CHAPTER 12
When I walked through the door, Andrea’s eyes were really big and she had that pained expression that usually meant she wanted to pull her gun out and shoot somebody.
“What’s up?”
“The Italians won the hunt,” Raphael said. “We’re supposed to have a big celebratory dinner in a couple of days in their honor.”
Okay. Not really surprising. I’d stayed behind, which dropped our team’s numbers to eleven. Half of them had guarded Desandra, and I had a feeling that Aunt B, Raphael, and Andrea had concentrated purely on getting the best kill for the panacea.
“I was just telling them it was Gerardo,” Desandra said. “It’s his long legs. He can run forever. Most men don’t have sexy legs, but he does. They are very elegant.”
Aha.
“And, like I was saying, he is hung.”
Oh boy.
Andrea turned her back to Desandra and rolled her eyes. Raphael grimaced. They both looked scandalized. Dear God, what could she have said to scandalize a bouda . . .
“No, really!” Desandra nodded. “Okay, so most guys don’t have a nice ball sack, right? It looks all hairy and wrinkled like some small animal died between their legs, but Gerardo’s is like two plums in a velvet bag . . .”
Derek, who’d been lingering in the doorway, took a careful step to the left behind the wall and disappeared from my view.
Kill me, somebody. I raised my hand. “Hold that thought. I need to borrow Andrea for a minute.”
I grabbed her arm and pulled her into the hallway. Behind us Raphael growled, “Don’t leave me!”
Andrea leaned toward me. “Plums.”
“Listen . . .”
Andrea raised her hands, imitating holding plums the size of small coconuts, and moved them up and down. Desandra had no idea, but I was about to save her life.
“I’m sorry I’m late. There’s been another murder.”
“Where?”
“On the tower.” I brought her up to speed. “So sorry I got held up, but I’m here now to take Desandra off your hands.”
“I love you. In a purely platonic way.” Andrea stuck her head into the doorway. “Honey, come on.”
They escaped. I came in and sat in the chair so I could see the door and Desandra. Derek parked himself just outside.
Desandra tried talking to me. I let her go on. After I listened for twenty minutes to detailed descriptions and point-by-point comparisons of Gerardo’s and Radomil’s private parts, complete with size demonstrations, Desandra finally wore herself out and fell asleep. She snored a little, whistling to herself, her belly propped on a small pillow.
Derek rose and walked over to sit by me. “How can you stand her?”
“She is lonely. She’s pregnant and scared. Her father is probably trying to kill her, and neither of the men she married is offering her any support. Nor can they protect her from her own father. I don’t mind cutting her some slack. She isn’t the worst body I’ve guarded.”
“Who was the worst?”
“One of the state senators got on the bad side of the law and took some bribes. His accountant blew the whistle on him. His wife was convinced that state protection wasn’t good enough, so they called in the Guild. I was with them for seventy-two hours. The accountant and his wife fought the entire time. There were four of us guarding him, and by the end of the fourth day, Emmanuel, he was one of the mercs, big, cut Latino guy, really calm, walked away. He just got up and left. I asked him about it later and he said it was that or he would knock their heads together just so they would shut up . . .”
A familiar revulsion rolled over me, like an unclean oily residue laced with rotten fat. A vampire. Moving in from the right.
The only person who could possibly have a vampire in this castle full of shapeshifters would be Hugh. He either piloted it himself or had some Masters of the Dead stashed someplace, but somewhere a necromancer was pulling on a vampire’s strings, sending it steadily toward us, like a worm on a hook.
Trying to figure out if I could sense vampires. Nice try, Hugh.
“A good way to piss away your fee,” Derek said.
The vampire came closer, its mind a pinhead of hateful magic. The urge to reach out and crush its mind like a walnut was almost too much. It was close, too close. My hand itched. I wanted to get my sword and stab it.
I couldn’t leave it just sitting here. If by some miracle it wasn’t Hugh, it could get into the room and kill Desandra. She would give it a run for its money, but a vampire was nature’s closest equivalent to a killing machine. It had no thought, consciousness, or doubts. Like a huge predatory cockroach, it obeyed only one basic impulse: feed.
I lowered my voice. “It was mostly about self-preservation. Do you remember when you and I went to White Street? The time you got your leg ripped open?”
Derek nodded. “I remember.”
Here was hoping he remembered it was a vampire who tore his leg. “I think that’s how Emmanuel felt. Like something was closing on him and he just had to get out.”
Derek looked at me, his brown eyes focused.
“Another ten hours or so and he might have committed a homicide.” Come on, Derek. Vampire. Ten o’clock. In the wall.
“So let me guess, he got no money.” Derek rolled into a crouch in a fluid move. He was only half listening to me.
The vampire was almost directly to the left of me. I felt it. It was precisely eleven feet away, which put it right at the end of the room. The wall had to be hollow, because I saw nothing.
“Nope. And the Guild slapped him with an abandonment-in-progress fee.”
The vampire shifted about ten inches to the left. Derek turned slightly. He was tracking it.
“In his place I would’ve left, too. When you’ve got to go, you’ve got to go.”
Derek shot toward the wall. He sprinted for half a second, jumped, flying through the air, and hammered a kick to the wall. The stone block cracked and fell, breaking. Before the last chunks bounced off the floor, I was up and moving. Derek shoved his hand into the hole and yanked a desiccated, ropy arm out. He twisted the wrist, locking the elbow, and I stabbed into the dark opening. Slayer sank into vampiric flesh, sliding along bone. Need to adjust the angle. Coils of smoke rose from the blade as it bit into undead tissue and began to melt it. I freed it with a sharp tug and thrust again. The point of the saber pressed against the hard ball of heart muscle and I felt the precise moment the bloodsucker’s heart ruptured. It writhed on the end of my sword. Still alive, nasty bugger.
In less than a breath Desandra was off the bed and next to us. “What . . . ?”
Derek kicked the wall directly under the opening. Cracks split the stone blocks. He kicked it again. Chunks of plaster showered the floor. Faux stone. Ahh. That explained it. Last time I checked, shapeshifters were strong but not strong enough to kick through solid stone.
Derek yanked the vampire out of the wall, slapping it on the floor and pinning it. I moved with them, keeping Slayer right where it was. A pale body writhed on the floor: hairless, nude. Its pale green-tinged skin fit too tightly over its frame, and every muscle and ligament underneath was clearly visible, as if someone had taken a world-class athlete, bleached him, and stuck him in a dehydrator for a few weeks. The vamp hissed. Its eyes bore into me: hot, bright red, and devoid of any thought except for an insatiable thirst for hot blood.
Slayer smoked. The flesh around the blade began to sag as the saber liquefied the vampire’s heart, trying to digest it. The vamp struggled to rise. Derek strained. The muscles on his body bulged. I leaned into Slayer.
The vamp arched, lifting Derek off his feet for half a second. The moment I removed the blade, it would go for my throat. Slayer was taking too long. We couldn’t hold it.
“Drop it.” I jerked the blade free. Derek hurled the vamp out and onto the stone floor. The pale body landed with a wet thud, and I beheaded it with one quick stroke. The vamp head rolled toward Desandra. She nudged it with her foot and wrinkled her nose. “Stinks, doesn’t he?”
I wiped Slayer down.
Derek rolled to his feet and stuck his head into the opening. “I can see a ten-foot-wide passage to the side with a vertical shaft at the end.” He indicated a rough rectangle of the wall. “This is plaster. Looks like the size of a small doorway. The rest is stone.”
A light staccato of steps came down the hallway and four djigits ran into the room and halted.
“Tell Hibla we need maid service,” I said. “We could handle trash in our room and an odd smell, but now we have a dead body. If this continues, we won’t be able to give your hotel a decent rating.”
“Yeah,” Derek said, his voice completely deadpan. “The continental breakfast better kick ass or we’ll complain to the manager.”