Lasting Fury (Hexing House Book 2) (19 page)

“It’s possible she’s telling the truth,” someone two chairs down from Megaira said. Frederick. He’d been pretty high up in RDM at Hexing House, Thea remembered. It had been a blow when he jumped ship and went to Fury Unlimited.

“How would she get a hex like that?” Megaira snapped.

“I’m not saying Alecto wasn’t developing something,” Frederick said. “But Thea may have stolen it and come on her own. Judging by what Philip has told us, she’s quite unstable. And I’m not reading dishonesty in her now.”

Thea’s stomach did a little flip at that last part, and she quickly glanced down. The amulet that protected her from furies reading her vices and virtues had been taken from her.

“She could be manipulating what you can read,” said Megaira.

“It takes a very skilled fury to do that,” someone else said, doubt that Thea was such a fury clear in her voice.

“And how do you explain the human?” Frederick asked Megaira. “Bizarre as it is, I’ll admit that Thea seems to be a favorite with your sister.”

Ha. You’re working on some outdated information there, buddy.

“But I seriously doubt Alecto would send a
human
to attack us,” Frederick finished.

Holgersen shifted in his seat, but remained stone-faced and silent.

Megaira looked back at Thea. “Let’s shelve the issue of responsibility for the moment. Tell me everything you know about this hex.”

“I don’t know anything about it,” Thea said with a shrug.

Megaira gaped at her, then looked at the security guard standing beside Thea’s chair. “How big a dose did you give her, that she’s acting this stupid?” Turning back to Thea she said, “You’re telling me you came here all on your own, with no backing from Hexing House, with a hex you didn’t know anything about, and just, what?” She flung her hand outward. “Cut it loose, figured you would just see what it did?”

“No, I’m not telling you that,” Thea said. “I’m not telling you anything. I’m done answering questions.”

Megaira laughed at that, then looked at Holgersen. “How about you, Detective? Care to be a little more forthcoming?”

Holgersen said nothing.

“What do you think, guys?” Megaira asked with a sigh. “Go through the trouble of torturing them, or just kill them now?”

“Definitely keep them for questioning,” Frederick said. “There’s a lot we don’t know, still.”

“And there may be lingering aftereffects of the hex,” another board member added. “They may be able to help.”

Megaira considered Thea. “Actually, I seem to recall that she has some talent for hex removal.” She drummed her fingers on the tabletop. After a few seconds she said, “Okay, here’s how we play it. Take the human and question him separately. Do whatever’s required to get all the information he has. Humane treatment is not a concern.”

A security guard nodded and moved toward Holgersen.

Shit. Sacrificing yourself is one thing, but you don’t get to decide that for Holgersen. Pretty sure he’s not willing to be tortured to protect Hexing House.

Time to tell the truth, then.

But suppose they don’t believe it?

Shit.

Even if they do, chances are they’ll kill us anyway.

Shit.

“As for Thea,” Megaira went on. “I say we take her outside and take her wings right now. That might start her talking.”

Thea was still frantically arguing with herself, although it was quickly devolving into nothing but cursing, when Philip came into the room. She couldn’t help but notice an ugly scar on his cheek, courtesy of her talon. It made her feel a little better.

“I told you not to disturb us,” said Megaira.

“I know and I’m sorry, but you’ll want to take this,” Philip said. “Your sister is here to see you.”

Maybe the drugs they’d given her hadn’t entirely worked their way out of Thea’s system, because her first reaction on seeing Alecto come striding into the room with Gordon, Langdon, and Nero in tow was one of irritation. Thea figured if Alecto had come for her, it could only be because Flannery had tipped her off.

That bitch. She promised.

But Alecto’s eyes widened in surprise as they scanned the room and found Thea. Her expression went back to neutral so quickly that the moment would have been lost on someone who didn’t know her. But it wasn’t lost on Thea, and it wouldn’t have been lost on Megaira, either.

She didn’t come for me. She didn’t even know I was here.

“Alecto, how lovely to see you.” Megaira’s face was as flat as her sister’s.

“Likewise, I’m sure.” Alecto glanced at Philip. “Can we get some more chairs and a fresh pot of coffee in here? We may be a while.”

Philip glanced uncertainly at Megaira, but if she was offended at Alecto giving orders in her conference room, she didn’t show it. She merely nodded, and Philip left the room.

“Well,” Megaira said once the new arrivals were settled at the table. She gestured at Thea and Holgersen, who were still cuffed in their own seats, although they’d been moved off to one side, where everyone could see them. “You didn’t look like you were expecting to see these two here. Maybe they were telling the truth, and you didn’t send them? Or maybe you just weren’t expecting them to get caught.”

“I didn’t send them, I can tell you that much,” Alecto said dryly. “What makes you imagine I’d be sending a human police detective anywhere?”

“So you’re telling me that you had nothing to do with this hex?” Megaira asked. “Your arrival is just a coincidence, is that it?”

Thea felt a flare of fear as she realized that Alecto was probably making similar calculations to the ones Thea herself had made just a short while ago. Here was a handy scapegoat. If she chose to, Alecto could still walk away.

But then, even if she was prone to dishonesty, which she wasn’t, walking away was not Alecto’s style.

“Oh, I had everything to do with the hex.” Alecto gave her sister a tight smile. “That was an official action on the part of Hexing House. But Thea had no part in it. I couldn’t tell you what she’s doing here.”

“What
are
you doing here?” Frederick asked Thea.

“An excellent and necessary question, but it can wait,” said Megaira. “I’m more interested in what Alecto is doing here.”

“That should be obvious,” Alecto said. “We need to come to an understanding. Oh, and I’m sure it’s equally obvious that we would’ve taken several safety precautions. You’ve seen for yourself we can infiltrate your systems. It wouldn’t be a good idea to try to hurt us or detain us against our will.”

“I assure you, I have no interest in keeping you here,” Megaira muttered.

Alecto went on as if her sister hadn’t spoken. “What you’ve just experienced here was a small warning shot, intentionally mild. We have our own weapons now. You are no longer any more of a threat to us than we are to you.”

“So after all your self-righteous interference with our hex research, you went and made one of your own,” said Megaira.

“Pretty much,” Alecto agreed. “Did you like the flu-like symptoms we worked in there? It wasn’t easy developing a hex that would target more than just vices and virtues. I bet you’d love to get your hands on that research.”

Megaira let out a puff of exasperated laughter. “You really do have an endless supply of nerve.”

Thea was inclined to agree with Megaira on that one. She knew enough to keep her mouth shut, but it was all she could do to control her outrage. Alecto was just as bad as her sister. They were supposed to be finding a solution to the problem of the superhex, not meeting it with one of their own.

And what about the rest of them? Had the board approved this? The presence here of three department heads suggested they had.

Damn you all.

“We didn’t make it to sell it,” Alecto said. “Unlike you, we don’t consider it a viable product. In fact, we hope to never use it again. We’re only trying to protect ourselves.”

By getting into an arms race. Because that always works so well.

“Protect yourselves from what?” Megaira asked. “We’ve never threatened you.”

“You deployed the superhex practically in our backyard!” Alecto said.

“And tried to frame us for it,” Nero added. “You don’t get off the hook on that just because you did such a clumsy job of it that you had to backtrack and blame Boyd Lexington instead.”

Megaira ignored Nero. Her eyes never left her sister’s face. “We tested the superhex in a human area. We have never harmed another fury.”

Thea couldn’t quite manage to keep silent on that one. “Hello? Are you seriously making that claim in front of me?”

But it seemed Megaira was going to disregard anything that didn’t fit into her narrative. She didn’t so much as glance in Thea’s direction.

“We’re the ones who’ve been attacked,” Megaira said. “We’re the ones who need to worry about defending ourselves.”

“You deployed the superhex in Hemlock Heights to make a point,” said Alecto. “I deployed a hex today to make a point, as well.”

Megaira gestured at her board members on either side of her. “Well, you’ve got our attention. Make your point.”

“You need to stand down,” Alecto said. “You will not use your superhex again. Ever.”

“Or else you’ll use yours?” Megaira leaned forward, her eyes hard. “That would be difficult for you to do, if your colony was hexed into chaos and falling apart, wouldn’t it?”

And so it went on. Alecto and Megaira spent the next twenty minutes posturing and arguing, backed up by their board members, using the sort of language diplomats use when they’re more interested in making the enemy cower than in actually avoiding a war.

Furies. They’re worse than humans. It’s not even just Alecto and Megaira. Look at Nero’s face. Look at Frederick’s. None of them will back down.

They’re really this stupid. They’re really going to start a damn war.

Thea’s thoughts were interrupted by a sharp kick to her chair. Holgersen. He was giving her a hard look that insisted she do… something. What did he want from her?

Thea looked around at the angry faces. How could she stop them?

And then she knew.

What she had in mind might not be exactly what Holgersen was hoping for. And it certainly wasn’t anything a fury would think of. It wasn’t violent, for one thing.

But it would turn the tables quite nicely. On both sisters.

“Pardon the interruption,” Thea called out. “But now would be a hell of a time to get to that question of what I was doing here.”

Alecto and Megaira wore identical expressions of mixed condescension and irritation. Thea smiled pleasantly at both of them. “Megaira, if you check with your Human Relations staff, you’ll find they met with some potential clients today. A couple called the Bowmans. They’re on a flight home right now, with proof that Fury Unlimited has developed a superhex.”

Of course, in reality Thea had no idea where the Bowmans were. She hoped they weren’t still waiting at the bottom of the mountain road, where they’d be easily picked up by the furies. But what she was about to do would call for a certain amount of bluffing, and Thea felt she had to start by giving Megaira something verifiable and specific.

Luckily Holgersen, who hadn’t spoken since they’d been brought before Megaira’s board, was finally ready to do some talking. And he was a quick thinker. “Naturally, we recorded their conversation. You’ll find the transmitter in the inside pocket of my jacket, if you’d like to verify that. We backed it up in real time to multiple secure locations, so I wouldn’t recommend going after them. Not only would it be a waste of your time, it might encourage consequences.”

“What are you threatening, exactly?” Megaira asked. “To go to the police?” She considered Holgersen. “Or, I suppose you
are
the police, aren’t you? How has going after us helped your career so far?”

“We won’t bother with the police,” said Thea.

“Who then?” Alecto asked, then snorted. “The Concerned Citizens For A Fury-Free County?”

“You’re not thinking big enough,” Thea said. “You’ve got a whole world of potential clients out there. And they’d be mighty scandalized to discover that you’re not only developing weapons of mass destruction, but testing them on unsuspecting humans.” She shrugged and went for a look of vague innocence. “I haven’t worked in this industry very long, but it seems to me that this kind of thing is not going to make you a trusted service provider.”

“So you want to try us in the court of public opinion, is that it?” Megaira asked.

Thea nodded. “My friend the detective here used that exact phrase himself recently, in fact. You depend on public opinion for your survival.” She glared at Alecto. “As do you. And you’ve recently gotten a taste of how a decline in your approval rating can hurt, thanks to your sister.”

Alecto bristled and tossed her head at Megaira. “Our business is doing just fine.”

“Sure,” agreed Thea. “It is now. But I’m prepared to go a lot farther than a picture snapped on some amateur’s phone. And more importantly, I’ve got the power to go a lot farther. I don’t think you’ll be able to blame it on Boyd Lexington this time.”

She paused and smiled in spite of herself.
I never thought I’d see the day when I’d be thanking Baird Frost. But here it is. Thanks, Baird.

“You may recall that I was a celebrity once,” Thea said. “D-list, I’ll admit, but associated with an A-list star, and that’ll still open a door or two.”

“Just get to the point, will you?” said Megaira. “You remind me of Uncle Graves, grandstanding for attention.”

Alecto actually snickered at that.

Great. Now I’ve got them acting sisterly again.

Thea nodded at Megaira. “It so happens attention is exactly the point. And my particular ability to get it. Celebrity!TV would give me a reality show in a heartbeat.
My Life As A Fury
. And when I’m in their living room an hour a week for ten weeks or so, I assure you, people will come around to believing in furies.”

“Well, not everyone,” Holgersen interjected. “Some would still think it was fake. But of course, people who refuse to believe in your existence aren’t your potential customers, are they?”

“And the ones who do believe—the ones who
are
your potential customers—will not be inclined to come to you, once this scandal breaks,” Thea said. “It will bury you. I will bury you.”

“Unless?” Frederick asked.

Thea smiled at him, delighted to find a weak spot. Megaira and Alecto would probably argue with her for hours, Megaira because she wouldn’t want to let the superhex go, Alecto just to prove that Thea couldn’t order her around. But Frederick was being awfully quick to open negotiations. And if Thea could get the two boards to go along, she might not even need the two sisters.

“Unless you agree to destroy the superhex, all the relevant research and data, and submit to quarterly inspections of your facilities to prove you’re no longer pursuing that line of business.” Thea looked from the members of Fury Unlimited’s board, to the members of Hexing House’s. “And I’m both surprised and disappointed to be saying this, but that applies to both colonies. This only works if we all agree that this is not a road we, as furies, want to go down.”

There. The terms she’d laid out were almost identical to those Alecto herself had asked for in March, the first time they’d come to Fury Unlimited. Surely Alecto would see the wisdom in them now.

Unfortunately, Alecto looked mad enough to cut Thea’s throat wide open, right then and there. For a few seconds, nobody said a word.

Nero, bless his heart, broke the tension—for some of them, anyway—by bursting into laughter.

“I kind of have to hand it to you, Thea,” he said. “It’s kind of an elegant solution. And points for having the balls to try blackmailing people while cuffed to a chair.”

“But she is cuffed to a chair,” Megaira said. “Which makes her threats kind of meaningless, doesn’t it? Easy enough to kill her.”

“Like hell it is,” said Nero. “Try to keep up, Maggie. We’ve just established that you can’t afford to piss us off right now, remember?”