night moves - a holden chancery story Read Free Page B

like sex and stardust, the human incarnation of champagne bubbles. God bless them.
    The street kid was eying the distance between them, trying to decide if it was worth it to make the trip around to them before the next train arrived. Felicia had noticed their observer as well, and was fidgeting more than before.
    “Stop,” Holden warned. “It makes you look like prey.”
    Felicia froze, immediately halting her uneasy swaying. She relaxed her arms and straightened her posture, and suddenly looked like someone not to be messed with. She was still trembling, but no one else would notice if they weren’t right next to her.
    Squealing brakes and a faint rumble announced the arrival of an incoming Northbound 1 train. Holden gave the kid a smug flip of the bird, and the punk bared blackened teeth at him.
    Not having to feed off that guttersnipe was the best thing to happen to Holden’s night since he’d left the gallery. Heroin wasn’t the party it was cracked up to be once it hit the blood. It tasted of paint thinner and dead-eyed reality. There was no joy in it whatsoever.
    With a hand on the small of her back, Holden guided Felicia onto the closest subway car, and the doors sighed closed behind him. The interior of the car was layered with more spray-painted tags and obscene drawings, and the air was thick with the stench of cigarette smoke and urine.
    Holden wasn’t a fan of small spaces like this. He hated the reminder of how disgusting human beings were capable of being.
    Felicia glanced at the empty seats around them and seemed to think better of sitting in any of them. The pungent odor of human waste might have come from anywhere, and standing felt a lot cleaner than taking the risk. It turned out she was as much of a snob about these things as he was.
    The only other passenger in the car with them was an elderly black man with a patchy gray beard. His unfocused eyes were milky white, and he stared at the opposite wall without acknowledging he knew they were there.
    “What’s the genius plan, here?” Felicia asked. “You going to take me to the end of the line and see if I can make it home in one piece or something?”
    “I’m disappointed I didn’t think of that. But no. I’ve got a different idea. I want to see if you have what it takes to work for the Tribunal. And you wanted to get your hands dirty tonight and kill some vampires. So we’re both going to get what we want.”
    Her cheeks went pale, and she swallowed hard. Her pulse was hammering with such ferocious intensity he could taste her fear in the back of his throat, and it excited him. Why couldn’t she have just been a quick-and-dirty feed in a back alley somewhere? This hadn’t been how he’d envisioned his night going, but now that he was in the thick of it, he might as well see things through. He had it on good authority the council was down a bounty hunter right now, so bringing them someone he’d seen in action might help him in his lowly warden position.
    Recruiting a new hunter might not elevate him to sentry, but it would help the council remember he existed.
    “Where are we going, then?”
    “Harlem.”
    Felicia’s lips tightened into a thin frown, and she shot him an unfriendly glare. She was really good at those. She also didn’t appear to be frightened of him anymore, which he couldn’t decide if he liked or not. In this game, it didn’t hurt to be a little afraid of the things that could kill you.
    “And what, pray tell, are we going to Harlem for?”
    “Jazz?” He grinned broadly.
    The subway lurched, tossing Felicia into him. She braced her hand against his chest to steady herself, and that instant, that one touch, electrified him. There was nothing sexual about it, yet he felt it right into his core, making him awake and alive, like every one of his senses was totally alert.
    You’re just hungry , he told himself, as if that might explain what he was feeling. But it didn’t, not in a satisfactory way. He was feeling