I keyed my mike. “Angel, give me some good news.”
“Got none, Legs,” he said into my ear. “The little green guy got out, the cops have showed up at the front gate, decked out in paramilitary gear. They have ladders and they’re coming over the walls. They’ve got every unit in the city headed your way. Oh. And the wolves are loose. Who! Who let the dogs out?”
“Not funny, Angel,” Derek said, reaching my side.
“Sorry, Sarge.” He didn’t sound sorry, but he instantly started giving updates on the location of the wolves loose in vamp HQ. Not all of them had stayed in the ballroom.
Derek and I met eyes. I said, “We need to find the female were-cat. Katie fed off her.”
He gave me a chin-jut of understanding. “You take care of the MOC. I’ll get the premises locked down and the wolves contained.”
“How?”
“Trank guns. All my guys got ’em.”
I should have thought of that. But who would have expected werewolves to attack? And if not wolves, then who had he been planning to tranquilize? Q and A for later. Job now.
We spun in opposite directions, Derek trotting through the doors issuing orders, me wading through the vamps after Leo and Katie, caught in a mortal embrace.
I was stopped by Dominique, heir to Arceneau, and Bettina, master of Laurent. They were facing off, the energies between them cracking with fury. Both had blood-splattered clothes and bloody mouths; both had flushed skin and smelled warm-blooded. They had fed. Fully.
I grabbed an arm on each and shook them hard. “You can challenge each other tomorrow night. Get your vamps and servants together and follow me.” I was as surprised as anyone when they looked from each other to me and nodded.
Dominique called aloud to Grégoire. Bettina closed her eyes. Shaun Mac Lochlainn, her heir, and her other two vamps raced through the melee to her side, all three with torn clothes and bloodied bodies. The summoning was impressive, and so were the men who responded to her call. It made me wonder if she had mind-joined with Shaun. More to think about later. More slowly, Dominique and her clan gathered. The human blood-servants followed, surrounding their masters. The clan leaders had gone from mortal enemies to allies in a human heartbeat.
“Wall off Leo and Katie from the rest of the room,” I said to the vamps, “and then give Leo what support you can. If Katie wins, this night will be a bloodbath.”
“I like bloodbaths,” Dominique said. I didn’t want to inspect that line too closely, especially as her eyes were alight and she looked so cheerful all of a sudden. They all did. The smell of blood and fighting was like drugs to vamps.
Mac Lochlainn and his pals moved in front of us and started clearing a path between the fighting vamps and humans, some by asking, others, those too belligerent or out cold, by simply tossing. We moved forward with an awful efficiency. I heard bones break as the vamp warriors cleared the way. A lot of people were gonna be sore tomorrow. If they lived through the night.
Kabisa and Karimu, Arceneau’s soldier twins, worked to the side, holding off four wolves, using blades with ruthless efficiency. Sending the wolves yelping, bleeding, limping away, where “my guys” tranked them. They fell so fast that they maintained wolf form. Ooh rah.
I spotted Leo and Katie in a corner of the room, bodies wrapped around each other seemingly melded together. Fangs and claws were embedded in flesh and they held each other still, like two wrestlers, evenly matched. But Katie had her fangs in Leo’s throat and Leo had his buried just below Katie’s right collarbone. Not a good site for draining a victim.
Katie lifted a hand and smoothed Leo’s hair, like she might soothe a pet, her hand steady and controlling. I didn’t like that one bit. Leo was splashed with blood, his clothes ripped and showing pale skin. Very pale skin. Katie was harder to judge under the garish blood-based body makeup, but I was thinking she had a well-fed, rosy hue.
“Dominique, how do we separate them when we get there?”
The blond woman turned to me, blood on her chin. Surprised, she said, “We feed him.”
“Ah. Right.”
Moments later, we reached Leo and Katie. Dominique held out her hand and Karimu, eyes fierce and intent, placed a clean blade in it. Dominique sliced her own wrist and held it near Leo’s face. He opened his eyes and slid his fangs from Katie’s chest. He sank them into Dominique and sucked hard. She hissed. Fell to her knees beside Leo. A moment later, Leo released her; Dominique fell over and was carried away by her blood-servants as Grégoire knelt in her place, rolling up his sleeve. The two men held glances a moment, Leo’s vamped-out, Grégoire’s calm and still.
Grégoire said, “My pledge to you. My pledge to Pellissier. My pledge to the Master of the City.”
“You will be rewarded and recompensed.”
Grégoire chuckled, the tone dismissive. “Drink, my friend. And win.” Leo sank his fangs into Grégoire’s arm at the elbow.
Over my earpiece I heard, “Sarge, cops are at the door. And ... I’m seeing blood in a hallway on one of my monitors. No one’s been fighting there.”
“Location?”
“Outside Leo Pellissier’s office.”
Ruse. Opportunity. Battle and mayhem in the vamp-camp would be a great opportunity to accomplish a goal if one were prepared and willing to take a chance. I saw an image of a big-cat lying on a tree limb over a path to a watering hole. Waiting for the opportunity to attack the unwary. Or a great place to take a nap.
Both, Beast assured me. There was something smug in her tone.