Page 29 of Cry of Blood and Joy (French Quarter Vampire Enforcer #2)

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Enzo

The thought of hell hit me like a sucker punch to the gut, and panic clawed its way up my throat until I thought I might lose it right there in Keir’s fancy car.

What Serenity had endured down there—the things that had broken her, twisted her—I’d be damned if I’d let Joy suffer the same fate.

A cold, sick feeling washed over me, sending every murderous vampire instinct I had screaming that we were out of time.

“Let me out. Now.” My voice came out flat, deadly calm in the way that made smart people step back and stupid ones reach for weapons.

Keir studied me with those calculating eyes. “You want to go see Joy?”

I stared at the door handle on Nyx’s side of the limousine. “I said let me out. I won’t ask again.” Every threat I’d ever made, every promise I’d kept in blood and violence echoed in those words. This wasn’t a request anymore.

I turned away from the door handle and back at Keir.

“We can take you wherever you want,” Keir glanced briefly at the door handle as if he knew what I was thinking. “I believe we need to form an alliance against?—“

But I wasn’t listening anymore. His words faded into meaningless background noise as violence roared inside me. The limousine lurched to a stop at a red light, and that split second of stillness was all I needed.

Using vampire speed that turned the world into slow motion around me, I launched myself across the confined space with lethal precision, knocking Nyx into the door.

I climbed over him, my knee driving into his ribs with enough force to crack bone as I used his body as a springboard.

His startled curse was cut short as the air whooshed out of his lungs.

I seized the door handle and ripped it open with enough vampire strength to tear the hinges, the metal groaning in protest before giving way with a sharp crack. Without hesitation, I threw myself out into the chaos of New Orleans traffic, the humid afternoon air slapping my face like a wet rag.

The moment my feet touched asphalt, the world exploded into a kaleidoscope of motion and sound.

Streets and cars and buildings blurred into streaks of color as I pushed my supernatural speed to its limits, my body moving faster than human eyes could track.

The sounds of the city—car horns, shouting voices, music spilling from open doors—compressed into a single rushing symphony that filled my ears like the roar of a hurricane.

Guilt gouged my chest like a living thing.

I shouldn’t be leaving Rocco—he was vulnerable.

Something had happened to him. Keir might know how to heal him.

Usually I would want to know the what and the why.

But the image of Joy’s face burned in my mind like a brand, and I knew with crystalline certainty that I couldn’t save anyone if she was lost.

I moved faster than the wind itself, my feet barely touching the ground as I weaved through the dense afternoon crowds like a ghost made of shadow and desperation.

Tourists scattered without even seeing what had brushed past them, their drinks spilling and cellphones tumbling as the displaced air of my passage hit them like invisible fists.

Cars became static obstacles that I flowed around with fluid grace, their drivers never knowing how close death had come to kissing their bumpers.

The familiar scents of Bourbon Street hit me before I could see it—that unique cocktail of spilled alcohol, fried food, and human desire layered over the underlying current of supernatural power that always hummed through the French Quarter.

But underneath it all, something else made my heart clench with terror: the foul scent of dark magic, thick and cloying like smoke from a funeral pyre.

By the time I reached the hotel, my hands were shaking with more than just adrenaline.

If something had happened to her while I was playing politics with Keir, if Ari had gotten his greedy fingers into the woman who had somehow become my entire world, I would burn this city to the ground and dance in the ashes.

The thought of losing Joy—of failing to protect the one person who had made my centuries of existence feel like something more than an endless parade of violence and emptiness—was a pain so sharp it could have killed me if I were still human.

I had to reach her. I had to be in time. The alternative—arriving to find nothing but bloodstains and the lingering scent of her fear—was a possibility that would shatter what remained of my soul.

I burst through the door to Rocco’s room with enough force to splinter the wooden frame, the sound echoing through the hallway like a gunshot. “Joy? Where are you?” My voice cracked with desperation as it bounced off the empty walls, coming back to me hollow and mocking.

The silence that greeted me was worse than any scream.

The bed was messed up, sheets twisted and tangled as if someone had thrashed in their sleep—or been dragged from it in a struggle.

Pillows lay scattered on the floor like abandoned soldiers on a battlefield.

The lights were dimmed to an eerie twilight that cast long, accusatory shadows across the room, making everything look like a crime scene waiting to be discovered.

But it was the silence that tore at my heart like talons ripping through flesh.

Not the comfortable quiet of someone sleeping, but the terrible, yawning emptiness of abandonment.

The air itself felt wrong—stale and lifeless, as if all the warmth and energy that made a place feel lived in had been sucked away by some cosmic vacuum.

I moved through the hotel room like a man possessed, my vampire senses straining for any trace of her.

I inhaled deeply, searching for that unique scent that was purely Joy—vanilla and moonlight with an underlying hint of something wild and untamed that spoke to the Unseelie blood in her veins.

The generic smells of hotel soap and industrial cleaning supplies overpowered the faint ghost of her.

My hands shook as I checked the bathroom, yanked open the closet door, even looked under the bed like some paranoid mortal afraid of monsters in the dark. Each empty space was another nail in the coffin of my hope, another confirmation that I was too late, that she was gone.

Panic ripped through me like teeth and talons. I spun around and put my fist through the connecting door to the adjoining room with enough vampire strength to reduce the wood to splinters. The door exploded inward in a shower of debris, and I stepped through the wreckage into the next room.

Empty. Completely, utterly empty.

The twin beds were still made with military precision, the surfaces free of dust that would indicate recent use.

No personal belongings, no signs of struggle, no lingering warmth of human presence.

It was as if no one had ever been here at all—just another vacant room in an endless chain of identical spaces designed to house the temporary lives of strangers.

I stood there in the ruins of the door I’d destroyed, surrounded by the deafening silence of my own failure, and something inside my chest cracked like ice under pressure.

Somewhere out there in the sprawling maze of New Orleans, the woman I loved was in the hands of monsters, and I had no idea where to even begin looking for her.

Someone knocked on the door, the sound sharp and intrusive against the silence that had been consuming me. “Hey, you okay in there handsome?”

I spun around, anger and frustration pulsing through my veins.

A blonde-haired woman stood in the doorway, her cheap dress wrinkled and her makeup slightly smudged from the humid night air.

The scent of cigarette smoke and cheap perfume clung to her.

I could have used compulsion—the familiar pull of power thrummed beneath my skin, eager to bend her will—but I wasn’t about to waste time on mind games.

Not now.

“There was a dark-haired woman staying here.” Desperation bled through my carefully controlled tone that I’d maintained for centuries. “Did you see her?”

The woman’s eyes widened slightly, her hand moving instinctively to the doorframe as if ready to bolt. “I did see a dark-haired woman. Don’t know if she was staying here or just…visiting. But I can make you forget all about her.”

Panic exploded inside me like a bomb. I rushed over to her, my movements too fast, too predatory. My hands shot out and clasped her arms, fingers pressing into her soft flesh. “Where did she go?” The words tore from my throat like a growl. This wasn’t like me. I never lost control.

That was Angelo. I was the calm one. The calculating one. The one who thought three moves ahead.

“She was…she was with a man. Dark hair. They got in—” She trembled beneath my grip. “You’re hurting me.”

I could smell the sharp tang of her fear, could hear her pulse racing beneath her pale skin. Normally, I would have stopped, but not today. Not when Joy’s life was in danger.

My fingers dug even deeper into her flesh. Her bones shifted beneath my grip. “They got in what? Tell me.”

“A black Corvette.” The words tumbled out in a rush, her breath coming in short, panicked gasps.

I immediately dropped my hands as if she’d burned me. The prostitute stumbled backward, rubbing her arms where my fingerprints would undoubtedly bloom into bruises.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

Dimitri Dragan. The name rolled down my throat like a bitter tonic. I staggered back a step. My vision tunneled, the edges going dark as rage—pure, incandescent rage—flooded my system. I dragged my fingers through my hair, pulling hard enough that strands came away in my grip.

All his blustering that he wouldn’t betray us had been a big fat lie. When pushed into a corner, he rolled over on his back like a good hound dog and handed over his prize to Angelo Santi.

All my calculations to keep Joy safe burned up. Angelo had the one thing that mattered.

Damn it! I never should have left her. Never should have trusted that she’d be safe, even for an hour. Fury erupted inside me like a raging volcano. My fangs extended, my control finally burning away like ash.

And where the hell was Steve? He was supposed to come back and protect her. She was his sister.

When I got my hands on him, he’d find out exactly why people whispered my name in the dark. Why even the oldest of our kind crossed themselves when they heard I was coming.

He’d learn that there were worse things than death.

And I was one of them.