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Theresa looked at Chloe, begging with her eyes for an explanation.
Chloe glanced at Jude. Jude shrugged, as if he didn’t care. Chloe turned back to her. “Because your friend Sam has been investigated for date rape before. He’s on the street only because the woman withdrew her complaint.”
“Oh, my God!” Terri’s hand clapped to her mouth, and for an instant she wondered if the remains of her lunch were going to come up. “Oh, my God.”
“God has nothing to do with it,” Jude said grimly. His eyes seemed to have grown even darker. He pushed himself out of the chair and looked down at Theresa. “You were lucky. Last time the woman claimed he used Rohypnol.”
The date rape drug. Theresa sat frozen, her stomach churning, remembering last night. He’d bought her a drink. A drink she hadn’t wanted. One he kept insisting she enjoy until finally, when he was distracted, she’d dumped most of it on the floor behind her chair. “Oh, God,” she whispered. “I didn’t drink it. I dumped it.”
Chloe jumped up from her chair and came around her desk to put a hand on Theresa’s shoulder. “Jude will take care of him. He’ll never dare come near you again.”
“But … the cops will find out the same thing you did. Won’t they take care of it?”
Chloe answered, “Not the way Jude will.”
The words hardly registered, because another feeling washed over her, one of sheer fury. “I wish I’d stabbed that pen into his heart!”
Surprisingly, a laugh issued from Jude. She looked at him, unable to understand what was so funny. “I mean it!”
“I know.” The brief laugh disappeared from his face. “Hell.” He sighed.
“Jude,” Chloe said warningly.
He glared at her, an expression that Terri was sure would have made her sink to the floor in a quivering puddle. The man looked capable of mur der.
“I’ll deal with him.”
“But how?” Terri demanded. “How can you?”
His dark gaze returned to her, nearly pinning her. “First,” he said slowly, very quietly, “I am going to ensure he never so much as thinks about coming near you again. Unlike the police, I can use threats. Okay?”
Terri managed a jerky nod.
Jude’s attention returned to Chloe. “She doesn’t leave here until I get back or call and say it’s okay. Got it?”
Chloe nodded. “You can count on me.”
“And if Master Garner ever drags his behind in here, nail his feet to the floor until I say otherwise. I mean it, Chloe. Don’t let him go running out. I swear that kid has a death wish.”
On that grumpy statement, Jude disappeared into his office only to return a moment later wearing his long leather coat.
He paused just long enough to pick up Sam’s photo, then look at Terri and say, “Stay. I mean it. This guy is bigger trouble than I originally suspected.”
She didn’t think she could have moved to save her life.
And only when he left the room did she feel she could breathe again.
Once he was in his battered car, Jude took a moment to clear his head, nose and lungs of Terri’s scent. God in heaven, that woman’s scent was like a drug. Being in the same room with her was enough to drive him nuts. In no time flat she pushed him to the edges of self-control in a way he hadn’t experienced in at least fifty or so years.
The Hunger raged in him, but that alone wouldn’t have put him so much on edge. No, it was the desire he felt for her, pounding and strong, stronger than any he had ever felt as a man, stronger than any he had ever felt as an immortal. The feeling was so powerful that it could have turned him into the kind of creep he was about to go see.
Breathing deeply, he battered the insanity back into the buried, darkest places of his being. The places he had vowed never to visit again.
Madness was no longer welcome in his world.
But certain forms of vengeance were.
Chapter 3
As Jude had suspected, Samuel Carlisle was in no mood to paint the town that night, not after having been stabbed just the night before. Whether or not he had been visited by the cops, and Jude strongly suspected he hadn’t, he undoubtedly thought by now that he was safe. Little did he know.
So there he was, opening his own door, looking sour and saying before Jude could speak, “I don’t want any.”
“You’re going to get it, anyway,” Jude replied, his smile glacial. With a shove, one that required very little effort for him, he pushed the door hard enough to make it slam all the way open. At once Sam started backing up. Fear entered his gaze. “I’ll call the cops, man. You better get out.”
Jude’s smile widened. “No, you won’t call any one.” The Voice.
It froze Sam in his tracks as Jude entered the apartment and closed the door. “We need to have a talk.”
“About what?” Sam’s defiance was rising again, and he started edging toward a phone on the coffee table.
“Stop.”
Sam froze again. Jude closed the distance between them, caught Sam under his chin with one hand and lifted him off the floor. Sam stared wildly at him, but didn’t try to fight.
“Look into my eyes,” Jude ordered.
Sam obeyed, not really having any choice at the moment. Jude shoved him up against a wall so he wouldn’t strangle the guy. Although he was tempted. So very tempted.
“Listen to me.”
Sam stared in hypnotic horror.
“You will not ever go anywhere near Theresa Black again. Do I make myself clear?”
A small nod.
“You will not ever attempt to rape another woman.”
“No.” A squeak.
“Because if you ever again attempt to use Rohypnol on anyone, if you ever again attempt to take a woman without her express and freely given permission, I will hunt you to the ends of the earth and rip out your throat. Are we clear?”
“Yeah.”
“In fact, let me take this one step further. If you ever, ever even so much as think of using Rohypnol or force again, you are going to walk yourself to the nearest police station and turn yourself in. Got it?”
“Yeah.”
“Failing that, you’re going to jump off the highest building you can find. Because if I have to come after you, you will wish you had never been born. Understood?”
A croaky yes answered him.
Jude held the man’s gaze, making sure the suggestions had taken solid root. Then for good measure he added, “You will forget Theresa Black. You never met her. You never talked to her. You never knew her and you will head the other way if you ever see her.”
“I … don’t … know her.”
Jude let go and watched the man collapse to the floor. Then he squatted and lifted Sam’s chin with one finger until the man had to look at him again.
“I am your worst nightmare,” Jude said. “Forget last night. Remember my directions.”
“Yesss …”
“Remember me.”
Sam’s eyes closed.
Satisfied, Jude stood and walked out of the apartment, closing the door behind him.
Well, not one hundred percent satisfied. He would have cheerfully drained the guy dry, to ensure he would never threaten anyone again, but in these days of modern forensics and advanced detection, he couldn’t leave a blood trail behind him. Ever.
And he was fairly certain his suggestions about never doing this again would wear off eventually. Yes, the guy would avoid Theresa, because she was specific. But the more general threat, well, his compulsions would eventually start to win out against it.
And eventually Jude would have to come for him again.
In some ways, life had been easier a century or two ago. In others, less so. Frankly, sometimes he wasn’t sure which was better.
But one thing was constant, and that was evil. True evil.
Outside, after he was in his car, he flipped open his phone and called Chloe. She answered on the first ring, knowing it was him because she insisted on having caller ID.
“Hi,” she said. And for once she didn’t sound cheerful.
His instincts kicked into high gear, but first things first. “Tell Terri it’s safe to go home. Did Garner get there?”
“Uh … boss?”
“What?”
“I think you’d better come back.”
“I have another job, remember?”
“I think,” Chloe repeated evenly, “that you’d better get back here now.”
“Is anyone bleeding?”
“Not yet. But Garner may be soon.”
“What did he do?”
“Jude,” she said, this time almost shrieking, “just get back here now!”
That did it. His tires barely hit the pavement on the way back.
He burst into his business suite to find Chloe standing in front of the closed door of his inner office and Garner trying to vanish into the far corner.
“I just went to the bathroom,” Chloe said at the same time Garner protested, “I thought she knew!”
And in an instant, he guessed what had happened. “Where’s Terri?”
“Locked in your office,” Chloe said, staring daggers at Garner. “That damn fool told her. Told her!”
“I thought she knew!”
Jude shook his head as if to loosen something. Astonishment nearly overwhelmed him. “She believed it?”
“She not only believed it, she locked herself in your office. I had to cut the phones off in there.”
He reflected for a bare instant that he was glad he’d insisted on that feature so he couldn’t be disturbed when he wanted total privacy.
“She’s threatening to call the cops,” Chloe said.
“They won’t believe her.”
“Who cares?” Chloe threw up her hand. “Who cares if they believe her. She believes it, she won’t come out, she’s terrified and hysterical and who knows what she’ll find in your desk or … Tell me you locked the fridge.”
She was almost pleading.
“I put all that stuff in my bedroom. It’s locked.”
A puff of breath escaped Chloe and she sagged. “Thank goodness.” Then she turned on Garner. “I swear I’m going to cut you into little pieces and feed you to my fish, you idiot!”
Garner’s eyes were huge. “I’ll tell her I was making it up.”
“She’s obviously not going to believe that now, you turkey! She saw some things last night. I had it all explained, and then you, you …”
“Calm down,” Jude said. “Just calm the hell down and let me think.”
He knew he could get into his office, locked or not. He had the code, after all, and the key card. But he wasn’t sure that would be wise, at least not yet.
He looked at Chloe again. “She really believed it?”
“Well, I don’t think she locked herself in your office because she thought Garner was telling a tall tale. And she certainly didn’t try to call the cops because she thought she was hearing the new and updated version of Grimm’s Fairy Tales.”
Garner dared to clear his throat. “You can make her forget.”
Jude merely looked at him. “She didn’t exactly respond to the Voice last night.”
