Area of Influence (Immortal Ops Book 8) Page 17

  Always stay on the move, Emi.

  Her uncle’s words echoed in her head.

  He stared down at her with eyes filled with moisture. A lone tear slid down his cheek. “Emi, get up and get away from here. Go! I can’t keep him pinned for much longer.”

  “Uncle Yanko?” she asked once more, her heart racing. “What? How? Why?”

  He sighed. “Emi, there isn’t time for me to explain it all. You have to run! Get as far from here as you can. Chilton has found you.”

  Chilton?

  Before she could question her uncle more on everything, he turned into black mist and went down through the floor in the direction of the never-used basement.

  Emi scrambled to her hands and knees, hitting the floor, tears coming fast. “Uncle Yanko!”

  He didn’t come back.

  As her mind began to clear, she turned and smelled smoke. The fireball that had come from Taylor’s room had started a fire on the hallway wall. “Hector!”

  She pushed to her feet and entered the room to find Hector there, throwing fire at two men who weren’t creatures like Frank had been. They were vampires. And they certainly didn’t look friendly. They looked like they wanted to make Hector their midnight snack.

  The vampires snarled and leaped high in the air, just missing getting hit with Hector’s fire.

  “You’re a hard one to find,” said a man with a deep voice from behind her.

  Turning, she found a man with gray eyes and pale skin that pulled at his face, making him look sickly. Death poured off him in a way that nearly made her gag, but he wasn’t like Frank and the other creatures. He was something else.

  In some ways, he was like Auberi and Blaise—the vampires she’d met—but that didn’t feel right either. They didn’t feel like death, and they didn’t feel sinister. This guy did.

  He’s pure evil.

  That was the difference, she realized. Auberi and Blaise didn’t radiate death, but they didn’t exactly feel like rays of life, either. This man’s aura was dark, threatening, and it made her want to shiver.

  He reached for her, and she dodged his grasp, making the edges of his mouth draw up into a sneer. When he reached for her again, it was with a speed that stunned her. He grabbed her by the throat, his clawed fingers digging into her skin. The bite of pain made her eyes water, but she didn’t cry.

  She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

  “Emi!” yelled Hector, sounding as if he’d been slammed into the wall in Taylor’s room.

  Emi glared at the man holding her by the neck, refusing to show him fear. He was easy enough to read, letting her know he got off on hurting and scaring others. She wouldn’t feed into his sick hunger.

  He dragged her across the floor, closer to his thin frame. Lowering his head, he put his face close to hers and spoke, his breath smelling of old blood. “I don’t know what the new master sees in you, but he wants you, so you’re coming with me.”

  She batted at his arm, to no avail. “No,” she managed.

  He tightened his grip on her throat. “There could be an accident. You could be killed in the commotion.”

  Emi did the first thing she could think to do—she kneed the man in the balls.

  He instantly released his hold on her throat and bent forward.

  Happy to see kneeing was universally painful to men of all species, she spent a second rejoicing and then pushed him as hard as she could before letting her power build. The minute he looked up at her, baring hideous fangs and a contorted, demon-like face, she let her power go.

  It slammed into him, knocking the vampire back from her and sending him hurtling down the hallway toward the open front door.

  Emi rubbed her raw throat and blinked in surprise as a familiar face appeared behind the sinister vampire. Auberi grabbed hold of the man and yanked him off the floor, snarling as he did. The two vampires grabbed one another and took turns thrusting each other into the walls, making the house shake.

  Someone grabbed her around the waist, and she reacted on instinct, kicking and elbowing. There was a loud groan, and then someone tapped her back gently.

  “I…come…in…peace.”

  She spun around to find Blaise there, holding his groin. She gasped and reached for him.

  He jerked back and held up a hand. “I surrender!”

  “I’m sorry. I thought you were another vampire,” she said before thinking better of it.

  “I am another vampire,” he said, still cupping himself, looking pained. “And I’m also a vampire who’s going to need to have surgery from blunt testicular trauma.”

  “Yeah, well, you may be a smart-ass, but you’re not evil like the other ones here.” She touched his arm. “Sorry I elbowed you in your private parts.”

  He stilled. “Willing to kiss it and make it better?”

  “I will elbow you again,” she warned, his gaze sliding down.

  He grinned and then stared past her as a huge cloud of dust seemed to suddenly coat the hall. He groaned. “Sure, Auberi, you had to kill a DustBuster one. I fucking hate those kinds of vamps. Better than the goo-guys, but messy as hell.”

  Goo-guys?

  She wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

  Emi stared around, wondering where the gray-eyed vampire went. It took her a second to realize she was breathing him in as dust particles. She coughed. “Ohmygod, gross! Am I inhaling bad guy?”

  “Yep,” answered Blaise.

  “Hold him!” shouted someone in Taylor’s room.

  Emi gasped. “Hector!”

  Auberi motioned to Blaise. “Take Emi and go. I’ll handle this.”

  “My friend is in there,” said Emi sternly, refusing to budge.

  “And would yer friend be the one who just threw fire at me?” asked a Scottish man as he came through the hole in the wall. He brushed down the front of his kilt, putting out the last bit of fire. “He’s nae too happy right now with Daniel, who has him pinned to a mattress on the floor. But he was trying to ignite us all.”

  Auberi laughed. “No one would miss you. Well, no one but your mate, Searc.”

  Searc grinned. “You’d mourn me. Admit it.”

  “A little help in here, please,” called a man who sounded very British.

  “I’m nae getting near him again. He nearly burned off my family jewels,” said Searc. “This is what we get for rushing over the second Toov does nae show at sunset. We get attacked by a human flamethrower.”

  Emi ran past the man in the kilt and into Taylor’s room to find Hector being pinned by a dark-haired man dressed in designer clothing. A tall, broad-shouldered man with ink-black hair was near them, laughing and taking a picture with his phone.

  “Malik, what are you doing?” asked Auberi as he followed Emi into the room.

  “The rest of the guys back at headquarters will want to see this,” said the man with his phone out. “Could get him an honorable mention for Asshole of the Week.”

  Emi glanced around. “Where are the other two guys? The bad ones?”

  Malik stopped taking pictures long enough to point to a pile of dust to the right of the room and a burned corpse to the left. “One is extra done, Pompeii style. The other one will need a broom and dustpan to collect all of him.”

  Emi exhaled in relief and then moved closer to the mattress on the floor. Taylor had never gotten around to finding a bed frame. She bent and touched her friend’s shoulder. “Hector, please don’t kill these guys. I think they’re friends of my mate.”

  “Aye,” said Searc. “Though he doesnae remember us verra much.”

  “I think he might now,” Emi said, standing and helping Hector to his feet when the British guy got off him.

  Malik chucked the British guy’s shoulder. “Ha, Daniel, he took a lot of your energy to pin down.”

  Daniel leveled a hard gaze at Malik. “Thanks to all of your amazing assistance.”

  Malik laughed. “Hey, he was throwing fire at us. I wasn’t taking a chance on losing my eyeb
rows—again.”

  The men all laughed.

  Hector gave them all a hard look. “Emi, are you sure I can’t burn them all?”

  “I’ll think about it.” Emi stared around at them. “Where’s Lance?”

  They shared a look.

  Auberi nodded to Blaise. “Get her out of here. We’ll find Toov.”

  “I’m not going anywhere without my mate,” she said firmly.

  Malik lifted his head and sniffed the air. “I smell another vampire.”

  “No shit,” said Blaise. “There are how many of us in the room right now? Get your kitty sniffer checked. It’s not working worth a damn.”

  Malik shook his head. “Not you guys, dipshit. Another. A powerful one. There’s a dark energy to him. It’s revolting.”

  Blaise gasped. “Chilton.”

  Emi didn’t wait for the men. She took off running in the direction of the back stairs. She made it all the way up them and found Blaise hot on her heels. She was about to run down the hall in the direction of her room, where she’d last left Lance, when Blaise grabbed her and leaped high in the air.

  She cried out in surprise, and he landed, pushing her against the wall before pointing to what used to be the floor.

  It was gone, leaving only a huge hole in its place.

  And clearly, someone large had fallen through it.

  “Ohmygod, Lance!” she yelled, wiggling free from Blaise’s hold and rushing in the direction of the hole in the floor. She stopped just before it and stared down…and down…and down.

  Blaise did as well. “Holy shit. That goes all the way to the basement level.”

  “Lance!” she yelled down the hole.

  “Toov? You alive?” called Blaise, snaking his arm around Emi’s waist to keep her from falling.

  There was no response.

  Fear slammed into her, and she bent, yelling again. Blaise yanked her up and back as more of the floor gave in. Her heart went to her throat. She knew Lance was down there, and if her guess was right, so was the darkness that had been hunting her.

  Austin appeared next to her, with Fredrick and Mrs. Pumpernickel at his side. Fredrick pointed to the hole in the floor. “Your husband is down there, with the ultimate evil. Lance is alive, but you have to hurry to him, Emi.”

  Mrs. Pumpernickel fanned her face with her hand. “Oh heavens. What a mess they’ve made. But, on the bright side, my jewelry is there for you, sweet child. My no-good son did not get it. You take it all. I want you to have it.”

  “W-what?” asked Emi, not following. “Husband? Lance isn’t my husband. He didn’t claim me.”

  Blaise put his face to her neck and breathed in deep. “Uh, yeah he did. You’re mated to Amnesia-Boy.”

  “I will push you down the hole,” she cautioned.

  He grinned. “I really like you.”

  Chapter Twenty

  “Lance?”

  “Toov? You alive?”

  Thor blinked, and darkness surrounded him. Disoriented, he tried to sit up but realized he was pinned under something substantial. His brain scrambled to figure out what had happened. The last thing he remembered was putting on his jeans, unconcerned with the dried blood on them, and going in search of Emi and her buddy who had shown up. It was then he’d sensed dark power moving over the area, and he’d smelled Chilton fast approaching.

  He gasped, remembering that he’d been at the top of the stairs when a boarded-over window had suddenly burst in at him, bringing with it, Chilton. The two men had locked together and, in the next breath, the floor had given out from under them.

  That was all he could remember.

  Thor felt around, trying to figure out what was on him and why everything was so dark. As his hands moved over bricks, he groaned. Not only had he fallen through the floor, he’d apparently had bricks spill onto him as well.

  Why the fuck not?

  He shoved the mass of bricks and debris from him and made a move to rise, only to find something was sticking through his stomach. He felt around and let out an annoyed breath. A piece of wood had impaled him. Taking hold of it, he clenched his jaw and then yanked the wood free, groaning as he did.

  Sure, it hurt, but Chilton was in the home—and so was Emi. It didn’t matter what kind of damage he’d sustained, he had to protect his mate.

  Finally free from the wood, he managed to stand, only to sway and nearly fall again.

  He reached out and steadied himself with the wall—a second before the debris around him exploded up and out with such a force, the wall Thor had his hand on gave way. He tumbled with the sliding rock and twisted around just in time to catch Chilton before the vampire would have snapped his neck.

  Thor held the vampire at bay, shifting partially into hybrid form. He used the added strength to thrust Chilton from him. He then came up as if on strings, his claws out, his fangs distended. He was ready to kill the enemy.

  No games.

  No playtime.

  Chilton came up quickly as well, his long dark hair falling partially into his face. A face that seemed tanned year-round. Chilton hunched his shoulders, his own nails lengthening. “You dared to touch her?”

  Thor stepped around the rubble and walked in a circle, keeping his eyes on the enemy, ready for the attack. This confrontation had been a long time coming, and he was more than ready to kill the asshole.

  “You dared to think you could put your filthy shifter hands upon my daughter?” demanded Chilton.

  Daughter?

  The question threw Thor for a loop.

  Hesitating, he stared at the man harder, instantly noting the similarities between the man he hated and Emi. The same eyes. The same skin tone. They even had the same lip shape and hair color.

  No.

  It couldn’t be.

  Gasping, Thor shook his head. Emi said the darkness killed her parents. She never mentioned her father was the fucking darkness.

  Chilton snarled. “I will make your death painful and slow.”

  Thor put a hand up, needing answers before he killed the man. “Hold the phone here, asshole. What do you mean, your daughter? Emi can’t be yours.”

  Could she?

  Chilton was dressed as he normally was, in what could only be called a pirate shirt and a pair of black leather pants. He was pretty much what everyone thought of when they pictured a vampire—and seemed to take fashion advice from Pierre. A total dick with an obsession with leather and a penchant for fashion that was woefully outdated.

  He lifted his chin in defiance. “I can smell her scent on you. You defiled her!”

  Seven times, thought Thor, but didn’t voice as much. Besides, he’d hadn’t defiled her. He’d made love to her. To his woman—and he wouldn’t let the Dracula wannabe cheapen what he had with his mate.

  “She’s my mate, so back the fuck off the ‘defile’ remarks, dickhead,” said Thor, ready to kill the man and end his mindfuck.

  Chilton drew back slightly, disbelief in his eyes. “Your mate?”

  Thor nodded. “And if you try to hurt her, I’ll tear your head off and send it back to Gérard gift wrapped.”

  Chilton puffed out his chest, clearly posturing. “Gérard is no more. I am the master now.”

  “Gérard is dead?” asked Thor. That was news to him, and he knew damn well Pierre didn’t know, either.

  Chilton grinned, the look in his eyes nothing short of crazy. “I killed him myself. He was weak. He didn’t deserve to rule. It was simply a matter of time before Pierre seized the territory, so I beat him to it. I’m the master of these parts now. All will bow to me.”

  Yep. Totally crazy.

  The more Thor thought about it, the angrier he became. “Hold on. That means you’re who sent those hybrids after Emi and me. Dick move! If she’s supposedly your kid, why the hell would you try to kill her?”

  “They were sent to kill you and retrieve my daughter,” said Chilton.

  “Seriously, stop with the daughter thing. That can’t be.”

>   “Yet it is. Her mother was my mate. Gérard forbid me from seeing her, and even tried to kill her and my child when he learned the truth of it all. I went to stop it from happening. I was too late. I arrived just as Yanko came. And he blamed me for his sister’s death. He took Emanaia far from my reach and kept her hidden. It took me years to track them down; each time I got close, Yanko would run with her again. Finally, I saw to it he could run no more. But my daughter had learned too much from him. She ran on her own. It took me years to locate her once more.”

  Thor stared at the man. “I feel pretty comfortable in saying she’s not going to be okay with who you are to her.”

  Chilton laughed maniacally. “She will have no choice. The time has come for her to return to me. We will rule Louisiana together. As we were meant to. Father and daughter, together again. Yanko can no longer stop me. And you will not live long enough to be a problem—shifter.”

  “Father and daughter?” Emi’s voice echoed through the darkness as light burst into the area from above.

  Lance looked up to find Emi standing in the open doorway at the top of the old wooden staircase leading to the basement. Blaise and Auberi were next to her.

  Chilton grinned, his eyes widening. “Emanaia, darling.”

  Emi jerked as Chilton spoke.

  A large black mass appeared between Thor and Chilton. It took the shape of a tall man with a head of closely cut dark hair.

  Had Thor finally gone mad? Had a figure really just appeared out of thin air?

  “Uncle Yanko!” yelled Emi from above.

  Yanko? As in the dead guy?

  Oh goodie, now I’m seeing the dead too.

  Chilton snarled, staring around the room wildly. “I can sense you. Where are you, coward?”

  “I am no coward, Chilton,” said the figure as it swayed, like a breeze was blowing it lightly. “I will not allow you to harm her.”

  “Is he really my father?” asked Emi, emotions written across her face.

  Yanko glanced up at her, pain on his face.

  Chilton gazed around, looking like a feral dog. “Where are you?”

  Thor glanced from Emi to Yanko. “Why is it I’m seeing you?”