The old woman shook her head, but all Ben could see was the tearful girl on the museum bench, fighting back tears in front of her dead uncle’s paintings.
Running away.
Luring him in.
Giovanni’s laughter on the phone.
“You do have a type, don’t you?”
Emilie smiling at him in the sunlight, dressed in a yellow sundress outside his regular haunt.
So what are the chances… in a city this big?
What were the chances that he’d randomly run into Emilie Mandel, a girl who pushed every one of his buttons, twice in the space of a week? A girl with a brilliant laugh and a smart mouth. A girl thrown in his path, tied to an art mystery with a sympathetic grandmother and a noble mission to retrieve a work of art stolen from her family by the Nazis.
A mystery tailor-made to tempt him.
So what are the chances?
“I don’t believe in chance,” Ben muttered.
Mrs. Clark said, “What?”
Ben forced himself to keep talking. “The people renting this place, did you get their names?”
Her brown eyes were wide. “Didn’t you say you were dating their granddaughter? You don’t know their names?”
The ice in his stomach moved up to his chest and began to burn. He forced a smile to his face. “A misunderstanding, ma’am. Did you say you got their names?”
“She called herself Mimi. I thought it was cute. I never saw the son.”
“The son?”
“Yes.” She nodded. “She had her son with her, but he was an odd man.”
“And when did they move in?”
“Three… four months ago, maybe? It was a long rental.” She wrinkled her nose. “You’re really not supposed to rent like that in this building, but most of the people have been so nice I didn’t want to say anything. But this family…”
“What?” Ben walked to the hallway and offered his arm to Mrs. Clark. “Was there something unusual about them?”
Ben began walking Mrs. Clark to the door. He’d come back to search the apartment later if he needed to, but instinct told him whoever Emilie and her “grandmother” had been, they were good enough not to have left anything behind.
Mrs. Clark said, “I thought it was just the older woman, Mimi, and her son. And the son was strange. Had an accent, but I’m not sure from where. The girl I only saw a few times. I thought she was visiting the son. She didn’t live with them, I can tell you that.”
His chest might have been burning, but his voice was calm. “I’d like the number of the owner, the grandson you mentioned, if you still have it.”
“Of course.” She patted his arm. “What a thing! To move on and forget to tell your own boyfriend. Who would do something like that? I don’t know if she’s the right girl for a thoughtful young man like you.”
Ben walked the old woman to her apartment and opened the door for her, pulling out his phone as soon as she walked in to look for the landlord’s number. He tapped on Emilie’s name and didn’t blink when he heard her voice on the recording.
“I will find you,” he said in a low voice. “You have no idea what you’ve done.”
23
Tenzin was frying eggs and rice when Ben came home. He slammed the door and sat at the counter. He didn’t say a word, but she could read his face better than any human she’d ever known. She’d studied his expressions and mannerisms as if he was her own personal map, her guide to the foreign world she’d woken in five years before.
Ben was angry.
No, he was livid.
When Ben was truly angry, he did the opposite of most humans. Most humans yelled or exploded outward. With Ben, the explosion was inward and it quickly turned from hot to cold.
Giovanni’s influence? Maybe. But she suspected that part of Ben had been forged long before his fire vampire uncle had found and adopted him. She paused for a moment, then went back to frying the rice.
“Tell me when you’re ready,” she said quietly.
He didn’t wait long. “We didn’t steal the painting back. We just stole it.”
Tenzin looked up and she was…
Not surprised.
“So the woman—”
“I don’t know what her real name is, but the apartment is empty. It was a furnished rental.”
Tenzin nodded. “And the grandmother?”
“Gone.”
“The painting?”
“Gone.”
Tenzin flipped over the scrambled eggs. “The clippings you showed me? The copies and pictures you took?”
“Forged, probably,” Ben said. “It’s not that hard to forge things. You and I both know that. The clippings she could have collected or faked. The pictures could have been anyone.”
Tenzin turned the rice and added a few more drops of sesame oil.
“You’re not shocked,” Ben said.
“No.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
She drew in a breath and let it out slowly. “I didn’t know for sure. She might have been legitimate. It was doubtful, but possible.”
“But you didn’t feel the need to tell me you were suspicious?” His voice was flat and cold enough to concern her.
“Would you have listened?” she asked.
“If you told me you thought the woman was conning me? Yes, I would have listened.” He carefully gripped the counter. “What the hell, Tenzin?”
She raised her cooking chopsticks. “It wasn’t about the woman.”
“What are you talking about?”
“It wasn’t. About. The woman,” she said again, looking him in the eye. “You might—might!—have listened if it was just the woman. But you weren’t obsessed with the woman.”
Ben was silent.
“You wanted to find that painting,” she said. “You were addicted to the mystery, and you wanted to take it. Having Emilie in the background just gave you an excuse. It made you a knight in armor instead of a thief.”
He curled his lip. “She lied to me. She played me.”
She nodded. “And she was quite good too. Did you have sex with her?”
“None of your business,” he said through gritted teeth.
“That means yes.” Tenzin went back to frying the rice. “That always makes it worse somehow, doesn’t it? I don’t know why, but it does.”
“Tenzin—”
“Do you want me to kill her?”
Ben blinked. “What?”
Tenzin looked up to meet his eyes. “Think very carefully, Benjamin. Because I will.”
“No.” The ice had cracked. “I don’t want you to kill Emilie. Or whatever her name is. I’m sure it’s not Emilie.”
“Okay.”
“Jesus, Tenzin. I just want the painting back.”
“I know. Because it was never about the woman.” Tenzin grabbed a plate and served him food. Food always made him more levelheaded. “It was about the painting. The anger you’re feeling is about her fooling you. It is about your pride.”
Ben glared at the eggs and rice, but he picked up his chopsticks and started eating. “It’s not just about my pride, Tenzin.”
“No?”
“We stole a valuable painting—a painting with a vampire in it—from one of Cormac O’Brien’s guests.”
“Yes, we did.”
He took a deep breath. “Should I call Gio?”
“Why? Do you think we can’t get it back?” She leaned across the counter and smiled. “This is the fun part, Benjamin. This is the revenge.”
At nightfall, Tenzin left Ben fiddling with his computer while she took off into the night. She landed on top of Cormac O’Brien’s building and waited for the guard to find her.
“I need a word with him,” she said. “When he has a minute.”
The guard said, “He’s busy tonight.”
“He’ll want to talk with me.” She perched on top of a water tower and waited for Cormac to show. It only took ten minutes.
The earth vampire was we
aring a pair of jeans and a black T-shirt that night. No glasses. No pipe. The affectations were gone and the look in his eye was brutal. He waved the guards away, leaving them alone on the roof.
“Good evening, Cormac.”
“Tenzin.”
“How are you this evening?”
“Cut the shit.” He put his hands in his pockets. “You know, when I allowed you to set up house in my city, I knew you’d cause problems. It wasn’t a question. The only real question was if the benefit of you owing me a few favors and increasing trade would be enough to offset the annoyance of having you around.”
It’s amusing that you thought you had a choice in the matter. Tenzin didn’t say it aloud. She liked Cormac most of the time. “You probably overestimated how much I was going to increase trade.”
“That fucking human of yours had something to do with this,” Cormac spit out. “And he involved my own daughter this time, Tenzin. So stop pissing me off.”
She floated down to stand in front of him. She looked up and met his eyes. “I’m not going to tell you anything when you think you know everything.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “Then why are you here?”
“To remind you that everyone starts somewhere and some lessons are harder than others.”
“I don’t need any of your Zen bullshit tonight. I have a guest who is furious, Tenzin. A woman who was in serious negotiations with me about a distribution agreement that could change the future of my clan. A guest I made assurances to when I guaranteed the safety of her personal art collection she brought to the city as a gesture of good will.”
“She should have kept the second painting at the museum then,” Tenzin said. “Their security is a lot tighter than yours.”
Cormac exploded. “Do you want me to fucking kill you both?”
In the blink of an eye, Tenzin flew into his face and grabbed him by the throat, digging her nails into his windpipe and cutting off his speech.
“You could try,” she said in a singsong voice. “But you know how that would end, my friend.”
He curled his lip, but she saw him grabbing control of his temper.
“Here is what will happen,” she said quietly, still holding his throat. “You will buy me a little time. Just a little. I don’t need much. Is that understood?”
He nodded his head slightly, but she didn’t release him.
“After that time, you will have Midnight Labyrinth back and there will be no further questions.” She released him. “Understood?”
Cormac rubbed his throat. “Keep your human away from my daughter.”
“For the last time, Ben is not my human. And your daughter could find far less honorable people to socialize with, believe me.”
“Three days,” he said.
She waved a hand. “More than enough time. It only took me thirty minutes to steal it.” Tenzin saw Cormac start to boil again. “Consider this a favor. You really do need to work on your security.” She stepped to the edge of the building, ready to fly to her next meeting. Cormac would be fine. Pissed off, but fine.
Which was… his usual state of being, if she thought about it. So really, no harm done.
“You know why she couldn’t keep it at the museum,” he said. “Don’t you?”
“I know.” Tenzin stepped up on the ledge.
“Things are volatile in France. She has enemies.”
“Clearly. They went to a lot of trouble to obtain that painting. If she wanted to be safe, she should have destroyed it.”
Cormac’s voice softened. “It was her brother’s work. Would you?”
Interesting. So that part of the story was true.
“Who suggested she bring her art collection here?” Tenzin stared down at her feet as they inched over the ledge.
Cormac was silent behind her.
“Was it Ennis?” she asked.
“He has connections at the museum. He’d heard about the surrealist exhibition and knew the Lady—”
“I don’t need to know any of this to get the painting back,” she said. “But think about how long it took you to answer me.”
There was another long pause before Cormac spoke. “He’s my brother.”
Tenzin turned back to him. “I used to have brothers too. Three days, Cormac O’Brien. Goodbye.”
She took some time to check in at DePaul and Sons. She liked the old man and there was no need for him to feel any blowback from their actions. If there was, she’d have to speak to Cormac again. She opened the alley door and walked in.
A Caucasian man in his thirties looked up from his workbench. “Oh! You’re back early.”
“Is my frame ready?”
“I’m afraid not,” he said.
Tenzin glanced around the shop as he spoke.
“My father just doesn’t work as fast as he used to,” the young man said in a lower voice. “Are you sure I can’t refer you to a proper framing shop? We know several who deal with customers like yourself who need privacy.”
“I’d rather keep my business here,” she said. “I don’t mind waiting.”
“Of course.” He stood. “Would you like to see the progress?”
An older man stuck his head into the hall. “Bill, were you… Oh! Hello again.”
“Hello. I came to check on my piece, but I’m happy to wait.” Reassured that nothing was amiss with the old man and his son, Tenzin walked back to the door. “Please call my assistant when the frame is finished.”
“Of course. Are you sure we can’t—”
Tenzin walked out the door before he could finish. Which was fine. DePaul and Sons was a valuable business for just that reason. They accepted the unusual with no questions asked, but they wouldn’t be moving this stolen piece. No, whoever Emilie was working with would have other channels. Tenzin walked farther into the shadowy alley and took to the air again.
Her last stop of the night was Gavin Wallace. Tenzin found the wind vampire on his roof, sitting in the low light of the pool area, reading the newspaper while Chloe snoozed on a lounge chair next to him. Tenzin sat on his other side and waited for him to acknowledge her.
After a few minutes, he set the paper aside. “Can I get you a drink?”
“I appreciate that about you,” Tenzin said.
“What’s that?”
“You honor hospitality,” she said. “Even when a visit isn’t in your plans—even if you don’t particularly like a person—you honor the ritual of hospitality.”
“Fuck’s sake,” he muttered. “I’m just offering you a drink; it’s not a sacred ritual.”
“It was,” she said. “For a long time.”
“What is your purpose here, Tenzin? Normally I’d say this is far too soon to socialize after a job, but as Ben seems determined to make us all friends, there appears to be no avoiding it.”
Tenzin glanced over at Chloe, but the girl was still sleeping soundly.
She looked back at Gavin. “You’re taking my advice.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Fine.” She kicked her legs up on the lounge chair and crossed her ankles. “I like her. I consider her a friend.”
“Yes, so do I.”
“Do you understand her situation?”
“Probably more than you.”
Tenzin turned to meet his eyes. “Do you think so?”
Gavin looked away. “You didn’t come here to talk about Chloe.”
“No, I came here to talk about Ben.”
“He having pangs of conscience?” Gavin curled his lip. “If he is, tell him he can assuage them by paying me back for that bottle of wine.”
“I’ll pay you for the wine.”
Gavin narrowed his eyes. “Why are you paying for Ben’s wine?”
Tenzin let out a long breath. “Do you remember the first time someone used you to steal something?”
The Scotsman let out a long and delightfully colorful string of curses. Tenzin had to smile. Scottish curses trul
y were amazing. She needed to go back to the Highlands for a visit.
“That girl,” Gavin muttered after he’d vented his ire. “That fucking girl. I knew something was off with her.”
“I did too, but…”
A long silence filled the air between them.
“She was actually quite good,” Gavin admitted.
“Yes, I thought the same thing.”
“Dinna come on too strong.”
“Running away after the first meeting was a brilliant move,” Tenzin said. “She could not have drawn him in faster after that.”
“You saw them at the gala. She sold it. Ben might not like to admit it after this, but she had some genuine emotion for him. There was chemistry and you canna fake that.”
“The best jobs are that way.” Tenzin swung her legs over the lounge chair and sat up straight. “But now he knows her.”
“Yes,” Gavin said, sitting up straight. “And she knows him. She knew him.”
“Yes.”
“You think this was personal.”
“I do,” Tenzin said.
“That girl was human,” he continued. “Someone trained her. Hired her. But why go to all the trouble to have Ben steal the painting? If you’re skilled enough to run that job, you’d be skilled enough to get the painting yourself. Why use Ben?”
“To tarnish his reputation? Make him leave New York?”
Gavin raised his eyebrows. “Or make you leave.”
That was a valid point. If Ben left New York, Tenzin would leave with him.
Tenzin was having fun brainstorming with Gavin. The vampire was far less cranky when he was discussing illegal activities than when he was discussing his legitimate business. “Who do you think benefits from us leaving?”
Gavin said, “I can think of an earth vampire who’d be more than happy for you not to have his brother’s ear.”
“Ennis?”
Gavin nodded.
“That’s a possibility.”
Silence fell between them.
Finally Gavin said, “He’ll be brooding over this for a good long while, won’t he?”
“I think getting the painting back will help.” She sighed. “I’m going to end up owing you another favor.”
Gavin smiled again. “I canna object to that.”
Midnight Labyrinth: An Elemental Legacy Novel Page 25