’d find Michaela there as well.

By the time they hit the ground floor, her heart chugged in her chest like the little engine that couldn’t. They followed the blood droplets to the boiler room door. It was open. Inside, the droplets were farther apart, almost as if Bartholomew had been running, carrying Benjamin.

Had he feared discovery? Or had he been in a rush to get back for his other victim? In the far wall there was another door, this one secured. Jesus pulled out his lock picks and sprang it. Diana looked at the three civilians as she drew her weapon. “You need to hang back.”

Ryder slashed his hand through the air. “No way. You are not going in there alone.”

“She’s not. She’s going in with me,” Jesus said, and pinned Ryder with a warning look to keep out of their way. Diana could tell Ryder hated all that her ADIC’s stare managed to communicate, but thankfully, he stifled his protectiveness and nodded. “Fine.”

Jesus grabbed hold of the doorknob. “We’ll go in on three.”

He counted down, and like a well-choreographed ballet, she and Jesus plowed forward, clearing the doorway, guns drawn and ready for battle.

At their echoes of “All clear,” they moved into the space. It was filled with machinery of all kinds, some of it still in use despite the rust and leaks of oil and steam. The room was narrow and long, the farthest end in deep shadow.

That murky area was the only way they could go. Diana and Jesus snapped on their flashlights, found the trail of blood again, and followed it to the far end of the room. There they found a hole in the wall made by removing several large stones that at one time had been part of the foundation of an older section of the building. Diana lit the area beyond the hole with her flashlight and Jesus ducked his head to peer into the space.

“It’s some kind of valve chamber. Maybe one for the city water system. I’ve always heard there’s a big one right under Central Park.”

“Which is probably where we are, based on how far we’ve gone from the main building,” Ryder said. “If I had to guess, we’ve gone at least two blocks east, putting us past the park boundary.”

Diana nodded. “This whole area is loaded with tunnels, and natural streams and springs. That chamber could open to any number of places. God knows where.”

Ryder smiled grimly. “I guess there’s only one way to find out.”

…

As usual, his brother was one big party pooper.

With his knife, Bartholomew scored a line across Benjamin’s midsection, annoyed when only the barest twitch of muscle registered beneath his blade.

“Come on, Ben. You’re going to have to do better than that. A little scream like your friend Michaela. I’d stop cutting for a while if you did that.”

His brother’s muscles finally heaved as he sucked in a breath. “Fuck you.”

“I’m not the one who’s fucked, Ben.” To prove his point, he increased the pressure on the blade and it bit deeper into Ben’s flesh, crisscrossed the other slashes he’d already scored onto skin and muscle.

Ben moaned then, but pulled in his breath and held it, probably fighting to remain silent, but failed as one word exploded from his mouth.

“Why?”

Bartholomew had thought this torture would give him satisfaction, but he’d been at it for over an hour with little to show. Not the screams he’d wanted. No pleading and begging. No requests for forgiveness for the wrongdoing Ben had done.

Just the one simple question.

“I loved you, Ben. You were my hero, and when I needed you the most you turned your back on me. You let them sentence me to death.”

“I never wanted you to join the slayers. It wasn’t right for you.”

“I needed to avenge our parents. Our sisters. Have you forgotten their screams? The smell of their blood and their bodies rotting above us?” He pounded the knife handle against his brother’s chest.

“I r–remember…
Bart. I…
c–can’t ever f–forget.”

“You should have stood up for me, Ben. You were my brother!”

Fuck this. He had other things to do. The vampires were sure to be at The Lair again tonight, and he had to pick one out and continue his mission. After that, he could come back and exact more punishment on his brother and Michaela. If they were still alive.

The stake had done its work in immobilizing the little bitch. And the silver nitrate…
It would keep on hurting and hurting unless she got the stake out. Of course, she might bleed to death first, but what the hell. Work before pleasure.

He placed his knife by his brother’s wrist, just beneath the rope that lashed him to the wall. Benjamin seemed relieved until Bartholomew sliced through skin and muscle to sever the blood vessels beneath. He repeated the same process on the other wrist, and for a moment considered whether a quick jab through the brachial artery would be better.

Then he decided against it. “This is how they would have killed me, Ben. They would have let me bleed out slowly. How does it feel, brother? Will you beg for life soon? Beg for me to change my mind?”

Only Ben said nothing, apparently resigned to his fate.
Weakling
.

Bartholomew cut through the ropes and Ben fell to the ground, his body drained of strength. His blood spilling from his ravaged wrists. The smell of blood was strong in Bartholomew’s nostrils, but he knew someone who would enjoy it even more.

He grabbed hold of Benjamin’s legs and dragged him into the adjacent room where he’d left Michaela.

As he entered the darkness, the glint of neon from the corner warned that not only was she awake, but so was her demon. The pain from her injury and her growing weakness was eroding her ability to keep her vampire needs in check.

Delicious
. He hauled Benjamin right next to Michaela.

She growled and shoved at his brother’s body, but barely budged it. Benjamin was a big man and she was too weak to do much of anything.

“Please, Bartholomew. Don’t do this,” she pleaded.

He crouched beside them, where Benjamin’s blood pulsed slowly from the wounds in his wrists and trailed toward Michaela.

“‘Please’? You’re begging? For yourself or for him?”

She tried to scramble away. Away from the growing pool of blood. Away from the temptation. The hints of neon in her gaze grew brighter, and a glint of fang gleamed in the dim light as the vampire emerged. Bartholomew grabbed hold of the stake in her side and pushed down hard, driving her back onto the floor. She grunted in agony, and growled, “You’ll regret this.”