Replica(3)

He pulled his head back a few inches, though he didn’t let me go. “I don’t know your name, or at least not all of it.”

That made no sense. I hadn’t given him anything, either in the cab or out on the street.

Once more I jerked away from him, breaking free this time, turned my back and strode toward the news station. Rachel. I had to find her and get us both the hell out of here. The certainty that something was coming for her grew more and more. Which meant it was coming for us both.

Behind me, Ivan laughed softly, his footsteps telling me all I needed to know. The dumb-ass mutt wasn’t giving up.

“I’m not telling you my name,” I said over my shoulder.

He shrugged. “Then I’ll call you the only thing I know.”

Bitch. Bloodsucker. Vamp tramp. It wouldn’t have surprised me for any of those derogatory names to have flowed from his mouth, spilling out into the street between us. What he said, though, could not have shocked me more than if he’d ignored my order and planted his lips to mine.

“I’ve been waiting to meet you, Cazador.”





CHAPTER 2





RACHEL



The camera lights went off and the crew stood around the studio, their mouths open as they stared at me in disbelief. I knew it was a lot to take in. I knew there would be skeptics—how could there not be? If I’d been home watching my report, I would have been skeptical too. I was hardwired that way. But I could tell some of them did believe. They were looking at me with the same expression I’d seen on my boss Don’s face when I’d approached him with the story.

Terror.

That was what had convinced him to give me airtime. Once I’d presented my evidence, he believed me. The issue was making everyone else believe. I had spent forty-eight hours working nearly around the clock with the news team to get the story right.

I was exhausted and proud, but I was also grieving. Derrick had lost his life to bring this story to light. I hoped I’d made him proud. But I had to admit, I was also sad about losing Lea. She’d promised to come back, and while she didn’t make promises lightly, she hadn’t given me a time frame. For someone who had lived hundreds of years, a few days was nothing. For that matter, I suspected a few months was nothing too.

If only I’d convinced her to let me go with her to get Stravinsky.

But now wasn’t the time to think about all that. I had to deal with the fallout of the report first.

One of the stage crew led me off camera as they set up for the next segment in another part of the stage. Kristin Schumacher, the Warner News five p.m. regular anchor, gave me a look that said she thought I’d lost it.

I headed down the hall to the green room, glaring at the people who snickered as I walked past. They wouldn’t be laughing when the monsters came for them.

Don waited for me outside the green room, shifting his weight from leg to leg. We hadn’t worked together much in person—most of the stories I’d sent him had been email attachments from the Middle East—but it didn’t take a genius to see he was pissed.

“This is not going over well.”

I walked past him into the green room to get my bag. “We knew we wouldn’t convince everyone.”

“I look like a fucking joke, Rachel.”

I grabbed the strap of my bag and looped it over my head. “We discussed this ad nauseam. Both of us knew it would be a hard sell. You saw the finished report. You showed it to your boss. You were totally on board. What happened?”

“Sponsors. That’s what happened. We’ve ticked off Hudson Electric and they’re a major sponsor.”

“And Hudson Electric is a subsidiary of Monroe Industries, which is in bed with Simmons Industries.” I shook my head, but I wasn’t sure why I was surprised. I’d dug through more of Derrick’s research. Simmons Industries had donated money to a special government project. “So what do they want?”

“They want us to issue a retraction. They want you to go on camera to admit you made it up.”

“You told them to go fuck themselves, right?”

He was ashen, his eyes wide.

I put my hand on my hip. “Oh, my God. You actually want me to issue a statement saying I faked this whole thing.”

“My job is on the line.”

“And so is mine. We discussed this. We knew we’d face people who wouldn’t believe it. You told me you had my back. I guess you forgot to add the caveat that you would only support me until the flames got too hot. Then you’d just throw me into the fire to save yourself.”

“Rachel. I’m sorry.” He sounded nervous, like he wasn’t just worried about his job.