Ripper (Hunter #1)(87)

“No, but I wonder if you don’t know who did,” I said, concentrating on every nuance of his expression. “Have you met a man named Peter Hamilton?”

He seemed to pulse with some strange form of joy, as though we were playing a game and he’d discovered he’d finally found a worthy opponent. “Very good, Miss Atwood. Yes, I have indeed made the mad professor’s acquaintance. He accosted me one night outside this very club, though he’d left me a present the night before. It was the only reason I agreed to meet with the man. I found his gift…intriguing.”

I could only presume what his gift had been. “What did he want from you?”

“Immortality, of course. Turns out the good professor has a brain tumor. He only has six months to live. It’s made him quite mad. He believes I can cure him.”

“He believes you can turn him.”

“Yes. I didn’t have the heart to explain the truth to the bugger. Besides, we all like to have our admirers, don’t we? I think I could very much admire you, Miss Atwood. I find you endlessly fascinating.”

The room got cold around me as the vampire smiled at me. I knew that no matter how this case turned out, Alexander Sharpe wasn’t finished with me. I was on his radar and I couldn’t even use Marcus’s power to keep him away. He knew Marcus and I had nothing between us. He would enjoy toying with me.

Something behind me caught his attention. “Ah, it looks like he’s left me another one of his trinkets.”

One of the doormen walked forward carrying a small wrapped box. Alexander Sharpe held out his hands and then motioned the servant to exit. “Would you like to do the honors, my dear?”

I didn’t want to. I had a suspicion, but I found myself untying the neatly placed crimson bow and lifting the lid off the box. Even in the dim light of the club I could plainly see the heart wrapped in tissue paper.

I shoved the box away and stood up with one thought in my head. He’d just delivered the package. He might be waiting to see if Sharpe would show up to acknowledge him. He might be standing outside, waiting eagerly to see if his god accepted the offering.

“Oh, I feel sorry for him,” the vampire murmured, but I was already racing to get out of the lounge.





Chapter Thirteen





I rushed past vampires in the lounge who tried to catch my attention, but I stopped when I made it into the hall. I physically couldn’t keep going. It was as though the walls themselves were threatening to close around me. They seemed almost alive and pulsating with menace. Whispers. I heard them coming from all sides, from the walls and the floors and the fixtures. Everywhere I turned something was beckoning, trying to lure me into the rooms. Traps. Stacy had mentioned something about traps. It looked like I was getting the full measure of one.

“Calm down and breathe through it.” Alexander Sharpe’s precise British accent cut through the panic I felt. He stood behind me, staring at me, curiosity in his cold blue eyes. He was long and lean, dressed in a conservative suit and tie.

What had she said? I needed a vampire to escort me or else the club would try to hold me. I felt it pulling at me. At first the whispers had been threatening, but they changed tactics. Now they soothed and tempted. They told me all the wonderful things that could happen if I opened the doors to certain rooms and stepped inside. When coaxing didn’t work, it went back to fear. I would die if I didn’t make it behind locked doors. It sent images of all the things that would come after me if I didn’t leave this hallway immediately.

“Could you please get Marcus?” I wasn’t about to hold his hand. I let my hand find the wall to steady myself because the magic was making me nauseous and the slightest bit dizzy. Touching Alexander would be worse.

“And stop this interesting test? Never. I think you’re different, Miss Atwood. I would like to know how different you are. I begin to believe there’s a reason a high-powered councilman is wasting his time on a woman he isn’t f*cking. He thinks you’re a Hunter.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” I practically snarled the question because I was getting damn sick of being left out of the joke. I took that deep breath Sharpe had advised me to take and tried to banish the nausea I felt.

“It means you can get the bloody hell out of here on your own if you try.” He leaned casually against the very wall that threatened to close in on me. “Think about it; your prey could be getting away. He’s probably standing outside, waiting to see if I will favor him with immortality’s kiss. Bugger’s been reading too many novels if you ask me. He’s waiting, but he won’t wait forever. How do you like the fact that he’s standing out there and you’re stuck in here?”

I didn’t like it at all. It didn’t sit well with me. If he was out there, then I wanted my hands on him. I wanted to run him to the ground and to feel him quake with fear when he realized I was after him. It started like it had with the wolves. The instinct started as a tiny ember in the pit of my stomach. It was a whisper at first, telling me I could break free of this magic.

Alexander Sharpe’s bored voice sliced through my thoughts. “Then again, perhaps you’re a silly little human. What’s the fun in that?”

I growled at the killer and it was right there in the back of my mind that I could gut him like the first Hunter had, but this time it would be more permanent. I could end him and avenge my brethren. I wasn’t sure where that thought had come from, but it was compelling all the same. There must have been something in my eyes because the vampire took a step back when I turned on him.