But that was before I’d seen the woman she was with.
Righting herself from the embrace of the feline queen, the other woman glanced up at me, her eyes the sleek black of a vampire longing to feed. Her hair was so dark it was the color of charcoal, and her skin had probably been its current shade of ivory when she was human. Her features were dainty, and everything from her makeup to her clothes screamed sophistication. She was the one I was here for.
“Secret,” Genevieve cooed. “Do you know Rebecca?”
I shook my head, still not quite able to form words.
Even with both of them fully clothed, I felt like I was interrupting something very personal. And judging by the miffed expression on Rebecca’s face, I wasn’t wrong. Genevieve pressed against the vampire, brushing her nose up Rebecca’s neck and nibbling playfully at her ear.
“Say hello,” the ocelot queen instructed. I didn’t know which one of us she was speaking to, but it couldn’t hurt to assume it was me.
“Hello,” I said to Rebecca.
“Bonjour,” the vampire replied, her French accent evident in every syllable.
I was always intrigued by vampires with accents. Some, like Rebecca here and the Southern belle upstairs, maintained the accents they’d had in their human lives. Others, like Holden, seemed more suited to adapt to the new world they lived in. Though he’d been born in England, he’d been in America for over a hundred years, and I rarely heard him say anything that hinted at his history. It must have been a decision for them, to adapt or to keep that part of their human life.
Rebecca had clearly decided to stay French.
“I’ll leave you two,” Genevieve said, placing a kiss on the vampire’s mouth before rising to her feet. As usual, she wore sky-high heels. Her dress was simple and red and shouted dangerous curves ahead. She stood next to me and kissed each of my cheeks, then pouted a little. “Trouble in paradise?”
“What?” I gaped at her.
“You smelled like dessert last time I was with you, love. Now you smell like stale candy.” She patted my face fondly.
“I’m fine.”
“Don’t let those wolves bowl you over, Secret. You’re the prize, not the property.” She grasped the curtain and moved to step out, but I grabbed her wrist to stop her.
“What are you doing here, Genevieve?”
She smiled at me and held both hands in the air, her fingers dancing like the light in her eyes. “Fingers in pies, Miss McQueen. Fingers in pies.” She winked at her paramour and then was gone, leaving me alone with the mysterious French vampire.
I sipped my drink again, gulping in spite of myself, and stood in the doorway, waiting for Rebecca to speak.
“Well then, belle, asseyez-vous.” She nodded to the plush couch that wrapped in a U shape around the entirety of the booth.
I sat a little farther away than I normally might, but she was still black-eyed and I’d forced her playmate to leave for the night. I was playing it safe. I finished off my drink and placed the empty glass on the small table, its film of blood glinting in the candlelight. I stared at the glass so I didn’t have to look at her.
“I may have all night, Mademoiselle McQueen, but I’d prefer we pretend I do not and let us get on with it, shall we?”
“Are you with the council?” I asked.
“Oui. I am a council elder.” She inspected her manicure and radiated perfect vampiric boredom.
“Then you know about Holden Chancery’s warrant.”
She smiled, although I wasn’t sure I liked it, given the context. “Oh you clever little girl. Did Sig send you?”
“No.” My voice wavered slightly. He hadn’t, really. I’d decided to come here when I left Bramley, before my run-in with Sig in Central Park. But I was beginning to wonder how much of what I was doing was my idea and what was suggestions from others being put in to action.
For my entire adult life I’d been doing the bidding of others. My whole life in this city I’d been the puppet on the end of Sig’s strings, and I was only now becoming truly aware of that.
Rebecca kept smiling, running her fingers over the back of the couch behind her. “Of course not. Non. That would be against the rules, wouldn’t it? Sig would be smarter than to send his beloved pet to her death.”
Okay, seriously, did everyone know about Sig’s peculiar attachment to me? What did it mean that the entire council believed I was Sig’s pet?
“Ask me your questions,” she urged.
“Do you know what Holden is accused of?”
“Oui,” Rebecca answered without hesitation. I was stunned into muteness. It couldn’t be this easy, could it?
“Can you tell me?”
“I don’t see why not. The warrant is issued. It cannot be undone now, and I am not bound to keep it a secret like the Tribunal is.” She kicked her shoes off, and each fell to the floor with a hollow thud, then tucked her feet under herself. Outside, music was humming, but I couldn’t have told you what was playing if you paid me a million dollars. I was sitting forward on the edge of my seat, staring at her expectantly.
“What did he do?”
“Holden Chancery stands accused of being a traitor to the council.”
“But that’s crazy. Holden has devoted his life to the council.”
“Certainly. But did we not also ignore his right for advancement? Did we not give him reasons to loathe us, all because of—”
“Me.”
“Oui.” She was watching me for a reaction, and I was doing my best not to give her one. Everything she was telling me was something I’d thought already. I knew Holden’s supposed betrayal could be traced back to me. I couldn’t let the guilt overwhelm me, because it was more important I prove Holden’s innocence than focus on the part I’d played to make him look guilty.
“You know he didn’t do it, don’t you?”
“Does it matter now?” She wasn’t denying it.
“It matters to me. It matters to Holden.”
“Is that because Holden matters to you?” Rebecca seemed genuinely curious.
“Yes.” I let my face show nothing.
“How interesting.”
“Tell me.” I was barely touching my seat, I had shuffled so far forward. She sat up, mirroring my stance, and looked me right in the eyes. Her smile flashed fang.
“Your warden could not have done what they say he has done.”
“What do they say he did?”
“In our council, a council you now count yourself a member of, there are some who need to be protected. Their safety is a priority to us all, because they know secrets or are keepers of power we cannot allow to be risked.”
I nodded, but I was still a few mental steps behind her.
“The council, we have something akin to your human world’s witness protection. Only ours has always worked. Until recently.”
“What changed?”
“Failure…is death.”
“They were killed?”
“Not all, non. But two elders this year were, and another three last year. These were old vampires, well protected, who believed the council would protect them above all else. Protect them even from ourselves. And we failed them.”
“And Holden is supposed to have killed them?”
“Apparently.” But her tone told me she didn’t believe it for a second.
“Why don’t you think he did it?”
“I know he did not because he would never have had access to their locations. He was not powerful enough or trusted enough to be given those details. We would have been fools indeed to give the locations of our protected elders to the warden responsible for our council’s assassin.”
“Bounty hunter,” I said, but felt stupid for it because both of us knew what my real job was.
“Your title is irrelevant, Secret. You are paid handsomely and your prey does not come back alive. You are feared, but not respected. And because of that, Holden was not respected. You made an easy target of a good man.”
I choked back the swell of guilt threatening to eat me alive.
“Holden was always loyal to the council,” I defended.
“And what a great lot of good his loyalty got him in the end.”
I left the booth feeling flustered and burdened, with enough time to see Nolan disappearing up the staircase with a slight, blonde vampire. Just my luck. I strode across the floor, giving the bartender an accusatory glare on my way. She shrugged, but on her face I could see smug satisfaction wrestling with uncertain worry. That look told me everything. She was glad Nolan was away from me, his keeper, but she was worried he was out of the frying pan and into the fire.
There was no sign of them in the hallway, so I took the stairs two at a time back up to the main foyer. The gatekeeper was gone. I ran into the alley and was slapped by a wave of hot air. I breathed in through my nose, hoping to get Nolan’s scent while it was still fresh.
A sound at the mouth of the alley drew my attention, and I followed it, running down to the street and skidding to a halt under a streetlight. Nolan was backed against the brick wall, a blonde vampire latched on to his neck. At his sides his hands hung limp, and his eyelids were open so I could see the whites of his eyes from where they had rolled back into his head.
A thin trail of blood ran down his neck, but he looked for all the world like he was having the most pleasurable experience of his life.
“That’s enough,” I whispered.
For a moment no one reacted, and I might as well have been speaking to the night sky. I took the extra two steps towards the pair, grabbed a fistful of long blonde hair and hissed into her ear.
“Brigit. Enough.”
My protégée released her victim, and after the longest two-second pause of my life, Nolan’s eyes rolled back forward and he let out a raspy sigh.
“Whha?” He looked from me to Brigit, then back. Brigit was smiling sweetly, in spite of the smear of his blood across her cheek. I was less than pleased.
