With the shades pulled, the quiet rumble of the engines was the only real indication that they were in an airplane. This plane had been built to shepherd captains of industry, sheiks, and princes. The floor was carpeted, and the seats were creamy leather and polished walnut.
“Adam,” said Marsilia after a moment, her voice oddly gentle. She asked, “Are you all right? Did you speak with her?”
He rubbed his face and moved to the edge of his seat. “I did.” He gave his comrades a genuine smile. “You know Mercy. She escaped and is now traveling somewhere in the luggage compartment of a bus. How does that change our game?”
“He will be furious,” said Marsilia. She smiled, a surprisingly sweet expression on such a dangerous woman. “Somehow, when she is destroying other people’s carefully laid plans, she is not so annoying.”
“Fabulous,” said the goblin. “Such a clever coyote is your Mercy.”
Mercy had seemed frayed, but Adam would never admit that in the present company. “Never admit weakness before your enemies” had been his mantra long before he’d been Changed, and he wouldn’t betray Mercy’s, either. He’d just met the goblin—and Marsilia was not a fan of his wife.
“Do we continue to Milan?” Adam asked. “Or divert to another country and try to find Mercy before he finds her?”
“Milan,” said Stefan. “This isn’t an isolated incident—something he can only do once. Next time, he might make a more lethal move.”
“What if the fae threw in with us?” Honey asked. “Would that be enough to back him off?”
The goblin, who went by the human name of Larry Sethaway, shook his head. “Never happen,” he said. “The fae would rather watch the battle, then pick at the corpses like the carrion crows they are.” He grinned briefly, fully aware that in the supernatural world, it was the goblins who were looked upon as scavengers. “Can’t hardly get them all pointed in one direction if they were all dying of thirst and there was only one place to get water. I don’t mind them as noncombatants, but I’d just as soon keep them off the field. You don’t know who they’ll decide to kill first, your enemies or you.”
The goblins didn’t consider themselves fae, though the reverse wasn’t true. Most of the fae looked upon the goblins as sort of lowborn, weak, stupid cousins. Some of the fae looked upon them as food—and the goblins never forgot that.
Larry could pass for human, though some of his kind could not. When he’d met them at the airport, he’d been wearing dark glasses to cover his yellow-green eyes, and leather driving gloves to hide his four-fingered hands. Here in the plane, he’d left off both.
“I agree,” said Marsilia. “Both with Larry and with Stefan.” She smiled a little, a cat’s smile. “Let’s not tell him we know she’s gone. Let’s see what he chooses to do now that he’s lost her.”
“Will he believe we don’t know?” asked Honey. “She’s Adam’s mate.”
“The only reason we know she escaped is because Elizaveta was able to use their bond to work her own magic,” Marsilia answered.
Stefan nodded. “And Wulfe told him that your mate bond is erratic. If you act as if you don’t know, he’ll probably believe it.”
“He might just tell us that she escaped,” Marsilia said. “But I don’t think he will. It betrays a weakness, a mistake. He doesn’t like admitting to real mistakes, only pretend ones.”
“Like if he killed her,” murmured Stefan. “Oops. I accidentally killed your wife, poor thing. I hope you didn’t care for her too much. I just don’t know my own strength.”
“Would he have done that?” asked Honey. “If she hadn’t gotten away?”
Stefan glanced at Marsilia, who glanced surreptitiously at Adam.
“I am very glad Mercy managed to get away,” Marsilia said finally. Adam knew diplomacy when he heard it.
“What would you have done with me,” said Adam very quietly, “if he had killed her while you were trapped in here with me?”
She met his gaze with her own. “Died with everyone else if you lost control or destroyed this plane,” she said. “But you wouldn’t have given Iacopo—Jacob,” she corrected herself with a cool smile. “You wouldn’t have allowed him such an easy victory as that. I know you too well. But Mercy is not dead.”
She leaned forward. “I have not lied to you about the danger we face. I do think that we may come out of here with nothing worse than an unplanned trip to Europe. But there is an equal chance that he will start killing—and if he does, all of us will die.”
Larry leaned his head in the direction of the cockpit. “Including our pilot and copilot? Such a shame. He is quite beautiful for one of our kind.” The pilot, he meant. The copilot was a werewolf, though not Charles.
Marsilia smiled at the goblin, and Adam realized, somewhat to his surprise, that she genuinely liked Larry. He wasn’t used to associating Marsilia with such a . . . gentle emotion as that.
“No flirting until we are back home and your wife can’t blame me,” she said.
Larry shrugged. “No harm in looking, is there?”
Stefan stiffened. He looked at Adam. “Mercy is trying to get my attention. Do you have any message for her?”
“Tell her to stay safe,” Adam said. “See if she knows where she is yet.”
He made note that Stefan’s bonds with Mercy were able to function at a greater distance than the mating bond. He didn’t like it, but he made note of it.
Stefan smiled compassionately. “It is a simpler thing,” he told Adam, “the tie between vampire and prey, than the one between mates—as the bond between master and slave is simpler than a marriage. And Mercy is bleeding.” He held up a reassuring hand. “From a few small wounds only. But the blood feeds her call.”
He took out a pocketknife and cut a shallow wound on his thumb. He put the bleeding digit in his mouth, then froze.
Adam was determined not to be jealous. He was too worried about Mercy to be jealous. If she could contact the vampire, then they had two ways to find her.
Two was better than one. If Adam died here, Stefan could still get Mercy to safety.
Even the wolf thought so.
—
IT WAS NIGHT AGAIN WHEN THEY LANDED AT THE PRIVATE airport Bonarata had specified. There would be no trouble from customs; Adam’s pilot (and the owner of the company) had assured him that all of the paperwork had been taken care of. His pilot had also timed the flight so they landed on the morning side of midnight. Adam was pretty sure that Bonarata didn’t own the airstrip, but he wouldn’t need to. Being the Lord of Night meant he would have lots and lots of minions.
Bonarata’s people met them as they exited the plane. There were six of them, all male, all vampires, all dressed in the exact same very expensive suit. Dark hair cut into the same style—like Ken dolls but not so handsome.
One of them stepped forward and spoke in British-accented English. “My Master bids you welcome to Italy. He would have met you himself, but business matters kept him away. No need to see to your luggage; it is my honor to see that it makes it to your rooms with all haste.”
He signaled, and three of the vampires headed to Adam’s left toward the plane.
One of them smelled familiar.
This one had been among those who stole Mercy from him. Adam noted his face very carefully. There was nothing remarkable about his face—but Adam would remember it for a very long time. The vampire caught him at it and involuntarily met his eyes.
Adam let the wolf surface for a moment, let the vampire know that he’d been recognized.
The secret weakness of all vampires—and it was a big one—was that they all feared death. The only way any vampire was Made was because they feared the ending of life enough to give up everything in order to survive. Everything, including the person they had been.
Adam saw fear rise into the vampire’s eyes, and he was momen
tarily satisfied.
“Adam?” Honey said, and there was a note in her voice that told him he’d missed something important.
He turned his attention to the matters at hand.
“It was not made clear,” the vampire repeated, “what your preferred sleeping arrangements were?” He was so carefully not looking at Marsilia that Adam turned and raised an eyebrow at her.
“I wasn’t certain what would please you,” she said apologetically.
She intended to play second to his first. Adam wasn’t alone in his determination to use weapons that weren’t purely physical against Bonarata. He thought of how he would feel if he saw Mercy playing devoted follower to another man and had to fight back an inappropriate growl.
Marsilia smiled at him, and it was an intimate smile, a lover’s smile—a little deferential still. And Bonarata’s vampire saw it for what it was.
If Mercy were playing a man like that, Adam would know she was about to stab that man in the back. His wolf settled. Mercy wasn’t above playing roles and fighting dirty when the odds weren’t in her favor. As long as she felt she stood on the side of the angels, she wasn’t particular about how her enemies fell.
Marsilia was no more ethical in that way than Mercy—and far more vindictive. Bonarata had chosen his addiction over her, and she had not forgotten nor forgiven it. Bonarata would eat glass at the sight of her catering to what he thought were Adam’s . . . what? Needs? Ego? Distracting Bonarata would be to their advantage. Hadn’t Adam told Honey that he was going to use her to do that? Marsilia could play that game, too.
He did wish that Marsilia had discussed this aspect of her plans with him—but even as he thought it, he knew why she hadn’t. Marsilia knew that he wouldn’t have agreed to play ball. He didn’t cheat on Mercy, not even mild flirtation for appearances.
What were his choices now? Expose Marsilia? Reject her? He thought about that one. He could do that without making her lie apparent—but the whole point was that Bonarata saw them as a united front, not to leave Marsilia exposed as a target.
Honey, he trusted, could protect herself from anyone but herself. Marsilia . . . she was strong as hell, but she was vulnerable to Bonarata.
“Adam?” Marsilia asked again, this time touching his shoulder. He didn’t back away from her touch, though he wanted to.
Adam glanced at Honey and Larry, then shrugged. In for a penny, in for a pound—Mercy might, on a very bad day, have a moment of weakness that would let her believe that Adam would cheat on her with Marsilia. But—
“Give us a suite that will sleep six,” he told the vampire. She would never believe that he’d also sleep with Stefan, Honey, some goblin he’d never met before, and—holy cow—Elizaveta. She’d know that this was the easiest way for him to make sure all of his people were safe. And to really stick a bug in Bonarata’s peace of mind while he did so.
Adam looked at his people and said, “We might as well share space as spend the night running down hallways.” He turned back to Bonarata’s head minion and let the thought that they were going to be in a vampire’s lair—a consideration, not a cause for alarm—come and leave his eyes. Then he said casually, “Or days, I guess.”
“Mercy might object to Larry,” murmured Stefan. He was going to play along.
“Larry might object to Mercy,” said Larry in the exact same tone.
“You should be so lucky as to have Mercy pick you,” said Stefan shortly and, Adam’s wolf noticed with sudden sharp interest, totally honestly.
Adam shrugged again. “Mercy can organize us as she sees fit when we get her back.”
“It will be like a vacation,” said Honey in sultry tones, because Honey was sharp as a tack and a fine actress. “We haven’t had one of those in a long time.”
Honey sold the lie with her body language and her voice—and gave it just enough to be believable. Most of the other supernatural folk kind of thought that the werewolves, who touched a lot more than was a comfortably human norm, all probably slept with their pack mates anyway. And those stories were fed by the now-vanishingly-rare Alpha who felt like that was the only way he could dominate his pack. Come to think of it, those would probably still be fairly common in Europe, where there was no Marrok to deal with them.
“That is not your reputation,” said Bonarata’s minion, sounding a little . . . shocked. Which he shouldn’t be, given the stories Adam had heard about Bonarata’s parties. The minion was looking at Marsilia, and Adam wondered abruptly if the vampire was old enough that he’d known Marsilia before she left.
“A suite,” said Marsilia shortly, but her body leaned into Adam. Her heart was racing—unusual for a vampire, but she’d been very stressed since this had begun. Adam could relate, but he gave her a reason for her racing heart by caressing her face lightly.
He let his wolf rise just a bit—rage and lust smelled very similar. In his experience, vampires weren’t good at sorting through emotions, though they could smell them very nearly as well as a wolf. But the vampires’ emotions were skewed, they were selfish creatures by definition, and it left them in trouble when it came to sorting someone else’s out.
“We have a suite with three bedrooms,” said one of the vampires. “We can house your pilot and copilot in servants’ quarters.”
“My pilot and copilot?” Adam said. “They will stay with the plane.”
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible,” said the head minion. “My Master made a special request that they, too, accept accommodations with us.” He smiled slyly. “We could bring trundle beds if you want them in your rooms, too.”
Adam looked over his shoulder to see that the two men were climbing out of the plane with the small bags they carried with them. The pilot was as good-looking as Larry had said, tall for a goblin, with sandy-gold hair and robin’s-egg-blue eyes. He watched the vampire escorting him warily, temper in the set of his shoulders. But Austin Harris was smart enough not to argue with Bonarata’s people.
Harris reached out to steady his copilot without looking at him when he wobbled on the ramp, too busy watching the vampire to watch his feet. The copilot was medium height and average-faced, and so intimidated by the vampires that he very nearly clung to the side of Harris. The copilot was a werewolf. The way he sought protection from Harris told Adam—and anyone else who was watching—that he was submissive. It was dangerous to be that submissive when surrounded by vampires.
Bonarata’s head minion cleared his throat. Right, he wanted an answer to his question.
If Adam pulled the pilot and copilot into the suite, it would look like they were afraid. Which they were. But it would also look like an insult, making clear that they did not expect Bonarata to keep guesting laws.
Adam raised his eyebrows in surprise. “Does Bonarata sleep with every damn person he hires? Give them their own rooms.”
He glanced over his shoulder at the pilot and the werewolf again. Harris met his eyes with a worried gaze and then glanced at his copilot. “One room would be better,” he said.
“Better give them one room with two beds, I suppose,” Adam said. “Someone as scared as he looks to be isn’t going to sleep well alone in a vampire seethe. If we can’t make him comfortable, the pilot is going to have to fly us home all by himself while his copilot sleeps.”
“That can be arranged,” said the minion, who was watching Harris with interested eyes. Predatory eyes.
“I trust in the honor of the Lord of Night that those two will be safe from the seethe,” Adam said softly.
The minion started, looked at Adam, and flushed when he realized that Adam had seen his hunger. The minion closed his eyes and went very still.
“They will be our guests,” he said after maybe half a minute of blank face and quiet body. “My Master’s word on it.”
So Bonarata could get and give information through his minions—at least through this mini
on. Adam would remember that.
Adam glanced at Harris and the wolf again. Putting a handsome man and a vulnerable one in the middle of a seethe . . . if Bonarata didn’t have iron control of his vampires, there might be trouble.
Then he thought of Marsilia’s assertion that Bonarata didn’t like making mistakes—though he didn’t mind hiding behind an apology and the claim of a mistake that wasn’t really a mistake.
Bonarata’s vampires probably wouldn’t attack Harris and his man by accident. But if it was in the Lord of Night’s best interests to have them trapped here without a pilot . . .
Adam sighed audibly and said, “Oh, put them somewhere near us. At least that way if someone starts screaming, there’s a good chance we will hear them.”
The vampire drew himself up. “Do you doubt my Master’s honor?”
“No,” Adam said. “But I won’t trust the self-control of vampires I don’t know when presented with prey that looks like this.” He waved a hand at Harris, who raised a good-looking eyebrow.
“Sorry,” he apologized. “This is really what I look like. I don’t have enough magic to keep up glamour.”
When things might get dangerous and I might need every ounce of power I’ve got, the goblin pilot didn’t say. Probably the vampires wouldn’t hear the unspoken message—and if they did, likely they’d understand the reasoning behind it.
Harris frowned suddenly at Adam. “And you have no room to talk.”
“Yes,” Elizaveta said venomously. “We are all beautiful here. Can we get going? Or do I need to get the makeup mirror out of my purse so you two can admire yourselves a little longer?” She looked at the vampire. “I hope there are sufficient bathrooms in the suite. I don’t like to share”—she glanced at Adam, laughter in her eyes—“bathrooms.”
Bonarata’s minion nodded, but he wasn’t really paying attention to Elizaveta, which was a mistake he might regret. It didn’t do to forget that she was a power who could make even the Gray Lords of the fae back down. Instead of paying attention to someone who could make him wish she was only killing him, he was staring at Harris’s copilot, who had been doing a pretty good job of being unnoticeable.
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