Authors: Michele Drier
“It’s not the best, but he’ll come through it.” The man scrubbed a hand over his face. Was he a vampire or a regular? Was this the middle of the night or the middle of his day? Whichever, he looked exhausted, too.
“What’s the damage?”
The doctor sat down. “The wound is nasty, but it’ll heal. It looks like the bone is already starting to knit.”
“The bones are broken?”
“Yes. The bullet broke the humerus below the shoulder socket. The head wasn’t smashed, so even with chips, it’s still clean. The muscles are ripped up, but nothing’s missing. The problem is the silver.”
The room was silent. I knew the Kandeskys and their demons used silver ammunition. Of course, the Huszars did too. Now I was seeing firsthand what that really meant. I’d just thought of it as “special” ammunition that killed. Now I realized it poisoned as well.
Jean-Louis took a sip from his glass. “Will he survive?”
“Yes. It’ll take time for him to overcome it. The best thing is for him to have complete rest and a safe place.”
“Thank you doctor. Vladmir will see you home. You won’t speak of this to anyone.”
“No, I understand the implications. No one in Kiev knows that I serve as a back-up physician to the Kandeskys, and as a regular, I intend to keep it that way. It’s much better for my health.” He stood, shook Jean-Louis’ hand and left. Never spoke to me. Never even saw me.
Just as well, after what I’d seen tonight.
“Tell me what you did to the Huszars.” I needed to know that they had as much damage as we did. We. I realized I was thinking and acting as one of the family. Odd.
“It was a mixed group. Leonid, of course, and two of his shapeshifters. And they had three Chechens, as well, acting as drivers and guards. I know we shot, and killed, I think, two of the Chechens. One of the shapeshifters is dead. We managed to get Leonid immobilized with the silver wire.”
Ahh, that must have been the snaky sound I heard.
“They were driving an armored SUV, like the ones the Secret Service in the U.S. uses. They’re big, heavy vehicles with a higher profile than our Mercedes, so when the last Chechen got Leonid into the car, he decided to ram us. If I hadn’t gotten you down into the floor well, you would have been hurt. The Mercedes has heavier armor down the sides and across the bottom as protection against roadside bombs. I was worried they had rocket grenades.”
Roadside bombs? Rocket grenades? This may have been a former Soviet country, but it wasn’t the Middle East.
“Do you guys, you vampires, have rocket grenades?” I knew my voice was up in the soprano range. “Don’t you just rely on...I don’t know, regular weapons and speed and strength and...” I ran out of words.
Jean-Louis pulled out the patience he’d use for a small child. “Generally, we do. But this is the former Eastern bloc and they’re still finding their way. The rulers are the strong men. That translates to thugs with money. And thugs with money find the most up-to-date weapons.”
“I thought you just needed silver bullets and wire.” Guns, violence, were way out of my comfort range. I’d learned to ignore the bulges under the demon’s jackets
“Those are personnel weapons, fine if we have them, or they have us, in the open. When we’re traveling, conventional weapons are best. Blow up the car we’re in
then
use the silver.”
That made sense. I’d been traveling around in the Baron’s fleet of armored Mercedes and didn’t think through all the implications. Now, every time I got into one, the memories would come flooding back.
I must have grunted because his hooded, dark eyes softened. “It’s been eventful and you looked whacked. You’ll stay here tonight. We can defend the house. Vladmir will pack up your hotel room and tomorrow we’re going home.”
One of Nikoly’s demons picked me up and, with Jean-Louis trailing behind, took me to a bedroom already made up. Jean-Louis held me until I fell asleep, which took probably all of five minutes.
Chapter Nineteen
They’d held dinner for us at the castle. We pulled up and walked straight into the dining room where the Baron, Pen and Bela were already seated. As Jean-Louis and I took our seats, the meal, more casual and hurried than usual, was served, eaten and cleared away.
Then came the night’s discussion, but this time instead of being just the agenda, I was given a voice.
“We didn’t expect that Leonid was so tight with the Chechens.” Jean-Louis began the story of Kiev. “We were watching Maxie, and Nikoly and his demons were on the alert. Taras only knows that a possible rival has hired some Chechen thugs to make it uncomfortable. He thinks we might sell out if we’re too bothered, and we want to keep him thinking that way. Just a routine business squabble with the oligarchs looks good.”
He was twiddling with his napkin and looked up with a wry grin. “It’s a good thing we’re not a publicly-traded company.”
The tension eased some as Pen and the Baron laughed gently, but Bela seemed mystified, so Jean-Louis took a side trip down the fast lane of explanation about hostile takeovers and stockholder revolts.
“Thank Nikoly for us,” the Baron said. “I think we should bring him here to recuperate.”
“I mentioned it. As soon as the bone heals, I’m sending the plane for him. Silver poisoning can be tricky and we know the best ways to counteract it. We’ll make sure that Taras spreads the word that Nikoly is going to the Caribbean for relaxation after his run-in with the Chechens.”
He turned to me. “You need to be the one who tells Taras what Nikoly’s plans are. That will help solidify your standing in SNAP management and pull attention away from the family.”
The others nodded and I was obscurely pleased that I’d been accepted.
This could be a two-edged sword, though. While I was happy that I was finally part of the family, it also made me stick up more as a lightning rod for all the baddies. My mother’s voice drifted through my head,
“If you stand out from the crowd, you’re likely to be shot at.”
The discussion continued most of the night. There was agreement that we keep on with the plans for building up the Kiev bureau. Jean-Louis and I talked about the Huszar’s attempt to lure young women with the promise of everlasting life, and what that might mean to our finding true celebs to follow.
One of my tasks was to have Francois get in touch with all the fashion houses and alert them that we were searching for Eastern Europeans. The oligarchs were so private that finding them was difficult, so finding their shopping patterns was next best.
Jean-Louis was continuing to meet with Karoly and Alessandr who were quietly talking to Huszar family members about their dissatisfaction. Matthais’ violent leadership was fine during the wars, and helped the family weather the hardships during the Communist era, but now that money was flowing and people traveling, they were itching to get a piece of the action.
And for them, that didn’t mean just going out on nighttime raids for food. They saw the glitz and glamour and wanted in on the goodies of fame, fast cars, beautiful women and expensive clothes. Some of the younger members of the Huszar family were 300 years old, but having been turned at 18 or 23 or whatever, in their prime as young adults, they still had testosterone raging. That made them good soldiers for Matthais. And it made them lust for more of the material things of the regular world, mostly revolving around women.
The Baron, Bela and Jean-Louis groaned. “That’s one of the reasons we don’t take many young people as acolytes,” Jean-Louis said. “Chasing after women gets in the way of business. They’re also more unstable and make the family vulnerable to scrutiny.”
He had the grace to let a small grin cross his face. That was one of the reasons the Kandesky elders were upset at Jean-Louis when he started showing an interest in me. Most of them had been in stable relationships for centuries and to have the second in command get seriously involved with a regular—a regular on their payroll and an executive in their business—could bring a lot of scrutiny.
Those pitfalls didn’t hamper the Huszars. Money could buy them entree into the echelons of attractiveness. Money could buy them bait for women—jewelry, fast cars, travel, luxury—even though many of those women always had an eye out for the richer, older, sexier men. Of course, the Huszars had one thing that trumped all the money and power—eternal life. Using money and all the trappings lured some young women, and the hook was set with the lifetime guarantee.
What they didn’t see, and what the Huszars didn’t tell them, was that they couldn’t trade on their youth and beauty forever. They still had to be seen in the regular world and people would talk when they never aged. So they bought an eternal life where they gave up the pleasures of being seen and admired in the regular world, for a world that only admired them as a lure for others.
As Jean-Louis ran down our assessment of the Huszars, Pen nodded in agreement. She had been one of the world’s leading celebrities, not an actress, not an aristocrat, just a beautiful, cultured woman admired for years for her panache and elegance. The time had come a few months before when the Kandeskys bowed to the inevitable.
Pen had been a star in the celebrity world for better than 40 years and tongues were wagging about lots of surgery; it was time for her to retire. In today’s digital world of 24/7 news cycles, instant communications, cloud computing, images never went away and even in a century, some sharp-eyed photographer or editor might recognize her if she were to re-emerge as a celeb.
“We have so much more than the Huszars.” The Baron waved his hand around. “Not just material things, although we have a lot more of that, but interests, businesses, influence. We move in spheres that the Huszars have never conceived. It would be incredibly dangerous to allow them money and power. They supported Hitler because it helped them out. They have no understanding or caring about the way the world folds in on itself. How one action can have severe consequences, not only to them but to others. Can you imagine if they aligned themselves with one of today’s rogue states?”
Everyone murmured. We all understood the potential chaos that could be unleashed. The Huszars had to be reined in and controlled, our only discussion was about finding the best way to do that.
I was beginning to droop and still hadn’t taken Jean-Louis to task over scaring the hell out of me when I thought he’d been killed. He felt my emotions and stood. “I’m taking Maxie to bed; she’s probably on the edge of shock.”
Wait a minute. I wasn’t a child, to be put to bed! I started a snide comment then bit my tongue as a combination of fatigue and desire swept over me. I was tired. I wanted Jean-Louis. Comforting me while I fell asleep was fine and all, but I wanted this beautiful man to make love to me. I wanted his hands to undress me. I wanted his lovely, naked body next to me and I wanted him to make me forget.
Chapter Twenty
We were engulfed in a whirl of activity the next few days. Jazz and I had two or three Skype conversations a day, I talked with Francois, Taras and Carola about the upcoming holidays, I had to work out coverage assignments for the spring fashion shows and always, wonderfully, magically there was Jean-Louis.
I felt at the top of my game, with an enthusiasm and energy I hadn’t had since my first months with SNAP, when I was making a name and creating my persona. All those self-doubts were gone. Without that nagging sense that I was in over my head, I just let things roll off me instead of hunting for hidden messages.
These few days were a respite from the tension with the Huszars, and Jean-Louis was able to spend a few hours with me every night. It’s wasn’t just the sex that was making me want more of him—although it was glorious. This man clearly had years of experience with women and my skin tingled when he touched me, knowing what was to come.
Best part though, was that he was letting me know him. He told me stories of his turning and how difficult it was for him at first as an acolyte of the Baron. How hard it was for him to learn to feed and not always kill. How traumatic to find an attractive woman and know that he couldn’t have her forever. How he hardened himself to short relationships and tamped down the qualms about using women.
But he didn’t tell me about Magda. His wife. His one love.
He had casually asked me if I would let him feed off me, but when I cringed, he backed away. I was falling more in love with this stunning creature, but I couldn’t give my life completely over to him.
“I won’t ever push you to become my donor. I have plenty of food and you’re too precious to me to frighten away,” he whispered to me one night as he was stroking me. My legs fell open and I wanted to take all of him into me but I wasn’t able to let him pierce my skin.
I knew this idyll wouldn’t last, if for no other reason than my legs wouldn’t hold me up after he left to go to his own rooms.
And I was right.
One night, the Baron summoned all of us to the media room. He had CNN on one screen, Al Jazeera on another and BBC on a third. All of them were reporting on an overnight attack on an Afghan town that left 25 dead. What was so different about this attack was that no one was taking credit for it. No Taliban communiqués, no Al Qaeda statements, no traces of car bombs or other incendiary devices. What witnesses they could find reported some shots, but most of them only saw black-robed figures going into the victims’ homes.
After a few minutes of watching the news tapes loop, the Baron muted the televisions. “Well, what’s your best guess?” He turned to us but was really addressing Jean-Louis.
“It doesn’t take a genius to know this one.” Jean-Louis was pacing, running his hands through his hair. “This has Huszar written all over it, and the Taliban and Al Qaeda are trying to keep their distance. I knew it was going to be a bloodbath if they got mixed up with the rogues in the area.”
I just sat there, open-mouthed. “Why would terrorist groups want to hook up with the Huszars? They don’t have the same aims. They don’t care about Islam. They don’t hate the West.