Marco strode into the room as well, wearing his human skin and a pair of ill-fitting trousers. He’d refused the shirt Carrick had taken from the Daicrypta disciple who had given up his pants. Why don a shirt when he could intimidate them all with his broad, chiseled torso?
“I won’t be here long enough to enjoy the room, I’m sure,” Ingrid replied, purposefully cool. “Now, for the last time: I want to see my father.”
Carrick gestured toward the writing desk’s chair. Ingrid remained on her feet, with Marco standing so close to her side that she could feel the heat radiating from his body. His presence gave her a fraction of confidence, but she still longed for Luc. Worry kept closing in on her, dashing her concentration. Where was he?
“I assure you, your father is perfectly fine,” Carrick said.
He’d said the severed finger had come from a corpse, but what proof did Ingrid have of that?
“I’m here,” she said, her patience worn thin. “I’ve done what Dupuis has asked. Now let him go!”
The papered walls and hanging tapestries muffled her shout. Carrick could have been lying. Marco hadn’t yet scented her father, so he was unable to tell what was happening to him.
“I will see to it personally,” Nolan’s father said, putting on a cajoling tone that only made her more irritated.
“You’ll forgive me if I don’t believe a word you say,” she replied as she crossed the room. Earlier she’d been able to command Vincent. She wished she could do the same with Carrick now.
At the window, Ingrid shoved aside the heavy drapes and tried to open the sash. It wouldn’t budge.
“Nailed shut, I’m afraid,” Carrick explained.
To bar an escape, she guessed.
Marco came to the same conclusion. “The tricky thing about glass, Alliance fool, is that it shatters.”
She backed away from the window. “I have two questions. I want answers for both, or else Marco and I will be leaving and you will have an open gap here instead of a window.”
Marco looked giddy with anticipation when she turned to face him and Carrick. “Where is Luc? And why does the Alliance want me dead?”
The first question was, of course, the crucial one, although a small, dark corner of her already knew the answer.
Carrick began with her second question. “The decision was made by a handful of the highest-ranking Alliance leaders.”
“The Directorate?” Ingrid asked. “Why would they want me dead?”
“Why wouldn’t they? Learning of a fallen angel’s intentions to reclaim her blood from you and then form a demon-human army was enough to give us all nightmares. We asked you to come to Rome, if you remember. We could have kept you safe in confinement there. But you refused, and considering you aren’t officially Alliance, we had no right to force you. Spilling your blood, dashing it out of your veins before Axia could take it for herself, was the next most commonsensical answer.”
Ingrid couldn’t form words. She had trusted the Alliance. They were supposed to help her, not try to kill her.
“Was there no one who objected?” she whispered.
“It was a unanimous vote,” he replied. “The sacrifice of one girl to ensure the safety of millions was deemed acceptable.”
The small hairs on the back of her neck stood on end as Marco stepped up close behind. He towered over her, the crown of Ingrid’s head reaching his collarbone.
“You were supposed to kill her?” he asked.
With those words, Ingrid heard all the vicious things Marco wanted to do to Carrick. Nolan’s father, however, remained aloof.
“Not I. A mimic demon.”
Ingrid jerked back, stepping on Marco’s bare feet. He braced her shoulders to keep her from falling.
“The Directorate authorized its release from our holding chamber at H?tel Bastian with orders to target you. I released it myself,” Carrick said.
Ingrid rolled her shoulders until Marco let go of her. She didn’t mind his touch, but she didn’t want Carrick to think she needed Marco to make her feel safe. She still had powers of her own. Sometimes.
“You’ve captured demons?” she asked.
“Certain breeds,” Carrick answered.
Ingrid puzzled over how they’d captured them—and where the demons would be kept. At H?tel Bastian? She recalled the strange room she had stumbled into, with the freezing, steel-fronted drawers. The pressure gauges and Rory’s flash of annoyance that she had gone inside. Was that the holding chamber?
“And you can give these captured demons orders?” she asked.
“Not all of them,” a new voice answered. It came from the doorway. Robert Dupuis stood with his hands clasped at his waist.
Ingrid had nearly forgotten what he looked like. He was plain enough to be easily forgettable. A head shorter than Carrick, and leaner. When he closed the door behind him, she saw that his fingers were long and feminine.
“Do you like your room here?” Dupuis asked. Ingrid stood rigid, wary of him. “Do you accept it?”
What an odd question. She hesitated before nodding. “Yes.”