by Ким Харрисон
"No." He took his hand off the wheel when we rumbled over a railroad track. "His charms saved me a lot of pain. But I can't tell you the number of times he spent fumbling for the right spell when a good right cross would have settled things faster."
We crossed the river into Cincinnati proper, and the buildings made flickering come-and-go shadows on me. He was prejudiced only when sex came into the picture. I could handle that. "I'm not going in completely helpless," I said, warming slightly. "I can make a protection circle around myself if I have to. But I'm really an earth witch. Which might make things difficult as it's harder to bring someone in if you can't do the same magic." I made a face he didn't see. "Then again, there's no way I can beat Saladan at ley line magic, so it's just as well I'm not even going to try. I'll get him with my earth charms or my foot in his gut."
David brought the car to a slow halt at a red light. Face showing the first signs of interest, he turned to me. "I heard you brought down three ley line assassins."
"Oh, that." I warmed. "I had help with that. The FIB was there."
"You brought Piscary down yourself."
The light changed, and I appreciated him not creeping up on the car ahead of us until it moved. "Trent's security officer helped me," I admitted.
"He distracted him," David said softly. "You were the one who clubbed him into unconsciousness."
Pressing my knees together, I turned to look at him straight on. "How do you know?"
David's heavy jaw tightened and relaxed, but he didn't look from the street. "I talked to Jenks this morning."
"What!" I exclaimed, almost hitting my head on the ceiling. "Is he okay? What did he say? Did you tell him I was sorry? Will he talk to me if I call him?"
David glanced askance at me as I held my breath. Saying nothing, he made a careful turn onto the parkway. "No to everything. He's very upset."
I settled in my seat, flustered and worried.
"You need to thank him if he ever talks to you again,"
David said tightly. "He thinks the world of you, which is the main reason I didn't go back on my agreement to get you in to see Saladan."
My gut twisted. "What do you mean?"
He hesitated while he passed a car. "He's hurt you didn't trust him, but he didn't say one bad word about you, even stood up for you when I called you a flighty airhead."
My throat tightened and I stared out the passenger-side window. I was such an ass.
"He's of the backward opinion that he deserved being lied to, that you didn't tell him because you felt he couldn't keep his mouth shut and that you were probably right. He left because he thought he let you down, not the other way around. I told him you were a fool, and that any partner who lied to me would end up with their throat torn out." David made a puff of scorn. "He kicked me out. Four-inch man kicked me out. Told me if I didn't help you like I said I would, he'd track me down when the weather broke and give me a lobotomy when I slept."
"He could do it," I said, my voice tight. I could hear the threatened tears in it.
"I know he could, but that's not why I'm here. I'm here because of what he didn't say. What you did to your partner is deplorable, but so honorable a soul wouldn't think highly of someone who didn't deserve it. I can't see why he does, though."
"I've have been trying to talk to Jenks for the last three days," I said around the lump in my throat. "I'm trying to apologize. I'm trying to fix this."
"That's the other reason I'm here. Mistakes can be fixed, but if you do it more than once, it's no longer a mistake."
I said nothing, my head starting to hurt as we passed a river-overlook park and pulled onto a side street. David touched his collar, and I read in his body posture that we were almost there. "And it was sort of my fault it came out," he said softly. "Bane has a tendency to make you loose in the lips. I'm sorry about that, but it was still wrong of you."
It didn't matter how it came out. Jenks was furious with me, and I deserved it.
David signaled and turned into a cobbled drive. I tugged at my gray skirt and adjusted my jacket. Wiping my eyes, I sat upright and tried to look professional, not like my world was falling down around me and all I had to depend on was a Were who thought I was the lowest of the low. I'd have given anything to have Jenks on my shoulder making wise-cracks about my new haircut or how I smelled like the bottom of an outhouse. Anything.
"I'd keep my mouth shut if I were you," David said darkly, and I bobbed my head, thoroughly depressed. "My secretary's perfume is in the glove box. Give your nylons a good spray. The rest of you smells okay."
I obediently did as he said, my usual hot abhorrence to take direction from someone squelched in that he thought so little of me. The musty scent of the perfume overpowered the car, and David rolled his window down, grimacing. "Well, you did say…" I muttered when the cold air pooled at my ankles.
"It's going to be quick once we get in there," David said, his eyes watering. "Your vamp partner has five minutes tops before Saladan gets angry about the claim and kicks us out."
I held Mrs. Aver's briefcase on my lap tighter. "She'll be there."
David's only response was a muttered rumble. We wound up a short drive that looped about itself. It had been plowed and swept, and the red clay bricks were damp with snowmelt. At the top of it was a stately house painted white with red shutters and tall, narrow windows. It was one of the few older mansions that had been refurbished without losing its charm. The sun was behind the house, and David parked in the shadows behind a black pickup truck and cut the engine. A curtain at a front window shifted.
"Your name is Grace," he said. "If they want identification, it's in your wallet inside your briefcase. Here." He handed me his glasses. "Wear them."
"Thanks." I set the plastic lenses on my nose, learning that David was farsighted. My head started to hurt and I pulled them lower so I could look at the world over them instead of through them. I felt awful, the butterflies in my stomach as heavy as turtles.
A sigh shifted him, and he reached between our seats for his briefcase in the back. "Let's go."
Thirty-one
"David Hue," David said coolly, sounding bored and a little irritated as we stood in the entryway of the old mansion. "I have an appointment."
I, not we, I thought, keeping my eyes down and trying to stay in the background while Candice, the vamp that had been all over Lee on his boat, cocked her jeans-clad hip and looked at his business card. There were two more vamps behind her in black suits that screamed security. I didn't mind playing the meek subordinate; if Candice recognized me, it would get really bad, really quick.
"That was me you talked to," the shapely vampire said around a bothered sigh. "But after the recent ugliness, Mr. Saladan has retired to…a less public environment. He's not here, much less taking appointments." Smiling to show her teeth in a politically polite threat, she handed his card back. "I'll be glad to talk to you, though."
My heart pounded and I stared at the Italian tile. He was here—I could almost hear the rattle of chips—but if I didn't get in to see him, this was going to be a lot more difficult.
David looked at her, the skin about his eyes tightening, then picked up his briefcase. "Very well," he said shortly. "If I can't speak with Mr. Saladan, my company has no recourse but to assume our understanding of terrorist activity is correct and we will deny payment on the claim. Good day, ma'am." He barely glanced at me. "Come on, Grace. Let's go."
Breath catching, I felt my face pale. If we walked out of here, Kisten and Ivy would be headed into a trap. David's steps were loud as he went for the door, and I reached out after him.
"Candice," came Lee's irate, buttery voice from the second-story railing above the grand staircase. "What are you doing?"
I spun, David taking my elbow in warning. Lee stood by the upper landing, a drink in one hand, a folder and pair of wire-rimmed glasses in the other. He was wearing what looked like a suit without the coat, his tie loose about his neck but still tidy.
Lee's dark eyes pinched as he frowned. "Almost a quarter million—dear. They're insurance agents, not I.S. operatives. Do a spell check on them and show them up. They're required by law to keep everything confidential, including that they were even here." He looked at David and tossed his surfer-boy bangs out of his way. "Am I right?"
David smiled up at him with that shared, good-old-boys' look that I hated. "Yes, sir," he said, his voice echoing against the flat white of the open vestibule. "We couldn't do our work without that little constitutional amendment."
Lee put his hand up in acknowledgment, turned, and vanished down the open hall. A door creaked shut, and I jerked as Candice grabbed my briefcase. Adrenaline pulled me straight, and I clutched it to me.
"Relax, Grace," David said patronizingly as he took it from me and handed it to Candice. "This isn't unusual."
The two vamps in the background came forward, and I forced myself to not move. "You'll have to forgive my assistant," David said while he put our cases on the table by the door and opened first his and spun it around, then mine. "Breaking in a new assistant is hell."
Candice's expression went mocking. "Were you the one to give her the black eye?"
I flushed, my hand going to touch my cheekbone and my gaze falling to my ugly shoes. Apparently the darker makeup didn't work as well as I thought.
"You have to keep your bitches in line," David said lightly. "But if you hit them right, you only have to hit them once."
My jaw clenched, and I warmed as Candice laughed. I watched from under my lowered brow while a vamp pawed through my briefcase. It was full of stuff only an insurance adjustor would have: a calculator with more tiny buttons than a leprechaun's dress boots, notepads, coffee-stained folders, useless little calendars to stick on your fridge, and pens with smiley faces on them. There were receipts from places like sub shops and Office Depot. God, it was awful. She glanced at my fake business cards with an absentminded interest.
While David's briefcase got the same scrutiny, Candice sauntered into a back room. She came back with a pair of wire-rimmed glasses, with which she made a show of scrutinizing us through. My heart pounded as she then brought out an amulet. It was glowing a warning red.
"Chad, honey," she murmured. "Back up. Your spell is interfering."
One of the vamps flushed and retreated. I wondered what Chad-honey had a spell for that would turn his ears that particular color. My breath slipped from me when the amulet shifted green, making me grateful that I'd gone in under a mundane disguise. Beside me, David's fingers twitched. "Can we move this faster?" he said. "I have other people to see."
Candice smiled and twirled the amulet on her finger. "Right this way."
With a quickness seemingly born from irritation, David snapped his briefcase closed and dragged it from the small table. I did the same, relieved when the two vamps vanished into a back room following the smell of coffee. Candice headed up the stairs with a slow pace, her hips going as if they were going to gyrate off her. Trying to ignore her, I followed.
The house was old, and now that I was getting a better look at it, not well-maintained. Upstairs, the carpet was thinning, and the pictures hanging in the open hallway overlooking the vestibule were so ancient they probably came with the house. The paint above the wainscoting was that icky green popular before the Turn, and it looked repulsive. Someone with little imagination had used it to cover the eight-inch floorboards carved with ivy and hummingbirds, and I spared a pained thought at the grandeur hidden behind ugly paint and synthetic fibers.
"Mr. Saladan," Candice said in explanation as she opened a black-varnished door. Her smile was catty, and I followed David in, keeping my eyes down when I passed her. I held my breath, praying that she couldn't tell it was me, hoping she wouldn't come in. But why would she? Lee was an expert in ley line magic. He didn't need protection from two Weres.
It was a good-sized office done in oak paneling. High ceilings and the thick framework about the tall block of windows was the only evidence that the room had started out as a bedroom before becoming an office. Everything else had been covered and disguised with chrome and light oak that was only a few years old. I was a witch; I could tell.
The windows behind the desk went to the floor, and the low sun spilled in over Lee as he rose from his desk chair. A bar cart was in one corner, and an entertainment center took up most of the opposite wall. Two comfortable chairs were arranged before his desk, leaving one ugly one in a far corner. There was a huge wall mirror and no books. My opinion of Lee hit rock bottom.
"Mr. Hue," Lee said warmly as he extended his tanned hand over the expanse of the modern-looking desk. His suit coat was hanging from a nearby hat tree, but he had at least snugged his tie up. "I've been expecting you. Sorry about the mix-up downstairs. Candice can be protective at times. You can understand, seeing as boats seem to be exploding around me."
David chuckled, sounding a little like a dog. "Not a problem, Mr. Saladan. I won't take much of your time. It's a courtesy call to let you know how your claim is being processed."
Smiling, Lee held his tie to himself and sat, indicating we should do the same. "Can I get you a drink?" he asked as I settled myself in the supple leather chair and put my briefcase down.
"No, thank you," David said.
Lee hadn't given me more than a cursory glance, not even offering to shake my hand. The "men's club" air was thick enough to chew on, and whereas I normally would have charmingly asserted myself, this time I gritted my teeth and pretended I didn't exist like a good little bitch at the bottom of the hierarchy.
While Lee added ice to his drink, David donned a second pair of glasses and opened his briefcase atop his lap. His clean-shaven jaw was tight and I could smell his leashed excitement growing. "Well," he said softly, bringing out a sheaf of papers. "I regret to inform you that, after our initial inspection and our preliminary interviews with a survivor, my company has declined making a settlement."
Lee dropped a second cube of ice into his drink. "Excuse me?" He spun on a shiny heel. "Your survivor has too much at stake to come forth with any information contrary to it being an accident. And as for your inspection? The boat is at the bottom of the Ohio River."
David bobbed his head. "Quite so. But the boat was destroyed during a citywide power struggle, and thus its destruction falls under the terrorism clause."
Making a bark of disbelief, Lee sat behind his desk. "That boat is brand-new. I've only made two payments on it. I'm not going to take the loss. That's why I insured it."
David put a stapled pack of papers on the desk. Peering over his glasses, he dug out a second paper, closed his briefcase, and signed it. "This is also notice that your premiums on your other properties we insure will be increasing by fifteen percent. Sign here, please."
"Fifteen percent!" Lee exclaimed.
"Retroactive to the beginning of the month. If you would like to cut me a check, I am prepared to accept payment."
Damn, I thought. David's company played hardball. My thoughts shifted from Lee to Ivy. This was going south really fast. Where was her call? They had to be in place by now.
Lee wasn't happy. Jaw tight, he laced his fingers together and set them on the desk. His face went red from behind his black bangs and he leaned forward. "You need to look in your briefcase, little pup, and find a check in there for me," he said, his Berkeley accent growing pronounced. "I'm not accustomed to being disappointed."
David snapped his briefcase shut and set it gently on the floor. "You need to broaden your horizons, Mr. Saladan. It happens to me all the time."
"Not me." Round face wrathful, Lee got to his feet. The tension rose. I eyed Lee, then David, looking confident even though he was seated. Neither man was going to back down.
"Sign the paper, sir," David said softly. "I'm
just the messenger. Don't get the lawyers into this. Then they're the only ones who get any money and you become uninsurable."
Lee took a hasty breath, his dark eyes pinched in anger.
I jumped at the sudden ring of my phone. My eyes widened. It was playing the theme to the Lone Ranger. I scrambled to turn it off, not knowing how. God help me.
"Grace!" David barked, and I jumped again. The phone slipped from my fingers. I fumbled after it, face flaming. My emotions warred between panic that they were both looking at me and my relief that Ivy was ready.
"Grace, I told you to turn that phone off when we were in the drive!" David yelled.
He stood, and I looked at him in helplessness. He snatched the phone out of my hands. The music cut off and he threw it back at me.
My jaw clenched as it hit my palm with a sharp snap. I'd had enough. Seeing my hot anger, David moved between me and Lee, gripping my shoulder in warning. Ticked, I knocked his arm away. But my anger caught when he smiled and winked at me.
"You're a good operative," he said softly as Lee punched a button on his intercom and had a hushed conversation with what sounded like a very upset Candice. "Most of the people I work with would have gone for my throat at the front door with that subordinate-bitch comment. Dig your feet in. We can get a few more minutes out of this conversation, and I still need him to sign my form."
I nodded, though it was hard. The compliment helped.
Still standing, Lee reached for his coat and slipped his arms into it. "I'm sorry, Mr. Hue. We will have to continue this at another opportunity."
"No, sir." David stood unmoving. "We will finish this now."
There was a commotion in the hallway, and I rose when Chad, the vampire with the charm, stumbled in. Seeing David and me, he swallowed down his first, probably frantic, words.
"Chad," Lee said, the faintest bother in his expression as he took in the vamp's disheveled appearance. "Will you see Mr. Hue and his assistant to their car?"
"Yes, sir."
The house was quiet and I stifled a smile. Ivy once took out an entire floor of FIB agents. Unless Lee had a hell of a lot of people hidden about, it wouldn't be long until I had my charms and Lee would be wearing handcuffs.