The Lost: Book Two of The Whitechapel Chronicles

Chapter 30

"And you've tried reaching him, I take it?" Harper's tone was measured and controlled, but one look at his face told me that the demon was lurking just under the surface. I could understand. My own demon was literally scratching at my flesh, desperate to break through in an eruption of anger and fully-fledged panic.

"Of course," Fenton replied with a note of irritation. "It just keeps going to voicemail."

Harper tilted his head slightly, eyes narrowing darkly at Fenton's reaction but quickly turned his gaze towards Edward. "You left just after Garrick. Where was the last place you saw him?"

Flushing slightly, the skin reddening on his cheeks just above his shaggy black beard, Edward frowned. "Just before East India Dock. We had to wait at a junction, when we crossed the roundabout, he'd gone. I just assumed he was on his way here."

"Wait," snapped Harper, the veins on his neck starting to protrude angrily as he glared at Edward. "You mean to tell me you don't even know if he crossed the river? What if he never made it across? What if he's still in the north somewhere?" Harper's voice echoed through the garage and I saw the last of the refugees turn to look our way, eyes wide on pale worn faces. They were already ravaged with brittle nerves that teetered on a knife's edge and the sudden burst of anger from Bartholomew's first-made son was enough to cause ripples of dissent through the line that was filing through the door at the back of the room.

Without thinking, I curled my fingers around Harper's wrist and was relieved when he didn't furiously reject me as he had Fenton. Nodding to where Maggie and Blaine stood, now desperately trying to calm the survivors and offering smiles of reassurance as they ushered them on their way, I looked pointedly at Harper and raised an eyebrow in warning. When the last of the refugees had disappeared out of sight and Maggie had followed them to wherever they were being led, Harper spoke again and the deathly venom in his voice left me under no illusion that the demon was now in control.

We were well acquainted, Harper's demon and I and I feared for anyone who had the misfortune to fall under its radar.

"Edward, I swear on Bartholomew's bones that if anything has happened to my brother, I will rip you apart. I don't care for any affiliation you had with my father, I will do it with my bare hands if I have to."

"Come now lad, you know full well that we all had our duties. What the bloody hell was I meant to do? Drag twenty survivors along with me while I searched the streets for Garrick?" Edward scratched at his beard, a self-conscious action that was mirrored by the apprehension in his eyes.

Harper sneered at him. "And how long have you been here knowing that Garrick was still out there somewhere? Did you not think to go and look for him?" He turned his fury then on the other vampire. "And you Fenton? Of all people, I expected more from you. Garrick's blood runs through your veins and yet you sit back and do nothing. Have you grown too comfortable lording it up in the south that you're threatened by Garrick coming here and taking over?"

"You're out of line, Harper," Fenton warned, clenching his fists.

"And you're a fucking stain on our family name."

Fenton stepped forward and I saw it then, that familiar glint in his eye, that same darkness that lurked in all of us and I knew that what Harper said was true. This vampire was one of us; he was a Garrick and not only that but apparently created by Garrick himself.

A wicked smirk tugged at the corners of his mouth. "You talk of family name and yet you turn your back on your family time and time again. How long will you be with us this time, Harper? How long before you tire of us and skulk off into one of your little hidey-holes, playing the poor tortured soul card that you seem to love so much?" Astute shards of blue swept over me and he smiled smugly. "How funny that it always seems to be a woman that has you running back to us with your tail tucked between your legs."