Sherrilyn Kenyon - Infamous

Booked. That word slammed into him so hard that for a minute, he thought he’d vomit.

“Good luck with that,” the smaller officer scoffed. “With what we have on him, he’s not going anywhere until trial.”

What could they have on him? He hadn’t done anything. Heck, he’d only been out of the hospital since yesterday.

As they were placing him in the backseat, Caleb came running up to his mom. He frowned at her as she told him what was happening.

Caleb winced, then kicked the front bumper of the squad car.

“Hey!” the smaller cop snapped. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“What?” Caleb challenged. “I can’t touch your car?” He kicked it again.

“Boy, do you want to go to jail?” the taller officer asked.

“For what?” Caleb braced his foot against the front fender. “It’s a free country.”

“Not when you’re vandalizing state property it’s not.”

Caleb arched a defiant brow at him. “State property? My tax dollars bought this car then. Doesn’t that make it my property?”

“Oh, that’s it, you little punk.” The cop went for Caleb.

Caleb scoffed. “C’mon, really? What are you charging me with?”

“Vandalism.”

Caleb rolled his eyes, then shouted out to their classmates. “Come, see the violence inherent in the system! Help! I’m being repressed!”

“Get your ass in the car!” the cop snarled, his Yat accent coming out full force.

They put Caleb in on the other side.

Nick gaped at him. “What are you doing?”

Caleb glanced askance at the cops as they called in his arrest. “Where you go, I go, Gautier. And there’s no way you’re going into a jail without backup. You’re about to find out why Adarian lives in a prison.”

Nick wasn’t sure what to think of that, other than the fact his father was a mass murderer. “What do you mean?”

The cops opened the doors and got in.

There are some things that defy explanation—kind of like … you know, you . Not to mention your loco mindset when you did whatever it was that you did when you saved Kody, or why the color of the dryer lint always matches the color of your missing sock. He projected his answer to Nick’s mind. A Malachai in jail is definitely one of those inexplicable things.

Caleb turned his attention back to the police. “So what tort am I being held for again?”

They didn’t respond to Caleb. Instead the larger cop sighed irritably. “I hate the smart-mouthed kids the most.”

Caleb leaned forward in his seat. “So who’s the meanest person you’ve ever arrested?”

“What are you doing?” Nick gasped.

Caleb cracked an evil grin. “You have things you can’t resist doing. This is one that is a moral imperative to me.” Must rankle bullies.

You’re going to get jack-slapped.

Caleb frowned at him. Jack-slapped?

Slapped so hard you forget everything you know, i.e., you don’t know Jack … jack-slapped.

Caleb rolled his eyes.

Nick didn’t say anything else as he sat there, trying to figure out why they would think he’d raped someone when it was the most repugnant crime he could think of. Who had accused him?

And why?

When they got to the jail, they were gruffly hauled out of the car and into the building.

As soon as they stepped through the doorway, Nick saw a familiar face, but he wasn’t sure what to make of it.

Virgil Ward, attorney at law. And in Virgil’s case, blood-sucking attorney took on a whole new meaning, since he was also a vampire. His dark hair was short, but slightly shaggy. With it brushed back from his face, he didn’t appear much older than Nick or Caleb … to Nick, anyway. But Virgil managed to project a much older persona to everyone else. Those around him saw Virgil as someone in his midthirties. Dressed in a tailor-made, expensive black pinstriped suit and a pair of black Ferragamo shoes, he wore a dark purple shirt and a dark gray, purple, and black tie that had miniature skeleton bunny heads and crossed bones all over it.

“Gentlemen,” he said, inclining his head to the officers escorting them. “These are my clients. I trust you’ll take good care of them.”

The larger officer growled in frustration. “I should have known.… I suppose you want them put into the special holding section.”

“It would be prudent.”

The other officer growled again. “They’re not going to start eating each other or one of us, are they?”

Virgil laughed. “They’re not zombies, men. But one of them does have special dietary concerns you might want to note.”

The larger officer grumbled.

Virgil winked at Nick, then projected his thoughts to him. Don’t worry, kid. I know it’s your first time here. But we’re set up to deal with our special needs detainees.

Special needs? Dude, I don’t ride the short bus.

Good for you. ’Cause some days, I definitely do.

That was not comforting when coming out of the mouth of your attorney.

As they walked past a group of deadly-looking gangbangers, one of the bigger members lunged at Nick with a snarl as if he was going to attack him. The moment the man did, it sent an electrical charge through Nick. One that put all of his senses on high alert and made his heart race with gleeful expectation. Suddenly Nick saw and heard everything with a shocking clarity. And instead of cowering, he lunged at the gang member, wanting to taste his blood.

The man’s eyes widened, before he backed down.

Against his conscious will, Nick tried to break out of the policeman’s hold so that he could go back to the gangbanger.

Caleb cut him off. “Look at me, Nick.”

For several heartbeats, he couldn’t understand what Caleb had said.

“Nick!” he shouted.

That finally broke through the cloudy haze. “W-w-what?”

“Remember what I said about your father?”

Yeah … Nick felt it, too. Being around this many people who were corrupted by hatred and rage and violence, it was like being a wind-up toy that someone had snapped the spring in. His powers were fully charged and he felt more alive than he ever had. It was a heady concoction.

He looked at Caleb. “Do you get the same…” He wasn’t sure what to call it.

“Thrill? Not to the extent you do. That fun little nugget is unique to your species alone.”

And he was right. He totally got it now why his father stayed in prison. It was like breathing in fresh air and sunshine. Bad analogy since only an idiot would breathe in the foul body odor, urine, and vomit stench that permeated the building, but that was the closest example he could think of.

The cops took them to a special booking room that was reserved for Virgil’s clients. They were rudely searched, fingerprinted, and then photographed. Honestly, Nick wanted to cry as it brought back his one and only other arrest when he’d been a kid. And while they’d hauled him to the station in their car, they hadn’t “booked” him. It was so humiliating. He glanced over to Caleb as guilt stabbed him. He was the only reason Caleb was here.

God love Caleb for his loyalty.

Nick cringed as he looked down at the bright orange jumpsuit they’d forced him to change into. Heck, they’d even confiscated his shoelaces. “I’m sorry, Cale. I didn’t mean to get you into this.”

He shrugged. “Trust me, this is neither the worst nor the most humiliating thing I’ve ever gone through. And while we’re here, you should pray that this is the worst thing that ever happens to you.”

Point well taken. Still, it stung. While he hadn’t always been the best person and had done some questionable things, he’d never really thought he’d ever be arrested for real, with real felony charges that carried a hefty prison sentence if he was found guilty. That was the kind of thing that happened to people like his father and the scum his father ran with.