Angels of Darkness

far.
    She gently squeezed his hand. “We both know how belief can be warped, so that people think they’re doing something good—when in reality, they’re just destroying other good people.” Guardians and vampires were basically the same as they’d been before their transformations. Their personalities didn’t change; only their abilities did. “But to kill a woman, and not feel any remorse—that means they feel justified destroying anything standing in their way. And it’ll happen again.”
    â€œI know,” Marc said. “And if it had just been the vampires—hell, it’s not right —but I’d have just set them straight about vampires, make them understand who they killed . . . and then make them live with what they’d done.”
    â€œMaybe not punishment enough, but still punishment.” And if the other option was turning the girls over to the vampire community, and letting them dispense justice or punishment . . .
    That wasn’t even an option. Maybe in some circumstances. Not this one.
    â€œYes,” he agreed. “But for what they did to Marnie Weaver, that’s not our decision to make.”
    No, it wasn’t. That was for the human courts to decide, and he knew this territory and the law of the land better than she did. “What will you do?”
    â€œMost likely, I won’t have to do anything. There will be evidence. Someone will have seen the Cherokee. The girls will have left a fingerprint. There’s no chance that four teenagers got in and out of there without leaving some kind of trace. So I’ll wait. I’ll head back to Riverbend and keep an eye on them, make certain they don’t slay any more vampires. And if it seems like the sheriff isn’t getting anywhere in the investigation, I’ll point him that way. Maybe send him those text transcripts when SI puts them together.”
    â€œThat’s probably the best way.” Radha rose up onto her toes, softly kissed his mouth. “This is one of the harder ones. It’s not just the vampires, not just a woman—those four kids threw their lives away, too.”
    He nodded, focusing on her lips. Maybe thinking of the kiss she’d just given him so easily. “You have to go back?”
    â€œNot right away. Rosalia and Mariko are covering the news for me. Nothing has popped up yet.”
    And that was the most efficient way of hunting most demons. They stumbled across some demons, so regular patrols around a territory were necessary, but almost all of the other demons Radha found came from a mention of something odd in the papers, a detail that didn’t make sense, or a half-heard rumor flying around a city. It was all a lot easier now with computers, and with Special Investigations digging up leads from all around the world. Still, Radha had recently spent two months in London on another mission—and though other Guardians had covered her territory, she wasn’t ready to leave it again for more than a day or two at a time. Anything else felt like ignoring her responsibilities.
    So, maybe another day here . . . and then he could come to her in another day or two, when everything in Riverbend had been settled.
    She looked up at him. “We’ll work this out, won’t we?”
    His eyes sparked with green light. His kiss was hot and thorough. The perfect answer.
    Until his phone rang. Marc groaned, held her for another long, scorching second before pulling away. Radha grinned, appreciating his reluctance to break away almost as much as the kiss.
    â€œHopefully SI with those transcripts,” he muttered, glancing at the screen. He frowned. “Local.”
    â€œSomeone you gave a card to?”
    Humans, vampires. How many people had he talked with? But if someone called at five in the morning, it was most likely a vampire.
    â€œProbably.” He brought the phone to his ear. “Revoire.”
    Radha had no trouble hearing the other end of a telephone conversation from this distance, but to begin, there was only a brief silence. Then a young female voice: “Agent Revoire?”
    â€œSpeaking. May I help you?”
    â€œMy friend Sam said you talked to him yesterday. About Jason.”
    Marc’s brow furrowed. “Miklia?”
    â€œYes,” she said, before continuing with obvious uncertainty. “I wondered . . . if I could talk to you. About . . . a few things. If you could