Embraced By Darkness

Maybe just this once, forewarned would be forearmed.

"You will gain what you have always wanted, but it will not be in the form you have dreamed of."

I blinked. What I'd always wanted was a hubby and a family of my own—how could I gain all that if it wasn't in the form I dreamed of? "And that means?"

"that sometimes what we wish and what life offers are two completely different things."

Like I didn't already know that.

She continued softly, "There are many men in your life, but I see three who will become special."

"Three? I don't need three. I need one." Just one. That wasn't asking too much, was it?

"There is always one. But there are others. One will hurt One will heal. And one will always be there, regardless."

I hesitated, part of me wanting to ask the question, the other fearing it. "Is one of them my soul mate?"

"Can a spirit with two souls have one soul mate? That is a. question only time can answer."

"Well, that's a crappy sort of answer, if you ask me."

She blinked, then squeezed my fingers and released them. "I'm sorry I couldn't concentrate more on the murders, but as I warned, sometimes my foresight goes where it wills."

Yeah, and it didn't exactly give us more than what we already had. Still, if these murders weren't new, as Dia had implied, then a trip into the files for a closer look at past murders was obviously in order. The clues might lay in the past. Whether they'd help us solve the present crimes was anyone's guess.

"Be careful with this thing you hunt," Dia said, rubbing her arms lightly. "I do not think it will be easy to stop."

"The things we hunt never arc."

"No." She hesitated. "I'm sorry for dipping into your private life. I know you didn't want to hear that, and it wasn't my intention—"

I waved her apology away. "Don't worry. At least it wasn't totally bad. And at least there's some hope of my dreams coming true, even if not in the form I desire."

She smiled. "Which makes no sense when said like that."

"Tell me about it," I said wryly.

She pressed her hands against the sofa and stood up. "Would you like tea? Coffee? My next reading isn't for another hour, and it's so nice to see someone other than clients for a change."

Technically, I could be classed as a client, given she now worked for the Directorate, but I knew what she meant. While I had my doubts that Dia and I could ever be pals, I wasn't about to walk away from a prospective friendship. I had few enough of those, too.

All of which was my fault. I tended to be the prickly, standoffish type—a leftover of my hellish days with the pack, no doubt.

"Coffee would be good," I said with a smile.

"Good." She walked around the sofa and headed to a side door, but stopped as her daughter came choofing around the corner again.

"Where does she get the energy?" I asked with a grin.

"Heaven only knows," Dia muttered, then bent and asked, "Risa, would you like a drink? And some cookies?"

The little girl nodded so fast her pigtails were a blur of white. And then she stilled, looked at me, and pointed.

"Death, Mommy. Death."

Chapter Six

I stared at the finger pointed so firmly in my direction, then at the wide, violet eyes. There was no fear in those eyes, only a matter-of-factness that chilled me.

Whatever it was she was seeing, she believed it.

"Where do you see death, Risa?" Dia asked, her voice as matter-of-fact as her daughter's. Like seeing these sort of things was an everyday occurrence. And perhaps for the two of them, it was.

"Here." The little girl patted her left shoulder.

A chill ran through me. I clenched my fingers and resisted the urge to say anything.

"Can you describe him for me?" Dia asked.

The little girl screwed up her nose. "Dark, floaty. He smiles, Mommy."

"Does he reach for Riley?"

She shook her head. "He watches."

"Nothing else?"

"No."

"That's wonderful. Now, would you like a cookie?"

Pigtails went flying again as the little girl nodded enthusiastically.

"Then we'll race you to the kitchen."

The little girl took off. Dia rose to her feet and looked at me.

" 'That's wonderful'?" I asked, eyebrow raised.

"I don't want Risa to be afraid of what she sees, nor do I ever wish her to be afraid to talk about it. So, I praise rather than react, no matter what she says she sees."

"And has she ever seen anything bad?"

"She once saw death with his hand on the shoulder of a client. He died the next week, hit by a truck at a pedestrian crossing."

"Oh." Great. Not that death and I hadn't been chummy before. Hell, I'd even faced the god of death himself and was still alive to tell the tale. "So what does it mean when she sees death near me, but not touching?"

"I'd presume it means you're about to do something dangerous, something that puts your life on the line. Be careful when hunting this serial killer."

"I intend to be, trust me." I shivered and rubbed my arms. "I think that coffee you mentioned might be a good idea now."

She smiled and motioned me to follow her. We went through a large, formal dining room and into a kitchen that was as large as my entire apartment. Unlike the other rooms in this house, though, it had a homey feel to it, filled with warmth and the rich scent of baking. Risa was already in a high chair, munching on cookies.

A thin-looking shifter turned around as we entered, her smile rippling across her face, making her rough, aquiline features glow with cheeriness and affection. Obviously a woman who loved her job.

"A guest! How lovely. Will coffee and cake be good, Miss Dia?"

"Elsa, this is Riley. And coffee and cake would be wonderful."

"Good, good. You sit, I serve."

So we sat and we talked, the topics ranging from her work and clients to news, shops, and TV. It was a tentative begi

And, oddly enough, despite the fact her visions had confirmed that my future would not be what I'd always imagined, I left Dia's house feeling a lot more enthusiastic about whatever fate had in store.

I climbed into my car and headed back to the Directorate. Given what Dia had seen of the shadow, my next line of inquiry had to be a search through past murder records, both Directorate and police. Which would probably take ages. But while the computer was doing its stuff, I could at least catch up on Cole's latest findings. Not that I thought anything would be a lot different from the first murder.

I drove into the parking lot and was lucky enough to find a spot near the elevators. The car keys I pocketed. While regulations said that all keys had to be returned to the responsible officer on reentry to the Directorate, I'd probably need the car later, so it was easier to simply keep them. And besides, it would piss off Salliane.

I went through all the sca

I tucked the folder under my arm and helped myself to coffee. "He didn't notice anything unusual there?"

"No." Jack hesitated. "Are you sure this thing you're sensing at the crime scenes isn't a vampire?"

I shook my head. "It's not a vamp. A vamp couldn't get close enough to the scene, not without Cole and his team sensing him." Because a shifter's senses were every bit as keen as a werewolf's. "It doesn't even feel like a soul."

"It's not like you've had a whole lot of experience with souls yet."

And if I had my way, that lack would continue. But this was one instance where I was never likely to get my way. "When I feel souls, I feel the chill of death or whatever the hell the afterlife is before they appear. With this other thing, all I feel is evil. It needs to kill, it hungers to kill, and then it hangs about afterward to gloat in the destruction it causes."