10
"I know we have to go back soon," They were walking past the security guard in large New York City office building. Asta had to meet with her editor to discuss the seventh and final book in the Always series. She'd kept Fiona waiting weeks now for the first two chapters and her last message from the woman was full of dire warnings of missed deadlines and the release date having to be pushed back if she didn't turn in something in soon.
On their way to the bank of elevators, Nolan noticed an extremely thin woman scrolling through her cell phone options and watching them closely. "But other people's jobs are affected by whether or not I meet my commitments here," said Asta, the elevator doors swooshed open, they steeped in and she pressed the button for the 23rd floor. "This meeting won't take long, I promise. And once I take care of this, we can make plans to leave."
"Do you know that woman in the black dress we just passed?"
"We're in New York City, all the women wear black dresses," Asta laughed, as they walked down a plush, carpeted hallway. "But, no, I've never seen her before. I only come here occasionally, though, and then only in the evening. Maybe she's just working late," she knocked on the editor's door.
"Wait for me here. I'll come and get you after I find out if she has a legitimate reason to be here," he waited until she went inside, then left and headed back to find the woman.
Nolan searched the spacious lobby with its brown marble tile that covered the floor and then continued up the walls. There was an abandoned desk that ran half-way along one wall for a receptionist during the day. And real plants sparingly set along the walls in an attempt to soften the feel of the room. Nolan heard someone talking to his right. The woman was still there but she wasn't alone anymore, two men had joined her. The three sat on a couch in the reception area. Nolan screened his presence from them and listened from a short distance away.
"Just look at the picture" she was whispering angrily as she held out her cell phone. "I'm telling you, Mary Sue Jenkins is Eileen Bennett. I just saw her come in for her meeting with Fiona Basso. I knew I'd catch her if I hung around long enough," .
"If that bitch reporter is here," the man sitting next to her stood and looked around and saw they were alone except for the lone guard, "it won't be a problem to grab her here, we've got the van and the poison with us."
"It might not be as easy as you think, Mark," her face took on a smug look. "You'll never guess who she had with her." When Anne was sure she had their total attention, she told them, "A vampire. He had the same sort of look about him as the ones in the pictures you've shown me. And they were walking as though they were attached at the hip. I never trusted your precious Eileen, I think she's one of them, and that vampire is her mate." she said the last with a certain satisfaction.
Ever since Mark met Eileen he'd had the hots for her. He was the one responsible for giving her access to the information that brought them down.
Mark wondered how much of what she was telling them was the truth and how much was the result of jealousy. He knew Anne had set her sights on him in Houston. And when she saw his attention drifting away from her to the petite blonde, she'd taken an instant and permanent dislike to her.
He was still living with the humiliating sense of betrayal he'd felt that morning he'd driven past their warehouse and saw the police cars with their lights and sirens signaling the exposure of their secret organization. His car radio told the bare bones of the sensational story. How a local reporter infiltrated a group of psycho killers who lured innocent victims into their clutches, performed gruesome medical experiments on them, then brutally killed them when they were finished. Eileen's stories about them resulted in seven of their organization being sent to jail, sitting on death row.
It wasn't long before Eileen was publicly identified as the reporter who betrayed and disgraced him. She would pay for outing them to the police and the public. Then making them a laughing-stock when it was discovered they'd been trying to rid the world of vampires. He'd been fantasizing about the different ways he'd bring her to her knees, literally and otherwise, ever since.
But that didn't mean she was one of them. The thought turned his stomach.
Mark's reaction was all Anne could have hoped for. His face was red and he looked ready to kill. "If she is one of them now, it's because she was turned. I know a vampire when I see one and so do you, Jasper. She was human and she was on our side until she found out about the few humans we'd accidentally identified as vampire."
"Give it up, Mark," the other man's face showed his disgust with Mark's denial of the truth. "She was never on our side, she was looking for a story and you handed it to her on a silver platter. We don't know all the tricks they're capable of, especially the females. Maybe they can hide what they are more easily than the males," Jasper had been held accountable for the debacle in Houston. He remembered his last meeting with his boss, the terror that filled him as the consequences for his continued failures were listed. She would definitely pay for what she'd put him through. This was his chance to redeem himself and get revenge on the woman who'd caused him so much grief.
"I always wondered what happened to the hard drive with all the proof on the actual vampires we tracked and captured. I was hoping one of our people grabbed it before the cops got there." Jasper stood. "But if she was one of them all along and not just a reporter, she'd have as much reason as us to keep it from leaking to the press."
"Once we get the poison in her system we'll know whether Eileen is vampire or not," said Mark. "If she is, she'll regret the game she played with us. And I'll enjoy every moment of it before it's over." There was something in his tone and face that made even Anne feel just a little sorry for what Eileen was going to go through at Mark's hands.
"Let's go back to the van and see if we can spot them when they leave. Maybe we can find out where they're holding up and get started on that pay back," he looked at Anne. "Call that temporary agency you've been working for and tell them you're quitting. You won't be coming back here again, we need to get started on our real jobs."
Nolan wasn't surprised by anything he'd heard. What did surprise him was his reaction to it. He'd dispensed justice for centuries, destroying both vampires and the humans who served them. There had been so many it would impossible for him to name the number, but never had he been filled with such a desire to kill. He would get Asta to safety and then remove this threat from her, from his people, for good.
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"I still don't understand how you write your heroes so realistically. You can't be getting your inspiration from anyone you've ever met. Guys like that just don't exist in real…" the door to Fiona's office opened and in strolled Nolan. Fiona saw his black hair, blue eyes, and trim, muscular build, she felt the aura of danger he brought into the room with him. The Mount Olympus escapee wrapped his arm around Asta's shoulder, pulled her close to his side and politely waited for Fiona to finish her sentence "…life?"
The editor got up from behind her desk and came around to introduce herself to the man who must be Asta's new husband and the reason for the late chapters. She held out her hand, "I'm Fiona Bennett, Asta and I have just been discussing her latest book and your whirlwind courtship. I'm surprised you're such a fan of romance."
Fiona tried to picture this man sitting poolside, spending an afternoon flipping through the pages of a paranormal love story. She could see him in the swimsuit, no problem, she just couldn't make the book appear in his hands.
Nolan shook the hand of the tall brunette, "I'd say I'm more a fan of Asta's work than of the whole genre," he abjured. "She is very talented," he looked lovingly into Asta's eyes. ' We have to leave. They have found you.'
She knew exactly who they were. She sighed. The list of mistakes she'd made in Texas was too long to think about. Five hundred years she'd stayed below the radar of both humans and Carpathians and now both had tracked her down. She didn't regret writing the story, those people were a danger to everyone, the murders had to be stopped and Carpathians had to be protected from exposure. She'd been the only one around to do it.
When she heard about and seen the pictures of the men who'd gone missing over the last few years; all of them single in their twenties or thirties, all with no family. She noticed a Carpathian look about them, the dark hair, the height. She'd been curious to find out if the missing person cases were related. The police, once they eliminated the possibility of a sex-crime connection hadn't looked into it anymore.
The name Mark DeWitt had come across her desk as a connection between some of the victims, so she set herself up to meet him, after that it had been easy to earn his trust, and piece by piece discover exactly what they were doing. She didn't have any choice but to expose them. During the months long investigation there had never seemed to a good time to pull out and leave it to someone else to finish up. Besides that, she couldn't use any of her abilities around the fanatics, so getting that hard drive had been impossible until the police were in the warehouse with her and she could remove it without being detected.
"I agree," Fiona picked up her PDA, "Asta's made our publishing house tons of money. The higher ups are very fond of all their big money makers." She looked at Asta, "If you promise to get those chapters to me in three weeks, I can get us back on schedule."
"I'll get them to you on time," Asta was looking at the framed cover of her first book, hanging on the office wall. "You know, I'm going to miss writing the adventures of the Whitenight family. But their stories have all been told except for Neil," Asta's eyes went to Nolan, "and I know most of his story now."
Fiona crossed the room and hugged Asta, "You've been wonderful to work with, and you deserve time off to enjoy married life. Besides, why should you write fantasy when you'll obviously be living it?"
She watched them walk to the door. The tall, handsome man who, while not hovering, made it very clear the woman under his arm had both his total devotion and protection. And the beautiful woman whose whole being signaled to the world, this was her man and she was content with that.
They were almost out the door when Fiona called after them, "At least, I finally found out where you got your inspiration!" she laughed.