Chapter 12

Chapter

Twelve

I'd only taken two steps into the hallway when a familiar voice spoke from my right. "Well, well. Hello, sunshine. I thought that was you I saw skulking around."

I heaved an exaggerated sigh and turned. "Hi, Nora. You're still alive? Amazing."

Somehow, O'Neil managed not to gape at my flippant remark to Moses's most vicious blood and air mage. I could only imagine what she was thinking: Who is this person who gets to talk back to both my bosses without fear, when anyone else who even looks at either of them the wrong way would be dead on the spot?

Hands on her hips, Nora Keegan chuckled. She wore jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, and boots, with her shoulder-length dark brown hair in a ponytail. "Always a little comedian, aren't you?"

"I like to think so." Deliberately, so she knew it was an insult, I turned my back on her and raised my eyebrows at Moses. "So? To the conservatory?"

He smiled with what I might have described as paternal pride if I thought him capable of having normal feelings. My grandfather liked it when I acted like a Murphy, which was more or less shorthand for evil, pompous, manipulative, and cold.

Meanwhile, I felt Nora's stare on my back as Moses and I headed down the hall in the direction of the mansion's beautiful glass conservatory. Moses having dinner with me was one thing, but the fact he allowed me to go into his conservatory, where literally no other person alive or undead was permitted to go, had to give Nora heartburn. Not just because we would be alone in there, but because the conservatory contained Moses's blood garden.

Moses had mixed pints of his own magic-infused blood into the soil and it permeated all the plants and trees. For all the power the garden generated to maintain its own wards and feed magic to its creator, as a blood mage I could use it to turn him into crime lord vichyssoise without even much effort.

Moses had invited me into the garden to show off that he wasn't afraid of any threat I might pose. It was absolutely in character for him, so most people probably didn't think any more about it. But I did wonder as Moses unlocked the door to the conservatory and ushered me over its threshold if Nora might start thinking there was more to it than just Moses flexing. She was many things, but she wasn't dumb.

As Sean and others had pointed out more than once, there was no reason for anyone to suspect Moses's granddaughter Ava had survived the explosion that had apparently killed her six years ago, much less start thinking I might be her. But the more interactions Moses and I had, the more people close to him—like Nora—would notice how he treated me. And that might get her thinking.

The very last thing I wanted was for Nora to start thinking too much.

We left O'Neil in the hallway and made our way from the closed doors along the narrow footpath that ran through the thick foliage to a paved terrace near the far end of the garden. My own much-smaller garden at home had deadly carnivorous plants grown in soil infused with my blood and that of a slain demon. I wished I could have a garden as large as this one. Besides the obvious benefit of producing more power, as a blood mage, I enjoyed the heady, electric sensation of walking through any blood garden, even this one that buzzed with Moses's blood.

"I think these dinners are a bad idea," I told my grandfather as we reached the stone terrace.

I expected him to sit at the table, but instead he made his way around the perimeter of the paved area, examining the plants growing at its edge. "So you've said," he said, his attention on a large fern with beautiful dark green fronds.

"Not just for the obvious reasons." I flopped into one of the chairs and propped my boots on the seat of another one, crossing my ankles. "You don't treat me like you would anyone else who doesn't quake in your presence or kiss your ass. Anyone who's around us sees that. I thought you didn't want anyone to figure out who I am. If we want to keep our secrets secret, we should avoid interacting in person, except for the occasional business meeting."

When he didn't reply, I scowled. "Tell me that doesn't make more sense than this plan of yours for family dinners ." I put air quotes around the words. "I have no idea what you're hoping to get out of dinners with me, but we might get something we both don't want—namely, someone putting two and two together. Someone like Nora."

"Do you think I fear anyone who works for me or what they might think?" He glanced at me, then resumed running his fingers along the long, thin leaves of the fern. "I've been doing this a long time. I know when someone has started thinking. And I know what to do about it."

"You said you wouldn't kill people because of me anymore, remember?" I persisted. "Killing people for thinking is the direct opposite of not killing them."

"I never said I wouldn't kill anyone." He moved from the fern to the plant to its right and caressed its leaves. "I said I would only kill those who forced my hand and made it necessary. You said you were curious about Charles Vaughan. "

I gritted my teeth. "I'm not done talking about you killing your people because you think these stupid dinners are worth more than their lives."

"You made the deal. We agreed to terms." His expression turned cold. "I'm not interested in hearing you whine about the lives of people you don't know. I assure you I have the situation under control. Now, we can discuss the Court or you can choose another topic, but the subject of our dinners is closed."

I wanted to know what he meant by having the situation under control, but he clearly had no intention of telling me. So I switched gears back to the Court.

"I've known Charles for years," I said. "As much as anyone can say they know a vamp, I guess. We've interacted quite a bit, especially when I did investigative work for the Court. We cut ties a couple of months ago." No need to tell him why I'd cut ties with Charles. He didn't need to know the depths to which Charles had betrayed me. "I certainly didn't see this coup coming. I don't think Valas did either, or she would have been ready for it."

"That was my assessment too." Moses finally abandoned his plants and sat in the chair across from mine. "Like most, I'd thought Valas would rule her Court for as long as she wanted. She was a good leader. Not everyone liked her, but she had everyone's respect. Vaughan's move was quite the power play, even by vampire standards. He must have planned it for years—possibly decades."

"I can't help but think his new connection to the Silver Thorn coven made this possible. The moment Valas was vulnerable, he got Morgan Clark in bed, established her mother's coven his ally, and took his shot."

"We both know witches love power more than anything." He poured each of us a glass of water from the carafe on the table. "As I'm sure you're aware, the two members of the Court who sided with Valas against Charles are deceased."

I swallowed hard. "Yes, I did know that." The memory of seeing and smelling Valas bathing in Ossun and Friedrich's lifeblood would haunt my nightmares for a long time. "Are all three seats still empty?"

"Yes." He settled back into his chair and sipped his water. "From what I understand, Charles has focused on filling those seats with vampires loyal to him. Seats on a Court rarely become available, so for many vampires this is a once-in-a-millennium opportunity. Statements of interest come in every day from around the world."

"Charles will leverage this to the max." I rubbed the end of my nose as I thought about the implications. "Valas killing Ossun and Friedrich was just about the best thing she could have done for Charles. He must have thought it was his birthday when he found out they were dead. Between whoever he chooses to add and those on the Court who are already loyal to him, he'll have a stranglehold on the Court that will last for centuries, if not more."

"I think you're right." He raised his glass of water in a kind of salute. "For better or worse, Charles Vaughan has taken power and set himself up for a nice, long reign—if he can survive this transition period."

I snorted. "Big if ."

How would this affect our pack? The indictments aside, generally speaking a stable Vampire Court benefited everyone because that made them a known quantity. Deals made would stick as long as the people who made them remained in power. Turnover meant chaos and jockeying for influence both within the Court and among various alliances and organizations like the Were Ruling Council, local cabals, and even the federal Supernatural and Paranormal Entity Agency, or SPEMA.

But we didn't know what kind of leader Charles would be yet, and that was an X factor the size of Alaska.

I sighed. "Okay, so there are three empty seats on the Court and Charles wants to fill them with toadies he can control. What else you got?"

"He plans to surround himself with an honor guard of dhampirs. "

My eyebrows shot up. "Not even Valas did that. She had human enforcers."

"Valas relied on her great power to intimidate," Moses reminded me. "She didn't need a cadre of dhampirs—or thought she didn't."

"As it turned out, she probably wished she had an army of them when it all went to hell." I hummed. "Charles doesn't have Valas's sorcerer power, so he needs the dhampirs to back him up. Is Charles changing all the dhampirs himself? Of course he is." I answered my own question. "They'll be utterly loyal to him."

I didn't mean to sound so impressed. Moses, on the other hand, clearly admired Charles's strategy. "I've found enforcing completely loyalty to be a sound management practice myself."

No shit , I thought. "Anything else?" I asked aloud.

He finished his glass of water and set it on the table. "I enjoyed dinner."

"Yeah, I don't care. About the Court, I mean."

He smiled. I didn't like that smile. It seemed kindly but only evil and cruelty lurked behind it. Moses wasn't capable of anything else. I had the scars and twenty-four years of firsthand experience to prove it.

"I'll make some calls and pass on any information I get," he said.

"What do you want in return for asking around?"

"Nothing." At my obvious skepticism, he chuckled. "It's not difficult for me to get information. You're used to working with vampires. They exaggerate how much effort they put into gathering intel so they can charge a fortune in favors or work in trade. This is a phone call or two at most."

I'd often had that same thought about vampires and their business practices. It was eerie to hear Moses vocalize my own theory. "Thanks," I said. "I appreciate it."

"You're welcome."

I had a sudden thought. "Do you know what happened to Valas's daytime representative, Ezekiel Monroe? I haven't heard anything about him and he wasn't at the manor where Valas holed up—at least, not that I saw."

He rose. "Valas didn't take him with her when she escaped."

I stood as well. "So Charles got him?"

"Yes."

"Oh. Is he?—?"

"Yes. You don't want the details, I'm sure."

"No, I guess I don't." My shoulders sagged. I hadn't been friends with Monroe, and he'd thrown me under the bus more than once on Valas's orders, but I hadn't wanted him dead. His apparently horrible execution really drove home the point that Charles was more ruthless than I'd thought.

I sensed Malcolm floating invisibly at my side and realized for the past several minutes I hadn't felt him nearby. I hadn't really noticed him leave, having been deep in conversation with Moses, but the fact he'd left me, even briefly, caused concern that I couldn't show until we were well away from this place.

"We're done, then," I said. "I'll tell O'Neil I'm ready to go."

"She answers to me, Alice. She won't sneeze unless I tell her to, much less leave the manor with you or anyone else." He regarded me. "If she turned against you on my orders, would you kill her?"

"Are you planning to tell her to kill me?"

"Not at the moment." He gave me a thin smile. "But it's always on the table. Would you kill her if I did?"

Hatred made my eyes hot and voice clipped. "Yes." In those circumstances, I wouldn't have a choice. It would be her or me, and it wasn't going to be me.

"Remember that every time you feel tempted to consider her an ally or friend. She's neither of those things to you." He gestured at the stone walkway. "After you, dear."

Instead of leaving, I said, "I feel sorry for you."

I caught a flash of—something—in his eyes. Maybe surprise, maybe fear. It vanished so quickly I thought maybe I'd imagined it or misinterpreted what I'd seen .

"What you just said about not considering someone an ally or friend applies more to you than to me, doesn't it?" I said. "I have allies and friends. I have family . I love a lot of people and they love me back. It must be so hard to live the way you do, after you've chosen a path without any of the things that make life worth living."

He nailed me with a withering stare that might have made anyone else run or cower. But with my feet back on solid ground, emotionally speaking, I just raised my eyebrows and waited.

"Three things, Alice," he said, his voice flat. "First, I don't need or want any pity from you. Second, power always comes with a price and I'd rather be feared than loved any day. And third, you have no business assuming anything about me, least of all what my choices have been. Now get the hell out."

That uncharacteristic flash of anger convinced me not only was I right, I'd also struck a nerve. He might have knocked me off-kilter with the soup and tried to put me in my place by reminding me O'Neil wasn't my ally or friend, but I'd just punched him back hard enough that he'd felt it. That was job well done in my book.

"Best idea you've had all night," I said. And with Malcolm at my back, I got the hell out.