Royal Pains (Vampire Kings 2)

Still, after seeing Candy off at the door, Maddox found himself going to Will’s room just to make doubly sure the boy was not out terrorizing glib tv hosts. He opened the door to reveal Will passed out in the moonlight, looking the perfect image of masculine repose. That was a relief.

“If not you, boy,” he murmured. “Then who?”

Will took a deep breath in his sleep and let out a little feral growl. He didn’t know the answer, of course. He was still a very simple, very innocent human. The rest of his kind might have considered him a vessel of violent guilt but to Maddox’s gaze there was still some part of Will that remained untouched and entirely pure. In the silver light coming through the bars of the window, he was cast in an almost ethereal glow. He was beautiful. Maddox felt a surge of protectiveness and desire. Perhaps he’d wake him. Perhaps…

Clunk.

Somewhere in the house something moved that shouldn’t move.

He knew it was not Lorien or Will. Will was fast asleep and Lorien was out doing whatever it was Lorien did these days. He did not monitor Lorien. Lorien was the city’s problem as far as he was concerned. That meant it was someone or something quite exciting. An intruder. It had been a very long time since Maddox had dealt with an intruder.

Maddox followed the sound throughout his home. The initial clunk did not repeat itself, but there was a great deal of surreptitious rustling coming from the area of his home dedicated to admin and secrets. The door to his office was open enough to allow him to peer through, and…

“What are you doing, Candy?”

The woman jumped up, tried to close the drawer she’d been snooping through, and managed to shut her own hand in it in the process. Maddox watched dispassionately as she flung her hand about in the attempt to soothe the pain.

“Looking for a pen, sir.”

He sighed at the obvious lie. First Will, now Candy. His home was absolutely bursting with humans snooping about the place. A lesser vampire might have become concerned that he was losing control, but he was accustomed to people not doing what he wanted. He was not, however, used to Candy being one of those people.

She began to wither underneath his gaze.

“What are you doing, Candy?”

“I…” she took a breath. “You know what the wolf thing is. I want to know too.”

“Don’t lie to me,” Maddox snapped harshly enough to shock her.

“I want to know what else is in the city. I want to know what might hurt people. That’s why I work in this unit. I want to serve and protect my community.”

Maddox glanced around. “Are there television cameras here?”

“Sir?”

“You appear to be attempting to make an advertisement for the NYPD, so I assumed you must have installed cameras.”

Candy’s face fell. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I know I’ve crossed several lines. But you don’t understand. These creatures, they're not just monsters. I mean. They’re not animals, and they're not fakes. They're real, and most of the time they look like people.”

“I think you should tell me exactly what you know,” Maddox said. “And then I will decide what to do with you.”

“I met one when I was a teenager. He was the same age as I was. He was like nobody I had ever met. He… we…”

“Yes, it ended in a baby in a dumpster,” Maddox said. “I should have recognized you.”

“What I did was bad,” Candy admitted without missing a beat, not even bothering to deny the cold horror of her past. “But what he is… what he is, is so much worse…”

William’s eyes opened the second his door closed. He needed to get out of the house again. He had a date with Chauvelin. Fortunately, Maddox seemed to be preoccupied. Will peeked out of his door and saw the vampire going down to his office. Perfect. He wouldn’t hear anything from there.

Will pulled on clothes and slipped out the back door, down the alley where he had once broken his leg. Tonight was the most important night of his life, potentially. Tonight he was going to finally find out who his father was.

Chauvelin had told him to meet him under a bridge on one of the roads that fed into the main arterials and onto the interstate. He’d also suggested he bring a bag, though Will hadn’t done that. He didn’t want anything weighing him down, and if Maddox caught him, he didn’t want to be holding.

At first it seemed like nobody was there. Will was on edge. It was possible that this was a set up. His death would be a bonus for Chauvelin any way you cut it. It would remove one threat to the vampire’s life, and it would hurt Maddox. Hell, if Will were Chauvelin he would have had him jumped as quickly as possible.