Page 76 of The Mech Who Loved Me
He saw it in her eyes. "Nothing personal, you see. Just doing what I'm told." Rubbing at his cap, he dislodged it just enough for her to see his hair, and suddenly it all made a horrid sort ofsense.
His extremelypaleskin.
His icy blue eyes, so translucent they looked like aglacier.
His hair, a shock of white that resembled the down ofaswan.
The scarf, gloves, hat, and coat, which covered as much of his sun-sensitive skin aspossible.
For the last month they'd been searching for one of thedhampirthat conspired against them, and here one was, right in frontofher.
"Hey," another man said. "Do you need help? What'shappened?"
"She's all right," thedhampirsaid, swinging Ava up into his arms, where she had no choice but to flop as though she'd come down with the vapors. "My wife was feeling poorly this morning, and I guess she's taken ill from the shock. I'll get her home and tuck her up in bed. She'll come round soonenough."
"Aye, good luck to you." The stranger surveyed the scene helplessly, even as sirens began to peal somewhere nearby. "What a mess. Good luck with your wife.""Thanks."
Ava made a choking sound in her throat as thedhampircarried her away from the carnage, though she couldn't so much as cry outforhelp.
"Let's get you someplace private," thedhampirmurmured, "where we can have alittlechat."
Eighteen
"WHERE IS SHE?"Kincaid demanded, leaping from the carriage almost before it had finished moving. Gemma and Charlie had made a mad dash for the guild, but he and Malloryn were using Malloryn's trackingdevice.
"Give me a moment," the duke replied tersely. Malloryn had insisted when they first started working with him that a tracking beacon be implanted beneath their skin at the back of their hairlines. It was some sort of gadget the Nighthawks had come up with. The compass hand spun, heading directly to the south. "There."
They both looked to thesouth.
Some sort of crowd gathered, hovering around the crossroads ahead of him. A chill ran down Kincaid's spine. They were too late. He justknewit.
Slamming past people, he shoved through the crowd. A carriage was smashed against a wall, the under-carriage snapped in two with the force of the impact, flames licking around theboiler.
"What happened?" Kincaid demanded, and a young girl beside him babbled about a runaway carriage, and a woman on top who'd steered it intothewall.
"What did she look like?" He grabbed her by the shoulders, and only refrained from shaking her when she began babblinginfear.
"I don't know! A lady. Dressed ingreen—"
"Pale green?" That was what Ava had been wearing when she left the house thatmorning.
The girl nodded infright.
"Where isshenow?"
"I didn't see what happened to her," the girlblurted.
"Leave her be," the duke commanded, turning this way and that through the crowd. "She's not here. She went this way." Malloryn startedrunning.
Why would she leave the scene of the crime? Kincaid sprinted after the duke, his coattails flapping. "It's unlike her to leave injured peoplebehind."
"Agreed." The duke paused in the next intersection. The arrow spun. "Thisway."
Left. Down a smaller street, then across another. "You think she's beentaken?"
"Possibly," Malloryn called, sliding to a panting halt as he stared up at a small house across the street from them. "Unless she was injured and the craving virus overtook her. Then she might have sought privacy, away from any potentialvictims."
That madesensetoo.
