Chapter 3

 

 

The pumping bass couldn’t ease the feeling that something really fucked up was coming. Jordan sat at the table with Mike and Gwen, drumming away on the table with his fingers.

What he wouldn’t give to have his drumsticks in hand so he could work off the nervous energy.

“Jordan,” Mike snapped.

He looked up, meeting his oldest friend’s gaze. “Yeah?”

“Where is she?”

“Leanan?” Jordan asked.

“Yeah. Who else would you be with? Well, unless you had a friend with you again.”

Jordan snorted. Yeah, he had quite a few busy nights, but Leanan was always there, right in the middle of all the fun. She was a succubus, and he was an incubus. They made a good team.

He rubbed a hand over his face and shook his head. “She went to the bathroom.” He glanced at his phone and frowned. “Shit, how long ago was that?”

“You okay?” Gwen asked.

“Just nervous. Got the heebs bad.”

“Why? You haven’t been snorting or shooting anything, have you?” Mike growled. And it was a fair question. He’d gotten himself in trouble with that mess before. Not since Leanan taught him how to cope with his physical need.

Jordan shook his head. “No. Not at all. Ever since Leanan showed me what I was and how to keep all that at bay, I’m good. Real good. This is something else. I don’t know. Same sort of fucked panic that kept building until Roxy went through all of that shit…”

His mouth fell open. “Shit, Gwen, can you go to the bathroom, check on her? She shouldn’t still be gone, and she’s been acting weird lately. Keeps looking over her shoulder and tells me not to be so damned paranoid, but she’s the one freaking out.”

“That’s not a good sign,” Gwen said, but she slid from the booth and hurried to the bathroom.

“What? You’re a precog now?” Mike asked.

“Pre what?”

“Precognitive, clairvoyant?”

Jordan shook his head. “Just get a bad feeling before some shit goes down. Like when that asswipe took you away from practice out in Edenton.”

“Well, great. You send my woman to the bathroom when shit is about to go down. Just stay here.” Mike was up, out of the booth, and hurrying through the crowd to catch Gwen.

“Shit on me,” Jordan muttered and followed. He only sent Gwen because the mage could take on anything. He wasn’t worried about a Silver Council enforcer. She was like the magical CIA, FBI, and police all rolled into one. And Mike was a druid and part of the DSF or the Diverse Special Forces, and paired with Gwen.

Leanan, however, didn’t have any combative power. All her magic came through sex and had everything to do with pleasure.

Mike held Jordan back as Gwen stepped out and shook her head.

“We’ve got a problem,” she announced.

“Is she in there?” Jordan already knew the answer.

She shook her head, her phone on the way to her ear.

A few seconds later, she said, “Come to the Taste. I need help figuring out what the hell happened here. We’re near the bathrooms.”

There was a pause, she nodded, then slid the phone back into her purse.

“What’s going on in there?” Jordan demanded.

She rubbed at her face. “There was a struggle. I don’t know what happened, other than they didn’t go willingly.”

“They?” Jordan demanded.

“They,” she confirmed.

Robert and Preston appeared beside them.

“What’s going on?” Preston asked.

Gwen nodded to the bathroom. “See what you sense in there. And a warning, it’s a mess.”

“Anyone in there?” Preston asked.

She shook her head.

Preston slipped past Gwen, into the bathroom, and Jordan pressed inside, his mouth falling open.

There was a bloody handprint on the counter, the same size as Leanan’s hand. The bathroom was trashed, a sign there had been a struggle.

“What the fuck happened?” Jordan snarled.

“Fuck.” Preston stepped back into the hall, dragging Jordan with him. “We all need to go to In Other News.”

“Why?” Jordan demanded.

Robert grabbed his arm and Preston’s. Then all of them were in some fancy office with Brent Shadows watching a redhead in a cubicle.

“Who disappeared?” Brent asked without looking up.

Preston spoke up, “A succubus named Leanan, an unknown witch, a Faery, and some kind of cat shifter. I only recognize Leanan’s essence. All I know is that there were four vampires in the bathroom. Whether or not any of the vampires were abducted, I have no clue.”

“What the hell is going on?” Jordan demanded.

Mike caught Jordan’s shoulder. “Calm down. Apparently, there’s some sort of investigation already underway.”

The redhead stepped into the office. “Then we need to get to work now.”

Brent nodded. “We have to make our own preparations if this is going to work.”

“Damn it, what happened to Leanan?” Jordan shouted.

Preston sighed. “This can’t leave the room, Jordan. We don’t want major panic out there, especially from humans.”

Jordan grabbed Preston’s shoulders, staring him dead in the eye. “Just tell me what the fuck is going on.”

Robert glanced at Preston and back. “People are being abducted by vampires.”

“What the hell?” Mike asked. “And you haven’t told the whole Enforcer team?”

“No, we haven’t,” Preston said. “For good reason. This is the type of shit that needs to stay quiet. We need to end it, then help those who were taken adjust to life after their ordeal.”

Gwen caught Mike’s face. “Something like this is only ever trusted to a few of us. The wrong mages would use it to wipe out all vampires. You know as well as I do, not all vampires are the problem. I’m sure they’re looking for the right person to infiltrate the vampires.”

“That would be me,” the redhead stated, then blew out a breath.

One corner of Preston’s mouth tipped up. “Told you, Brent.”

Her brow quirked as she directed her attention to the cocky mage. “What did I miss?”

“Brent wasn’t sure you would agree to the story,” Preston answered.

She glanced at Brent and swung her gaze back to Preston. “I’m all in. But he’s right. I need to feed from Brent before we go out there.”

Jordan put a hand up. “Thought it was bad for vampires to drink from Others, and Brent is definitely Other.”

Robert turned to Amelia. “I hadn’t considered that factor. Amelia, if this is too much, we’ll find someone else.”

Her eyes narrowed as she crossed her arms over her chest. “Nope. No one else. Let me do this. I’ll deal with the consequences. Victoria came back from full-blown addiction to Other blood. I can do the same too, if necessary.”

“There is a possible work around,” Brent said.

Amelia shook her head. “We don’t have time for that. Besides, if I’m to go undercover, I need to learn to deal with Other blood on my own.”

Robert paced away and came back. “I should have thought this through.”

Amelia got in his face. “Stop treating me like a child. I managed to come through everything I went through with Yuri Slovik and becoming a vampire. I can handle this burden so we can find the people involved and put a stop to it. Finding another suitable vampire would take too long.”

“You’re right,” Robert answered.

“I can’t tell a soul that Leanan is just gone?” Jordan pushed his fingers through his hair. He wasn’t sure what to do without her. She was the only reason he was stable. “I can’t lose her.”

Mike gripped Jordan’s shoulder. “We’ll fix this. In the meantime, we’ll find you someone.”

“Just find her. I can’t lose her,” he insisted.

“We will,” Amelia assured. “What does she look like?”

“I know her,” Brent said.

“Yeah, but you’re not supposed to know anyone if we go in there, right? You want to be unassuming. Which means I need to know who this woman is.”

Jordan scrambled to pull his phone out and brought up a picture of Leanan on the couch with his guitar. “This is her.”

She met Jordan’s eyes. “I recognize her.”

“You do?”

She smiled. “She’s always at your shows.”

His brow pinched. “I’m sorry. I don’t recognize you.”

She lifted a shoulder. “Haven’t been going long. Only been twenty-one about six months.”

“How will you get her out?” he asked.

She held his gaze and calm flowed through him. It didn’t make sense with what she said. “I’m not sure what we’re walking in on yet. I’ll find a way.”

“Thank you,” he answered, as if that was the only possible solution, though something in his brain said it was all wrong.

Brent caught Preston’s arm. “Whatever you learn, send to me. Please. First, Amelia and I need to take this next step. Alone.”

Robert touched Jordan’s shoulder. “I’ll take you to my office. We’ll take care of this, and I’m going to let you listen to what will happen, hoping I don’t have to wipe your memory later.”

Jordan nodded. He would keep quiet if it meant he might be able to help.