Black Bird (Nevermore Duet #1)

CHAPTER 17

LENORE

Sarah had spent two days trying to figure out what to do with the information Brent had given her after he came by her apartment that night. Her blood remained in a bag in her fridge and her sanity was becoming dangerously close to slipping. Was there a single person in her life that hadn’t had some part in shoving a knife into her back? She’d worked so hard. So damned hard to get that job. She promised herself a bright future and the answers to all the questions that had haunted her like a chained ghost of her precious mother, who she desperately wished she could talk to about everything that had happened. Wished she could get some kind of advice about love … about pretty much anything. She missed her.

“What do I do, Mom?” she whispered into the dark of her bedroom as she clutched the old blanket to her chest. She turned onto her side and curled her knees up, a single tear falling onto her pillow. “Everything is so fucked up.” Her eyes found the photo on her nightstand. The faces were barely visible with the small amount of streetlight coming in from her curtained window. Whispers feathered through her mind as if in answer.

Just a bunch of nonsense … utter nonsense.

Sarah squeezed her eyes shut and tried to concentrate on them as they grew louder. All the voices seemed so jumbled … unorganized. Floor? Shore? She imagined a hand in the darkness—her hand … reaching out toward some kind of answer. Some of the voices began to quiet as if they were moving farther away. Still, she reached out. One voice seemed to remain …

“Lenore.”

Sarah’s eyes tore open and focused on her mother’s sweet face in the photo. The whispering became a longing call … a name she’d buried but realized how it suddenly all made sense.

“Lenore …” the voice repeated, the voice a song within her.

Sarah’s eyes filled with tears as she turned her wrist and peered at the tattoo. “Nameless here forevermore,” she whispered back. There was a reason. A reason that fate had brought the two of them together. A reason that her mother gave her a name she’d never use but had so much purpose. Every purpose. She sat up in her bed, leaning over to switch her lamp on and looking across her apartment to the discarded poster in the corner with the busted frame. She wondered if he knew. She glanced at the clock that rested on the nightstand. Nearly two in the morning and she’d never even dozed off, although every part of her felt heavy and exhausted. Sarah’s mind fluttered with so many things, but his face was the most demanding of all of them .

It was real for her. Still was, and God help her, she missed him. She couldn’t sleep. Had eaten very little in the last couple of days, save for her coffee and cigarettes. Although it seemed like the wisest decision to let him go, she wondered if she’d ever get over it. Wondered if he was awake … if he was thinking about her. If there was even the slightest chance that he hurt as deeply as she did right now. Sarah’s head hung and she sighed deeply, sniffling and reaching over to switch the lamp back off and grab her phone from the nightstand. She opened his name on her contact list and stared at the picture she’d snapped of him sleeping the morning everything had gone to shit. Stared at the number beneath it.

Don’t do it. You’re stronger than that.

Sarah wasn’t sure which part of herself won that war when she moved her thumb away from the call button and dropped down onto her pillow, tossing her phone back onto the table. She didn’t know how long she lay there, still as death. Didn’t glance at the clock again. Her eyes fixed on a shadow casted on her ceiling from the dim window light and she daydreamed about any moment they’d shared those looks. As pathetic as it was to admit, he was still the only thing that seemed to settle her restless soul. And who would know how often he crossed her mind if she never said a word about it? The shadows became abstract shapes the longer she focused on them. Shapes that—like everything else in her life—made no sense. She laid on her back and tucked her arms beneath her worn-out blanket.

It was so windy out tonight. The chill of the late fall air soothed him as Athan stood out on his balcony and drew on the filter of his second cigarette since stepping out. The sky was clear, and the stars were bright as it neared the witching hour. He would almost find it beautiful if he hadn’t grown to resent the night and all it now represented these long years after he’d become what he was. He found himself longing more for the daylight now, than when it used to be a death sentence. He couldn’t get his mind off the woman who’d fixed that problem as he dragged another chestful of smoke and blew it softly through his nose. She was shutting everyone out again. Wasn’t speaking much to Wren, and none at all to Rhaena. Athan couldn’t help but wonder if she’d medicated that gaping loneliness with Stratford, or some other nameless prick. He wouldn’t blame her if she did, but he prayed to God he was wrong.

Athan’s eyes cut to the side of town where he knew she likely slept. Slept, or was up reading, or maybe neither. Maybe she was thinking about him, too. He’d be happy just knowing he was on her mind, even if when she thought of him it made her very blood boil. He told himself he’d hold out. If there was any truth to what Rhaena and Wren said about how women think … maybe she’d eventually seek him out again. He just wanted one chance—one chance to tell her she was wrong. So wrong .

“You made me believe that what we felt for each other, however forbidden it was, was something real, and—then I find out that it wasn’t real for you at all.”

But it was. It still was and would always be. She had changed every part of his lonely existence. She fought off the darkness that had consumed him for so long. She didn’t just gift him sunlight … she was his sunlight. The only thing that had thawed the ice around his heart after centuries of the darkest winter. He was nothing without her. If he could just hear her voice …

“Fuck this.” His cigarette flew from his fingertips and was caught on the biting wind that howled past him. Athan stepped back inside and grabbed his phone, resting his elbow above his head against the open sliding glass door and not giving himself any time to reconsider how stupid this was.

The phone started ringing.

Sarah’s deep moans were free to echo through her empty apartment but caught by her teeth as they sank into her bottom lip. She rolled over onto her stomach, her hips rolling against her slick hand as she let go of everything and let her body convulse around a truly forceful release. It wasn’t her touch that had her knees quaking, it was his head between her legs. It hadn’t been her fingers that she was riding, but him . Of course, she knew that neither of those things were the truth … however … he had been the reason for the mess she’d left beneath her blanket. Sarah’s hair blew in and out of her face with the shallow breaths she was heaving against her pillow. Maybe now she could sleep. She dragged her hand up from between her thighs and slid it under her pillow as her body sagged in debility.

No sooner than the thought of not moving a single muscle overtook her, the phone next to her bed started ringing, startling her enough to make her face tingle—or maybe that was from the aftermath of what she’d just done to herself.

“You’ve got to be joking,” she whispered, rolling her eyes in exhaustion and disbelief. She gathered any remaining strength in her still trembling arms and turned herself on her side to reach for her phone. She nearly choked when his picture appeared on the screen. Her finger hovered almost too long over the green circle, but her curiosity got the better of her. At least, that was what she’d blame it on. She was still winded and said nothing as she pressed the phone to her ear. She wasn’t really sure what to say.

“Sarah …”

Her heart sped up and she continued to breathe like she’d just ran ten miles. “Is Wren okay?” she asked, wondering if maybe that was the reason he’d be calling her at this hour. It didn’t matter that she’d contemplated the same thing only minutes ago, and for no other reason than to hear him speak.

“She’s fine, I—” Athan paused, “Are you alright?”

“Why are you calling me at three in the morning?” She couldn’t help but ask. Silence. “Athan …”

“Because … I—” Another pause.

“What if I hadn’t answered?”

“Why did you?”

Now it was her turn to go silent. Sarah bit down on her lip. The war within her began its battle cry again, and again she wasn’t sure what side she was favoring when she chose not to tell him that it was because she wished he were here with her in this bed. “Are you really gonna make me say it, when you haven’t given me a single explanation for the way my heart is breaking, Athan Kane?” Her eyes prickled with tears.

“You were wrong, Sarah …”

“Wrong about what?”

“It was real for me, too. It always was.” She could hear him breathing heavier. “It still is.”

A single tear crept down her cheek. “Say it, Athan.” He was so quiet for such a long time that she almost thought he’d hung up the phone. Sarah glanced at the screen. The call was still going. She heard him sigh, and finally …

“Eagerly I wished the morrow … vainly I had sought to borrow … from my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore …” His voice was a sound that sent every muscle to unrest … especially with the mention of her middle name that was called for the second time tonight. She wanted to tell him to come over. Wanted to feel him next to her and to hear him say it again … but it was what he wouldn’t say that broke her further, and Sarah closed her eyes in defeat.

“I’m busy … I need to go.” It was all she could do to hide the emotion in her own voice. She couldn’t will her eyes back open.

Athan hid in the shadows of the corner on the rooftop, keeping one eye on Sarah through her window… another on the oblivious officers watching porn on their phones outside the lower door to her apartment. She hadn’t realized throughout the conversation that he’d thrown on a shirt and jacket and spent the entire phone call going to her.

“I’m busy … I need to go.”

He watched her clutch her blanket in her fist and raise it to her face to wipe it. He’d decided if it was gonna leave his mouth for the first time in his life, then it wouldn’t be through this phone. “I’m sorry … I didn’t mean to wake you,” he breathed.

“You didn’t,” Sarah said, clearing her throat and adjusting herself. “I’ve got somebody over.” A lie, but he understood what she was trying to do. He couldn’t help the smirk that lined his mouth as he watched her .

“Understood,” he muttered with a slight nod. “Night, Sarah.” She slid the back of her finger beneath her eye and didn’t respond … but didn’t hang up, either. Athan didn’t count how many minutes passed before he finally lowered his phone and ended the call. She laid there, staring blankly until her lids slowly closed. He waited, watching her until the tendrils of dawn started to turn the sky into the deepest gray.

An unlocked window in the back of her apartment led him inside, and he quietly snuck through the shadows towards her bedside. He laid a few items next to her and tugged her blanket up to cover her shoulder—the scent of her laced with the remnants of what he realized she’d done before he had called her made him lower his brows. He glanced up at the wall behind her bed, finding the poem missing and a slight dent in the sheet rock. She had been alone. There wasn’t another trace of anyone’s scent in this entire apartment. His mind swam with the possibility that maybe he was the one she’d been thinking about. Maybe that was her reason for telling him that someone was sharing her bed when they clearly hadn’t. She turned on her side, facing him and tucked her hands beneath her pillow.

“I love you, Sarah St. James …” he whispered, brushing the hair away from her face. His chest tightened when a soft smile graced her lips. She shifted slightly and he backed away, cloaking himself in the darkness again and slipping out the way he came.

The warmth of her blanket, heated by harsh autumn sunlight coming in through her window soothed her as Sarah snuggled deeper under it. There was a strange comfort that eased her that wasn’t present after she’d hung up the phone with—

Athan …

Sarah’s eyes opened and she was greeted with the emptiness of her apartment, though she could swear she felt him there. Or maybe she had been dreaming it? An ache pelted her chest when she recalled the words he wouldn’t say. She’d downright begged him to, but he still didn’t. She needed to hear them so badly that they had haunted her dreams in the little sleep she had finally gotten in the early hours of the morning. It irritated her. Sarah rolled onto her back, her brows furrowing when she felt the stab of something underneath her. She quickly bowed off, turning onto her other side and her eyes widened.

He was here … shit.

She recognized the figurine that laid on top of a familiar leather-bound book with no title, a small glass container that made her heart stop, and a thin silver chain that wrapped around the mandible of the skull where a raven perched. The remnants of the stone in her mother’s necklace rested in one of the eye holes of the little statuette, and on the back of the skull he’d carved the word: Forevermore .

She couldn’t explain the way her heart fell out of rhythm, or the way that it made the scar on her neck tingle at the thought of him not only being here when she didn’t know it … but the possibility that what she heard come out of his mouth may not have been a dream at all. Sarah damned herself for telling him that she wasn’t alone, and her face heated in embarrassment. But then again … for the first time since she’d learned the truth, she felt lighter. Almost relieved. She swiped up her phone and dialed his number.

“Umm … hey. Everything okay?” he answered in a hushed voice. Sarah’s face scrunched.

“Why are you whispering? And were you in my apartment last night?”

He paused for a moment, and she could barely hear a few unfamiliar voices in the background. “I believe you know that answer already.”

“Why didn’t you … stay?” she asked hesitantly.

The smile was evident in his tone when he answered. “I didn’t want to disturb your overnight guest.”

“Jesus.” Sarah palmed her face in shame. “Where did you get this container?”

“I—I have to go. Don’t leave the apartment, okay?”

“What?” Before she could ask anything else, Athan had hung up and she pulled the phone away from her ear and sneered at it in confusion. “What the hell?”

Patrick’s quarters were dingy and far too small for her taste as Dahlia slipped from his tiny bed and wrapped her dark red silk robe around herself. She couldn’t explain why she’d felt the need to join him in here when she’d returned before dawn, instead of summoning him to her own bed for the day. She had no reason to explain herself anyway, in her opinion. Patrick didn’t budge, still naked and half-covered from the waist down as she crept out his door and padded toward her own room.

She hadn’t been outside this club in what seemed like ages, but last night … after deciding that Raine was either dead or had somehow run off with her newfound immortality and immunity to sunlight, Dahlia had decided to take matters into her own hands. Several heads had turned at the sight of her beauty and her strange wardrobe as she passed them on the street, but none had stopped to speak to her. Wise. She’d found her way to Sarah St. James’ apartment on her own—with a bit of help from the tug of a siring bond still tethered to someone she’d been itching to find out more about here lately. She certainly hadn’t expected it but was intrigued to find Athan lurking on the rooftop while she concealed herself into the darkness a short distance away. She had listened to what her keen hearing could make out of his half of the conversation and realized that her little blood bank had no idea that he was there .

Two unattractive police officers giggled back and forth about whatever they were watching on their phones and were completely oblivious to the vampire swiveling around the back of the building and disappearing into a side window toward the back. Dahlia followed him, taking his spot on the rooftop and watching intently as he knelt by her bedside. She didn’t have to hear the words he spoke as he softly caressed that girl’s face. Something in her aging bones twisted, her dark blood festering beneath her skin while she watched him.

So … the detective is in love.

Dahlia felt the corner of her mouth twitch with rage. She shoved it down somewhere deep and replaced that rage with the evil that came so much more naturally to her. It seemed her clever gift on Halloween hadn’t been enough to scare him away from the idea that she would ever allow him to have what she couldn’t. He belonged to her . The prized piece in her collection of souls. St. James would be another in that collection, and she’d be damned if she’d let anything stand in the way of the two things she wanted most. Dahlia moved, hiding within the shadows of the next building without so much as a scrape of sound to give her away. Athan was nearly three blocks from the apartment when she watched him get into a very stylish new vehicle and drive off.

Well … let’s give the detective something to take his mind off his little harlot.

She slipped from the shadows and prowled toward the city to find someone worthy to be the wrench she’d throw into whatever plans he had of courting anyone.

Rhaena knelt down, examining the second body they’d found that resembled Sarah St. James, this time with a far more threatening message—one that was directed at one of their own. Captain Foley had decided to visit the scene himself and he stood next to her, his dark skin and towering frame an unsettling presence as he stared with his arms tightly crossed at the message written in the victim’s blood on the sidewalk. This was going to be disastrous. Rhaena had the good sense to warn Athan that while they all knew that Sarah was safe, per the officers that had taken the day shift to stand guard at her apartment, it wasn’t going to be a pleasant day.

“Well, Gloves … your time off request may have come at a good time,” Foley said glumly, sighing after his statement.

“Why, sir?” Rhaena asked, standing. The captain didn’t answer, and they both turned toward the sound of Athan’s car arriving at the crime scene. She watched him step out and couldn’t help but notice how tired he looked when he did. He hadn’t even showered yet when she’d called to ask if he wanted to ride with her when she received the call about the body. He stopped short on his way toward them and glanced at his phone before promptly turning away and taking a call. After a couple of minutes of watching the captain grow more frustrated, Rhaena stormed after him and grabbed his shoulder, knowing full well who was on the other end of that phone just by the look on his face. She made a face of her own and jerked her head toward the black body bag that laid on the ground behind her.

“I—I have to go. Don’t leave the apartment, okay?” he said, quickly hanging up.

“You realize our captain is standing over there, right?” Rhaena said through her clenched teeth. “He’s already in a mood. Don’t make this shit worse, Kane.”

He didn’t respond, instead cutting her a glare and making his way past her toward the body. She followed behind him slowly and Foley stepped toward him. “What are you leaving out of these reports, detective? Or do you think I’m just gonna continue to look the other way?” Foley asked, his tone firm and demanding.

“Sir?” Athan asked, scrunching his brows.

Captain Foley turned to the side and pointed down at the bloody message. Rhaena stepped forward and watched Athan’s face go deathly pale.

THINK AGAIN KANE

Athan lowered himself down and slipped on a glove as he peeled back a rip in the victim’s shirt, revealing the number 73 on her slashed chest. His throat bobbed and he stared at the mutilated face. A dead black bird was shoved into the girl’s mouth. It made Rhaena tremble with anger. The slashes weren’t made with a blade this time. These were claw marks. Dahlia likely had done it herself rather than send her useless henchmen. Rhaena figured she must be growing tired of them failing to get to Sarah and had taken it upon herself to do her own dirty work. The bitch was torturing him. Taunting him in the cruelest of ways. Reminding him of his servitude and letting him know that she was well aware of his feelings for Sarah. The mere fact that she’d left her little fortress was problem enough, but she had taken it somewhere that there was no coming back from now.

“How do you know this victim, detective?” Foley asked, placing a hand on his hip.

“I don’t, sir,” Athan answered with a deadly edge to his voice. He raised and the latex glove snapped as he removed it. “It’s another staged homicide. She’s supposed to resemble—”

“St. James. I know,” Foley cut him off, stepping closer. “And I didn’t forget what you told me, Kane … but it’s out of my hands now. I’m sorry,” He cut his eyes to Rhaena. “You and Northwood are off the case.”

“Captain!” Rhaena yelped, jolting forward.

Foley raised a palm and shook his head. “There’s nothing that can be done about it, Gloves. You’ve had time. I tried to warn you both about the bigger hands in the pot.” They all turned toward six dark vehicles that pulled in around the scene. Foley leaned in and demanded their attention before lowering his voice. “If you know where she is, then get her the hell out of Boston before she’s found … either by them.” He nodded toward the team of agents emerging from the SUV convoy. “Or, by whatever deranged psychopath did this .” His long finger pointed back down at the young girl’s body.

“Conrad Stratford,” Rhaena whispered, desperate to leave the captain with some sort of direction. He lowered his brows at her. “If they take over this case … tell them to dig into Conrad Stratford.”

“He’s a very powerful man, Northwood. I can’t go on hunches here.” Foley glanced behind her as if in warning that they were running out of time to talk about it.

“It’s not a hunch, sir.”

Footsteps became louder and a tall, pretty blonde woman came to stand between her and the captain. Her long hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and she shrugged on a heavier jacket with the tacky FBI insignia all over it. “Detectives, this is Agent Rachel Foster. She’ll be taking over the case,” Foley said, looking between them all. Rhaena glanced at Athan, who to her surprise, wasn’t paying a damn bit of attention.

“Times up, detectives … sorry,” Rachel clapped her hands together in front of her and offered a tight smile. “This is considered a serial murderer at this point, and you’ve got nothing. So … it’s my turn. Which one of you is Detective Kane?”

Athan turned toward her and raised two fingers. Her eyes raked over his entire body and Rhaena nearly lost her self-control. “I’m Kane,” he replied softly.

Rachel quirked a brow and smiled. “I see … it’s a shame. I would have been ecstatic to work with someone like you.” She winked.

Oh, you flighty little cunt … back the hell off.

“He’s not interested,” Rhaena spat, pocketing both her hands. Rachel grinned and Foley shot Rhaena a stern look.

“Ah … Northwood, I presume. I’ve heard you’d be pretty good to work with as well, but … sadly your name isn’t the one written in blood.” She gloved up and stepped over to the body, kneeling down to examine it. “I want every file you have on this case—even if it’s just a theory with nothing to back it up. And I’d like Sarah St. James brought in immediately.”

Athan glanced at Foley, who lowered his eyes to the ground. “For what reason?” he asked, bristling. Rachel looked up at him from the ground and shielded her eyes from the sunlight.

“Unfortunately, I’m not at liberty to discuss it. But I understand that she’s been in your care for some time now, so I’m gonna need you to bring her in.” She stood and stepped close enough to Athan to make Rhaena want to snap her neck. “Look, I get it. It’s clear what’s going on here. I don’t really give a shit what’s going on between you, but …” She leaned in and whispered, “This isn’t your case anymore. She’s no longer yo ur problem. So, bring her to me. And don’t try anything stupid, detective. I’m really not in the mood to chase you down.”

“Why do you want her? And where is she going?” Rhaena asked.

“I don’t want her. My superiors have requested that I bring her in, and unlike the two of you … I like getting my shit done and keeping the bigger dogs off my back.” She smiled. “Now … are we gonna play nice, or do I need to send one of my dogs?”

Rhaena huffed a laugh and crossed her arms. “You know … I’m on vacation. And I dunno where she is.” She glanced at Athan, and he met her eyes. “Let’s go, Kane.”

Athan narrowed his eyes at the agent. “ Unfortunately, I’m not at liberty to discuss it. And since you’ve hijacked my case … help yourself to my desk as well as my board at the precinct. But as of now, I’m feeling a bit under the weather. I’ll be taking some time off.” He looked over at his captain, who surprisingly nodded his head with a smirk. Rhaena’s adrenaline pumped with excitement when he matched Agent Foster’s proximity and leaned in toward her face. “Consider me a citizen now, Agent Foster. I don’t take kindly to anyone touching my shit.”

Foster smiled. “You realize I could have your badge for interfering in an investigation?”

Athan shrugged a shoulder and smirked back. “I’m not interfering. And as Northwood’s already said … we don’t know where she is.”

“I know you have officers posted outside her door and following her wherever she goes. I’ve read up on all of you, detective.”

“Well, if that’s true … then you know how unpredictable Sarah is. I’m not helping you find her. It was nice meeting you.” Athan drew back and slipped a cigarette into his mouth, turning away and walking to his car. Foley’s smirk grew wider, and he slowly shook his head as he also turned and walked in the opposite direction, leaving Rhaena with the saucy blonde.

“So, I guess it’s safe to say we’re not going to be adults about this?” Foster continued with her foxlike smile.

“That’s my partner, Agent Foster.” Rhaena pointed back toward Athan with her thumb. “We take the cases that nobody can figure out, and given the circumstances, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised to see the big wigs moving in … but let me be clear.” Rhaena stepped closer. “If you ever threaten him again … in any way … you won’t just have him to deal with. And I’d prefer you keep your eyes somewhere respectable the next time you look at him, or I’ll pluck them out of your pretty head.” Rhaena winked and turned her back on her and started toward her SUV.

“Communicating threats will land you without a badge, too.”

“Good luck with that, bitch,” Rhaena called over her shoulder as she continued to walk away. Once she was in her car, and a safe distance away, she rang Athan.

“Hey.”

“You were with her last night, weren’t you?” Rhaena barked.

“It’s not what you think. But I’m saying yes, anyway.”

“Is she at the apartment? ”

“She is.”

“Go home and pack some shit. I’ll sneak her out. We’ll stop on the way and grab Wren from the tattoo shop. We’re gonna camp out at the cabin for a while. That’s the only place I can think of to take them right now.”

“Alright. What about the uniforms?”

“Don’t call them. Let me handle it.”

“10-4.”