Pure Blood_ A Nocturne City Novel - Caitlin Kittredge [22]
Today was not one of those days.
“Do you know where you’re going?” Shelby asked, watching the retreating were. I was just hoping that his fifteen testosterone-fueled buddies weren’t right behind him, looking to mate. Ford Fairlanes weren’t built to keep out horny were men.
“Not really,” I said, “but I have a feeling we’ll know it when we see it.” I drove forward again, keeping an eye out for sigils and ward marks, or anyone who looked vaguely anemic.
I had hoped never to come back to Ghosttown, but I always did, like a sailor to a siren call. A few miles away, in the section of the projects hit worst by the Riots, I had killed Alistair Duncan. Not in time to stop him from sacrificing Dmitri’s sister Olya to his working, but he was dead all the same. Murdered by my were.
“Stop it,” I muttered out loud.
“Stop what?” Shelby asked, and I waved her off. If I had shot Alistair Duncan in the head, I wouldn’t have this tempest of guilt and blood inside me. He needed to be killed. I had done the job. Whether by a bullet in the brain or teeth to the throat, I had done what was right and demanded of me.
And I had let the phase take me willingly, and once again someone had ended up dead because of it.
I was actually happy to see a brick apartment house marked with a blood sigil on the door. You know things are bad when you’re looking forward to meeting the head of a black-magic-using, human-sacrificing clan more than to being alone with your own thoughts.
“This is so not the place I want to be,” Shelby said. She got out of the car and adjusted her shirt so her gun showed.
“You and me both,” I told her, locking the Fairlane, not that it would do any good.
“Do you have any idea of the stories I’ve heard about these people?” Shelby demanded as I advanced on the door and knocked. The sigil was real blood—old and dried to crackling, but real, human blood.
“I can probably guess,” I muttered, brushing my hands on my jeans. “Look, just try to not be … yourself, and we’ll keep it short and sweet.”
“Sure.” Shelby snorted. “And after this, we’ll all go ice-skating at the rink in the ninth circle of Hell.”
The door swung open and a hollow-cheeked face peered through the crack. “What?”
I presented my shield and a smile, which produced no discernable result.
“Cops aren’t welcome at this address,” the face said. “Piss off.”
My foot kept the door from slamming shut, and I vowed if he’d hurt my boots I’d kick him. “We’re not here to harass you. I need to see whoever’s in charge.”
“Blackburn doesn’t traffic with plain humans,” said the doorman. He cast a look of contempt at Shelby and then focused back on me. “Get a warrant if your panties are in a bunch. Otherwise leave us alone.”
“Hey, genius,” I said, reaching through the crack and grabbing him by the front of his mesh shirt. “If I really wanted to come in, do you think your pasty ass would stop me? I’m being polite, and you’ve got about five more seconds of that before I kick the door down and walk over you.”
“She’ll do it,” Shelby confirmed. The doorman’s mouth crimped in disgust.
“Give the meat puppets a little power and they breed a world of fascists,” he sniffed.
“Whatever,” I said, shoving the door open wide. “Go be a good little houseboy and tell Blackburn we need to see him.”
In full view he was tall and painfully skinny, shocking pale skin against black clothes. “And what may I tell him this is regarding?” he asked, sniffing down his nose at us.
I said, “Tell him it’s about Vincent.”
After disappearing and reappearing with a summons, the doorman led us up a flight of narrow stairs with questionable integrity, and down a hallway lined with small efficiency apartments, most missing their doors. The dour décor was mid-century industrial, dingy gray carpet under my feet and acoustical tiles leaking black mold above us. My nose rebelled and I coughed discreetly, covering the lower half of my face.
“How many people are in here?” Shelby asked quietly as we passed an apartment where a woman holding a baby was cooking.
“Enough to make our lives unpleasant