“I believe you,” he snarled. “That’s the problem.”
“Come again?”
“You aren’t the first person to find a body today,” he told me, trying to pace. But the twins hadn’t quite grasped the concept of housecleaning, and he almost immediately ran into another pile of random stuff. Which he kicked violently against a wall. “They’ve been turning up like flotsam in portals all over the city!”
“What?”
“I opened one at my own flat not two hours ago, only to find a corpse plastered against the security shield. Like a bloody bug on a windshield!”
I blinked. “Who was it?”
“One of Varus’s chief competitors. As were the others. We’ve retrieved members from three different families so far—that we know of.” His lips twisted. “The owners of the illegal portals have yet to report in.”
I frowned. “So you’re saying what? That Varus was cleaning house? Attacking us last night and then going after—”
“That was the initial theory, yes. It was thought that he was taking advantage of the Senate’s preoccupation with the war to set himself up as the undisputed leader of the smuggling world. And that the…calling cards…he shoved into the portal system were his way of announcing that fact.”
My frown grew. “How does that work? Even if the Senate ignored a slap in the face like last night—”
“That was not a slap. It was a direct challenge, and it will be answered!”
“But that’s the point. Did he think you would just let him get away with—”
“We don’t know what he was thinking,” Marlowe said, sweetly vicious. “We intended to ask him, but somehow, I do not think he will be answering many questions now!”
No, I guessed not. I also guessed that I knew what Olga had wanted to talk to me about earlier. Probably wondering who the dead body was that I’d tossed into the portal.
“So what’s the theory?” I asked. “That there’s a new game in town? Or that one of his subordinates—”
Marlowe’s eyes flashed. “Thanks to you, we don’t have a theory!”
I started to point out that Varus’s death was hardly my fault, but I didn’t. Because Marlowe had thrown out a hand as if to punctuate his sentence, and something hit the wall like a shot. I jumped and Claire yelped, and then we both watched a two-inch crack run up and down, floor to ceiling, from an impact point the size of a cannonball made by absolutely nothing because nothing was there.
I stared at it blankly. The cellar had been built back when people took that shit seriously, and the walls were at least two feet thick. I knew that because that’s how far the impression into the bricks went.
Allllll righty then.
My mouth closed with a little pop. My jaw hurt like a bitch, anyway, and hey, I could ask questions later. But apparently someone else wasn’t feeling quite as intimidated.
“I want to know what you’re going to do about those men who attacked Dory!” Claire said hotly.
“They weren’t men,” Marlowe corrected, crossing his arms. Probably so he wouldn’t finish demolishing the house.
“Vampires, then!”
“Senior masters.”
“And that means what?”
“That means you have your answer.”
“Like hell I do!” she said, leaving the stairs to get in his face.
“Um, Claire…” I said, only to be completely ignored.
“You have witnesses!”
I started to get up, because Marlowe was in a scary mood. But to my surprise, his eyes softened slightly at the sight of the infuriated redhead invading his personal space, and his shoulders unclenched a trifle. “Your loyalty to your friend does you credit,” he told her shortly. “But it does not alter the facts.”
“Which are?”
“That my only witnesses are a human who left early and a vampire already under interdict for a variety of crimes. And that is hardly—”
“You have Dory!”
“A dhampir has no standing under the law. She is neither vampire nor human nor mage nor any other recognized creature—”
“You’re saying no one would believe her?” Claire demanded incredulously.
“I’m saying she would never be allowed to testify. Under vampire law, she isn’t a person—”
“The hell she—”
“—while on the other side are a first-level master and a handful of second- and third-levels—from a different court, I might add, making it far harder to put pressure on them. None of whom will likely remember anything of this evening’s activities.”
“They were in a jiffy store,” Claire said mulishly. “There has to be surveillance—”
I choked out a laugh. And for the first time Marlowe glanced at me with something akin to understanding. He and I both knew what SOP was in these cases.
I hoped Singh had insurance.
“Destroyed,” Marlowe confirmed. “And even had it not been, it would allow the owner to bring a claim for damages, nothing more. A dhampir has no protection under the law. She cannot—”
“Then anyone can just attack her on sight?” Claire said in disbelief.
“Yes. Which is why her father wanted her out of this.” He shot me a resentful look. “But she seems incapable of managing to go a single day without—”
“They attacked her!” Claire said, furious all over again. “What the hell are you thinking?”
Marlowe’s brows lowered once more, and for a moment he looked like he was considering telling her. Which was why they didn’t let him handle the diplomatic stuff. I decided I could live without seeing what would happen if those two ever really got into it.
“Uh, one question,” I said, pulling those dark eyes to me.
“What?”
“You said the bodies have been showing up in portals all over the city, like flotsam.”
“Yes?”
“But portals aren’t like…like a river system, are they? They’re self-contained units. So how did the bodies get in there?”
He just looked at me. And his expression said plainly that he didn’t know how he got stuck working with such incompetents. I scowled, because it was a valid question.
“Someone must have gone to each portal to plant them,” I persisted. “So maybe someone saw—”
“They didn’t have to plant them.”
“What does that mean?”
“Ask your servant,” he said sardonically.
“My what?”
I didn’t get an answer, because the door at the top of the stairs banged open and Ray staggered in. At least, I assumed it was Ray. All I saw was a shock of dark hair over a pile of dishes that smelled so good they had me tearing up.
“Oh, for— Go eat!” Marlowe said in disgust, and turned back to yell at an unfortunate vamp who had just been spit out by the portal.
“Come on,” Ray said. “I’m setting up on the porch.”
He and his tottering mound of dishes departed, and I got to my feet, joints creaking in protest. Sitting for that long had left me stove up, and when I tried to crack my back, it went off like another shot, scaring the shit out of the vamp. Claire’s expression teetered closer to open tears.
I sighed. “It’s not as bad as it looks.”
“Of course it’s not! You wouldn’t be able to stand otherwise!”
“You shoulda seen the other guy,” I said, grinning slightly at the thought of Zheng-zi’s messed-up face. And then almost choked on something. After a second of hacking, I spat part of a tooth out into my palm.
Damn. I hated when that happened.
I looked up to find Claire staring at me with something approaching horror.
I started to say something, but the horror turned to a glare so bright, I swear I could see little flames in her pupils. “If you say you’re fine,” she told me tremulously, “I’ll kill you!”
My mouth closed abruptly, and I meekly let her lead me off to the porch.
Ray, for some reason, had gone all out. The little table we used for snacks now had a bright white drape that someone had doubled over to hide Stinky’s latest artwork. In the middle was a vase with a bunch of the neighbor’s purple hydrangeas stuffed in the top. A chair had been pulled up along one side, near the ratty old swing. It was even rattier old wicker, but a pillow had been stuffed into the seat and a chenille throw had been folded over the top.
It was surprisingly comfy, but I wouldn’t have cared if I’d been sitting on the floor, not with the things Ray was piling on the table and on the broad porch railing when he ran out of room. “I can’t eat all this,” I said, unsure that I could eat at all.
“You haven’t tried,” he pointed out. “Besides, I picked soft stuff.”
And he had. The night’s extravagance included leftover chicken and rice, mushy peas, squashy white dinner rolls, beer and some kind of mixed-berry pie. I stared at it in a kind of wonder.
“We’ll call your father,” Claire told me, as I started slathering butter on a roll. “We’ll see what he has to say about—”
“Claire. There’s nothing to prosecute for, okay?” I said, with difficulty.
“Nothing—look at you!”
I glanced helplessly at Ray, because I wasn’t up to explaining the intricacies of vampire life right at the moment. He sighed. “It’s like this,” he told her. “Zheng-zi, well, he kind of paid Dory a compliment tonight.”
“What?”
“Look. He had his guys with him. He coulda turned ’em loose on us, and it woulda been over. Dory’s good and I’m…well, Dory’s good, but no way was she taking on that many senior masters with a couple little guns and no food. It wasn’t happening, okay?”
“Well, obviously it did happen. She’s alive!”
