To my right, a graying vampire with a lean undertaker’s face made a noise of interest. He looked like a creature who lured children into alleyways with promises of candy, then stared, smiling, into their dimming eyes as he strangled the life from them. His cheeks began to dimple.
I quickly averted my gaze.
“Did I not anticipate this day, Mr. Croft?” Arnaud asked over his steepled fingers. Before I could answer, he directed himself to the others. “You see, when the poor boy and I last spoke, I told him that should we ever meet again, it would be because he had come to me.” His eyes cut back to mine. “Mr. Croft was dubious. Fortunately for him, we were monitoring the encrypted police frequencies to know he had arrived at our doorstep.”
The vampires sniggered in a way that said they knew well the stupidity of mortals.
“I also anticipated the developments taking place in the city, but we’ll get to that in a moment. First, I want to make one thing clear. As long as Mr. Croft is here, he is under my protection.”
He spoke the words as though staking a claim. I understood then that the suit I wore was more than a clean change of clothing. In vampire society, it was a mark of ownership.
I shifted, the silky fabric suddenly stifling.
Arnaud stared around the table. Each vampire nodded his understanding of the claim, some more reluctantly than others, it seemed—especially the undertaker vampire beside me. Harsh energies moved throughout the room. A reinforcement of hierarchy? I shifted again, my neck damp with sweat.
When at last the energy settled, Arnaud’s gaze returned to me. I read the glint in his stare: Do not test me, Mr. Croft, for I am the only thing keeping them from your wizard’s blood.
I nodded, hardly aware I was doing it.
“Now to the business at hand,” he said, breaking his eyes from mine. “The day has come, gentlemen. With one hand, City Hall is prying away the financial ties that have kept the city in our debt, and with the other, it seeks to drive the proverbial stake through our chests.”
“The blasted werewolves are behind it,” the youngest-looking vampire seethed.
“Now, now, Damien,” Arnaud said. “Let’s not fall victim to reductionist thinking. The werewolves have a role, yes, but there are many forces at work. The election, the upcoming bailout, the war against supernaturals—indeed, we’re facing a perfect storm. One that will wipe us out if we do not keep our heads.”
“You don’t think Penny has awakened?” Damien persisted.
When Arnaud replied, vehemence scored his voice. “Penelope Lowder is not our concern.”
I considered the vampire’s question. Had Penny recovered? Had she been the one to link me to the vampires? The idea had flickered through my mind back in my classroom. There was certainly motive, namely that I had almost killed her. And then there was the age-old enmity between werewolves and vampires, as well as a more recent enmity between Arnaud and Penny. He had rejected her as his mate, and hell hath no fury…
But something didn’t jibe.
Maybe it was the thought of Penny recovering from a prolonged coma and going directly on the offensive. A campaign of this scale would take time to plan and prepare and with no assurance of success.
Unless she’s been awake this whole time, I thought.
I looked around the table. Could the eradication program have been a pretext to a larger war between werewolves and vampires?
“And no, Penelope has not awakened,” Arnaud said to Damien, killing my idea. “Do you think I am so foolish as to not be monitoring the situation? Regardless, the wolves see opportunity in our predicament. As do the fae. We are beset on all sides.”
Though he’d brought the fae up, Arnaud didn’t seem to suspect them of outing the vampires.
“Something to share, Mr. Croft?” he asked.
I couldn’t think about the fae without thinking about Caroline. The idea that she may have played a role in my betrayal savaged my heart. Still, a competing instinct to protect her persisted. Sensing the emotions clashing inside me, Arnaud arched a slender eyebrow.
“No,” I said quietly.
“Very well.”
Arnaud dropped his gaze. I didn’t realize a control pad was inset in the table above his lap until he tapped something. The paneled wall behind him rotated to become a large flat screen. The screen showed a satellite image of skyscraper-packed lower Manhattan, its northern boundary demarcated by the Wall. I noticed that the streets beyond the Wall had been cleared for several blocks, and…
I squinted forward. Was that a line of tanks?
“We are under siege,” Arnaud confirmed. “Tanks rumble from the north. Attack helicopters circle the skies. Gunboats have yet to appear, but they’re coming. Fortunately, we keep an impressive military stock of our own. Defensively, we have land, air, and sea covered.”
Along the top of the zoomed-in Wall, members of the vampires’ security force manned what appeared to be anti-tank missiles. On the roofs of skyscrapers, anti-aircraft guns swiveled, tracking the helicopters’ movements. The waterfront was manned as well, it appeared.
“Feeling safer, Mr. Croft?” Arnaud asked.
“For right now, yeah,” I admitted. “But we’re cut off. Nothing comes in or goes out.”
“If you’re worried about sustenance, you needn’t. My fellow executives and I have our associates.” Arnaud was referring to the blood slaves, from whom they could feed indefinitely. “As for you, we have independent sources of energy and clean water, as well as a large store of nonperishable goods. While you’re inside our district, you’ll want for nothing.”
But what do you want? I wondered.
Instead, I asked, “What about the supernaturals? The wolves and the fae?”
“We’ll worry about them when the time comes,” he said. “Though I do wish you would have brought your fellows. To take nothing away from you, Mr. Croft, but a dozen wizards are better than one.”
Especially when that one wizard is essentially unarmed, I thought. Absent my staff, sword, and spell items, what power I wielded was wild and would deplete quickly. But I stuffed such worries away, not wanting Arnaud to pick up on them and decide I wasn’t worth protecting.
“What’s the end game?” I asked.
Before Arnaud could answer, the door to the conference room opened. I turned to find Zarko holding a phone.
“It’s Mayor Lowder, sir,” he said to Arnaud. “He would like to speak with you.”
Arnaud nodded as though he’d been expecting the call. Zarko set the phone on the table in front of him and activated the handless feature. Arnaud rested an arm over the back of his chair and laced his fingers.
“I’m disappointed in you, Mayor,” he said. “I took you at your word.”
I realized he was talking about the deal he had struck with Budge in which the vampire had protected the mayor’s stepdaughter in exchange for amnesty. A hedge, he’d called it.
“You’re disappointed?” Budge shot back. “How do you think I feel when I find out the star of my program is in your pay, trying to sabotage everything?”
“Bunch of B.S.,” I muttered, anger toward the fae coiling my insides.
Arnaud showed a hand. “If you’re referring to young Mr. Croft, he was not working at my behest, I assure you. He was entirely in your service, his intentions quite golden, actually.”
“Was that him I just heard in the background?” Budge asked.
“I won’t deny his presence among us, but where else was he to have gone? It’s not as though you left him a choice, sending the wolves after him. Do you think they would have listened patiently, chins on their paws, while he pled his innocence? Even you’re not that obtuse, Mayor.”
“Well, we’ve got a problem.”
“It would appear so,” Arnaud replied, picking at a talon as though his fortress wasn’t under siege.
“I’ve got thirty-six men in the morgue, and a city convinced that, not only did Everson put them there, but that he’s working for you.
Oh yeah, and that you’re all vampires.”
“And why should that concern me?” Arnaud asked.
“Have you looked out your window lately?” Budge said, incredulous.
“I have, Mayor. But you and I both know that the charges are mostly falsehoods.”
The phone’s speaker hummed for several seconds, and I imagined the mayor consulting with someone off to the side. Caroline? At last, he cleared his throat and said, “We’ll pull back if you give us Everson. While we deal with him, I’ll, ah, work on putting out the vampire rumors.”
Give us Everson, Budge was saying, and war will be averted.
I pinched the corners of my eyes with a finger and thumb, trying to piece together what was happening on the mayor’s end. If Caroline was there advising him, was she trying to help me? Or would I be grabbed and thrown into a trial for public consumption? A trial seemed the logical next step in the fae’s campaign. They had already aroused the city’s sympathies and fears; now they could stoke a communal lust for justice—all to Budge’s and the fae’s benefit. The fae would get their preferred candidate and, using the vampire rumor as leverage against Arnaud, access to the lower portal. That may have been their plan all along.
One in which I’d served as unwitting pawn.
When I lowered my hand, Arnaud’s fellow executives were watching me. Loathing hardened their unblinking eyes. I was a threat to their security. They wanted me gone. Could I blame them? If I was in their position, I’d no doubt want the same. And if turning myself in meant preventing a war in which innocents could be killed, maybe I didn’t have a choice.
I cleared my dry throat, but Arnaud showed me his palm.
“I’m afraid I can’t accede to your request, Mayor,” he said.
I blinked in surprise. Several of the vampires hissed their protests.
“Why not?” the mayor demanded.
“Because I know a bluff when I hear one.”
Budge let out an aggrieved sigh. “You’re not leaving me much choice, then.”
“I’ll trust you to make the right call,” Arnaud said. “Your city is depending on you.”
Budge raised his voice. “Everson, if you’re there—”
“Good day, Mayor,” Arnaud said and disconnected the call. He signaled for Zarko to remove the phone from the conference room.
Around me, the vampires’ protests grew into bat-like shrieks. Without warning, something slammed into me. I toppled backwards in my chair and landed hard against the floor. The young-looking vampire was on top of me, pupils shrinking inside bright yellow irises, spiny teeth sprouting from his gums.
“You’ll get us killed!” he screamed, and lunged for my throat.
A fist knocked Damien off me. By the time I straightened, Arnaud had the vampire pinned high against the wall. “Did I not say the wizard was under my protection?” he seethed, an inch from Damien’s twisting face. “Subvert my authority again, and you will be killed.”
Arnaud tossed the vampire aside and returned to the head of the table.
Damien shuffled back to his own seat, grumbling but chastised. The remaining vampires stopped screeching, their eyes shifting between me and Arnaud.
“My apologies,” Arnaud said as I stood and righted my chair. “My fellow executives are on edge, and perhaps understandably. There is much at stake. However…” He peered around the table. “…I know what I’m doing. The eradication program would eventually have included us all. That day has only been moved up, an opportunity we should be embracing, not wringing our hands over like Nervous Nellies. The city has no intention of sparing us and never did. So now comes the question.” Arnaud leveled his eyes at me as I sat again. “Will you renew the Pact between our kinds and defend our rightful place in this city? Or will you bow to the fears and prejudices of humanity?”
His musky scent grew inside the room, making my heart slam harder. I raised my eyes to the satellite image. The gunboats Arnaud had mentioned earlier were rushing in to surround lower Manhattan.
“I need to know your endgame,” I said.
“There’s a fitting quote, Mr. Croft: ‘War is the continuation of politics by other means.’” He gave an almost paternal smile. “Don’t be fooled by the show of force. What’s happening is nothing more than politics writ large. All we need do is force a stalemate. Make it so further engagement will be too costly for the mayor’s reelection chances.”
“So your strategy is purely defensive?” I asked to be sure.
“We’ve nothing to gain by attacking the city,” he replied. “With a successful stand, we win by default. The mayor will have no choice but to seek a negotiated settlement. We may have to make a concession or two, yes, but we’ll find the ground on which we presently stand more solid. And that would include you, Mr. Croft, for whom the ground underfoot must feel like quicksand.”
“Assuming we’re successful,” I said.
“Trust me.” Arnaud’s eyes gleamed. “I’ve anticipated this day.”
A sick shiver passed through me. Trust me. As if I could ever trust someone so vile. But something in his words carried me back to my final meeting with Lady Bastet. There had been a moment when the mystic had stared into me, her third eye probing some future horizon. And what was it she’d said when she’d returned? Trust in the one you trust least?
I lowered my gaze back to Arnaud.
The one I trusted least was right in front of me.
“I’ll repeat my offer from the bar,” Arnaud said.
He reached into his shirt pocket and held out a silver band. His yellowing talons scraped as he turned the signet around to face me. I stared at a rearing dragon. Grandpa’s ring. He was offering to return it to me. All I had to do was renew the strategic alliance between our kinds.
Trust in the one you trust least.
I clenched my jaw. How in the hell could I trust a monster?
“What say you?” Arnaud pressed.
26
I eyed the ring Arnaud’s blood slave had broken my finger to remove. Containing the power of the Brasov Pact, the ring was a deterrent against vampire aggression. If I renewed the Pact, that power would only be enhanced. Arnaud and his ilk wouldn’t be able to touch me.
“The offer will not stand forever,” Arnaud said.
My legs tensed, as though to stand and claim the ring, but the rational part of my mind resisted. Aligning with Arnaud might mean protection, but at what cost? I would be committing to a war against City Hall as well as the werewolves, maybe even the fae. And something told me it wouldn’t play out as neatly as Arnaud was forecasting.
Trust in the one you trust least. Lady Bastet’s remembered words again.
Around me, Arnaud’s musk was strengthening, stoking my adrenaline. I was having trouble breathing. As the ring glinted out in front of me, I felt pressed in from all sides.
“I need to make a phone call,” I blurted out.
“To whom?” Arnaud asked, watching me for a lie.
“Detective Vega.”
“For what purpose?”
My gaze moved around the table. I couldn’t reason in here. My thoughts were slamming together. I needed to know what was happening outside, and Vega would give it to me straight.
“Information,” I answered.
“Look at the screen, Mr. Croft. There is all the information you need.”
“It will only take a minute.”
Arnaud closed his fist around the ring. “Very well,” he said. “Through that door, you will find a small office with a phone. You have exactly one minute.”
I stared at him, making sure I’d heard him right.
“Run along,” he said. “The second hand is ticking.”
I hurried through the door he’d indicated and closed it behind me. A conference phone sat on one end of a desk. For a moment I considered calling Caroline, but I doubted her offer to help me still stood. Besides, there was too much she hadn’t told me, and I wasn’t going to waste my one minute on more vagueness. I pulled D
etective Vega’s business card from my wallet and dialed her cell.
“Vega,” she answered.
“Before you say anything, let me explain—”
“Croft,” she whispered. “What in the hell are you doing?”
“I ended up at Arnaud’s, yeah. But listen, listen, listen,” I said over the expected outburst. “I didn’t have a choice. The wolves caught my scent. I got trapped in the subway tunnels and had nowhere to go but downtown. His men grabbed me at the Wall.” All true on the surface.
She was quiet for a moment. “You’re okay?”
“For right now,” I said. “How about you?”
“Yeah. Told the officers you kicked my gun away and jumped out the window. But what in the hell are you gonna do now?”
“How bad is it out there?” I asked.
“On a scale of one to ten? Twenty. We’ve got just about every piece of military equipment aimed at the Financial District. There are some in the chain who want to start blasting.”
“Where are you?”
“Police Plaza … inactive duty because of my knee.”
The acidic churning in my stomach abated slightly. Vega wouldn’t be involved in any fighting. “The mayor made Arnaud an offer,” I said. “Turn me over and he’ll pull back, quash the vampire rumors.”
Vega snorted. “Budge would have a better chance putting out a volcano with a bucket of water.”
That was what I’d been afraid of.
“The story’s already caught fire, huh?” I asked.
“Put it this way. If you’re looking for a crucifix or bulb of garlic, every store in the five boroughs sold out this morning.” She lowered her voice further. “And the government security guards, Croft. They’re working with the NYPD in ways I’ve never seen.”
“The werewolves,” I muttered. “Who’s in charge?”
“Hard to say. Cole is down at command-and-control, but this feels higher up the chain. I could try to—”
“No, no,” I said, seeing where she was going. “You’ve already helped me enough.”
She’d also given me the straight answers I needed. Arnaud was right, dammit. The city meant war.
“I don’t know how to tell you this, Croft. But you’re trapped.”
Purge City (Prof Croft Book 3) Page 17