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“That’s only one of many questions that we’ll be addressing throughout this investigation. We will find all our answers, Lucius. I give you my word.”
He stood then, his posture suggesting the interview was over. Sara pushed to her feet as well, accidentally dropping her pad and file. She bent over to pick up the papers and photos and found herself looking into Braddock’s cold, dead eyes. Luke had done this. A vampire. A killer.
He’d torn Braddock’s neck out, drained his blood. And now he sat there, calm and cool despite having committed such a heinous crime. A crime as personal to her as his hands upon her naked body had been. She fought the memory back, unwilling to think about the intimate things they’d done together only hours after he’d gone out and murdered Judge Braddock.
The thought sickened her, her reaction all the more intense because the man had gotten under her skin.
“Record off,” Leviathan said. He turned to Sara, ignoring Luke. “We’ll talk in my office.”
He headed for the door and she followed.
“I won’t say it’s been a pleasure, Nikko,” Luke said, his voice controlled and confident. “But I will say that I look forward to seeing Ms. Constantine again. I’m sure our future interviews will be illuminating.”
Slowly and deliberately, she turned in his direction. “I look forward to it, too, Mr. Dragos. This case is mine now, and I promise you that I won’t rest until the dead have justice.”
“I believe you,” he said, his expression bland although she hoped her words had kicked him in the gut. “And may I be among the first to congratulate you on your new position.”
She started to reply, but Leviathan laid a hand upon her arm. “Advise your advocate to be present at interviews. Trust me when I say that you’re going to need him.” He keyed in the code and pulled open the door. “Constantine, with me.”
* * *
Sara sat behind her desk, trying to focus on the papers scattered there. She failed.
She couldn’t focus on anything. She felt numb and furious and betrayed all at the same time. Annoyed with herself, she opened the laptop that Blair had set up for her, then navigated to the live feed of the cell block. She selected the feed of Luke’s cell, and watched as he sat there, as still as death, and wondered what the hell he was plotting. Because there was something going on with him. Something not right.
She might be new to the PEC, but she wasn’t new to defendants. She’d tried cases from misdemeanors all the way up to capital murder. And over the years, she’d come to know how defendants thought. Luke, she was certain, was weaving a plan.
But what?
She sighed, her eyes on the screen. She’d never expected this. Never even had a hint that he was the kind of man who could commit murder. On the contrary, he had a giving soul. She thought about the apartment for Melanie and frowned.
He was a protector, not a killer.
Was he that good a liar? Or was she missing something important?
She glanced at the screen again, only to find him looking straight at the camera, and it felt as though he was looking at her, sliding deep into her thoughts. Urging her to trust him even now.
Bastard.
She slammed the laptop shut, then sighed. He’d used her, and she didn’t like being used. And now that she was opposing him, he’d try to manipulate her, and she definitely didn’t like being manipulated.
Well, he’d picked the wrong woman. Their night together had been exceptional, but if he thought that would push her toward leniency, he was very mistaken.
He was a vampire.
The thought kept returning, as if she was likely to forget.
She wasn’t, and yet she still couldn’t wrap her head about the reality.
She’d truly slept with a vampire. Worse, with a murderer.
And yet none of those facts lined up with the Luke she knew. With the man who’d touched her so tenderly.
Stop it.
Almost without realizing she was doing it, she pulled her wallet out of her purse, then withdrew the small photograph she kept behind her driver’s license. A picture of her and her father. He looked undeniably professorial in a tweed jacket and holding a pipe, and she’d been trussed up in a dress with an itchy petticoat. They’d come—she and her mother—to watch her father receive an award. Sara didn’t know for what, only that a lot of people were applauding for her daddy. She’d made it a point to clap the loudest.
Four days later, her father was dead. His neck ripped open. His blood drained. And her own screams echoing through the neighborhood.
