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He had seen these dim corridors and common areas before, in Natalia’s mind. Retracing her steps, he found his way to the upper floors and a corner conference room with seating for more than a dozen. Three of the walls were made of glass—one to the hallway, two to the night outside. The fourth wall contained what looked like a standard office door. He knew it was anything but. A core of steel lived under that benign wood façade, and anyone trapped inside had no hope of getting out. The door swung open to his touch, revealing a small, dark room. One side was another glass wall, a window facing east, looking out between glittering high rises, to the bay and mountains beyond. Two empty shackles hung high on the opposite wall. In between was nothing but the dry stench of ash.
Revolted, he lifted the back of his hand to his mouth. Vampire ash glittered everywhere, white and charcoal streaks smeared on the wall and the bare concrete floor. Dominique crouched beneath the shackles and traced a finger along the gritty seam where the floor met the wall. It was caked with ash. Aubrey hadn’t been the first to meet the sun here.
The anger and grief that gripped him was strong enough to reach Cassidy despite their faded connection. He could feel her rising panic. She didn’t want him being there.
He tried to calm them both with a sense of solitude.No one else is here.
Still, he sensed her silent demand that he get out of there. He almost heard her voice. And her heartbeat.
No, not almost. Hedidhear a heartbeat, but it wasn’t hers.
Dominique stood and spun around in a single supernaturally fast movement.
The other vampire stood in the doorway as if he had been there for minutes instead of a second. A dark gray coat still swayed around him. His hands, covered in fine gloves, were clasped before him. The brim of a rakishly askew fedora shadowed his eyes.
Dominique tasted the air, looking for clues in this blood-drinker’s scent as to his approximate age and strength. It reminded him of Serge. Dark and mossy, but not as wet. Older than three centuries then, but far from a millennium.
Esteban. The name came to him from Natalia’s memories. Esteban de Santiago. Adilla’s enforcer. Silent, brilliant, cunning—and dangerous enough to have surprised Dominique. In his present state anyway, which was far from optimal.
An impulse to flee beat at Dominique from Cassidy. He squashed it.
The man was petite, all but invisible in his neutral clothing, but when he looked up, a predatory gleam lit his dark eyes. “I don’t suppose I need to ask who you are?” He sounded bored.
Dominique said nothing, intent on letting this creature reveal himself on his own terms.
“Dominique Marchant, is it?”
Still, he didn’t react.
“I see. Well, I thought we might see you here before too long. But…you are not what I expected.”
Dominique stifled an annoyed snort. Two years into his rule, and he still heard this on a regular basis. Although, in all fairness, in these casual street clothes and with his helmet hair plastered to his head, he wasn’t his idea of a dominant blood-drinker either. To be even more honest, right at this moment, he wasnotthe dominant blood-drinker. He had little more strength now than the average youngling.
“A common mistake, Esteban,” he said flatly.
The brittle smile did not reach the Spaniard’s eyes. “Some fool recently tried to convince us that you are the—what was it?—the root of our species? The ‘lord’ of us all?”
“Because it is so. Shall I show you?” Dominique held out his hand. His strength wouldn’t hold up in a fight, but a re-siring he could manage. Not that he expected to be taken up on that offer.
Esteban scoffed. “So you take me for a fool as well? All I smell here”—he tipped his chin up and made a show of sniffing the air—“is youngling trouble.”
The mush in Dominique’s brain suddenly coalesced in a chilling realization. He was inside a room in which blood-drinkers were routinely executed—and the only way out was blocked by the individual who did the executing.
This must have shown in his face, for Esteban’s smile widened into a grin.
“Adilla swore he would end you if you ever crossed his path.”
“Then let him try. It is him I have come to see.”
“Oh, well. I’m afraid you just missed him. In his absence, crossing my path is as good as crossing his. So…”
Dominique reached the door the instant the lock caught and latched. The sound of the heavy steel slab slamming home reverberated in the concrete walls and plate-glass window. He tamped down a spike of fear. He wasn’t shackled. He’d been in worse traps. This was not a problem.
“You are a fool, Esteban,” he called, both hands against the door and mustering all the nonchalance at his command. “If I die, we all die. Including you.”
There was a long stretch of silence with a faint undercurrent of Esteban’s heart, but then the other blood-drinker seemed to make up his mind, and the heartbeat, too, disappeared.
19
