The Cold Kiss of Death

Chapter Five

Tomas lay on his back, his hips thrust upwards, arms outstretched, head thrown back, mouth and eyes wide open, his pupils fashioned into gold-bright orbs by magic, a grotesque statue sculpted rigid at the ultimate high of sexual pleasure.

Shock had me staring with disbelief.

Tomas hadn’t been killed by a jealous witch.

The French call the pleasure of orgasm le petit mort, the small death. Tomas’ death hadn’t been small—but then, humans are too fragile to survive the full force of faerie sex outside of the Fair Lands.

The white-gold light shimmered over his body, lining his pumped-up muscles with hard contours, and a detached part of me could see why the market witches had been battling over him with their broomsticks. Then sadness and anger washed away the shock and I moved towards him, an insane glimmer of hope telling me to touch him, that maybe he wasn’t dead, maybe this wasn’t real, maybe it was all just some elaborate illusion. I reached out and gently placed my forefinger to his forehead. Golden mist curled like rising smoke from his open mouth and spilled the scent of honeysuckle into the air.

Honeysuckle is the scent of my own Glamour, my own magic.

Horror rushed through me, raising the little hairs on my body. My heart thudded against my ribs. I took an involuntary step back, and another, then yelped, high-pitched, as the hot prickle of a Ward hit my shoulders. I turned and looked. The doorway was still open behind me, the flour-storm a swirling white curtain, but a Ward now vibrated up from the threshold like rising heat; a basic, bought-off-the-shelf Knock-back Ward, the sort that usually had big warning signs that read Danger—Keep Out. Someone wanted to make sure I was caught red-handed and still clutching the smoking gun when the police arrived.

‘Fucking bastard!’

I shoved the questions of who and why and how away. There was nothing I could do for Tomas, however much I wished there was, but there was still his ex, or whoever the woman was, to find. I walked through the kitchen carefully. Glass-fronted ovens lined one wall, small blue-tinged flames dancing in their huge stainless-steel cavities. Two commercial-sized food mixers were bolted to the floor, flat paddles jacked up above their industrial-sized bowls. And half a dozen large metal flour barrels were stacked under a high rectangular window next to the bolted and padlocked back door. I eyed the barrels. They were big enough for someone to hide in, but my gut and the fact there were more Knock-back Wards vibrating on both the back door and the high window told me the woman was long gone.

Rats and traps came to mind.

And escaping wasn’t going to be an easy option.

‘Genevieve.’ My name slid like sorrow and silk over my skin, making me shiver. Mesma. I recognised his voice with its not-quite-English accent and, heart thudding in my chest like a cornered cat’s, I turned to look at him.

Malik stood just inside the kitchen, the flour-storm behind him dimmed by the shadows shifting round him. His black hair curled into the darkness of his long leather coat, and the coat itself merged into the blackness of the clothes he wore beneath. I’d seen him draw those same shadows into himself, using them to hide himself from sight. He studied me, his skin gleaming pale as the shadows dissipated, his obsidian eyes enigmatic; his part-Asian heritage obvious in their shape. Once I’d thought his face perfect, pretty even, but he’d played with my mind and my perceptions and now with only the edge of prettiness left, he was more beautiful, more male, and more frightening than my imagination had let me remember.

I frowned. Something wasn’t right; not the fact that I was frightened—vamps are predators, and being wary of them is just common sense—but this feeling was ... different. Then I realised that thinking about coming to some arrangement with him was nothing compared to contemplating it while he was standing in front of me like some dark angel. Damn. Maybe Grace was right yet again and I was just kidding myself that I could negotiate with him on my own terms when the 3V and my attraction to him meant I probably didn’t have my own best interests at heart.

Mentally I shored up my resolve and said, ‘Malik al-Khan,’ grateful my voice came out dry as dust.

He inclined his head, an elegant movement that echoed the past. And going by the power I’d seen him wield he had a good five hundred years of past too, maybe more, for all that he appeared to be around my age, twenty-four. Like all vamps, he looked the same now as when he’d accepted the Gift. An unfelt breeze ruffled his hair and lifted the edges of his coat, dislodging the faint patina of white that covered him, and I glanced down at the flour still stuck to my own damp clothes and sighed.

Vamps get all the best magic tricks.

His eyes flicked to the body that lay on the baker’s table between us. ‘It was unwise of you to enter and not wait for the police.’

‘Yeah well, I’d sort of come to that conclusion myself.’ I grimaced. ‘I don’t suppose you can tell if there’s a witch or anyone else hiding around here somewhere, can you?’

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. ‘There has been no witch here, in this part of the shop, for a day, possibly more, and no one now other than us and the dead man.’

Okay, so Tomas’ ex wasn’t around, and the barrels held only flour. Then another thought clicked. Malik had been following me; had he overheard the boy talking? ‘The lad outside said he’d seen a woman come in and heard some sort of fight?’ I narrowed my eyes in question.

‘He lied.’

‘Ri-ight.’ I pursed my lips. Good old vamp super-senses, better at spotting a fib at fifty paces than any polygraph machine ever would be. ‘He’s part of the set-up then?’

‘Not necessarily; there was some confusion in his mind.’ He pushed back the fall of dark hair from his forehead. ‘As I said, Genevieve, it was unwise of you to enter.’

Confusion? Caused by some sort of spell? Still, back to being the trapped rat and now with a scary vampire in tow. So not the way I wanted to start my day. Still. I looked sadly at Tomas; his day had started a hell of a lot worse than mine, so I really was the better off. Until the police got here, at least.

I frowned at Malik. Why had he followed me in? ‘You do realise that there are Wards stopping us getting out, and that the police will be here any minute, don’t you?’

‘I informed the boy that the police would not be required.’ He turned his head as if listening, giving me the sculptured line of his profile. ‘He believes you will deal with any problems and has put it from his thoughts.’

My pulse sped up. He’d mind-locked the boy, given him instructions. The vamp trick isn’t illegal—just as any other form of hypnotism isn’t—so long as no crime results. It meant there were no police rushing to arrest me. Or to rescue me. One of those good news, bad news things. Still, at least it bought me some time. Tomas was dead. Someone had used him to frame me and—I clenched my fists—I was going to find out who it was, and why. My eyes moved suspiciously to the vampire standing like a beautiful statue not three feet away.

‘Is this anything to do with you?’ I indicated the dead body.

He treated me to his usual impassive expression, then started walking with graceful purpose around the body. I held my place as he rounded the feet and closed on me, refusing to allow him to intimidate me. Finally he stopped, his coat brushing against my bare legs. Dark spice mixed with the scent of leather curled through me, shimmering lust in my belly. I ignored it; with the 3V in my blood, it was nothing more than a chemical reaction to his nearness. You just keep telling yourself that, whispered a mocking voice in my mind. I ignored that too.

‘This looks more like your handiwork, Genevieve,’ he murmured, looking down at me, his breath disturbing my hair.

‘Yeah,’ I lifted my chin to meet his eyes, ‘like I couldn’t work that one out, except of course I didn’t kill him.’

‘Which is always the standard response of both the innocent’—he wrapped cool fingers round my left wrist; the bruises there heated to his touch—‘and the guilty.’

‘I’m fae, Malik.’ I jerked out of his hold. ‘The fae can’t lie.’

‘That is true.’ His voice licked over me like hot flames. ‘As far as the truth goes.’

‘Fine!’ I glared up at him. ‘If we’re doing the pedantic stuff; yes it’s impossible for the fae to lie outright, but they’—I paused to correct myself; I was fae, after all, even if I hadn’t been brought up amongst them—‘we fae can usually skirt around the edges of the truth and misdirect. And of course the same holds for vampires.’

He shifted away, so quickly that I almost swayed. Then he bent over Tomas’ heavily muscled chest and, eyes closed, inhaled deeply.

I frowned in consternation. ‘What the fuck are you doing?’

He lifted his eyes to mine; incandescent pinpricks of power flared red in his pupils. ‘The scent could be yours.’ His expression turned predatory. ‘It is almost indistinguishable.’

Apprehension fluttered under my ribs at the intensity of his gaze and I forced myself to stand my ground. ‘Yeah, he smells of honeysuckle, I know. But he’s been dead at least a couple of hours, so truth or not, I’ve been with others all night.’ Grace, then Hannah—okay, she and Darius weren’t the most reliable of alibis, but hey, I had something she wanted. And before she turned up I’d been on the ghost job with Finn.

‘No.’ A fine line creased between Malik’s brows as he stared down at the body. ‘It is only recently that this human has been killed, maybe half an hour at the most.’

‘But he’s all stiff!’ I had a sudden visual of just how stiff a particular part of Tomas’ body was and stopped. The double entendre seemed wrong with him lying dead and unable to defend himself. I pushed the thoughts away and carried on. ‘I thought rigor didn’t set in until two to three hours after death?’

‘The body has not reached the stage of rigor mortis yet.’ He moved back a couple of paces to study the body. ‘This is an example of cadaveric spasm: should death occur at a moment of high emotion and extreme exertion, the body’s muscles seize in position. It can happen where the human has drowned or suffered a heart attack whilst fleeing, or as the result of an overload of sexual stimulation as here.’

I almost asked him if he’d taken a course or something, then thought better of it. Vampires don’t just see a lot of death, they cause a lot of death, never mind the current bat-shit PR propaganda the public has swallowed bloody hook, line and sinker. Of course, vamps were considered dead themselves up until the court case back in the seventies; then a disinherited widow decided she’d be better off as a divorcée after her rich husband accepted the Gift and left his millions to his new master. She got her medical experts to prove that daytime vampires still produced brainwaves, ergo no clinical death there then. And wasn’t it a handy coincidence that the judge’s decision removed yet another nail from the coffin in which the vampire’s human rights had been buried in?

‘If you look here—’ Malik crouched and pointed to where the body’s back ribcage met the stainless-steel table; a faint bluish-red line discoloured the skin like a thin bruise. ‘It is only now that the blood begins to settle. Death occurred within the last hour, probably not long before you entered the shop.’

I worked it out. Tomas had been killed while I was out running, a time I had no alibi for.

‘And I would not have been able to sense the body,’ Malik carried on calmly as he straightened up, ‘if it had been less fresh.’

Nice image! ‘So what,’ I said, ‘you just happened to be following me and decided to drop in and give me the benefit of your expertise in determining the time of death?’

He gave me another impassive look, like this time my question was so stupid that it wasn’t worth answering.

‘Didn’t think so,’ I said drily. ‘And I suppose you’ve only been following me for my own protection?’

He inclined his head with a wry twitch of his mouth. ‘If that’s what you wish to believe.’

‘More like you’re concerned about losing what you consider to be your property,’ I snorted, ‘and just want to chase off any other vamps that might be getting ideas.’

‘Genevieve.’ A hint of impatience laced his voice. ‘If you were my property there would be none that would risk my displeasure, save one. But after the last challenge meeting, in the eyes of all other vampires you do not belong to me, you belong to Rosa.’

Rosa! Malik’s beloved, as Hannah had called her. Rosa was a touchy subject as Malik had been the one to give her the Gift, and at one point he’d been determined to rescind that same Gift rather than let another borrow her body—not one of my most cherished memories—until he’d discovered it was me doing the borrowing. Even so, I wasn’t entirely sure where he stood on the Rosa/me issue now.

‘Even if Rosa were in truth your master,’ he carried on, ‘instead of the puppet you have made of her body, she would not be strong enough to keep you from those that would seek to persuade you to their blood. It is a situation that must be dealt with before it escalates further.’

‘And what exactly do you mean by that?’ I said warily.

‘It is not a matter for discussion now, Genevieve.’ He brushed his hands together, then indicated the dead body. ‘This is a more immediate predicament. Someone has gone to great efforts to ensure you appear guilty. Have you any ideas who might have done so?’

‘Haven’t a clue,’ I said, but I intend to find out. ‘The only other time I’ve been framed for a murder I didn’t commit, it was your doing.’

Irritation flickered across his face. ‘Unfortunately for you, my plan then did not succeed. If it had, you would not have become involved in all that followed, and I would not have the need to watch over you now.’

‘Look, don’t bother with the watching thing, or whatever it is you’re doing. The last thing I need is a shadowy vampire stalker.’

Something dangerous surfaced in the dark pools of his eyes and I swallowed past the sudden fear constricting my throat. He reached out and grasped my left wrist again. My pulse beat fast and eager under his touch. ‘I have laid my claim on you,’ he said as he lifted my wrist until it was level with my face; the bruises there bloomed like red roses and blood trickled down from between his pale fingers. ‘I will not let another usurp that claim.’

‘I am not a thing to be claimed, Malik,’ I snapped, trembling with both rage and the need that rushed through my body. ‘And if you want my blood, then you’re going to have to start negotiating to get it.’

He stilled, staring at me, emotions I couldn’t read flickering across his face. Then he raised his other hand and cupped my cheek, brushing his thumb over my lips. They tingled with his touch and my anger washed away with the desire that leapt through my body—mine or his, or both, I couldn’t tell. He leaned closer, the scent of him invading my senses, holding me captive. Sliding his hand around the nape of my neck and threading his fingers into my hair he tugged and without conscious thought I tilted my chin, offering my throat. He kissed his lips to the soft, vulnerable skin under my jaw, a gentle, almost reverent kiss.

‘You think you will dictate terms to me? When and where and how much?’ The words whispered against my pulse. ‘But what if I do not wish to negotiate, Genevieve?’ Sharp fangs drew a line of heat down my flesh. ‘How will you stop me?’

My heart stuttered. The need to give him everything I was ached deep inside me. I placed my palm against his chest, spreading my fingers over the lean, hard muscle ... and I pushed him back, forced my mouth to say the words my body didn’t want to. ‘Negotiation is all I’m willing to offer; without that, then I will kill you.’

‘Then we will negotiate.’ He smiled, but the shape of his mouth was sad. He released my wrist and drew away, putting space between us. I closed my eyes, resisting the urge to go to him, resisting the call in my blood. Damn vamp! Negotiate meant talking, not messing with my mind, but of course, he knew that. I breathed, concentrating on the faint scent of honeysuckle in the air, the vague sourness of gas from the ovens, the earthy smell of fermenting yeast. Opening my eyes, I looked down at my wrist. There was no blood and the bruises were once again just warmer imprints on my honey-coloured skin. It was just him using my own susceptibility against me. I clenched my fists, angry with myself that I’d let him do that so easily, and looked back at him.

He was staring up at the small high window. ‘Dawn approaches.’

As soon as he spoke, it was all that I could feel, all that I could hear, almost like a shrill alarm getting louder and more insistent, driving all other thoughts from my consciousness. I shook physically with the feelings, then almost kicked him in annoyance. Mesma. Crap, he was still messing with my mind. Dawn wasn’t going to harm me, but it would him. Vamps don’t do sunlight, or even the gloomy October daylight that would be filtering through the small window in the next few minutes. But the particular vampire trapped in the kitchen with me didn’t look too worried, but then he was old enough that he wouldn’t have followed me into the trap if he’d thought he’d be in real danger, so he was still playing games. But why?

‘Does being out at dawn mean you’re going to burst into flames and collapse in a pile of ashes?’ I asked, instilling vague interest into my voice.

‘Your own father was a vampire.’ He frowned. ‘Yet you appear woefully ignorant of our species.’

I shrugged. ‘I know staking doesn’t always kill you, not without taking the head and the heart, but hey, seeing a vamp in daylight without some protection is a new one for me and I don’t want to take anything for granted. I mean, up until I met you I thought that revenants were just a scary old myth.’ He didn’t even flinch at the dig—revenants are the scary skeletons in the vampires’ closet, and he was the one who proved the myth was real. ‘And I’m sure that wasn’t the only part of my education my father neglected.’

‘No,’ he said, tucking his hands in his coat pockets. ‘I will not burst into flames, nor would any vampire who has reached their autonomy. Those who still bow to their master’s hand would be dependant on their master’s goodwill to keep them alive. But the touch of the sun can bring much pain and a lingering disability; many would wish to choose a quick, final death to end their suffering.’

‘So what’s going to happen to you?’

‘As I have told you before, Genevieve, I carry the true Gift.’ His lips thinned to a grim line. ‘So long as my remains are not scattered, I am able to heal any injury, even a day in direct sunlight ... eventually.’

‘What do you mean “eventually”?’ I frowned.

‘Some things take time.’

‘How much time? Days, weeks, months?’

‘The window faces north and the day is cloudy ... a few weeks, maybe.’

Damn, that wasn’t what I wanted to hear. No way did I want him out of action for all that time. A day in jail I could cope with, but weeks ... I glanced at Tomas’ body. I had a murderer to look for.

‘If you get out now, can you get to somewhere safe in time?’

‘Yes.’ His expression turned thoughtful. ‘But why would you be concerned for me?’

‘Stop playing with me, Malik. When the police do finally turn up, I’m probably going to be arrested on suspicion of his death.’ I waved a hand at the body. ‘But you’ve been following me and I bet you know exactly where I’ve been every minute of last night.’ I smiled, knowing it didn’t reach my eyes. ‘You’re my Get Out Of Jail Free card.’

‘You want me as your alibi?’ he said, as if the idea hadn’t occurred to him.

‘I think you owe me one after the last time, don’t you.’ I made it a statement. ‘And of course, there’s the fact that you want something from me’—and I had a suspicion it wasn’t just my blood—‘otherwise why follow me in here to offer your help.’ I made that a statement too. ‘So me sitting in prison while you recover isn’t in either of our best interests, is it?’

He inclined his head in tacit agreement, then moved and touched his hand to the open doorway to the front shop. Magic sparked like a match flaring as his hand brushed the Ward. ‘There is still our predicament, Genevieve.’

‘No problem,’ I said with a confidence I wasn’t entirely sure I felt. I stood in front of the back door and looked. The black bars of the Knock-back Wards pulsed and as I studied the spell I realised long black cables of magic linked the three Wards—two on the doors and one on the window. I would need to remove all three to get Malik out. No way was there enough time to dismantle the spells, and the kitchen was too small to crack the magic—bits of wooden door or shattered glass raining down wasn’t going to help anyone—which left only one option: I’d have to absorb the spells. Of course, that option had its own drawbacks.

‘Just so you know—’ I started, turning back to Malik, then blinked as I saw him texting on his phone. Why, or rather who was he texting? He’d always struck me as a loner, not like the rest of London’s vamps, who could call on others of their blood-families. I shook my head and went on. ‘When I remove the Wards, the magic might do something to me, but don’t worry about it, okay?’

He looked up, curiosity in his gaze. ‘What will it do?’

‘Difficult to say, maybe knock me out for a second or two, or it might just make my hair stand on end, or maybe even nothing at all. The magic can be a bit capricious when it wants, but the effects wear off quickly enough. So just get out safe and come back at sunset with my alibi.’

‘As you wish,’ he said, and went back to his texting.

I gave Tomas one last look, not really wanting to leave him but knowing there was nothing I could do for him now other than find his killer. Then, I took a deep breath, held out my hands and called the Wards.

The magic hit me like a ton of bricks falling on top of me, smashing my bones and pulverising my flesh, filling my lungs with dust until I felt like I was inhaling razorblades. Somewhere in my mind I screamed as hot flames scorched through my body. Fire destroyed the edges of my vision. Hard hands circled my wrists, lifting me, jerking my shoulders from their sockets. Blood, thick and copper-sweet, filled my mouth; the reek of burning flesh was in my nose. And the bricks kept falling, and falling, burying me beneath a mound of magical rubble.