Page 3 of Dark Souls

Finally, that feeling of satisfaction I craved in his death was beginning to appear. My dick hardened to a painful state when she noticed the heart, picked it up in her fingers and studied the bite marks with her excitement. When she dipped her finger into one of the torn valves and then brought the bloody finger to her mouth, wrapping her lips around it and sucking it clean, I nearly came in my fucking pants. It was the most erotic thing I’d ever seen and now I couldn’t stop fantasising about her smooth, ivory skin smothered in blood as I licked it off.

A choked, desperate noise came from the shadows, which caused her to drop the heart and stand up on the dumpster. Her stunning pink eyes were hyper-focused and staring straight in my direction. I knew she couldn’t see me but she could sense me. Or at least sense she was being watched. I heard her pulse quicken but not with fear; with something else. Something I couldn’t quite pinpoint.

“Who’s there?” she shouted, jumping off the dumpster. I smirked, willing her to come deeper into the shadows.

‘Heath.’

My skull tingled with the unpleasant sensation as Master’s voice echoed in my mind. Ignoring it, I focused on her footsteps as she approached, her eyes narrowing. Sienna raced back around the corner, distracting her.

“Spoke to Ron. They’re on their way.” Sienna turned to follow Snow’s glare into the darkness. “Ilaria, what is it?”

Ilaria.Ilaria.Perfect. Stunning. I wanted to try speaking it aloud but I didn’t dare make a sound. I liked watching her from the dark. I needed to know everything about her. I needed to understand her. To get under her skin and figure out what made her heart race. I needed to make her mine. Make her as addicted to me as I was to her.

‘Heathen!’

“Nothing. I just thought I heard something but it must have been a cat,” Ilaria replied, walking back towards the body with her friend.

‘Demon!’

The tingling intensified until it was unbearable and I had no choice but to answer Master’s summoning. Taking one last look at my new obsession, I licked my lips and released my wings before taking off into the night with a newfound purpose.

Ilaria. You’re going to be mine.

Loophole

“SylvesterGraidern.Forty-two-year-oldmale.Human. Born and raised New Yorker. He’s been in and out of prison since he was a teen. Previous history of petty thefts, gambling addictions, assault and, more recently, links tied with the black markets. A glowing reference, clearly,” Archer skidded the profile across his desk towards Sienna, who picked it up and started skimming through the information the CIA had gathered and handed over to their subdivision, the Supernatural Intelligence Agency (SIA) which focused on specific crimes that were believed to be committed by supernaturals. Archer Brooks had just stepped into his father’s shoes as the Director along with Sienna and my Uncle Raiden who led the teams of agents.

“So, he was involved in some shady shit that more than likely got him killed,” I clarified as Archer smacked his lips together and shrugged in agreement.

“Except this was a supernatural kill, so it could have been a wrong place, wrong time situation and nothing to do with his crimes,” Sienna offered a counterargument. “You think it links with—” She paused as she gave me a side-eye before glancing across at Archer. “You know.”

“Don’t mind me,” I lifted my hands up and smiled, pretending to slip into the background. “Just act like I’m not even here. I promise nothing confidential will leave my lips. You can trust me.”

Archer’s eyes met Sienna’s with apprehension and the room suddenly filled with prickly tension on their end.

“We do trust you, Ilaria. But this is now official SIA business and because you are not an agentyet, we are going to have to ask you to step outside for this conversation. But you did amazing last night. So, things look promising. I’ll work on Raiden and see if we can at least start you on some of the training programs,” Sienna said, trying to placate me. It didn’t work.

Rolling my eyes, I fought the urge to snort. Words and more words. In fact, words were mostly insignificant to me. When you’re born with the ability to see inside someone’s head, their innermost depraved thoughts and their true feelings, you realise that what comes out of someone’s mouth and what goes on in their brains is rarely the same. People say what they think others want to hear. All the fucking time. Words can mean nothing. Actions are what I pay attention to. You can learn a lot about someone from their actions. That shit is instinctual. Actions can be calculated or impulsive but they all have meaning. Every action says aloud what someone can’t put into words, whether or not they realise it. Whether it be their body language, physical responses or the lack thereof. And even though I couldn’t read Sienna’s mind as she was a member of my family through a mate bond, I knew she was trying to buy herself some time to seek permission from my family before involving me in any other ’dangerous cases’.

Being seen as the baby in the Romano-Black family really fucking sucked. I was so tired of their refusal to allow me to make my own choices and become an official agent for the SIA. What did I have to do to prove my worth? I’d helped read minds in the last few interrogations they’d conducted, but they forced me to stay silent throughout and only offer my opinions after the interview. Even though it felt good to be doingsomething, using my mind-reading abilities wasn’t enough for me. I wanted to be a field agent like Sienna and Ronnie. I wanted to be where the action was. Last night at the dive bar was an opportunity for me to show them what I could do if they put me in their ranks.

Eddie Hughes was a well-known opportunist, whether it came to drugging and/or raping innocent women on nights out. He was on the run from the police, making his way through the states with fake IDs and going under the radar until his next victim. But it was enough for him to end up on the Green List my grandpapi had created years ago (a list of the worst of humankind we vampires can feed from without it affecting our moral compass). My mission was to seemingly become his next victim before arresting him and handing him over to the cops. The challenge was not to kill the sick bastard. It was a display of control. Because, according to my family, I am too emotional and impulsive to be an agent. My vampire side takes over when I’m angry or upset and I act on my killer instincts. But I’m working on it. I’m trying to prove I can control my demon and the darkness within me can be channelled into something useful. I would be bloody brilliant at this job and they all know it. But control isn’t the only obstacle in my way. My overprotective family, or more specifically, the overprotective men in my family, who all see me as some little princess they must keep directly out of harm’s way, aren’t thrilled with the idea of me voluntarily throwing myself in the line of danger.

“I found the body. Doesn’t that give me some exclusive rights to this case?”

Sienna sighed, rubbing her hand against her forehead, clearly feeling torn between her loyalty to her mate, my Uncle Raiden (justoneof those overprotective men in my life), to keep me out of this, but also wishing to hear my thoughts. So, I turned my focus to Archer Brooks. He was human, after all, far easier to manipulate and get on my side. He was already an ally because he was one of my friends, Amelie’s soulmate but that would only get me so far. I still needed to prove myself.

“Director Brooks, I have some theories. The killer has to be a vampire.”

“Why do you say that?” He leaned his arms on his desk, the cufflinks from his immaculate suit knocking against the wood as his dark eyebrows tightened with interest. “This could have been any species of supernatural. Someone ripped his heart from his chest and then threw his body off a building. There were no bite marks to indicate it was a vampire.”

“But the heart had been bitten,” I explained, feeling a rush of excitement at being included. “If I had to guess, two, maybe three, large bites out of it. And from the tearing, very sharp teeth, potentially fangs. So that eliminates lots of species and leaves only vampires and wolves. Wolves don’t eat people. They could rip a heart out with their claws, yes. But they wouldn’t need to bite into the organ after. No, they did it because they wanted to. Or they needed to give into their bloodthirst.”

“Could have been a hybrid,” Sienna added.

I nodded, agreeing but my gut was telling me it was one of my kind. “Perhaps the killer was trying to hide the fact it was a vampire by not obviously draining the body of blood but couldn’t resist a bite from the bleeding heart in their hand.”

’I know I couldn’t,’ my vampire side muttered in my mind.

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