Page 6 of Vampire's Bite

I, unfortunately, was the smasher of his hope. An exhausted sighed escaped me as I stared for a second because I was certain that we’d been over this and I’d given him the answer already. At this point we were going around in circles.

"Rook, I told you. There's nothing I can do other than what you've already tried. Hell, you're much closer to Cordelia than me. If anyone can track her down, it's you." I hated to be so frank, but times like these, Rook couldn't be reasoned with.

He was beyond all rational thought right now.

His lip curled in a snarl and I braced myself for whatever was coming next. "This is all your fault," he said, his voice low and dangerous. And there it was. The first throwing of blame. I’d known it was coming, or at the very least suspected it. "You were supposed to be watching her."

I flinched but didn't say anything. There was nothing I could say that would make things better between us. He needed to get the frustration out. I was an easy target, and I could take it, unlike most others.

We both knew that Cordelia was missing and we were both doing everything we could to find her. But we didn't know where to start. I wasn't sure what was going to happen if we didn't find her soon. Equally disturbing was the fact that Rook seemed to be deteriorating with each hour that passed.

"Let me remind you that I did check on Milo and there wasn't anything suspicious about the guy, other than the fact he has a hard on for Cordie," I said. Milo was the creepy human that Cordie had chosen to associate with. Last I’d checked, though, she didn’t seem overly impressed with him. "So I just took the opportunity to get a snack," I admitted and braced myself for the full force of his wrath.

"So, let me get this straight." Rook stepped forward, ready for a confrontation. "You didn't even interrogate the guy?"

I sighed. This was going to be ugly. "You know as well as I do that it was absolutely unnecessary. We did a background check. I followed him for three days. He’s not suspicious at all. He’s just boring. And if I interrogated him then that would mean having to come up with a valid reason to question him without raising his suspicions about us."

"Why the hell should we care about his opinions?" Rook demanded, fury blazing in his eyes.

"Because we both know that one stray human running his mouth could start a fire we wouldn’t be able to put out. It wouldn't have done any good," I said. "Milo doesn't know anything." He wasn’t smart enough to orchestrate a kidnapping. Interrogating him wouldn’t change that.

I also didn’t want to leave Rook alone while I took the time to track Milo down and actually do the interrogating. The amount of damage the prince could do in that time wasn’t something I was comfortable with. It wasn’t like I could take Rook with me either, if I did that Milo probably wouldn’t survive.

Rook ran a hand through his hair, frustration etched in the lines on his face and the grim set of his mouth. "I can't just sit here and do nothing," he said. “Even worse, I can’t watchyoudoing nothing.”

"I get it," I replied. I could empathize because whether he knew it or not, he cared about her, he probably even loved her, I just wasn’t sure if he realized exactly how far gone he was to her. "But we need to be smart about this. We need to figure out who took her and why they want her instead of demolishing the entire city. If we’re lucky they might just ransom her to us."

"And you have to learn to interrogate suspects properly," Rook added, his normally blue eyes had turned cold and flinty, letting me know just how close he was to losing his shit.

I inclined my head. He was going through something. I could tolerate his abuse for now. But only for now. If he pushed me too hard then he knew I’d push back and neither of us would take that well. "I'll do the best I can, Rook."

"You'll do more than that," Rook said. "Because if you don't, Cordelia might not be the only one who ends up paying the price." He was menacing and it wasn’t wholly wasted, not if his purpose was to piss me off.

"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked, standing, fists curled at my sides.

"Are you even concerned about her? Does she mean nothing to you?" Rook asked, his eyes wide and dark with rage and a bloodlust that was nothing to do with his hunger.

Yes. I was worried. Didn’t much appreciate his questioning it either. I frowned. "Of course I'm worried about her. And how could you ask if I care for her? I wouldn't have slept with her if that were the case." I tried to push my anger down, knowing this was nothing more than Rook taking his frustration out on me.

"And yet you're not doing a damned thing to help her," Rook said. "You're just sitting here."

"I have done everything I know to do to find her," I protested. "But there's nothing more I can do, at least not right now. I’ve put feelers out into the community, but I need to give them time to try and find information. This stuff isn’t instantaneous. You know this, you’re just too panicked to remember it."

Rook shook his head and turned away from me. "I don't have time for this," he said. Every word was a dagger, although I wasn’t sure which one of us he was trying to cut.

"Where are you going?" I asked.

"To find Cordelia," Rook replied, heading for the door. He couldn’t tell me anything more specific because there was no actual objective behind his actions. We didn’t know where to look, how to track her without the bond, nothing.

"And what am I supposed to do?" I asked. He probably had a list of tasks and I would hate each one.

"Sit here and rot," Rook said over his shoulder. His words were like a slap in the face. I honestly didn’t know how to take them.

I opened my mouth to argue, but Rook had already turned his back on me, walking out of the room. I knew he was going to do whatever it took to find Cordelia. And I also knew that there was nothing I could do to stop him.

Not that I wanted to stop him.

I wanted Cordie back just as much as he did, but I also wanted him to be reasonable and not burn bridges that we’d been carefully cultivating for the last decade. Or do any more damage to the city than absolutely necessary. With the foul mood he was in right now I was sure that the damage would be high if I wasn’t there to rein him in.

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