Kick The Candle (Knight Games) Read Online Free Page A

please.”
    I straightened up. “Fine, but you could benefit from more humor in your life. You take yourself way too seriously.”
    He cocked his head to the side and raised his eyebrows.
    “Okay, okay.” I stared at the swirling silver and said in a cool, strong voice, “Reveal.”
    The bubbles rose to form buildings, a 3-D model of an area I recognized immediately.
    “It's the edge of Carlton.” I pointed at a blinking silver sign at the center of the cityscape. “See, it's the Mill Wheel nightclub.”
    “You know this place?”
    “Everybody knows this place. It's where all the college kids go because they don't enforce the drinking age.”
    A male figure boiled up in the back alley, watching silver skinned girls filter past him to smoke near the dumpster. I frowned.
    “I believe a certain vamp would like to take advantage of the most impressionable guests.” Rick's brows knit.
    I passed my hand over the mirror and the scene melted into a pool of swirling silver.
    “Reveal,” I repeated. Another scene boiled to the surface. Another man, another alley.
    “I know this place,” he said. “Maison des Étoiles. It’s a fae bordello.”
    “Should I ask why you are familiar with a bordello?” Rick told me he’d never been with anyone but me.
    “These fae are friendly to our cause and often have information about creatures of the night due to their profession.”
    “So, you use them for information?”
    “Yes.”
    “Ah.” A wayward pang of jealousy sliced through me at the thought of Rick in a Bordello. Had he really saved himself for me? And if he had, why did that mean so much to me now? Hell, why did the thought of Rick in a bordello fill me with green-eyed rage? I shoved the feeling down deep. I had no right to that emotion, not while I refused to commit.
    I turned my attention back toward the mirror and watched the voluptuous silhouette of a shiny winged fae meet the man in the alley. He grabbed her shoulders, and she writhed in pain, dissolving between his hands.
    “That’s not a vampire. What is this, Rick? He just eviscerated her with a simple touch.”
    “I’m not sure. The fae are filled with light and warmth. Whatever he is must possess the opposite to have that effect.”
    I blinked at the silvery scene, an ominous sinking feeling in my belly. Then I passed my hand over the top and said, “Reveal.”
    The scene changed again. This was going to be a busy night.

Chapter 3
A Rough Night at the Office

    “I sentence you to ten years in Monk’s Hill cemetery.” I pressed the tip of Nightshade’s razor-sharp, bone blade into the vampire’s neck, drawing the tiniest drop of blood. What once was a labored process was now something I could do as easily as breathing. Unlike sorting human souls, judging supernaturals only required the offender’s own sacrifice, not mine. I watched his eyes grow wide before he poofed to the confines of the graveyard.
    Ten years was a light sentence, but honestly, this time the victim asked for it. Literally.
    “What have you done to him?” the brunette sorority girl screamed in my face, turning in circles as if I’d performed a magic trick with smoke and mirrors.
    I pulled a tissue from the pocket of my long wool coat and mopped the blood from her neck. “Um, you must know he was a vampire. You were attacked. You’re safe now.”
    “I know he was a vampire. Why do you think I come here?” She pointed at the door to Mill Wheel.
    Stupid Twilight . These young girls actually wanted to be vamp fodder. “He could have killed you,” I stated firmly.
    She popped her hip out and placed her hand on it. “Or turned me,” she said wistfully. She grinned like the thought warmed her soul.
    I slapped my forehead in frustration.
    Rick placed an arm around the girl’s shoulders and turned her body to face him. Their eyes locked. “Vampires don’t exist. You are going to collect your things and go straight home. Forget this ever happened.”
    Her face blanked for a