Page 17 of Cry of Blood and Joy (French Quarter Vampire Enforcer #2)

Chapter Sixteen

Enzo

I drew on vampire speed as I raced toward the office, my feet barely touching the cracked pavement as I moved faster than human eyes could track.

The flickering neon lights blurred into streaks of grimy illumination, the night air rushed past my face like cold fingers.

I didn’t want anyone remembering seeing me go in here.

The last thing we needed were witnesses who could point Angelo’s men in our direction.

My jaw clenched as I took in the full scope of our hiding place.

Rocco had picked one of the worst dumps I had ever seen, and I’d seen plenty during my years as an enforcer.

The building looked like it was held together by peeling paint and desperation, and the parking lot was more pothole than asphalt.

Hopefully, it would take Angelo some time before he hunted us down to this godforsaken place.

The thought of him finding Joy here, vulnerable and trapped in this maze of crumbling concrete, made my protective instincts flare with violent intensity.

I forced myself to slow to human speed as I approached the office door, my muscles knotting with barely restrained energy. I hadn’t heard Rocco was living here, so maybe Angelo hadn’t either. It was a thin hope, but hope nonetheless—and right now, I’d take whatever advantage we could get.

The office door stuck when I tried to open it, the warped wood scraping against the frame with a sound like rusted hinges grinding open.

The smell hit me before I even stepped inside—a nauseating cocktail of stale beer, unwashed bodies, and something that might have been rotting food.

My enhanced senses made it almost overwhelming, and I had to breathe through my mouth to keep from gagging.

A greasy bald man sat slumped behind a counter that looked like it had been rescued from a demolition site.

Sweat glistened on his scalp under the harsh fluorescent light that buzzed and flickered overhead like an angry wasp trapped in glass.

He had on a stained T-shirt that had probably been white sometime in the distant past. It stretched tight over a beer gut that strained against red suspenders attached to faded blue jeans that looked like they’d never met a washing machine.

He looked up at me with bleary red-veined green eyes that suggested he’d been sampling his own merchandise, whatever that might be.

His gaze was unfocused and slightly hostile, like he resented being interrupted from whatever important business involved staring at a small TV with terrible reception.

“You want a room?” His voice was gravelly and thick, like he’d been gargling with gravel and cigarettes. “By the hour or the day?” The question came with a knowing leer that made my skin crawl, and I realized exactly what kind of establishment this was.

Some place I didn’t want Joy to be within one hundred feet of, let alone sleeping in.

I swore under my breath as I imagined her delicate presence in this cesspool of human misery, surrounded by the kind of people who frequented hourly motels for activities I didn’t want to think about.

She’d already seen too much when Ari had her prisoner.

This hellhole was no place for someone like her.

She’d seen too much, and I hated exposing her again to this sordid underbelly of desperation.

But we were on the run, and accommodations unfortunately weren’t going to be five-star. The bitter taste of compromise filled my mouth like ashes, and I had to swallow my pride along with my disgust.

“By the day,” I said through gritted teeth. “I want a week.” The words felt like admitting defeat, like acknowledging we’d fallen so far from grace this was our reality now.

The man lifted his greasy eyebrow as he took in my appearance with calculating eyes, probably noting the expensive cut of my clothes, the way I carried myself like someone who didn’t belong in a place like this.

His bloodshot gaze lingered on my watch, my shoes, cataloging everything that suggested I had money to burn.

A slow, predatory smile spread across his stubbled face, revealing teeth stained yellow from years of coffee and cigarettes.

“Three hundred,” he said with the confidence of someone who knew he had a desperate customer over a barrel. The price hung in the air between us like a challenge. I could smell the stale beer on his breath and see the satisfaction in his eyes.

The amount was highway robbery for what amounted to a disease-ridden shoebox, but I didn’t have the luxury of negotiating. Time was a commodity we couldn’t afford to waste, and every second we spent here was another second closer to Angelo finding us.

“Three hundred cash.” I reached for my wallet. “No questions.” The unspoken threat in those two words was clear.

“I don’t talk to pigs,” the man sneered, the kind of contempt that came from years of dealing with cops and anyone else who threatened his grimy little empire.

A cold smile spread across my face, the kind that had made hardened criminals reconsider their life choices.

“No, you won’t.” Humans always broke under torture.

If Lorenzo or another one of Angelo’s men found this place, they’d make this fool talk, and he’d remember every detail about me. I couldn’t risk it.

I stared directly into his bloodshot eyes, drawing on the compulsion that ran through my veins like liquid fire.

The familiar sensation started as a warm tingle at the base of my skull, then swept through my entire body in waves of electric power that made my skin feel like it was crackling with energy.

My vampire nature rose to the surface, ancient and predatory, turning my gaze into something that could bend mortal minds like soft clay.

I narrowed my eyes, focusing all that supernatural force into a laser-sharp beam of mental domination. The air between us seemed to shimmer with invisible pressure, and his face shifted—fear giving way to blank submission as my will wrapped around his consciousness like iron chains.

“You’ll forget about me,” I commanded. Each word carried the beat of compulsion, sinking into his mind like the drumbeat of song, low and dark. “Forget about what I look like. You’ll only remember me as a bald, sleazy John who paid for a week and left without causing trouble.”

The man’s mouth went slack, his jaw dropping open as if his muscles had suddenly forgotten how to work.

His bloodshot eyes glazed over with the glassy stare of someone whose mind had been temporarily hijacked, pupils dilating until they looked like black holes in his flushed face.

The hostile intelligence that had been there moments before simply.

.. vanished, replaced by the empty compliance of a puppet waiting for its strings to be pulled.

“I understand,” he said in a monotone voice that no longer belonged to him, the words coming out flat and emotionless like a voice on a warped record.

His head bobbed once in a mechanical nod, and my commands settled into his memory like sediment, overwriting what had actually happened with the false narrative I’d planted.

“Give me a room near Rocco Palazzo.” I forced myself to sound calm despite the adrenaline coursing through me.

He reached behind him with jerky, puppet-like movements and grabbed a grimy key on a bourbon-shaped key ring. His fingers fumbled slightly, motor control still adjusting to my influence. “This one is next to his. Room eight.” He set the key on the stained counter with vacant eyes.

I pocketed the key quickly, guilt twisting in my stomach at what I’d done to him.

Mind control always left me feeling dirty, but survival demanded ugly choices.

I stepped away from the counter and melted back into the shadows, my vampire speed carrying me silently through the night.

The man would remember giving a room to someone—just not me, and not the real reason why.

I’d only requested one room, knowing that multiple reservations would draw unwanted attention from staff who might remember faces, ask questions, or worse—gossip to the wrong people.

This was about survival now, not comfort.

Every decision had to be calculated, every risk analyzed against exposure.

I wasn’t the aggressor this time, wasn’t the one with Angelo’s resources and network of loyal soldiers at my disposal.

The roles had reversed completely—I was the prey now, and prey survived by staying invisible, by creating layers of misdirection that would keep the predators circling in the wrong places.

The irony wasn’t lost on me. After decades of being the hunter, I was learning what it felt like to be hunted.

I slipped inside the room the clerk had given me, the warped door catching slightly before groaning open with the sound of wood against wood.

The metallic taste of anxiety coated my tongue as I stepped across the threshold—I wanted to check it out thoroughly before I moved Joy from Rocco’s room to this one.

The thought of her delicate presence in such squalor made my jaw clench with protective fury.

Steve could stay with Rocco; at least then I’d know she was as safe as possible in this godforsaken dump.

My enhanced vision took in every depressing detail as I scanned the room with the methodical precision of someone who’d learned that overlooking even the smallest threat could be fatal.

The air hung thick with the stench of stale smoke and something medicinal that might have been cheap disinfectant failing to mask deeper, more unpleasant odors.

The room featured a double bed rather than a queen, its sagging mattress covered by sheets that had probably been white in some previous decade.

The green shag carpet looked like bald patches of dying grass, worn down to the backing in high-traffic areas.

My boots stuck slightly to the floor with each step, making soft peeling sounds that turned my stomach.

I ran a hand through my hair, feeling how far we’d fallen pressing down on my shoulders like lead.

It would have to do. Even thinking those words left a bitter taste in my mouth, but they were true.

This wasn’t about comfort—it was about survival—and sometimes survival meant accepting the unacceptable.