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Jozef was one of the soldiers who’d come from Slovakia with my father to help found the Kral Syndicate. Not part of the inner circle, but close enough. He could be the spy.
Zoe bumped her shoulder against mine. “Maybe we should sit down?”
I took a deep breath, rolled my shoulders and focused on the board. Our flight wasn’t due to take off for another hour. “Yeah, sure.”
We found an out-of-the-way corner and sat down. My jaw was still clenched. I worked it from side to side.
Jozef hadn’t realized it was me or he would’ve approached us. My glamour was solid, and I’d used a brand-new persona that no one, even my brothers, had seen before. I could’ve explained my own presence in the airport, but explaining why I was with Zoe would’ve been a hell of a lot tougher.
Why had the soldier been in Newark, anyway? We were in the international terminal. It didn’t make sense for a Kral to take an international flight from New Jersey—we almost always flew out of JFK Airport in Queens. In fact, I’d chosen Newark because I’d figured we weren’t likely to run into anyone I knew.
Maybe I was just paranoid? But this was no longer just about Zaq; Zoe was involved, too. Even if Jozef wasn’t the mole, a Kral traveling with the Tremblay Princess would send shock waves through the vampire world. Victorine would hear, and the gods knew what she’d do.
I massaged my nape. Damn, I hated not knowing whom to trust.
“Are you hungry?” Zoe asked.
“Nah. You?”
She shook her head. “I fed right before the ball.”
A man in an expensive suit headed toward us. My jaw tightened again. The tension spread to my shoulders and down my back. I slid a hand into the pocket of my jacket over my switchblade.
But he stopped a few yards away, broke into a grin and greeted another human in a Midwestern accent.
I let go of the switchblade and fingered the phone in my other pocket. Desperately wanting to talk this over with someone, but my reasons for going dark still held. I simply couldn’t trust anyone except family, and maybe Tomas, my father’s lieutenant. The big blond man was more like an uncle than an employee.
Should I call Tomas? Just before Father had gone dark, he’d ordered me to inform Tomas as soon as I made contact with Zoe, but things had happened too fast last night.
Still, I could’ve phoned him earlier tonight while I waited for Zoe to wake up. I’d decided against it for the same reason Father had gone dark. If no one knew I was in Paris, the information couldn’t be leaked.
Now, I was uncomfortably aware that if I didn’t call Tomas soon, I’d be disobeying a direct order from my primus. Yeah, it was because I was worried about the mole, but I knew damn well Tomas wasn’t a spy. He was my father’s oldest friend, the two of them a team since they’d been turned back in a little Slovakian mountain village.
Hell, I might as well admit it. I hadn’t contacted Tomas because I’d pictured myself springing Zaq and returning home with him, triumphant. The youngest brother, the lightweight, playboy Kral succeeding where everyone else had failed.
Uneasiness pricked at me. Father was already in Paris, and as far as I knew, he hadn’t managed to find Zaq yet. He’d be furious if I appeared out of nowhere and fucked things up.
I slid lower in the cramped plastic chair, stuck out my legs and stared at my boots. Zoe sat primly beside me, legs crossed at the ankles, hands folded on her lap, gazing with interest at the sea of humans.
I came to my feet and excused myself to use the john. On the way back, I ducked into an alcove and called Tomas.
“Where the hell are you?” he demanded in his Slovak-accented English. “Karoly has been asking about you.”
That was Tomas, blunt, unpolished. No one would call him a diplomat, but everyone trusted him. No one guarded my father’s interests better than Tomas.
“Newark,” I said.
“You have left Montreal? Why?”
“First, what about Zaq? Has Father found him?”
“No. He is still missing.”
My heart sank. I’d hoped Tomas would have good news for me.
“Okay. I’m on my way to Paris to follow up a lead.”
“I see. And what about Princess Zoe? You have seen her?”
