Before he left, I asked, “Has the Rege set a date to confirm you?”
“No. I think he’s got his people working on ways to alter the interpretation of their laws so he can deny me even after I prove that I can change at will.”
I broached the subject of the party at the haven. “Should we go?”
“Yeah. You have your duties. I should be back in time for it.”
“Should be?”
Zhan let him take the Audi. I think it was a means to coerce him to return on time.
Nana worked on her quilting. I settled in at the dinette in the kitchen and wrote up a reminder list for the party. It was the first kids’ party I’d ever thrown, and even though I’d be disguised as someone else, I wanted Nana to have a reference to make sure everything was proceeding according to plan.
Zhan stepped into the room. “I’ve been thinking,” she said, “about Maxine, about life, and about what you said the other day.”
I gestured for her to join me. “Which part of what I said?”
“That you’d talk to Menessos for me.” She sat across from me. “To ask him if I could go home.”
“You’ll let me ask now?”
She nodded. “But wait until after Pittsburgh. You’ve got enough going on right now.”
“Okay. I’m sure he won’t have a problem with it.” I’d pull rank if I had to.
“Can I take pictures of them, the animals, to show my father?”
“Absolutely.” I stopped. “Oh, and talk to Mountain. If he thinks it would be all right—and if your family can house them—maybe you could take a few of the phoenixes. If your family would like to be charged with their keeping, it might be like a peace offering from you.”
She was stunned. “You would do that for me?”
“Of course.” When I answered, her chin dropped, her mind surely racing with the logistics of getting phoenixes to the West Coast, as well as the family reunion playing out in her imagination. Movement outside caught my attention. Mountain had emerged from the field.
He was hammering in some metal posts to erect a temporary fence across the new driveway to the barns: no need to provide a tempting pathway for our young guests.
Sneakily, I added. “But if you go …”
“What?” She sounded concerned.
“Mountain would miss you.” I pointed through the glass.
She saw him. Her concern converted into guilt. “Don’t tell the Boss.”
“I won’t tell. Why would I?”
“Offerlings and Beholders aren’t supposed to … to …”
“Like I said, I won’t tell.”
“Mountain is good to me,” she said softly, wringing her hands. “He sees me. Other men see … something else.”
“You don’t have to explain, Zhan.”
She had resumed staring at the tabletop.
“Why don’t you go ask Mountain now? Work the plan out.”
She rose from the table, but lingered long enough to say, “Thank you.”
The sun set at five-thirteen and my now-expected connection to Menessos clicked in. It was full dark when Johnny arrived at six o’clock as promised. It felt much later than it truly was. We sat together in the back as Zhan drove us to the haven.
Johnny told me how his afternoon had gone. “Feral didn’t believe I kicked an Omori’s ass, or put the Rege on his knees. I had to conference call Kirk and Todd to corroborate.”
“What did he say then?”
“He grunted, but that was because he was under someone’s sink.”
“Huh?”
“He was on a service call.” Feral’s day job was plumbing. “So I drove out and joined him.”
“Did you help?”
“I fetched him tools. Helped him carry things in and out.”
“Did your labor have a payoff?”
He nodded. “He called Erik, had him meet us at Triv’s restaurant. Over a beer, Feral told Erik what the other guys had told him. And then he says to Erik, ‘I’m telling him.’” Johnny set his jaw momentarily, demonstrating his irritation before he continued. “The Rege had sent Omori to their houses and they were told the band would be breaking up eventually, but if they quit and made the process go smoother, they would be given ‘severance pay.’ They each got an envelope with twenty-five grand.”
“No way.”
“Way.”
“They took it?”
“When the Omori shows up on your doorstep, you comply.”
“You didn’t.”
He smirked. “I’m the Domn Lup.”
It occurred to me that we were talking rather freely about pack stuff in front of Zhan. Johnny had wanted to avoid Maxine’s knowing too much. I took his hand and, concentrating, tried to figure out how to word what I wanted to say.
He squinted at me. “It’s all right,” he said.
“Huh?”
“I could … hear you.”
He gripped my hand tight. Menessos called me. We talked.
His lips hadn’t moved. Yet I’d heard him.
In signum amoris. Menessos had admitted he’d used magic on Johnny and me when we had sex at the haven. He’d claimed it was a link, a shared mental connection by which we’d be able to sense each other’s moods. If the emotions were strong enough, like fear, it might call to the other—a benefit that we might find “as worthwhile as the more physical one.” The vampire had also said Johnny and I had already imprinted on each other, inflaming that physical bond. The in signum amoris made it an emotional bond as well.
And then we shared pieces of our souls, making it spiritual, Johnny added.
“Lord and Lady!” I said aloud.
“Everything all right back there?” Zhan asked.
“We’re fine,” Johnny said and winked at me, adding, Wanna see how she reacts if we make out?
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Menessos’s haven was in the lowest levels of the old May Company building on Euclid Avenue, facing Public Square. The eight-story building was beautiful, with white glazed terra cotta tiles framing the nine bays of Chicago-style windows and all of it topped with a scrolled pediment and a Renaissance Revival clock.
Well, it’s beautiful above street level, anyway.
The ground level had a flat industrial-type awning that jutted out. While it provided cover from the elements, it seemed to me that the plainness below that awning detracted from the rest of the building. The restaurant next door to the haven had a strange portico embellished with an old car, neon lights, and tall arborvitae in containers. It didn’t fit with the majesty of the rest of the building.
But then Menessos’s frontage didn’t add any class either, being comprised of plywood walls and a primer gray door. Or it had been on my last trip to the haven. As Zhan rolled to a stop to let us out, I saw a newly refurbished exterior, dazzlingly lit.
The vampire haven’s entry now matched the white glazed tiles and architectural trimmings. There were also sections that encroached just slightly on the sidewalk, like half an octagon, with four six-inch-wide panels of glass separated by narrow strips of white tile.
Two sets of doors were lit from the front and behind; the white of the frosted glass seemed to glow, and was interrupted only with the universal vampire symbol—six gleaming white teeth on a field of black inside a red circle. Of course, the outermost teeth were razory fangs. The word HAVEN was written below in bold lettering.
A foot-wide plastic banner was stretched across the left set of doors. It read OPENING SOON.
Johnny held the door for me. Inside, the cherrywood ticket booth gleamed under soft lighting, and I saw that the entire lobby was finished. A metal security fence separated this from the open space beyond, which was now blocked by plastic sheeting.
“Guess he’s refinishing in there, too.”
“Didn’t he tell you?” Johnny asked. “He’s putting in a nightclub. That’s what those two angled things out front are for.”
So Menessos and Johnny were getting chummy? N
ot necessarily a bad thing. “Those bay windows indicate this is a nightclub?”
He gave a throaty laugh. “They will when there are scantily clad young women dancing in them.”
I groaned and headed for the stairs, but I saw the elevators were now unbarred. I punched the button. The doors opened and Johnny and I stepped in. He waved up at the corner. Seeing the question on my face, he said, “Always cameras in elevators.”
It must have been true. When the doors opened on the lower level, Risqué was waiting for us in all of her red-eyed, blonde-ringleted glory. She bowed her head toward me and murmured, “Erus Veneficus.” She followed it with a nod at Johnny. “Gorgeous.” She twisted on her clear plastic heel and barked, “This way,” as she strutted off.
We followed without a word. Tonight Risqué wore aqua blue ruffled satin short-shorts. I hoped there was a top of some sort under those mounds of curls, but considering Risqué’s proclivity for a topless tease look, it was not likely.
She escorted us to the same rooms where she had fixed my hair for the Erus Veneficus induction ceremony. “Damn it,” she murmured. “They didn’t bring the beauty case over yet. I’ll be right back.”
In the back room I found zippered bags holding clothes for us. A piece of cardstock with a hole punched in the corner had been fastened to the zipper of each. My name was written in calligraphy on one. Johnny’s was on the other.
Though Menessos had promised me a sensible selection, I wasn’t convinced we’d have the same definition of how that word related to apparel. “I’m afraid to open this.”
Johnny stepped up beside me. “On three, we unzip and see what he expects us to wear.”
“Deal. But first, about that … telepathy … in the car.” I was still astounded by that. “It must be linked to the in signum amoris thing, but why didn’t it happen before?”
“It did happen before. For me, anyway. A day or so after you were inducted as the EV, when you asked me if I wanted the burden of knowing another big secret, Menessos’s secret, I could hear your voice in my head. You admitted you hadn’t told me everything yet. And you asked me if I wanted the responsibility of keeping it.”
I remembered that, now that he reminded me. I had been thinking those words to him, but I had no clue he actually heard me. Then, “Yeah. I kind of heard you weighing the pros and cons of it.” And I’d heard him at the beginning of our probing session with Great El’s slate.
“We were touching then, and touching in the car. Maybe physical contact makes it happen.”
He, of course, made physical contact sound dirty. “But we’ve touched a lot since the in signum amoris thing.”
“Okay, maybe we have to be touching and be in the right frame of serious-mindedness. Focused. Something. We should experiment. Maybe even when we’re naked and—”
“I agree. But not here and now.”
The moment wore on silently for a heartbeat, then Johnny said, “On three.”
He counted. We unzipped as one.
I was judging the contents of Johnny’s garment bag, not my own. He had been given a suit. Not a department store one, either. It was absolutely not anything Johnny would wear, but it was black, with a black silk shirt and tie. Even as I studied it I knew it was something that would clothe the Domn Lup. “Wow.”
“Touché.” He gestured toward my own garment bag.
A black silk evening gown with a sequined top cascaded from the hanger like glittering spilled ink. I held it up. It was floor length, with a high slit up the side. The straps crossed behind the neck, and the bodice had a plunging neckline, but all in all, it had good coverage. Then I turned it around and realized the back was virtually nonexistent.
Johnny gave a howl of approval.
“Keep it up,” I said.
“Not a problem if you’re wearing that.”
I shot back, “I hope you know how to tape a girl into her evening gown, because I’m going to need tape if I’m going to stay in this modestly.”
He laughed at me. “I’ve never taped a girl in a dress before, but it sounds like it includes man-handling. Let’s get started.” He grinned wider and added, “And since we have to get undressed, we could experiment …”
Before I could answer, however, Risqué returned.
“My second-in-command is off on a task tonight, so it pleases me to have the newly revealed Domn Lup honor me by sitting at my right.”
With a spotlight on him, Johnny descended the steps, crossed the theater’s house, and strolled up the ramp to make a show of clasping forearms with Menessos before taking a position in front of Goliath’s usual seat. When the polite applause died, Menessos said, “And now my Erus Veneficus.”
As I made my crossing, I mentally repeated how grateful I was for the practical two-inch heels on the sequined pumps Menessos had provided.
Risqué had not only done my hair and applied my makeup, she’d presented me with a scarlet garter. Though the hosiery that had also been provided wasn’t the thigh-high kind that needed a garter, I wore the red satin-covered elastic as the symbol of my rank in the vampire’s court. The bright color and the high slit skirt of this dress meant the garter was apparent to everyone.
Bestowed with a gorgeous gown and sensible shoes, my hair and makeup done, it was one of those moments when a woman should feel confident and beautiful, and I did. As I neared Menessos and Johnny, however, and took in the spot-lit view of them, both in stunning suits, standing side-by-side as if there had never existed any animosity between them, their attractive faces attuned to me, their eyes seeing only me, it hit me that I truly was the luckiest woman in the world. Not only because they were such handsome devils. Not only because I knew how desirable each was without the suits. But because I had nearly lost them, and I still had both.
My hand slipped into Menessos’s hand, and he guided me to my place, presenting me to the applauding crowd.
The house area was filled to capacity, with all of Menessos’s people and those he was taking on. I saw familiar faces in the crowd, specifically, Zhan, Seven, and Mark. There were others I recognized but didn’t have names for. Only Mountain was missing, and he had an excuse—tending the animals and especially Thunderbird.
Menessos kissed the back of my hand and bid Johnny and me to take our seats.
“Now. Eva de Monique. Join us on the stage, and sit on the dais steps to my left, that all may know you have rank here, second to my own Erus Veneficus.”
A tall slender woman in a dove gray one-shouldered sheathe dress stood up from a table in the house. She moved with a liquid grace uncommon for a mortal. Her ebony tresses were arranged in short angled lines that I guessed must be all the rage in Paris. Her skin was like smooth-chiseled white marble. Her gray-blue eyes seemed to capture not only the color but the threat of stormy seas. It was a face that would have been beautiful no matter what, with or without makeup, no matter the hairstyle. Not everyone could wear glossy black lipstick and make it look good, but Eva could.
Yeah. She was someone I could legitimately envy.
Menessos gestured to the steps before me. She sat, posture remaining as rigid as if iron bars lined her spine.
“Allow me to welcome all of you who are new to our haven. Let this celebration symbolize the first embrace of the family you are joining. Once your hungers are sated, you will be called up, table by table, and I will bestow your new marks individually, according to your previous rank. Henceforth, you will be mine, and this will be your haven. But first … feast!”
Menessos clapped his hands and caterers entered, taking lidded plates and placing them before those, like Zhan, seated at tables draped in black cloths. Those seated at the tables swathed in scarlet received tall stemmed glasses of dark fluid.
Ornate tray tables were placed before Johnny, Eva, and me. We were then each served by Risqué. Menessos was given a tall flute like the other vampires.
The meal was delicious, but being on stage made eating awkward. The fact that no one engaged in convers
ation made it more so. My appetite simply didn’t exist.
Our tray tables were carried off and as the servers moved into the house to clear the tables, Risqué crossed the stage with a silver-lidded dish. She lifted the shiny top and offered me chocolate-dipped strawberries. Eva twisted around and whispered, “I made those myself.”
Her French accent was thick. Menessos had told me she had a chocolate shop in Terminal Tower. The huge strawberries had to be luscious and juicy, and the dark chocolate was striped with white. I reached to take one.
Menessos laid his hand on my arm. “No,” he said gently. However, he graced Eva with an angry sneer. “I said no chocolates here.”
She smiled broadly. Eating her meal had not smudged her lipstick. I wondered what brand would stay that glossy even through a meal. “I mean only to share the best of me with my superiors, my lord.”
“We discussed this already. I said no. I will not have the chocolate tainting my sweet.”
“I’ve never even heard of such a thing affecting the taste of blood.”
“My refined palate is no doubt more sensitive than your former host’s.”
I’d stayed out of their conversation, but it was clear Menessos meant to enforce his rule. Fine by me. My hand dropped back into my lap.
Eva pouted up at Menessos. “I am trying to make a good impression with her.”
“Your defiance of me has ruined that possibility.”
At his tone, Risqué eased a step back, then another. Moving the way a person backing away from a wild bear would, she put distance between her and Menessos.
“Let me reclaim it,” Eva pleaded. “Let her see how delightful my chocolates are.”
Menessos sighed, relenting. He nodded. I reached and Risqué moved in again so I could take one. As I opened my mouth, however, the vampire said, “Wait.”
“What?” I asked.
“Give it to Eva.”
This was getting weird and all eyes in the silent house were trained on us as if we were the after-dinner show. Maybe we were, but I didn’t have a script, so I did as told and held out the confection.
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