Page 18 of Soul Sucker

“I am.”

“I met your colleague yesterday.”

“Vadim? He didn’t mention it.”

“No reason for him to. I just gave him change for the vending machine. What do you do, Alexei?”

“I work for the Moscow branch of the SBLE. I’m a Fae-Web specialist. I believe we’ve been drafted in to help you with the serial killer.”

Ella glanced up to see Feehan entering the office with Liz and the tall pretty Russian. She deliberately raised her voice. “Really? It would’ve been nice if the boss had mentioned it to us, wouldn’t it, Liz?”

It seemed Liz was too busy gawping at the two Russians to do more than mutter something unintelligible and sink into a seat beside Ella. Feehan took the chair at the head of the table, and Tall, Dark and Handsome sat opposite Ella. If one ignored the distinct lack of welcome in his cold blue gaze, he really was hot.

Ella turned to Feehan. “When did you decide to call in the cavalry?”

Alexei cleared his throat. “As soon as Mr. Feehan added the details of the crime into the SBLE worldwide database, I was alerted to the similarities by my superiors.”

“You didn’t work it out yourself?” Ella asked.

“Unfortunately, I was involved in another case which took all my attention.” The Fae looked suitably contrite. “When I became aware of the new data, I was able to incorporate it into my existing cache and confirm their suspicions.”

“What percentage of Fae are you?”

Before Alexei could reply, the other Russian spoke. “With all due respect, I don’t see what Alexei’s parentage has to do with this discussion.”

“I don’t agree.” Ella focused her gaze on the man opposite her. “It’s important to know what facilities a Fae can utilize in both of our worlds. I’m also wondering why we need another web specialist when we already have Liz.”

“Alexei is exceptional.”

“So is Liz,” Ella replied swiftly.

“Perhaps your superiors felt they needed a more impartial observer to determine whether or not this killer is from Otherworld.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Wow. There are so many things I find objectionable in what you just said that I hardly know where to start. This team is very competent. I assumed the reasonyouwere here was because we had already determined that we have an Otherworld serial killer on our hands.”

“A suspected Otherworld killer.”

Ella flicked a glance at Feehan, but he was listening intently. So she concentrated her attention on the asshole Russian opposite her.

“What exactly is your problem?”

His beautiful mouth quirked up at the corner. “I’m hardly likely to share important information with you when I have no idea who or what you are.”

“You haven’t exactly introduced yourself either.”

Feehan coughed. “I apologize. I should have taken care of the introductions when we came in. Vadim Morosov, this is Ella Walsh.”

His expression went blank. “You’re the empath?”

“Don’t tell me—you’ve got a thing about empaths. Did you get screwed over?”

He stared at her for a long while. “In a manner of speaking, yes.”

“So why are you here?”

“Because I was sent here. Why are you here?”

“Because I’m the one who had to delve into a murdered empath’s mind and discover that every thought and memory she possessed had been stripped away.”

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