Venom

by Jennifer Estep

  Bria opened her mouth to say something, when a sharp ring cut her off. But it wasn’t the telephone next to the register that had sounded. It was my disposable cell phone. Which could mean only one thing—trouble.

  “Excuse me.” I dug my cell phone out of my jeans pocket and answered it. “What?”

  “Gin?” Jo-Jo’s voice flooded the line. “We’ve got a problem.”

  The tight, worried note in the dwarf’s tone told me exactly what she was going to say.

  “Roslyn’s gone,” Jo-Jo said.

  23

  Roslyn Phillips gone? Fuck.

  Bria saw my face tighten. Her blue eyes sharpened with interest.

  “Gin?” Jo-Jo asked. “Are you still there?”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” I said in a calm voice. “Tell me what happened.”

  “I was busy with clients most of the day. I checked in on her at lunchtime, and Roslyn was fine. Well, as fine as she could be, given the circumstances. Quiet, but fine,” Jo-Jo said. “I went upstairs to ask her what she wanted me to make for supper, if she needed some blood, if she wanted to talk about anything, and she was gone. She must have slipped out while I was doing my last perm of the day.”

  “Do you have any idea why she decided that she didn’t like her perm?” I asked.

  Jo-Jo knew enough to realize that I didn’t want to speak openly in front of whoever might be standing nearby. “She left her cell phone behind. There was a text message on the screen from Elliot Slater. He said for Roslyn to meet him on the street outside Underwood’s restaurant in half an hour or he would start killing the people close to her—starting with Xavier. He also threatened to kill her sister and niece whenever they came back to Ashland.”

  So the giant had decided to play hardball. And instead of coming to me, instead of trusting me to handle things, Roslyn had gone straight to him. She might even be dead already.

  “When did she leave?” I asked. “Right after you gave her the perm?”

  “I finished up at six. I heard her moving around upstairs as late as five thirty. She can’t have been gone more than thirty minutes, forty tops.”

  I glanced at the clock on the wall. Creeping up on six fifteen now. Which meant that Roslyn had been gone almost an hour. The restaurant was only about a twenty-minute cab ride from Jo-Jo’s house, which meant Roslyn had to have reached Slater by now.

  “I’m so sorry, Gin,” Jo-Jo said, shame and worry in her voice. “I thought that she’d let you handle things. I had no idea that she’d take off.”

  I sighed. “It’s not your fault that she didn’t like her perm. Some people just don’t know good work when they see it. We’ll talk about it later. I have a customer waiting right now. But keep your door open, okay? I’ll probably stop by later.”

  “Sure,” Jo-Jo replied. “I’ll have everything ready, including myself. Whatever you need, Gin.”

  What Jo-Jo really meant was that she’d be on standby, ready to heal Roslyn Phillips when I got the vamp away from Elliot Slater. If I got the vamp away from the giant before he killed her.

  “Great. See you then.”

  I hung up and looked at Bria.

  “Something wrong?” Bria asked.

  I smiled at her. “Nothing serious. A friend of mine runs a beauty salon. Seems like one of her clients didn’t like the curl in her hair today.”

  Bria didn’t look like she believed me for a second, but there wasn’t much she could do about it. She’d already called me a liar to my face and threatened to take me to the police station. I hadn’t blinked at either one of those threats, and she was smart enough to realize that it would take a lot to rattle me. So she drew a card out from her coat pocket and put it on the counter between us. I didn’t pick it up. I didn’t want to risk brushing my fingers against hers and feeling her Ice magic again. I didn’t need the distraction of that and all the emotions that came with it right now.

  “Another one of my cards,” Bria said. “Please call me if you hear anything about Ms. Phillips. I’d consider it a personal favor.”

  “Of course,” I lied. “You have a good evening, detective.”

  “You too, Ms. Blanco.”

  I thought Bria would turn around and leave, but instead, she just kept staring at me with her cold, icy eyes.

  “Is there something else, detective?” I finally asked.

  “It’s funny,” she murmured. “But ever since I came here a few days ago, I’ve had the strangest feeling of déjà vu about you. Almost like I… know you from somewhere.”

  Years of training kept any emotion from showing on my face. The first time Bria had come to the Pork Pit, when our fingers had touched and I’d felt her magic, I’d wondered if she’d sensed anything about me. If she’d felt my Ice power that was so similar to hers. Whether she had or not, something about me had tickled her memory.

  Bria and I had been exceptionally close when we were kids, but I wasn’t particularly worried about her recognizing me as her big sister Genevieve Snow. With my dark, chocolate brown hair and gray eyes, I looked like our father, Tristan. He’d died when Bria was a baby, and she’d never known him. Bria was the one who’d looked the most like our mother, Eira. And I’d changed a lot from when I was thirteen. I’d lost all the baby fat that had softened my features. The planes of my face were much sharper, harder, and more angular than they’d been when I was a kid. Then again, so were Bria’s.

  But more than that was the fact that Bria had already looked into my background, already dug into my rock-solid cover identity as Gin Blanco. There was just no reason for her to think that I was her long-lost sister Genevieve. Especially since I hadn’t acted anything like she probably thought Genevieve would. I hadn’t exactly been welcoming toward Bria, even though I longed to just wrap my arms around her and hug her tight, just to make sure she was real. But too many things, too many secrets, lay between us right now for all that.

  Bria shrugged. “I suppose it’s nothing. Just like the help that you’ve given me today, Ms. Blanco.”

  My sister stared at me a second longer, then turned and walked out of the Pork Pit.

  The first thing I did was go over to the front door, lock it, and turn the sign over to Closed. I stared out the storefront windows, but Bria had already disappeared from sight. Good. I didn’t need her hanging around distracting me from what needed to be done. A long, bloody night lay ahead, and I needed to focus, needed to forget about everyone and everything that I cared about, and morph into the Spider once more, so I could get through what lay ahead. So I could get Roslyn Phillips through it— before she got dead.

  So I pushed all thought of Bria away and turned to face Sophia. The Goth dwarf stood behind the counter, a dish towel draped over her shoulder, just watching me with her flat, black eyes.

  “That was Jo-Jo on the phone,” I said.

  “Problem?” Sophia rasped.

  “Roslyn left the house and went to meet Elliot Slater. He threatened to start killing the people she was close to. Slater has her now, and I have to figure out where he took her—before he kills her.” I looked at the Goth dwarf. “I need you to go babysit Xavier for me. If he finds out Roslyn went to Slater, he’ll go crazy and start looking for her himself. And I can’t have that.”

  Sophia nodded. She knew that Xavier would only get in my way—and probably get Roslyn killed in the process.

  While the dwarf turned off the french fryer and shut everything else down for the night, I called Finn and told him the situation.

  “Fuck,” he said.

  “Fuck, indeed.” Then, I asked Finn the most important question—of Roslyn Phillips’s life. “Where would Elliot Slater take Roslyn for one last hurrah before he kills her?”

  “You don’t think she’s dead already?” he asked. “He’s had her at least an hour by now.”

  I thought of the hot rage that I’d seen flashing in Slater’s hazel eyes last night on the riverboat. Of the embarrassment that Roslyn had caused him with her screamed accusations.
Of the way that the giant had started after her, only to be called back by Mab Monroe. Of all the incessant calls that he’d bombarded Roslyn with during the long night.

  “No,” I replied. “Slater will want to play with her first, punish her for what she did to him. At least for a couple of hours. That’s what he did to all those other women in his file. Which means I still have time to get to Roslyn—if I can find her. So where do you think Slater would go? You’re the one who compiled that file on him, who dug up all of Fletcher’s old information on him. You would know better than me.”

  Asking for direction, for guidance, for a target to strike out at. It was something that I would have asked of Fletcher Lane, if he’d still been alive. But the old man had taught Finn everything he knew about how to gather information on a member of the opposition, analyze it, and predict how he would react in a certain situation. In some ways, Finn was even better at it than Fletcher had been, because Finn innately understood things like greed and desire and avarice. He saw them every day at the bank where he worked, and again at night, while he hobnobbed with his rich, deadly clients.

  Through the cell phone, a slow, slurping sound filled my ear. Finn, drinking yet another cup of coffee and thinking about my question. I could picture him leaning back in his expensive office chair, his green eyes bright with thought, the warm scent of his chicory coffee adding to his caffeine high. I let him think. Roslyn’s life depended on his coming up with the right answer. After about a minute, the slurping stopped, and I knew that Finn had come to a conclusion.

  “Elliot Slater has a mansion up in the mountains north of the city,” Finn said. “He calls it Valhalla, if you can believe that. It’s large, remote, secluded. Dad used to speculate that Valhalla was where Slater disposed of certain bodies for Mab Monroe. I bet he’s gotten rid of some of his own victims up there as well. The Aneirin River cuts through the area. Lots of gorges, lots of hollows, lots of places to dump a body where it’ll never be found. If Slater wanted to spend one more night with Roslyn before he killed her, that’s where he’d take her. I’d bet my life on it.”

  “You’re not betting your life,” I replied. “Just Roslyn’s.”

  “I know that, Gin.” Finn’s voice was as dark and somber as mine. “Believe me, I know.”

  We didn’t speak for a moment.

  “Everything you need to know about Valhalla is in that file I compiled on Slater. Maps, roads, blueprints of the mansion and outbuildings,” Finn said. “Do you have it with you?”

  I looked at the papers that I’d spread out on top of the counter. “I’m looking through it right now.”

  “Where do you want me to meet you? Because I’m coming with you, and that’s not up for discussion.” There was no hesitation or give in Finn’s voice. Just the determination to finish this and save Roslyn. No matter what.

  I eyed the clock on the wall. Creeping up on six thirty now. Roslyn had been gone an hour. By the time I got to Valhalla, close to another hour would have passed. If I waited for Finn here at the Pork Pit, it would be closer to ninety minutes. I didn’t know how long Slater would keep Roslyn alive, but every minute, every second I waited, was another one that the vamp would be in pure agony—and another one closer to her eventual death.

  “All right, but we’re running out of time. I’m leaving right now to drive up there.” I looked at the maps of the area. “Looks like there’s some sort of gas station at the bottom of the mountain where the mansion sits. Grab your gear and meet me there as soon as you can.”

  “You got it,” Finn said and hung up.

  I gathered up all the papers on Elliot Slater and his mountain hideaway and stuffed them back into Finn’s manila folder. While I’d been talking to Finn, Sophia Deveraux had slipped into the back of the restaurant. The dwarf came out through the swinging doors carrying an anonymous black duffel bag. She handed it to me without a word.

  “Thanks, Sophia.”

  I took the bag from her, listening to the comforting clink-clink-clink of weapons rattling around inside. The bag contained just about everything I needed to do a quick, dirty job—silverstone knives, money, dark clothes, fake IDs, credit cards, tins of Jo-Jo’s healing salve. There was only one more thing that I needed to stop and get on my way to Elliot Slater’s mansion. I unzipped the bag and put the folder of information in on top of my other supplies. Then I hefted the bag over my shoulder and headed for the swinging doors that led to the alley behind the restaurant.

  Sophia moved to one side to let me pass. The dwarf reached out and put her pale hand on my arm. For a moment, I thought she meant to stop me from going on what basically amounted to a suicide mission. If anyone could do it, the dwarf could. I wasn’t stupid enough to think that I could take Sophia in anything resembling a fair fight. She’d seen all my tricks before, and she was tough as hell. And now I knew that she had Air elemental magic too—powerful magic that she could use to dissolve me into nothingness.

  The dwarf stared at me for several seconds. Her eyes were black and flat as usual, but I caught the flash of some emotion swimming in the dark depths. It might have been approval or even pride, but it was gone too quick for me to pin it down.

  “Luck,” Sophia rasped in her broken voice. She dropped her arm and gestured for me to go on through the swinging doors. The dwarf wasn’t going to stop me.

  I nodded. “Thanks, Sophia. Tonight, I think I’m really going to need it.”

  24

  Twenty minutes later, my Mercedes Benz skidded to a halt in front of Owen Grayson’s mansion. I climbed out of the car, ran up to the front door, and banged the hammer rune knocker as hard as I could against the thick wood. About thirty seconds passed before I heard the scuffle of footsteps inside. A moment later, Eva Grayson cracked open the door. When she saw that it was me, she swung the door back even more.

  “Gin?” Eva asked. “What are you doing here? Do you and Owen have another date or something?”

  I didn’t answer, instead shouldering my way past her inside the mansion.

  “Gin? Gin, what are you doing?” Eva called out behind me.

  I ignored her and walked on through the house with all of its comfortable furnishings in their muted colors and the elaborate iron sculptures standing in various nooks and crannies. My boots smacked out a loud pattern, while softer slippers scurried on the wooden floor behind me, as Eva hurried to catch up.

  “Gin, what’s wrong?” she asked.

  I didn’t respond. I hurried past the downstairs living room where Eva and Violet had been watching a movie last night. Had it only been last night? Seemed like a lifetime ago.

  To my surprise, Violet Fox poked her head out of the living room, clutching a tub of popcorn in her hands. She and Eva must have been having another girls’ night in. Violet’s dark eyes widened behind her glasses when she saw me, and she started following me down the hallway, just like Eva was.

  After about a minute of brisk walking, I came to the door that marked the entrance to Owen Grayson’s study. I rattled the knob. Locked. I turned to face Eva.

  “Do you have a key for this?” I barked.

  Eva started at my harsh tone. “Yeah, somewhere up in my room—”

  No time for that. I reached for my Ice magic, and the familiar silver light flashed on the spider rune scar on my palm. Eva let out a small, surprised gasp at my display of elemental power. Violet just stood behind her, watching me.

  A few seconds later, I let go of my magic and went to work with the two Ice picks that I’d created. It took me less than a minute to open the office door. I snapped on a light and walked over to the rows of silverstone weapons hanging on the wall. Eva and Violet followed me inside.

  “Owen’s not here,” Eva said in a desperate voice. “I don’t know what you want or what you’re doing, Gin, but if you’ll just wait for him, he’ll be back any minute.”

  “Sorry,” I replied, scanning the weapons for what I needed. “No time to wait.”

  There. Those would do nicely. I
plucked the matching set of long swords that I’d noticed last night from their spots on the wall. I hefted the silverstone swords in my hands, checking their weight and balance. Perfect. Absolutely perfect. Owen Grayson truly was a master craftsman. And I was going to put his weapons to good use tonight.

  A black leather scabbard with two slots in it hung next to the swords, and I grabbed it as well. I turned and was headed toward the office door when Eva stepped in front of me.

  “Oh no,” she said. “Owen’s absolutely insane about his weapons. He never lets anyone take them out of the office, not even me.”

  I tried to go around her, but Eva sidestepped in front of me again. She was persistent, if nothing else. Just like her big brother was.

  “I don’t have time to argue with you, Eva,” I snapped. “Get out of my way. Right now.”

  Her blue eyes narrowed at my sharp tone. “Or what? You’ll stab me with one of those swords? I don’t think so.”

  “No,” I said. “But I’ll shove you out of the way. How about that?”

  Eva’s face paled at my threat, but she held her ground. Brave, but stupid. Reminded me of Bria. I didn’t want to hurt Eva, but I would if it meant I’d get to Roslyn Phillips in time to save the vampire.

  Violet Fox stepped up beside her friend and regarded me with her dark eyes.

  “You’re going after someone,” Violet said in a quiet tone.

  I let out an angry breath. “Yes.”

  She nodded. “All right then. That’s all I need to know.” Violet put her hand on Eva’s arm and drew her friend to one side. “Let her go, Eva. Just let her go.”

  “But Owen—the weapons—” Eva sputtered.