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Daisy scoffed. “Until you got all fancy-schmancy on us, you were the worst offender, Mimi. I mean, how many familiars have you had? None of them are registered, I’ll bet.”
“Yeah, why don’t you tell us about what really goes on in the Conclave? I mean, is Vix really in Switzerland?” Willow Frost cackled.
Mimi responded mildly. “I got an e-mail from her the other day. She’s spending spring break in Gstaad. We can meet her there if we want.”
“She never said anything about a ski trip! Since when were you guys so close?” Piper blurted, looking a bit hurt. If the girl had done her best friend harm, she certainly knew how to hide it, Deming thought.
“That Vix,” Stella Van Rensslaer said. “I can’t believe she didn’t even let us throw her a good-bye party. She just up and left! And whatever happened to her little boyfriend? We never see him around anymore. Don’t you think it’s weird? How the two of them are gone all of a sudden? Remember what happened with Aggie Carondolet and all those people a couple years ago? I bet the Conclave’s hiding something.”
“Well, someone could tell us, but won’t,” Piper accused, looking directly at Mimi.
“I told you guys, it’s an honorary title. They don’t actually let me do anything. I mean, c’mon,” Mimi protested. “They just gave it to me because Charles has been gone so long. The Conclave makes all the decisions. I don’t even get invited to meetings.”
Deming thought it was smart of Mimi to not let her peers understand the breadth of her newfound powers and responsibility. For one, they wouldn’t believe it anyway, since she was so young. And two, some in the Coven might be uncomfortable to know the extent of her influence. While Azrael and Abbadon were two of the Blue Bloods’ fiercest and strongest fighters, their power had always been held in check by the Uncorrupted. With Michael and Gabrielle missing, this was a whole different scenario. No wonder the Conclave was planning a coup d’etat.
Froggy tossed a bread stick in Bryce’s direction, and an epic bread stick fight broke out between the boys, with the girls laughing and screaming for them to stop—they were getting garlic in their hair.
Deming noticed the rest of the customers were looking at their table with sour expressions. The vampires were making a spectacle of themselves, drawing attention. They were acting just like Red Bloods. Foolish and careless. Deming caught Mimi’s eyes, but the Regent looked resigned.
Outside, Mimi sent, and excused herself from the table. A few minutes later, after paying her portion of the check, Deming followed her to a back alley behind the restaurant, where they would not be seen by the rest of the group.
“You’re supposed to check in with me every morning. What’ve you got so far?” Mimi asked. “The rats in the Conclave already have the scribes dismantling the Repository. How can they think I don’t notice?” She shook her head in disbelief.
“I’m still getting in with them. It’s only been three days,” Deming said. “There hasn’t been anything to file yet. It takes a while to break these things.”
The Regent tugged on a lock of her hair nervously. “My sources tell me they’re planning to go in a fortnight. They’re going to take over headquarters and lock me and the Venators out.”
“There’s nothing you can do?”
“I can’t show my hand until I can give them the killer. It’s the only way to keep the Coven together and convince them to stay.”
“I’ll have your killer before then.”
Mimi hugged herself tightly. “You’d better. Keep me posted on your progress.” She left to join the group, who were now congregated on the sidewalk, and after a few minutes, Deming did too.
“We’re headed to Stella’s,” Piper said, upon seeing the Venator. “Her brother is home from Brown and he has the most adorable friends.”
“Not me,” Deming replied a little abruptly. Her impromptu meeting with the Regent had annoyed her. All right, she had to act faster, did she? She looked over to the group of boys horsing around by tossing Froggy’s iPhone between them.
She said good-bye to the girls and walked over to Bryce. “Walk me home?” she asked, barreling her way through the crowd.
Bryce looked her over. They had spent the last couple of days hanging out in the same crowd of people but had not exchanged two words to each other until this minute. Not that it mattered, really, as long as he fancied her, and Deming had never had a boy turn her down yet. “Sure, why not,” he said, as she knew he would. His voice was like Tabasco and honey: hoarse and sweet at the same time. “Catch you guys later,” he told his friends, as he and Deming walked away.
Deming studied the handsome boy at her side. She had seen a lot of injustice and cruelty in her time as a Venator, and careless disregard for life offended her deeply. She did not care if it was an immortal or mortal one, each life was valuable. Had Bryce Cutting decided that Victoria’s was not? And if so, why?
She’d promised the Regent she would find Victoria’s murderer. Deming had not yet made a promise she couldn’t keep.
THIRTY
The Girlfriend Role
Dating Bryce was almost too easy. After he’d walked her home from the pizza place, they were immediately an item. The next day at school he was already waiting for her after each class so they could make out in the hallways. She was still getting used to the taste of his tongue in her throat and having to answer to “Babe.”
Now it was a Saturday afternoon, and the boys were indulging in their usual post–crew practice ritual: video games and lounging. Bryce had invited her to meet him at Froggy’s town house. When she arrived she immediately excused herself to the powder room upstairs but crept into Froggy’s bedroom instead. In the time it would take Red Blood agents to dust a fingerprint, she had already performed a thorough survey of Froggy’s immediate surroundings and family background.
She had downloaded a copy of his hard drive to send to tech, and performed a test in the glom to see if she could find any clue in the spirit memory. If he had been the culprit, she would have been able to detect traces of guilt, horror, or violence in his immediate physical surroundings. Especially if he had been handling devil flame, which left a distinctive smell years after it had burned out—the fire in Rio was still smoldering. But the only thing she could detect was a malodorous waft from the laundry basket containing his socks.
She sighed as she slid back Froggy’s bureau drawer. Just as she’d suspected, there was nothing extraordinarily good or terrible about the boy, who carried the spirit of a minor angel with a rather uneventful history. As for his cycle parents, the Kernochans had almost no interest in Coven business. Neither of them had ever served as an Elder or a Warden; they were apolitical types who wouldn’t be able to fight a Silver Blood if their lives depended on it. If once they had been God’s warriors, they were now America’s bankers. As far as she could tell, the only thing they were interested in was the stock market.
