Chapter Seven
A thorough search had begun upstairs. Some of Clive’s team had shown up to take Baker into custody and the others had joined Rowan’s people systematically going through each room.
“Elmer is on his way up,” Vanessa murmured through the earpiece.
Rowan and David moved out of the line of sight, waiting for Elmer to walk out, letting the door close at his back.
The surveillance room was empty but for the three of them. Clive had gone off to handle Nation business and a lot of the equipment had already been removed. Elmer didn’t even notice until Rowan threw a pen at the back of his head.
When she’d interviewed Aron, he’d told Rowan Elmer appeared harmless. Warned her to watch closely.
And, as she first caught sight of him when he spun around, she agreed with that. At first glance anyway. She walked closer and that’s when she caught sight of the flat gaze of a predator. Such a big red flag that even the most deliberately clueless of humans often had a sense of something very wrong around any being with an affect like that. Blank.
Outwardly, everything about him said he was bland. A vanilla dude who fucked with the lights off and ate a lot of beige food. Just a Vampire out for the night grabbing some potato skins and a drink after his workday doing whatever people did inside an office building.
Those shark’s eyes met hers and then skittered off, settling at her right ear, and then he decided to get bold and try to glamor her.
She leaned close, thumb and middle finger enough to get the force for a flick right between his eyes. “Far more powerful Vampires than you have tried—and failed—to glamor me.
“Weird you aren’t asking who I am or what I want as I’m standing in your little pervert hole.” She examined him closely. Elmer had managed average leaning into attractive. But not too far. He had yellowy-gold hair that he’d artfully let curl just a bit. Green eyes. He was sitting, but she was sure he couldn’t have been taller than five ten or so. He appeared soft. Khaki trousers and a button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. Well made though. Vampires liked a well-made garment. Nice watch, but not a Rolex like she’d found back at his house. Didn’t wear them when he went out to find himself snacks, she figured. Good shoes.
Though he’d been Made a Vampire in a time when men wore wigs and breeches, he’d embraced modernity well enough that he wouldn’t stand out. Witnesses would forget about him five minutes after they left his company.
But Rowan had been able to spot a monster from before she could speak. Elmer Marsc, through Brigid’s eyes, had a dark and cluttered energy. Dirty. This being was a taker. She underlined just how little respect she had for him as She stood back and let Rowan resume control once more.
From the start, when it came to this Vampire, there’d been a knowing in her gut. It had led her to this very place. To this very person. At the very least, Elmer was a predator who sought out underaged humans to Make. In violation of Vampiric law as well as the Treaty.
There was more. She knew it. The Goddess knew it and now Rowan had to prove it.
“I know who you are and what you do. I’ve done nothing to merit this sort of attention,” Elmer said, and that flare in her belly happened again.
Rowan sent him a censuring glance and cocked her head. “I’m sure that’s not true at all or I wouldn’t be here.”
The harmless act faded, though the flatness of his demeanor remained. Creepy.
“What do you want, Hunter?” he said at last.
Rowan would start out slow and see just what direction Elmer rabbited off to. Vamps like him weren’t that hard to goad into saying too much. Their belief in their supremacy was their weak spot. It made them incautious. It meant they underestimated everyone else.
Originally she’d planned to take him through the house, show him his perfect, ordered world was crumbling all around him, but as his first glimpse of real emotion was when he caught sight of the missing equipment, Rowan settled her feet a little wider. Let him stay right there wondering just what else was going on. Confronted with her power over him.
“Let’s talk about Aron.” It was his interview material that had first sent up a knowing within Rowan’s belly. Then he’d told her about Elmer’s gross little hobby. The more she found out, the stronger that feeling had become.
Elmer’s expression shuttered immediately and the laugh that burst from her lips was all Brigid. The goddess was delighted by that reaction because deep in the pit of her belly, distrust and anger banked, heating up.
Rowan did like the way his smug was wiped away by that laugh though she hoped she’d get to use the cane too.
“What about him?” Elmer said, trying to sound tough, but the thread of panic in his words was delicious and she wanted to lean in and take a deep breath. “He left my line seventy-five years ago.”
“After you Made him illegally and abused him for several decades.”
“It wasn’t illegal back then. Anyway, one man’s abuse is another man’s pleasure. Don’t let him convince you he was a victim. He said he wanted to leave. I told him to get on getting the fuck out. There’s a hundred more where he came from. He file a complaint?” Elmer’s sneer told Rowan what he thought of that. “You going to turn me over to the Nation?”
Rowan made a face, admittedly surprised he seemed to have no idea the Scion was in his fucking mansion with his fingers all over Elmer’s illegal bullshit. Rowan could feel his power and she wasn’t even a Vampire. “That’s between you and the Nation.”
He’d simply assume she had and that her answer was what he wanted to hear because otherwise meant a confrontation and he wasn’t up to it.
He was more vicious than smart or cunning. That much was clear to her. Viciousness had its uses in the Vampire world. Many of them made their living from it in one way or another. But viciousness without intelligence was a problem. Especially without someone holding the leash.
“What do you want, then?” he asked at last.
“Aron works for Hunter Corp. That makes him one of mine.” Let him think all she knew about was Aron. Right at that very moment, the data cards from the house were being examined. She’d done a quick search through the entire house before Elmer had come upstairs, and had located a number of caches. Some appeared to be spell trapped, so Genevieve showed up with Darius and they were now part of the search.
Elmer had no fucking idea how deep his troubles went. He seemed to sense none of it.
“I hear working for you gets a body killed,” he said, mean in his voice.
Just when she’d begun to feel a little sorry for what a weak Vampire he was, he had to go and make a reference like that. Before Elmer was conscious of it, Rowan had shifted to his side, and had the tip of one of her blades pressing into the flesh between his ribs.
“And what would you know of such a thing?” she asked, her lips pressed to his ear. The sticky copper of the blood she’d spilled beading down the tip of her knife was a match to the kindling of her rage. Not even two months before, several of her closest friends had been murdered by magic-wielding Vampires as a way to get to Rowan.
It had broken her heart and she’d spent the intervening weeks hunting down and killing every being who’d been involved. The key players—that she knew of—were dead, but the problems remained. And where there were problems, there were aggrieved Vampires waiting to plot about it.
Elmer’s intake of breath and gurgle of pain had Brigid delighted.
He said, “I heard. It’s all over town. I didn’t have anything to do with it, I swear. I would never!”
“You felt pretty comfortable bringing it up. Which makes me really cranky and makes you really stupid.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have joked about it,” he said in a rush.
“Who Made you?” Rowan asked.
“I don’t have to tell you that.”
Well, that was an interesting response from a Vampire who was just so eager to abase himself moments before. Rowan pulled her phone out with her free hand and dialed Clive.
Before he could purr her name and get all sexy, Rowan said, “Who is this fucko’s Maker?”
“Give me a few minutes,” he told her and rang off.
“Well then. While we wait, I should probably let you know just on the other side of this door there’s a search of your home being executed by Hunter Corp. Nation stuff too, but the Scion’s people can tell you about that.” She shrugged, amused by the way his mouth flattened with displeasure.
She stepped away, her back to the door, blocking his only way out. She held her blade in between them, just so he didn’t forget it was there.
“This is preposterous!”
“I will give you points for vocabulary, Elmer. Otherwise, honestly, how is it you thought you could just do whatever the fuck, and the Scion would never pay any mind? This one isn’t a criminal scumbag like the last one.”
“Jacques was the epitome of what a powerful Vampire is.”
That made her guffaw. “Yeah? Dead and irrelevant? Is that what you mean?”
Less than two minutes later, Rowan looked at her screen and then up to Elmer. “Well, isn’t this interesting. David, did you know Roderick Haigh was this Vampire’s Maker?” Haigh was a Vampire she’d personally executed upon finding out he’d been the source for the black-market spells Vampires and a bad-guy faerie had been using to harm innocents.
Clive’s tersely worded text told her he was beyond pissed, which was a problem to deal with once they got out of there and Elmer into a cell.
“We’re going to go outside and load you into a car. Then we’re going to get you somewhere secure so we can have a chat about what you’ve been up to,” she told Elmer. “I can see in your eyes you think you can run. I’ll warn you now, that would be a very bad idea. I’m already pissed off. I’ll make it hurt if you run.” Walking stick or not, she’d be on Elmer’s ass before he could gather his next breath.
“I don’t have to go anywhere with you,” Elmer said, his gaze returning to the blade over and over. The stink of his fear made her eyes water. He was hiding something he desperately didn’t want her to know. Which piqued her interest like a motherfucker.
“You’re two hundred and seventy-five years old and you still don’t have the power or ability to take me on. Whereas I have a goddess inside me and the power and authority the Hunter Corp. brings to bear. Your Maker is—sorry, was —a very bad Vampire who got himself executed. If you’re involved in anything he was, I could serve a warrant on you right here. You’d be nothing but dust afterward,” she told him conversationally. “But then I wouldn’t be able to have a longer chat with you and I don’t want that.”
Interrogate first. Then came killing. Logical order.
Rowan said, “David, let’s get him out.”
David moved to obey, opening the door.
Rowan took Elmer’s arm and moved him out.
Patience, one of Clive’s top lieutenants, approached with a curled lip in Elmer’s direction. She and Rowan weren’t pals, but the job she did for Clive kept him alive, so they respected one another.
“Tell him I’m taking this one to Die Mitte ,” she requested.
“I’ll get in contact with Alice to clear the way for you,” Patience said and headed back into the heart of the house where Clive probably was.
But outside the night seemed weirdly still and she stood on the doorstep a few seconds more to listen carefully.
The hair on the back of her neck prickled, awareness that there were powerful beings in that area. Whoever else was out there wasn’t more powerful than she or the Vampire she was frog marching to her vehicle. There were Nation Vampires everywhere on Clive’s orders, along with a Dust Devil or two and an incredibly powerful witch.
But she didn’t think it was a friendly out there. Paranoid or not, the situation warranted caution, so Rowan shifted so that David had physical control of Elmer. Her valet had been at her side long enough that he adjusted, knowing she was up to something and to be ready in case their prisoner tried to run.
She’d let it play out to see what—or who—Elmer had up his sleeve. It was as she hit the automatic locks that another Vampire raced at her, snapping his jaws as he attempted to rush her off her feet. In an easy movement, Rowan stepped to the side, sticking her foot out before she remembered that was her injured leg and an echo of pain blossomed, but she wrestled it back, not having time for any injury bullshit right then.
His rate of speed combined with his trajectory meant when she tripped him, he flew face-first into her passenger door. That would leave a mark on her brand-new car, damn it. She had to give it to him though. Despite the crunch and spray of blood as his nose had broken, the new Vampire scrambled to his feet and went at her again, trying to rip her open with his nails and teeth. She punched him in his already broken nose and then kneed him in the balls with her good leg, sending him right back to the ground on a gurgled exhalation of air.
“Cease this immediately,” Rowan ordered and thought of how Clive had done it, using his voice just so. She pitched her tone slightly differently and the threads of compulsion wrapped around the younger Vamp as she watched. Ooh! “Stand up and dust yourself off. And for goddess’ sake, Elmer, you’re his Maker, find your voice and your spine and tell him to back off or you’ll both be true dead.”
“Haddon, please,” Elmer said. “Stand down.”
Haddon had been the name George had given them for Elmer’s boyfriend. He’d most likely been the one tasked with bringing the car around.
“They said she’ll kill you,” Haddon said. They? She’d let them think she missed that little slip of the tongue until she was ready to run them over with it.
Rowan saw how young he was. Or had been when he’d been Made into a Vampire. She sent a glare Elmer’s way.
“I’m the Hunter. And I will kill you both if I need to. So. Don’t make me need to. I’m in the middle of a hunt. Answer my questions. Don’t be an asshole and try to bite me. Are you a fucking rabid raccoon or a Vampire?” Still annoyed, her injured leg beginning to throb, she sent a middle finger Haddon’s way.
That shut him up.
David put Elmer in the back seat, climbing in next to him. Rowan sent a text to Clive and then jerked her thumb for the younger Vampire to sit up front with her. It took a few minutes to be sure everyone was secure, but Rowan got down to it. She might as well start the questions then, since she had them both subdued and a little scared. Just to take the edge off, so to speak.
“What’s your connection to Roderick Haigh other than his being your Maker? You aren’t in the Haigh line, I know that. You didn’t remain close after he brought you over?” Rowan asked Elmer.
“Why do you care about Haigh?” Elmer challenged. Again.
Rowan sneered at him. “Answer the question. It’s the least of your problems right now.”
“I was never part of that line. He and I were particular friends. His family did not approve.”
“I know the Haighs. There are plenty of gay Vampires in their line and no one seems bothered at all. Maybe it was because you and Roderick went out hunting for young people to seduce and change, and they found it as abhorrent as I do.” It was a guess based on what she already knew and given the way Elmer’s whole body jerked, Rowan figured it was accurate.
Some days being jaded really paid off.
“And you?” she asked Haddon. Haddon? What a ridiculous name. It sounded like one of three last names of an old white guy law firm. “How old were you when Elmer Made you? Don’t lie to me. He’s a Nation Vampire, which means there are rules.”
“I was eighteen. Fully legal.”
Sure. And she was eighteen too. Rowan rolled her eyes knowing all she had to do was look up the paperwork for the Change. If Elmer had done it officially anyway. “Did you consent? Did you know what was going to happen?”
“You don’t need to answer any of these questions,” Elmer told him.
Rowan leaned through to the back seat and punched Elmer’s fucking asshole face and then gave one more jab because he deserved it and her leg still hurt.
“Actually, he does. And now so you do. See you like to frequent bars, but you can’t get drunk from human alcohol. You know the bars I mean. I imagine you choose classier bars serving blood-added drinks when you’re not hunting humans you can manipulate.”
“You’re grasping at straws.”
She’d been doing this too long to miss the slight rise in his voice. The way his words had sped slightly.
To be over two centuries old and still have so little control was a real problem when it came to nearly immortal beings who could make other people into their bonded blood servants or other Vampires.
“See, I don’t think I am. I’m going to take a look at anyone who’s gone missing from this place and the others you creep around. I bet I’ll find a few.” The panic wheeling in his gaze told her she’d win that bet.
That electric blip that pinged in her chest a few seconds before vibrated again, stronger this time, echoing through her whole system. She knew without thinking on it too hard that it was Clive approaching and the bond they shared was reacting.
Not even one more question to Elmer and Clive emerged from the main door, his power filling the air.
“If anyone moves from this car or makes any trouble whatsoever, I will shove a blade through your eye. It’ll take forever to heal, and as a bonus for me, it’ll hurt. And then I’ll do it again. Sit your ass in here. David, shoot them in the face if they make you nervous at all. They’ll survive and you’ll be safer.” Rowan opened her door and Star jumped up into the driver’s seat. “Uh, hi there. These are the bad guys. Protect David.”
Star licked Rowan’s nose and then turned her attention back to the Vampires. Rowan closed the door and stepped a few feet away. “Let me get you up to speed.”
Clive interrupted. “You were in pain. I felt it through the bond. What happened?”
“I didn’t think. Always at the root of a problem.” She shrugged. “I’ll be all right.” No doubt she’d set herself back a little though. Not that she’d admit it outside extreme circumstances.
“You should have called for backup,” he said quietly enough she didn’t worry he’d be overheard.
“Moving on. Elmer is exactly what I thought he might be. Brigid doesn’t like him at all. The pain you sensed came when I tripped his little friend. Emphasis on little because if that Vampire was eighteen when he was Made, I’m the nicest person on earth. And, to top it off, Roderick Haigh is Elmer’s Maker. That’s a lot in an already eventful day.”
“I wish I was shocked Marsc was made by that little gobshite.” Clive smoothed a hand down his tie. Anger throbbed from him. Haigh had not only been a traitor on his own, but he’d been the connection to Clive’s uncles, who’d betrayed the Stewart family line and could have gotten them all executed by the First. They’d been part of the xenophobic, anti-human movement they called the Blood Front. And the Blood Front had been working with some end-of-days-level bad guys.
It had been a violent, costly mess that had left people they’d both cared about dead. And it wasn’t entirely over.
All in all, Clive had every reason to be pissed at the mention of Roderick Haigh, so she relented. A little.
“After spending some time in Marsc’s presence, I can believe they were close. Marsc further claims Roderick was his boyfriend. The baby Vamp, the one who tried to bite me like he was a rabid animal, claims he was eighteen when he was brought over. Says it was consensual. But they weren’t all that way and I’m doubting Haddon had seen his eighteenth birthday before changing either.”
Clive’s mouth set into a hard line as he shook his head. “We’ve discussed this matter. You know full well I will not allow for any Vampire to prey on minors in my territory. Remand these prisoners over to Nation custody so we can deal with it. I vow you will have total access to them for your Hunter purposes.”
Only because she knew he’d be satisfied if she let it show, Rowan shoved her impulse to raise her brows at his demands. “ I’m going to interrogate them both first. This is a direct connection to my hunt. She agrees with me,” Rowan said, meaning Brigid. “As I said, I won’t get in between you with the illegal Making. Stalking too, most likely. I absolutely agree there’s evidence of a feed loop. Lots of young people’s lives to ruin. I already have Vanessa working on checking missing persons reports in the general area of these bars. When I mentioned it, he nearly shit his pants. I mean, thank goodness that didn’t happen because gross. Not in my new car!”
“Well, let us be grateful you were spared such an event. I think once we give the evidence culled from this house a more thorough examination, we’ll get all the information we need. I’ll need to find where he nests so we can take care of any possibly traumatized Vampires. I’m not going to play political games with Hunter Corp.”
She blew out a breath, allowing herself to soften a little. For him. Because he was capable of a lot of shitty Vampire behavior, but not to harm her or their bond. And because he truly did want to protect those Vampires who were often at the mercies of more powerful masters. Plus, her other prisoners were already at Die Mitte so it made logistical sense.
He said very quietly, “Let me help.”
How could she resist when he was this way? Well, easily when she wanted to. She was a badass bitch, after all. But she didn’t want to. Or need to. “Fine.”
Star’s bark caught their attention and they turned, Rowan stalking over with a snarled curse. She yanked the door open as David had a gun pulled and pointed square into Elmer’s face.
Clive had ceased to be amazed at the amount of trouble Rowan could find herself in at any given moment, but he was impressed by the tableau, nonetheless, as he flowed to stand next to her, not bothering to filter away his true power.
“Do we need to shoot him in the face?” she asked David, calm. Star had her lips pulled back, teeth bared as she growled in the direction of a pitifully young-looking Vampire cringing back against the passenger door.
Both Vampires realized the Scion was standing there, and everything went very still and very quiet. Clive turned his glamor up to ten and it rolled over the area in a warm wave of energy. Rowan had told him it was like a brownie and a hug. Like everything you ever wanted.
He was good with that when it got him everything he wanted.
“Well, introductions need to be made,” Clive said, satisfied both Vampires in the SUV had taken on glossy gazes and slack mouths as a result of the glamor. “You’ve been a very bad boy, Elmer.”
“You said you weren’t going to execute me!” Panic roused Elmer enough to accuse Rowan after she rattled off their names by way of introduction.
“I said I was here on Hunter Corp. business. And I am,” Rowan told him, disdain dripping from her tone.
Yes, this impacted Rowan’s investigation. But. While most of Vampirekind would have ignored making such young humans even fifty years prior, what they knew for sure by that point in their history was if there was something bound to get attention from the authorities that would endanger their secrecy, it was this sort of abuse.
“Shall we move to a more secure and private location?” Clive said, though he made an effort to sound like he asked. His wife was already on edge and feeling territorial, he didn’t want to start an argument with her in the open, in front of witnesses. But they needed to get out of the public eye before things devolved any further and eventually neighbors would begin to peek out windows.
“You two.” She pointed a knife tip toward the Vampires in the SUV. “Fuck you both if you make him shoot you. And he will. In your femoral artery, which will absolutely ruin my upholstery, so I’ll be billing the Nation, and they’ll take it out on you. You won’t die. Probably. But it’ll hurt. Haddon? My dog will rip your nose off and shit it out later, so just for the love of Pete, behave yourselves!” she said and shut the door.
Clive said, “You can question them first. However many times you need to.” He underlined that.
There had been times when he’d been placed between the Vampire Nation and his wife. Neither of them had liked it one bit. He had responsibilities and loyalties to the Vampires he ruled and lived with that did not always align with those he had to her. Though she understood those responsibilities—and had some of her own as it pertained to Hunter Corp.—it had exacerbated her distrust of Vampires. They’d spent a lot of time working to avoid such problems in the future. And to always choose one another above anyone or anything else.
Add this ridiculous Vampire lord situation and their threats toward any Vampires working for Hunter Corp. and it paid to be careful to get that balance right.
Clive’d been steadfast at her side throughout this entire situation. As she’d been at his. They had to lean on one another. He trusted that beneath her annoyance, she knew him, and his motivations, while Vampire-centric, were never to cause her harm.
“When this goes left and I have to make someone bleed, you can’t complain,” she said.
“Darling. I would never.”
She snorted.
“I’ll take them over myself, but I’ll let you arrange with Alice to meet us in the garage so we can transfer these two safely,” Rowan told him. “And I still want dinner after this.”
“I’ll handle it and see you there. I just have a few things to finish before I leave. I’ll be less than ten minutes behind you.”
“I’ve done this a few times before,” she said, narrow-eyed.
He held his hands up. “You certainly have. Alone even. But you’re not alone anymore. Go on. I’ll see you shortly.” Though he wanted to, he held back his desire to lay a kiss on that curled lip.