by Meg Cabot
“No.” Emil reached into the pocket of his coat and produced a pamphlet, which he handed Lucien. “You need to leave this place. Now.”
Lucien looked down at the purple-and-gold pamphlet, which was advertising a new exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. “Vatican Treasures: A Journey Through Faith and Art. What could this possibly have to do with me?”
“The exhibit features rare art objects and historical documents relating to the evolution of the Church and the papacy,” Emil explained. “It’s one of the largest collections the Vatican has ever released to tour the world. It includes more than five hundred objects, many of which have never before been on public view. Its first stop is the Metropolitan.”
“This isn’t a show I’m particularly eager to rush out to see,” Lucien said wryly. “But I still fail to see how it endangers me.”
“Lucien, I’ve looked at the catalog. One of the objects on display dates back to the days of your father, before his death. His original death. It’s a certain illuminated manuscript.”
Lucien looked puzzled. “So?”
“It’s a book of hours dating from the fifteenth century. It’s said to have come from the region near Poenari Castle . . . and from the description, to have been a gift to a young princess upon her betrothal from her doting husband-to-be.”
Lucien stared at him for a full minute. He wasn’t certain he’d heard him correctly. He had spent a lot of time underground lately, living in darkness . . . absorbing the darkness, trying to become one with the darkness.
The darkness, however, had a way of playing with a man’s mind.
“My mother’s book of hours?” he finally croaked. “How is that even possible? That was lost when I was captured by the Ottomans, before my father . . .” His voice trailed off. The memory of what his father had done—not just to him, but to Emil—was too painful for either of them ever to mention. Lucien’s father had made them what they were.
He’d then gone on to kill what scholars estimated were tens of thousands of human beings. But anyone who’d been around at the time knew the number was actually much higher than that.
Lucien had spent five hundred years swearing he would never be anything like his father.
But recently he’d come to realize that the only way he was ever going to get what he desired was to become a little more like his father.
Emil coughed. “Yes,” he said. “Well, I only mention it because it seems to me that—”
“The Vatican has had it?” Lucien was still stunned. “All this time?”
“Those were confusing times,” Emil said soothingly. “Especially after your father . . . well.” He fell tactfully silent.
Lucien leaped to his feet and began to pace the length of the carpets.
“That book,” he said. “Last night, Meena spoke of it.”
“But that means . . .” Emil looked appalled. “My lord, you know what that means. If it’s in the collection, it can only mean she had something to do with it being placed there.”
“No,” Lucien said. “I’m certain she didn’t. She said she saw it in a dream.”
Lucien closed, then opened, his fists, hardly aware of the gesture. Practically the only happy memories he had from his childhood were about that book. His mother had taught him to read from it.
That was why he’d found Meena’s dream so disturbing. The scene she’d described—of the dark-haired woman sitting by a window, turning the pages of an illuminated manuscript with a young boy—seemed almost to have been plucked from his mind.
It was one of the images he’d been hoping so desperately that the Mannette would rob him of forever, because he found that it—like the knowledge that Meena Harper existed, but would not be with him—did nothing but torment him.
How could this be happening now, when he was so close? And why? Was this some kind of last temptation, a test, to see if he was finally worthy of the dark crown?
Or was it something else? An unprecedented release from the Vatican of historical documents and works of art? An exhibit of those objects at a museum in the city where he was rumored to be dwelling? And then . . .
“Last night,” he murmured, stunned. “It was all a setup. It had to be. To make sure I’d come crawling out of my lair, if I was still in the vicinity. And she was the bait.”
“I’m not sure I quite follow you, sir,” Emil said. “Are you speaking of Ms. Harper?”
Lucien ignored him. “She just didn’t know it. I’d swear she didn’t know it. Those damned, soulless bastards.”
“Sire,” Emil said. “I don’t know who you’re talking about. Who’s a damned, soulless bastard?”
“Not us this time, Emil.” Lucien shook his head. “Believe it or not. Not one of us.”
“Well,” Emil replied. “We always knew they were, sire. That’s why I came as soon as I heard. I knew you would be in need of me. I suggest you let me take you from here as soon as possible. It’s obvious that however strong the powers of this place might once have been, they aren’t strong enough now to match the powers of whatever is happening within the Palatine. Mary Lou and I will find another place for you to—”
“No,” Lucien said, shaking his head. “No need. I’ll go. I always planned on going eventually. But not until I’m ready.” He threw Emil a steely glance. “And I won’t leave without that which rightfully belongs to me.”
Emil set down his wineglass with a sigh.
“My lord, retrieving the book is exactly what they’ll be expecting you to do. It’s undoubtedly why they put it in the collection in the first place. It’s the Vatican. Tonight is the gala to celebrate the exhibit’s grand opening in the U.S. Everyone from the archdiocese is going to be there. And, I suspect, everyone from the Palatine. They’ll be lying in wait.”
“That,” Lucien said, a red glow growing in his eyes, “is what I am counting on.”
“So,” Emil said, looking uncomfortable, “when you said you won’t leave without that which rightfully belongs to you, you weren’t referring strictly to your mother’s book.”
“I was not,” Lucien said.
Emil picked his wineglass back up and drained it.
“I was afraid of that,” he said.
Chapter Fourteen
Jon lifted up his sunglasses, squinting at the object perched on the edge of the roof.
“Can you see any difference?” he asked.
“I think he’s leering at you,” his best friend, Adam, said.
“I don’t care about his expression,” Jon said. “Is he dead?”
“Well,” Adam said. “Considering he was never alive to begin with, it’s kind of hard to tell.”
Jon scowled. Adam was right. The garden gnome balanced between the roof of his building and the one next door not only showed no sign of having been shot, it did appear to be wearing a slightly mocking expression.
Jon ran his hand over the stubble where his muttonchops were growing in, just not as quickly as he might have hoped. He had a lot of time to think during his shift behind the counter at the Beanery—except when Yalena came in, before her shift at the thrift shop next door, which always distracted him—and he’d decided that he might stand a better chance of getting hired by the Palatine Guard if he looked the part. Alaric Wulf, for example, had that kind of blond Captain America thing going on.
Jon knew he was never going to achieve that level of awesomeness, but he could probably get away with a little more Wolverine in his personal style.
He glanced at Adam. Adam, on the other hand, was never going to be anything more than the nerdy sidekick. It wasn’t his fault, really. It was simply the role he’d been born to. Jon was actually a little relieved it wasn’t the role he’d been relegated to. That would fully suck.
“Maybe it works and gnomes are immune to UV rays,” Adam offered.
Definitely nerdy si
dekick.
“Gnomes are immune to UV rays,” Jon said. “Especially ones made out of plaster. I already explained that this was just a hypothetical.”
“Then I guess I don’t really get why you’re shooting at one.” Adam sank into the closest folding deck chair, then reached down to lift his baby, Joanie, from her car seat and pull her onto his lap.
Joanie, unfortunately, didn’t like that. She let out a wail loud enough to startle the pigeons roosting on a nearby cable wire. They took off into the air with a flutter.
Adam hastily removed his hands, saying, “Sorry, I forgot.”
Jack Bauer, who was sprawled in the shade of the baby seat, lifted his head to shoot both men an annoyed look. As soon as Adam leaned back in his chair, the dog lay back down and relaxed. Joanie stopped crying and began to coo contentedly.
“What was that all about?” Jon asked.
“Dogs,” Adam said with a sigh. “The kid is nuts about them. Especially that one. I don’t know why.”
“Oh,” Jon said. “Probably because she feels safe and secure around him, seeing as how he’s a demon-scenting dog. I bet she picked up a little bit of her mother’s unease about vampires from the womb.”
Adam sighed again. “Great. Like I don’t have enough problems. Now I’ve got a baby who loves vampire-hunting dogs, a wife who’s so terrified of demons that she’s repressed all memory that they exist, and a best friend who won’t talk about anything else. Can we please change the subject?”
“No problem,” Jon said.
He folded himself into the deck chair beside Adam’s, then reached for a cold one from the cooler between them. It actually didn’t get much better than this, he thought. His dog, his best bud, an actual Bud, and his best bud’s baby, chilling out on the roof, with the sounds of the city moving below them. He could hear the not-so-distant roar of the San Gennaro Festival farther on down the street, the carnival music of the Ferris wheel, the guys at the food booths hawking their wares. When the breeze blew just right, he could smell fried mozzarella sticks and roast pork.
Life was good.
He patted the object in his lap, which looked like a hair dryer, only bulkier, and much less streamlined. “I’m telling you, dude, if I can get this thing to work, Leisha doesn’t have to worry anymore. And neither do you, since you helped with the design. That little girl’s future is going to be made.”
“I told you. Leisha doesn’t remember what happened that night at St. George’s,” Adam pointed out, “and I actually prefer it that way. And do you honestly think that you’re going to be able to get hired by the most elite demon-fighting force on the planet just by inventing a gun that uses UV rays to kill vampires?”
“Why not?” Jon asked. “Wouldn’t you rather shoot a vampire from a hundred feet away, as opposed to staking him in the heart from a foot away, and get so close to those fangs?”
“I guess,” Adam said, with a shrug.
“Exactly,” Jon said. “Police forces already use spectroscopy technology to detect trace evidence, like blood and residue left by chemicals used in meth-making labs. I’m just applying it in a new way. And I’ve doubled the amount of UV filaments in the mirrored chamber, to intensify and focus the ray. It should work.” He looked down at the gun in his lap. “It’s got to.”
“That’s ultraviolet light,” Adam said. “It isn’t sunlight. How do you know UV light does anything to vampires?”
“It’s what grows plants, doesn’t it?” Jon demanded. “Where do you think I got the filaments?”
“Oh,” Adam said. The baby had leaned over and was grabbing handfuls of Jack Bauer’s fur. The dog looked up inquiringly, saw that it was just Joanie, yawned, and went back to sleep. “Sorry. I forgot. Those pothead friends of yours?”
“They’re horticulturists, Adam,” Jon said. “Not potheads. They’re providing a service to people in need. Such as cancer patients.”
“Got it,” Adam said.
“And don’t forget Meena’s next-door neighbors. Remember?”
“Oh, right,” he said. “The ones who turned out to be vampires.”
“Right. They were fine as long as they didn’t walk into any direct sunlight. They had UV-ray coating on all their windows. I’m telling you, the SuperStaker is going to sell itself.”
“I suppose,” Adam said noncommittally.
“I guess we should talk to Meena about finding a real vampire to test it out on first, before we schedule a meeting with the Wulf Man. You know. To make sure it really dusts vamps before we go bragging that it works. Wouldn’t want to make fools of ourselves.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time,” Adam said.
“True. There are these guys who come into the Beanery every Sunday . . . I swear they could be blood junkies. They get Americanos and sit there nursing them for, like, hours, staring at their laptops. They don’t even look at Yalena when she comes in. What’s up with that? It’s not normal. I mean, even gay dudes look at Yalena.”
Adam glanced at his watch. “Is this the part where you start talking about Yalena? Because Joanie and I have to go pick up Leisha from work, and we could actually leave early if that’s what this is going to descend into.”
Jon, offended, said, “I don’t do that. Talk about Yalena too much? Do I do that?”
“You do that,” Adam said.
Jon sighed. “If I can get the Palatine to seriously consider this gun, and then get a real job and make some real money, I could get my own place to live, so I’m not mooching off my sister. Then Yalena might go out with me.”
“Jonathan,” Adam said. “Do you want my advice?”
“I should shoot those guys, right? The next time they come into the Beanery? If they really are vamps, they’ll blow up. And if they aren’t, it won’t do anything to them, like the gnome. No harm, no foul.”
“No,” Adam said. “I think you should ask Yalena out now. I don’t think she cares about you not having a real job or living with your sister. She’s a nice girl. I don’t know what you’ve been waiting around for. Life is short. I mean, look at me and Leisha. I’ve been out of work what . . . almost two years?”
Jon thought about it. “Yeah. That sounds about right.”
“And in that time, we were both nearly killed by murderous vampires, thanks to your sister.”
“True,” Jon said.
“But we’ve got this beautiful baby.” Adam nodded at Joanie, who was beaming as she thrust her bottle at Jack Bauer to lick, which he was doing enthusiastically.
“And I’m not saying we don’t have problems,” Adam said. “We do. Like the fact that our baby prefers the company of your dog to human beings. But this isn’t the worst problem to have. And to reach it, I had to take the first step of asking Leisha out. So stop being such a douche, and just do it.”
Jon looked dubious. “I don’t know, man,” he said.
Adam put down his own beer bottle and stood up. “Well, think about it. In the meantime, Joanie and I are headed for the salon to pick up Leisha. We’ll see you in a bit. Oh, you might want to plug your ears.”
He lifted the baby seat. This had the swift and immediate effect of causing Joanie to begin shrieking, so loudly that the pigeons who’d resettled on the cable wires flew off. Jack Bauer flattened back his ears and let out a whimper.
“Later,” Adam called, waving, his voice mostly inaudible due to his daughter’s protests at being taken away from the dog she adored.
“Later,” Jon said, standing up to wave back.
Adam and Joanie disappeared through the door to the rooftop. Jon could still hear the baby’s cries for several minutes more until finally, they faded away.
“Stop being such a douche, and just do it,” he repeated. Then he spun around, the SuperStaker in hand, and assumed a gunslinger’s stance.
“Hasta la vista, vampire,” he said to the gnome
.
He pulled the trigger.
Chapter Fifteen
Meena took a deep breath, then undid all three locks to the sublet she shared with her brother and opened the door. She was met by the enthusiastic barking of Jack Bauer and the smell of pizza.
“Where have you been?” Jonathan asked. He was sprawled across the couch in front of the television and a laptop computer, which was open on the coffee table next to a plate containing a half-eaten slice of pizza.
“New Jersey,” Meena said, closing and locking the door behind her. She took another deep breath before turning around to bend and greet the dog, giving his ears plenty of affectionate scratches.
“Oh God,” Jon groaned. He took a slurp from the can of soda he was holding, his gaze never straying from the TV in front of him. There was some kind of football game on. “New Jersey? Why?”
“Because,” Meena said, straightening up. She tried to keep her voice steady. “I killed David Delmonico last night.”
Jonathan choked on the mouthful of soda he’d just taken. Droplets sprayed onto his computer screen and even reached the wide-screen TV. But he didn’t appear to notice. He just stared at Meena in horror.
“You what?”
“Somebody turned him into a vampire,” Meena said. She walked over to the couch to lift up the remote, then turned down the volume of the television. “He attacked me. I staked him. That was his mother who called this morning. I had to go out to New Jersey to talk to a police detective. Is there any of that pizza left? I’m starving.”
Jonathan continued to stare at her. She hoped it wasn’t because he could see that she’d been crying. She’d tried to wipe away all the evidence of her tears in the sun-visor mirror in the car, just before Alaric dropped her off.
It wasn’t that she didn’t want her brother to know how upset the events of the past twenty-four hours had made her. It was that she wanted to protect him, and keep him from becoming upset as well. The two of them were close . . . they’d survived being raised by their parents, after all, a couple who had turned out to be uniquely unqualified to have children.