He remained still, staring at the corner where I’d just been standing before escaping his cage. “You’re acting like a woman who’s never had a man in her bed,” he said without turning around.
“And you were a frat boy rapist that night with a drunk girl in your bed.”
I didn’t mean it. I swear I didn’t. But the fear had turned me into a real bitch, and the words just spilled from my mouth. There was no taking them back. The best I could do was downplay the suggestion that I thought he was a predator. But when he turned around, the look on his face told me I’d crossed a line. I’d hit a nerve so deep we might never recover from it. Was it possible to worship and hate at the same time, because I was afraid that might be his next dilemma.
We both turned when Thomas walked into the kitchen. It was late afternoon and we had an appointment that evening in Battery Park.
“So, you folks ready to rock and roll?” He took one look at the two of us and shook his head. “Well, fuck.”
TWENTY-FOUR
Greer and I managed to put our very strained relationship on the shelf for one night, for the sake of possibly finding the vessel. Tomorrow was a new day, and we’d have plenty of time to carry on with our differences in the morning.
The plan was to meet Isabetta Falcone at the East Coast Memorial at the southern tip of Battery Park. Dr. Oxford, Greer, and I would go to the center of the memorial while Thomas, Rhom, and Loden watched from the distance.
There were more direct routes, but we decided to take the long way and walk the promenade along the Hudson River. With the others heading in from the top end, it gave us the advantage of scoping out both ends of the park to make sure we weren’t being set up for an ambush.
It was dark by the time we arrived, and the black water rolled against the promenade seawall as Lady Liberty held her torch high in the middle of New York Harbor. It was a magnificent sight, opening up my memories of seeing her for the first time from the World Trade Center. My mother had a friend who work in one of the towers. It was the Fourth of July and we were invited to come up to the fifty-eighth floor for a private viewing of what a real fireworks display looked like. I remember pressing my face against the floor-to-ceiling windows, looking out over the harbor at the explosion of color filling the sky, reflecting against the sheet of black water below.
“There it is.” Greer’s voice broke the spell of the memory. “There’s no one there.”
We walked down the plaza, past the giant granite pylons engraved with the names of thousands of servicemen lost at sea during World War II. Looking over the pylons was a massive bronze eagle gripping a wreath.
The eight pylons stood around twenty feet tall, with four on each side of the plaza.
“We’re sitting ducks with all these obstructions,” I pointed out.
Dr. Oxford looked jumpy. “One would think Isabetta would be on time for such an important meeting.”
“Yes, one would think,” Greer agreed. “Considering she has door-to-door transportation straight from home.” He nodded toward the east. “The Staten Island Ferry Terminal is just a couple blocks from here.”
I glared at him. “Don’t piss her off, Greer.”
“I just like fucking with her. If she’s on the defense, it means we’re on the offense. That’s exactly where we want to be.”
The doctor hummed nervously as his head scanned back and forth, looking for something only he might be able to see.
My eyes caught something in the distance. All three of us turned and looked down the long plaza toward the Statue of Liberty as three figures approached. The three dots got bigger, and then Isabetta Falcone stepped out of the shadows. Demitri was with her, and the short guy with the big feet.
“Alex Kelley,” she said without even glancing at Oxford or Greer. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”
“Come on, Isabetta. You knew I’d tag along.” I turned to walk away. “But I can leave if you’d like.”
A short burst of air expelled from her nostrils. “Enough games.” She finally looked at Dr. Oxford and then at Greer. “You, on the other hand—”
Greer glanced at his watch. “You’re late. What’s the matter? Ferry running a little behind tonight?”
I thought her head was going to explode as she fought to keep her pointed fingernails at her side. I could just feel the catfight itching to surface, and I had no doubt that if they were confined to a room together, he’d have some gouges to show for it.
Demitri must have sensed it, too. He took a step toward Greer and sneered.
“Not now.” Isabetta’s face relaxed, and like an obedient pit bull, Demitri stepped back in line. “I’m sure Greer meant no disrespect.”
I didn’t trust her. She was being a little bit too tolerant. I watched her like a hawk as her eyes roamed discreetly around the plaza before landing on Oxford’s hand.
“Are those the glasses?”
Oxford flipped the frames shut and slipped them into his shirt pocket. “Yes. A prototype.”
“May I?” She extended her hand.
“I mean no disrespect, but no, you may not. No one touches the specs but me.”
She didn’t look happy about being snubbed. In her eyes, I’m sure she took Oxford’s letter telling her to politely fuck off as a negotiation. “I thought we had a deal.”
“What part of my letter didn’t you understand?”
She glanced at Demitri, and he moved toward the doctor. Greer made a move, too. He gave Demitri a warning look that clarified who had the upper hand. It seemed both Isabetta and her goons had forgotten whom they were dealing with, and Greer’s past tolerances gave them a false sense of power.
“I’ve given you the wrong impression, Isabetta,” Greer cautioned. “You’d be wise to know your place.” He looked at Demitri again, and I watched the big man begin to shrink as his shoulders lowered into a submissive posture.
“Now, shall we begin? Where does your ‘source’ suggest we start looking?”
She was beginning to look as jumpy as the doctor, and I detected a telltale twitch around the corner of her mouth. Her eyes were doing that roaming thing again, only now she wasn’t as discreet about it.
I looked at Greer who seemed as suspicious as I was.
“Fuck.” He dove at me, but he was a half second too late.
My feet left the ground. Before I could process what was happening, I landed on top of one of the pylons. I twisted sideways to get a look at who or what was dragging me along the granite ledge, twenty feet above the ground. The eyes staring back at me were brown.
“You look surprised to see me, Alex. I told you I’d be back for you. Did you think I was bluffing?” Daemon’s arm wrapped around my waist tighter. His cheek slid down the side of mine, grazing my sensitive skin with the roughness of a day-old beard.
The pylon began to shake, and I imagined falling to the ground as a couple tons of granite buried me alive.
“Let her go, and I’ll consider killing you quickly.” Greer was staring at Daemon with a blackness in his eyes I’d never seen before.
Daemon laughed. “Now, you know what they say about possession and the law. Looks like I win.”
The granite began to shift again. Daemon grabbed my chin and forced me to look at Greer. I could see a small bottle in his other hand. A clear liquid splashed around the sides as I struggled against him. He tilted it toward my face. “Such beautiful skin. It would be unfortunate to destroy it. Don’t make me do that, Sinclair.”
I felt sick when I realized what was in the bottle. All Daemon cared about was taking me alive, because in the grander scheme of things, it really didn’t matter what I looked like.
Greer fell on his left knee, his eyes shutting tight from some invisible pain driving through him. Rhom came out of nowhere and pulled his boss to his feet, but Greer pushed him away and glared at Daemon with a hatred that would have incinerated an ordinary man.
Daemon moved the bottle away from my face but kept it in his hand, ready
to use it if Greer made a move. He let go of my chin and moved his hand down to my neck, forcing a strangled gag from my throat as he squeezed my airway shut.
Greer took the bait. I could feel a shift happening around me, a vibration in the air. The waves crashed against the promenade with such force, I thought the walls might break and allow the sea to swallow us.
“So the rumors are true,” Daemon murmured against my ear. “The mighty Greer Sinclair has his cock tied to the end of a very short string.” The muscles of his chest contracted with sharp jerks as a mocking laugh wheezed from his throat. “I’ll have to scrub his smell off of you.”
The battle was over without a fight. Greer would never let that liquid touch my skin. He would stand there, while the man who nearly raped me carried me away. The lesser of two evils.
Ironically, Daemon was the one who set everything in motion, my introduction to Greer Sinclair. He was the one who’d started it all, and now he would be the one to end it.
I felt refreshed and alive when I woke up, like I’d been sprinkled with stardust, or pixie powder and rainbows. Not once did I feel like I’d been abducted and dragged off by a monster who may have done terrible things to me while I slept.
The feeling disappeared the second I remembered how I got there, in a strange room with an even stranger smell of freshly baked bread filling the air.
The space was bright, but the light was coming from the lamps in the room. There were no windows.
Through a door on the right side of the room, I spotted a toilet and a sink. Other than the bed and a couple of small tables to hold the lamps, the rest of the room was empty.
I pushed the comforter back and looked at the oversized T-shirt I was wearing. It wasn’t mine.
“I took the liberty of dressing you in something more appropriate for sleeping.”
My head snapped toward the voice. Daemon was sitting in a chair behind me, in the corner on the other side of the bed.
“Don’t worry. I was very respectful about it. Although I did peek.”
I grabbed the sheet and pulled it back. “Have you been sitting there leering at me all night? That’s what perverts do, isn’t it?”
He looked at me with amusement. “Why do women always do that—clutch the sheet?”
“Are you speaking from experience?”
A subtle smile appeared. “Did you know that you curl up in a tight ball when you sleep? It must stem from some insecurity.”
“What do you want from me?” Other than the obvious, I had a sick feeling I wasn’t there just for the amulet and vessel. They could have come for me months ago, like all the rest. But there was something more going on. Daemon seemed to take a personal interest in me.
He lifted out of the chair and took his time walking around the bed. His hand fell, and his index finger ran along the blanket until it reached the outline of my leg. I nearly jerked my thigh out of its path, but he anticipated my response and retracted his hand before I could react. He liked control.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small object. Before laying it on the table next to the bed, he examined it, running his finger over the slightly yellowed surface and giving it a good sniff. It was the good luck charm I’d carried with me all my life. My mother told me it was a gift from the faeries on my fourth birthday. But I learned the truth the night Greer placed my hand on the scar at the dimple of his back where the bone had been cut. It was a piece of him, meant to serve as a powerful connection between us.
“It fell out of your pocket when I was making you more comfortable.” He picked it back up and rolled it between his fingers. “Is it bone?”
I suppressed my reaction to seeing it in his hand. “Ivory.” I lied, not wanting him to explore the source and possibly take it from me.
He flicked his eyes from the charm to my face. “It’s bone.”
“Is it?”
He swallowed it in his hand but then reconsidered and let it roll back onto the table.
I released the air trapped in my chest as my only connection to the outside world settled on the small table. I figured it had a few favors left in it, and if the magic was still there, I might be able to get Greer’s attentions.
“Are you hungry?”
Now that he brought it up, I was starving. And if he was fetching food, he wasn’t in the room. “I could use something to eat.”
He reached for my chin and lifted my eyes to his. “Then I shall feed you.”
The look of pleasure on his face made me uneasy. What was it about feeding me that gave men such a hard-on?
“Thank you,” I forced myself to say, following the false gratitude with a sweet smile. “And coffee.”
He smiled back with satisfaction. “You’re in luck. A fresh batch of cornetti should be coming out of the oven right about now.” His eyes drifted to the ceiling. “There’s a bakery above us.”
He noticed the flicker in my eyes. “Ah, you think I’ve just slipped up and given away a clue to our location. There are hundreds if not thousands of bakeries in New York. I could have just as easily said there’s a coffee shop above us. But I’m afraid you’ll be staying with us for a while, so it really wouldn’t matter if I gave you the exact address.”
“Us?”
“Ah, my manners. I haven’t explained anything, have I?”
I inched back as he sat on the edge of the bed. His eyes moved to the spot where the amulet rested under my shirt. “It’s still there. The amulet is useless without its keeper, so we saw no reason to remove it from your neck.”
“Was this all just a hoax to get your hands on me?” I couldn’t understand why they’d bothered jumping through all the hoops when they could have just snatched me from Shakespeare’s Library. Especially since he’d been there. He knew exactly where I worked.
“You and the doctor. It appears that Greer and his colleagues have made it very difficult to get to David Oxford, so we decided to bring the doctor to us. You see, it’s true. We believe the vessel is hiding in plain sight—invisible. It’s very clever of the gods, don’t you think?”
Clever, all right. If he only knew how clever Dr. Oxford was. For the sake of the doctor’s eyes, I hoped he never figured it out.
“Dr. Oxford has become almost as valuable as you, and Ms. Falcone was more than happy to reevaluate her loyalties and switch sides. Greed is quite useful. We simply asked her to make a call. As we expected, Dr. Oxford took care of the rest.”
“So you’ll use us to find it, and then we’re dead? Is that the plan? You’ve got what you want. Don’t I at least deserve to know my fate?”
His head slowly craned to look at me. “That’s the beauty of all this. It’s such a win win for us—for me. We get the prophecy, and—” His smile shut down as he realized he’d spoken too freely. “In time, Alex. It will all make sense very soon.”
“You keep saying we and us, but all I see is you.”
“You mean Greer hasn’t told you what we are?”
“You’re a Rogue,” I answered, choosing to leave out the colorful expletives that described their nature so thoroughly.
He let my words sink in. “That’s a very dramatic label we’ve been given. We prefer to think of ourselves as warriors.”
“And warrior isn’t?”
He showed no reaction to my snark. Instead, he stood up with his back to me. “You’re a guest in our castle.” When I gave no further response, he headed for the door. “I’ll get that food now.”
I heard the lock on the door engage, and then his footsteps disappeared down the hall. I grabbed the bone off the table and rubbed it between my fingers. “Come on, Greer. Don’t fail me now,” I whispered, suspecting the room was bugged.
I knew Greer could sense the bone, but it had a poor track record as an actual GPS. Maybe now that we were in the same city it would be more reliable, and he’d come through that door to take me home.
My clothes were draped over a chair in the corner. While I was getting dressed, I heard a faint
whimper coming from somewhere in the room. I followed the sound to a vent at the base of the wall. “Dr. Oxford?”
The whimpering stopped. I held my breath, thinking I’d imagined it.
“Ms. Kelley? Is that you?”
“Yes. I’m here. Are you all right?”
“I’m afraid I’ve had better day.” His voice stuttered and hitched around a stifled sob.
Fear was getting the best of him, and he sounded like he was cracking under the pressure. David Oxford was a scientist, unaccustomed to life outside his box of what could be controlled and proven. Even the vessel was within that box because its invisible properties could be explained and measured with science. On the other hand, its contents could not. I imagined he’d struggle with that if we ever found it.
“Dr. Oxford, did they hurt you?” I shuddered as I thought about his secret—his eyes. “Do they have the glasses?” I asked, referring to the 3D fakes he’d brought with him.
Pulling one over on Isabetta wasn’t brain surgery, but deceiving the Rogues was a different ball game.
Damn things are smart, Greer said to me when he first told me about them, and I’d seen Daemon’s intelligence firsthand.
“I don’t know what happened to them. I was rendered unconscious for a time. When I woke up, they were gone.”
He cleared his throat as a crack grasped his vocal chords. “I fear, Ms. Kelley, that the gift of sight may not be in my future. Can you imagine a scientist who studies the spectrum of light, without eyes? My life’s work is over.”
“Don’t even think about that, Doctor. And keep your voice down.” I whispered. “For all they know, the glasses work.”
He sighed heavily into the vent on the other side of the wall. “I’m afraid they may have figured it out.”
“Why do you say that?”
“One of them was looking at me oddly. He was staring into my eyes—smirking.”
I heard a noise in the background of Oxford’s room. It was the door opening. “They’ve come for me, Ms. Kelley,” he whispered in a small, defeated voice.
The muffled sounds of a struggle penetrated the thin drywall. I stood up and smashed my fists into the wall as the helpless man screamed. “Don’t you touch him!” I yelled.
The Blood Thief (The Fitheach Trilogy Book 2) Page 23