At least, no “official” ones. A girl had to try. Holly shoved her microphone toward Ben. “Be back in ten.” And hopefully, she’d be back with a story.
Holly turned on her heel. Zeroed her sights on the detectives. They were talking to a uniformed cop. Faces intent. She slipped under the yellow police tape, then crept toward them, hoping to overhear—
“Ms. Storm, just what the hell do you think you’re doin’?” Colin Gyth demanded, blue eyes glittering down at her. His arms were crossed over his rather impressively muscled chest. “This is a crime scene.” He grabbed her arm and hauled her back toward the tape, ignoring her outraged yelp. “If we wanted reporters screwing up the evidence, there wouldn’t be a damn barrier set up.”
A flimsy barrier. He pushed her under the tape, shook his head, and frowned down at her. “Hell, woman, didn’t you learn your lesson the last time?”
Learn her lesson? What was she, a two-year-old? “What I learned,” she pitched her voice low, knowing others couldn’t overhear this, “is that this town has a lot of deadly secrets.” She pointed toward the body. “Looks like you’ve got someone hunting demons.”
His eyes widened. “What?”
Uh, oh. The detective hadn’t known—
He was under the tape and beside her in less than two seconds. For a big guy, he could sure move fast. “What did you just say?”
Holly licked her lips. The detective was intimidating as hell with those dark features and the glinting edge of teeth that looked a bit too sharp and—
“She said the victim wasn’t human.” The cold, slightly mocking voice had every nerve in Holly’s body tensing. No, shit, not—
She and Colin turned together and met the coal-black stare of Niol Lapen. It was just after dusk, and the dark shadows gathered around him, wrapping over the tall, muscled length of his body.
He strolled toward them, power evident in his every rippling move. His face, a face that Holly figured most women would find attractive—not her, of course, but most women—showed no hint of emotion. But then, she’d rarely known Niol to bother much with emotions.
Midnight-black hair swept back from his high forehead. The guy really had perfect features, aesthetically speaking anyway. High cheeks, square jaw, long, straight nose, and lips that were—
Not for me. Holly jerked her gaze back up to his black eyes and away from the lips that she was not the least bit interested in. She needed to focus on his eyes—because it was the eyes that told the true nature of the man. Or, in Niol’s case, the true nature of the demon.
Because Niol Lapen was a demon. Probably the strongest and most dangerous demon she’d ever met, and she wasn’t going to forget that fact.
Or the fact that she was pretty sure he’d killed a man the last time they’d met.
His gaze swept past her. Holly followed his stare and saw that the body had been covered with a sheet. About time.
“How did you get here so fast, Ms. Storm?” Niol’s voice, harder now, dark and demanding.
Her eyebrows shot up. Just what was the demon implying? “I was covering a story two blocks over. I followed the sirens.” Okay, probably not her classiest moment, but she’d landed an exclusive.
And stumbled onto a scene that would give her nightmares for a week.
Not now. She couldn’t let this get personal now.
But dammit, why him? He’d been a good guy, harmless. He hadn’t deserved terror and death in a dirty alley, behind a strip club for God’s sake.
“Fuck that.” Colin stepped toward Niol. “You knew the victim?”
“Um.” Neither agreement not denial.
Colin’s hands clenched. “Don’t play with me, Niol. If you’d seen the way the poor bastard was slashed—”
“I did.”
Colin stiffened. “You didn’t—”
Niol laughed, a rough, dry sound, and his gaze returned to Holly. “I didn’t kill him. One of her kind did.”
What? Her kind? What was he—
“Come with me. Now.” Colin pointed at her. “And as for you, Ms. Storm, stay away from my crime scene.”
Niol’s gaze raked over her, for just the briefest moment, darting from her head to her strappy black shoes, and Holly shivered. Dangerous.
But, dammit, sexy.
Focus. “You can’t just shut out the press, you know, detective. The public has a right to know—”
Niol shook his head. “Still playing that song, Holly?” Holly, not Ms. Storm any longer. And his voice was different too. Husky. Rough. The voice a man would use in bed. Goose bumps rose on her uncovered arms.
“I don’t know—”
“You knew he was a demon.” His lips twisted and those soulless black eyes bored into her. “He was one of your sources, wasn’t he?”
No way was she going to answer that question, even if the dark demon before her was right. Carl Bronx had been one of her sources. She’d talked with him more than a dozen times. He’d been young, a little over twenty-one, with a ready smile and a dimple in his chin.
No. She would not think about him. Thinking about him and realizing that sweet Carl was the guy who’d gotten sliced to bits, well, that had almost caused her on-camera breakdown.
Niol stepped toward her and brushed the back of his hand over her chilled arm. “You’re not as hard as you pretend to be,” he whispered. “Pity.” His breath stirred the hair near her cheek.
Holly blinked back the tears that stupidly filled her eyes because even though the sheet was over him, in her mind, she could still see Carl’s bloody body.
Niol shook his head. “You’re out of your league. Go home, Holly. Back to your safe world.” He stepped back. “Leave the demons and the death to me.”
The guy couldn’t have given her a more clear dismissal.
Holly watched Niol turn and stride with Colin toward a patrol car.
Oh, yeah, that had been a rather nice “Fuck off.”
Unfortunately for the demon, she wasn’t the fucking-off type.
“Didn’t get the story, huh?” Ben asked, coming to stand at her side.
Holly didn’t take her gaze off the strong lines of Niol’s body. He leaned against the blue-and-white patrol car, his arms loose at his sides. “Not yet.”
“The cops will release a statement later, no big deal—”
“It is.” Carl had been important. One of the good guys—uh, demons. He hadn’t deserved an ending like this. Hell,
