BONDS OF JUSTICE

“Max.”


It took him three minutes of teeth-gritting control before he could begin driving. Neither of them said another word until they walked into the DarkRiver building. Clay met them in the lobby and led them upstairs to a meeting room, where Dorian was waiting.

The sentinel with his blue-eyed, blond good looks raised a hand. “Here’s the lowdown—the assassin I found ate some kind of a fucking suicide tablet. I haven’t seen anything like it outside of historical dramas.”

“I worked a case where a small cult committed suicide en masse,” Max said, his mind cascading with bleak images of small bodies curled up beside larger ones that should’ve protected, not harmed. “They used a wine laced with poison.”

“It speaks of fanatical devotion,” his J said, “rather than professionalism.”

“But he was a professional, too.” Dorian showed them some images on the comm screen. “His gear, the way he’d been waiting there long enough to have left DNA behind, if you know what I mean—the man knew what he was doing.”

“Where’s the body?”

Clay was the one who responded. “Enforcement morgue.”

“And the other one?” Max asked.

The sentinel looked disgusted. “He figured out we were on to him and rabbited. I had to bring him down in a public area—Enforcement was there within a minute. He’s sitting in a cell not talking right now. No doubt he’s Psy.”

“There’s something else.” Dorian picked up what looked like a business card off the table. “This was left behind in the room where the second sniper was hiding.”

“That’s evidence.” Max scowled. “You’ve fucking contaminated the hell out of it.”

“Trust me,” Dorian said, “you don’t want that in the system. And we processed it.”

Max glanced down to see that the card carried a single line of text—what looked like a comm code. Turning it over, he read the handwritten note: Sascha, DR HQ

“I recognize that code,” Sophia said in a quiet voice. “It’s Councilor Duncan’s private line.”

“Very well guarded,” Dorian said. “And available only to a select few.”

Max shook his head. “Nikita isn’t behind this. And the handwriting—the time’s missing.”

Sophia took it from his hand. “They were going to insert that once they’d hit Sascha, make it seem as if Nikita had given them the location and time.” She placed the card back on the table. “But the fact that they have this number further implicates someone in Nikita’s inner circle.”

“Another Councilor would also have it—or be able to get it,” Max said, eyes narrowed. “No question that Nikita has a mole inside her organization, but there’s a much larger power behind this.”

“I’ve already got our informants on alert for anything that might be related.” Clay said with a tightly held fury. “You need us, we’re there.”

Max tapped the card. “What did you find?”

Dorian’s scowl did nothing to lessen the sheer beauty of his face. “Only usable print was—surprise, surprise—Nikita’s.”

“They really thought you were going to fall for that?” Max had seen the way the cats operated—they were highly intelligent predators.

Dorian’s mouth went grim. “If they’d succeeded in hurting Sascha, we wouldn’t have been thinking too straight. The leopard would’ve gone for blood.”

And, Sophia realized with a chill in her heart, the ensuing carnage would have begun a war.





CHAPTER 30


Nikita thought long and hard about her next move, considered, too, what it might betray. Nothing. If she was careful.

Picking up her cell phone, she input a code.

Anthony Kyriakus answered after a few seconds. “Nikita, this is unexpected.”

Yes, Nikita thought, it was. Though they occupied the same basic area of the state, their paths rarely collided. The NightStar empire was built around the foreseeing abilities so prevalent in their genetic line, while Nikita’s own company had a much more prosaic base in housing and design. But—“We do have certain commonalities.”

A pause. “Is this a Council matter?”

“No.” That left them with only one common thread, a thread they’d never before discussed. “Sascha was targeted by my enemies today. You may wish to ensure Faith’s safety.”

“I don’t think you’re doing this out of the goodness of your heart.”

Nikita had no heart. What she had were brains and a survival instinct that saw nothing wrong with killing, manipulation, and betrayal. But she wasn’t fickle. That was bad for business. “It strikes me,” she said, “that our aims have coincided more often than not in Council matters of late.”

“You’re allied to Krychek.”

“So are you.” It was, she knew, less of an alliance than she had with Kaleb, but it existed. “They are attempting to take our territory, Anthony.”

“That’s their mistake.” And, for the first time, she heard the pure steel that had made Anthony Kyriakus a threat long before he became Council.





CHAPTER 31