The Dark War: The Dark War, Book 1 Read online

  Another one of the bastards laughed. “She’s gonna see the perverted side of you isn’t she, Ed?”

  Like. Hell.

  I focused my anger out, my skin burning with power. Wyatt had been right about my lack of control. My power played over my flesh like fire smoldering. The vampire holding me cursed, his arms loosening a fraction.

  “What the…”

  I tried to send out a flash of magic, something that would shock him into dropping me, but I had little control. Frustrated, I kicked my foot back again, hitting nothing but air. Shit.

  He laughed, slipped his hand between my breasts and squeezed my neck until I saw stars once again. I was gonna die tonight. Brutally.

  “Who the fuck are you?” The one in front of me growled.

  Just like that, he dropped me to the ground and my legs gave way instantly. I landed on my knees with a hard thump and shifted forward, bracing myself on my hands, desperately sucking lungfuls of air, forcefully pulling it in as fast as I could. My hearing and eyesight cleared within seconds.

  “I don’t believe the lady is interested in your kind of entertainment, fellas.”

  I swiveled my head toward the familiar voice just in time to see the vampire who’d been holding me arch outward, his hands raised to his chest, his lips parted in a silent scream. From my viewpoint I couldn’t actually see Wyatt, but I knew it was him and I could have wept with relief.

  The vampire’s chest exploded when a stake pushed through, his eyes suddenly going dead as Wyatt gave a brutal twist then let him drop. The body landed next to me and I stared at it with dumb awe. Wyatt was always formidable…but I’d never seen him dust a vampire so efficiently. He was lethal. The Strix vampire turned to ash, nothing but a pile of dust on concrete.

  I flinched as a hand appeared in front of me, my mind finally coming back to reality as more and more oxygen poured into my system.

  “Kali, take my hand.”

  I reached up and Wyatt grabbed my wrist, hauling me to my feet and against his strong body. My legs were trembling and he braced my weight against him, his arm wrapped protectively around my waist. In the other hand he held a gun I’d never seen before. “Come any closer and I’ll start shooting.”

  One of the vampires laughed, but none of them moved in our direction. “A gun won’t do much. You’ll only get one shot off and there’s two of us.”

  Wyatt shifted us backward. “Obviously you don’t know what kind of gun this is.” His trigger finger twitched and the air around us grew thick with the smell of gasoline. The vampires smelled it too and, without another word, started moving backward as well, eyes wide, hands raised.

  “Yeah, you’re right, buddy. We don’t want any trouble.”

  Wyatt was holding some kind of flamethrower. As he backed us up, his grip loosened around my waist.

  “The truck is right behind us, get in, now.”

  I spun out of his grasp and did as I was told, hopping into his truck seconds before he did. I’d never been gladder to see the rusty hunk of metal. With a few grunts and some awkward maneuvering, he unlatched a series of belts around his waist and chest. He removed a small tank of what I assumed was gasoline from his back before flinging it into the backseat of the truck. The vampires were still moving away, obviously thinking we weren’t worth the trouble.

  He turned the ignition, then shifted the truck into drive and gunned the engine, heading straight for the vamps. They scrambled out of the way as we drove past.

  “You okay?”

  I sucked in a deep breath, then glanced over at him. “Yeah, I’m okay.” I arched my back and winced. “I’m gonna have one nasty bruise though.”

  “Broken ribs?”

  I stretched out again, testing my pain threshold. My ribs hurt, but not in the broken bone kind of way. “No, nothing broken.”

  I glanced over at his arm. Obviously, he’d healed in the time we’d been apart. All that remained of the injury he’d stitched up was a wicked red line that marked the trail the vampire had torn with his teeth. “You okay?”

  He flexed his arm and turned toward me. “Yeah, good as new.”

  Silence fell. A thick silence that made it hard to breathe.

  “You’re mad at me aren’t you?”

  He tapped his fingers across the steering wheel. “What? For taking off while I healed? Leaving me totally defenseless and getting yourself into a fuck load of trouble?”

  I cringed. Okay, fine. He had a point. “I didn’t think I’d be gone this long. And the day had been uneventful up until just now—”

  “You stopped at a motherfucking vampire den after sunset carrying a visible weapon and you didn’t think shit was gonna go down? Really, Kali? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?”

  I shrugged, my own anger suddenly rising. “It’s not like I was going to wait around all day while you slept. For fuck’s sake, Wyatt, you were totally out of it. Useless to me!”

  He flexed his arm, clenching his fist briefly. “Useless, eh?”

  Okay, so maybe he’d saved my life…again. This was becoming an increasingly annoying habit. “How’d you find me?” He found me, kept finding me. I was the tracker, not Wyatt. I narrowed my eyes at him. “You know what? I think there’s some shit you’re not telling me. Like, where did all these weapons come from?” I waved to his weird flamethrower in the back, a weapon bag I hadn’t noticed before sitting open. “You’ve never been one to carry an arsenal. How did you get that on a flight over here anyway?”

  He clamped his lips shut. So juvenile. Eyes riveted to the road ahead. A vault as usual.

  “Wyatt, grow up.” I sighed, rubbing my hand along my neck, shivering at the memory of yet another vampire running its dirty fangs along my jugular. “I know something is going on. For one, this can’t be a rental. Too much rust.” I hadn’t noticed it before, just assumed he’d taken a flight. And what about the weapons—he had a cache that rivaled mine.

  Which I just realized was sitting in the back of the cab that had taken off.

  Shit! This day just kept getting better and better.

  “I can’t cast, okay?”

  His words were barely audible. I leaned toward him. I couldn’t have heard that right… I thought he’d said…

  “Haven’t been able to cast in a few years.”

  “A few years?” My mouth gaped, eyes wide.

  “Seven years.”

  “Seven years?” Okay, that so wasn’t what I was expecting to hear. I thought over the past couple of days. Any opportunity that he could have used magic, he hadn’t. Even back at the den, he’d made me cast despite the fact that we both knew it wouldn’t end well. Holy shit! “But you’re healing…”

  “Yes, I still have that. Didn’t fuck with the innate powers.”

  “Who didn’t fuck with them?”

  He shot me a look so bitter I actually flinched. “The Council.”

  I raised a hand, “Whoa…what do you mean? The Council tampered with your powers?”

  “They bound me, okay. My spell casting abilities have been bound.”

  “Holy shit!” Wyatt, the golden boy of the Academy, Mister Do-No-Wrong, had pissed off the Council to the point of binding his powers? Wow! I couldn’t help but smirk. I knew it was a shitty thing to do, but come on. When you ride in the shadow of someone’s greatness, you can’t help but feel a little smug when they hit a wall. “You have got to be kidding. What did you do?”

  “That, I don’t want to talk about.”

  I crossed my arms and leaned back in my seat. “Okay, fine. Still doesn’t explain how you keep finding me though.”

  He reached up to his neckline and yanked a silver chain out of his shirt. I felt the power the second it was visible. “Your dad gave it to me.”

  Yep, it reeked of Dad’s magic. I was surprised I hadn’t felt it before. It had some kind of
masking spell on it. To keep me from zoning in? Perhaps. It had a tracking spell etched into the stone. Powerful, but it would only work for one signature. Mine apparently.

  “I can still heal. I can feel magic too, you know. Like I know when it’s there. But I can’t do anything. That makes it worse actually. Knowing it’s there, but I can’t access it.”

  Castrated. That was what they’d done to him. I felt a twinge of guilt for taking a momentary amount of pleasure in his punishment. As much as I sucked at being a witch, I would hate to be without my spell casting privileges.

  What had he done? It had to be something huge.

  He raised his hand at me, palm out. “Don’t bother pestering, Kali, I’m not going to tell you.”

  “As if that’s what I was thinking.” I scoffed, feeling a blush rise to my cheeks. My cell buzzed with an incoming text and I glanced down, grateful for the distraction. An address popped on my screen. “I’ve got a location.”

  “Location for what?”

  “While you were asleep, Billy got me an assload of information.” I cringed, hoping I hadn’t just ignited another Wyatt firestorm. He stayed quiet long enough for me to continue. “For one, my bounty’s name is Ivana.”

  “Ivana? That’s it? A name?”

  “No, I also got a list of vampire den locations that she may have frequented. Which I’ve been checking all afternoon.”

  “Uh huh, any luck?”

  He was being an ass and I wanted to punch him.

  “No.” My phone beeped again. A name this time. Drake Marshal. “He got me an interview with one of his informants. Says he has information about Ivana and is willing to trade.”

  “Trade for what?” Wyatt all but growled the words.

  I sighed. This would be so much easier if Wyatt was gone. I mean, without his powers, he was useless to me.

  I grimaced, okay, low blow. He was still good at saving my ass, right?

  “He wants a boon.”

  “From you?”

  “Yes.”

  Wyatt burst out laughing, like full on belly laugh.

  “You’re an asshole.”

  He wiped his eyes as if there were tears and looked over at me, righting the truck where he’d swerved. “I’m sorry, don’t you think that’s a little ironic? You’re not exactly the Betty Crocker of spell casters.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “I say go for it. I mean, when the time comes for him to call in the boon you’ll have to deal with some shit—false advertising and all that—but for the time being, hell, why not?” He was laughing again.

  “At least I have powers to trade.”

  “Ohh, good one.” He smacked his leg. “Give me the address, Kali. Let’s get this job done so I can take you home.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Wyatt signaled into the parking lot of an upscale condo complex. Nice digs.

  “I’m going in alone.” I checked the weapons I had on me. Two knives at my waist, one in the sheath under my arm, one missing thanks to that vampire, the fucker. Not that I thought Billy’s informant was going to pose a threat, but it was better to be safe.

  Wyatt put the truck in park and killed the engine. “Is that so?”

  I checked my phone for the condo number. “Yes, Billy said his informant will only meet with me.”

  Wyatt chuckled, then leaned across the center console and popped open the glove box. “I’m gonna chalk that up to lack of oxygen to your brain. No way you’re going in there alone.” He flipped up the owner’s manual to reveal a Glock 9mm in a holster. “I’d be willing to wait outside in the hall, but that’s about it.”

  I sighed, knowing by his tone there was no use arguing. Mister Drake Marshall was just going to have to deal.

  I felt Sam’s magic the moment I opened the truck door, saw her and Clive emerge from the front entrance of the condo a second after that.

  She bounded toward me, a huge smile on her face. “Kali!” Despite the fact that she was tiny, pixy like, she nearly knocked me over with a bear hug. “I haven’t seen you in ages!”

  Clive sauntered up, eyeing Wyatt warily. “Kali,” he said with a subtle nod. “How’ve you been?”

  Sam released me and returned to Clive’s side. The two were rarely apart, literally. It was like they were attached. It was nauseating, especially when they started in on the PDAs.

  “You look good,” I said. She always looked good, forever youthful. Her hair was cut into a Chelsea, dyed bright purple, piercings on both sides of her bottom lip, tattoos peeking out from under her tank top and board shorts. Steel toed army boots to go with the ensemble.

  Clive looked like a football player. Clean cut, blond wavy hair. Total opposites that way. They made a striking couple.

  Sam smiled as she wrapped an arm around Clive’s waist. “This your man?” She nodded at Wyatt.

  “No!” I nearly choked in my haste to correct her. I cleared my throat. “This is Wyatt, from back home.”

  “Ah.” Sam nodded while she took a sweeping look at Wyatt, eyes narrowed, teeth briefly worrying one of the rings on her lip. “Back home.”

  I cringed. She was a hard core Union woman. If I had issues with our species, she had a hate and loathing that made me look like an angsty teen. She would gladly annihilate the entire race with the exception of a few. She knew what back home meant.

  “It’s like a witch convention here,” she drawled, then she snapped her eyes to me, disregarding Wyatt completely. She had her reasons for being rude. Our kind had majorly fucked with her. “Drake is inside. He’s expecting you.”

  “Is he hostile?” I flexed my hands, quietly testing my power. I was fully charged. At the very least, I’d be able to blast out something in the way of a spell if I needed to. It might not hit the target, but I wasn’t without power altogether.

  Clive snickered. “He’s stubborn.”

  “I can deal with stubborn.”

  Sam leaned in and gave me another hug. “We’ve got a bounty to track. You and I need to catch up. You should swing by headquarters when you’re done here.”

  I nodded. “If there’s time, I will. I’ve got a bounty to track too.”

  “Understood.” She motioned for Clive to come. “Catch ya later.”

  “Nice seeing you again, Kali.” Clive trailed after Sam, both heading toward the huge Humvee parked on the other side of the lot.

  “Nice friends you’ve got there,” Wyatt said, his tone dripping with sarcasm.

  “They have their reasons.”

  “For being bigoted assholes?” Wyatt snorted. “Yeah, sure.”

  “Oh, get over it. They just ignored you. Not like they suggested tying you to a stake and setting your feet on fire.” And they hadn’t started in on the bashing—their typical banter directed at witches was usually laced with a lot of harsh judgment. “Let’s just get this over with.”

  We made it to the door without saying anything more. I buzzed the code Billy gave me.

  “Name?”

  “Kali Richards, I have a meeting scheduled with Mister Drake Marshall.”

  “You’re not alone.”

  I glanced up to the camera mounted on the wall and smiled. “No, I’m not. This is Wyatt Steel. He’ll be waiting in the hall.”

  There was a pause. A long one. I looked at Wyatt, eyebrows cocked, challenging him to say anything. If he fucked this up, I was gonna kick his ass.

  “Fine. Come in. But the guard dog waits in the hall.” The door buzzed and I jumped to open it before the opportunity passed.

  We took the elevator to the tenth floor and found the condo at the end of a long hall. I knocked, saw a shadow pass over the peephole.

  “Light spell.”

  I frowned. “Excuse me?”

  “There are no cameras here. I’m not letting you in until you prove your worth. Ca
st a light spell. Make it big enough for me to see.”

  Wyatt stifled a chuckle as he leaned back against the wall, arms folded, cocky smirk on his face.

  Okay, not the hardest spell to pull off. Thank fuck. I opened my palm, concentrated on pooling the available light. A moment later, and with a slight popping noise, a small light flared in the palm of my hand. I gave Wyatt the finger, then moved back a few steps, mumbled a few more words of the incantation and the light projected toward the peephole.

  The deadbolt on the door clicked open. I squeezed the spell down until it dissolved.

  “I’ll be right here,” Wyatt said.

  I put my hand on the doorknob and twisted, then glanced over my shoulder. “This probably won’t take long.”

  * * * * *

  “Sit.”

  Drake slammed the door shut and I turned to face him. He was a small man, mousy brown hair receding almost to the middle of his skull, a ponytail extending down his back. Why bother? He wore thick glasses, making his eyes look twice the size they were.

  He motioned to the couch in the next room. “Make yourself comfortable.”

  “Drake Marshall?” I moved into the next room.

  “Of course.” He chuckled. “You were expecting me to look differently.”

  I shook my head. “No, I just…” Yes, with a name like Drake, I had expected tall, dark, menacing.

  He patted my back, then moved past me into the room. “I’m not delusional. I know what I look like.”

  A wash of magic cascaded over my body, making me feel sluggish. I shook my head. “What the…”

  Drake chuckled softly. “You’ll want to sit down. Your legs are going to feel wobbly in a few seconds.”

  I shot a hard look his way, reached a hand up in an attempt to retrieve a knife.

  Drake tsked. “You’re not foolish enough to think I’d let you in here with those weapons and not do anything to protect myself, do you?”

  I cringed. Touché. “I’m a hunter, I come prepared.”

  He smiled indulgently. “A witch hunter and a witch. Quite the conflict of interest.”

  “You know why I’m here. I don’t have a lot of time to waste.” There was a tea tray set up—biscuits, scones, jam even.