Bound by Forever - (True Immortality #3) Page 0,38
lifted into the air and he followed her scent to a comb lying by the sink. It was one of the hotel’s free amenities. The cardboard packaging laid beside it.
Kiyo clutched the comb with Niamh’s tangled hair caught in its teeth. He almost broke it he gripped it so hard. She’d used the shower. The complimentary shampoo bottle was half-empty. There were soap suds on the bottom of it. A wet towel on the floor.
Hurrying back into the bathroom, his anger built as he swept the space for any trace of her. Nothing.
The new clothes Bran had provided were gone.
She’d left on her own.
Damn her!
Racing back into his room, he quickly gathered his shit into the duffle bag, throwing the comb in, too, and got out of there. To his annoyance, the woman on reception last night had been replaced by a guy. He questioned him anyway.
No, he hadn’t spoken to a young woman with long brown hair this morning.
Eyes searching the lobby, his gaze wandered high near the ceiling, and satisfaction slammed through him when he spotted the security camera. The guy at the front desk watched him suspiciously, so Kiyo pretended to make his way back to his room. Instead, as soon as he was out of sight, he searched for the hotel office. The security tapes were likely in there.
Finding the office, he also found a security camera trained on the door.
That was fine. He’d just need to steal the tape for that too.
Making sure no one was watching (which there wasn’t because it wasn’t even six o’clock yet), Kiyo tried the office door. Locked.
He took care of it and slipped inside, shutting the door quietly behind him. Dumping the duffle bag, he searched the room and found three small TVs and old-fashioned VCRs for the security tapes inside a walnut cabinet. Using the remote, he rewound the tape on the first TV, which was for the camera trained on the reception desk. To his dismay, he had to rewind the damn thing back to just before midnight. There she was.
Niamh. Leaving the reception area.
She hadn’t spoken to the desk clerk.
He frowned.
Winding it back further, he found her again.
At around eight thirty last night, Niamh appeared at reception and had a ten-minute chat with the female clerk.
He noted the dazed way the woman looked at her.
No doubt, she’d used her powers to make the receptionist forget their conversation.
His fury was a burn in his throat.
Abandoning the tape, he found the one for the office and ripped it out of the VCR. Hiding it in his duffle bag, he got out unseen and returned to reception. He didn’t even look at the guy behind the desk. He just kept walking until he was outside beneath the breaking dawn.
Compounding his anger was the fact that his fingers shook as he removed his cell to call Bran. He hated that he had to make this call.
Never in his life had he failed on a job.
Bran answered with, “It’s my nighttime, arsehole, so this better be good.”
Kiyo bared his teeth, wishing the vamp was there in front of him so he could take his bad mood out on him. He needed a fight. But no one challenged him like Fionn, so what was the point?
“I lost her.”
There was silence. Then, “You what?”
“I woke up this morning and she was gone. I checked the hotel tapes. She had a nice chat with the front-desk clerk last night and then around midnight, the tapes show her strutting her ass out of the hotel.”
“Did you question the clerk?”
“No point. I could tell Niamh had used that mind-fuck thing she does. And I know from watching her do it, she covers her ass. She’d have told the girl to forget their conversation.”
“Did anything happen last night after we spoke?”
The memory of Niamh convulsing in his arms came to him instantly. “She had a vision. She said it was the same one, but …”
She’d asked him about himself and had seemed more disappointed than usual when he didn’t answer. What did it mean?
“She might have been lying,” Bran said. “What about her room? Is there anything that might suggest where she went?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Bran, this is what I do for a living. I have no leads other than Tokyo.”
The vampire was silent for so long, Kiyo thought he might have fallen asleep. He was about to growl his impatience down the line when Bran said, “Do you have anything of hers?”