by K. A. Linde
“I’ve never worried much about upkeep in the main parts of the house, but the basement was completely refitted in recent years.” Washington seemed more comfortable now that he was back in a lab, downstairs, and away from the memory of his dead wife, upstairs. “All of my research has been uploaded to the servers, and the lab was created as a just-in-case option.”
“Wow,” Gabe said, admiring the impressive gun collection, “appearances are deceiving.”
“I’m glad that I pass your muster,” Washington said dryly.
Gabe tipped him a two-finger salute.
“I think that we should all pick rooms and clean up. I have superior olfactory and can tell you that everyone needs a shower,” Washington said with a small smile. “I will contact Genevieve to come by with food.”
“You trust her?” Meghan asked.
“She has been taking care of this house longer than you have been alive. She’s trustworthy.”
“All right,” Meghan agreed. “A shower sounds nice.”
Gabe, Tye, and Meghan immediately fell into a sense of normalcy, arguing among themselves over which bedroom to take. Reyna didn’t really care. They all seemed extravagant.
Washington stopped her on her way toward the stairs. “Reyna…”
“Yeah?”
“Beckham had been here before…in the past. Before I abandoned the place, he had a room here.” Reyna’s heart constricted at the words. “I thought you’d want to stay there.”
Reyna nodded, unable to form words.
“Turn left and it’s the room at the end of the hall.”
“Thank you,” she choked out.
“I am terribly sorry for your loss. Beckham was a good vampire. A great man. He…he deserved better than William Harrington,” Washington said. “As long as I was friends with William, I never knew him to get his hands dirty. He must have felt very threatened by you to do something so out of character.”
“Little consolation.”
“Indeed. But don’t ever forget the power that you have over him. He seeks to control you, but he doesn’t understand you. It’s his greatest weakness. I do not think he has realized that harming you was a tactical error.”
Reyna raised her chin. “He will one day.”
Washington let a small smile grace his cheeks. “I believe you.”
With that, Reyna grabbed fresh clothes out of one of their duffel bags, climbed two flights of stairs, turned left, and faced down the door to Beckham’s room. She slowly walked toward it and placed her hand on the metal doorknob. Her hand shook on the knob before she worked up the courage to turn it and push the door open. She flipped on the lights and the room was bathed in a soft glow from the antique lamps. It felt homey in Beckham’s space instead of threatening. A four-poster bed took up the center of the room, complete with a canopy and navy duvet. An entire wall was full from top to bottom with books in every shape, color, and size. An old-fashioned writing desk sat unoccupied in a corner, still littered with papers he’d apparently left behind.
She knew immediately that the Beckham who had lived and worked at this residence had not been the Beckham she had known. This was the ruthless vampire who had risen to the top with murder and destruction. The vampire he had been before he’d turned his back on this life and started to help Elle. Before he became hers.
She could sense it in every fiber of her being, standing here. Still, somehow, she was completely connected to Beckham in every way. He was gone, but she could feel him like phantom pain in a severed limb.
Reyna swallowed back the bile rising in her throat and then for the first time since Beckham had wrapped his jacket around her shoulders, she removed it from her body. She found a wardrobe against the wall…still stocked with clothes. The smell of him nearly overwhelmed her. For a moment it was as if he were standing directly behind her. She could close her eyes and feel his hands on her and breathe him in. But he wasn’t there.
She pushed all the clothes together, took out a hanger, and hung the jacket in the wardrobe. She hated the absence of it already. She wouldn’t let it go, but she would keep moving forward. If she stopped entirely, his death would be for nothing. Beckham would want her to go on. He would want her to use his death to further their cause. He would want so much more from her. He always had.
Mourning would be a long process, but she couldn’t let it cripple her. Not when there was so much left to do. After her shower, Reyna felt much clearer and levelheaded. She dragged on new clothes, pulled her hair up in a sharp ponytail, and knew what she needed to do.
* * *
—
An hour later, she had everyone assembled in the dining room. The room was much too big for their motley crew of five, but it was better than nothing. Tye had stood on the antique table to light the candles on the chandelier, which somehow had survived all this time and not been replaced by electric.
“Do you know how old that table is you’re standing on?” Washington tsked. Reyna didn’t know how else he was supposed to light it.
“Probably not as ancient as you, old man,” Tye said teasingly before jumping down and taking his seat.
“I take no offense to having three hundred or so years on you,” Washington said.
Reyna stood from her seat at the head of the table. It had been purposeful to take what had been Sydney’s place. None of them knew if the leader of Elle had survived the attack on the bunker.
“I called this meeting,” Reyna said, “because I don’t want to waste any time. Though I am thankful that we have a place to stay, there’s a lot that needs to be done.”
“Reyna,” Meghan said with a sigh, “this is really not the time. You should rest. You should grieve. You need the time to recover.”
Reyna held up her hand, and to her surprise Meghan actually stopped talking. “I understand where you’re coming from, but no. I don’t need downtime. I don’t need to grieve. I’ll sleep when I’m dead. Right now we need to regroup and hit them back. They’ll never expect us to rally.”
“Because we have nothing to rally around,” Meghan said.
“That’s where you’re wrong. We have everything to rally around. Everything. Visage is still going to unveil their plans for a feeding camp. They still have humans imprisoned beneath their building in the city. They’re trying to take over the world. We can’t let them get away with it.”
“I agree with you,” Gabe said, holding his hands up. “But we need more time.”
“You said that I needed to live so that this wouldn’t all be for nothing,” she said, throwing his words back at him. “Let’s not make it for nothing.”
“I’m sorry, Reyna. But you just saw Beckham murdered. You’re not ready for this,” Meghan said.
“Kid gloves off, Meghan. I appreciate you breaking me out of Visage, but please don’t baby me. You all lost as much as I did and you’re not falling apart. I’m ready to step up. Are you?”
Meghan leaned back and pursed her lips. She didn’t respond. Reyna shrugged and turned to face the guys.
“Well?”
“Whatcha got?” Tye asked.
Gabe winked.
Washington just smiled and tilted his head toward her.
“We have a lot to do, but first, we need to figure out what happened with the bunker. Tye and Meghan, you two should figure out how bad the damage is and work with Washington to make contact with whoever survived.”
“And you and Gabe?” Meghan snapped. “Where do you fit in all of this?”
Reyna turned and stared at her friend. She loved Meghan. But something had broken in her with this. She was no longer the upbeat woman that could charm the pants off of anyone with a smile. Reyna was using that energy for change. Meghan was letting it eat at her.
“Gabe and I are going to get Jodie.”
Meghan’s eyes rounded. “Jodi
e left almost a week ago. We have no idea where she is. It’s a waste of resources to look for her when we’re in the midst of all this.”
“Jodie escaped Visage with us. She’s our responsibility and my closest friend. She has never been on the streets alone. Ten years inside Visage and now she’s all alone? No, we have to find her. The mission is to get all of Elle back together. Jodie is part of Elle, and we do know where she went. I have an address. Once we have our team back together and more information, we can get back to the real matter at hand—taking down Harrington.”
“I think it’s a good plan,” Washington said. “We have much to do to get Elle back on its feet. This is as good as any place to start.”
“And we will get Elle back on its feet,” Reyna said passionately. “Visage will not win. They will not break us. No matter how they try. We will always come back swinging.”
Gabe, Tye, and Meghan looked up at her with a newfound respect. As if she had suddenly begun to grow into the person she was always meant to be.
Chapter 4
“So, you really up for this?” Gabe asked. He arched an eyebrow as he pulled out an assortment of guns.
“Please stop asking that question. Between you and Meghan, I think I’ve been asked enough about my feelings on the matter.”
“Hey, you should go easy on Meghan.”
“I know,” Reyna said with a sigh. She pinched the bridge of her nose. “I know what she’s lost. I know what it all feels like. I’ve been depressed like that. But I just can’t stand being babied anymore. I’m not the same person I was when I joined Visage. Or the person Meghan met when she broke me out of Visage.”
“I can see that. But Megs can’t help but look out for you. It’s in her nature.”
Reyna shrugged. “You’re right. I’ll take it easy. Just trying to keep the train on the rails. I don’t want us to get so lost in our feelings that we stop doing shit.”
Gabe chambered a bullet in his weapon and then smiled at her. “Don’t worry. I’m all for doing shit.”
“You’re ridiculous,” she said with a laugh.
Gabe collected all the guns and loaded most into a duffel bag. He stuffed one into his waistband and attached several others to straps on his body. Then he handed one to Reyna. “Hope you don’t need this.”
“Me too.” She took it reluctantly, checked the safety, and then strapped it to her side. She pulled her jacket over it and they headed out the door.
“Can you believe that Washington has had this place since 1805?” Gabe said with a shake of his head. “Fucking vampires, man. How fucking old is he?”
“Old.”
Reyna hopped in the passenger seat of an inconspicuous car in the huge garage. Reyna’s eyes had doubled in size at the amazing selection of vehicles that Washington had revealed to them, from flashy sports cars to SUVs to a fucking Hummer. The guy was a collector. Thank God, he kept this place outfitted with up-to-date tech.
“Why the hell would he work as a doctor with this loot?” The car revved to life and then Gabe peeled away.
“It clearly didn’t start as an Elle establishment,” she said, voicing the thought she’d had all along. “Fifteen years ago, he would have been helping Harrington start Visage.”
“It’s a little poetic that the rebel organization that’s going to take Harrington’s ass down is working out of a base he started all this shit in.”
“Couldn’t agree more,” Reyna said with a vicious smile.
They drove for over an hour in companionable conversation. Gabe was a carefree, flirtatious sort. When she’d first met him, she’d immediately pegged him as trouble. That much was still true. Except now it was one of her favorite qualities about the quick-witted, quick-tempered Irish mobster.
As they moved through more decrepit streets, they now continued forward in silence. Reyna realized with horror that she’d been here before. When she had first started as Beckham’s blood escort, he’d tried to show her the reality of vampires. That, despite her disagreement, they were all desperate, hungry killers. He’d never had much success with her in that department. She’d always had him as an example and thus felt his logic was flawed.
But on one such occasion, he had driven her out to this neighborhood. She’d seen fiendish rogue vampires, prostitutes, blood whores, poor hungry people—and overall desperation. People who had nothing and would do anything to have just a morsel. Beckham’s Town Car had sent them into a frenzy.
It had shaken her, but done nothing to change her resolve that the world needed change. That a place like that existed at all was the issue. People in poverty were the real victims. And the top echelon were the villains.
And now she was driving down that same street.
Her heart sank. She sure hoped Jodie had already left this hellhole.
“I’m not sure what to do about the car,” Gabe said. “I thought it would blend. I greatly underestimated how shitty this neighborhood is.”
“Yeah. I think we need to find a place to stash it.”
“You okay with a bit of a walk?” Gabe grimaced.
“Whatever we need to do.”
They were probably a mile away from their destination before Gabe found a place to leave the car where it wouldn’t be stripped down for parts before they returned. The weather was brisk, but it was nice to be out actually doing something. She hardly noticed the walk or the cold as anticipation fluttered through her stomach.
“Try not to get your hopes up,” Gabe muttered. “This isn’t the kind of place people linger if they don’t have to.”
Reyna ducked her head and tried not to make eye contact with the other people on the streets. She’d grown up in the Warehouse District. She’d thought she’d known hardship but that was nothing compared to what she was seeing now.
A few guys approached Gabe, who bucked up to twice his size at their approach.
“You got some cash?” the first guy asked.
“No.”
“What, you’re too good for us?” the second guy asked.
“How about your little girly, then?” The last guy took a step toward Reyna. She sidestepped closer to Gabe.
Gabe shot them a menacing glare and then pulled back the front of his jacket. The handguns he’d secured there earlier were clearly visible. “You’re making a terrible mistake. Just keep walking.”
One guy showed off his own gun, but his friends looked warier.
“Promise I’m faster on the draw,” Gabe snarled.
“Come on, Dom.”
“Yeah, Dom,” Gabe spat. “Listen to your buddies.”
Dom offered some choice expletives before being dragged away by his friends. Reyna only breathed again when they were a block away from them. She sure hoped that they didn’t run into them again. She knew that encounter wouldn’t go as well.
“Fucking cocky bastards. Thinking only with their dicks,” Gabe growled relentlessly as they walked the last few blocks. “Think they’re so bad. They wouldn’t survive a night on my fucking streets.”
Reyna smiled at him. She liked seeing Gabe be all big bad tough guy. No wonder Meghan was into him.
“Well, here we are,” Gabe said.
They stared up at the decrepit apartment building. Most of the windows were boarded up with an air-conditioning unit sticking out. A group of kids played with a kickball in the street. A few elderly men played backgammon on the stoop. A drug deal was happening on the corner.
“Great place,” Reyna muttered.
They approached the entrance, which had a gate that had long since been deactivated. One of the elderly men called out to them, but they both ignored him and hurried up the steps. They checked the registry for Jodie’s cousin’s name, June Gardner. There was no one by that name, but they’d been expecting that. They buzzed the apartment number. No one answered.
Gabe shrugged and took to the stairs. They went up five flights before finding the apartment just off of the landing. Gabe knocked on the front door long enough for someone to finally crack it open. It was a large woman in nothing but a bra and underpants. Her hair was in curlers and she wore a permanent sneer.
“What?” she spat. “I don’t need nothin’. Don’t need you bangin’ on my door. Fuck off.”
Reyna jumped forward. “So sorry to bother you, ma’am. We were just wondering if June Gardner lived here.”
“Don’t know no one by that name.”
“Or Jodie. Tall, black, curly Afro?”
“Yeah that bitch came by.”
Reyna’s heart leapt. “When?”
“Don’t fucking know. But I sent her on her way just like I’m ’bout to send you on yours.”
“Do you know where she went?” Gabe interjected.
“Do I look like someone’s fucking keeper?” the woman spat, and then slammed the door in their faces.
Gabe looked like he wanted to barrel through the door. Reyna put her hand on his arm and shook her head.
“She’s not going to be any more help. I think if she was this nice to us then she wouldn’t have been any kinder to Jodie.”
“True.”
“Come on. Let’s find someone more willing to give information.”
They headed back downstairs and Reyna walked over to the elderly man who had tried to flag them down. He at least had wanted to talk to them.
“Hello,” she said with a smile.
“Well, hello there,” he said with a toothless grin. “I’m Harold.”
“Nice to meet you. We are looking for our friend June. She used to live here and we haven’t heard from her in a while.”
“June, June, June,” the man said as if looking deep into the recesses of his mind.
“Our other friend, Jodie, came looking for her last week.” Reyna gave him the same description she’d given the woman upstairs.
“Oh! I remember her,” the man said. He moved a backgammon piece before turning back to them. “She came ’round asking the same questions as you.”