Chapter Fourteen #2
The vase said everyone was speaking truth.
I frowned at the cop, putting things together.
When Uncle Rick LaFleur had entered the crime scene at Londyn’s house, the two men hadn’t had to introduce themselves.
I hadn’t caught it at the time, but the two cops from very disparate levels of law enforcement had already known each other.
They had worked together. Sooo. Villetti was bypassing Uncle Ricky-Bo by coming here alone.
Bypassing the protocols set in place when the queen’s standard was raised at Londyn’s crime scene.
Deliberately I met Villetti’s eyes. Slowly I pushed my chair back from the table, creating a space between us.
“Angelina Everhart-Trueblood, of Clan Yellowrock of the Mithrans,” I said, my heart like a rock in my chest, “godchild to the queen, Princess Angelina Everhart-Trueblood of the Dark Queen’s court. We’ll dispense with my other titles and honors.”
Villetti sighed. “Fine. We’ll do it the hard way.” He took out a recording device and tried to click it on. Nothing happened.
Villetti’s eyes went through a series of emotions as he put things together. He rubbed his head, the familiar motions of a headache. Once upon a time I would have offered him a healing amulet to alleviate the symptoms.
“Will my department be offered an unaltered copy of video and audio from this interview?” he asked.
“Of course,” Brandon Robere said, sounding completely sincere. “The queen is always willing to work with law enforcement.” The vase glowed pink.
“You may as well stay handy, Robere,” Villetti said. “I’ll need to chat with EJ as well. Ms. Everhart-Trueblood. Will you walk me through the events as they relate to Londyn Simms from the time she appeared on your security system?”
My voice cold, I detailed the bomb, gave the timeline of finding Londyn dead, finding our client dead, the search of the house, everything up to Villetti’s appearance at Chancy/Cennet’s. No details, only broad strokes, the facts, and only the facts. I stopped.
Villetti nodded, his lips pursed slightly. “And after you left the premises where your client was found dead, where did you go?”
Here we are, I thought. This is what the cop wanted.
I lifted my brows and stared him down. It was an expression I had seen on the face of the Queen’s Consort. I said, “That is the queen’s business.”
On the screen, Brandon Robere said, “And that concludes this discussion, Detective—or should I say Chief of TriCoPara?”
“Detective is fine. This interview is ended. Please end recordings and allow me a moment of privacy with Angelina.”
“No.”
Villetti laughed but the sound was painful.
“Fine,” he said, standing up. He bowed to me.
It was one of the full-court bows used in the queen’s court.
In an instant, his posture changed again, becoming that of the carefree college boy I had known and loved so long ago.
“Angie. I will pick you up at six. Casual wear. If the weather is still inclement, I’ll bring takeout.
” He turned to the screen and said, “Mr. Robere, please send me an escort and inform Evan Everhart-Trueblood that I will be knocking on his door momentarily.” With that, he walked away from me, stepped into his shoes, took his coat from the hat rack, and left the apartment.
Cats followed in his wake and caterwauled at the closed door. Traitors.
“You are having…dinner…with him?” Uncle Brandon’s tone was cautiously amused. And there was that odd pause before and after the word dinner. As if he was actually thinking of saying something else. Like, sex.
“Apparently.” I wasn’t sure why it was disturbing that Villetti had informed the queen’s people about us having dinner. I looked away from Brandon’s face to the cats, who were sniffing under the door. Traitors, traitors, everywhere.
Suddenly, the screen bifurcated and on one side was Aunt Jane, in a different room with a different background, pillows and blankets visible around her.
“That will be all on this interview, Brandon. Thank you for your service to the queen’s court.
We appreciate you taking the interview with Little Evan.
My best to Grégoire,” she added, mentioning the Roberes’ vampire blood master.
Brandon lowered his head in a personal, more casual bow than the full-court doo-wop thing Villetti had done. “My queen,” he said. His image vanished.
It was just the queen and me. No. Not the queen.
There was no crown, no backdrop of the royal chambers displayed for formal chats.
It was just Aunt Jane and me. Aunt Jane was sitting in bed, her long black hair in a messy braid, wearing a tank top and a sloppy sweater.
She looked like a thirty-year-old human, older than the way she had looked when I was a child, when she had looked eighteen or so.
She was nearly two hundred years old, but skinwalker genes and magic kept people young. Until they didn’t.
The war had aged everyone. Even her.
“Hey, Aunt Jane. I kept you up all night, didn’t I?”
“Crap on crackers with toe jam,” she swore.
“Is that what you’re worried about, Angie Baby?
Keeping me awake? Call your parents. They’re worried sick and ticked off.
After that? Go. Have fun. Off the record, have fun with Villetti.
Feel free to tell him anything and everything.
Have a few glasses of the good stuff. Not that crap you were drinking in college. ”
“You’ll never let me live that down.”
“You’re a hilarious drunk,” Aunt Jane said. “Sleep with him. Talk to him. He’s safe. And he’s madly in love with you. So, don’t walk away from this without thinking long and hard.
“Christmas is coming,” she added. “Will you be here? I miss you.”
My heart melted at her words. “I miss you too. So much. And of course I’ll be there. As your niece,” I said, grinning insouciantly.
Aunt Jane looked to heaven as if calling on angelic help.
The screen went blank. Dark from one wall to the other.
It hit me hard. Aunt Jane said Leandro Villetti was safe. Was madly in love with me. There was only one way she could know that. Villetti had either been bled and read by a vamp loyal to the queen, or he had been read by her personally, using her crown and some of his blood.
Either way, Leandro Villetti had offered his mind, his thoughts, his feelings, himself, to the queen. And she approved of him. Son of a witch…Why?
EJ
He watched the interviews on his wall screen, studying Villetti’s face as the cop questioned Angie and then himself. The detective chief—how had he not known about that title?—asked no hard questions. Either he hadn’t come prepared to interview, or he hadn’t expected Angie to lawyer up.
He tapped the paper version of Villetti’s military sleeve into a neat stack and set it aside, focusing on the wall screen.
The paper version was for Walter when the vamp woke at dusk.
Walter liked the feel of paper in his fingers, the smooth face, crisp, cutting edges. Paper made the writing real to him.
Large portions of text, entire pages of the military sleeve, were redacted, black marker streaking across the copies. Even with Alex’s expertise and his own contacts in the para groups, Villetti’s redacted record was all he could get.