The Ghoul Vendetta Read online

  I believed my partner was going to become a lab rat for the next few hours—or longer.

  The door opened and Kylie O’Hara hurried to Ian’s side. “What happened? I heard you fai—”

  “Got his bell rung but good,” I finished before she could.

  Kylie didn’t get to where she was without being perceptive. She took a sharp left turn into “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine.” Ian started to sit up, but Kylie’s dainty hand on his shoulder pushed him right back down. Dryads were strong. “I’m better than fine, but try telling that to Dr. Stephens.”

  I grinned. “When Stephens gets someone new to poke and prod, he likes to hang on to ’em for a while. Smart people get bored easily. Ian touching that spearhead and lighting it up made him downright irresistible to the lab-coat crowd around here. They probably stuck a tracking device somewhere on you in case you try to make a break for it, which has happened a lot around here.”

  Kylie fixed Ian with her sharp green eyes. “But you’re not going to be the latest escapee, are you?”

  Ian met her fix and raised her a glare. Kylie didn’t back down.

  I stepped in. “Ian, if the ghoul left it for you, that means he knew it would react to you the way it did. He knows why. We don’t.” I paused for emphasis. “We need to know. There’s a lot more to this than just a ghoul chasing the one that got away.”

  “And I need to be out there finding him.”

  “All of our people are on this one, Ian,” Kylie told him. “And since that spearhead is Irish, our Dublin office is involved now. The men and women of this agency admire and respect you. This thing is after you, and it’s baiting a trap. They take that personally. If this thing can be caught, they will do it. We will do it.”

  Ian reached out and put his big hand over her tiny one, and suddenly I felt like a third wheel. “Nice try,” I told him. “I’m not stepping outside to give you privacy. You ex-special forces guys are sneaky.”

  Ian grinned, and I was glad to see it. “Would I do that?”

  “In a heartbeat.”

  Kylie extracted her hand, put it over his, and patted it. “While you’re here, you can finally get some sleep.”

  That was news. “You’re not sleeping?”

  Ian dismissively waved the hand Kylie wasn’t holding. “It’s nothing.”

  Kylie harrumphed. “It’s something. And it’s not just that he’s not sleeping; it’s the nightmares.”

  That was news, too. Ian wasn’t the type to share any personal issues with anyone, which meant Kylie had been there when said issues had happened. I bit my bottom lip against a smile. They were sleeping together. At least Kylie was sleeping; Ian apparently not so much.

  “When did that start?” I asked him. “The nightmares.” Not their sleeping together, though I admit I was curious.

  Ian shifted uncomfortably. That told me they hadn’t been a recent acquisition.

  “Perhaps I should ask how long have they been going on?”

  “Sleep and I haven’t been on speaking terms lately.”

  I scowled at him. “Dodgy thing, aren’t you? Define lately.”

  “Off and on. Now, mostly on. I had the first one five years ago, when I was in the hospital.”

  “After the ghoul attack.” I didn’t ask it as a question. I knew, but I wanted to say it, to get it out there.

  Ian nodded. “Every time I see him I start having the dream again.”

  “The same one.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you didn’t tell anyone.”

  “I didn’t see a reason to. Besides, I didn’t want anyone to worry.”

  “Maybe some of us should,” Kylie said. “You don’t seem to.”

  Silence.

  “You are worried, aren’t you?” I said quietly.

  Ian half shrugged. “Sleep dulls the reflexes, slow reflexes can—”

  “That’s not what I mean and you know it.”

  Ian took a long breath and let it out. Even that seemed to take too much effort. I wasn’t getting worried—I was already there.

  “Describe the dream,” I told him.

  “There’s a battle,” Ian said. “It’s not here, and it sure isn’t now.”

  “Where?”

  “Don’t know. I know the language in my dream, but not when I wake up.” He paused. “And I’m wearing armor. Old-fashioned armor, like medieval. The weapons are swords.”

  My breath hitched. “And spearheads?”

  “Not that spearhead. At least not that I remember. There’s a battle going on all around me. I see the armor in flashes of gold and silver. Incredible workmanship. The men wearing that armor are . . . glowing, that’s the only way I can describe it. At least their faces are glowing.”

  “Like that spearhead?”

  Ian hesitated, and that gave me my answer right there. “Yeah,” he admitted. “Like that spearhead.”

  “What armor are you wearing?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Don’t know or can’t see?”

  “Yes.”

  “Huh?”

  “I’m wearing a helmet.”

  “At least your dream self is safety conscious.”

  “It has a half faceplate, with a slit for the eyes, to see out.”

  And the tip of a sword blade could get in, I couldn’t help but think.

  “Who are the enemies?” I asked.

  Ian slowly shook his head, his eyes on the wall over my shoulder, but it wasn’t beige infirmary paint he was seeing.

  “I don’t know, but I’m looking for someone. The one I need to kill.”

  Now we were getting somewhere.

  “Is it the ghoul?”

  “I don’t know. My dream self knows. I don’t. So far, I haven’t been able to find him.”

  “So it’s a man.”

  “Male, not man. And no, I don’t know what he is,” Ian said before I could ask.

  The ghoul had been involved in the incident at the Metropolitan Museum of Art last Halloween. And Isidor Silvanus, the elf dark mage responsible for nearly releasing Hell on Earth, had claimed the ghoul was a mutual acquaintance who wanted to “reach out” to Ian in the very near future.

  It sounded like the ghoul was keeping his promise—in Ian’s dreams and reality.

  “Is he in your dreams?” I asked quietly.

  Ian nodded, a smooth muscle tightening in his jaw. “I haven’t seen him, but I know he’s there. I’m starting to think that the night in the jewelry store with Pete wasn’t a random event. Whether the ghoul recognized me then, or he’d set me and Pete up, or it still could have been some sick coincidence . . . the ghoul knows me from someplace.”

  “Or some time,” Kylie said quietly.

  I was about to take our discussion to a whole new level of strange, and Ian wasn’t going to like it. But getting to the bottom of this was more important than my partner’s paranormal comfort level.

  “Ian, I think you should talk to Dr. Tierney.”

  My partner didn’t look surprised by my suggestion, but I certainly wouldn’t have described his expression as happy.

  “My psychological health is perfectly—” Ian began.

  “I’m not talking about seeing him as a shrink. He also does past-life regressions.”

  The flat look Ian gave me said loud and clear what he thought of that idea. Some things were too woo-woo even for Ian to accept.

  Ian could accept that vampires and werewolves existed just fine. He also had no difficulty accepting that they lived longer than humans—a lot longer. Heck, he wasn’t even bothered that our boss was a three-story tall, multi-millennia-old dragon in the guise of a petite human woman.

  But that human souls could have lived before in another body?

  My partner’
s normally flexible mind didn’t want to wrap itself around that one, especially when it came to himself.

  The look I gave him in return conveyed all of that and more.

  “Ian, you’re best friends with a werewolf, your manager is a vampire, your boss is a dragon, and you’re sleeping with a dryad. I mean, come on.”

  No reaction to the “sleeping with” part from Ian, but Kylie confirmed it with a big ol’ grin.

  “It’s not the idea of past lives that I don’t like—” Ian began.

  “Don’t like?” The bulb in my head came on and I was enlightened. “Oh, it’s the hypnosis, isn’t it?”

  My tough-as-nails partner actually squirmed.

  “It is the hypnosis.” I wanted to laugh, but I wasn’t about to actually do it. “Ian, Dr. Tierney is a medical professional. I promise he has no interest in making you cluck like a chicken.”

  “I’ll go under, wake up an hour later, and not know what happened. Would you like that, Agent Control Freak?”

  “Agent Control—” I put my indignation on pause. “Come to think of it, I probably wouldn’t like that.”

  “Probably wouldn’t?”

  “Okay, definitely wouldn’t. But if that ghoul was obsessed with me and this was the only way to find out why . . .”

  “I’m not convinced it’s the only way.”

  “Ian, you said it yourself. Your freaky dreams started that night. They’d go away until the next time you two ran into each other. There’s obviously a connection. The ghoul is in these dreams, and you know he’s real. Is it that big a leap to accept that it is you in that armor? Okay, not exactly you, an earlier version. Finding out what that dream is and what it means could be the key to discovering why a who-knows-how-old sadistic shapeshifter has picked you to pick on. There has to be a reason.” I gave him a look that said arguments and resistance were futile. And just in case I didn’t look fierce enough, I added, “Don’t make me tell Moreau, because I will, and he’ll insist that you do it.”

  Ian’s expression was outfiercing mine.

  “We care about you, Ian,” Kylie said. “You need to put this behind you, and to do that, we’ve got to get to the bottom of it. If these dreams are related to the ghoul—and it sounds like they are—Dr. Tierney would be the person who could find out what’s going on, or at the very least, provide a few much-needed answers.”

  My partner lay there for a few moments, motionless, then came my sign of victory—a resigned sigh.

  I gave a little internal cheer.

  Ian scowled at me. “Don’t look so happy.”

  “I don’t look happy.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Mac?”

  “Yes?”

  “Never play poker.”

  13

  KYLIE’S phone beeped with an incoming text. She read it, spat her favorite four-letter word, then glanced from Ian to me and back again, her distress evident.

  Concerned, Ian put his other hand on top of hers. “What is it?”

  “I have to go. The footage from the second robbery—all of it—was leaked online almost as soon as the networks had it. It’s all over the Internet now.”

  Kylie didn’t need to specify what “all of it” meant. Even people who weren’t necessarily sick and twisted wouldn’t be able to resist at least a peek at what those ghouls had done to those guards. Most people knew that ghouls couldn’t possibly be real, but the sight of four men in movie-quality prosthetic makeup eating two men alive had to be sending normally logical and levelheaded people into a panic.

  Kylie and her department had their work cut out for them.

  “Go,” Ian told her. “I’ll be fine.”

  “And I’ll be here,” I promised.

  The door opened and Yasha filled the space.

  I smiled. “And right on cue, here’s my backup. Ian won’t go anywhere he isn’t supposed to.”

  Yasha was never one to hide his feelings, whether affection or violence. His heart was firmly on his sleeve at all times. It was one of the reasons why I loved him so much. Right now, Yasha was worried about the man he considered to be his best friend. If that ghoul put in an appearance anytime soon, he wouldn’t stand a chance against an enraged and protective Yasha, regardless of who or what he actually was.

  Kylie clearly still didn’t want to leave, but she knew she had to.

  “We’ve got this,” I assured her.

  “I know you do, it’s just that—”

  Ian pulled on the hand he was holding, bringing Kylie down to him and into a pretty danged passionate kiss. For the duration, I found a fascinating spot on the ceiling to study. Yasha watched, a happy smile on his face that his partner had found someone. Note to self: find Yasha a nice werewolf girl to settle down with.

  No sooner had Kylie shut the door behind her than Ian sat up in bed and tossed back the blanket that had covered him from the waist down. He hadn’t even glanced underneath before he shucked his covers. Good thing he was still wearing pants.

  Yasha stepped in front of the door.

  I joined him. “And what, pray tell, do you think you’re doing?”

  “Leaving.” Ian looked around for his shoes. “I’ve got work to do.”

  “You’re not leaving this room, mister. Not until Dr. Stephens says you can.”

  The door opened, or at least someone on the other side tried to open it, but a six-foot-eight Russian made for one heck of a doorstop.

  “Excuse me, is someone not decent in there?” Dr. Tierney asked.

  “We’re all decent,” I told him. “And we even have clothes on.”

  Yasha stepped away from the door, and Tierney opened it the rest of the way. “I was blocking the door.”

  Tierney had to look up—way up—to look Yasha in the eye. “And a fine job you were doing. I take it Dr. Stephens’s patient is losing his patience?”

  Ian swung his long legs over the side of the bed. “You take it right.”

  Dr. Stephens came in and he didn’t look happy. He began unhooking Ian’s monitors. So much for the cause of the frown; he was losing his lab rat.

  “Finally,” Ian said. “Thank you.”

  “Don’t thank me,” Stephens said. “And you might not want to thank Noel here, either.”

  Dr. Tierney gave Ian an apologetic smile that didn’t look all that remorseful. “You’re going from Mike’s end of the hall to mine.”

  • • •

  Dr. Tierney wanted to talk to Ian. Ian needed to talk to Dr. Tierney. My opinion, not his.

  I was Ian’s partner, and had been at the site of the first robbery/murder, and had met the ghoul myself on two occasions, so Ian wasn’t the only one Dr. Tierney wanted to talk to.

  His office was down the hall from the infirmary and medical offices, near a main stairwell. He knew that some of SPI’s agents would only come to see him if they could do so privately. His office placement was intentional.

  As a psychometric, Dr. Tierney got psychic vibes from objects, even furniture, especially antique furniture. As a psychiatrist, he needed to keep his concentration on his patients. That explained why all of his office furniture came from Ikea. He even assembled it himself so that the frustration of the people who had to put it together didn’t sink into the wood and fabric. I’d heard there’d been a lot of Zen meditation and burning incense involved while Dr. Tierney had assembled the desk, chairs, and bookcases. As a result, his office was a psychic neutral zone, a center of calm for himself and his patients.

  On our way to his office, Ian gave Dr. Tierney the shortened version of his dream. Needless to say, with everything that’d happened this afternoon plus the dream as the cherry on top, Tierney cleared his schedule for Ian.

  Noel Tierney had furnished his office to put his patients at ease. Low lighting, tabletop water
feature, soothing colors, strategically placed boxes of Kleenex, and an honest-to-God crackling and popping fireplace—all to make people feel warm and fuzzy and comforted.

  Ian was none of the above.

  He was former military, ex-cop, and presently wound tighter than a spring.

  “Ian and Mac, go on in,” Dr. Tierney said from down the hall. “I’ll be right there.”

  SPI headquarters was completely underground. Dr. Tierney loved plants. Plants loved sunlight. Not to be deterred, he had brought in glow lights. It didn’t help. Bless his environmental-loving, nurturing heart, but the man had a black thumb. The only thriving plants were in his drawings that he’d decorated his office with. But to his credit, he never gave up on his plants, and he extended that same determination to his patients.

  “Please be seated and make yourselves comfortable,” Dr. Tierney said, closing the door behind us.

  Ian and I chose chairs. Dr. Tierney sat next to me and across from Ian, leaving the chair between them empty.

  Good move.

  I half raised my hand. “Dr. Tierney, I have a question.”

  “You can ask it on one condition.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Call me Noel, both of you. Dr. Tierney is my mother.”

  I smiled. “Done.” I inclined my head toward the fireplace. “That. How the heck?”

  “The flames are an illusion. One of our mages set it up for me. While it doesn’t put off any heat, it also doesn’t make any mess or require tending.”

  “I feel cheated. Our conference room only has folding chairs and a whiteboard.”

  I was trying to help Ian relax. It was obvious he felt uncomfortable, even though Noel didn’t have a notepad, pen, or a file with Ian’s psychological profile in front of him.

  Noel leaned forward, his hands lightly clasped in front of him.