Dark Queen (Jane Yellowrock #12)

To me, Bruiser said, “LaFleur has been studying African werecat law, or he’s been to Africa. Msimamizi is Swahili for administrator. Rick just gave Kem a job.”

I studied my ex. He’d been traveling internationally. Had he been to Africa? Did that travel have something to do with his silvered hair?

Rick stood, pushing Kem aside. The black leopard looked at him adoringly. “Go home to Gabon and be kind to your”—his lips turned down—“my wives and your children.”

Asad snarled. Clearly this was not what he had expected to happen. Beast snorted in derision and I grinned, showing blunt human teeth to the werelion. Asad had been planning something disruptive and dangerous as he tried to steal the SOD, maybe that war I had thought about. He had put tiles on a world-sized playing board, all perfectly arranged to topple for a predetermined ending, no matter where they started to fall. And then—whatever his plan had been—I messed it all up. That was clear on his face. Go, me.

The elevator opened to reveal more guards, which was my cue. Leaving the others and the mess of blood and interspecies politics, I slipped back up the hidden stairs, wondering where the werewolves had disappeared to. I freaking hated being out of my own Enforcer loop.

I needed a few minutes with Leo. As I rounded the stairs on the main floor’s landing, I caught the fading stench of werewolf blood, then Ayatas’s faint scent, Leo’s scent overlapping both, but seemingly at different moments. Together, the fading scents went up the next set of stairs to Leo’s office. Great. Leo had come out of his office lair and met the werewolves. Then had come back out and greeted the special agent. Ayatas got a private meeting with the MOC while I dealt with were-creature politics. I dropped my headset off at the foyer security nook and dropped into a chair with a tired sigh.

A low voice rumbled slyly, “Want me to rub your feet?”

I chuckled up at Wrassler. “You big ol’ softie, you. Instead, let me see the security footage. Let’s start with sub-five. I want to know who was responsible for the FUBAR down there.”

Wrassler frowned. His expression told me that he had already watched the footage and wasn’t happy about any part of it. The cameras mounted in the sub-five basement showed me most of what I needed to know, beginning with the elevator opening and a female vampire walking out. Pale hair and eyes, her face chiseled and cold, the stark beauty of a glacier in pink silk and ballerina shoes. Dominique. Grégoire’s clan heir. She stepped onto the clay floor of sub-five, the werecats and wolves behind her, the wolves carrying Antifreeze, his head lolling.

Inside me, Beast growled low, odd tones in her voice, vibrating through my own chest.

Dominique, a two-hundred-year-old, powerful vamp, aimed a flat device like a television remote control at the camera. The screen went black. Then the other cameras went black.

“What happened?” I asked.

“We don’t know how she did it,” Wrassler said, “but she shut off the cameras on sub-five with that thing. The entire system covering the lower floor went black. Alex is trying to isolate the security loophole on his integrated system and we’re going over the cam footage of people on stairs and elevators before the outage and after. But so far we have zip.”

My fault, I thought. The SOD had ripped out Dominique’s throat and I hadn’t taken her head. The memory of her dead body at my feet was bright and clear as the vision of her on the screen before me. Leo and Grégoire had brought her back and restored her, hoping she would lead them to her coconspirators. Instead, she had pledged fresh loyalty and given them nothing until now. “Where is she now?” I asked.

“Gone. I told Grégoire that his heir attacked HQ, leading our enemies to the Son of Darkness. He’s in a rage. He had begun to trust her. Foolishly.”

I let a soft breath go. “Crap.” Vamps, especially old vamps like Grégoire, needed their closest allies to be faithful unto true-death. Betrayal cut deep. I checked my cell. There was a text from Eli, telling me he and Ayatas were with Leo. There was also one from Alex that said, Spotted an oddity on sub-five lasers before cameras went out. Call. It took a moment before I remembered. Alex had done laser upgrades on the security at the entrances and in the gym, the rec room, and sub-five, places where we’d been attacked in the past.

I punched his number and Alex spoke fast. “Anomaly from the lasers in sub-five. The presence of a witch under an obfuscation spell.”

“And? Tell me you caught the witch.”

Wrassler whipped his head to me at the words.

“No. The witch left with Dominique. But the same anomaly was in the gym earlier too, unmoving. I tracked the anomaly back and discovered that it—she—came in the front door with Dominique and some were-creatures and left with her.”

“Any way to alter the system to track this anomaly and see it before it gets in?”

Alex hesitated. “I don’t know how the magic works. I could talk to Molly.”

I thought about that possibility for half a second. “I’ll call her. I’m heading home in a bit.” I hit end and told Wrassler what Alex had discovered. He frowned and sat in front of the system, punching buttons to see the anomaly for himself.

A familiar face appeared in the doorway, Shemmy, my sometimes driver. “May I drive you home, Miz Yellowrock?”

My security measures had failed. I was suddenly tired beyond bearing, my legs feeling leaden and my shoulders drooping. I had lost my scarf in the fight and couldn’t make myself go look for it. I did something I seldom ever did. I accepted when a security blood-servant offered to drive me home. “Yeah. Thanks.”

As we walked through the doors together, a car swept in, and a vampire visitor emerged. She passed us on the front stairs, carrying a package addressed to Leo, the name clearly visible. The packaging looked vaguely familiar in terms of vampire business, but I couldn’t remember where I saw the kind before or why. I stopped the vamp with an upheld hand and took the package. It was from Leo’s biomedical lab in Texas. Not my business. I waved her on and slid into the backseat of the armored SUV and closed my eyes.

I didn’t move again until I was back home, when Shemmy opened the door for me and wished the Enforcer a good rest and happy dreams. And then I looked up. And groaned.

I wouldn’t be given a chance to sleep. The windows upstairs were open, the cold breeze blowing the curtains back and forth in the night. I thought about telling Shemmy to take me to a local bar. I couldn’t get drunk, it wasn’t in my physiology, but I could nurse a Coke and people-watch. Instead I said, “Thank you. Drive safely back to HQ.” I blew out a breath and went inside, where I was met with the sound of electric saws running, nail guns thumping, hammers banging, Latin music playing, and men laughing. The cacophony echoed through the house. In my room, I took off the dancing shoes, pulled off the clothes, the sports bra, and the weapons, leaving them all on the bed, and dressed in a soft tee, a ratty sweatshirt, and leggings.

I sat on the bed, crossed my legs guru fashion, and made a call.

“Hey, Aunt Jane,” Angie said, answering.

“How’s my sweet girl?” I asked.

“I made a big butterfly. Mama punished me. I’m in trouble.” But she sounded proud of herself for the entire episode, even the being-in-trouble part.

“How big did you make the butterfly?”

“Big as my feet.”

My eyebrows went up. “That’s a big butterfly.”

“Yup. Mama was mad ’cause she couldn’t see where I got the mass from.”

My eyebrows went up higher. “You know what mass is?”

“Yup. Energy equals mass times the speed of light squared,” she quoted. “Which means that magic and electricity and sunlight, which are energy, are the same stuff as things I can touch, which is mass or matter. And I can innerchange ’em ’cause they’re just different forms of the same thing. But I didn’t innerchange ’em.”