Angel's Pain. Maggie Shayne

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      Prologue

      Gregor didn’t need to get very close to watch his target. He was a vampire, after all, thanks to the efforts of his employers in the CIA.

      They had created him, set him up in style, taught him secrets unknown even to other vamps, all to serve their own purposes. His mission, they had told him, was to become the most notorious rogue vampire imaginable. A rogue, a vampire who killed humans at will without remorse or caution, would not be long tolerated by the rest of vampire society. They would send someone after him, and Reaper would be their most likely choice. All part of the plan.

      When Reaper came for him, Gregor was supposed to capture the former CIA assassin turned vampire turned vampiric hit man, and return him into the agency’s tender care.

      The problem was, Gregor had changed his mind, and he was pretty sure his supervisor knew it. He’d decided he liked being a rogue vampire. He liked taking whatever he wanted whenever he wanted it, without apology. He liked the wealth he was accumulating by taking everything his victims had to give. And he especially liked the power he gained when he murdered one of his own kind.

      Reaper’s blood would be some of the most powerful he could imagine. He had been made by Rhiannon, who had been made by Dracula himself. Powerful.

      And now he had other reasons to want to take vengeance on the arrogant undead prick. Reaper had stolen his woman from him. He’d had no right to do that. Gregor had plucked the ungrateful little bitch from the gutters, transformed her, taken her in. And Briar had repaid him by sleeping with the enemy.

      Oh, yes, the two of them had some serious pain coming.

      But first things first.

      If the CIA had guessed that Gregor was no longer their obedient lapdog but was, instead, working for his own gain, they would try to have him eliminated. And since the agent who’d been in charge of him, Magnarelli, had been killed during a recent scuffle with Reaper and his gang, the entire case had reverted to Derrick Dwyer, the special agent who had been Reaper’s direct supervisor and who’d been running the whole operation from behind the scenes all along.

      Gregor didn’t trust Dwyer. But he needed to know what the bastard had in store for him. And besides, Dwyer might have a line on Reaper and Briar.

      So now Gregor was lurking outside Dwyer’s home in rural Connecticut. He was five hundred yards away from the small Cape Cod, concealed by shrubbery and a youngish pinon pine. From his position, he could see Dwyer clearly as the man moved around beyond the windows. Tall, awkwardly thin, with an Ichabod Crane profile from nose to Adam’s apple, Dwyer was six months from retirement. Getting Reaper back into custody and completing his work with Gregor—possibly by putting Gregor into the grave—would be his final assignment.

      Gregor relaxed, surrounded by the fragrance of the pine tree’s lower branches, watching by the light of a nearly full moon. He had all night, after all. Dwyer flipped on a computer, then moved out of sight. When he returned, he was carrying a coffee mug in one hand, steam spiraling from its mouth. He set it on the desk, put on a minuscule headset, and then paused, turned and stared straight at the window behind him.

      Gregor ducked, even though he knew the mortal couldn’t see him, much less sense him there. It was a knee-jerk reaction, and a ludicrous one. Or was it? As he watched, Dwyer got up, moved to the window and lowered the blinds.

       Damn.

      Rising from his position underneath the pine, Gregor lunged into rapid motion. He sped across the short distance between his vantage point and the house, stopping right beside the window. And then he peered through the slits in the blinds, and was able to see and hear everything as if he were inside looking over Dwyer’s shoulder.

      “Everythin’s fine,” Dwyer was saying softly, in his very slight Irish brogue. There was very little of it remaining, but it was clear to the perceptions of a vampire. “Nothin’s goin’ to hurt you. This is perfectly natural. There’s nothin’ to be afraid of.”

      Frowning, Gregor stared at the computer screen. It was dark. He could hear what sounded like rapid breaths coming through Dwyer’s earpiece. Like a child getting ready to cut loose and cry its heart out.

      “Open yer eyes for me. Go on. I want you to look around, see everythin’ around you.”

      The way Dwyer spoke also suggested he was speaking to a child. Odd, Gregor thought. He’d expected Dwyer to be solely focused on one case and one case only—Reaper’s. But apparently he had something entirely unrelated going on.

      Or was it?

      As Gregor watched, the black screen changed, as if a shade had been lifted, and he couldn’t make out what it was showing at first. And then he realized what it was. It was a camera’s eye view. As if the camera on the other end were walking through a long hallway, turning left and right, moving slightly up and down with the cadence of the foot-steps.

      “Could you go on outside, hon? Just step or two outside?”

      “I’m not supposed to go out alone,” a voice said, clearly and suddenly, making Gregor snap to sharper attention. It was a female voice. Adult, and yet childlike at the same time.

      “You’re not really goin’ anywhere. Just step outside the door. It’ll only take a minute, I promise. Then you can go right back in.”

      There was a bobbing motion on the screen, as if the camera were nodding. And then there was a door looming before the lens, and a slender, pale hand gripping the knob and pushing it open. The screen showed what she saw as she looked outside—a wet street, with cars rushing past now and then. Streetlights and headlights cast their glowing reflections on the slick black pavement, and no moon shone in the sky. It was not a clear warm evening, as it was here.

      Dwyer watched the cars and muttered, “New York plates. Jersey. Florida. Indiana.” He sighed. “Do me a favor, lass, and just turn to your left. What can you see in that direction?”

      The camera’s point of view changed. Something fell over the screen, and as Gregor frowned, trying to see what it was, a hand rose and brushed it away. It was a lock of hair. It had fallen over the girl’s eyes, and she had moved it away. As if…as if…Gregor swore under his breath as he realized that this woman on the other end of the computer connection wasn’t just holding the camera. Somehow, she was the camera.

      His mind whirled with questions, possibilities, theories, but he had to bring his focus back to the matter at hand. He refocused on that computer screen and saw brick buildings, more wet roads, more streetlamps. Not a sign or a business in sight.

      “Now turn the other way,” Dwyer ordered.

      “I don’t want to,” the girl said, but she turned. A gas station came into view. Its sign read SUNOCO. Its prices were listed. There was nothing else to help identify where it might be.

      “I need to go in now.”

      “No,