Mortal Ties (30 page)

“How fast do you need them?” Lily glanced at her watch. It was after ten in D.C. “I
don’t want to wake Ida up if I don’t have to.” Lily could make the calls herself,
but in a nonemergency situation it was better to let Ruben’s secretary handle things.
She’d pull in agents in a way that didn’t disrupt their current workload too badly.

Bergman smiled slowly. “How about by noon tomorrow?”

“Works.” Lily made a few notes, talking as she wrote. “While you handle the heavy
load, I’m going to be coming at this from another angle—the prototype. If we knew
who wanted it so damn bad and why, we’d have a better idea
who the players are.” She looked up. “If no one here’s going to miss their kid’s birthday
or an anniversary or something, I’d like to order in some food and bat this around
while we eat.”

That’s what they’d done. Drummond had reverted to his misty, untalking shape for most
of the session, though he had formed up enough to comment now and then. They were
useful comments, so Lily had passed them on. And maybe no one came up with any breakthrough
ideas, but brainstorming got them farther along. And more invested. It put them on
her team. Lily had felt satisfied as she rode down to the ground floor.

Drummond joined her as she stepped out of the elevator in his fully formed version,
his usual scowl in place. “What you did—that was creepy as hell.”

Lily glanced around. The lobby was empty except for the security guard, but her back
was to him as she walked away, and he was plugged into his iPod, listening to something
with lots of bass. That made for lousy security, but came in handy at the moment.
If she whispered…“A ghost is telling me something’s creepy?”

“You yelled right in my mind!”

“That’s how mindspeech is supposed to work.” Lily felt a bit smug. Mostly she couldn’t
make the mindspeech thing work. She’d been practicing for months now with Sam, but
her ability remained so erratic as to be useless. Maybe this was a breakthrough?
Can you hear me now?

He winced. “Don’t do that.”

Get used to it. I don’t want people to wonder why I keep talking to myself.

He sighed. “I can see that. I handled it wrong up there, but I was so…why did you
hand it off to Bergman? I could have helped. I’m supposed to help, dammit.”

The lobby had revolving glass doors. She could see Scott waiting right out front,
as arranged. She glanced at Drummond and shoved on the glass.
Because she’s good, and this frees me up to do what I’m good at. Unless you know something
against her
, she added as she stepped out
into a chilly San Francisco night. Maybe Drummond had worked with Bergman and had
some reason to object. They were roughly the same age. The age he’d been when he died,
anyway.

“No,” he said grudgingly. “Bergman’s competent. But you don’t get anywhere by handing
the juicy cases off to someone else.”

“Depends on where you want to go, doesn’t it?” Whoops—she’d forgotten and spoken out
loud. She glanced over her shoulder—no one nearby, so maybe no one noticed.

Not even Drummond. He’d stopped dead and was staring at the car with loathing. “I
hate
it when you go in the car,” he’d said—and winked out.

He hadn’t come back when she called him. Lily was beginning to understand why responsible
mediums rolled their eyes when asked about getting supernatural aid from the dead.
Ghosts—coherent or not—just weren’t much help.

She didn’t see him at the hotel, either. Marcus and Steve were on duty in the hall
when Lily approached the suite trailing her own contingent of guards. She greeted
them absently, used the key card, and opened the door.

Joe sailed down the short entry hall to land on his back with a grunt, right at her
feet.

L
ILY’S
gun was in her hand before she even thought about it. Joe grinned up at her. “Whoops.
No alarm needed. Rule’s been showing me a few tricks.”

Joe was wearing boxers. Period. Rule was in shirt and dress slacks when he appeared
at the end of the short hall. The shirt was unfastened. “Sorry.” He ran a hand through
his hair, which was already pretty messed up. Sweat gleamed on his chest. “I should
have warned you.”

Lily holstered her weapon. “Or at least thrown Joe the other direction.”

Steve was shamefaced. “It’s my fault. I knew they were working out. I should have
told you before you went in. It didn’t occur to me you’d…sorry.”

“No one got shot, so I’ll accept the apologies.” Steve hadn’t been around her much,
and he was Leidolf. He wasn’t used to women who reacted the way she did. “Next time
you’ll know.”

Rule, however, had been around her plenty, and while she hadn’t shot anyone, she might
have. It wasn’t as if he never made mistakes, but this…this had been stupid in the
didn’t-bother-to-think sense. That wasn’t his kind of
mistake. Lily closed the door and moved on into the room, studying him while trying
to look like she wasn’t. “I don’t see any damage to the furnishings.”

“We moved things around to make room.” Absently he began buttoning his shirt.

“Where’s Cullen?”

“Casting his Find spell. Again.”

“It didn’t work?”

“Oh, he claims it worked. He said the spell located the prototype, but it doesn’t
know where that location is. Apparently that makes sense to him.” Rule ran a hand
through his hair a second time, but this time with fingers spread to smooth it down.
He glanced around. “It was a good bout, Joe. Thanks. Everyone on duty, take your posts.
Off duty, get some food or sleep or head for the hotel gym.”

The sitting room emptied quickly. She and Rule were as alone as they’d been since
she climbed in his lap last night…God, yes, that was only a little over twenty-four
hours ago, wasn’t it? As alone as they ever got lately. She walked up to him and put
her arms around his waist, leaned her head against his chest, and hugged.

He sighed and hugged back, rubbing his cheek along the top of her head. For a long
moment they just stood there, neither of them speaking. He smelled of fresh sweat
and the faint, underlying scent that was his alone. Even her poor human nose could
identify him from this close. “What do you smell like?”

“Hmm?” He raised his head. He was smiling slightly.

“If I could smell you the way your men can, I mean. What were they smelling when you
and Joe were working out?”

His smile fled. “Tension,” he said at last. “I hope they didn’t smell the anxiety.
If they’d been in wolf form, they would have.”

“Hence the sudden need to throw Joe around.”

“Hence that.” His smile returned, but didn’t make it to his eyes. “Hence turning suddenly
stupid. I thought I was dealing with this better.”

“This” being his unexpected acquisition of a brother?
His worry about her? The war? All of the above, she thought, and stretched up and
kissed him lightly on the mouth. “You’re dealing okay. You sent Patrick to look out
for Beth. If you hadn’t, they’d have gotten her.”

“I didn’t claim to be stupid all the time, but I can’t afford even brief bouts of
it.”

“I didn’t shoot.”

“And thank God for that, but—”

“Point being that you aren’t perfect, you aren’t going to turn perfect just because
you feel like it’s all up to you, and sometimes you have to rely on other people to
do the right thing. What did Scott do when I drew?”

“Shifted to the side so he could leap past you if needed. Todd turned enough to keep
both you and the hall in view. Mike…his posture suggested he was ready to take you
to the floor if there was a threat. I need to talk to him about that. Standing orders
are that they never block your shot. And yes, I take your point, which I gather is
something about teamwork.”

He sounded irritated about the whole concept of teamwork, which she gathered had something
to do with being a Rho and, therefore, a control freak. The latter condition she understood
only too well, so she gave him another quick kiss to tell him that, then simply lingered,
held close, and thought about all the questions she’d been saving up for when they
were alone. And didn’t want to ask any of them. She didn’t want to talk at all, not
with her body stirring and beginning to yearn.

She sighed. “We need to talk.”

“Why do those words always sound so ominous?” he murmured. But he was more relaxed
now, more himself. “You want to discuss the venue for the wedding?”

Their wedding had been so far from her thinking the last twenty-four hours that his
question took her aback. She shook her head. “This is about the case. The cases.”

He squeezed her waist and let go. “All right. Would you like some wine to go with
our words? I had a pleasant Syrah with dinner. There’s some of that left, or I could
open the Riesling the wine steward recommended.”

“Some Riesling would be good.” As he moved to the room service cart she took off her
jacket, draped it over the back of a chair, and began unfastening her shoulder harness.
“Why Leidolf?”

“Hmm?” He inserted the corkscrew and began twisting.

“I wondered why you brought an all-Leidolf squad with us.”

“Oh.” With a soft sound like a sigh the cork came out. He reached for a wineglass.
“Call it a gut impulse, but my head agreed.”

She set her shoulder harness on the table and toed off first one shoe, then the other.
It felt good to wiggle her toes, dig them into the plush carpet. “What did your head
say?”

“That it’s hard on my Leidolf guards at Nokolai Clanhome. They’re surrounded by Nokolai
and constantly see me in my role as the other clan’s Lu Nuncio. They need time with
me as their Rho.”

He wasn’t making any effort to lower his voice, which meant any guards in the other
bedroom who were awake could hear him easily. Which meant he was okay with that. Maybe
he wanted them to. Lily picked up her jacket, shoulder harness, and shoes and carried
them into the bedroom that was hers and Rule’s. “It’s kind of weird to hear you call
Nokolai the other clan. I know what you meant, but…do you think you’ll become more
Leidolf than Nokolai?”

Glass clinked. “The balance has shifted, but I’ve been Nokolai all my life. I won’t
lose that. It’s too much a part of me.”

She set her shoulder harness on the bedside table where she could get it in a hurry,
if needed. Shoes and jacket went in the closet. “And your gut said?”

He came into the bedroom carrying two glasses. “I wanted Leidolf around me. I wanted
them to feel the change. They may not consciously notice, but they’ll feel it. Leidolf
is truly mine now.”

“That’s a very dominant way of seeing it.”

His grin flashed. He held out one brimming glass. “I’m a dominant kind of a guy.”

In the lupi sense of the word, she reminded herself as she
accepted the wine. He knew he was in charge—but of the clan, not her. Which was sort
of the problem, considering what she needed to tell him. Lily took a sip of wine.
“Hey. That’s really good.” Good enough to burst through her preoccupation and make
her notice. “It tastes kind of like the sky looks up high in the mountains. You know—really
saturated, but crisp.”

He took a sip, too, his eyes steady on hers. “I agree. I’ll have to tell the wine
steward we approve. What is it you wanted to talk about that you can’t bring yourself
to talk about?”

He was too damn perceptive at times. She sighed. “Before we left Clanhome, Cynna asked
me to promise I’d let her know if we needed her. You said Cullen can’t make his Find
spell work. We have two people missing that we’re pretty sure are hostages. We need
Cynna.”

“No.”

He said that coolly and with complete assurance. It was exactly the reaction she’d
expected. In his mind this was a clan matter—Nokolai clan, not Leidolf this time,
but either way, his territory. “You don’t get to make that decision.”

“Lily, stop and think,” he said impatiently. “Bringing Cynna here could be the reason
for all of this. Why is Friar kidnapping people? That’s what you keep asking, isn’t
it? Maybe because he wants the best Finder in the country to show up and try to find
them. Stealing the prototype might get her here, but if not, grab some people, too,
because that’s exactly the sort of thing we’d need her for. Exactly the sort of thing
she’d
want
to come here for. Cynna has no apprentice. If she were killed, the clan’s memories
would be lost.” He shook his head. “It’s unthinkable.”

“And it’s still not your decision. Look.” She set her wine down on the bureau and
went to him. “You lupi have been around for over three thousand years. In all that
time, has a Rhej ever died before she could pass on the memories?”

His eyebrows went up. “It hasn’t happened, therefore it won’t? You usually argue better
than that.”

She laid her hands on his chest, wanting the contact. “It
hasn’t happened, and maybe there’s a reason. You protect your Rhejes in every way
possible, and that’s got to be part of it. What if the Lady protects them, too? By
warning them, maybe, in certain special circumstances. Like if a Rhej who hasn’t passed
on the memories is about to do something that’s apt to get her killed.”