Nick couldn’t help noticing she wore a negligee, made up of faux silk shorts, black lace, a fitted, bodice top. The negligee was weird enough. Somehow, it was even stranger to see St. Maarten in something that looked so… well, tacky.
It looked like something Nick saw on human hookers inside the Cauldron.
He still held the gun in both hands, but he had it trained on the floor now.
“Are we alone?” he asked her.
“Y-y-yes… I believe so.” She was breathing too much, too pale, too out of breath. “I thought you were them. I thought they had come back––”
Nick’s headset exploded into life.
“NICK?” a voice yelled. “NICK! CAN YOU HEAR ME?”
He grimaced, wincing away from the sound.
“What the fuck, Kit?” he said out loud, partly for St. Maarten’s benefit. “Vampire ears. I think you just gave me a brain embolism––”
“Nick. Jesus.” She exhaled in obvious relief. “Are you okay? What the fuck happened? You disappeared––”
“I’m fine.” He rearranged his grip on the gun. “Relax, kid.”
“What about her? Did you find her?”
He glanced down at Veronica Racine, grimacing. “More or less.”
“More or less??!”
“St. Maarten is okay, Kit. Far as I can tell, anyway.”
His eyes returned to the Archangel CEO, who still stood by the half-open cubbyhole in a fearful-looking crouch. She straightened cautiously as he watched, taking a deep breath. Exhaling that breath, and obviously trying to regain her composure as she smoothed back her auburn hair, she began walking towards him.
He continued to speak out loud.
“…Looks like she managed to cram herself into some kind of makeshift panic room,” he told Kit. “She turned on the VR program to hide. I’m assuming she cut off outside communication for the same reason.” Glancing down at the dead body next to him, he frowned. “Ms. Racine, her assistant, is dead.”
“What?” Kit’s face appeared in a smaller screen behind his eyes. “What the fuck? That super-hot bodyguard chick? She’s dead? Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“How? How did she die? Who did it?”
From what Nick could glimpse behind her, Kit was still at the indoor recreation area, more or less where he’d left her on the lounge by the water’s edge.
“Vampires,” Nick said, still watching St. Maarten as she closed the gap between them. “And no, I don’t know which ones. I haven’t gotten the story yet.” Pausing, he added, “Let me know when the medical techs get here, all right? I’ll call in to NYPD about the body––”
“No,” St. Maarten said, holding up a hand.
Nick frowned, staring at her.
His attention returned briefly to Kit. “I’ll call you back, kid. I need to speak to the lady of the house right now.”
“Nick… be careful.”
A faint smile touched his lips, but not one with a lot of humor.
Without answering her, he hung up.
St. Maarten stood in front of him, her long legs visible below the tacky, bright red shorts, her body showing an uncomfortable amount of pale skin around the bodice. Nick found himself avoiding looking at her directly, even as he frowned in her general direction.
Her lipstick was smeared.
Her hair looked mussed despite her attempts to smooth it down, especially compared to her normally immaculate appearance, which always struck him as borderline artificial-looking. All of that machine-like precision was gone now.
She looked afraid.
She’d also just told him not to call a murder in to the authorities.
“What do you mean, no?” he said. “What the fuck happened here, Lara?”
He glanced at her face, realizing he’d never called her by her first name before, not without sarcasm at least. His eyes shifted off the pale skin of her upper breasts, her long neck and lean arms. For a human woman in her fifties, she looked remarkably ageless.
He supposed an endless amount of money helped with that.
She followed his eyes to look down at her own body, and Nick saw her hesitate.
Then, without a word of answer for him, she turned on her heel and walked away, heading purposefully for a different segment of wall. Nick watched as she placed a hand on the organic metal, prompting an opening to melt into the surface. Beyond that opening, he glimpsed rows of clothing, making up a long and narrow walk-in closet.
She disappeared inside.
He stood there, waiting, still gripping the gun, and now frowning.
When she re-emerged, she wore a floor-length, crushed velvet robe in forest green. Her feet remained bare as she padded back over to him, now moving the way he was accustomed to her moving––head up, her expression smooth.
Stopping in front of Nick a second time, she pursed her lips.
“Let’s go into the other room, Detective. We need to talk… preferably before the emergency personnel arrive.”
Arching an eyebrow at him, she added,
“Then you can tell me whether or not you still think we should contact the police.”
Chapter 13
Him Again
Nick followed her back to her living room.
He didn’t holster his gun, but kept it in his hands, holding it in front of him as he scanned every visible inch of the route back to her throne room and that stunning view of Central Park. He trailed her up the stairs to the sofa overlooking the bay window, but instead of standing below her, looking up, he joined her, walking to one of the oversized velvet chairs flanking the divan.
He didn’t sit.
He continued to stand there, scanning the room. He used all of his senses, including the different bandwidths of light picked up by his vampire eyes.
“Is your security system back up?” he growled finally, when he saw and sensed nothing. “Are you certain they’ve gone?”
She gave him a hard look. “If you don’t smell anyone… or see anyone… then I’m going to assume yes. They are gone.”
He turned, glaring at her. “And why the hell would you need to rely on me for that?” He watched her tuck her legs and feet up under the velvet robe. “Where are your people? Why are we alone up here? Did your security system fail?”
Her thin lips pursed.
Nick couldn’t help noticing she must have fixed them, at least marginally, while she was inside that walk-in closet.
After a beat where she only looked at him, she gestured dismissively towards the chair behind him. He stared at the chair, then at her, before exhaling in annoyance.
Only then did he re-holster his gun.
He sank into the velvet upholstery without taking his eyes off hers.
When she finally spoke, she said the last thing he would have expected.
“Have you spoken to Jack?” she said, subdued. “He wanted to talk to you.”
He knew she meant “Jack Bird,” the seer he knew as Malek, or “Mal.” For whatever reason, the prescient seer’s human alias never really stuck in Nick’ brain. He thought of and spoke of the prescient seer using his seer name, always.
“No,” Nick growled. “He called me in the middle of a fucking murder scene. I haven’t had a chance to call him back––”
“Are you assigned to the case at Praetorian?”
Nick blinked, then frowned.
He shook his head.
“No.” He continued to frown at her. “As far as I know, no one is… not at NYPD. You didn’t know that?”
“No one?” Her stare grew cold. “What do you mean, no one?”
“I mean no one. Not our jurisdiction.”
She stared at him, lips pursed.
She was clearly displeased.
A beat later, Nick watched her eyes flicker away. She focused on the floor, staring sightlessly at a rug that looked to be made of real cowhide. She tapped her lips with one manicured finger.
“I may have to do something about that,�
�� she muttered.
Nick frowned.
“What the fuck is going on?” he said, when she didn’t look up. “How are you involved with what happened at Praetorian? Who killed Veronica?” Pausing, he added more coldly. “Are you at least going to tell me why we haven’t called the police?”
She waved that off dismissively, still staring down at the cowhide rug.
“I have my people tracking them,” she said, distracted.
“Your people… tracking them. You mean the vampire who killed Veronica?”
“Yes.”
“But you aren’t going to tell me who it is?” he growled.
For a moment, she only continued to stare at the floor. Then, looking up at Nick, she met his gaze, her dark green eyes in shadow.
“It was a message, Detective,” she said, her voice holding more of an edge. “Related to what was taken out of that vault. That shouldn’t surprise you, given what you saw last night. It shouldn’t surprise you that there would be… a reaction… to what that incident revealed. I doubt I need to tell you much of anything about who was behind sending me that message, either.”
Nick only stared at her.
Then he frowned.
“According to Praetorian, nothing was taken out of the vault,” he said. “We were told it was a security systems malfunction. That the damned sentient machine they were using as a guard dog went nuts…”
She didn’t seem to be listening, though. She waved him off, her expression impatient, her mouth pursed in a harder line.
“Yes. Well, clearly you aren’t dumb enough to believe that,” she muttered. “If you believed that, you wouldn’t be here.” She turned, staring at him with those glass-sharp eyes. “Why did you come here, Detective? What did you want to know from me, if it wasn’t about the contents of that vault? I assumed you knew it was my prototype they’d stolen.”
“Your prototype?”
“Of course. It’s why I agreed to see you.”
Pausing at his silence, she added,
“You at least noticed this… machine… targeted vampires in that vault? You must have at least noticed that much?”
Nick stared at her.
He was starting to lose patience, real fast.
“I came here for my boss, Detective James Morley,” he said in a low growl. “I came here, yes, to see if you could… or would… tell me anything about what the fuck happened last night. I wanted to know if I could share that information with him––”
“No.” Her face slid back into a cold mask. “You cannot.”
Pausing at his scowl, she amended,
“Well. Not until I have a chance to assess this detective of yours more thoroughly. But I might be interested in involving you in this situation. Perhaps you and this Morley can obtain answers of your own, if I reinstate your jurisdiction in this matter.” Her eyes grew warning. “You may not thank me for that, so think carefully before you answer.”
Nick stared at her.
She could be maddeningly indirect at times, even misleading.
She could also be maddeningly coy in assuming he knew more than he did.
But this was damned cryptic… even for her.
He pointed a finger back towards the hallway leading to the back room.
“Veronica is dead,” he growled. “Are you really going to play your fucking games with me right now? Don’t you care at all? Because it sure looked like she was pretty goddamned loyal to you. And from the wounds I saw, she fought to the death. I’d be willing to bet it was at least partly to protect your bony ass––”
“Detective,” St. Maarten interjected coldly. “I don’t need to prove my feelings about Veronica to you.”
Her voice slid a few notches colder when she added,
“Are you quite through venting your volatile vampire emotions? Can we address this professionally now? Because frankly, I don’t have time to indulge one of your self-righteous rants, Nick. We have a serious situation in front of us. Moreover, I’m increasingly concerned the forces looking into it aren’t up to the task.”
Nick frowned at that, in spite of himself.
“You mean the I.S.F.?” he said, when she didn’t go on. “The Human Racial Authority? Homeland Defense?”
“Any of them,” she said, her eyes swiveling to his. “All of them.”
Pausing for a beat, she added,
“Every one of the agencies you just named has already been compromised. Unfortunately, I don’t know the precise numbers, names, or even departments involved, which means I really don’t know who to trust inside those organizations, or even how to work around those infiltrations, precisely.”
She studied his face.
“I’m working on it,” she added. “But I don’t know how long it might take, to weed out all of the plants inside those organizations. Not all of them are outside actors, but actual ideological sympathizers… those who have been recruited. Converted.”
Nick stared at her.
When she didn’t go on, or elaborate on what she meant, his brows knitted.
“What the fuck are you talking about?” he said. “Do you mean the White Death? Are you saying the federal and international security agencies have been infiltrated by vampires? Well, no shit, honey… but that can hardly be news to you. They’ve had people inside since the war––”
“Not the White Death,” she said coldly, her lipsticked mouth pursed. Then, thinking, she amended, “Well, yes, them. But not only them.”
“Then who? And why? And what ‘ideology’ are you talking about? Veronica was killed by a vampire. She had her throat ripped out by a vampire.”
She stared at him.
For a moment, that’s all she did, her face unmoving.
Even so, her features were maybe the most vulnerable he’d ever seen them, without the usual perfect sheen of make-up and augmented accents, without her perfectly styled hair, without her usual tailored suit and unreadable yet slightly imperious expression.
She was still staring at him, when it seemed to really hit her, what he’d said, or maybe what she was seeing in his face.
Her eyes flashed with frustration as she held his gaze a beat longer. Then, leaning back in the couch cushions, she tilted her face up towards the ceiling, her expression tired. Nick watched as she raised a hand to her forehead, massaging her temples.
“I don’t know how much to tell you right now, Detective,” she said, staring up. “I know I need you. I need you, at least until I can clean house and make sure of my own people. Jack insists I can trust you…”
Her eyes flickered down, staring at him with a small frown, as if the idea of trusting him still bothered her deeply, maybe on the soul-level.
“…Jack also warned me this could end up much bigger than I already fear. He has a painting he showed me. He said he would show you. Has he done so, yet?”
Nick, still watching her warily, shook his head.
“Well.” She exhaled, nodding. “I suppose that explains some of your confusion.”
Raising her head off the cushion, she looked at him. For the first time since they’d left that virtual room, real emotion colored her features.
Anger flashed in her eyes, along with grief.
“They killed Veronica as a message to me,” she said, fingering the hair out of her eyes. “But they delivered that message to the wrong person. I tried to tell them that. I tried to tell them I didn’t intend for the tech to function that way… that those who stole it obviously reprogrammed it to do what it did.”
She met Nick’s gaze, that grief standing out in her eyes.
“They didn’t believe me. They think I must be helping them. They think what happened at Praetorian was a field test, of sorts… that I designed the machine, so it must have been me who programmed it to target and kill vampires. They think I joined the movement, you see. They think I was converted. I’m not, but telling these vampires that was useless. I would have let them bite me, truthfully. I would have let them venom me…”
Her mouth trembled briefly, right before her jaw firmed.
“Veronica would not permit it. She didn’t believe they wouldn’t kill me.” Pressing her lips together, she shook her head. “Perhaps she was right.”
Seeming to notice the frown on Nick’s face, she fell silent.
Frowning back at him, she added,
“I don’t entirely blame the vampires, you know… as surprising as that might be for you to hear. They are afraid, you see. Something I understand. They may not take kindly to you helping me, given that.” A wry, humorless smile touched her lips. “You may have noticed in your many years on this Earth, Detective… fear has a tendency to make beings irrational. Humans. Seers. Hybrids. Vampires.”
Staring at him coldly, she added,
“The vampires, believe it or not, are the least of my worries in this. Despite what they did today, despite what they did to Veronica, I could even see being their allies… in this situation, at least. Assuming I can ever persuade them that my allegiances do not lie where they think they do.”
“Which is where?” Nick said, still struggling to follow this. “Who do they think you are loyal to?”
“Dimitry Yi.”
Nick felt something click in his head, all at once.
“The vamps think you’re with Yi,” he said, exhaling. “White Death thinks you’re with Yi. That’s why they came here. That’s why they killed Veronica.”
“Yes,” she said, her jaw hardening as she clasped her hands. She added, sharper, “We have a much bigger problem, though, Detective.”
Nick frowned. He opened his mouth to speak, but she cut him off.
“He has my machine,” she said, and for the first time, he heard the faintest tinge of accent in her voice, strong enough to make him flinch. “Detective… those fanatical, Yi lunatics have my bloody machine, and worse, they appear to have programmed it to kill vampires.”
Nick opened his mouth.
He closed it again.
For a few seconds, there was nothing he could say.
Chapter 14
Ideas Are Like Poison
Fang & Metal: A Science Fiction Vampire Detective Novel (Vampire Detective Midnight Book 4) Page 12