Mercy Blade

CHAPTER 8 Die Young Then, Sonny

I was dressed when the limo pulled down the street, its V-8 engine thrumming. Vamps aren’t into green in any way at all, and saving the planet by saving gasoline isn’t among their priorities. I turned, letting the long dress swirl around my ankles, checking to see how much the skirt would inhibit movement. The sleeveless dress was made of thin black silk crepe with a plunging neckline held to decorum with strips of black silk charmeuse. The neckline’s lapels were embroidered with tiny faceted citrines and yellow quartz and black jet beads, which caught the light and mirrored my amber irises. The new sequin-studded leather holster straps were belted on over the waist of the dress and under one lapel, while the holster and H&K were snugged at the small of my back under a short cape that draped from the neckline to my hips.

I didn’t want to attend a party. I wanted to stay home and watch movies with Evangelina and maybe eat a bucket of her homemade ice cream, but I had work to do and Leo Pellissier expected me to do it. I turned, watching myself in the mirror.

The dress was designed to hide weapons while making me look like I had a lot more class than I did. The mirror suggested the designer had been successful. Beneath the wide, flowing skirt that belled out as I moved, I had three thin blades and one vamp-killer strapped to my thighs. My hair was braided and twisted into a bun so tight it made my scalp ache, and eight silver-tipped wood stakes acted as hairpins. My only jewelry was the gold nugget necklace and the gemmed collar of the dress. Beast sent a satisfied purr through me at the vision of the weapons and the bare skin of my arms and throat. Trap, she thought at me. Looks like prey but isn’t.

I wasn’t adept at putting on makeup, so all I wore was bloodred lipstick. Stark and striking was my best bet. New dancing shoes were strapped to my feet, not club shoes, but real dancing shoes, the kind ballroom dancers wear, with straps across the instep to hold the shoes in place and slightly clunky heels for stability. Wearing them, I was six foot three, and imposing. Looks like prey but isn’t. Yeah. Exactly. And I might be able to pull it off, after the magic of Evangelina’s dance and the dinner she had prepared—mostly meat and carbs, my kinda meal.

She wasn’t altruistic by nature and I had to wonder if she intended me to benefit or if I just wandered into her own private spell of happiness. Whatever the reason, I was no longer seeing flashes of nightmares. I took a calming breath, as deep as one that prepared me for a shift. I could do this. I could deal with the dreams later. I spun the lock on the weapons cabinet in my closet, sealing inside everything not in use.

I was moving for the front door before the knock sounded but Evangelina beat me to it, holding the door open wide so that street light and foyer light met and blended and Bruiser’s eyes didn’t have to adjust. He stood in the doorway, a black tux molding to his frame, taller than I was, even in the dancing shoes, his shoulders boxer wide, and his butt cradled by the expensive cut of the suit. His hair was different tonight, combed straight back and moussed into place, a 1940s style that looked elegant and made his hair seem darker than his normal brown. He nodded to Evangelina without really seeing her as he entered, his eyes on me, moving from the tips of my toes to the tips of the stakes fanned out around the back of my head like a wood and silver halo. His eyes were heated and heavy as they slid over me, and I flushed as if he touched me. It was enough to help push the remnant memories of the dreams far away. Evangelina pushed his shoulder to move him inside; shut the door.

I don’t know what I expected him to say, but I wasn’t disappointed when he said, “Weapons?” Eyes holding his, I gave him the list and his mouth curled up as I spoke, his gaze searching out the probable location of the blades and gun. “Show me.”

I turned around and flipped up the small cape to display the holster, my right hand on the butt for drawing, and whirled back around, sliding my legs, one at a time, through the skirt slits in little dancer kicks. Bruiser was a leg man and his pupils widened at the flash of skin. I was sure the kicks and skin would have been flirting for most girls, but I had no idea how to build upon it. And no desire to, I assured myself.

I ducked my head, feeling self-conscious, and picked up my tiny bag, sliding the long strap over one shoulder. I nodded good-bye to Evangelina and caught her watching Bruiser. A quick glance at Bruiser showed him watching back, surprise and unwelcome speculation on his face, as if he’d just recognized her, standing in my foyer. “Miz Everheart,” he said.

“Have fun at the ball, Mr. Dumas.” She lifted the nearly empty glass in the half-drunken salute I’d seen several times this evening, though this time she seemed stone-cold sober. “Don’t let Cinderella here kill your golden goose.”

I flinched at the acerbic tone and the insult, feeling sucker punched. Bruiser said, “That would make you the ugly stepsister in your jumbled nursery rhyme.”

“More like the wicked witch of the west, sweetie, with a broom, a gingerbread house, and a big cauldron out back to cook up curses.”

“I was under the impression that you were a white witch, not a sorceress.”

“I walk a fine line during negotiations. And I’ve been known to bloody my athame when needed.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, Miz Everheart.”

“You do that, Mis-ta Du-mas,” she said, spacing out the syllables in what sounded like a taunt. Evangelina turned her back and moved into the kitchen where she turned the music up, Celtic notes tinkling on the air.

Bruiser’s eyes followed her through the doorway and stayed there for a moment before swerving back to me in question. I said, “You did know she was my houseguest, right? Molly’s idea, by the way, not mine.”

“It must have slipped my mind.” As usual, when he was thoughtful, his English lilt slipped out, though muted by decades in America. It gave him a mixed accent, part British, part old-guy American, part modern American. He gave me that half smile, the faint but intense one that had been known to curl my toes, and raked my body with his eyes again. “You look striking tonight, Jane, lethal and lovely.”

Striking. Good choice of words, I thought. “Thanks. You look good yourself.” I cocked my head. “Weapons?” I quoted.

Bruiser lifted his coat to the side, exposing a semiautomatic handgun as if it was his only weapon, but Bruiser was security for Leo Pellissier, which meant for the greater Mithran Clan of New Orleans, which meant he was packing big-time tonight. I glanced at his ankle and his smile widened fractionally. “A .32 snub-nosed,” he said, his tone final. When I pointed to his waist he breathed out a laugh and said, “Two blades in spine sheaths and a .38.” I waggled a finger back and forth from one arm to the other. “One blade on each wrist,” he conceded, “no more. All we need are blades in the toes of our shoes to arm us as well as Bond. James Bond,” he said, sounding all Sean Connery on me. Connery had always been a hot-tie, far as I was concerned.

With the talk of weapons, my pulse and breathing had settled; the tension still coiled in my psyche loosened. Yes. I can do this. I locked the front door behind me and led the way to the limo, sliding across the seat, the leather soft as butter, and replied, “Let’s hope we don’t have to kill anyone tonight. I nearly ruined a perfectly good dress at the last vamp party I attended.”

“I’ll see another is sent to you,” Bruiser said, closing the car door and sitting close, with his outer thigh touching mine. The limo pulled away from the curb as the warmth of his thigh passed through the layers of cloth and into mine. I glanced at the floor of the limo, where Bruiser and I had ended up on our last ride to a vamp party.

Crap. I have a boyfriend. Who disappeared after showing up at our breakfast place with different girl. My heart thumped hard once, and heat that hadn’t been there a moment before whispered through me. It traveled up my thigh to settle low in my belly. A breath later it purled out and through me, giddy and drunken, like the magic of Evangelina’s dancing. Like the spell she had woven out of elation and joy. And I remembered her taunt.

I knew that some of the magic she was dancing had affected me. Calmed me, and then upped the intensity of my happier emotions. I had been in the presence of varied magics, all unlike my own, ever since I first arrived in New Orleans. And around a lot of magic in the last couple of days: were-change magic, Evangelina’s witch magic, and even Gee’s blue magic on my skin, any of which might affect Beast’s wild influence, and charge my own skinwalker energies. It was a cocktail of magic that could make any girl a little unsteady.

Bruiser shifted on the seat next to me and the heat in my belly did a little somersault. Stop it, I commanded myself. But my pulse sped up and I saw a vision of Bruiser and me on a big bed, with the sheets torn, the pillows on the floor, and the mattress skewed. Us panting and sweaty and a little bloody. Beast’s idea of good sex. Heat steamed though me, hers more so than mine.

Magic. Yeah. This was magic. Evangelina’s magic. And it was powerful. Suddenly, I wondered if the little witch had done it to me on purpose. I couldn’t decide what to do with my hands. I folded them together in my lap, which felt all prissy, not like me. But if I put them to my sides, one would be in Bruiser’s lap. I strangled the desire to laugh, knowing it would come out as a nervous titter. I was a vampire hunter, for pity’s sake. There would be no more mad make-out sessions with Bruiser. Not anywhere. I had a boyfriend now. Rick. Pretty boy Ricky Bo. Who might be cheating on me. At the thought of Rick with another woman, my pulse spiked painfully, my heart twisting inside my chest. Crap. What had Evangelina done to me?

Beast placed a paw against my mind, her claws pressing down, exerting enough pressure to almost hurt, but not quite. I saw reddish energies beneath her claws, sparking, sparkling, and curling away. Evangelina’s spell fled from Beast’s claws, and I could almost see it scatter, like pink motes in the darkness. I closed my eyes and sank back against the seat, breathing too fast, but back in control of myself.

“As Leo’s Rogue Hunter,” Bruiser said, and I struggled to remember what we were chatting about. Oh, yeah. Bruiser was still talking about a new dress. “—and hired security, you will be expected to attend many such high-priority functions over the course of the next year, and it will not do at all, to have you appear in the same dress. And don’t complain,” he said, as though I had been about to object to a fitting, which I hated. “You are paid well. Looking beautiful as well as deadly upon occasion is part of your employment requirements, and the dresses come with the job. Madame Melisende will whip up something in her shop to fit your needs, according to your last measurements, deliver the dress, and make any small adjustments. It will take a quarter hour of your time at most. And you do know, don’t you, that most women would groan in pleasure at being given designer clothing as part of an employment package.”

I couldn’t think of anything to gripe about in the scenario he described, especially with him paying, and the unexpected beautiful comment. I almost reminded him that I wasn’t most women, but I figured he knew that already.

Bruiser poured and handed me a glass of champagne. I took it, sipped. I’m more of a beer girl, but even I could tell this was very good stuff. It further settled my insides, which were still ruffled by the witch magic. “Nice,” I said.

Bruiser agreed with a murmured note, a soft hmm, but he was staring out the car window. He was preoccupied, and as I watched, seemed to pull into himself and away from me, aloof and reserved, caught up in his own thoughts. Better. Much better. His distance and Beast’s paw on my mind cleared the last of Evangelina’s spell from me like the sun evaporated rain. We rode the last blocks in silence.

When we reached vamp HQ, the driver drove around to the back of the building, passing a few cars parked on the street, and one panel-sided van, black. Antennae bristled from the roof. “Cops are watching the place,” I said.

“Noted,” Bruiser said.

The driver parked. Bruiser opened the door and handed me off to his second in command, Tyler Sullivan, with a curt, “Run over the security measures once again with Miz Yellowrock. If she suggests any modifications, make them and inform me of the changes.” To me he added, “The envoy and his assistant arrived this afternoon via private car and have been ensconced in their rooms since.” His mouth formed a thin line and he added, “They brought their own security, one ... something. I don’t know what it is, but it isn’t human. Leo says it isn’t a cat; it smells like dead fish and it’s fast. It left its rooms once and real-time on the camera is a blur, but it didn’t get out of the building. On slow-mo it looks humanoid with green skin.”

Slow-mo was digital feed slowed down. I speculated on what creature had green skin and smelled like dead fish as the demands of the job took over. It didn’t sound like a were, but any creature charged with security detail had a job that might run in opposition to ours. Someone we had to keep an eye on.

Adding a new species into the mix tonight didn’t make me all happy inside. I looked at the men milling in the parking area, armed, dangerous, and smelling like blood-servants. They all looked edgy.

To Tyler, Bruiser said, “Take care of her. Keep her out of trouble.” He walked away.

Keep her out of trouble? I had no idea what that meant, but there was a more important question to ask Tyler. “Why is everyone so tense?”

Unexpectedly chatty, Tyler said, “Leo hates weres, but with the attention the national vampire council has given the were-cats, he’s had no choice but to deal with the envoy. He isn’t happy about it.” He studied my face, adding, “Rumor has it that werewolves are in the city.”

I tilted my head to acknowledge his statement. “They are. And when Leo is unhappy everyone is unhappy. Got it.”

Tyler said, “Come. Your guys are here, under guard, and George wants you to vet them.”

I’m not sticking a thermometer up anyone’s butt, I thought, but I was wise enough to keep the witty, though vulgar, thought to myself.

“My guys” were six ex-marines, not happy being kept in a locked room, their weapons in the hands of vampire blood-servants. I could hear a shouting match between two hot-headed grunts all the way down the hall. From the expression on Wrassler’s face as he guarded the doorway, he could hear it too—improved hearing, another benefit I could chalk up for blood-servants getting regular blood sips from a vamp.

Tyler veered off down another hallway and I was left with Wrassler, who looked uncomfortable in a suit, like a bear in black tie, communication headset on, earpiece in his left ear. He opened the door and I sauntered in, Wrassler behind me. I interrupted, “If I wanted you guys dead and I had a loaded Uzi, I could have opened this door and sprayed you all down.”

I heard a click from overhead and quickly counted the soldiers in front of me. Five, not the six I expected. I looked up and met Derek Lee’s eyes. His full lips were closed as if holding in a laugh, and he was perched in the supports above the dropped-ceiling tiles. Two tiles had been slid out of the way to allow room for his body, and his dark skin and night camos blended with the shadows. He had a nine millimeter aimed at my head, and another one aimed at Wrassler. The argument had been a ruse to keep us from seeing how many were present until someone had the drop on us. Neat and clever. The big guy behind me was frozen into immobility, a gun inches from his nose. Only now did I realize that the room didn’t smell of anger pheromones. I started laughing.

“If you’d wanted us all dead,” Derek said, “you’d have been leading the way through the pearly gates, Injun Princess. Nice dress, by the way, especially from here.” Derek was looking down the front of my dress. I resisted the urge to spread a hand over my chest.

Wrassler asked, “How’d you get a weapon in here?”

“I’m good. Better than your boys.” Derek dropped from the ceiling, landed with easy grace, and handed me the weapons. The demonstration was finished, and my position as alpha established by the relinquishing of the guns. It was nicely handled. Vintage Derek.

“Derek Lee, meet Wrassler,” I said.

“Good name for you,” Derek said.

“How come you don’t have a nickname?” Wrassler asked. Derek looked at me.

I didn’t have an answer. Some people had nicknames, some didn’t. Simple. I wasn’t into self-examination to figure out why. “Have you had a look at the grounds?” My question wiped away the last of the effects of Bruiser’s thigh against mine, and if a little voice was still making suggestions that I sleep with him, I could blame it on spells and Rick with another girl. It was time to work.

“We got a man in over the back wall near the parking area. Inserted a camera. Saw a funny-looking little guy speeding around.”

“Green skin?” I asked.

“Coulda been. Low light camera only showed heat sigs. He’s colder than a human, hotter than a vamp.”

“You got a man in to the compound?” Wrassler repeated.

“In and out. Slick as owl shit, my man. Like I said. We’re way better.”

Wrassler’s mouth turned down. To stave off the looming pissing contest, I said, “We need to work the grounds and the building. Wrassler, send an electronics tech with one of Derek’s men and see if you can find anything the Leprechaun might have planted on cars or the premises.”

“I’ll go with the ET guy.”

I looked at the grunt who was speaking. He had been with Derek and me on two other jobs and survived both, but I’d never been privileged to know his name. This time he was wearing military ID stenciled on his chest pocket that said V. Angel’s Tit. My brows rose, and the guy, who was probably a mixed-race kid, with café au lait skin and green eyes, grinned at me. It seemed I was still not worthy of knowing their names. A quick glance around showed me the names, V. Martini, V. Lime Rickey, V. Chi Chi, V. Hi-Fi and V. Sunrise. “V as a first initial with a drink name after. This job’s code name is Vodka?”

“Vodka Ball Buster,” Derek said.

I assumed a ball buster was another drink. Derek’s name was officially V. Lee’s Surrender. I didn’t know what drink it was, but the Civil War note was cute. “Get ’em their weapons,” I said to Wrassler, “assign them each one of your security guys or gals, and let them get to work. If they got in over the wall, we have to assume that someone else could have too.”

Wrassler nodded and touched his headset, speaking softly into the mike. “What about you?” he said to me when he was done.

“I want to see the security console again and check out the camera placement updates I recommended. I want to look over the press entrance again. And I’m hungry.”

“The greenroom is on the third floor, off the ballroom. Snacks and sandwiches, water, colas, and coffee are available. Beer and drinks after, with a real meal, if anyone wants,” Wrassler said.

“That’s mighty white of you,” Vodka Chi Chi said, baiting the bigger man.

Wrassler said, “You want to say thanks, offer a little sip to one of the Mithrans.” He grinned and it wasn’t intended to convey humor. “They like fresh meat.”

Chi Chi sneered. “I’m not a blood whore, white boy. None of us are, except to heal combat wounds suffered in the employ of Mr. Pellissier.”

Wrassler laughed again. “Die young then, sonny. I’m sixty-four years old.” The two men looked one another up and down, while surprise blinked its way through the soldier’s dark eyes.

“If y’all are finished sniffing each other,” I said, “we have work to do.” Men.

We split up, me with Wrassler and Derek in the electronic monitoring room, where I got my first glimpse of the green-skinned security guy. He was no Lucky Charms Leprechaun, all stovepipe hat and chin whiskers. He was a little golem of a fellow, Yoda with fangs, about five-two, slender as a reed, with joints that seemed to bend the wrong way, bones that seemed too slender and too knobby. His head was too big for his body, his ears were set too far back on his skull, and when he ran, he seemed to be on his toes, like a dog or cat. His clothes were loose and baggy, hiding a full view of how he was put together, which might have been vaguely froglike.

Beast sat up and peered at him on the monitor, holding me down with a paw. She didn’t send me any images or comments, but I got the distinct impression that she wanted to kill the little green guy—yeah, he was pale green, like olive serpentine or some bread molds—and leave him for the buzzards.

I had no idea what he was, but Wrassler got word quickly that Green Moldy Guy had planted a dozen spy-eyes in the parking area and on the grounds, his actions all undetected by the monitors until the footage was viewed slow-mo and the time stamps compared to Derek’s visual of the grounds. The envoys weren’t playing fair, and clearly had an unannounced, undisclosed goal in New Orleans. It took us the better part of an hour for Derek’s IT guy to find and remove the minicameras in the parking area. We got it done just in time for the clans to start arriving.

Two months ago there had been eight clans, divided into two groups according to clan affiliation, and a stable power structure. Then a few vamps wanted more of the pie for themselves and there had been a mini war—short, bloody, and decisive. Now there were four clans: Pellissier, Laurent, Bouvier, and Arceneau. The other vamps had either merged under a surviving clan or they were dead. Or in hiding and plotting a coup, if you believed the gossips, which I did. Only Clan Pellissier had any real power, the others were under Leo’s thumb. Or his fang. Pick an analogy.

Wrassler touched his earpiece and handed one to me. “We have guests.” The vamps had started to arrive. Without seeming to hurry, but with a lot of speed just the same, Wrassler and I left the electronic security monitoring system in the hands of V. Angel’s Tit and one of Wrassler’s ladies, a whip-thin, older woman built like a stiletto and with a tongue just as sharp. I placed my earpiece in and dropped the mike to my chin, hiding the receiver under the little cape next to the handgun as we reached the ballroom.

Neither Bruiser nor Leo was in sight. Right. In vamp politics Leo would be last to arrive, before the were-guests. I checked the ballroom one last time. It was ornate in a style all its own, a sort of colonial Moorish mix, with pointed arches and domed ceilings high overhead, held up with fluted columns painted with gilt. There were stained-glass insets in many of the domes, illuminated by artificial lights. No sunlight had ever been in this room, or in any of the council house rooms used by the vamps themselves.

Underfoot, the carpets were so rich my feet sank into them with each step, and where the carpets stopped was pink marble flooring, smooth as the inside of a pearl. Linen-draped tables and side chairs circled the walls, furniture that belonged in museums. Curio cabinets filled with exquisite objets d’art, interesting historical and archeological items donated by vamps, and the macabre, like the shrunken heads and human-skull drinking cups, handmade items of tribal life: flutes, stone hammers, small pieces of pottery that had been shaped without a potter’s wheel and fired in open fires, the unglazed sides charred with smoke in unusual patterns. Bouquets were everywhere, and the smell of roses and aromatic lilies and jasmine pervaded the air.

There was gold-plated serving ware and utensils, nothing silver to harm the vamps or weres. Tables laden with cheeses, fish, a dozen meats, and a boatload of tropical fruit sliced into bouquets were set up for the human servants, with an alcohol bar and a cute bartender blood-servant dressed in a red tux. The food smelled wonderful and my stomach growled. Evangelina’s steak was long gone, but I had a lot of work to do before I could get that sandwich waiting for me in the greenroom.

All the servers brought in by the caterer had been vetted and body-searched, and armed blood-servants loyal to Leo were stationed everywhere throughout the building. The media types were in place, cameras in three strategic places in the ballroom. The color girl—a reporter who would gather sound bites from the guests—and the on-air reporter were in place. The makeup guy—I had expected a girl and it felt odd to recognize my sexist tendencies—had commandeered a corner in the greenroom.

There was no blood bar with willing blood-slaves set up behind a curtain to provide the vamp partygoers their dinners, not with press present. Leo had made the proclamation: feed before you show. There were a thousand things that could go wrong tonight, but the smell of blood in the presence of two predator species wasn’t going to be one of them. The place was as safe and secure as I could make it. Still, the blood thrummed through my veins when the doors opened and the first vamps walked in.

Clan Laurent was this first arrival, meaning they got the best places for their scions and blood-servants, but this also put them at the bottom of the pecking order among the clans. That vamp one-upmanship stuff wasn’t my department. Bettina, clan master, entered alone, the petite woman standing in the doorway like a runway model. Bettina had once been clan master of Rousseau, but was taken down by rivals within her clan, not according to vamp law, in personal sanctioned combat, but outside proper channels. Gossip claimed that when her clan was disbanded, Bettina survived and called the sire of Clan Laurent to personal combat. She won, and Clan Laurent survived.

Bettina was an exquisite woman with mixed-race heritage, mostly African and European, and once she had been so sensual that lust wafted off her like steam above a volcano. Now, she was colder, more introverted, and when her eyes flashed fire, it was the fire of anger, not sex. Her heir and two other master vamps stepped to her from either side in choreographed pacing. They moved into the room, their blood-servants behind them, two blood-servants per vamp, the number allowed by Leo. The stink of vamp was swept up by the air conditioner and filled the room, smelling like dried herbs and fresh blood, the way an old-fashioned herb shop might smell if someone slit a human’s throat in it. The first twelve visitors had arrived.

Next in the pecking order was Arceneau, with four master vampires: Grégoire with his heir Dominique on his arm, both blond with chiseled faces, and two African masters to either side, Kabisa and Karimu, twins, both female, tall and regal, like walking Egyptian statues wearing flowing creations unmistakably made by Madame Melisende, Modiste des Mithrans, my dressmaker. Both women were soldiers. I recognized the gait, surefooted and assertive, though nothing in their dossiers suggested battle training. Arceneau’s scions and blood-servants fanned out around them and moved into the ballroom. I smelled fresh mint from them, overlaid by a hint of rosemary. It wasn’t a scent I’d have associated with a vamp, but vamp pheromones were mutable, like a human’s.

I looked at the clock to see 11:27. Two clans to go, then my first look at were-cats up close and personal. My Beast was prowling inside, slow sinuous steps like a lion in a cage. Which she was, in a way, caged inside me.

The third clan was Bouvier, its new co-masters Innara and Jena, who were mind-joined Anamchara, and who had been loyal to Leo during the recent unpleasantness, stood in the entry to the ballroom. They were little things, the tallest standing five-four in heels. Their master had been killed true-dead by the opposing camp and the girls had swept up his power base in their cute but deadly little hands. They were going for the gay twenties look tonight in contrasting teal and aqua silk sheaths embroidered with beads, crystals dangling and catching the light. The silk hems ended at their shins, but the crystals formed pointed Vs that hung lower, accenting the crystal shoes each wore. Which looked really uncomfortable. The outfits were perfect with their bobbed hair, one dark blond and one darker brown. Their clan heir, Roland, who was a big guy by vamp standards, stood behind them, arms crossed, showing muscle through the cloth of his long tunic, which was vaguely Arabian in style. Behind him, another master and all eight blood-servants filled the open doorway. They looked charming and implacable as they moved into the room, blood-servants spreading out and posturing for position. The air took on a vamp stink so strong that my nose itched and stung. I needed to sneeze out the reek, but the next breath would only be worse.

The on-air reporter, who was standing near me, gasped and backed away. I glanced at her and back at the vamps and almost shook my head. She was no twenty-something ditzy girl, but an older woman, a seasoned reporter, likely retired from a bigger network, let go because of age, but that experience was nothing in the face of vamp mesmerism. Her lips hung slightly open, her eyes glued to Roland.

I looked back at the vamps. Yeah. Vamps were gorgeous all right. Pitcher plants or Venus flytraps, ready for fresh blood and willing flesh—or a victim stupid enough or susceptible enough to fall for them.

The reporter moved toward Roland, her mike in front of her—a shield and a sword. Or an offering. He turned to her and smiled, his face looking almost beatific. And hungry, in spite of the edict to eat before showing up here. He held out an arm and slid it round her when she reached him. She fell back against the iron-band strength of it, her throat exposed. Prey, Beast whispered in my mind.

Roland kissed the side of the reporter’s neck. Teasing. But his fangs stayed snapped back in his mouth and he released her with a kiss and promise I heard across twenty feet of pink marble floor and Oriental rugs. “Later, my lovely. I’ll come to you before dawn.” She was toast, but she was a big girl. I had other worries. Like the cameras capturing too much. Not too much of the vamps—that was a job for the spin doctors—but too much about the layout of vamp HQ. It could be dangerous for the security of the place.

Unlike other vamp parties I’d attended, no one went immediately for food or alcohol, but took up positions around the room, as if keeping sharp for trouble. Crap. What did they think was gonna happen? I was suddenly conscious of the blades on my thighs and the weight of the H&K at the small of my back. Possible collateral damage was everywhere. My mouth went dry.

Everything was ready for Leo. But seconds passed. Minutes. The vamps were immovable as marble headstones, not bothering to breathe, since they didn’t have to talk. The blood-servants mimicked them. Except for the breathing/heart beating part. It was unnerving. But at least the vamped reporter had regained her equilibrium. She was standing in the corner having her makeup touched up, casting confused and nervous glances at Roland, who was ignoring her. Cat and mouse. Literally. A vamp playing with his dinner.

At twelve minutes to twelve, Leo was standing in the entrance, his authority a nimbus around him, crackling with electricity that lifted his shoulder-length black hair on a breeze of power. I hadn’t seen him move there. No one had.