The Feeder Read online

  “It’s okay. It’s okay,” I whispered in her ear as I rocked her in my arms. Her scent surrounded me, my throat burned with thirst, but somehow I managed to hold myself back. The last thing she needed after witnessing this was me trying to take a bite.

  “Why?” she cried. “Why would someone do this to her?”

  Why indeed?

  “I don’t know. But I promise you I will find out.” And when I did, there would be hell to pay.

  It was almost another hour until Eve finally calmed down enough to rest, falling to sleep in my arms. I’d dreamed of holding her like this but never had I wanted it to be under these circumstances.

  I needed to go to Gideon's office and fill him in on the situation with Dean and the reason the club was in desperate need of repair. When I tried to pass her over to Chad to hold for a moment, her grip on me tightened. She refused to let go of my shirt as if she sensed what I was trying to do and didn’t want me to leave.

  I have to admit that while being a little inconvenient, it made me smile. I was a little reluctant to let go too.

  Deciding it would be easier just to take her with me, I carried her down the stairs and into the office, taking a seat across from Gideon with her on my lap. He did not look happy.

  “First dead bodies, then my barman going berserk and destroying my fucking club, and now I find my… I find Eve, asleep in your arms. Care to explain what the fuck is going on?”

  His what? What was Eve to him? I knew for a fact that there wasn’t anything sexual be-tween them; I would have scented him on her if there was. There was also the fact that I knew from our talks about the club and the problems with Gideon’s management of it that she hated the bloke. She wouldn’t come right out and say it, but she did.

  “Dean was in a relationship with Pippa, had offered to turn her just last night. As you can imagine, he was a trifle upset by finding out that she was dead.”

  “A trifle? That bastard destroyed my damn club!” I had to bite my lip not to inform him that he was doing a pretty good job of that himself. “Any idea of who killed her?”

  Shaking my head, I tried not to let my anger show. I was pissed, majorly, at him. “None. With the CCTV system not recording, we weren’t able to find anything. And whoever it was covered their tracks well… too well.” When I had discovered the system set up had no way of recording any of the footage I’d barely been able to control my rage. If it weren't for the precious bundle in my arms, I would have raced straight to Gideon’s office and beat the fuck out of him that instant. Did Gideon not care about this place at all?

  After filling him in on what we knew had happened from talking to the other familiars – which was basically nothing – the conversation quickly turned back to the club. “I expect this place to be open as usual tomorrow. As soon as she wakes, have her organise the clean-up and inform her that I expect her to get all the paperwork I asked her to do completed and organised before the week is out.”

  “Not going to happen,” I snapped. “She’s been through a traumatic experience. It took forever to calm her down. There is no way she is up to doing anything but resting.”

  “She will do as I say. And where exactly is she going to rest when her bed is stained with the blood of that slag?”

  Okay, if it weren't for the fact that I was here undercover, Gideon would be dead now having uttered those words. I hadn’t really known Pippa, but I did know that she was no fucking slag. She had loved Dean and had been loyal to him since the day they met. He was damn well lucky that Dean was no longer conscious or in the building; otherwise, I was in no doubt that he would have taken the bastard out himself. But he did have a point about her place, and judging by how she still had her hands fisted tightly in my shirt, she wasn’t going to be letting go of me anytime soon. Not that I was complaining about that.

  “She’ll sleep with me.”

  “Like fuck she will!”

  And that started a whole new round of arguments, Eve remaining silently asleep in my arms the entire time. In the end, with the sun quickly approaching, Gideon departed, but not before grabbing a large pile of papers and dumping them in Eve’s office.

  His precious paperwork would get done, even if I had to do it myself, but Eve wasn’t going to be the one doing it. She needed to rest. Not just because of what she had been thought tonight, but because she was exhausted.

  I wasn’t stupid; I knew that she hadn’t been sleeping well. I just didn’t know why.

  Eve

  I couldn’t move. Didn’t want to. The image of Pippa lying there, dead on my bed, was burned into my brain and didn’t seem to want to go away anytime soon. I’d seen dead bodies before, quite a few of them. But here, in my own home, it seemed to hit me the hardest.

  Everyone had been running about, shouts and screams ringing out through the building. I vaguely remembered hearing someone say that Dean knew. He and Pippa had been getting pretty close over the past few months; he had grown quite fond of her. I dreaded to think how he must be feeling right now.

  Every so often someone would come up to me, try to coax me out of my corner, but I flinched away from their touch every single time. I couldn’t stand to let a vampire touch me on a good day, never mind after this had happened. But when it came to Thayne, I had gone willingly, desperately clinging onto him throughout the entire meeting with Gideon, not truly asleep but not listening to a word of it. I just wanted to bury my head in Thayne’s chest and never let go.

  I felt safe with him, secure. What it was about Thayne that made me feel this way, I don’t know. Well, I do, but I’m going to deny it every chance I get. He was different, nice. And the fact that he was the hottest, sexiest man I had ever seen.

  Vampire, Eve! You can’t forget that he’s a vampire!

  As Thayne carried me out of Gideon’s office, he didn’t turn the way I expected. Instead of heading back upstairs to my place, he entered the club.

  Where are we going?

  Lifting my head, I forced my eyes open for the first time in hours. The place was a mess, destroyed. The new bar that had recently been fitted was split down the middle as if someone had hit it with a sledgehammer… or a vampire’s fist. Bottles were smashed. Drinks spilt. This mess wasn’t going to be easy to fix. Getting money out of Gideon for maintenance was hard enough on a good day.

  As Thayne stepped around the corner of the bar, I realised where we were headed. The cellar. And more importantly, Thayne’s room. “You can sleep in my bed tonight.”

  His bed?

  No, that wasn’t a smart idea. That was a dreadful idea. What if he got hungry and decided I would make the perfect snack? What if my scent got too much and he took a bite? I knew from experience that prolonged exposure to me could send a vampire’s thirst to uncontrollable levels.

  No, sleeping in Thayne’s bed was definitely not a good idea.

  “I’ll be fine,” I said, my voice coming out shakier than I wanted. “I can sleep in my own bed.”

  “I don’t think you would want to right now, sweetheart. There has been a dead body in it, remember? And while Pippa's body has been removed, the bed is far from clean. I promise you’ll be safe down here with me.”

  With him? Meaning that he wasn’t planning on leaving me down there alone. My body tensed up at the thought. “It’s okay,” he soothed. “You can have my bed, and I’ll kip on the floor. Unless you want to share?” he asked, a light teasing tone in his voice.

  I couldn’t help it. No matter what I had gone through tonight, the horror that had taken place, I couldn’t help the laugh that burst out of my mouth at his terrible line.

  “See. That wasn’t too hard.” He smiled down at me, his eyes softening. “You’re even more beautiful when you smile.”

  Entering the small room in the cellar, Thayne strolled over to the bed and deposited me on it gently. He made to stand, to move away from me, but my hands refused to let go of his shirt. My fingers fisted so tightly in the fabric that I didn’t think they would ever be
able to release. I didn’t want him to go, didn’t want to be left alone. “Don’t leave me.”

  “I'm not going anywhere. Just let me get you an extra blanket. It’s freezing down here, and while the cold doesn’t affect me, I don’t want you getting ill.”

  Nodding, I forced my hands to relax, allowing him to slip away from me.

  My panic started to rise the moment he left the room, my breaths coming in short, fast pants, but only for a moment. Within seconds he was back, his arms bundled with blankets and pillows for me. After making sure that I was warm enough and comfortable, he set to making his own bed for the night upon the floor. I wanted to say something, tell him not to do that and just get into the bed with me, to hold me. But I couldn’t. He was attractive and kind, and over the week since he started here we had gotten to know each other a little. But that didn’t change the fact that he was a vampire, someone that I could never get close to. But fuck did he make it hard to remember that at times.

  “How are you holding up?” he asked lying on his side, his chin rested upon his hand.

  “Okay, I guess.” A shiver running through my body as the images flashed through my mind once again. “I just can’t believe this happened. I mean, why would somebody do that?”

  “I was hoping that you could tell me. It is obvious that whoever killed Pippa left her body in your room for a reason. Any idea what that reason might be?”

  “No. What reason could anybody possibly have for doing that? Why would anyone want to hurt her?” I cried. The thought of someone binding Pippa and harming her so violently was just insane to me. She was such a sweet girl. She didn’t deserve that.

  “I don’t think it was her that mattered,” Thayne said, pulling me back to the conversation.

  “What? Of course she mattered! How could you even say that?”

  Raising his brow, he held up his hands. “That is not what I meant. Of course she mattered. She mattered very much. What I am trying to say is that she didn’t matter to the killer. Whoever this was wasn’t concerned about Pippa, otherwise, he wouldn’t have left the body where he did. He was concerned about you.”

  “Me?”

  “I think… No, I know, that the body was left for you. The killer wanted you to find her, to be scared.”

  “Well, it’s worked. I was already pretty scared as it was, and now… I'm terrified.” At Thayne’s confused expression I wanted to fill him in on the strange feelings I’d been having lately, the sense that someone had been watching me, following me, but I couldn’t.

  “I’ll find them, Eve. I’ll find whoever did this and make them pay.”

  “I know you will,” I whispered. For the first time in my life, I was beginning to trust a vampire. Even if it was against my better judgement.

  Thayne

  It had taken a week, but finally, I was able to search the place unseen. I was happy in a way, but the fact that it had taken Pippa being killed and Eve left traumatized to finally make it happen pissed me off good and proper.

  Once I was sure that Eve was sound asleep and that the place was now well and truly empty, I made my way upstairs to the main floor. I’d searched the cellar twice over already since my arrival, so there wasn’t much point in searching down there again. No, with Eve asleep and with the knowledge that the CCTV system didn’t even fucking record – a fact that pissed me right off – I began my search of the main club and offices. I felt bad going through Eve’s office, but it needed to be done. I didn’t discover anything there to help in my search for information on the fight between him and Denton, but I did learn one thing – something that I already kind of knew. Gideon was a bastard.

  Piled high upon her desk were not only papers concerning the club and its everyday running, but the Council of Masters too. Gideon was making Eve do his job. What the fuck! That was one thing to going to inform the Council.

  I hit a few store rooms next, finding nothing out of the ordinary before moving on to the bastard’s office. Searching through the room, I didn't turn up anything different than what I’d already discovered from being here and seeing all the paperwork in Eve’s desk. It was simple, Gideon didn’t give a shit about this place, and he was pushing all his Council of Masters work onto Eve. The only thing that did peak my interest was the diary upon his desk. Every week, every Friday to be exact, the day was ringed in a thick red pen. Flicking through it, I discovered the pattern continued. Every Friday from this week on, and every Friday of the year, in fact, was marked.

  What did that symbolise?

  Whatever it was, I would have to wait another week to find out, as it was now Saturday… or maybe not. Next to last night’s date the word ‘reschedule’ were pencilled in.

  Reschedule what?

  When I got to the shelves of the large bookcase in the corner of the room, I was amazed at the amount of dust covering the spines of the books. No one had touched any of these in a very long time, years even. I was betting these had belonged to Denton. I didn’t want to alert Gideon of my presence in the room, so I kept my hands away from the dust covered objects.

  Scanning my eyes over the contents of the shelves my gaze froze on a large box sat upon the top shelf. Unlike everything else, the box had very little dust upon it. Curiosity got the better of me, and I reached for it, removing it from the shelf and taking it over to the desk. There was something about it; a feeling I got that told me there was something important in this box.

  Lifting the lid, my suspicions were spot on. Within the box were a small group of items, one of which really peaked my interest. Laid among a group of small glass vials, some filled with blood, was a tracking device.

  Tracking devices were used for one reason, and one reason only in the vampire world.... to keep track of an Owned.

  The Owned were humans that belonged to a vampire or group of vampires. I wasn’t a fan of vampires keeping humans as pets or possessions, but I had been paid a very high price every now and again for the return of an owned human. Finding a tracking device hidden away here in Gideon’s office – one still stained with old blood – could be held as evidence against him in the future if I failed to find out any information on his and Denton’s fight. Stealing another’s Owned was a big crime in our world, one that could lose you your fangs if you stole from the wrong person.

  Taking one of the vials, I unscrewed the lid, lifting the small bottle up to scent. It wasn’t unusual for a vampire to keep blood around for consumption, but an amount that small and not kept refrigerated was strange. The smell of the blood was strong, refreshing, potent – very potent saying that it was old, cold blood – and it had a slightly familiar scent to it. What was this stuff?

  Deciding to take the risk, I shoved one of the vials and the tracker into my pocket, before returning the box to its place. I’d have to send the small bottle off for testing. There was just something about it that felt a little off to me, and I wanted to know what. For all I knew it wasn’t human, and the last thing we needed was for another vampire to become addicted to feeding on their own kind. Once was enough. I also needed to find out who the tracker belonged to, who was missing an Owned.

  Removing my phone from my pocket, I called the one person I knew would be able to get me the information that I wanted. “Brad?”

  “You do know what time it is?”

  The sun was rising. Most of my kind, Brad included, would be heading to bed around now if they already weren’t. “Sorry about that, but I need a favour. I’ve found something I want checking out. A vial of blood. I’ve just got this funny feeling that it is more than what it seems.”

  “Okay, send it to the hotel and I’ll get it check out.”

  “Thanks, mate. There’s one more thing… I found a tracker, one that’s been removed from its host. If I send it to you, any chance you can find out who it belongs to?”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “All I ask. But don’t let on as to where it was found. The last thing I need is for some stick-up-his-ass vampire to come st
rolling in and bust my cover.”

  Hanging up, I got back to work, rigging up my own secret set of cameras around the room. Hopefully, I’d be able to get some information in the footage.

  I made one more call before returning to the cellar room. Eve was still sound asleep, curled up tightly in a ball under the mountain of blankets I had piled upon her. She was human, fragile. I didn’t want her catching a cold or anything from being down here all night. Being a vampire, the cold didn’t affect me; I was comfortable with it.

  Looking over at the spot where I’d made my bed on the other side of the room, I had the urge to move it closer to her. It was almost as large as the urge I had to climb into the bed with her. Giving in to that first urge, knowing that even though she had held on for dear life to me earlier, she wouldn’t appreciate me jumping between the sheets, I dragged my makeshift bed along the floor, placing it only a few feet away from the futon. If she asked anything about me moving it when she woke up, I would just say that I thought it would be better if I were closer, just in case she had bad dreams. And with what she had been through tonight, I wouldn’t be surprised if she did.

  Lying on my side, I watched her sleep for a while, finding peace in the slow rise and fall of her chest, the flutter of her eyelashes. Her mouth-watering scent filled the small room, reminding me that I never actually got to feed tonight. I would need to take care of that first thing. I wouldn’t mind sinking my fangs into her delicious flesh and taking a taste of what I could only imagine would be the most succulent feast of my life, but I doubted that after what she had seen tonight she’d let my fangs anywhere near her.

  Still, a guy could dream.

  ***

  “Has he gone?” I asked as I entered the room.