Finally, Rollins lowered his eyes. Fear choked him and he shook his head dumbly.
David smiled, this time without any trace of compassion. Rollins went even paler at the nastiness of the expression. “Kneel to your Prime, boy,” he snapped.
Instantly Rollins dropped to his knees.
“Now tell me what you know.”
Rollins took a shaking breath and stammered, “They . . . they don’t tell us much. Just what the next mission is. There’s a woman in charge of my group. I don’t know her name but I heard one of the others call her Black . . . Black something. We meet in a warehouse on East Nineteenth. It used to be some kind of downtown hippie commune or something. There’s paint everywhere and it stinks like pot. Please don’t kill me . . . please. I told you what I know. Please.”
“Thank you, Rollins. That will do.” David turned to the Elite, who gave him back his sword; the guard gave him a questioning look, and he nodded silently back, then turned and walked away, sliding the curved blade back into its sheath inside his coat.
Behind him, he heard a faint scuffle and a whimper, then the swing of steel and the thump of something heavy hitting the street.
“Star-three,” he said into his com.
“Sire?”
“Faith, I need a search run on any female Blackthorn of rank within the syndicate, whether they’re presumed dead or not. Cross-reference with the list of Auren’s known supporters and see if there are any commonalities. Also have a unit run recon on the old Austin Art Collective warehouse on Nineteenth. The insurgents may be using it as a meeting point for their lower-level enforcers. Have a scan run for heat signatures while you’re at it to see if anyone’s living there.”
“As you will it, Sire. I’ll send the scan results in fifteen minutes.”
“Thank you. Star-one, out.”
He walked up the street to one of the less seedy bars in the Shadow District, and as he passed he heard movement in the alleyways, footsteps retreating as he neared.
Yes, let them run. Let them creep back under their rocks. He was going to have a drink.
The bartender at Anodyne knew him, of course, but unlike a great many others he didn’t so much as bat an eye-lash at the Prime’s arrival. There were a few places where David never deigned to set foot, but this one was frequented not only by him, but by most of the off-duty Elite.
The businesspeople who understood the bigger picture knew that running a vampire bar in a Signet-controlled city was a wise idea; if they were on the Prime’s good side they never had to worry about violence or intimidation from gangs battling for the district. Their patrons could drink in peace. That was one reason why Haven cities tended to have much greater concentrations of vampires, and the Signets focused most of their resources on those; he had to worry about vampire crime a lot more in Austin than, say, Little Rock. The only other city in his territory he was often compelled to visit more than once a year in person was New Orleans. Vampires plus voodoo tended to be a treacherous combination.
Inside, the bar catered to three of their kind’s favorite things: darkness, privacy, and beverages. Most of the room was cordoned off into booths, only a few of which were populated on a night like tonight.
The bar itself was empty except for a single man who saw the Prime approach and immediately decided to take his drink to a booth.
David took one of the stools while the bartender came over. “Evening, Sire,” he said, his accent a familiar comforting combination of Hispanic and Texan. “What can I get you?”
“Good evening, Miguel. I’ll have a Black Mary.”
“Top shelf?”
“Stoli, please.”
Miguel measured vodka into a shaker, then retrieved an opaque bottle from the fridge marked O NEGATIVE and filled the glass the rest of the way. He glanced over at David and asked, “You want Tabasco or Cholula?”
“Cholula.”
He slid the drink over to David, who took an experimental sip and said, “Perfect.”
He smiled to himself, thinking how Miranda would react if she saw—or better yet, smelled—what was in his glass. He could picture the face she would make.
His smile faded. That very reaction was the proof of how impossible it all was. He could think about her all he wanted . . . and he had been unable to stop for the past few days . . . but in the end, she was human. Even if by some miracle she was ever interested in sex again, and even if that interest were to turn to him, the fact was, it was doomed before beginning. She would grow old and die. He wouldn’t. He was a predator. She wasn’t.
He could tell himself that all he wanted, but it apparently made no difference to his body. He had caught himself staring at her, his eyes following the sweet line of her neck and shoulder, remembering the sight of her fingers on the guitar and wondering what it would feel like to have those fingers ghost over his skin. Every time she spoke, the curve of her soft lower lip occupied his thoughts for hours.
He had to fight with himself every night not to seek out her company, and he tried to be content with the time before and after their training sessions when they sometimes just talked for a while. He hadn’t known anyone since Lizzie who could make him laugh so easily. Miranda was far smarter than she gave herself credit for; there were times when she offered an insight into something weighing on his mind that made everything crystal clear. She made him laugh, she made him think, and she made him want desperately to tear the clothes from her body and taste the sweet flesh of her thighs . . . and her mouth . . . and the copper-cinnamon of her blood.
It was slowly driving him mad.
“Rough night, Sire?”
Thankful for the distraction, he looked up at Miguel. “You could say that.”
“I hear there’s a war coming. Bad for business.”
“That depends on who wins,” David replied wryly. “I don’t suppose you’ve heard anything about these bastards.”
Miguel shrugged. “Their kind don’t come in here. They don’t mess with me, I don’t mess with them. They know your people are my best customers.”
“I figured as much.”
He had to get back soon. Miranda was expecting him for another session. After almost another week she still wasn’t progressing nearly well enough for his peace of mind, although she had finally stopped having a panic attack every time she tried to shield. He wondered if perhaps, subconsciously, he was trying to sabotage her efforts by setting the bar too high, trying to keep her with him longer; but surely his subconscious wasn’t that stupid? The longer she stayed at the Haven, the more danger she was in. Before long the enemy would know all about her, and she would prove another vulnerability. Networks could be upgraded, but Miranda’s life was a risk he wasn’t willing to take.
“Another?”
“No, thank you, Miguel.”
The bartender raised an eyebrow and said casually, taking his empty glass, “Why do I get the feeling like you’ve got something on your mind more important than war?”
“What’s more important than war?”
Miguel laughed. “Everything you’re fighting for, Sire. But most of all: women.”
“Women.”
“Damn right. You got woman trouble?”
“Women are always trouble.”
“I’ll give you that. But if you’ve got a woman, what are you doing here?”
“I don’t have a woman,” David told the bartender, tossing a folded twenty on the bar and standing up, “but I’m afraid she has me.”