CHAPTER 1
Having a breakdown in the middle of a live broadcast was really not a very good thing for a reporter's career.
Holly Storm's fingers tightened their already white-knuckled grip around the microphone. Her breath came too hard and way too fast as she fought to hold on to her control.
"Holly…" The reed-thin voice of her producer.
Shit. Her career was about to hit the toilet. She dragged her gaze away from the body-away from the body that she knew didn't belong to a human-and glanced back toward the round lens of the camera. "Uh…I'm…H-Holly Storm, reporting to you live from the scene of-" A freaking slaughter.
"A brutal…murder." Yeah, brutal was a good word choice considering the way the poor guy had been sliced to ribbons.
Get a grip, girl. She couldn't afford a meltdown right now.
After a hard swallow, she finally managed to suck in a full breath. Holly cleared her throat, then spoke in that calm, cool voice she'd perfected back in her college communication classes so long ago. "Police aren't talking…" At least not to her. But then, the two detectives on the scene-Colin Gyth and Todd Brooks-weren't exactly on her "friends" list. "But this reporter can't help but wonder just what sort of monster is loose on our Atlanta streets." There was a growl to her right.
Her gaze darted over, just for a moment, and she met the bright stare of Detective Gyth.
Screw him. Her chin lifted. "Reporting live from a downtown scene of death, this is Holly Storm, signing off."
The camera lens watched her for a silent moment. Then…
"Christ, Holly, you think that was a little dramatic?" Ben Blake muttered, lowering the camera from his shoulder. His Braves hat, the one the guy always wore, rain or shine, night or day, rested high on his head. A line of stubble lined his jaw.
"Dramatic's good," she told him, aware that while her voice was cool, her heart thundered hard enough to shake her chest. "Drama gets folks to forget about their crappy days and pay attention to the news."
"Are you okay?" The quieter, and no longer panicked, voice of her producer asked. "Not everyone is cut out for these kinds of stories."
Her shoulders, already straight, stiffened even more. No way was she about to be yanked off this story. Her last encounter with the Other –the supernaturals who walked the streets acting like humans and hiding behind magic-had left her with singed hair, a body full of bruises, and the acid of fear on her tongue.
But she wasn't the running-and-hiding type. Okay, fact one: Monsters existed. Fact two: Those monsters scared the hell out of her. Fact three: If she wanted to work in this town, and she did, then Holly was gonna have to learn how to live with the darker beings that stalked the streets.
"I'm fine, Mac." McArthur Phillips was a news veteran. Once an anchor for News Flash Five, the sixty-three-year-old had turned his attention to bossing folks around in his producer gig. Not that Mac looked sixty-three. The guy worked out four times a week to keep his body in top "anchor" form and his black hair was only now starting to gray.
From what Holly could tell, Mac was one of those guys who generally spoke softly, but could rip the flesh off anyone who got in his way with just a few careful words. Probably a leftover trait from his army days. She knew the guy had served back in Vietnam. She'd heard more than a few of his stories before.
"Don't lie to me." Still soft, but with a hard rasp beneath the words. "You looked pale as death for a minute there. A reporter fainting on camera-"
"Would be a major ratings score," Ben cut in, tugging his hat down a bit as a smile curved his thin lips.
Holly glared at him. "Right, because I want to be known as the Fainting Flash Five girl."
Asshole. She liked Ben, really did, but sometimes he could piss her off.
Holly's nose wrinkled. Oh, dammit, she could smell the blood.
"Well, if you're not goin' to faint, then get your ass over to those cops and find out just what the hell is goin' on," Mac growled.
Her back teeth locked. The cops had already said there would be no interviews. 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.