I was still smiling when I said, “Couturié Forest in the New Orleans City Park.” De Allyon’s Enforcer blinked at that one. So did Leo. Heads turned to me. Yeah, I’d kept something from them, a lot of somethings actually—like being a skinwalker—and if I was going to be outed as a supernat tonight, or killed saving Katie, then I was going to do it on my terms. Beast growled low in my mind, a warning, a challenge. Her strength flooded through me.
Sabina was the only one in the room to show no surprise, and she set her dark eyes on me in consideration. Her head tilted slightly, acknowledging much more than just my choice of location. Acknowledging what I was. “Number of rounds?” she asked de Allyon, while keeping her eyes on me.
“The full ten rounds. But if our people are in the park, how are we to know when a round is complete?” the old vamp asked.
Sabina considered me, the faintest of smiles on her pale, pale face. “Each round shall be one half hour long. If the combat is concluded with the death of one of the participants before the end of the specified number of bouts, or if a participant should surrender and concede the challenge prior to the termination, the bout will end.”
Concession sounded like a pretty great thing on the surface, but I’d learned that if I conceded, the referee—Sabina—would offer me the coup de grace and kill me. Conceding was a way to ask for mercy when one opponent was totally beaten and the other guy was just playing with him. Like the way Beast played with her food while it was still alive. It was a mercy stroke, not a way to stay among the living.
“Point of clarification and . . . maybe point of privilege,” I said, trying to remember the Rules of Order for asking for something personal before the bout started. “Clarification—no weapons means we fight with the abilities and gifts nature gave us, right?” I didn’t want to be beheaded after the fact for drawing on Beast or shifting.
“That is correct,” Sabina said, her black eyes glinting. Except for Rick, Sabina knew more about what I was than any other supernat here. “And what is your point of privilege?” she asked.
“I would like to keep my personal jewelry with me.” I almost laughed at Leo’s expression, and I thought Bruiser was going to choke. It was such a girlie request. Even better, the bag-a-muscle Enforcer smirked, as if I’d just proven how easy I was going to be to dispatch. Might as well go with the helpless and dumb female act—it seemed to be working. “My gold necklace, and this.” I held up the lion’s tooth. “It’s like, uh, my lucky rabbit’s foot.”
Sabina smiled again, her face softening. It was such a rare thing that for a moment I just stared. “Does de Allyon refuse or reject the personal point of privilege?”
“The woman may do as she wishes,” the vamp said, his tone both irritated and insulting.
“We will retire to the Peristyle, in the City Park, where stairs lead down to the edge of Bayou Metairie. There, the bout will begin upon my order.” Sabina turned to Leo. “Bring the carriages around.” Leo bowed again and Bruiser spoke into his mouthpiece. De Allyon’s people backed toward the door. Pellissier’s vamps followed Leo, leaving me alone in the center of the Nunnery.
Rick walked up to me, standing close. I knew it was him, without looking, and I could feel his concern. “Can you take him?” he whispered. “Bare hands and teeth?”
“Bare claws and fangs,” I said. I turned and met his black eyes with my own black ones, and felt him start, shock shooting through him.
And then he grinned. “I like the new look. So, what?” He glanced after de Allyon. “He knows?”
“He killed my people. Drank their blood. It’s in a history book Leo has.”
“Beautiful woman, undercover, with guns and knives and things that explode. I’m in love.”
I laughed, the sound filling the quiet warehouse. The remaining vamps turned to look, hearing my laughter. “Great lotta good it’s doing me.”
“Being in love or the weapons?” Rick asked.
“Yeah. Both.”
Rick lifted a hand and stroked my jaw. I closed my eyes and leaned into his caress. “Are you going with us to City Park?” I asked.
“I’ll be there. We’ll follow in our vehicle. Don’t get yourself killed, Jane.”
“I’ll do my best.” I opened my eyes and met his. “I may have to break some rules.”
“Like I said. My kinda girl. Just don’t kill any humans and eat their livers, not even with fava beans and a good Chianti.”
“Not planning on either.”
Moments later, we were on the way.
*
I was silent on the drive, looking away from the others in the limo, staring into the night. The new moon was in two days’ time, and the final challenge between the masters, de Allyon and Leo, would take place then, assuming I died tonight or failed in some other way.
I had planned as well as I could for this fight, but I had planned to fight a human, not a vamp with three-inch fangs. I needed something to create an edge for myself so I could survive the night. I needed something deadly. Some game-changer. Something to defeat a vamp warrior. But my mind was blank.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Beast Saw Gorilla on TV
The Peristyle was a fancy neoclassical arena—not a building exactly, because it had no walls, only a roof with large Greek-style columns. One of City Park’s oldest structures, it was built in 1907 as a dancing pavilion, and I had seen the place from a distance when roaming as Beast, but I had never been inside it.
Now, as the limo pulled up, the four concrete lions that guarded the open-air structure felt like an omen—that I might survive this coming bout—even if they were African lions and not Puma concolor. Real ducks, geese, and swans were nesting on the banks, sleeping, most with heads under their wings, and as the vamps and I emerged from our vehicles, some of the water birds stirred, wings shifted uneasily. Wind rustled the leaves overhead. A security guard bent to the limo’s window and verified who we were before scampering away into safety. Not that there was any safety here tonight. The Naturaleza were here and they’d guzzle down the plump guard like a cheap beer if they wanted to.