Boundary Crossed (Boundary Magic Book 1) (16 page)

I’d believed Maven and Itachi when they’d promised to protect my niece, but it was nice to have the independent confirmation. I cut my eyes to Quinn, letting him take the lead. “They both pledged troth to you,” he said, his voice as low as Kirby’s.

The other vampire nodded. “I made Victor myself. Took Darcy on when she came to Boulder a couple of years ago and started rooming with Victor.”

“And who are you pledged to?” I broke in, just in case Quinn was wrong about the chain of command.

Kirby’s fake-friendly expression wavered as his eyes narrowed at me. “Itachi, same as him,” he retorted, tilting his head at Quinn. Kirby’s eyes were on me, and he didn’t see the little flicker on Quinn’s face as he said this. I filed that away for later.

“How often did you see the two of them?” Quinn asked.

Smiling again—just a friendly college kid chatting with some out-of-towners—Kirby shrugged. “I’d check in with them once or twice a month, or they’d check in with me. And before you ask, no, they never mentioned doing any side work, and they weren’t showing off a sudden influx of cash or bragging about a new job. We would meet somewhere, they’d tell me everything was fine, I’d remind them of the rules, and we’d split.”

Quinn pulled the photo out of his pocket. “Is this you?”

Kirby’s glance was quick and careless, his face revealing nothing. “You know it is.”

“Who’s the fourth person?”

The friendly, open expression Kirby had been forcing suddenly faded. “That’s Nolan. He’s one of the Denver vampires.” He gave Quinn a quick glance. “I haven’t seen him since the purge.”

Quinn asked a few more questions after that, but Kirby really didn’t seem to know anything more about Victor and Darcy’s plans. “Look, I gotta get back to the party before this looks any more suspicious,” he said, his face still cheerful. “Good luck and all. If anyone asks between here and the car, you two are trying to visit your nephew at Tau Kappa.” Without waiting to see Quinn’s response, Kirby turned on his heel and disappeared into the throng of people near the house’s archway.

Quinn shot an annoyed look at Kirby’s back and started toward his car. “Come on.”

A DJ had set up giant speakers and a table while we were talking to Kirby, and as Quinn and I walked back to the car, “The Fallen” by Franz Ferdinand came pulsing out of the speakers. It seemed pretty appropriate.

Back in the car, I asked, “How is it possible that Itachi put that guy in charge of two other vampires?”

Quinn tilted his head to the side as he thought that over. “It’s just kind of . . . how they do things,” he said at last. “I can’t really think of a comparison, except maybe Alcoholics Anonymous.”

I chortled. “Sorry, what?”

“Sponsors,” he said, completely serious. “In AA you have a sponsor, and you also become a sponsor. The whole thing is this big system so you learn responsibility.”

“That sounds ridiculously stupid,” I argued. “What’s to stop Kirby from turning all his vampires against his boss?”

“Because Itachi is the only vampire in Colorado who can officially sanction kills,” he said shortly. “Kirby might enjoy needling Itachi, but he knows exactly how far he can push him. Trust me, Kirby’s dominus responsibilities are the one thing he takes seriously.”

He was staring through the windshield, where we could just barely see Kirby standing in a loose circle with four of his frat brothers. As we watched, Kirby put Chewbacca in a headlock and started laughing.

“I don’t think he was involved,” Quinn said finally, mostly to himself. “Kidnapping a baby so you can train her the way you want, to do the things you want to do—that’s a long-view move. I don’t know Kirby all that well, but I just don’t think he’s a long-view kind of guy. I could see him knocking over a liquor store, sure, but kidnapping a baby?”

“He could have been the . . . you know, the fence,” I offered, uncertain of the terminology. “The middleman for another buyer.”

Quinn shook his head again. “Kirby’s got plenty of money. That whole prostitution thing, which was a hell of a risk, was just for his own amusement. And selling a baby isn’t particularly amusing, nor is the kind of heat that would have come down on him if he’d gotten away with your niece.”

In front of us, Kirby had finally released poor Chewbacca and was telling the throng of brothers a story with great enthusiasm, waving his hands around to emphasize the point. The other frat boys were hanging on his every word, watching Kirby with the fervor of cult members. “I agree,” I said finally. “It doesn’t seem like his style. But do you think he knows something he’s not telling us?” I wished we had gotten Kirby alone so I could have tried the mind-pressing thing again; I was way too new at it to experiment in front of a big crowd of college kids.

Quinn shrugged and started the car. “If he does, we’re not going to find out tonight,” he said pragmatically.

“Denver next?” I asked.

“Denver next.”

Chapter 23

Boulder is only about thirty miles northwest of Colorado’s capital and biggest city, and in perfect traffic you can make it there in forty minutes. But since plenty of people work in Boulder but live in the much less expensive Denver area, there were a lot of commuters. The traffic was far from perfect by the time we began the trek south.

Quinn called Itachi on the way and got an address for Nolan. When he hung up, I asked, “Did he tell you anything else about the guy?”

He shook his head. “Not really. I’ve heard a little about him, though. He was a big player during the purge.”

“I don’t know what that means,” I said irritably. I was getting really tired of playing catch-up. Every time I thought I had a decent grasp of the Old World, someone started talking in made-up terms.

Quinn tapped his fingers on the steering wheel, his face expressionless as ever. Finally, he said, “Remember I told you there are no werewolves in Colorado?”

“When I was in the hospital, yeah.”

“Well, this whole state used to be werewolf paradise, with a pack in most of the bigger cities. Then one of the alphas, Trask, decided to take over
all
the packs.” Quinn eyed me. “You ever met a wild dog? Or a pack of wild dogs?”

Some unpleasant images from Iraq flashed in my head before I could push them aside. “Unfortunately.”

“Trask turned his people into that, or gave it his best shot, anyway.” Quinn’s voice was perfectly level, his voice betraying no emotion at all. He might as well have been describing the history of deforestation. “Of course, a few of the wolves tried to stand up to Trask. He killed them, too.”

I stared at him. “Someone had to have noticed.”

Quinn lifted a disinterested shoulder. “They did, but the Old World is like the Wild West. You stake your claim on a patch of land, and you do your best to defend it. As long as Trask wasn’t drawing enough attention to alert the foundings to our presence, no one wanted to challenge him. He was too strong.”

“Someone must have stepped in,” I objected. I didn’t like bullies, and I
really
didn’t like the kind that got away with killing people.

“The witches did—sort of,” Quinn confirmed. “When Trask was on his rampage, three of Colorado’s big clans got caught in the crossfire. One of their leaders decided something had to be done.”

“Hazel,” I whispered.

Quinn nodded. “Hazel went to the oldest, most powerful vampire in the United States, and she begged for help.”

“Itachi?”

A brief, amused smile graced Quinn’s face. “Maven is the one with the serious power. Hazel went to her.” It was the most unguarded thing he’d said yet, and I saw him glance over at me, unsure if he’d overstepped. I made my face neutral. “Anyway. There’s a whole long story, but basically the witches cut a deal: if Maven killed Trask and forced all the werewolves out of the state, Hazel and her clans would swear total loyalty to the vampires for a period of twenty years.”

I remembered the way Hazel had reacted when Simon explained that Maven wanted me trained. “And Maven really did it.”

“Yes,” Quinn said. “This was thirteen years ago, before my time. All I really know is that she summoned every vampire who’d sworn troth to her—and believe me, the girl’s lived long enough to collect quite a few allies. She promised them a place in her new enclave if they fought for her. Itachi became her second-in-command, and he called in all of his vampires, too, including Nolan.”

“Jesus, it sounds like a war,” I said in awe. “How the hell did they keep it quiet?”

Quinn shrugged. “Like I said, it was before my time, but Maven’s been covering up murders for hundreds of years. Anyway, when it was over, most of the regular vampires who helped ended up in Denver or Colorado Springs, including Nolan.”

I considered that for a few minutes. Something about the dynamic between Maven and Itachi felt off to me, and I said so.

“Maven . . . doesn’t want to lead,” Quinn explained after a moment’s hesitation. “I’m not sure why, exactly. Something to do with her history. She has serious power, but no interest in being in charge of a territory. Itachi, on the other hand, doesn’t have as much juice, but he’s plenty ambitious. So he leads and she kind of . . .”

“Acts as his muscle?” I suggested.

He smiled. “Something like that.”

I thought that over for a few minutes. I couldn’t really see Maven, the teenaged bag lady with the orange hair, as the equivalent of a four-star general. Then again, she
had
seemed much more powerful than any of the other vampires I’d met. “How old
is
Maven?” I wondered aloud.

“I’m not really sure,” he admitted. “But from things she’s said, I’d guess Middle Ages.” His expression turned grave, and I got the message:
don’t piss her off.

I would sure as hell try.

We headed into southwestern Denver, and a little over an hour after we left Boulder, Quinn pulled into the parking lot of a swanky condo building in the Cherry Creek neighborhood. It was a mostly residential area, with lots of cul-de-sacs and big single-family houses that probably cost more than I’d earn in two lifetimes at the Flatiron Depot. Nolan lived in a lone condo park in which six or seven buildings were clustered around a small central area, where there was probably a pool and a walking path. We circled the enormous square parking lot a few times until we found a sign for units 8 to 12.

The inside of the building had the same restrained sense of wealth as the outside, like this was a place for people who had plenty of money but no desire to flaunt it. In the lobby, Quinn pushed the button for Nolan’s unit a few times, getting no response. He glanced over his shoulder at me, and I shrugged. This was his show. I was just the on-the-job trainee. Quinn sighed and glanced around, then planted his feet and tugged
hard
at the handle of the interior door. It cracked open with a terrible metallic crunch.

Nolan’s condo was on the basement level. We found the stairs, which led us past a small gym and a sauna before depositing us in front of the door of unit 12. Quinn knocked, waited for a moment, then knocked again. “Nolan?” he called, his voice authoritative.

“He’s probably just out,” I reasoned. “Getting, um, food.” I still hadn’t completely wrapped my head around the idea of vampires existing on blood they drank from regular people.

“Probably,” Quinn said, but he looked up and down the hall again. When he was sure no one was coming, he got down on his hands and knees and put his face right next to the crack of the door. Then he
sniffed
in long, deep inhalations that held no embarrassment or self-consciousness.

I tensed. Of the few vampires I’d met, Quinn seemed the most human. But moments like this one reminded me that I wasn’t dealing with an ordinary man. I heard Simon’s voice in my head.
Vampires aren’t like us, Lex.

I thought of the horror in Hazel Pellar’s eyes when she looked at me. Then again, I wasn’t much like “us” either, was I?

Finally Quinn straightened up, looking put out. “What?” I asked.

“Blood,” Quinn said shortly. “Too much blood.” He took a closer look at the door, which was far less secure than Victor and Darcy’s door had been. There was a single dead bolt and an ordinary knob lock. “From now on, I’m bringing lock picks everywhere we go,” he grumbled. Before I could respond, he leaned back and kicked the door so fast that I could barely follow the motion of his leg. The door shot open, and I heard the knob crunch into the plaster wall behind it. I raised my eyebrows at Quinn. “What is it with you and doors?” I asked. He gave me a sheepish look and stepped forward, flicking a light switch on his right.

My first thought was that whoever had killed Nolan had made no effort to hide his body. The dead vampire’s skeleton was sitting three feet away from the door, wearing jeans and a blue T-shirt. The clothes puddled around the skeleton, which was situated on top of a large red stain. I was so busy looking at all that bright red blood that it took me a moment to realize there was no skull attached to the body.

“Lex,” Quinn said impatiently, and I registered that it was at least the second time he’d said my name. “You need to come in and close the door.”

“Right,” I said stupidly, stepping all the way in and shoving the door closed behind me. It didn’t latch, but it stayed more or less shut. “Where’s his head?” My voice came out sounding like a little kid’s, and I swallowed.

“Here.” Quinn had wandered into a small kitchenette on our left, just behind the counter. “It rolled.”

“Right.” I shook off the shock—I’d seen much worse, just not this
weird—
and moved closer to the body. “Do we think it’s Nolan?” I asked.

Quinn came over to the skeleton, studied it for a second, and then squatted down near the left arm. I tried not to flinch as he gently picked up the skeleton’s hand, which snapped loose in his fingers
despite the care he took. There was something shiny on the wrist,
which slid off the forearm bone into Quinn’s hand. He studied the fancy-looking watch for a moment and tossed it to me. “It’s him.”

I caught it and, seeing an inscription on the back, read it aloud. “For N, my greatest soldier, a token of my thanks. —I.” I looked up at Quinn. “This could have been planted on the body,” I pointed out. “Nolan might have killed someone else to fake his death.”

Quinn shook his head. “Look around. This wasn’t a fight. Besides the big pool, there are only a few drops of blood on the carpet, and none on the walls. Nolan let someone else come in, someone he trusted enough to turn his back. That’s how he died.” He jumped up and circled the body to stand behind me, gently taking my shoulders and positioning me just inside the door. “You’re Nolan. While your back is turned”—he swung an imaginary dagger—“I take a swing and lop off your head, which isn’t as easy as they make it look in the movies, by the way. You pretty much need vampire strength. Anyway, this happened fast, just inside the door. You wouldn’t stop to put a watch on someone before chopping off their head.”

“It could have been put on the body afterward,” I pointed out, although we both knew I was just playing devil’s advocate.

Quinn was shaking his head before I’d finished the sentence. “That thing is brittle as shit—pardon my language.” He nodded at the watch in my hand. “The clasp on the watch is complicated. No way you could get it on the skeleton without snapping off its hand.”

“Gross,” I said. “But okay, I agree that it’s probably Nolan.” I glanced around. I’d never seen an actual beheading, but I’d seen arterial spray before. Quinn was right. There wasn’t enough blood. “But that doesn’t explain why the blood is in one neat puddle like that. If his head was cut off, shouldn’t it have spurted everywhere?”

“Yes,” Quinn said absently. “But I don’t think he bled at all.” Before I could ask what that meant, he abruptly reached forward and flipped the skeleton over.

I jumped, half expecting it to roll the extra two feet and bump into my ankles. But it just lay there on its back, allowing me to see the empty plastic bag that had been beneath it.

“A blood bag,” Quinn said. He got up and went over to the fridge, beckoning me to follow. I stepped carefully over the body and joined him.

He opened the fridge door, exposing neat rows of deep red IV bags. “Most of us drink live, but Maven has a private donation center set up for anyone who wants it, or for those of us who aren’t great at pressing foundings,” Quinn told me. “The bag was still was in his hand when he answered the door, which confirms it was a vampire.” Before I could ask, he added, “If it’d been a human, Nolan wouldn’t have still had the blood bag in his hand.”

Okay. “What do we do now?” I asked.

Quinn looked straight at me, his gaze so intense that I flinched. “Nolan being dead . . . it complicates things,” he said frankly. He dug into his pocket and pulled out a cell phone. “I gotta make a call, and then we’ll take a quick look around.”

Quinn, as it turned out, wasn’t responsible for doing the vampire dirty work in Denver— they had their own person for that. After placing the call, he grabbed a wooden chair from the small table in the living room and used it to prop the door shut. “We don’t have a lot of time,” he said, “so search fast.” He looked around. “Why don’t you start in the living room? I’ll head for the back bedroom, and we’ll meet in the middle.”

So for the second time in two days, I found myself searching a vampire’s quarters for clues. Nolan’s place was the opposite of Darcy and Victor’s filthy college apartment: the condo was tidy and sparsely decorated, with simple, comfortable furniture and lots of neutral colors. There weren’t even a lot of places to search. I had only gotten as far as flipping through the stack of reading material on Nolan’s side table—fishing magazines, an invitation to a condo association meeting, some junk mail—before Quinn called for me.

I followed his voice to the little bedroom at the end of the hall. I rounded the door frame, and right in the center of the otherwise empty room I saw a big pile of brand-new baby gear, still packed in bags and boxes. There was a high chair, a Pack ’n Play, an economy-sized box of diapers, a changing pad, and two bags bearing the logo of a popular kids’ clothing store. I reached into the clothing bag and pulled out a package of onesies, size eighteen months. An involuntary shiver shook me where I stood.

“This is where they were bringing Charlie,” I whispered.