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  John shot him, too.

  The wound had landed the buttinski in the hospital, bringing to light more interesting information. The blood of the M4-wielding guy, name of Devid Nichita, had tested as not quite human. Same as some blood found in Tonĩ’s hospital room at Scripps when she’d originally disappeared.

  All the threads were starting to intertwine, weren’t they?

  Although, oddly, in the process of being treated for his own gunshot wound, John’s blood had tested as having a “not entirely human” element in it, as well. Not exactly the same inhuman as Nichita’s and the blood at Scripps, but still with an unidentifiable marker. A tight sensation pinched the back of John’s neck. Had to be a mistake.

  Nevertheless, there was something about this case and blood.

  To tangle the strands further, five months after her disappearance, Miss Bonaventure had returned to San Diego bearing the last name of Nichita.

  It was getting more and more difficult to tell where one string of the web ended and the others began.

  John heard the coffee maker burp to a stop, and took a cup off his mug tree. He grabbed the pot and started to pour, but midway through, one of his shaking fits overtook his hands. The pot clanked against the lip of the mug, sloshing hot coffee onto his fingers. “Ouch!” The mug slipped out of his hand and shattered on the kitchen floor. “Dammit!” That had been his Police Academy mug.

  Holding his hand under cold running water, he waited for the shaking to stop, then slammed off the faucet. Snatching up the small broom and dustpan from under the sink, he swept up the shards of the mug with hard jerks. He was having these fits four or five times a day now. Soon he was going to do something in front of his partner that would give away his condition…whatever his condition was, exactly.

  According to the bomb his mother had dropped on him when he was sixteen years old, John suffered from an inherited disorder called Blestem Tatălui. But when he’d looked that up on Google and in medical books, he hadn’t been able to find it.

  Don’t worry, honey, his mom had assured him when symptoms had appeared in his twenties. You can take these pills to manage your condition.

  The pills still arrived monthly by mail, no prescription needed. Detective though he was, he chose to ignore that oddity. Whatever kept him out of a doctor’s office was worth a little feigned ignorance. He’d been gulping the little green babies, called another foreign-sounding name, Suprimarea Patrimoniu, for twelve years now with only minimal problems. It was only in the last couple of years he’d started feeling like absolute crap. More and more each month.

  Something was obviously wrong. But since doctors had killed his dad, he was steering clear of letting that be another inherited condition. At some point he should probably talk to his mom, but he got the sense she didn’t know anything more than she’d already told him. The day she’d filled him in on his condition, it was as if she’d been reading off a script, using someone else’s words. John didn’t see any point in worrying her.

  Dumping the broken remnants of his mug into the trash, he put away the dustpan and broom just as someone knocked. He crossed his living room, frowning at his watch. It was midnight. Squinting through the peephole, he saw—Ria? He opened the door. “Hey.”

  It’d been a couple of years since Ria Mendoza had darkened his doorstep, so to speak. These days he saw her only through work. She was a prosecutor and he was a detective, so their paths crossed at the courthouse with the shared mission of trying to put away bad guys. Although even those encounters had become few and far between now that John worked exclusively night shifts.

  “Hi, John,” Ria said, her voice that kind of hoarse women got after they’d been crying. “I hope it’s not too late to come by.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” He stepped back. “Come on in.”

  Petite, with dainty features and soulful brown eyes, Ria didn’t look at all like the Amazon warrior she actually was in the courtroom. Walking inside, she hesitated beside his couch, blinking for a moment, probably letting her vision adjust.

  He kept his apartment dim these days. Maybe a sign of oncoming depression?

  “I’m sorry, I…” Ria faltered. “I don’t mean to bother you, John, but I’m really worried about my sister and I heard your unit was given her case.” She glanced over his shoulder at the photos on his kitchen table. “Have you…made any progress, yet?”

  “No, not much, sorry. But it’s only the first day.” He headed into his kitchen. “You want some coffee?”

  “Oh.” Ria followed. “No, thanks.”

  Maybe not him, either. “No news from your end? No ransom demand?” He’d planned to question her tomorrow, but…she was here now about her sister, and the first twenty-four hours of a missing person case were the most crucial, so why not?

  “No.” Ria’s eyes shifted down and to the left.

  He nodded noncommittally and blanked his expression in reaction to her tell. Now why would Ria lie to him?

  “Do you have any wine?” she asked.

  “I think so.” He went to his refrigerator and pulled out the bottle he found there. “White okay?” He didn’t drink it himself, but his partner, Pablo, liked it.

  “That’s fine.”

  “Can you think of anyone who might want to have leverage over you?” he asked her as he found a goblet in his cupboard. “Are you working on a case like that?”

  “No.” Her tone was firm and straightforward: the truth.

  He poured. “So you have no idea why anyone would want to take your sister?”

  “No. None.” Her eyes shifted again. Back to lying.

  Weird and weirder. It made absolutely no sense for her to hide facts from him. Without all the information, his ability to solve this case would be impaired. Unless… “Ria, are you being threatened? Because it feels like…no offense…but I get the sense you’re not telling me the entire truth.”

  Her cheeks flushed. “No, I… John, the truth is I’m also here because I don’t want to be alone right now, and… There’s no other man in my life, but…I don’t want to make things awkward between us, you know?”

  He nodded again, once more putting a bunch of meaninglessness into the gesture. The history between him and Ria could account for her strange behavior. But also, maybe not. He smiled reassuringly, anyway. He knew enough about interrogating witnesses to back off; badgering a scared woman wouldn’t get him anywhere. “Well, hey, you and I are still friends, aren’t—?”

  She was against his body in an instant, her arms tightly wrapped around his waist, her face buried in his chest.

  He hesitated with a mental um for about half a second, then did the natural thing and put his arms around her. He’d meant only to give her a comforting hug, but the act of embracing her pressed her feminine body close to his, and he flooded with heat. She felt so warm and supple, and if memory served, they’d been fantastic in the sack together way back when. He also hadn’t gotten laid in over a year…since before Tonĩ had said “yes” to a date with him, her answer putting a spark of hope in his mind that soon she’d be the one gracing his sheets.

  “Do you ever think about us?” Ria asked quietly.

  Hmm, the situation was getting sticky. Ria had come here tonight for reassurance, not a bootie call. “Sometimes,” he lied. “It was a good six months we had together.”

  Why it hadn’t been great was still somewhat of an enigma. Ria had everything he could ever want in a woman; she was smart, beautiful, owned a passion for catching criminals equal to his, and was a dynamo in bed. He supposed it came down to some women being able to just look at a guy and make him feel like she’d reached inside his chest and grabbed his heart. Or between his legs and squeezed his cock. Ria hadn’t done either of those.

  No, the only woman who’d ever had that effect on him was a certain hot hematologist.

  As Tonĩ Parthen’s beautiful face flashed through his mind, he stepped back from Ria. “Uh…I think…I know you’re feeling vulnerable right now
, Ria.”

  She smiled a little. “I know how I’m feeling, John, and it’s exactly why I want to be with you. I just…with everything that’s going on with my sister, I need intimacy right now, warmth and affectionate human contact. I know I can get that with you. If…you don’t mind.”

  Mind? He almost snorted. Pulling her back into an embrace, he kissed her, their lips finding an instant, comfortable union. Her mouth opened eagerly, her tongue sliding inside to tangle with his. Daaaamn. She was game for sex big time. Securing her more tightly against his body with one arm, he tunneled his fingers into her hair with his other hand, holding her as he twisted his lips against hers. He explored deeply with his tongue, tasting her softness. The moist warmth of her mouth bounded his heartbeat forward and heated his blood. Nothing much was happening down below, though.

  Please, no. Not tonight.

  He hadn’t seen hide nor hair of a boner in a good long while, hadn’t even tried to beat off in ages he’d been so disgusted with himself. But this was a real, live woman in his arms, pliant and sweet-smelling and raring to go. His cock should absolutely rev up with that kind of provocation. Shouldn’t it?

  He pushed his hips forward, trying to get his engine going.

  Ria groaned.

  The hot little noise went through his ears, traveled into the super-sexual command center of his brain, and lit off a “wanna get busy” lust in flashing neon…then careened down to the southern regions of his body and fell into an abyss. Shit. His breathing speeded and his nerves bunched up.

  Ria dipped her hand to the front of his jeans and palmed him through his zipper. She rubbed him…

  Nothing happened.

  Twin spigots turned on inside his armpits, sending sweat streaming down his ribcage and pooling at his belt. What the hell was wrong with him? Face flaming, he stepped back from her. “Uh…” The monosyllabic utterance hovered awkwardly in the air between them. His cheeks grew hotter. “I…had the stomach flu last week,” he lied again. “I guess I’m not completely over it.”

  Ria’s lashes moved rapidly, her breathing uneven. “Really?” she said, her disappointment obvious.

  His face now officially needed a fire extinguisher. Hey, this is cool. I’m in the middle of every man’s dream: a nasty case of impotence getting in the way of sex with a gorgeous woman.

  “Maybe,” he half-mumbled, “you should go.”

  She stood there and stared at him—stared and stared like maybe if she looked at him long enough with disappointment in her eyes his dick would feel guilty and magically take itself to task and get erect. Golly, why wasn’t that working?

  He cut a quick path to his front door. “I’ll call you as soon as I know anything about Elsa’s case.” He opened the door.

  Ria moved reluctantly across his living room, then hovered in his doorjamb.

  He caught back the urge to shove her into the hallway. Go already! “Well, bye.” He eased the door closed, leaving her no choice but to step past the jamb and into the hall. The door clicked shut, and he cursed softly to himself. John’s third most embarrassing sexual experience, topped only by farting loudly while in the process of losing his virginity, and ejaculating in his pants during piano lessons when Miss Sonum had leaned forward to do nothing more racy than place his hands properly on the keys.

  He crossed through his kitchen, switching off lights as he went, then trudged into the master bathroom. He stripped out of his sweaty clothes, opened the door to the floor-to-ceiling cabinet, and examined his reflection in the full-length mirror mounted there.

  Kansas born, he’d worked horse and cattle ranches throughout his teen years and into his young adulthood, and had always had a muscular build because of it. Now he was a shadow of his former self: sunken belly, bony cheeks, circles under the eyes, thinning muscles. His ashen skin glistened with so much perspiration, he might’ve just gone swimming. Yes, sirree, a new symptom was exactly what he needed: uncontrollable flop sweat. He looked down at the useless member between his thighs and felt despair slide into the hollows of his gut. Maybe he should go to a damned doctor. There weren’t many things worse than—

  Movement flashed behind him.

  He spun around, fists coming up. Then froze. “Ria?” He blinked stupidly. How had she gotten in here?

  She had the white wine bottle in her hand.

  He frowned at it. “What are you doing?”

  He got his answer in the form of her slamming the bottle against his head.

  He keeled sideways, a snowstorm of white lights blasting apart in front of his vision, pain shredding through his skull. Gasping raggedly, he crashed into the cabinet door and slumped against it, his feet slowly skidding forward until his ass met the floor. He tried to maintain a sitting position, but couldn’t. He wilted onto his side.

  Ria moved quickly toward him, regret on her face. “Don’t struggle,” she said, kneeling at his side. “I have to draw some of your blood, and I don’t really know how.” She grabbed his arm and tied a rubber tourniquet around it. She had a syringe in her hand.

  “What…?” he tried to ask as he felt a sharp prick at his arm. Then another prick and finally one that went deep.

  Stars and meteors collided before his eyes, mottling his vision. He almost didn’t see Ria leave, gliding like a wraith out of his bathroom.

  The front door to his apartment open and closed distantly with an efficient snap.

  Chapter Eleven

  Ţărână: eight days later

  Nỵko’s leg muscles tightened as he strode into Ţărână’s conference room, meeting place of the community’s twelve-person Council. The last time he’d been here the wall partition had been pushed back, transforming the conference room into a courtroom, and he’d been watching his little brother, Shọn, defend himself in a criminal trial. Not that much defending had been going on.

  “The reasons I did what I did are nobody’s business” was all Shọn had been willing to say when challenged to explain why he’d attacked Luvera Nichita, now Luvera Parthen.

  So this room wasn’t exactly Nỵko’s favorite.

  He came to a stop in front of the U-shaped conference table, standing at parade rest on the far right side of the rest of the Special Ops Topside Team members: Dev, Sedge, Gábor, minus Thomal, but Arc was here to take his place, and since Arc was half-crazed with worry these days, Jaċken had secretly asked Nỵko to tag along as a potential team member. As strange as Arc was acting these days, he probably shouldn’t have been a part of any operation right now, but with Thomal’s life on the line, Arc wasn’t letting anyone put him on the sidelines.

  Roth Mihnea, black-haired, nicely dressed, and seated in the top dog spot at the head of the conference table—even though Tonĩ was the real head honcho around here—glanced expectantly at the team.

  Nỵko felt tension roll off of Dev.

  During this Thomal crisis, the Council had insisted on a daily check-in from the team. Which meant every day Dev, as team leader, was forced to admit they weren’t any closer to finding Pändra Parthen than they’d been when they started. And failure didn’t sit well with Dev, especially when his best friend’s life hung in the balance.

  “Any progress?” Roth asked, even though the four of them probably would’ve run in here, whooping and hollering, if there had been.

  “No, sir,” Dev answered.

  Same-old, same-old. Or maybe not…

  Roth rounded on Jaċken, who was seated on the right arm of the U, across from Tonĩ on the left. “It’s been eight days.”

  “I’m aware of that.” The grooves around Jaċken’s eyes and mouth made it look like his face had been wrung out. He wasn’t feeling too fond of the warriors’ lack of success, either.

  “Were you also aware,” Roth continued with a harder edge in his voice, “that Thomal fell unconscious this morning?”

  Now Arc’s tension boiled into the room.

  A muscle pulsed in Jaċken’s cheek.

  That was news to everyone.


  “The situation has become dire,” Roth pronounced.

  An expression crossed Jaċken’s features that Nỵko couldn’t entirely interpret—he’d go with disgusted impatience, though. “The warriors have always treated this situation as dire, Roth. Ãlex has been working around the clock to find evidence we can use to track down Parthen, but whoever’s running things on Parthen’s end has security locked down extremely tight.”

  Nỵko shifted his attention over to the empty Council seat next to Tonĩ. Where was Ãlex, anyway?

  Ãlex Parthen wore two important hats in the community, that of computer expert and that of Soothsayer. The latter meant Ãlex was the only person who could read the Străvechi Caiet, the ancient text of the Vârcolac…although read wasn’t the most accurate description. Ãlex saw certain future possibilities, or answers to questions, or law interpretations through visions. Unfortunately, Ãlex didn’t have any control over visions of the future. They came when they merry well pleased. Otherwise Ãlex would surely have told them where Pändra Parthen was by now.

  Funny enough, Nỵko and Ãlex had recently become friends. Funny, because Big Bad Nỵko and a computer nerd were as opposite as two men could get. But he and Ãlex were trying to map out the Hell Tunnels—a network of torturously hot passageways that led from Ţărână to the demon town of Oţărât—and they needed each other for that. Ãlex would go into a meditative state to try and see the pathways using his Soothsayer skills, while Nỵko followed his directions via a headset…and tried not to melt. As soon as the tunnels were completely mapped, the Vârcolac could turn the tables on the Om Rău, who’d always been able to get at them and not the other way around. Once the Om Rău knew they could be pursued into the Hell Tunnels after an attack on the Vârcolac, said attacks would undoubtedly lessen, or stop altogether. And, more importantly, the Vârcolac could finally get into Oţărât to save the human women there.

  Roth sat forward in his chair. “The unbreachable security we’re facing is exactly why we need to discuss the option of negotiating directly with Mr. Parthen.”