Blood Gamble (Disrupted Magic Book 2)

by Melissa F. Olson

  “So you and your client, who wants revenge, are trying to keep them from killing a bunch of vampires,” Lex said when I was finished. “But your friend is working for the bad guys.”

  “Right.” Damn. Say what you would about Lex, but the woman could grasp a situation. “The problem is that we have no idea how many people the Holmwoods have working for them, or how many of their employees are actually true believers,” I added. “There could be twenty hostile vampires in there, or it might be just the Holmwoods and my friend.”

  “Who you want to save.” Her voice was matter-of-fact, but for some reason I still felt judged.

  “Yes. He’s like me. And like Charlotte,” I said, and immediately regretted it. That had been a little below the belt. Lex was silent for a moment, and I added, “I’m sorry. Just . . . look, Sashi told me that people have tried to kidnap Charlie and brainwash her, or whatever. That could have happened to me, if I hadn’t grown up in a small town with no Old World. It did happen to Jameson. I want to help him, not kill him. Like you did with Katia.”

  “Okay.” There was a pause, and then she said, “Tell me about the location.”

  With Wyatt supplying details, I told her as much as I could about Erson Station. She absorbed that without comment, then asked, “What do you have for resources?”

  “Resources?”

  “People, weapons, vehicles, that kind of thing.”

  Wyatt was mouthing something at me. “We can get guns, apparently,” I relayed to Lex.

  “But it’s just you and this vampire? Who else do you know in Las Vegas?”

  That was a good question. “Well, Sashi, but I got the impression that she’s not really a fighter.”

  “No, she isn’t. Anyone else?”

  Could I get Cliff back? He was supposedly driving the SUV back to LA, but if they hadn’t left yet, maybe Bethany or Tara could drive. But convincing Cliff to help me save a bunch of vampires, without Dashiell’s permission, was going to be a hard sell. “I might have one other guy. Human, but a well-trained bodyguard type.”

  “That’s good. And you mentioned a witch?” she asked.

  “Yeah, Laurel. But she’s pretty weak.” I shot an apologetic look at Wyatt, who shrugged in a you’re not wrong kind of way.

  “There may be ways to boost her magic,” Lex said immediately. “That’s something I’ve been working on here. Is she a trades witch?”

  Most witches did general magic, but a few specialized in something, the way Sashi could do healing magic and Lex worked with death magic. I started to ask Wyatt, then just said, “Hang on, I’m going to put you on speakerphone with Wyatt; he’s the family friend.”

  “Is Laurel a trades witch?” I asked him after I’d hit the speakerphone.

  Wyatt hesitated. “Not exactly,” he said. “She can do trades magic, but her clan has a sort of talent. I wouldn’t call it a specialty so much as a . . . family tradition. It’s what brought them to Vegas, actually.”

  He launched into an explanation, while Lex and I listened silently. I couldn’t tell what Lex was thinking, but at the end Wyatt added, “Look, Laurel’s already got one kid, and her wife’s expecting their second. I don’t want to put her in danger, not for me. Not for my revenge.”

  “That’s okay,” Lex said. “I think you can use her ability without putting her in harm’s way.”

  “How?” I asked.

  “Well, look, you guys are going to have to make your own plan, based on the terrain and the players. But I do have a few . . . suggestions.”

  Chapter 28

  After I hung up with Lex, Wyatt went down to the seating area to call Laurel, while I sat on the bed and called Cliff. When he answered, he was in the Venetian parking lot, driving around to pick up Juliet, Tara, and Bethany to rush them back to Los Angeles. I asked him to pull over for a moment, and explained the situation.

  “I don’t know, Scarlett,” he said, sounding uneasy. “No offense, but I’m not all that invested in saving a bunch of vampires from themselves. And this does not sound like something Dashiell would want you to do.”

  I heard something in his voice. On a hunch, I said, “Did Hayne already call you?” Dashiell would be pissed that I was going against his wishes, if not his direct orders. And Hayne was Dashiell’s human right-hand man.

  Heavy silence, and then, “Yeah. I told him you were sending me home, and he said that was a good idea. He didn’t say it, but I got the impression that Dashiell is hoping you won’t want to go in without backup.”

  “He’s betting on me chickening out?” Well, that just made me more committed.

  Stay on task, Scarlett. Chain of command seemed really important to Cliff, so I said, “Look, did Hayne officially order you to go back to LA?”

  “Well, no, but—”

  I interrupted him. “Then I will give you ten thousand dollars to come along tonight and be my backup. In theory, you won’t even be in danger. You’ll mostly be protecting Laurel while she does a spell.” Without waiting for his response, I outlined the plan that Lex and I had come up with. Well, mostly Lex.

  There was a long pause. Then, in a quiet voice, he said, “Ten thousand dollars?”

  “Cash. Tonight.”

  He sighed. “All right, you’re on. But if Hayne calls me and gives me a direct order to come back, anytime before we actually leave, I have to do it.”

  “Deal.”

  A few minutes later, Wyatt hung up with Laurel. “Cliff is in,” I told him. “What did Laurel say?”

  “She’s in, too,” he said, looking grim. I felt a stab of sympathy. Cliff was used to walking into dangerous situations, but Laurel was a relatively weak witch with a relatively normal job. She was only willing to do this for Wyatt. And, to some extent, for Ellen.

  Guilt flared in my stomach. If Jesse were here, he’d probably tell me to abort, to go home and let Dashiell come back to Las Vegas with the cavalry. But if I did that, Jameson would almost definitely die. And Dashiell himself would be forced to take a huge risk. I’d like to think I wasn’t exactly expendable, but if something happened to me, it wouldn’t topple the whole governing system in Los Angeles. In the grand scheme of things, my death would be a brief inconvenience.

  “She thinks she knows of a store near the Strip that’s open late, so she’s going to run and get the items your friend Lex suggested,” Wyatt went on. “Meanwhile, you and I need to run an errand.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Oh?”

  A smile spread across his cowboy face. This particular smile made me nervous. “The guns,” I guessed.

  A nod. “Can you shoot?”

  “I’m better with a blade. I don’t like guns much.” This was a bit of an understatement—guns freaked me right the shit out.

  “That didn’t actually answer my question,” Wyatt said mildly.

  I sighed. Even I couldn’t deny that guns were probably necessary here, and I didn’t dislike them enough to go to the proverbial gunfight with only some knives. This was exactly why Jesse made me keep practicing with him at the range. “If the situation calls for it, yes. I can shoot.”

  Wyatt looked at me for a long moment, assessing, then shrugged. “The situation calls for it,” he said.

  I put on my bulletproof vest and my knife holster, a soft leather belt that looked like a short corset. It sat high on my waist, which let me sit and move around without stabbing myself, and held twelve small throwing knives. I covered this up with a loose long-sleeved shirt. I might get a little hot, but it could have been worse. I added my boots with their knife holsters, too.

  Wyatt watched me get ready with an approving—but never lascivious—eye. I was starting to get a serious Old West gunslinger vibe off him, like maybe this wasn’t his first time walking into a firefight. When I was ready, the two of us tramped through the noisy casino to the parking garage, where Cliff was waiting at the entrance with a black duffel bag in hand. To my relief, he looked much better than he had that afternoon: more color, less stiffness in his mo
vements. I introduced the two of them, and they shook hands, although Cliff looked a little wary. “He’s human in my presence,” I reminded him under my breath. Cliff nodded and relaxed slightly.

  “How’s the injury?” I asked, nodding at his side.

  “Pretty good.”

  “You look like you can handle yourself,” Wyatt said, surveying the other man. “You ever been in a firefight?”

  “Yeah. You?”

  Wyatt nodded, but admitted, “But it’s been . . . oh, about a hundred years.”

  Cliff frowned, and I hurried to change the subject. “So. Where are we going to get a bunch of guns at seven thirty on a Saturday night?” I said to Wyatt.

  A wide grin spread over his face. “That, I’ve got covered.”

  The three of us had to squeeze into Wyatt’s dusty blue pickup truck, which was the kind you see in music videos for country songs. Well, okay, I don’t actually watch music videos for country songs, but I’d imagine they’re full of small, well-used and well-loved pickup trucks. To my surprise, the interior was perfectly neat, even cleaner than I keep the White Whale. But then, I guess you don’t have to worry about fast-food wrappers if you don’t eat actual food. I had to sit in the middle because I was the girl. And, in all fairness, the smallest of the three of us.

  Traffic on Las Vegas Boulevard was getting hairy, but Wyatt turned us off the main drag, jumping onto a highway for a little bit to form what felt like most of a large circle. At least we got to skip the bumper-to-bumper.

  I lost my bearings, but eventually we drove into a part of town that was mostly closed up for the night, unlike the Strip. It was more or less a typical suburban strip mall kind of neighborhood, but Wyatt steered the pickup truck into a dark parking lot, and I squinted to see the building we’d pulled up to. “The Gun Store?” I said aloud. “Seriously?” Cliff didn’t say anything.

  “Las Vegas’s premier indoor shooting range for nearly thirty years,” Wyatt said smugly, pulling around to the back lot. “They specialize in guns from throughout history. This is where you go if you want to shoot a tommy gun, or one of James Bond’s Walthers.”

  “That’s really cool,” Cliff said in an almost reluctant voice, like he hated to admit he was impressed. “But I brought my own weapons.”

  “Suit yourself.” Wyatt put the truck in park and climbed out. “Me, I never did get much of a taste for automatic weapons,” he added. “This store stocks the guns I know how to use.”

  I hurried after him. “Wyatt, a place like this is gonna have state-of-the-art security,” I said nervously. “If you break in, the cops will—”

  Wyatt held up his key chain, giving it a jingle. Then he inserted a key into the back door and pulled it open. “I’m kind of a silent partner here,” he said over his shoulder.

  Oh.

  Wyatt keyed a password into an alarm keypad. We followed him to a security room, where he did something to the computer, presumably erasing our tracks. Finally he turned to me. “Now,” he said, suddenly reminding me of an Old West Willy Wonka. “What do you want to shoot?”

  I blinked. “Uh . . . a Glock, if you have it.” Jesse owned both a Glock and a Beretta, and made me practice with both. I preferred the grip of the Beretta, which felt more comfortable in my hand, but Jesse always pushed the Glock—a blocky, ugly weapon that would nevertheless still shoot even if it was underwater or full of dirt.

  Wyatt led me to what looked like the main salesroom, flipping on the lights and going behind the counter. Without being asked, Cliff took up a spot near the front door, keeping an eye out for incoming cars. The store had only been closed for a couple of hours, and I could still smell gunfire in the air, that special mix of gunpowder and propellant and ozone. It made me nervous, since I still felt like we were breaking and entering, but then again, Wyatt was a vampire. If the cops showed up, I would suppress my radius and he could press them.

  Behind the counter, weapons were hanging on hooks, presumably unloaded. There were little rectangular tubs below them, each one just the right size for a handgun and some ammo. Wyatt grabbed a familiar-looking gun off the wall and dropped it into a tub, then turned to look at me.

  “What else?” Wyatt asked.

  “Dude. If we’re going into a situation where I need more than one gun, we’re all gonna die.”

  He wrinkled his nose at me, but shrugged. “You know how to reload, right?”

  “Yes.” I was mildly insulted. “What about me makes me look like I don’t know how to reload a gun?”

  He dropped some speed-loaders into the tub along with the Glock and then passed it to me. He pointed to a doorway. “Go in there and get yourself a holster.”

  The other room had what I guess you’d call shooting accessories. I found an outside-the-waistband holster that looked pretty idiot-proof and carried it back into the other room, still in its package, which I would leave in the truck. Wyatt might not be worried about fingerprints, but I was.

  When I got back, Wyatt had removed his duster and was slinging a second rifle across his body on a strap. He had set out boxes of ammunition on the counter. “You know, I saw this scene in The Matrix,” I remarked. “It didn’t end well for Neo.”

  He grunted. “Better to have them and not need them and all that. You sure you just want the one?”

  I looked at the Glock in the holster, hating how crude and violent it looked. “Yeah. I’m sure.”

  He looked at Cliff. “You good?”

  Cliff gave the wall of historical guns a longing glance, but all he said was, “I’m good.”

  Wyatt shrugged. “Then let’s go kill some celebrities.”

  Chapter 29

  We drove to a gas station at the edge of town, where Wyatt did a loop of the parking lot to check for video cameras, and then parked his truck at the very back of the lot, behind the building. The two men got out and leaned against the truck, so I followed suit.

  With the sun down, the weather was cooling off quickly, and I probably would have been freezing if I wasn’t wearing so many layers. Now I was glad I’d had to pull on a long-sleeved shirt over everything else.

  A few minutes later, Laurel pulled up in an actual Range Rover.

  Cliff let out a low whistle. “Nice ride,” he said.

  Laurel climbed out, rolling her eyes a little in embarrassment. She was wearing jeans and a dark green tee shirt, the first time I’d seen her in clothes that I would actually wear. Her chin-length hair was pulled into a short ponytail, and her only jewelry was the same metal wave necklace she’d been wearing all weekend. She looked nervous, and a little excited, like she’d just been called up to the major leagues. Or maybe to the Avengers. “Yeah, well, Wyatt said we’d need to go off-road, so I borrowed this from my father-in-law. It would be best if we didn’t get any bullet holes in it. What happened to you?” she asked me, gesturing at my face.

  “Oh.” I touched my cheekbone, and instantly regretted it. I’d taken four Advil, enough that I didn’t have to think about the bruise as long as I didn’t move my face around a lot. “You should see the other guy’s dead body. Did Juliet and the others get going?”

  “Yes.” She looked pained. “Juliet is frantic with worry, so Bethany is driving Cliff’s vehicle. I take it the car accident was your handiwork?”

  “Yes . . . but Jack is completely fine,” I promised. “He was just pressed. They’re in for a few hours of worry, and some insurance paperwork.” I tried to make it sound like no big deal, but the guilt still lanced through me. I had gotten them involved.

  Pushing the thought aside, I said to Cliff and Laurel, “Can we get in your fancy car for a minute? Wyatt can show you the map.”

  Wyatt and I got in the back seats of the Range Rover, and the other two climbed into the front. Wyatt had drawn a little map on Venetian stationery, and after a moment of squinting around he located an overhead light and switched it on.

  “This is the boardinghouse, here,” he said, tapping at a long rectangle at the bottom of the she
et. “Right behind it and to the left, there’s a dirt path that leads to some scrubby forest. If you steer right, however, it leads you into the canyon. If I were planning to kill vampires, I’d tell them there’s gonna be an outdoor party back there. Might even set it up with some tables and lights and things. When the shooting starts, there will be nowhere for them to go.”

  “Okay . . .” Laurel said.

  “We want you guys down the other path, near the scrubby forest,” I told Cliff. “You’re gonna have to come in from the road, work your way around.”

  Cliff nodded. “I can do that,” he said, looking relaxed for maybe the first time since I’d met him. “I’ve got GPS, and this beast should be able to go just about anywhere.” He gave the dashboard a fond pat.

  “Where will the two of you be?” Laurel asked.

  Wyatt tapped a spot on the map again. “To the right of both paths, there are the remains of an old outbuilding. As far as I remember, there are only three walls still standing, but that should be enough to give us cover until the Holmwoods get close. We wait until they’re heading out back, and we ambush them.”

  Our best chance, Lex had pointed out, would be to go to Erson Station way ahead of the Holmwoods, while they were still busy with the nine thirty Demeter show. We would find our hiding place and wait for Arthur and Lucy to appear, and then I would extend my radius so Wyatt could shoot them. We still didn’t know how many vampires were working for them, but with the two leaders dead, I didn’t think anyone would try to retaliate. They were the engine driving this whole thing.

  As for Jameson, his ideology may have been in line with the Holmwoods’, but I couldn’t see him being devastated by their deaths. And if they were gone, hopefully I could convince him to get out of here, away from Malcolm and the skinners. If he didn’t want to come to LA and beg for Dashiell’s forgiveness, maybe I could send him to stay with one of the other nulls I knew of, in Europe or Japan.

  But that was a problem for Future Scarlett. For now, we would go in, wait for Arthur and Lucy to show up, and kill them immediately.

  Which reminded me of something. I gave Wyatt a sidelong glance. “Are you gonna need to do the whole monologue on why they need to die, blah blah vengeance, or can we just shoot them?”