I picked up my teacup in both hands and brought it to my mouth. The steam curled around my face, warm and soothing. “All of them?”
He pulled a serving spoon from a round utensil holder and opened a food-delivery container. As he dished up a late breakfast, he gestured to his shirt on me. “Is it a theme for us? Bacon?” he asked. I pulled out the tee and read it upside down. It was a tee I had bought for him at the touristy shop after seeing it hanging in the store window. It had a big raindrop on it and garish letters reading,I LOVE NOLA RAIN. ITSOUNDS LIKE BACON FRYING.
“Could be worse,” I said. “It could read Life Without Bacon.”
“True.” He dished up shrimp and grits into a china pasta bowl and set a plate of beignets between us. He leaned on the bar and dipped a spoon into his own bowl of spiced breakfast, and we ate several bites in companionable silence. “Shall I have that shirt framed too?” he asked.
“Eh.” I swallowed peppery grits and sipped my tea, which was a breakfast blend strong enough to bend iron bars and leap a locomotive, perfect for the spices. “Too much bacon might spoil the décor.”
He laughed and leaned farther across the bar to cup my head in his hand and claim my mouth as his own. An hour later, I went home to a nearly empty house. Molly and Evan were at the conclave, talking and voting, along with every other witch in town. Eli and Alex were at the conclave monitoring the witches’ security arrangements. The kids were in the safe house where Katie was sleeping, guarded by Derek’s most experienced men, the last members of Team Vodka. And by Brute. How weird was mylife when I was grateful to have a werewolf guarding my godchildren?
Edmund was sleeping somewhere. Bruiser was at HQ making sure everything was okay there. I hadn’t been alone in the house in months, and the silence that had once been peaceful was unnerving. So I pulled out all three of my new fighting leathers and tried them on to decide which one to wear. Based on color. On style. Tried out all the color-coded custom Kydex holsters on the new weapons rigs. Badass. Totally badass.
And then I braided my hair and went through my meager collection of makeup to choose what I would wear with my ensemble.I am such agirl.
***
Two hours before dusk, I received the call from Molly and Big Evan. It should have come before I left Bruiser’s and I had been pacing the floors waiting. “We have approval,” Molly said.
“You sound less than excited,” I said.
“You try to get agreement between a couple hundred witches onanything and see how excited you are afterward. It took an hour before they could decide to update the rules on the national council—which hadn’t been updated in over a hundred years, about the time the first telephone lines crossed the nation. Then there were another several hours of wrangling on the need to update the rules on witch behavior and mores, and another hour on who was to enforce those rules and—” I could almost see Molly rubbing her forehead. “All that was before lunch, which was served late because the Seattle coven insisted on a thorough cleansing of the kitchen, in a spiritual sense, not with Comet and elbow grease, though that might have been considered too at some point. And then they had to purify all the copper pots the food was prepared in. And let me tell you, the stink of frankincense, yarrow, and white sage is awful on the air.”
“And?”
“And then, about three p.m., we began to discuss the fanghead situation. And we just got the vote. Leo’s in. His proposal for rapprochement has been approved withoutany substantive changes to the wording or the reparations. The mayor and the governor have been notified and will be here for a live, remote, glad-handing photo shoot for the late-evening news.
“Leo will need to be here in time for his speech at seven thirty, to be followed by more speechifying, and a late supper at eight thirty or nine. Can you make it happen?”
“Piece a’ cake,” I said. And crossed my fingers.
***
I notified everyone about the arrangements by phone call, not text. No way was I leaving anything in the hands of electronics. When everyone was notified, I decided on the new scarlet leathers. Seemed all I needed to get out of my unexpected girly mood and into action was a definite time and date for the vamp festivities. My last line in each call was “Wear the anti-DNA charms I had messengered over. Donotforget.”
I powdered up, because the weather was muggy and leather meant sweating no matter what. Over the unscented body powder I pulled on a stretchy knit cami top and undies, and then matching stretchy knit socks. My former combat socks didn’t work anymore. If I had to shift into a half form, I needed room for my feet to grow in width, room for my claws. I slid into the leather pants and snugged up the clasps and ties to get them tight, but not so fitted I couldn’t move when needed. Then the jacket, the rich, scarlet leather so gorgeous I wanted to pet it. They still smelled strong, but I wasn’t a walking, talking olfactory ad for cow skin. And I looked freaking fantastic.
My cell made a burbling sound and I bent to pick it up. The leathers squeaked, which wasn’t good. Vamps had very good ears. Something to remember if I needed to go silent. I opened the cell and read a text from Alex. He had found a witch whose child owned a crotch rocket. A blue Kawasaki. Worse, the teenager was a budding witch too.
I pulled the guest list, and the young witch’s name wasn’t on the list. But... Yeah, but. Tau might have killed her to get the bike. Might have allied with the witch or her mom. Too many mights and might nots. But before I couldworry too much, Alex sent another text—the young witch safe at home.
I sent a quick text back, putting together the idea of a witch on a motorbike. There were dozens of places a witchy attack might be made upon Leo in the next few hours, but only one place where an attack might take place on the witches and Leo too. I weaponed up and strapped on my silver-plated titanium chain-mail gorget to protect my throat, and layered on the fancy gold-and-citrine gorget over it. When the horn tooted outside, I left the house, looking like a demon from hell. A well-armed demon from hell.
I climbed into the SUV that was my ride and greeted the driver. Wrassler said, “Looking good, Legs. Looking good.” I buckled in and he proceeded to update me on the security measures at HQ. Which gave me time to think.
***
At HQ things were going according to plan. Between them, Wrassler and Derek had every possible means of attack buttoned up at the vamp council chambers. The building across the street, from which an easy armed attack had once taken place, had been commandeered, and armed personnel walked the halls. Men and women with bullet-resistant shields lined the porte cochere, the shields overlapped to protect Leo’s passage from doorway to the limo. The three limos each had mapped out differing routes to take. Motorcycle escort was in place. NOPD had been notified of the passage of the MOC and the potential for problems.
I scanned the bikes as I waited under the porte cochere, and not one was brilliant blue. They were all white, and the riders wore white riding leathers, so we could keep track of them as Leo’s security. I sought out the three bikes whose riders wore red helmets and black riding leathers. One at a time, they lifted a hand to me. I nodded back. They were my backup plan if it all FUBARed as spectacularly as I feared.
The three Onorios stepped out of the doorway, heads swiveling, checking for danger. They were decked out in fighting leathers like mine, but all in black. None of themwere weaponed up, at least not that I could see, though I was quite sure they wore enough blades on them to start a good-sized butcher shop.
Leo followed the Onorios, dressed in evening wear. He and Larry had decided to go with a solid black-and-white color scheme, the tux, cummerbund, tie, and lapel silk all in black. The shirt was the trim white one he had tossed at the valet. He ducked into the armored limo and sat, his eyes on me.
Ming Zoya, formerly of Mearkanis, came next out the door, wearing finery that could only have been put together by Madame Melisende, a blend of elegance and class that was uniquely Ming. The outfit had to be something left over from her time as clan Blood Master. She wore yards of scarlet silk to her ankles, embroidered with peonies and brightly colored birds. Feathers, dyed to match the dress, trailed below her waist and around her body, in a train of some sort down her back. She wore black shoes, like flip-flops but not made of plastic or foam, rather made of something with no flex. Her long black hair was up in magnificent braids and coils and curls, her lips and talons painted to match the silk. She smelled of blood. A lot of blood. And she looked young and beautiful and powerful, as unlike the thing that had come up from the water of the pit as it was possible to look. A different being entirely. Ming of Mearkanis was here under the slim possibility that she might recognize the witches’ magic before anyone else. She was our canary in the mine. If she started acting weird, compliant, anything at all out of whatever was ordinary for her, then the Nicauds might be near. Ming made it to her limo without incident.
Girrard DiMercy and Grégoire slid into the last limo in line before I could get a good look at them. One Onorio stepped into each limo.
