Chapter 4: Penthouse Suite

Duncan, Andrew, and I pulled up to one of the tallest buildings in the city. As we shuffled out of the SUV, I let my gaze go up, up, up until I could just barely make out the roof. And with my sight abilities, that was really saying something. I couldn't imagine living so high up, but maybe the wealthy preferred the heights so they could look down their nose at all the poor people. I'd never be rich enough to find out.

I sucked in a deep breath of city air, listening to the sounds of traffic surrounding us. The city of New Haven had a special place in my heart, even though I didn't always like tall buildings. It was dark and grungy, with surprises around every corner – most of them were awful surprises – even so, I loved it. It was always bustling with life, no matter what time it was. Even when I got called out to crime scenes in the middle of the night, the city was still bursting with activity. Maybe that's why I loved it so much…

"Ready?" Duncan asked next to me, with a nod to the front doors. Across the dark parking lot, I could see the doorman standing stark still in his dark uniform, looking ready to shoo the next curious bystander away from the building.

"Ready as I'll ever be," I said, leading the team across the lot and closer to our target. These cases rarely ended well, but with the training the team had gotten in apprehending vampires, we rarely needed to call for backup.

Each of us had our own abilities, though mine were the strongest of the three of us. I was half-vampire, half-human, which lent me a lot of the same abilities that vampires possessed. Though, thankfully, I didn't have any inclination to follow their diet. I had the strength of a body-building human man, and I could see from one hundred yards away with no issues. My hearing was amplified, and I could heal quickly. The best gift, in anyone's opinion, was my ability to be impervious to vampire mind control.

Vampire mind control was tricky. It was how they got a lot of their victims to follow them into the dark alleys in the first place. If they weren't a blood bunny, that is. Some weren't if only because after a while, blood bunnies lost their number one appeal: blood. A human body could only go so long being a vampire's dinner plate before it caught up with them.

That's where the mind control came in. If you could hear a vamp, you were at risk of falling under their control. It was a real pain in the rear when it came to working with Duncan and Andrew. Their grandfathers were the vampires in their lines, making them only quarter-vampire, three-quarters human. Not to say that they didn't have their own unique abilities. But they weren't nearly as strong as me. And as much as Duncan may love to remind me, that is the only reason I'm allowed to run the team.

As we walked up to the front door, I noticed the exact moment the doorman saw us. His face turned from bored to suddenly assessing. And from the sneer that appeared on his lips, I could see that he found us wanting. He was shorter for a man and had his hard hair parted in what he probably thought made him look dignified. Instead, it just made him look oily.

"Can I help you?" He asked, his voice nasally.

"Yes, you can. We're here to see Amos Carpenter," I replied with what I hoped was a winning smile on my face. I could be nice when the occasion called for it. It was when a person gave me an attitude that I felt the need to return it. I got the sinking feeling that I was going to end up giving this man plenty of attitude.

"I'm afraid he is unavailable. Maybe you could make an appointment and try again tomorrow."

"Is that so?"

"Yes. I don't want any trouble here, miss. If you push me on this issue, I will, unfortunately, have to call for security." Though his tone was bored, the way his eyes lit up, I could tell what he most wanted was trouble. It had to be a monotonous job standing here in his dress pants and jacket, just waiting for something to happen.

"Well, I guess I am here to cause trouble, but you won't need to call for security." I said, pulling out my fancy badge. His face paled at the sight of it. "Secret Services. I think I might outrank your security team. Now, if you don't mind, we are going to walk into this building and take the elevator up to the penthouse. That is where Mr. Carpenter resides, is it not? You, however, are going to remain here until I'm ready to ask you some question. Got it?"

His brown eyes narrowed at me, apparently not used to being bossed around by those that aren't rich enough to gain his attention.

"Got it?" I repeated, raising my eyebrows menacingly. He grudgingly nodded before he handed me the card to the penthouse and turned his back to me. I grinned at Duncan and nodded to the doors.

"Let's go, boys. We've got business to attend to."

Five minutes later, we stood in the penthouse's foyer, gawking at the opulence that surrounded us. Surely, a person didn't need this much. The foyer alone was stuffed full of art and furniture that I would bet any amount of money that no one even took the time to look at.

"Alright, enough gaping. I can't sense Amos, so I'm guessing he's not here. But it can't hurt to have a look around." I walked through the foyer and into the living room and adjoining kitchen, both as opulent as the foyer.

Wealth was really wasted on the wrong people. Instead of having a modern and comfortable penthouse, Amos had apparently decided to stay in the 1900s. The walls were covered in a bright red wallpaper with engraved wall panels.

This type of décor works when it's done well. This wasn't done well. I could only describe it in one word: gaudy. It happened a lot with vampires, especially when they finally garnered some wealth. They were still stuck in whatever century they had been born in. Amos was at least a century old, by the looks of things. It could make it tricky when it came time to take him down.

The older a vampire gets, not only do they get stronger, but they also start to get extra gifts on top of their already strong arsenal. I'd seen everything imaginable, from telepathy to flight. It really wasn't fair once you really sat and thought about it. With extra gifts like that, what chance did humans have against them? If they ever came out in the open and tried to take over, we'd be screwed.

I meandered my way through the apartment, trying to ignore the decorating faux pas. After looking through all the multitude of rooms (seriously, did one actually need a gold bathtub?), I found myself standing in his bedroom. A giant California king bed took up most of the area and I stared, aghast, at the giant mirror mounted to the ceiling. Yuck.

I tore my gaze from it and studied the area, a tingling feeling spread across my back. Too similar to the feeling from the alley to ignore. I walked around the bed and then the smell hit me. Copper. Which could mean one of two things. Either Amos kept a supply of blood in the room for a midnight snack or I was about to find something I really didn't want to.

I made my way into the attached bathroom and stopped cold. There was nobody here, which was a relief, but there sure was a giant puddle of blood. Unless Amos enjoyed licking blood off of the floor, I had the feeling something terrible had happened here. Either to Marcus or to Amos. Or maybe Amos was on a spree and had another victim laid out in an alley for me to find.

I went back out into the bedroom to call in Andrew and Duncan when I froze again, my gaze on the glass door leading out to the balcony. It was like deja-vu all over again. A tingle went down my back at the sight of bright blue eyes staring back at me.