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“Could work, why not?” Sam Lennox agreed.
Lane rapped on the table. “That sounds like a plan. Are we done here? I’m meeting my editor for lunch at Michael’s and I’m late. We’re talking sequel.”
“More roses?” Annabeth teased.
“A veritable rose parade of the undead, my friends.” Lane raised his fist in a show of solidarity. “The Conspiracy lives!”
Warden Corrigan coughed into his handkerchief.
“Looks like the Venators have it covered. On our end, we’ll make sure the Web is all over this movie. We’ll squash any suggestion it might be ‘real.’ Although it might make for good publicity,” Harold said, looking meaningfully at Josephine, who nodded.
“Good point,” Mimi said. “Josephine, you’ll start production on that movie. Lane, Harold, Annabeth, continue doing what you’ve been doing. Thank you for taking the time to meet with us.” Mimi bid Conspiracy members good-bye as they filed out of the room, shaking Seymour Corrigan’s hand as he left.
“Too many members of the Conspiracy think their jobs are nothing but propaganda and artifice. This abduction is serious business,” the Warden said.
Mimi nodded. “We’ll find whoever’s behind this. You have my word.”
“And us? What about the other assignment?” Ted asked, gathering his papers.
“You mean my brother?” Mimi asked as Warden Corrigan shuffled out.
Sam nodded. “We have word that he is no longer under the protection of the Countess. We were about to start a more exhaustive search.”
Mimi sighed. She wanted more than anything to set the Venator twins loose on Jack and Schuyler. Bring that traitor brother of hers to heel. Talk about burning. But she knew it would have to wait. She couldn’t turn her back on poor Victoria Taylor.
“No. Focus on this for now. We need to find this girl. And whoever made this video.”
Ted saluted her. “Whatever you say, ma’am.”
The team disbanded, and Mimi lingered at the table, drumming her fingers. She felt a rush of the old excitement running through her veins. She was suddenly not paralyzed by hate, or stifled by an inchoate frustration; she was filled with purpose. She was going to find whoever did this and crush them under the point of her spiked heels. And she would enjoy it. No one threatened the vampires. No one.
SEVENTEEN
Recruit
As Mimi predicted, Oliver ignored her request to meet, so she had to track him down the following afternoon. He was still a student at Duchesne so it wasn’t that hard. She found him standing in front of his locker, putting away his trumpet after practice. Duchesne didn’t have anything as common as a marching band, but it did have a student orchestra that performed at the Kennedy Center every year.
“I didn’t know you played,” she said.
“You don’t know a lot of things about me,” Oliver grumbled. “What do you want, Force? Got another lamp to break?”
Mimi crossed her arms in front of her chest and frowned. “Why didn’t you come to my office yesterday afternoon like my secretary asked you to?”
He shrugged and picked up his book bag. “I figured you wanted the same thing, and the answer’s still no.”
His disrespect annoyed her, and although she knew it wouldn’t help to antagonize him any further, she couldn’t resist. “Why do you still keep a picture of her in your locker? It’s pathetic, you know. It’s not like she cares about you. Not anymore. If she ever did.”
Oliver sighed noisily. He rolled his eyes to the heavens. “Please stop talking.”
“Like I said yesterday, you should know better than to think a vampire would ever truly care for their familiar. I mean, of course her mother’s actions appear to suggest otherwise, but never in the history of the Coven has that ever happened before, and believe me—”
“Shut up, Force. You have no idea what you’re talking about. And anyway, is that why you’re here? To needle me about Schuyler? Don’t you have anything better to do, like save the world from lunatic Silver-Blooded vampires?” He shut his locker and started to walk down the hallway, and Mimi had to run to keep up with him. The two of them garnered a few curious looks from the other students. Everyone knew they couldn’t stand each other.
Mimi blocked his way and whispered in order to dissuade any potential eavesdroppers. “Look, you must have heard that the Conspiracy met yesterday.”
“Yeah. I saw the trailer on the Internet. Looks like Josephine Mara’s up to her tricks again. Some new movie, sure to ‘suck,’” he said, using air quotes to make his point.
“That’s what we want everyone else to think. The video’s real.”
