Agent Down: Region Two Series Book Two, page 30
Liv stepped up, hands loose at her sides and making it clear she wasn’t going for a weapon. “We assumed you had a lead on this vampire or already had one in mind who suited your needs. We’re ready to roll on it when you are.”
Vee and Stavros did that thing, Vee pressing into him, not touching, but sharing some message. Whatever the message was, Vee didn’t relax. “This isn’t a mission. This is a hunt, and it will be dirty and bloody, and basically? It’s none of your business.”
“Policing cryptids is our business.”
“The vampires will all end up dead. There, end of your business.”
“Jesus fucking—vampires, plural?” Came out of his mouth before he could stop it. The plan was ball shriveling enough when he believed they were taking on a single ancient powerhouse.
Vee didn’t speak to him, but to Liv, “Plural. Bye.”
Josh took a turn, after Kimi elbowed him in the stomach, sure as shit a reminder they’d been up to something too. “Look, we overheard. You’re going after big game. You need back-up, and here we are.”
“We need back-up we can trust, not another enemy at our back.” Vee was obviously done pulling her punches. “Is this a shortcut? You talked it over with HQ? Lull us into a false sense of security, get us in the field, and take us out while we’re preoccupied? Nice and neat, and bonus HQ points.”
Kimi closed her eyes as if she was in pain.
“Vee, damn it.” Liv waded back in. “What I said earlier was out of line. What you said earlier was out of line. None of us want you gone. Yes, I’m C.O., and yes, that used to be your role and isn’t any longer, and resentment is normal and we’ll deal with it later. Let us help, if for no other reason than you were right about Oversight burning all of us down if they find out about you. You’ve been here with us long enough to call our loyalty into question.”
It killed part of his soul when Vee straightened, shoulders relaxing. That, she believed. That it was about Liv being pragmatic and protecting the team, not about Vee being part of this family and that they cared if Vee lived or died. “Fine, we can strategize. Your office.”
She shoved past Liv, headed for the office and the maps, once Vee’s, now Liv’s. “Let’s get this over with. I’d like to have a meal that I’m reasonably certain isn’t doctored with the intent to kill me.”
“It’s a vamp, Vee. It’s gonna try to kill you.” Josh joined the exodus to strategize.
“Yes, but I expect it to.” Vee shoved the office door open.
Bruce angled to go after the crew, and hit a barrier, in the form of a vampire. One regarding Bruce like he was something found on the bottom of a shoe. “Leave them be. You and I are due for a conversation.”
Bruce bit down on the automatic “Fuck off.” The old vampire had saved Vee as well as been watching out for her this entire time, when Bruce hadn’t been able to. He was important to Vee. She’d lost enough—Bruce wasn’t adding to that stress again.
For once he chose his words carefully, keeping his pride and ego out of the equation. “I owe you an apology. I owe Vee…hell, there’s no way to quantify what I owe her.”
“I do not comprehend what my daughter values about you. I have seen wounded, cornered ghouls behave less viciously and with more compassion than you have.” Silver haloed the vamp’s brown eyes, effect shining brighter with each word.
“I was an asshole.” Bruce owned it. He’d never had a problem claiming what he excelled at, or what he fucked up. “I let my shitty attitude take over and took my hurt out on everyone else, Vee included. I will make it up to her, though. You and I don’t have to be drinking buddies, but we do have to find a way to coexist. We have caring about Vee in common, and that’s a solid start. Tell me what I need to do to help her. Tell me what she needs from us.”
The vampire’s eyes flickered brighter, like a candle flaming higher. “Your words mean nothing. You’re craven and petty. In all my centuries on this earth, you are the one human I have considered killing. Only Victoria eliminating you from her life saves yours. She’s seen to it that you won’t have another chance to harm her, since I’ll ensure she’ll be a continent away from your deviltry.”
Bruce hadn’t thought the knot in his gut could get any bigger, but it inflated by a magnitude of ten.” Another…what the hell are you—”
The team spilled into the kitchen before he could form a coherent thought. Josh and Kimi both gave him a hard stare.
Yeah, fine. They’d tried to bring Vee back where she belonged, and he’d undermined them. This clusterfuck was on him. He nodded at them, accepting his guilt.
Kimi tapped the vampire’s elbow and signed directly to him. She was going over their plan and linking Stavros in. Stavros was more of a team player than Bruce had been since Vee came back.
The vampire walked out with the pair, intent on Kimi’s conversation. Bruce ran his hands over his face and into his hair, clinching hard enough pain shot over his scalp. He had to get his shit together.
He ducked into the side hall to take a breath and get his head in the right place. Lock his jealousy and being butt hurt away before it caused more damage. At its core, that’s what this whole damn thing had been about. His jealousy over Stavros getting to be the one Vee relied on, getting to share this honest-to-fuck transformative experience with Vee.
Bruce knew, knew, that it had to have been unimaginably hard on her. She also had to have been in as much pain being separated from her whole family and her life as he’d been in while thinking she was gone. Vee would’ve returned sooner if there had been any way under heaven she could have. He didn’t know what went into being a newly transformed vampire. He didn’t need to know to grasp she’d had some kind of overwhelming shit to conquer.
He slumped against the wall. Vee and Liv’s voices echoed, the freaky acoustics of the y-shaped hall at work.
“We’ll work the perimeter. Josh will pick off singles,” Liv said, like she was confirming something they’d already discussed.
Bruce stood. He’d take this, a private minute, to apologize again. He had a hell of a lot of apologizing to do in order to begin re-earning Vee’s trust.
Vee’s voice rode the air, intimate, but weird. “You really have done an incredible job with the team.”
“Thank you.” Liv’s tone was just as off. “It’s past time to be honest. Are you going to make a play to take it back?”
He froze. This… he should’ve seen this. Jesus, he’d been blind.
Liv and Vee had always been competitive. Before Vee disappeared it had been positive, each pushing the other to be better. The easy competition serving as their version of cheerleading, all about building each other up. Now, he felt the change in their dynamic.
“You were right about the timing. I didn’t consciously admit it but I pushed my training hard, keeping this deadline as my incentive,” Vee answered her sister. “It was this barely-there wisp of a daydream at first.”
“And now?”
“I want it. All of it. My team, my position. None of it really matters though. Even if I wasn’t infected, and my brain’s response wasn’t suspect, the team isn’t mine anymore.”
The scuff of heels on wood stopped, the sisters halting. Vee spoke again. “We’re leaving. As soon as we figure out who or what is behind this vamp population shift, and re-level the playing field, we’re gone. Stavros and I will stage a believable, fiery death in one last raid. After, there’ll be heartfelt speeches and accolades all around, and HQ lavishing brownie points for you guys carrying on so bravely. We’re leaving the Americas and you’ll never have to see us again.”
“Vee.”
“Tell me to my face you don’t want the C.O. position.”
“Of course I want it. I want to keep my team, the family I love, safe. I can’t hand them over to this version of you, the vampire.”
“Exactly. Let’s be clear, here. What I’m saying is, if our mission today is really only about Stavros and I eliminating a nest the team isn’t equipped to? And you have the urge to take a shot on us after we do your job for you? You don’t need to bother. I’ll be gone, you’ll be C.O., and your hands can stay clean.”
“Do you truly, deep down, believe I would do that?”
“My emotions, which I thought I didn’t even have, say no. But we’ve established they aren’t trustworthy. And my head? My head says you are and always will be about the rules. They’re the thing that you believe protects teams and keeps civilians safe. Like, your magical talisman.”
“You’re going to vanish again, just like that?” Suspicion and frustration turned Liv’s tone sharp.
“I’ll tell Kimi and Josh. But not yet. If you can fake being cool with me being here for a bit longer, I can fake being happy to be here. Deal?”
Liv’s sigh carried clearly. “This is so completely fucked up.”
Which wasn’t a disagreement. It wasn’t Liv leaping in to tell Vee she was wrong.
“What about Bruce?
“He’ll have to wait to have his ‘Yay,Vee’s gone’ celebration a while longer.”
The knot in his stomach grew to fatal proportions as Vee swept past, Liv following.
He thought he had time and proximity to rebuild trust. A breather to prove he was truly sorry, and find a real means to show Vee how much he loved her, that he always had, and always would. He’d banked on making up for turning her homecoming into an ordeal instead of the joyous reunion it should have been.
Now, Stavros’ cryptic remark made sense. Bruce was on the clock and time might run out before he proved to Vee that this was her true home.
Chapter 46
Vee
“You sure your intel is solid?” Josh crouched beside me, surveying the estate.
The house and grounds probably hadn’t changed much from when they’d been built in the eighteen-hundreds, except for the addition of electricity and paving. The place was all about wealth, but the solid, low-key kind. Something passed down through the generations, not flashy and modern and meant only to draw attention and announce the owner’s status.
A flutter of eucalyptus leaves, the grove surrounding the thick adobe and wrought iron walls enclosing the compound on the edge between city and desert, marked Stavros finishing his surveillance and joining us.
“The hacienda has been in the same family since its beginning. That family is also a Master and his nest.”
Josh twitched at Stavros suddenly occupying the empty space on my left. “Dude. A little warning.”
Stavros leveled his attention on Josh, and I held in a snicker, but not my grin. My brother was about to be the recipient of one of Stavros’ teaching moments.
“Vampires of this age give no warnings,” he said, severe as a drill sergeant. “This nest has survived by embracing discretion. The Master is old and wise, refuting modern vices and teaching his get to embrace the same restraints.”
“No swiping-right, no partying, no social media, or digital footprint.” Kimi signed, looking smug as Stavros nodded his approval at her quick grasp of the situation.
“You’ve known they were here though.”
“Sí. Castillo allows discreet feeding, but even through these long centuries he’s lived, no deaths and no increasing his nest numbers.”
“But now they get hit,” Josh said.
“They were always going to die.” I shrugged. “Stavros just held them til last since they obeyed old laws. Last happens to be right now.”
“We are the Lord’s scourge.” Stavros’ pronouncement held a frigid, final weight of authority and inevitability.
Kimi shivered, gooseflesh visible, and Josh rubbed up and down his arms. “Sweet dancing baby J—”
I saw the words forming on Josh’s lips and caught his eyes, shaking my head hard enough I gave myself a temporary headache. We so did not need a lecture on blasphemy right now.
“You get the human servants. The rest are ours,” I reminded them. “Don’t hesitate, don’t cut any slack. Any humans here are well aware of who they work for, are loyal of their own free will, and thus complicit.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Josh grumbled, clearly feeling like being tasked watching humans was beneath him. I glared at Josh. I wasn’t sure he or Kimi were taking it seriously enough.
As the morning sun rose, the discreet in-ground security lights blinking off, I dug deep. Grabbing the slippery shadow hiding in the well deep inside, and hauling it out, pulling that power in. When I opened my eyes, the landscape sharpened and brightened. The breeze whispered all the land’s and the nest’s secrets over my skin.
Purposely I looked at my brother and sister, showing them what I was. I’d seen my face when I dug the power out, skin drawn tight, face thinner, eyes flat silver portals. Josh swallowed, adam’s apple working. Kimi’s grip on her knives tightened.
Then Josh gave me a quick thumbs up and Kimi signed, “Be careful.”
“You too,” I whispered.
Stavros and I were gone, streaking over the wall while the rest of the team scaled it, Liv and Bruce on the main gate.
A blast I felt through my bones marked the C-4 blowing the huge iron gate, then the rev of an engine and squeal of tires, Bruce gunning the truck down the drive. The truck was our distraction as Josh and Kimi dropped down on the sand inside.
Stavros and I passed through the barns, horses snorting and shying. We halted at the concrete wash pad. Stavros hooked his claws under the lip and slid it sideways, silent on well-maintained runners.
The scent of resting vampires filled my nose—the always-present taint of human blood, tobacco because someone enjoyed a cigar, and the dusty lavender of modern fabric softener. I followed Stavros down the wide stone steps carved into the basement that didn’t appear on any building blueprints, far older than things like courthouses and zoning law.
The affronted hiss of disturbed vampires hit us like a sonic wall. The five in the sitting room erupted from chairs, books and goblets crashing to the floor. The intoxicating perfume of vampire blood grabbed my attention, snapping my head around, fixating on a female vampire. She’d stepped over a broken decanter but had nicked her ankle.
I launched at her. She met me in a leap, claws clicking out. My knife took her hand, claws and all. She shrieked in shock and pain.
The room devolved into the dance of blades, the sting of claws raking through fabric to skin, and the promise of blood. Flashes of color and bone and skeletal faces like mine. Hisses and growls that all ended the same way, life fading from silver eyes.
I whirled in a circle, finally finding nothing else to fight.
I opened our link, locating Stavros. He stood in a side room in front of another vampire. Despite the shredded remnants of Stavros’ jacket and the gashes in the other vampire’s overly-formal looking clothing, both stood almost at attention in the gore-painted room. Heads high, backs straight. Royal, or regal at least.
When the other vampire spoke, his power laced his voice. Shimmering. Like I should be able to see the words, written in gold, appear on the air between us. “I had not thought any of your kind in the new world.”
“You were wise to flee your catacombs centuries ago.” Stavros’ voice was stark, raw steel compared to the other vampire’s gilded power. Both old and powerful but in different ways. “You cannot ever escape God’s judgment, only delay the reckoning.”
“The Lord’s judgment or another vampire’s addiction to our blood?” He arched a salt and pepper brow. He was tall and sturdy, but hadn’t been young when he was infected.
The soft clatter of boots beat down the stairs. I listened enough to identify heartbeats—Liv’s and Kimi’s—then went back to the display in front of me. We’d hunted Masters before, none in this sort of close-quarters, hand-to-hand style though. Other than Stavros, this was as close as I’d ever been to a living Master of any significant age.
Like he heard my thoughts, the Master turned to survey me. “She is already almost overcome by the lure of our blood. Bringing a decades-old child along was unwise.”
“She has only months, not years, of changed life,” Stavros said, no inflection, just a plain fact.
The other vampire’s surprise tasted…decadent. As tempting as a Belgian chocolate-on-chocolate mousse torte Bruce had made for Kimi’s birthday one year.
The nest Master looked closer, the inspection pressing over my skin. “Extraordinary. Most especially so for one of your adictos.” He turned back to Stavros. “Why now?”
“We have need.” Stavros didn’t elaborate.
My attention kept jumping between the team on the landing watching our strange vampire social display, and Stavros and the Master. My stomach growled, and my skin felt too tight, too hot, then too cold. The banked fire too bright. The blood from the female vampire heightening everything.
The other Master glanced at me and made a meditative clicking noise, with his tongue. It had the same feel as when Stavros used my name in the context of ‘aha, you’re busted’.
“You would be smart to do as I’ve attempted. Stay far from this upstart’s insanity, and even further from the recruitment efforts. No good will come of altering the balance of power or attempting to jumpstart creation.” The Master frowned, his aura brushing and turning pensive against my skin. “Even we cannot hold such power. No one is meant to, human, vampire, or other.”
Hairs on my neck and arms rose, a product of basic fear, not vampire powers. Recruitment.
He knew something. This Master, and he definitely deserved a capital M, also knew about the weirdness in the cryptid world. We had to talk to him, discover exactly what he meant by upstarts and recruitments. Because both sounded horrifyingly close to organized, in the sense we—the Company—was organized. An entity greater than a mere vampire’s nest, no matter how ancient the nest.
The mechanical click-snap of a spent magazine being replaced intruded.
One of the team. They weren’t ever supposed to be here for this part, and whoever reloaded wasn’t waiting for Stavros and me, or thinking of vampire discussions.
