Night's Promise(13)

“No. A stranger. We left the club together. When I turned my back on her, she stabbed me. There was a man with her.”

“Hunters.” Mara wet the towel in the sink, and wiped the blood dripping steadily from the ragged hole in her son’s back. The wound should have healed by now, she thought, frowning. “Does it still hurt?”

“What do you think?”

“I think a part of the stake is still lodged inside.”

“Well, don’t just stand there. Get it the hell out.”

Reaching into the cupboard over the sink, Mara withdrew a large brown wooden box. Inside, among other odds and ends, was a stainless steel probe. “Hold still.”

Derek hissed, then swore as she began to explore the wound. “Geez, woman, what are you doing in there? Digging for gold?”

“Hold still! I’ve almost got it.”

Moments later, she tossed a long wooden sliver into the sink, along with the probe. Wetting the towel again, she washed the blood from his back. And smiled. The wound was already healing, the deep gash knitting together seamlessly, leaving no scar behind.

“About the hunters,” she said, wiping her hands. “I trust you cleaned up the mess.”

Derek nodded. He had taken the man’s ID and left his body in an alley. The police would assume he’d been the victim of a robbery, or a drug deal gone bad. After dumping the body, he had wiped his memory from the woman’s mind and left her in her car, lucky to still be alive.

“I don’t like this,” Mara said, tossing the bloody towel into the sink on top of his ruined shirt. “I haven’t heard of any hunters in the area. Did you get their names?”

“The woman’s driver’s license identified her as Julia LaHood, thirty-six, with an address in Porterville. The man, Selkirk, was in his forties. Home town in Washington.”

“LaHood.” Mara hissed out a breath. “From Porterville.”

“You know her?”

“No, but I killed a hunter named LaHood about thirty years ago. She could be his daughter.” Leaning against the counter, Mara crossed her arms. Her family had left Porterville twenty-five years ago. She might have thought it was coincidence that LaHood came from that part of the country, except she had never believed in coincidence.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Derek said. “Forget it. There’s no way anyone could find you after all this time. We’ve all been careful.”

“There’s always a way,” Mara retorted. “I haven’t lived this long by making assumptions.”

The barb stung, but he couldn’t argue with her. He had been damn lucky tonight. If his reflexes had been a shade slower, it might have been his body lying in an alley.

“You’re forgetting one thing,” he said. “They weren’t after you. They were after me.”

And with that parting shot, he went upstairs to bed.





Mara glanced at the arched doorway that led into the kitchen. “You can come in now.”

With a wry grin, Logan sauntered into the room. “I didn’t want to interrupt.”

Mara smiled, thinking how lucky she was to have him in her life. He’d had doubts about being a father, but she had no complaints. He had been firm with Derek, stern when necessary, but he had never interfered between mother and son.

“You heard what happened?” she asked.

Nodding, he gathered her into his arms. Being a vampire, it was hard not to eavesdrop.

“Why would hunters be looking for any of us after all this time? We’ve kept a low profile since before Derek was born. Our old enemies are no longer a threat. We haven’t made any new ones.” She looked up at him, thinking, as always, that he was the most devastatingly handsome man she had ever known. And she had known many. “Have you nothing to say?”

He shrugged. “Unlike you, I don’t see conspiracies around every corner. Derek was at a vampire club. What better place to look for a vampire? Like you said, we’ve kept a low profile. Hell, I doubt if anyone who would care even knows that Derek exists. I think it was just bad luck that a hunter found him.”

“But you have to admit, destroying my son would be the perfect way for someone to avenge themselves on me.”

“You think the LaHood woman intended to kill Derek to avenge her father’s death?”

“It’s possible.”

“Anything is possible,” he murmured. “A meteor could wipe out life as we know it. A tsunami could sweep us all out to sea.” He lifted a lock of her hair and let it sift through his fingers. “Or I could take you to bed and make love to you until sunrise.”

“I’ll take door number three,” she said, leaning into him.