On Midnight Wings

As he studied the silent FBI agent, Lucien skimmed one hand along the back of a leather chair parked in front of Heyne’s desk. The buttery aroma of sunblock filled the room. Beneath that, he detected another familiar, but surprising, scent.

SAC Heyne wasn’t mortal. He was nightkind.

And using stay-awake pills like those Merri Goodnight had given Von.

Slim and of average height, Heyne’s skin was a shade lighter than his dark coffee eyes, his short-cropped hair flecked with gray. Given the lack of lines in Heyne’s face, Lucien suspected the gray came courtesy of Clairol in an attempt to mimic the passage of time.

“I admit, I didn’t expect a vampire,” Lucien commented. “I must applaud the FBI’s efforts at diversity.”

“Who are you?” Heyne looked Lucien over, speculative gaze drinking in and weighing details. “Suit’s too expensive, too fine for government wear, so I think I can safely eliminate you from the SB rank and file.” His nostrils flared. “What are you? You’re not mortal, not vampire—”

“No, I’m not,” Lucien agreed, unknotting and removing his tie. He draped it over the back of the chair. “Who I am doesn’t matter. As for what, perhaps it’d be best if I demonstrated. Save us a little time in pooh-poohing, denials, and demands for proof.”

Heyne arched one eyebrow. “Color me intrigued,” he said in a dry baritone, keeping the gun—what looked like a standard-issue Glock—aimed at heart level.

“You might as well put that away, it won’t do a bit of good.”

“I think I’ll keep it.”

Lucien shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

“If this is a stripper-gram, supernatural or otherwise,” Heyne said as Lucien continued to undress, “I’m all out of cash.”

“It’s not. And keep your wallet in your pants.”

Once his suit jacket and shirt had joined the tie on the back of the chair, he flexed his shoulders and unfurled his wings, fanning the smoky incense scent of wing musk and deep, dark earth into the air.

Heyne’s gun dropped from his hand to thud against the carpet. His eyes widened in mingled disbelief and fascination. “Fallen,” he whispered.

Blue flames arced around Lucien’s body, electrifying the air, and glowing as reflections from picture frames, the polished leather, and in Heyne’s eyes. Lucien’s hair, tied back in a ponytail, snaked into the air on the currents of Fallen power.

“What do you want?” Heyne asked with surprising calm.

“Information,” Lucien said. “And I’ll ask each question once and once only.”

“And if I refuse to answer?”

“You have a choice: pain free or not. To be honest, I hope you choose not. It’s been a long time since I’ve delivered a bit of Old Testament–style wrath.”

Heyne’s face turned the color of ashes. “Ask, then. If I know, I’ll tell you.”

“Does James Wallace know that he was the Bureau’s Trojan horse?”

Heyne scooped up the Glock, but by the time he fired a split second later, Lucien was already on him, wrenching the gun from his fingers and enfolding the vampire within his smooth black wings.

Lucien smiled. “Old Testament it is, then.”

7 BENEATH A CURVED SHADOW BATON ROUGE DOUCET-BAINBRIDGE SANITARIUM

“DANTE? DANTE-ANGEL? YOU NEED to wake up before they come back.”

A child’s voice—Chloe?—patted against Dante’s consciousness just like the fingers against his face. Her words sounded worried, a frowning downward turn of tone that suggested she was dealing with something she didn’t quite understand.

He tasted blood at the back of his throat—his own. Smelled it, thick and copper bright. Pain throbbed at his temples, prickled deep in his chest. Hunger scraped through him with razor-edged claws, leaving him hollowed, empty.

A woman’s voice whispered through his memory, the words as casual as a shrug, You won’t save her, you know. You’ll fail.

And from deeper within: Again.

Dante’s eyes flew open. Black specks pinpricked his vision. The brilliant overheads spiked jagged shards of light through his pupils and into his brain and, wincing, he lifted a hand to shield his eyes.

“Goody! You’re awake!”

He blinked until the specks vanished and Chloe’s freckled face, framed by long tendrils of red hair, swam into focus above him. Given his perspective, Dante realized that he had to be lying on the floor, the eight-year old kneeling beside him.

“What’s wrong, princess? You okay?” Dante asked. His words sounded slurred—even to himself, as fuzzy as the thoughts shuffling through his aching head. And he didn’t feel like he was waking up at twilight, hungry and alert; he felt more like he did at dawn, just before Sleep rushed over him in a cool, dark wave and yanked him under.

Worse, he felt shaky and weak, like he’d hadn’t fed in days.

Another voice whispered: This is all wrong. You need to wake your ass up.

“I’m okay, but you’re bleeding again, Dante-angel,” Chloe announced, touching her nose, then her ears to demonstrate from where. “I don’t think the doctor fixed your owies right.”