Wicked And Wilde: Immortal Vegas, Book 4 (27 page)

“Not quite.”

“You will be, once you come to a fuller understanding. An understanding I will take great pleasure in facilitating.” His voice was silky with threat. “Until then, you will remain allied to the Council. And protected by the Council as well.” He pointed at my left hand.

“I’m allied with the Connecteds who are the victims in this war,” I said coldly. “And I don’t need your protection.”

My phone rang again, punctuating my irritation.

“You are being contacted by Nikki Dawes,” Armaeus said. “She has more information about tonight’s auction. If she is correct, we will be there to assist you. But the magic that is warding the auction is very strong. We can let it play out.”

I checked my phone, confirming his assessment, then stuck it back in my pocket. “You know this Gamon?”

“The name alone,” Armaeus said, his gaze raking over me. “It is a name from the middle of the last century, though, a name I was told had long since been put to rest. It will bear watching. The Gamon from that time was given to tricks and subterfuge, veils and illusions. That such illusions are being played out upon my very doorstep is curious, however. Curious, and unnecessarily dangerous, if Gamon is truly behind it.”

I narrowed my eyes. “You’re wondering why he’s bringing the fight to Vegas. You thought Viktor had put him up to it.”

“Viktor’s role in all this is something more to be studied. But those answers will come in due time—so much has come already. The information of this world and the next was always open to me, should I have wished to divine it. I didn’t before; now I do.”

“Yeah? So what else have you learned?” I wasn’t going to ask about Mirabel. I wouldn’t. She wasn’t my business, she was Armaeus’s. She wasn’t mine to be curious about, or care about, or resent, or pity, or—

“I know this.” His unexpectedly quiet response caught me by surprise. “Your foster mother was never in Hell,” he said. “You have a memory of seeing her there, talking to her. But she was not there.”

I fought against the strange spurt of tears that threatened at the back of my eyes. I’d known this, honestly. From the moment I’d seen the figure on the hillside, so unnaturally still. And yet…

“How can you know that? You didn’t see her.”

“With the Hierophant’s assistance, I have touched the souls of every once-living and never-dead creature in that plane except, intriguingly, your alternate self’s. But Sheila Rose Pelter never walked those passages. She was spared them through the intercession of your true father, according to Michael, and sent forward to a plane beyond human existence. That image you saw of her was an illusion. A distraction.”

“I have no way of knowing if you’re lying.”

“A distraction that was strong enough for your second self to get to Mirabel, so it served its purpose. And a distraction that created a series of events that pulled us free from Hell without outside intercession. That is very difficult to do, though you may not realize it. It means your second self is powerful as well. Powerful…and potentially dangerous. Possibly even to you, for all that she remains in Hell.”

“Yeah, I figured that one out on my own.”

Something in my voice caught his attention, and he turned to me, his eerie black gaze piercing through me. “You’re too strong for me to fully understand everything that occurred to you in that plane. And I must, Miss Wilde.”

“Well, too bad.” My phone buzzed again, and I stood. “I’ll be with—”

He waved me silent. “You’ve no need to alert me any longer. I can track you at will.”

Irritation bubbled inside me, and the ring on my left hand bit down in a spasm of self-preservation. I scowled at Armaeus. “Not for long, count on it. In the meantime, if you can conjure up the Hierophant the next time I’m here, that’d be great. I need to talk to him more than I need to talk to you at this point.”

His lips twitched. “You are correct in that—and Miss Wilde…”

He waited until I looked back at him. “There is much you believe to be true that is not,” he said. His gaze was intense and unyielding, and there was no denying the possession in it. “And much about me you would also do well to learn.”

I could feel the power of him reaching out to me, a visceral, sensual tug as he continued. “The time is coming when you’ll no longer be able to deny yourself what you most crave.” He lifted his glass to me, his gaze never faltering. “You should know that I crave it just as much.”

I blinked, hard—and the Magician was gone. Poof. The penthouse suddenly empty of nothing but his memory.

That…was more than enough.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Shiver wasn’t merely an obnoxious front for the Council to spy on Connecteds unawares. It was a successful one.

Nikki didn’t bother masking her surprise as we rolled up in her car, Brody’s ride deemed too cop-like to fool anyone over the age of four. But the parking lot had attendants and new lines painted into the concrete, and there were tuxedoed bouncers at the door.

“This place looks like it needs to be raided,” Nikki said, eyeing the bouncers. The valet station was hopping too—taking cars to the back, where large covered carports loomed. “How is it not on your radar?”

“There’s never been so much as a peep about this place,” Brody said. “It’s gotta have paperwork somewhere, but so far no reason to go after it. Believe me, the LVMPD has enough legitimate drug hells. We don’t need to go looking for new ones masquerading as dance clubs.”

“Roger that.” Nikki found a parking space several rows deep in the large parking area, and we piled out of her car. “Wonder what it’ll look like on the inside.”

Brody fell into step between us. “Eyes only, no fights, no trouble. We don’t have backup for a raid or anything else. No one even knows we’re out here, so I got nobody close.”

“Lot of cars in the lot,” I said. “You heard about this yesterday? No way do I believe they pulled together an auction that fast. It would have taken significant lead time.”

“Not so hard with instant communication,” Nikki said, tapping her head. “Week, tops is all that’d be needed to get the ball rolling, and the trigger could have been pulled a lot faster once the final decision was made. Even if they’re selling Connecteds like we think they are, stock could have come in on public transportation, private jet, truck. Not so hard.”

“Now you’re depressing me,” Brody muttered, and Nikki flashed him a wide grin. She was dressed sedately tonight, for her—black dress with a conservative collar and flash of a bright red scarf, black tights and black platform pumps, her richly auburn hair styled in a 1960s flip. “Mod Squad,” she’d offered when she picked us up. I’d shucked my usual hoodie and was going with a simple gray T-shirt over my black jeans and boots, and Brody could have been my older brother. We’d dressed decidedly down-market compared to Nikki, but then, we always did.

Getting into Shiver was easy—the fifty-dollar-a-head cover aside—and we entered a room that looked exactly nothing like an auction house and everything like a roadhouse dive. There were two bars on either side of the space, both of them bristling with alcohol, and the place smelled of sawdust and sweat and way too much Drakkar Noir. Nikki headed to the right-hand bar and Brody and I walked out into the open dance floor—open being relative, since we were already cheek to jowl with partiers, each more stoned than the last.

“I don’t know about technos, but these guys are high on a cocktail of other shit,” Brody said. “Too manic, too wild for a group about to bid on serious goods.”

“They’re the cover,” I said. We were standing close to each other so we didn’t have to shout, and the sheer humanness of him was strangely soothing. Armaeus had gone radio silent since I’d left Prime Luxe. Considering how our stint there had ended, I was in no rush to see him.

There’d be time for that eventually, but I could wait until, well, Hell froze over.

Nikki joined us a minute later with two longneck beer bottles and something questionable in a tumbler. She handed the beers to us. “Made a friend,” she said, her eyes sharp despite her easy grin. “Apparently they run this show once a week here. Typical process is for homers to show up, get stoned, empty their pockets, and leave higher than they arrived, with new product to try. Anyone who buys gets tracked by the management.”

I stared at her, galled by the confirmation of Armaeus’s take on Shiver’s not-so-hidden purpose. “You are
not
telling me this is a fancy focus group.”

“I’m not telling you that.” She shook her head. “But if you wanted to infer it, that’s not too far off the mark. This week is different, though. The auction business is new, bringing in a higher-rent crowd than the usual Connecteds. The place is under new management too, according to the bartender. He’s kind of freaked-out by that, but a dollar’s a dollar.”

“Where’s the old management?” Brody took a drink of his beer, frowned down at it. “This tastes like shit.”

“That’s because it’s drugged,” Nikki said. “And the old management is at the bottom of Lake Mead, to hear my new bestie talk. He wasn’t much of a fan of the previous establishment, but the new one has him so scared, he’s afraid to quit.”

“And now we know how to fix the economy.” I wondered how much of this Armaeus already knew. I took a swig of my own beer, and Brody was right. There was a definite metallic aftertaste to it, indicating the open bottle had been doctored. “You see what he put into it?”

“Just that it was from a beaker, and it was blue,” Nikki said. “I asked, of course, and he winks and says it’s on the house, nothing illegal, nothing too crazy. I get the feeling we got special service, but not that special. Everyone here’s on something. We need to be too. They scan.”

“They what?” Brody’s gaze darted to the ceiling, and it wasn’t hard to spot the cameras sweeping the room. “That can’t be legal.”

“Tough to prove too. We detect this shit because we’re Connected, and we’re amped. I suspect to an ordinary drinker, it tastes like beer.” She tilted her glass toward us. “Well, beer that tastes like feet given that brand, but you get the idea.”

“So drink enough to have it in our system, not enough to puke, got it,” I said, taking another healthy swig. I grimaced at the aftertaste. “Heart rate is picking up, but that could be from the bass.”

“Roger that.” Nikki took another sip of her concoction as well. “We dance for another thirty, tops, so try to fake your way through that. Then the show starts.”

We circulated through the crowd over the next half hour, and a few trends surfaced. The women were young, the men decidedly mixed. The older men had money; the younger had the hipster vibe of the new generation of Connecteds. They were all quite a bit smarter than I wanted to give them credit for, based on their discussions. There was definitely a feel of solidarity, camaraderie, that didn’t sit well.

“They know why they’re here, don’t they?” I said to Brody when we regrouped. “They’re users willing to be used.”

“I picked up on that.” We’d located a high-top table near the opening of the dance-floor area, and Brody grimaced over another swallow of his beer. We’d both managed to nurse our bottles down to backwash, and Nikki had gone after a fresh round. “You feel anything from what we ingested?” Brody asked me.

“Not yet, but I’ll let you know if you start squawking like a chicken. It’s likely a sense heightener, maybe a mood lightener, anything that encourages a body to unload his wallet faster.”

Nikki came back. “For show,” she said, setting the new bottles on the table and lifting my first one experimentally. “No more drinking, either one of you.”

“I gotta hit the facilities anyway,” Brody said, his step back a little uncertain. Nikki pointed.

“Back there, lovechop. Don’t get lost on the way, or you might not appreciate what you find.”

“Figured that out already.” Brody saluted, then ambled off, and I stared after him curiously. His gait was suddenly very…relaxed. Too relaxed. He was also swiveling his head around so far I thought it might spin off, checking everyone out in the room. “Um, Nikki? What’s in our beers?”

“Finally got the down low on that, since we actually drank the stuff. Apparently, my bartender buddy was watching, so good for you both. Bottom line, it’s nothing you need to worry about, temporary effects, but it’s also not something you want to keep drinking. And you need to come stand by me.” She patted the table, and I obligingly squeezed forward until I was wedged between her and the mass of humanity starting to press in on us.

“You wanna explain?”

“Keep your distance from Detective Doublemint for at least the next half hour or so. Apparently the bartender thought I was with a couple of guys—saw you at a distance, couldn’t tell.”

“He thought I was a
guy
?”

“Can I help that you look like a refugee from Hollister? A gray T-shirt and black jeans? Really?” Nikki shook her head, disgusted. “Anyway, don’t get your boxers in a twist, bro. You got a shot of testosterone and a male-cued aphrodisiac, so you’re safe. Brody, however, will want to knock up anything in a bra here in about five minutes, so unless you want his tongue down your throat, stay on this side of me, ’kay?”

“Oh my God.” I clapped my hand over my mouth. “We should tell him.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” She grinned as the music amped up another level, then slid a glance to me. “You haven’t asked me about the kids, by the way. Were you gonna get around to that sometime?”

At my confused stare, she tilted her head, her expression wry. “Joe, Bobby, and Clara. Ring any bells?”

“Oh.” I shook my head, remembering the names she’d given me when I’d begun following her to the River Styx. “You said they saved you,” I said, suddenly awkward. “I realized—I don’t really know that much about you, not really. And I want to know, if you—you know, if you’d like to tell me. Who you were before you came to Vegas, who you were before you met me.”

“Lot of water under that bridge,” Nikki cracked, but her smile was gentle as she eyed me over her glass. “But some of it was good. And the best of it were those kids. I remember when—”

Brody plowed into our table so hard he nearly shoved me into the next knot of drinkers.