Wicked Game (24 page)

I jerk my eyelids apart. “Do you want some music?”

He shakes his head. “All I want to hear is you.”

Aww, he’s so roman—

The next sound
I
hear is that of my own snoring. I rub my eyes and see Shane lying on his back next to me.

“God, I’m so sorry. How long was I asleep?”

“About three minutes. Plenty of time to have my way with you. You liked it, judging by the way you flopped around.”

I giggle like a drunk girl. “Can we try this again?”

“Maybe tomorrow.” He tugs at the sheets, sliding them out from under my body, then pulls them over me. “Tonight, just sleep.”

“Don’t go.”

“Nothing but the sun will make me leave.”

“Set the clock so you don’t catch fire,” I mumble.

“I did, plus the alarm on my cell phone as a backup.”

I hear him blow out the candles, then take off his jeans and shirt. I want to open my eyes to see him, but exhaustion has glued my lids together.

Shane slides under the sheets and pulls me close. The feel of his skin against mine should start my blood racing, should yank me into instant horniness. But instead it just makes me think how right and safe it feels to have him in my bed, and makes me think how much I love him.

Wait...

Oh, crap.

My alarm cries out, echoed by a beeping across the room. Darkness shrouds the bedroom window. An arm reaches over me and silences the clock. I close my eyes again, hoping sleep won’t let go.

It doesn’t. The last thing I feel is a kiss on my bare shoulder, then the emptiness of an unshared bed.

My eyes open to a yellow glow around my window. The reawakened alarm clock says 7:30. I smack the snooze button and turn over, where my arm flops onto the other pillow and hits a piece of paper.

Lying on the indentation from his head is a note from Shane:

Ciara,

I set your coffee to start brewing at 7:20, so it should be ready by now. I put three sugars in the bottom of
the mug, so just pour and stir. I know you like it strong and sweet.

Shane

P.S.: The Dave Matthews Band should be filed under D, not M. Til fix it tonight.

The smell of fresh-brewed coffee drags me out of bed by the nostrils. Though the seven hours of slumber barely made the minimum payment on my sleep debt, I’m refreshed and alert enough to walk in a straight line toward the kitchen. I realize with no small shred of astonishment that I slept better last night next to a vampire than I have in years.

My feet stop. I stare across the room at the coffee-maker, whose orange light glows with pride to signal the brewing of another satisfying pot. But I’m not looking at the coffee. I’m remembering my last thought before I fell asleep in Shane’s arms.

That I love him.

The coffeemaker plops one last drop into the carafe, to accentuate my epiphany.

It’s a delusion, an emotional mirage, a by-product of exhaustion and gratitude. He did save my life, after all.

My feet unfreeze and take me to the pot. Three sugars sit at the bottom of the beagle mug. I reach for the pot and realize I’m still holding his note. Instead of throwing it away, I transfer it to my left hand, which, against orders, clutches it like a sacred relic. I stare down in annoyance.

The phrase “Bride 2B” mocks me from my chest.

Hmm . . .

Jolene.

Travis.

As I pour the coffee, I realize that the man who tried to kill me could end up saving us all.

Franklin greets me at the office door with a stack of plates and forks. “It’s about time. I’ve had to sit here smelling that thing for fifteen minutes.” He sees the thermos in my hand. “Good, you brought some decent coffee.”

“I need to talk to you and David right away.” I glance past him at my desk. On it sits an object with a large clear, plastic lid. “What the hell is that?”

“An olive branch, apparently. Hopefully a chocolate-flavored, butter-cream-icing olive branch.”

I go to my desk, expecting the strange item to explode any moment. It’s a large sheet cake with white icing and a label from a local all-night supermarket. Scrawled across the surface in green decorating-tube frosting is one word:
SORRY.
Four initials,
T, S, J,
and
R,
appear at the bottom, penned with a thinner decorating tube. Off to the side is a roughly drawn frowny face with tiny fangs.

I can barely lift my jaw to speak. “They stood there last night while I almost got eaten, and to make up for it, they buy me a
cake!”

“Can we eat it now? I didn’t have breakfast.” Franklin pops the lid. “Do you want a corner piece?”

“I don’t want any piece! I don’t want anything from them.”

David opens his office door. “What’s going on? Ooh, cake.”

“You won’t believe what’s going on.” I relate last night’s harrowing events.

Franklin displays his typical lack of wonder. “I told you those pencils would come in handy.”

David shakes himself out of shock. “Why didn’t you call me when it happened?”

“Hey, I was too busy trying not to be ground into human hamburger meat, okay?”

My phone rings, from the basement line. Shane’s checking in on me—how sweet. I pick up the receiver. “My hero!”

“It’s just a twenty-dollar cake,” Regina says. “You did get it, right?”

“You—” Every profanity in my arsenal strives to be the first out of my mouth, leaving me speechless.

“Shane said I should apologize directly instead of through baked goods.”

“How could you—”

“So I’m sorry for almost watching you die. I got caught up in the moment. The way you were screaming—”

“Stop—”

“—you’re lucky we didn’t all fall down and take a slurp.”

“After all I’ve done for you, you would’ve let that thing tear out my throat. I thought you were my friends!”

“We are,” she says calmly. “We’re also vampires. We look out for each other.”

“What did you do with—” I can’t say my almost-killer’s name. “—with him?”

“He’s here, under our care. Poor kid’s tired and cranky, like a baby switching from breast milk to formula.”

“Pardon my lack of giving a shit. Put him on the phone.” I don’t want to talk to him now or ever, but I need answers about Jolene and Skywave.

“He’s not ready to interact with people. Monroe and Spencer and Jim are taking him to find his maker tonight.”

“Let me guess: Gideon?” I give David a pointed look.

“Yep, the scuzzbag,” Regina says. “This was the first shot from his camp. They want us to stop the campaign.”

“If he’s so dangerous, why take Travis to see him?”

“They belong together, at least while Travis is young. It’s a vampire thing. But more importantly, it’s time to negotiate. Gideon told Travis to tell us that next time, he’ll leave a dead body where the police can trace it back to us.”

“Won’t that defeat Gideon’s goal of keeping vampires a secret?”

“It would defeat everything, but us first. Reminds me of the Cold War. We’ve got to lower tensions without totally capitulating.” A moaning comes in the background. “I better go take care of Travis. Tell Elizabeth to meet the guys at Gideon’s place tonight.”

“For what?”

Regina sighs. “For detente.”

I’ve never ridden in a Mercedes before, not even an old one like this. Even the tan vinyl of the backseat feels elegant. I try not to stroke it too much.

“Our file on Gideon is pretty slim,” Elizabeth says to David, who sits in the passenger’s seat. “We know he’s well over a hundred, probably American, and that he runs a compound out in the Catoctin Mountains, not far from Camp David. It’s sort of a sanctuary for old vampires who can’t hack reality anymore. Until now he’s been content to leave the rest of the world alone. In fact, he seems fanatical about keeping his vampires free of human influence.”

“Why?” I ask.

“Notions of purity, I suppose. Superiority.”

“What about you? Do you think vampires are better than humans?”

“Certainly not.” She looks at David. “Really, I don’t.” I lean forward. “Let me make sure I have these factions
straight: The Control protects humans from vampires, right?”

“When necessary,” Elizabeth says. “But we also protect vampires from themselves.”

“Sometimes at the cost of their freedom.”

“Only when—”

“Let me finish my thought. Gideon’s gang also wants to protect vampires, but they want more than just to survive. They want isolation and absolute freedom, and they’re willing to kill humans like Travis to get it.”

She frowns at me in the rearview mirror. “So it would appear.”

A faint queasiness spreads through my gut. We’re about to enter the domain of a vampire survivalist, escorted by the embodiment of everything he hates.

It starts to rain as we take the exit for Thurmont, Maryland. As we enter a valley between the mountains, WVMP’s signal and Noah’s reggae tunes crackle and fade to static. Elizabeth switches off the radio.

“I’ve been thinking about this all day,” she says, “and I’ve come to a decision.” She pauses and looks at each of us, clearly relishing our curiosity.

Finally David says, “A decision about what?”

“I’m not going to sell the station.”

I don’t dare believe my ears. David gasps and says, “Why not?”

“It’s exactly what Gideon would want. I sell VMP, the campaign ends, and he wins.” Her hands tighten on the steering wheel. “I can’t have that. We’re going to make it the best damn radio station ever—
with
vampires.”

“What if he comes after us again?” David asks her.

“Now that he’s made a move, the Control will dispatch
a security team to protect the station until he’s—until the threat has been neutralized.”

I scoff. “So someone had to die before the Control would protect us? Travis could’ve killed me, you know.”

“I’m sorry.” She shakes her head. “But no law enforcement agency sets up round-the-clock guard just because of a threatening phone call. Look at all the battered women killed after a lot more warning than Gideon gave us. There aren’t enough resources to make the world safe for everyone.”

“Hey, Ciara?” David turns in his seat to face me. “Congratulations. You did it.”

“No, Gideon did it.”

“Not entirely,” Elizabeth says. “I wouldn’t keep the station just to spite Gideon. If it were still hemorrhaging money, I’d sell it in a heartbeat.”

“Oh. Good. I guess.” I’m glad no one mentions that without the campaign, Gideon would still be a happy hermit, and there’d be one less dead detective. “Whatever the reason, thank you.”

David’s gratitude—and abject adoration—requires no words as he gazes at Elizabeth. I wonder what her change of heart means for their twisted relationship.

She slows the car and peers through the wet windshield at a group of mailboxes, the only ones in sight on this dark and wooded road. Elizabeth glances at a sheet of paper taped to the dashboard. “This is it, according to our files.”

We bumble up the steeply sloping lane, which becomes gravel, then dirt, as it enters a thicker patch of woods. I see nothing but trees blurred by sheets of rain.

We come to a gate in a high chain-link fence topped
with barbed wire. Elizabeth pulls up to a small white box. She rolls down her window and pushes a button under a round speaker. “We’re here to see Gideon.”

After a moment of static, a raspy male voice says, “Front door.” It’s hard to tell from only two words, but I don’t think it’s the same guy as the threatening caller.

The gate swings open, and we continue down the lane, which ends in front of a long white rancher. On the porch sits a single empty rocking chair, nodding in the blustery wind. The yard is about two acres large, with what looks like a playground toward the back.

Several antique and classic cars, including Jim’s blue Charger, gather on the grassy hillside to the left of the house. We pull in among them.

Elizabeth leans over and opens the glove compartment. In the process, her arm slides against David’s knee. His face goes all blissy. Yuck, just when I thought he was over her, she reels him back in. But at least he still has a job.

She sits up and offers two wooden stakes. David takes one.

“I’d rather go unarmed,” I tell her, “than carry something I don’t know how to use. Besides, they’re bound to search us.”

“That’s the point,” Elizabeth says. “I want them to know we mean business.” She pulls my wrist forward and slaps the blunt end of the stake into my palm. “It’s not complicated. One hard jab to the heart.”

“I know, I know.” I want to drop the thing, but her hand surrounds mine.

“That’s only half of it. You have to pull the stake out again.”

“Why?”

“Because that’s where—” Elizabeth turns her head. “Tell her, David.”

He looks away, out the window. “That’s where their life flows out.”

“Don’t whitewash it.” Her voice is sharper than the thing I’ve got in my hand.

“After the stake is pulled out,” David says, “their bodies go through the hole.”

“Where?” I ask.

Elizabeth titters. “That’s the eternal question for all of us, isn’t it? Heaven? Hell? The never-ending void?”

“No, I mean, do they go through the hole and splatter all over the room, or do they just disappear?”

David and Elizabeth look at each other. His face is etched with guilt; hers, with bitterness.

“Something in-between,” he tells me. “Pray you never have to see it.”

The music hits us even with the door closed. Standing on the porch, we can hear the thumping of a swing rhythm and the high calling of trumpets. Through a bay window to our right, thin curtains show shadows dipping and swaying with acrobats’ ease.

Elizabeth knocks hard. A wind gust drenches us with rain and scoots the rocking chair across the porch.

The door opens to reveal a tall dark man, powerfully built enough to make his magenta zoot suit look macho.

“I am Lawrence,” he says in a voice as deep as a foghorn. I notice that it doesn’t match the one on the phone or the security gate. Apparently Gideon likes to spread out his flunky work.