by M. J. Scott
“Who is it?”
“He says his name is Nikolai.”
This time Jase sounded dreamy rather than distracted. Crap. The last thing I needed was my PA falling for a minion of the dark side. And Niko was very much Jase’s type.
Hell, he was everybody’s type. Not that I had any idea which team he batted for, but he’d flirted with Dan as well as me, so I figured Jase could be fair game. Particularly if Esteban wanted to gain some sort of advantage by ordering his employee to seduce mine.
Fuck.
I practically sprinted into the foyer. Sure enough, Niko was perched on a corner of Jase’s desk, smiling his depraved angel smile. Jase gazed back with an expression that reminded me of a Labrador who’d just seen five pounds of prime rib drop into his food bowl.
“Nikolai,” I said, trying to figure out how to put myself between him and Jase—impossible unless I climbed onto the desk. I settled for staying on the far side of the desk so Niko would at least have to look at me. “What are you doing here?”
He turned the smile my way and the female part of me went almost as melty as Jase looked. But the wolf snarled. And when it came to vampires like Niko and Esteban, I’d trust the wolf’s instincts over my hormones any day.
I folded my arms and waited. You can’t exactly stare down a vampire—not when some of them can thrall you with a look—but I was learning a little about dominance games from my pack so I let the silence stretch between us while I waited.
Nothing.
“I asked a question.” I let a little rumble underscore my tone. This was my office and I was the boss here, not Esteban or his errand boy. In fact, Niko didn’t strike me as the type to be the boss anywhere.
Turns out my impression was right. Niko made an apologetic face, stood and actually performed a small bow in my direction. The action looked so natural for him I had to wonder exactly how old he was. I knew Marco was old—at least four hundred—but I had no idea about Esteban. Or anyone else in his lineage.
“My apologies, Ms. Keenan,” Niko said. “I was distracted. So much beauty in one room.”
“Cut the crap. Get to the point.”
He leaned down and picked up a stainless steel briefcase. I hadn’t noticed it before because I’d been too busy looking at his face.
“My lord requested that I bring this to you.” Niko held the briefcase out.
I took it gingerly. Quite frankly I’d rather he’d handed me a box of live snakes. They’d be less problematic than the keys to Esteban’s finances. “Thank you.” I passed the case to Jase. “Jason, can you please get this data loaded into our system and secured?”
Niko frowned. “Lord Esteban said the information was for you.”
“And Jason is my assistant. He assists. In fact, he’ll be working with me on Lord Esteban’s...matter.”
Niko looked like he wanted to object again but then his face cleared and he trained another charm-angels-from-the-sky smile on Jason. “Then I shall look forward to furthering our acquaintance.”
“We don’t socialize with clients,” I said, watching Jase’s eyes glaze over with something like adoration. This really needed to be nipped in the bud. “Sorry.”
That earned me a ‘we’ll see about that’ sort of look from pretty boy and I let another low growl escape me. Niko shrugged, bowed again, and then turned and glided out of the office.
I waved a hand in front of Jase, who was gazing after Niko like a man who’d just had a close-up-and-personal encounter with a fantasy come to life. “Earth to Jase.”
He focused on me slowly. “Who was that?”
“His name is Nikolai. He’s Leah’s brother. You remember Leah, don’t you?” Jase had been at the meeting with Marco and Leah that had led to me incurring my stupid debt in the first place.
Jase wrinkled his nose, some of the worshipful look disappearing from his face. “Yes.”
“Right. So stay away from this one. He works for Esteban and if he’s anything like his sister, he’s trouble.”
Jase’s expression seemed to indicate any amount of trouble might be worth it if it came in a package that looked like Niko.
I intended to change his mind. “Why don’t you deal with what’s in the briefcase and then we can talk about the best approach?”
“Sure. And while I’m doing that, you can tell me exactly what happened last night.”
Now was the time to ask him about Esteban’s powers but something made me hesitate. “Briefcase,” I repeated. “Then work. Remember work? Pays the bills? Stops your paycheck from bouncing?”
“You’re stalling.”
“Boss’s prerogative,” I said with a grin, and then ducked back into my office before he could do any more interrogating.
* * *
About twenty minutes later, Jase wandered into my office and lowered himself into a chair with a low whistle. “Someone’s ripping off Lord Esteban? All the data is transferred onto the secure server. Filed under ‘Bad Idea.’ I put the briefcase and the hard drive in the safe.” He passed me a hardcopy file, already bulging with paper.
“Yeah, seems like a good way to commit suic—” I broke off as Jase winced. “Sorry. I meant it’s pretty monumentally stupid. Can’t imagine Esteban is big on leniency.”
I opened the file and flipped through the first inch or so of paper, scanning the contents. Pretty standard stuff. A list of the clubs Esteban thought were involved, financial statements for each of them including budgets so I could see the discrepancies between actual and projected cash flows, and then the myriad financial details. Bank accounts. Employee lists. Creditors. Debtors. Inventory. On and on and on. “This is pretty comprehensive. Esteban obviously pays attention. Which makes our fraudster really stupid.”
“Either stupid or smug,” Jase muttered.
“What do you mean?”
“You either have to be very stupid or think you’re completely safe from repercussions to pull something like this with an Old One.”
Damn. My stomach lurched. Jase was right. If we weren’t dealing with stupid and greedy then the likely perpetrator had to have protection. Or clout. Or both.
Great.
But I couldn’t afford to let myself get distracted playing what-ifs. I needed to get down to the business of identifying whoever was doing this. Then Esteban could do whatever the hell he wanted with them.
I stared at the list of club locations. It didn’t add up to the number of clubs Esteban had mentioned last night. I’d have to ask Esteban for a list of all his properties. Just because he’d found anomalies at these clubs didn’t mean there weren’t any at the ones not on the list. I sighed. Another cozy chat with Esteban was high on my list of things I never wanted to do.
Unfortunately, I’d got myself into this mess and I was the only one who could get me out again. “So what do you think?” I handed Jase the list of clubs. “Where do I start?”
“Where do you want to start? Smallest club? Smallest discrepancies? Closest to home?” Jase squinted at the list. “None of these have anything much in common that I can see other than being owned by Esteban.”
Actually, I wanted to start with not starting at all. Failing that, I wanted somewhere low on the freak factor.
“Maybe we could just sort of ease into it,” Jase said.
I narrowed my eyes. “Are you reading my mind?”
He went still. Then relaxed. “No, I just know you too well. I’ve never been able to get you anywhere near a dark club.”
“That’s because I don’t fancy being a snack.”
“That’s hardly your problem anymore. You’ve moved up the food chain.”
“Ewww. That’s so not true.” Well, it was kind of. Vampires could drink shifter blood but it was generally a consensual arrangement. Most shifters, and particularly werewolves, were a pretty even match, strength-wise, for a vamp. But I didn’t want to think of myself or anybody else in terms of food.
He grinned. “Well, you’re higher than a human. How high depends on
how alpha you want to be.”
“Alpha isn’t exactly a choice,” I pointed out.
“Not pack-ruling Alpha, maybe, but the rest is up for grabs.”
I grimaced. I didn’t need Werewolf Politics 101 on top of everything else. Besides, Jase wasn’t exactly correct. Dominance in a werewolf wasn’t purely choice. It was partly innate to the person. If it was a choice, Dan and I wouldn’t be butting heads so often.
Maybe.
I made another mental note to talk to Ani. Soon. I’d hoped maybe today but there wasn’t going to be time. Until I could, my plan for sorting out the issues Dan and I were havingwasto do the best I could. I had the same plan for dealing with Esteban. “We were talking about dark clubs.”
Jase wiggled his eyebrows at me. “Coward.”
“Paycheck.”
“Invaluable personal assistant who could let you try and navigate these clubs alone.”
I stuck my tongue out. “And what part of paycheck don’t you understand?”
“The part where you can’t live without me.” He smiled smugly.
He had me.
“Here.” He ran his finger down the list of clubs. “Infradark. It’s small and it’s mostly a wannabe club. You get a few feeders but the rest is death metal and people who are way too fond of black and who only think they’re tough.”
I didn’t ask how he knew. He might think it was tame but anywhere that the feeders—vamps who drank live blood from willing victims—hung out wasn’t tame. It was gross. And dangerous. “Infradark, huh?”
Jase nodded. “Tonight?”
I sighed. “You’re going to make me wear leather again, aren’t you?”
“No. Just black. That killer suit—the one with the lapels. That’ll work.”
I nodded and Jase left me to try and figure out logistics for the day. I pulled my calendar up and did some calculations. I still had real work for paying clients to do, plus I had to put in some time with the Taskforce.
Dark clubs didn’t open early. So any way I looked at it, it would be close to ten or eleven before I even got to Infradark. Another long, long day. A chance to nap seemed unlikely. I was just going to do it the old-fashioned way. With gallons of coffee.
* * *
Dan’s office door was closed when I reached the Taskforce about seven p.m. and his privacy screen had turned the glass wall opaque. I hesitated, wondering whether to disturb him. So far today we’d managed not to argue and right now I was feeling the effects of a twelve-hour day on way too little sleep and way too much coffee. And I still had Infradark to look forward to. It might just be easier to go straight to my cubicle.
But I wanted to know if he’d found out anything more about the suicide. And, if I was completely honest, I wanted to see Dan. It was crazy when we’d known each other so long but I still got the good kind of butterflies when we’d been apart, even for a day.
I knocked on the door.
“Hey,” Dan said, sticking his head out.
Not exactly the warmest of welcomes but at least he wasn’t scowling. “Hey, yourself.”
“Did you just arrive?” He stepped back so I could come in.
“Yeah, busy day.” I paused as I saw a man I didn’t know occupying one of the visitors’ chairs. I cocked my head at Dan.
“Ashley Keenan, Andy Ramirez,” he said, waving me toward the chair next to the stranger’s.
“Agent Ramirez.” I assumed he was FBI. The Taskforce didn’t use many civilian contractors. I was the odd one out.
Agent Ramirez ran a hand over closely cropped dark hair. “Ms. Keenan. Dan was just filling me in on what you’ve been doing with this case.”
“You’re an accountant?”
The lines bracketing his dark blue eyes deepened as he smiled, flashing very white teeth against olive skin. “No, but I’ve done a couple of stints with the organized crime guys so I know a bit about money laundering.”
Well, that was a point in his favor. Extra help could only be a good thing. We’d hit dead end after dead end in the hunt for the source of Tate’s funding. But even though my brain was pleased at the prospect of assistance, my heart couldn’t help wondering if this meant Dan thought I wasn’t good enough for the job.
I know. Pathetic.
“Welcome aboard,” I said, trying not to study him too closely. Something about the way he was sitting—a kind of just-a-little-too-alert faux relaxed pose combined with the hair and the lines made me think he hadn’t spent all his time in underground FBI offices. Military, perhaps? Or an ex-cop like Dan?
His background wasn’t the only intriguing thing about him. His scent teased my nose, evoking warmth and dust and a contradictory hint of deep green places. It was almost familiar but I couldn’t place it other than knowing it tagged him as some sort of shifter. Not a werewolf—I knew wolf scent—but something I should know. Asking was out. Shifters tend to operate on an ‘I’ll-tell-you-if-I-want-to’ model. A hang-up, perhaps, from the times when human-supernatural relations weren’t quite as friendly as they were now.
I gave up trying to identify the scent and focused back on Dan. He looked tired and smelled frustrated. Maybe his day hadn’t been any better than mine.
“I’d like you and Andy to take another look at the Synotech records,” he said.
“Fine with me.” I’d gone through them so many times I could practically recite them from memory. I was more than happy to turn them over to Ramirez and watch his eyeballs start to bleed from staring at printouts and computer monitors.
Dan smiled. “Good.”
“Did you find anything more about the suicide?”
The smile vanished. “No. Not yet.”
I wanted to ask more but didn’t want to push things with Dan. Not when it looked like we might actually make it through the day without an argument. I stood. “Okay. I’ll take Agent—”
One of the other Taskforce agents stuck his head in the door. “Lord Marco has arrived.”
Dan nodded and waved him away. I sat back down, knees suddenly wobbly. Old Ones made me nervous. “Marco? What’s he doing here?”
“I want those tapes from Maelstrom last night. Marco is here to act as an intermediary.”
He sounded calm but he wasn’t happy about it. He practically bristled with tension.
Marco made me nervous because he was an Old One. He’d always been helpful to me even if he exacted a price. He was fair and probably as reasonable as it got when it came to powerful old vampires. But Dan didn’t see it that way. Marco was a thorn in his side because of the debts I owed the vampire. Which meant this would probably be a good time for me to beat a retreat to my cubicle. Having me around wasn’t going to help Dan negotiate.
“How about Agent Ramirez and I leave you to it?” I said a little too brightly.
Dan gave me a look but nodded. I hustled Ramirez out of the office before things could go downhill.
My cubicle was small for two people to share. When I’d been human I would’ve been hard-pressed to be so close to a shifter without getting shifter buzz. Now, all I had to worry about was the fact Ramirez was crowding my personal space. I’d gotten better over the last few months at putting up with the closeness of the pack but a strange shifter didn’t get the same privileges.
I pushed my chair as far away from his as I could and set about giving him the background information he needed. It took a while to explain the tangled web of Synotech, the anti-vaccine and the contagious vamps, Doctor Smith and McCallister Tate. Fortunately, he seemed to be a quick study. He asked intelligent questions and generally applied himself to the problem at hand.
I wound down my spiel and picked up a stack of files. “Start with these, they’re all the background Synotech stuff we’ve done already.”
He looked at the files dubiously. “You said Synotech was proving to be a dead end.”
“Yes, but you’re a fresh pair of eyes. There has to be a new angle in there somewhere.” My gut told me Smith had known my father. My father who ha
d worked for Synotech doing immunology research. There had to have been a connection even though I hadn’t found it.
“Have you looked outside Synotech?”
“We’re tracking all of Tate’s assets—”
He made a dismissive gesture. “I meant for Doctor Smith. Where else have you been looking for him?”
I sighed. Truth was, we couldn’t really look anywhere else for Smith. We had no idea who he really was. My memory of his appearance didn’t click with anyone on any of the government databases. Either he’d been a very good boy until he hooked up with Tate or he’d changed his appearance. Add in an obviously false name and looking for Doctor Smith without the connection to my father was another big dead end. “We still think Synotech is our best chance.”
“There are other biotech companies.”
“Well, gee, Ramirez, why didn’t we think of that? We’ve looked at those too. So far nothing.”
“What about your father?”
I steeled myself to stay professional. I hated talking about my dad at the best of times, let alone to someone I barely knew. “Synotech have given us access to his records or what’s left of them. As has every other company he worked for and his alma mater. There’s nothing there.”
“Personal papers?”
“My aunt and I got rid of a lot of stuff when I went to college. There was nothing in them related to his work, that I remember.”
Ramirez looked disappointed and I tapped the files again. “Trust me, start here. Maybe you’ll get some inspiration. Now, I need to work, so go do your thing somewhere else.”
* * *
Unfortunately, Ramirez didn’t come running into my office yelling “Eureka” any time during the next few hours. I didn’t get any sudden stunning insights into the case either. Which meant that, as I headed back to Dan’s office to say goodbye, I was still cranky and sleep-deprived with the prospect of another four or five hours work looming ahead of me.
Still, I tried to push the frustration away as I knocked on Dan’s door again. Making it through the day without fighting with Dan would be one small victory in a very average day.
“He’s in the conference room,” Esme Walsh said from behind me. “With Lord Marco.”