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“Probably hoped she’d eat enough to kill her,” Marco said savagely. “Don’t have to be poison to do the job if you consume enough of it! But even one or two pieces would make sure she couldn’t shift away from that asshole.”
“That asshole ate half the box himself,” Pritkin said, “hoping he’d pass out before that creature could make use of him.”
“Then why the hell didn’t he?”
“He doubtless would have, given more time. Unfortunately, our meeting broke up too soon and Cassie found the box—”
A phone rang. Marco pulled it out of his pocket and looked at the readout. “I gotta get the rest of my ass chewed off by the master,” he told me. “Think you can maybe not die for five minutes?”
“I’ll try,” I told him seriously.
“You know, if anyone else said that, it would be funny.” He left.
“What I don’t get is how that thing knew that particular mage would get in,” another vamp said. He was a tall brunet in nice tan jacket that was now covered in beer. “We’d been tossing them out on their fortune-hunting asses all day. He’d have gone the same way if he hadn’t shown up with the Lord Protector.”
“Maybe that’s what it was waiting for,” a third vamp said, glancing around. He was another brunet, in shirtsleeves and dark brown slacks. A bright blue tie was askew under one ear, but he didn’t appear to ha
ve noticed. “It could have been there all morning, watching us, waiting for someone to get in. . . .”
“Someone who just happened to have poisoned chocolates?” the redhead asked sarcastically.
“They weren’t poisoned,” the brunet said, scowling. “And he could have gotten them—”
“Where? At the gift shop?” The redhead rolled his eyes. “Yes, I’ll take the drugged kind, please. Do you have any in mint?”
“Very funny!”
“Well, you sound like an idiot! Obviously, the bastard brought them with him, meaning this wasn’t random opportunity. It was planned.”
“I agree,” Pritkin said, causing their heads to swivel back his way. “But not by him.”
“You would say that,” the redhead sneered. “Then where did he get the damn things?”
“He brought the candy with him, but it wasn’t drugged. He said he did that later, under the influence of the entity.”
“With what?”
Pritkin reached into a pocket and tossed something to the vamp, who caught it easily. It was a little vial, the type war mages wore in bandoliers or on their belts. A lot of them were filled with dark, sludgy substances that sometimes moved on their own, but this one was just plain, colorless liquid.
“And this does what?” the vamp asked, wisely not opening it.
Pritkin didn’t reply. He just knelt beside me, green eyes assessing. He held up a finger. “Cassie, can you tell me how many—”
I grabbed it and laughed.
He looked over his shoulder at the vamp. “That,” he said drily.
“What the hell was he carrying this shit around for?” the second vamp demanded.
“It’s useful in making captures, subduing difficult prisoners.” Pritkin shrugged.
“Then . . . this is a weapon.”
“Yes.”
“But he was going on a date.”
Pritkin looked confused. “Yes?”
