Chapter Twenty-Three
The San Francisco Bay came into focus as the vision left her, and Cordelia hid her satisfaction by sipping her tea.
If the Langeais wolves thought sending her grimoire to the wolf witch, Alain d’Louncrais, would stop her from coming for it, they were sadly mistaken.
She would storm the Bastille in the eighteenth century to get it back if she had to.
Whitecaps dotted the water, and dark clouds loomed on the horizon.
A storm was coming, and the Langeais wolves would bear the brunt of it.
As would the Bayside coven. Less than a block away was the home of Marjory Jackson, former High Priestess.
Cordelia smirked. She was right under their noses and they had no idea.
Not in some abandoned warehouse down by the docks.
Or some rundown cabin in the woods. No more mud huts, peasant villages, or poverty for her. Not anymore.
Cordelia turned from the window, her gaze lighting on the two men in her parlor.
Dutton, her grandson—though still recovering from the stab wounds inflicted by Annabelle, he could yet be of use—and Regis Veilleux, the vaunted leader of the Faucherians.
She suppressed a snort. If the man had any brains, he would change the damn name of his organization.
But his hatred, and subsequently his people’s hatred, of the Langeais wolves made for good, expendable foot soldiers.
He’d first sent her Gerard Boucher, but with Gerard dead at the hands of Gabriel Montagne, Veilluex had come in person.
Boucher had been little more than a thug.
In Veilleux’s eyes glimmered keen intelligence with a side serving of cunning.
He was the true mastermind behind the rise of the Faucherians.
Rumor had it he had connections in some very high places.
Connections that could prove useful to her.
Or they could turn on her at a moment’s notice.
She’d played the long game for decades. Across centuries.
She had patience and money and power. At her age, what she no longer had was time.
Despite the deep well of magic at her fingertips, even she couldn’t stop the inevitable.
Death would claim her like everyone else.
At eighty-five, her days were numbered. The return of her grimoire, and the spells within it, would help her stave it off a little longer.
Her gaze narrowed on the Frenchman. “Your men were a little too enthusiastic in their charade, Veilleux. I have bruises on my arms.”
Vielleux snarled. “Six of my men are dead. Where were your powers when zey were dying?” Veilleux’s French accent was not normally as pronounced, but in his anger it thickened.
“Zink yourself lucky all you ’ave are bruises.
Do we even want ze same zing, Cordelia? Mm?
” He said her name as though he’d tasted something foul on his tongue.
Her wrinkled, age-spotted hands gripped her tea cup. She wouldn’t tolerate being spoken to like a mere human. She could turn him into the very thing he hated. That which he hunted. The thought had some appeal. She doubted Veilluex would have the fortitude to master the beast within as he had.
She breathed through the temptation. Not yet. “I told you to send more men.” She infused enough ice in her voice to freeze over San Francisco Bay.
Men never listened. It wasn’t her problem if he’d paid the price.
It was her problem those blasted twins still walked the earth.
Them, and their brother, were thorns in her side.
As was the hacker she’d used. The bleeding-heart crusader hellbent on saving her.
She’d suited her purpose until the Montagne twins had tracked the stupid girl down.
Blast her second sight for the lack of warning. On this, it had been silent.
“I underestimated the twins.” A grudging admission from an arrogant man. “They’re pirate informatiques, not soldiers.”
Fool. They were werewolves first. Had he thought them weedy little men hunched over their desks, squinting at their computer screens? “Where are they now?”
“At the Ritz-Carlton.”
“And the girl?”
“With zem. I ’ave men on it. Ze ’otel is crawling wiz shifters. Taking ’er from ze ’otel is too risky, but ze moment zey make a move, we’ll know.”
She turned to Dutton. “The others?”
“Annabelle and her mutt, Gabriel, have gone to ground with Isobella and the d’Louncrais she-wolf. They’re still planning on using your spell to go back to the tenth century. From the whispers I’m hearing, it’s Isobella going back in time, not Annabelle.”
Isobella? No. That cannot happen.
Dutton helped himself to a whiskey from her sideboard. Annabelle choosing to mate a werewolf over him still consumed him. Dutton needed to find himself a willing bedmate. It was what she’d been forced to do all those years ago.
“It makes no sense to me,” said Dutton, between sips of whiskey. “Isobella is unwell. No one’s talking, but I tracked her to the hospital the other day. Cancer, I think. Why send her back?”
Because, you stupid sod, of what she becomes.
Cordelia had seen it. The woman she knew as Isobella using her spell to journey back in time, and mating the other pair of Montagne twins, the tenth-century ones.
She remembered them well. Big brutes of men.
Pure Frankish blood. No hint of the bronzed skin of their descendants.
“We can’t allow Isobella to go back to the tenth century. ”
Dutton’s glass halted part way to his lips. “Forgive me, Aunt Cordelia, but… It was you who suggested the coven send someone back to the tenth century. Now you want us to stop it?”
With Annabelle under their control, sending her back to the tenth century had been a masterful plan.
Two-fold in nature. She was an unknown, and unexpected.
A lost and helpless female, the d’Louncrais would’ve taken her in.
As they’d taken in Cordelia when she’d arrived in the village, her belly rounded with a babe.
Through her, they could have wreaked havoc on the Langeais wolves.
On the d’Louncrais. And Annabelle wasn’t Isobella.
Preventing Isobella from going back in time would strike a blow close to the heart of the Langeais wolves.
All three Montagnes—Gabriel, Pierre and Louis—would cease to exist. And it would do much more than that. She could not let Isobella succeed.
But no matter how much she tried, Cordelia had yet to subvert fate. What use were her damn visions if she couldn’t use them to alter the course of history?
“You don’t have to understand,” she snapped.
Dutton dropped his gaze. “Of course. I’ll update Douglas. He’ll see it done.”
“I’ll allocate a few of my operatives to assist him,” said Veilleux.
The man might not have an ounce of esoteric power running through his veins, but where Dutton had failed to make the connection, Veilleux hadn’t.
She would have to keep a close watch on the leader of the Faucherians.
He would turn on her. Eventually. When he did, she’d be ready for him.
And she wouldn’t make the mistake of turning him into a werewolf.
Not like she had all those centuries ago with him. When he’d rejected her.
Him. Alexandre d’Louncrais. Her creation.
The first ever Langeais wolf. It had all started with him.
And here, in the twenty-first century, his ancestors continued to flourish.
Progeny begotten from the womb of that wretched nobleman’s daughter, Genevieve.
Alexandre was long dead, lost to dust over the centuries, but it was not enough to ease the rage that burned in her chest.
“Dutton, fetch me that country bumpkin herbalist, Grace Williams. I have a task for her. Call her mother in, too.” A little leverage went a long way. She pinned the Faucherian leader with her gaze. “And Veilluex, get me that hacker.”
She’d wipe out the Montagnes, get rid of anyone who could trace her, and Grace would get her back her grimoire. Then she would finish off the d’Louncrais and the rest of the Langeais wolves once and for all. She’d created them. She was going to destroy them.