Pure Blood_ A Nocturne City Novel - Caitlin Kittredge [77]
“Detective, we have a problem,” said the SWAT captain.
“What is it, Captain…”
“Fuller, ma’am, and I’m a sergeant.”
“Sorry. Sergeant Fuller. What’s the problem?”
He pointed at Valerie, who was still sitting primly upright like a Valium-fueled prom queen. “The young lady claims she’s not being held against her will.”
That got me on my feet. “What? She was kidnapped, for the love of all things Hexed and holy!”
“So you say, Detective,” said Fuller with a calm that was utterly maddening. I bet he was a hostage negotiator. “But Miss Blackburn says she wasn’t taken against her will, nor was she imprisoned at any time.”
The compulsion was still in full force. I looked at Fuller, the room full of SWAT officers, literal and red-blooded and reality-based to a man. Trying to explain daemon magick, witches, weres, and a caster witch-blood witch feud over a carved-up skull was beyond my abilities right then.
“We have to let everyone go,” said Fuller. “No crime, no arrests. I’m sorry, ma’am.” He gave me an awkward shoulder pat and a sympathetic smile. Probably thought I was cracking up. Hell, I thought I was cracking up.
Joshua, released from handcuffs, sauntered over. “Better luck next time, Miss Detective.”
“Stay away from me, Joshua,” I warned. “I doubt anyone in Nocturne City would blame me for putting a couple of slugs in your smarmy face.”
“Except Seamus O’Halloran,” he said, still in that infuriating calm tone. “I’m head of security for his holdings.”
“Bend over and I’ll show you what I think of that,” I growled.
“Charming. I’m really starting to wonder what I saw in you. Oh … I remember—you were easy.” He dipped his head in a bow and walked out, gesturing for his squad to follow.
I’d like to say that the comment enraged me and I smashed something or punched him in the nose, but it hurt. It hurt almost as much as seeing Dmitri with Irina, in that part of myself I try to keep hidden from general view. Joshua was under my skin. His blood was my blood, and he had the ability to tear me apart whenever he wanted. The only way to get rid of his influence was to join another pack, or die.
Since neither of those were an option at the moment, I went out to the Fairlane, stripped off my Kevlar, sat in the driver’s seat with the windows rolled up and screamed until my throat was raw.
CHAPTER 23
The sun was setting over Siren Bay when I finally made it back to the city, illuminating the swooping outline of the bridge in black relief. The cottage was that mellow pinkish color it gets at sunset, the denuded climbing roses hiding the peeling paint and missing boards.
I turned off my cell phone and my land line, tossed my gun on the kitchen table, and shed pieces of clothing as I went upstairs, turning the cranky faucet in the old tub hot as far as it would go. I needed Joshua’s stink off me.
Thirty minutes later I was clean and smelled of tea tree oil and peach extract, but my thoughts were no less black. I couldn’t remember when I’d been this confused, and furious, and tired.
How dare Joshua try to use his dominate on me? And how had I fallen for it? I was a proud Insoli. I bowed to no one. Except the man who made you, I whispered.
I wrapped a towel around my head and another around my torso and kicked the growing pile of laundry around the basket as I went past. Tidiness had been Sunny’s reason for living, not mine.
If Joshua could exert his pack influence over me, it was bad all around. I’d lose my status as a free were, my effectiveness as a detective. My entire life was compromised the second I laid eyes on him.
Hex it.
I was about to dig an old bottle of scotch from some forgotten party out of the cabinet under the sink and drink myself into oblivion when I heard voices downstairs and froze. I smelled three distinct bodies, two female and one male, all musky with the odor of were.
Weres. In my house. Whoever they were, they were about to be very freaking sorry.
I padded down the stairs on light bare feet, balling my fists as I came around the corner into