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The prep meeting for Luke’s bail hearing was in thirty minutes, but instead of heading to the conference room, Sara took the elevator to the detention level and found herself urging a foul-smelling ogre to escort her to the prisoner’s cell.
“Meeting you set, open we the door.”
“Either you let me in now, or I’ll get Mr. Leviathan down here. Your choice.”
The ogre grumbled, but he stood. He slid a stake into a holster above his beefy hips, then grabbed a battle-ax. “Go we now.”
The detention block consisted of a series of glass-walled cells, and Sara kept her eyes straight ahead as they passed cell after cell occupied by a variety of creatures that shouted inventive sexual suggestions at her, alternating with pleas for release. She’d walked this path once before with Leviathan, and the inmates had been quiet then. Apparently she was less intimidating than the Director.
She kept her eyes forward and tried to ignore the catcalls, relaxing only when they reached Luke’s cell and the ogre unlocked the door to let her enter, then reset the lock behind her.
“Sara,” he said, and the pleasure she heard in his voice was enough to make her tremble.
“Stemmons killed again.” She swallowed thickly, thinking of the child’s large eyes and bloodless face. “Ten years old. We’ve identified the body. Betsy Todd,” she said, her heart breaking for Betsy, for her parents, and for the next child who Sara feared was already dead.
Immediately, the pleasure on his face turned to pain. “Sara, I’m so sorry. It’s not your fault.”
“It’s not,” she agreed. “But it feels like it is. I worked so damn hard to put him away, and now he’s starting all over again.”
Luke stood for a moment, his body tense, his jaw tight. He clenched his fists at his side, then stalked to the wall of the cell. He pulled back, then punched hard, so hard Sara swore she felt the room shake. When he stepped back, a spiderweb of cracks radiated out from the spot where his fist had landed.
He was anger and energy, but she didn’t hesitate. She went to him, pressed her hands on his shoulders and softly whispered his name.
He was silent for a moment, and she could feel the tension in his body, his muscles corded like wires. “My daughter was ten when she died,” he said, his back to her. “If I could, I would kill this man for you. Would you keep me from that task?”
She turned away, not willing to answer him, not sure she could answer honestly, because she did want Stemmons dead. So help her, she wanted him dead and rotting and burning in hell. “It’s a moot point,” she said. “You’re in here, and he’s out there, some vampire working with him, and time is running out.”
Luke turned to her, his body relaxing slightly, and the effort to make it so reflecting in his eyes. “What do you know?”
“Not much. Only that the vamp with Stemmons is female. And that he’s already got another victim in a cage.”
“Female,” he repeated, and something in his voice made her frown.
“Does that mean something to you?” He hesitated, and she stepped closer. “Dammit, Luke, if you know anything—anything—that might help us, you had damn well better tell me.”
He met her eyes and then slowly, very slowly, he nodded. “There are things at play that you do not yet fully understand. Rivalries. Political positioning.”
She frowned. “And this is relevant how?”
“You already know that the vampire and Therian communities are old enemies,” he said. “And I’ve learned that a Therian plot to paint the vampires in a bad light has been foiled.”
“What kind of plot?”
“The Therians intended to kill humans. To make the kills appear to be the work of vampires.”
Sara hugged herself, thinking of the bite marks on little Betsy’s neck. “Go on.”
“The primary instigators have been stopped, but one remains at large. A vampire. A traitor to the race who has aligned herself with the Therians.”
“Herself,” Sara repeated. “A female.”
“Her name is Caris,” Luke said. “Take care not to underestimate her.”
“And you think she could be involved with Stemmons?”
“I think the pieces add up. Tell me,” he said, “how did Stemmons kill Betsy?”
