Heart of Fire Read online

  I turned out of the lot and headed down the street, driving with my left hand while my right arm rested in my lap. I had healing spells at home that would take care of the knife wound, and then I’d have to try to get some sleep.

  I sighed. I probably wouldn’t have any more luck sleeping tonight than any other night in the days since I’d woken from the coma, but I always hoped.

  The nightmares had to stop at some point, right?

  1

  ONE MONTH LATER

  “Here’s to another job well done,” I said, raising my glass in a toast.

  “Cheers,” my companion said dryly.

  I took a drink and leaned back in my chair, propping my bare feet up on the railing. The late April evening was unseasonably warm, and I was on my back porch in a tank top and shorts.

  Malcolm hovered three feet to my right. The moonlight shone through his body, making him glow. “That’s the third toast of the evening.”

  “So?” I ran my fingers through my long hair and rolled my neck, enjoying the warm, disconnected feeling of being drunk. “I’m celebrating. Another paycheck, another satisfied customer.”

  “Well, maybe not satisfied,” the ghost pointed out. “She was pretty upset.”

  I waved my hand. “I found the thing; it’s not my fault it didn’t do what she wanted. I warned her magical objects have a mind of their own. She’s lucky all she lost was her garage and a couple of trees.”

  “You could have been a little more understanding.”

  I shrugged off the rebuke and sipped my whisky. “I’m not a counselor; I’m a detective.” I gently swirled the liquor in my glass. “I don’t get paid to talk to people about their feelings.”

  Malcolm muttered something.

  “What are you grumbling about?”

  “Maybe you should talk to someone about your feelings,” he said loudly.

  I tipped my chair on its back legs. Malcolm drifted closer, looking anxious as I teetered precariously. “Why would I want to do that?” I asked.

  “Maybe then you could figure out why you haven’t slept worth a damn for a month, and why you don’t eat, and why you find at least two or three things to toast almost every single night.”

  “You need to find something new to complain about. This is all I hear from you these days. Stop fussing at me.”

  “I’m not—”

  “I’ve been working every day,” I snapped, dropping my chair back down onto all four legs with a bang. Startled, Malcolm flitted away from me. “I’ve closed three cases in the past month. I’d call that a pretty big win for Team Alice.” I took a drink and glared at him. “So what’s the problem, exactly? I’m not socializing enough? I like to celebrate when things go well?”

  “Are things going well?”

  The unexpected voice caused me to jump and drop my glass. It shattered and broken glass scattered across the porch. “Son of a bitch!” I squinted into the darkness of my backyard, but saw no one. “Where the hell are you?”

  Charles Vaughan stepped out of the shadows. In the moonlight, the vampire’s eyes shone with a silvery light. “Good evening, Alice.”

  I glared at him. “How long have you been standing out there watching me?”

  “A few minutes.” Which could mean three minutes or thirty or anything in between.

  “That was my favorite whisky glass,” I complained.

  “I will replace it. The question remains: are things going well for you?”

  “Things are fine, Charles,” I said peevishly. “Didn’t you get my message?”

  “If you are asking if Ms. Smith passed along the contents of your most recent text message, then yes. I had hoped you would return my calls or accept my invitation to visit my office.” He moved to the bottom of the porch steps and studied me. “I have not seen you in almost a month. You appear unwell.”

  “Gee, thanks.” I picked up the bottle of Scotch next to my chair, stared at it, then shrugged and took a swig. Dismay flashed in the vampire’s eyes before his expression returned to its normal impassivity.

  “What brings you out this evening?” I asked, setting the bottle in my lap.

  “I was concerned. Since you completed the wards on my storage facility, you have not visited Hawthorne’s. My calls have gone unanswered, my invitations declined, my job offers refused. As you seem unwilling to speak with me, I am forced to appear on your doorstep.”

  “I’ve been busy.” The bottle started to tip and I caught it just before it fell off my lap. “Three cases in the past month. I got my car detailed. I haven’t had one minute to myself.”

  Malcolm sighed.

  “You know what we need?” I asked the ghost. “Perimeter wards around the property, so we get some warning when unexpected visitors decide to drop in. Why don’t you work on that?”

  He drifted toward me. “Alice…”

  I took another drink from my bottle of Scotch. “Just leave me alone, would you? Please.”

  “Fine.” He vanished.

  I looked at Charles. “Drink?” I held out the bottle. It slipped from my fingers and fell.

  Charles moved so fast that he blurred. He was suddenly up the steps and at my side, the bottle in his hand.

  “Wow.” I hiccupped. “Good catch.”

  “Alice.” It sounded like a reproach.

  We stared at each other. Finally, I held out my hand. “Either drink or give it back.”

  Charles tilted his head and regarded me silently. He glanced at the label, then brought the bottle to his lips. I was willing to bet the vampire had never drunk whisky straight from the bottle in his life. Still, he somehow managed to look entirely graceful while doing so.

  I reached for the bottle and Charles reluctantly handed it back. I took a drink, wiped my mouth inelegantly with the back of my hand, and blinked up at him. “You didn’t have to come out here. I would have called you back. Eventually. Probably.”

  “What has happened to you, Alice? For nearly six weeks, since you awoke from the coma, you do not sleep. You work all day and night. You drink excessively. You have lost weight. You avoid your friends, and you speak unkindly to your ghost.”

  I didn’t need to ask how he knew all that. Somehow, Charles always seemed to know what was going on. No matter what I said or how angry I got, he maintained surveillance on my house. I didn’t even bother to complain about it this time.

  “I sleep,” I protested, and it was kind of true. “I’m just trying to be a productive, law-abiding MPI and pay my bills.”

  Charles crouched by my chair. When I started to raise the bottle, he put his hand on mine. “I would like to know what troubles you.”

  “Why do you care? What is this, an intervention? Did Malcolm put you up to this?” I tried to pull away. “Let go of me.”

  “You are sufficiently inebriated,” he informed me.

  I bristled. “Who the hell are you to come to my house and tell me I’ve had too much to drink?”

  “I am your friend.”

  “Vampires don’t have friends. They have allies, they have enemies, and they have cattle for food. Which one am I?”

  Charles stared at me. “You are not yourself.”

  “That’s funny, because I feel like myself.” I yanked my hand out of his grip and lifted the bottle to look at it. There was only about two inches of Scotch left in the bottom. I frowned. Had I opened this bottle yesterday or the day before? I couldn’t remember.

  He took the bottle from me and set it on the porch. “Give it back,” I protested.

  “Tell me what distresses you,” he said.

  “At the moment, not being able to drink in peace on my own damn porch.” I started to get up to go into the house, then remembered the broken glass and my bare feet. “Shit.” I wrapped my arms around my legs and rested my forehead on my knees.

  I sensed movement, then heard footsteps crunching in the glass. When I raised my head, I was stunned to see Charles grab an old battered broom leaning against the wall. “What
are you doing?”

  “Sweeping.”

  I glanced toward the backyard. Somewhere in the darkness, one or more of Charles’s enforcers were watching us. I wondered what they were thinking right now, seeing a two-hundred-year-old vampire in a five-thousand-dollar suit with a broom in his well-manicured hands.

  “That wasn’t really my favorite whisky glass,” I confessed as he meticulously swept broken glass into the corner of the porch. “I have three more just like it. I think I got them at Costco or something. I have two really nice glasses someone gave me as gifts, but I don’t know where they are.” I realized I was babbling and closed my mouth.

  Charles worked in silence. When he was satisfied no more glass was left, he leaned the broom up against the wall next to the little pile of debris.

  “Thanks.” I unfolded myself from my chair and stood. The porch felt like it was moving under my feet as I tottered to the railing and leaned against it. The vampire and I stared at each other.

  There was a time, not so long ago, when I’d considered Charles to be an ally and a friend, or as close to one as a vampire could ever be, but things had transpired between us that made me question everything about him and his motives. I suspected he might have deliberately caused me to be injured so he could taste my blood. He’d also tried to seduce me while I was under his influence, and I’d been avoiding him ever since.

  Emboldened by liquor, I decided to demand some answers. “Why do you have someone watching my house?”

  “Because if I’d had surveillance in place the day Peter Eppright and Ray Browning attacked you in your driveway, you would not have been kidnapped, tortured by Amelia Wharton, possessed by the Kasten, and left in a coma,” he said.

  It was a straightforward answer as far as it went, though I’d be an idiot to accept it as the whole truth.

  I frowned. “I’m not your responsibility or yours to protect. I want you to stop watching my house. I’ve asked you before and now I’m telling you: it needs to stop.”

  Charles took a step toward me. “Alice—”

  “I survived this long without you looking after me,” I said, my voice gaining strength. “If I need your help I’ll come to you, but in the meantime call off your watchdogs.”

  He tilted his head. “I will discontinue the surveillance if you will tell me what troubles you.”

  I turned away to face my backyard, my hands on the railing. Charles moved to stand at my side. We stood in silence for a few minutes.

  “You must not blame yourself for the deaths of Peter Eppright, Ray Browning, and Kathy Adams,” he said. “There was nothing more you could have done to save them.”

  My vision went blurry. I blinked and hot tears slid down my face. Charles made a noise and reached for me.

  I suddenly couldn’t stand to be touched. I stumbled back, tripped over my chair, and fell. He tried to grab me, but I twisted away from him and landed hard on my side. I cried out and rolled onto my back, cradling my left arm.

  “Alice!” Charles crouched next to me, looking horrified. “You are injured.”

  I’d just fallen down drunk in front of a two-hundred-year-old vampire, and I felt like I might be close to a breaking point. “Don’t touch me. Please, just go.”

  “Let me help—”

  “Just go!” I shouted.

  He touched my face gently. “Let me help you.”

  I looked up into his eyes and suddenly had the crazy thought that maybe he would understand. “I keep seeing them in my dreams,” I heard myself say. “I try to warn them, but no one will listen to me. I watch Amelia cut their throats and they bleed to death over and over again. I can’t do anything to stop her.” I closed my eyes. “There’s blood everywhere. I’m drowning in it.”

  Cool fingers wiped away my tears. “What could you have done, other than what you did? You attempted to warn them of Amelia Wharton’s intentions, but they chose not to listen. Their greed blinded them. They went to the construction site knowing she intended to kill Ms. Newton and you, and yet you did everything within your power to save them when they would not have done the same for you.”

  Startled, I opened my eyes.

  Charles brushed hair back from my face. His gentle voice and compassionate touch made it hard to remember how dangerous he was. “Perhaps you think you did not deserve to live, that somehow you failed, but you did not fail. You saved the lives of Deborah Mackey and Natalie Newton. Most remarkably of all, you defeated an evil that had endured for centuries, and might have killed us all if given the chance. You saved thousands, if not millions, of lives, at great personal cost.”

  After a moment’s pause, he continued. “I can only imagine the temptation the Kasten offered you, and yet you refused to become either its master or its slave. You are made of iron, Alice. You must forgive yourself for this imagined failure. More than that, you must remember not the helplessness you felt but that you were not helpless, that you were the least helpless person there.”

  I didn’t know what to say. I recognized the truth in what he said, and it felt like a weight lifted off my chest.

  Charles stroked my forehead. “I know to be helpless is your greatest nightmare.”

  “What do you know about my nightmares?” I asked, my voice rough.

  “Only what I sense. When you woke from the coma, you spoke of being tied down, unable to act, and I could feel how deep your anger goes. I have seen the scars on your back. Beneath that lovely tattoo of the phoenix, your flesh tells a story of great suffering. If you were once helpless and tormented, then these events surely rekindled those memories.”

  I stared. “When did you get a degree in psychology?”

  Charles graced me with one of his rare smiles. “In two hundred years, one comes to understand such things.” He moved to his knees, unbuttoned his suit jacket, then reached for his belt.

  My eyes widened. “Charles…” I began, struggling to rise without using my injured arm.

  He helped me sit up. “There is no need to be concerned,” he said with a hint of humor. “I assure you I have no intention of trying to seduce you on the cold concrete of your back porch.”

  My cheeks burned. “Sorry,” I muttered.

  Charles unfastened his belt and pulled his shirt out of his pants. Despite my embarrassment and his assertion that this was not a romantic overture, my breath caught. Dangerous or not, he was a very good-looking man, and he was unbuttoning his pants in front of me. After all, I was only human.

  He pulled his waistband down a few inches. “You have shared your secret with me. I offer you mine in return.”

  He lifted his shirt to bare his pale stomach. I gasped.

  A long scar ran across his lower abdomen. At first, I didn’t understand; how could a vampire be scarred? Then realization dawned: it was a wound he’d received while alive, before he’d become a vampire. He’d been eviscerated, but the wound hadn’t been immediately fatal. Somehow, he’d survived long enough for it to heal somewhat before he’d been turned.

  “I know what it is to be helpless and afraid,” he said quietly. “And what it means to bear scars.”

  Almost of their own accord, my fingers traced the scar. I might have imagined it, but he seemed to tremble at my touch.

  With Charles’s vanity, I was rather surprised he still had such a significant scar. “Why didn’t you have this healed before you were turned?”

  “I suspect for the same reasons you did not have your own scars healed. Having once suffered the trauma of the original injury, I could not bear to relive it. It is a reminder to me, as well, of a lesson I dare not forget.”

  I shivered. Before I got the phoenix tattoo, I could have had the scars sliced off my back and vampire blood poured over the wound. The skin would have healed without the scars, but having survived being flayed alive by a blood mage, I couldn’t bring myself to have it done, even though I would have been unconscious for the procedure. The mere thought used to make me physically sick. Like Charles’s scar, mine were also
reminders of lessons learned so very well.

  He lowered his shirt and my hand went back to cradling my left arm in my lap. He touched my face. “We have this in common: great darkness in our pasts, scars that we carry.”

  “Yes. We’re survivors.” Saying it out loud made the rest of the weight lift off my chest. I took a deep, full breath for what felt like the first time in ages.

  Charles smiled again. “Yes, survivors,” he agreed. He leaned toward me, his hand cupping my chin. Our eyes met. “Wounded, scarred, but never defeated,” he murmured, and kissed me.

  For a moment, the Scotch and the soft silver glow of his eyes made me forget the danger, and I lost myself in the feeling of his mouth on mine. I’d been so lonely the past month, since an argument about furniture ended with Sean Maclin walking out of my life, probably for good. It had been that long since I’d been kissed and two hundred years of practice made Charles an expert at it. I moaned softly before I could stop myself and the vampire made a noise deep in his throat that sounded almost like a purr.

  The kiss deepened and a cool hand came to rest on my thigh. The hand didn’t move, but it was there: an offer, an invitation, a request.

  And just like that, I regained my senses. His ulterior motives have ulterior motives, I reminded myself. With vampires, nothing was ever what it seemed. Was his visit tonight truly out of concern for my well-being, or another carefully orchestrated attempt to get me to let down my guard? Either way, this was precisely the reason I’d avoided him for weeks.

  I broke the kiss and leaned back. Charles must have felt the shift in my emotions. He took his hand off my leg and the silver in his eyes faded.

  I cleared my throat. “You assured me you wouldn’t try to seduce me on my porch.”

  “So I did,” he said evenly. He tucked his shirt back into his pants, buckled his belt, and buttoned his suit jacket. He rose smoothly, as if pulled up by invisible strings.