Bitten to Death (6 page)

Since I’d helped with his training, I also didn’t appreciate the spike of fear that jammed itself into my spine when I thought of everything that could possibly go wrong with him out there on his own. Which was the main reason I tolerated his ridiculous texts instead of putting him in his place. At least this way I could be sure he was still kicking.

I read quickly, happy that Cole spelled most things out, saving me the labor of code breaking.

“I’m sorry, Jaz,” Dave said.

“Yeah?”

“I know you’re mad as hell right now.”

“Really? How can you tell?”

“You’re staring at my shirt. Which means you’re not meeting my eyes. Therefore you’re trying pretty hard not to punch me.”

Oh. Ha, ha, ha, not at all. I was just hoping that bizarre, bloody face wouldn’t reappear before we burn that rag you’re wearing. And then, yeah, come to think of it, I may have to beat the crap out of you
.

Before I could say anything, Vayl stepped in. “Tact does not run in your family, does it?”

Dave and I shared a wry smile. Together we said, “No.”

Since that seemed to be the last word, Vayl leaned into his final stitches and I wandered into the bedroom. Just to the left of the door sat a canopy bed with a scrolled headboard. It was dressed in enough white lace for three brides, which made the arch-lidded trunk at its base seem like a shipwreck survivor. Beside it sat a table whose finish was flaking like hickory bark. It held a lamp and an empty wooden bowl big enough to hold an entire birthday cake. On the other side of the table sat an armchair in dire need of reupholstering, but once fit for royalty if the velvety blue and green fabric gave any clue.

Two white armoires that needed repainting covered the wall adjoining the bed. I was betting they blocked a window as well. The bathroom was just to the right, a mildewed, water-stained closet that I’d have to attack with a case of bleach before I’d feel comfortable using it. As in the sitting room, the floor had been left in its original wide-planked, wooden state.

I was getting ready to claim the bed and let the guys fight for floor space when I took a closer look at the painting mounted on the wall opposite the door. The bed’s occupant would view this picture every night before closing her eyes. If she could manage sleep, that is, after subjecting herself to its bold, slashing images. It showed a vampire feast. Without actual food. Yeah, screaming victims, their blood running like red tar in a backdrop of a blazing city. Chicago, maybe, back when everything was flammable, including the sidewalks.

I thought about it a second. Would it be better to snooze in the sitting room next to the rusty water and the fungus-covered walls? Nope, I still wanted the bed. But the picture had to go.

A tap at the outer door brought me back to the sitting room. “Were we expecting somebody?” I asked Vayl.

“Always,” he replied gravely.

I drew Grief, triggered the magic button, and sank into the chair nearest to Dave, holding the crossbow comfortably in my lap. All that my Sensitivity told me was that the creature on the other side of the door scented vampire. At least I had that. Before I’d died the first time, I’d been stuck in the five-sense box with everybody else I knew. I still hadn’t figured out if these extra-specials had been worth the price. But at the moment—any advantage they gave me got a definite
hell yeah!
As soon as I nodded to Vayl he said, “Come in.”

Marcon stepped inside and stopped, his eyes darting nervously from Vayl to Grief and back again. He winked, which I found odd, until he did it again and I realized he’d developed a twitch. Which meant something had changed. He’d been nervous before. Now he seemed überstressed. “Disa and Sibley wish to discuss Hamon’s contract with you,” he said.

“It’s a little late now,” I replied roughly.

“Ah, my apologies.” His bow, so courtly, took me to another age. I suddenly felt underdressed and ill-mannered. “Our sense of timing never seems to be in step with that of the outside world,” he said.

Despite my obvious red-neck ancestry, I soldiered on. “What is there to discuss? You people are in breach. You’ve allowed injury to my guy, here. Plus, you don’t seem to be able to tell your asses from a hole in the ground. What guarantee do we have that you won’t pull some idiotic stunt during negotiations that will blow our chance to eliminate Samos, or worse, get us killed?”

Marcon’s eyelid fluttered so wildly he put a finger to it and rubbed. “Sibley requested that I extend to all of you the
Vitem
’s deepest apologies, and ask if you would consider rejoining the contract. If so, we would like to confirm the details you and Hamon agreed to, as well as any new deals you might like to make.”

“What did Disa say she would do to you if you came back with a negative reply, Marcon?” Vayl asked gently.

He shuddered. “N-nothing.”

“But if I walked in the Trust once more, you would tell me . . .”

Marcon stared at him miserably, then shook his head. “You should never have left.”

“I was little more than a killer when I was here.”

“Yes, but you were
ours
.”

Vayl shrugged. “Now I am the CIA’s. And”—his eyes strayed to mine—“I am more.”

Marcon’s sigh could almost have been a sob. “What shall I tell the
Vitem
?”

Vayl tied off the last stitch and cut the thread with the scissors Dave handed him. “I will tell them myself.”

“Do you want me to come?” I asked.

“Not this time,” he said. Before I could argue, he was crouched in front of me, his fingertips warm on my face.

“I should be there to guard your back,” I whispered as his eyes lightened to the green I equated with long, breathless kisses.

“That is David’s job,” he said.

But he’s injured! Plus, the danger around us is so electric it’s practically sparking. If we’re separated here, where everyone’s against us, will we ever come back together?

Small nod of Vayl’s head. “Perhaps you could bring our bags in and get us settled. I believe that vehicle you wanted to take off-road is now parked in the garage. At least”—he lifted an eyebrow—“I am fairly sure Tarasios said that is what he did with it.”

It took me longer than it should have to get his drift. First I had to get past the
I’m-not-your-goddamn-maid!
reaction before I could decipher his real message. Tarasios had pulled all their cars out of the garage. Ours wasn’t even on Trust property. Which meant Vayl was giving me an excuse to go outside. Why?

Because Disa would never allow those Weres to live.

They were too hard to kill in their present form, so she’d probably just wait until they turned and then have one of her lackeys do them from a distance. It would be bad news for the Trust if the wolf got back to his pack and told his story. And the bear—well, he’d have his own loose-knit league who’d be enraged at his tale. Wars had started over less.

My job wasn’t to prevent the conflict. That problem was for people higher up the political chain than me. I only had to save a couple of lives. For once. Which meant . . .
one more round with the injured, pissed-off Weres. Thanks a lot, boss
.

But I smiled inside. I so liked this part of him. Even a lot of humans I knew wouldn’t have given a second thought to the welfare of those wounded moon-changers. But he’d made it part of our mission to ensure their survival.

“Will you be okay?” I asked Dave, knowing the question would piss him off. As expected, he launched out of his chair and grabbed his crossbow. “Aw, for chrissake, it’s just a scratch! I’ll be fine!”

I smirked. It had been a mean move. But I was sick of seeing him mope. Better to have him hurt and yelling than feeling crappy and keeping mum.

As Dave went to the bathroom to wash up, Vayl took me aside. “When I return, we need to talk.”

Though he kept his voice low, I was sure Marcon could overhear us. So it seemed strange that he’d even bring up a private conversation for the Trust vamp to get curious about. “Yeah?” I said.

“I did not realize Disa was alive, much less living here still. Otherwise I would have told you of our history much sooner.”

“Ah.” Suddenly that word, “history,” meant so much more than boring stories involving stuffy wig-wearing lawyer types.

“I am sure it is nothing to be concerned about, now that I have you, my
avhar
.” Vayl’s eyes searched my face, almost like he was memorizing it.

But I couldn’t stifle the creeping sense of dread I felt as we went our separate ways. Marcon gave me directions that I didn’t need and led the guys away. I kept looking over my shoulder until they were out of sight. And then, realizing a divided focus could be the death of me, I shoved my concern to one corner of my mind and put all my effort into the job at hand.

I went back out to the courtyard. But I didn’t try the vine-framed door; despite the villa’s covered windows, I still suspected someone might see me from the inside. Instead I left through the open gate. Rather than hiking up the hill to where our SUV was parked, I followed the wall that circled the villa to the back. It stopped at the garage, which hadn’t even existed in Vayl’s time. When he’d drawn the layout of the place for us to memorize, he’d left it out completely, instead penciling in a one-room stone building he called the Gardener’s Hut. He’d told us in his time it had been used as a sort of halfway house for newly recruited vampires.

“You had to keep them at such a distance?” Dave had asked incredulously. “What, were you afraid they were going to rise a half hour before everybody else, steal all the silver, and run off with the kitchen help?”

Vayl’s chuckle, which usually sounded more like a guy choking on his porterhouse, flew round and full from his upturned lips. “You keep forgetting what a suspicious old wretch Hamon Eryx is. While he knows the Trust must grow if it is to survive, he still believes every other Trust is trying to infiltrate him and learn all his secrets, thereby stealing everything he has worked so hard to build.”

“So why doesn’t he just turn people?” Dave asked. When I gaped at him, he raised his hands. “Not that I’m advocating the practice. God knows—” He shook his head at me. “No, I’d never be okay with that, Jaz.”

My heart, which had twisted painfully at his question, relaxed. His wife had been turned before showing up at my back door, begging entry, planning violence. I’d ended Jessie’s undeath, because I’d made her that promise long before either of us dreamed our fates could actually unwind that way. I nodded at Dave, grateful his forgiveness still held true.

He went on. “All I’m saying is, looking at it from Eryx’s perspective, he’d have to think he’d get a more loyal brand of member that way.”

“A valid view,” Vayl replied. “But no one in the Trust is allowed to turn another. In fact, it is an offense punishable by execution.”

That conversation seemed even more significant as I scoped out the back of the garage. I whispered to myself, “They kill their vamps for turning humans. Wonder what they do to humans for turning Weres loose?” I pulled Grief. “What do you say we don’t find out?”

Outside the garage, on a wide concrete pad that stretched from the building to the lane, sat the vehicles Tarasios had moved. A BMW 523i that made my mouth water. A Porsche Boxster two seater that caused me to think things my Corvette would’ve considered adulterous. And a blue Fiat Scudo minibus that I could only assume the Trust used for field trips. It seated nine and looked like it had one of those tootie-toot horns that warn you all the passengers carry disposable cameras and close their shoes with Velcro straps.

The garage was windowless and the only other entrances were the shut and locked bay doors. So far the only close presence I’d detected was that of the werewolf inside. Since the locks were somewhat intricate, requiring time and possibly noise to defeat, I decided to check out the wagon house first. If I could free the bear more easily, so much the better for all of us.

The wagon house, surrounded on three sides by a confused mass of herbage that included chestnut trees and wild primroses, was a square, tile-roofed echo of the villa. To my relief, it held no vampires. All I felt was the prickling at the base of my brain that told me whatever lurked behind its extra-wide, barnlike door had a two-edged psyche, one of which was a beast.

This is just stupid
, I told myself as I holstered Grief and pulled my coral necklace out from beneath my shirt.
That damn bear is probably waiting right inside, licking his chops at the thought of a little grain-fed American for his midnight snack.

The shark’s tooth at the necklace’s center fit perfectly into the padlock that held the sliding door shut. I could almost see the tooth melding to the form of the key the lock required.
You know, Bergman may be too good. Sometimes it would be nice if I
couldn’t
get into places. Like this one
.

The padlock clicked open. A voice sounding oddly like
South Park
’s Cartman echoed through my quivering brain.
Goddammit!

Grief came back to my hand as if attached by a spring. I switched to crossbow mode for silence. Keeping my shoulder to the outer wall, I braced my foot against the door’s edge and shoved. It slid a couple of feet to the left, opening a twenty-foot-tall crack that felt like a hole in the universe.

Nothing happened.

Is he in there waiting for me? Or is he unconscious? Why doesn’t Vayl ever give me the easy jobs? I swear, if one of us was ever forced to get a massage, or watch the whole first season of
Futurama
for Uncle Sam’s sake
—
he’d assign that one to himself!