“Is anyone going to go check on the girl? On Devon?”
Andrew shrugged. “Not that I’m aware of. You know how the Master is. He doesn’t give a shit about humans other than the money and feeding opportunities they bring into the club. Of course, I wouldn’t care about their species, either, if I’d spent the majority of my life being hunted by them.”
“Yeah, but we don’t live like that anymore. Times are changing.”
“Not enough.” Andrew wrung out the mop over the sink and rinsed it out with clean water. “Forget about her, Kohl. She’s not for you. Her notoriety alone would bring way too much attention to you. To us.”
“I know.” And he did know. He would never do anything that would bring a threat to their doorstep. Of any kind. Besides, a woman like Devon would never accept someone—something—like him. Not of her own free will. “I know,” he repeated. Whether for Andrew’s sake or his own was hard to say.
“Come on, let’s go get some sleep. The cleaning crew will take care of the rest of this.” Andrew squeezed his shoulder. “There’s nothing we can do right now, even if we wanted to. The sun is about to rise.”
Actually, it wouldn’t be up for a few hours yet. Plenty of time if he knew where Devon lived. Kohl rolled the idea around in his head. He could call the cab company. Or just go to the cab company. Find out who the driver was. Force him to tell him where she lives. He couldn’t do the mind-fuck thing, but he could use the scary vampire tactic. Of course, then he’d have to kill the guy or risk exposure. Not something he’d prefer to do, but sometimes it was necessary.
“Kohl.”
His thoughts scattered, and he lifted his head to find Andrew waiting for him. “I’m coming.” His friend was right. There was nothing to do for it now.
They told Hawke they were heading in, and then made their way to the back door. Not the one by the bathrooms that led outside, but the one at the end of the hallway on the other side of the bar.
Andrew unlocked the combination lock and placed his palm on the sensor pad. There was a soft click, and he pulled the door open, holding it for Kohl. A steel ramp stretched out before them, winding its way to and fro on a gradual decline. At the bottom, they entered another hallway of sorts. Only this one was carved from natural limestone, the same color as the sand that passed for dirt in central Texas.
Soft lighting installed by the coven lit their way. It was needed this far underground where there was no luminosity at all. Even vampires couldn’t see in complete and utter darkness, but it was the safest place for their kind, especially during the long central Texas summer.
Kohl’s pulse kicked up at the conceived threat of sunlight, guaranteed to burn someone like him to ash within sixty seconds or less, even as the beast within him stretched languidly, longing to bathe its scaly skin in its warmth. It was a continuous tug of war between his two natures he lived with on a daily basis. More than once he’d caught himself heading out the door in the middle of the day, aching to feel the sunshine soaking into his skin, only to make a fast retreat the moment the rays actually touched him.
Down in the caverns, the passage walls were rough to the touch and dripping with moisture from the humidity, and the ceiling was so low in places Kohl had to duck so he didn’t bump his head. About fifty feet in, the tunnel widened into a small, natural cavern. The path they were on hugged the wall, and to his left, he looked down over a reservoir filled with a few feet of emerald green water. In the summer, when the rain stopped, it would dry up until it was barely a few inches deep. If it was a bad year of drought, it dried up completely. But vampires didn’t need water, other than to bathe, so it made no difference to them. And they had a system rigged that tapped into the city’s water for that.
Columns of limestone cluttered the open space, formed from water dripping slowly along the stone over millions of years. He passed by one of the largest stalactites in their home, running his fingertips over the smooth, cool surface as he passed. It had the appearance of hot candle wax melting from the ceiling, and was as big around as a telephone pole—the perfect sentry to stand guard over a forest of smaller stalagmites and stalactites huddled together on the opposite side of the water. A mound of stone pockmarked with crevices in the shapes of tiny doors decorating the front formed the base. He thought of it as the fairy house. Every time he passed it, Kohl half expected to see tiny, magical fairies come fluttering out like butterflies, leaving trails of sparkling fairy dust in their wake.
Though not the first place one would expect vampires to live with all of the technology of the twentieth century, the caverns actually worked out well for them. The temperature was a consistent seventy degrees, and just humid enough. More importantly, this particular series of caves was as yet undiscovered by humans. And the only way to access them was through the building above. Water and electricity was brought down to them from above ground. Cameras strategically mounted in and around the club would alert them to any trespassers who posed a threat, and that threat would be taken out immediately. In a worst-case scenario, the club and the passageway just on the other side of the door would self-destruct. If that happened, it would be up to Kohl to get them all out of the mass grave the coven would then find themselves in. And hopefully, he wouldn’t kill anyone in the process.
They followed the path about a quarter mile, through a myriad of passageways and caverns, until it opened up into a room nearly the size of a football field. The ceiling soared over a hundred feet above their heads, featuring a perfectly smooth circle etched into the greater part of the ceiling, the result of a long-gone colony of bats wearing away at the limestone every day as they hid from the sun. Much like the vampires.
And affixed directly in the middle of the cavern, was The Throne.
Like the entirety of the caves, it had been formed naturally from an underground stream that had once moved through the stone, forging it into the shape of a large throne-like structure, with armrests and everything. Above it, a curtain of stalactites hung over the chair, melted together to form a curtain-like formation. Below it, the stone formed natural steps.
In his darkest fantasies, Kohl imagined all of that stone crumbling down onto the head of the male who now sat there. But the Master didn’t really deserve that. He wasn’t a kind male, or real easy-going. He was an ancient vampire, and set in his ways. But, most of the time, he was fair. He’d also agreed to take in Kohl when he’d had nowhere else to go, even though he was a complete stranger to their coven. Not wholly vampire, but something…other. And for that, he would be forever grateful. It was hard to survive in this world without a group. The saying was true, there was safety in numbers.
The coven leader turned his head as he and Andrew walked in, his long, blond hair hanging to his waist. It was often spotted with dried blood from his last meal, giving him the look of a hyena. His form was solid and stocky, without a soft spot on him. Huge forearms used to wielding battle-axes rested on the cold stone, and thighs as big around as tree trunks tested the endurance of his worn leather pants.
Dark eyes narrowed on the two of them, and the Master held up a palm the size of a grizzly’s, quieting the others in the room. Some of them had been up in the club when the shooting happened, some had not.
Kohl spotted Jaz at the edge of the crowd, easy to pick out with his long, black hair and telltale jean vest he’d been “gifted” from a biker in California. The vampire grinned, his broken fang in full view, and toasted Kohl with his cup. Probably filled with the blood of one of the shooting victims. After a measuring glance, Kohl gave him a nod and looked away. Though Jaz never spoke of how he’d lost his fang, Kohl knew it had to have been a traumatic experience, even for a vampire. He knew this because Jaz’s state of mind was what was referred to in the vampire community as “fragile,” and he was often given some slack for his actions where others were not. But, they were family, and they all watched his back, and kept him from getting into any serious trouble.
“Kohl. Come here, please.” Voices fell to hushed whispers as the Master’s deep timbre echoed through the cavern.
Andrew slapped him on the shoulder, and with a small bow to the Master, wandered off to his room—one of the smaller caverns down a passageway behind The Throne. No one went anywhere without passing within sight or hearing of the Master. He kept a close eye on his coven. Kohl couldn’t blame him. It was mostly made up of a group of misfit vampires who, for one reason or another, had had to leave their original families.
He walked up to the Master, and went down on one knee. An old-school way to show respect, but one that was still insisted upon. “Master.” He realized at that moment he didn’t even know the vampire’s born name.
“Get up. And tell me what happened upstairs.”
He did as ordered, a tingle of apprehension lifting the hair on the back of his neck. “You haven’t gotten the full report, yet?”
“I saw the shooters on the cameras. I also saw you move faster than any bullet to dive across the dance floor to save a woman. A human woman.” The word was spit out of his mouth like a mouthful of moldy broccoli.
Kohl rubbed the slight ache in his hip unconsciously. He’d nearly forgotten getting hit. There was a tear in his pants, one in front and one in back, where the bullet had gone through, and the material was stiff with dried blood. The wound had healed quickly. Still… “I wouldn’t say I was faster.”
