“Blue across the board.” Saiman’s face dripped distaste.
“But the Reapers aren’t exactly human. We’ve established that. However, because they fight as ‘normals,’ initially the House gave long odds in their favor. They were an unproven commodity and most humans fighting against a shapeshifter or a vamp will typically lose. The Reapers cost the House a great deal of money, correct?”
Saiman confirmed it with a short nod. “Yes. There are also other reasons for their ‘humanity.’ You see, to participate in the tournament, the team must consist of seven members, at least three of whom have to be human or a human derivative, such as a shapeshifter. Without three humans, they wouldn’t be able to enter the tournament.”
“So to sum up: you don’t know what they are, how they’re tricking the m-scanner, or where they go when they leave the Games?”
“No.” Saiman wrinkled his nose in distaste, a distinctly female gesture that fit the blonde to a T.
“Not very useful, are you?” Jim said.
Thank you for your help, Mr. Diplomacy.
Saiman glanced at him. “Twenty-one years ago, on April twenty-third, you killed the man who murdered your father while they had been incarcerated. You nailed your father’s killer to the floor with a crowbar through his stomach, and then you dismembered him. The coroner estimated he took over three hours to die. His name was David Stiles. You were never charged with the crime.”
Oh boy.
“I disclose this fact to prevent any appearance of incompetence on my part. I deal in information. I’m expert at it. When I say that I don’t know what the Reapers are, I say it with all the weight of my professional expertise behind it.”
Jim laughed softly, displaying his white teeth in a wide smile.
Saiman inclined his head in an amicable bow. He may have gathered information about Jim, but he didn’t know him. Jim was a jaguar. He showed his teeth only to people he intended to kill. He wouldn’t kill him just yet, because we needed him, but one day when Saiman least expected it, he would find himself stalked by death from above.
And I would have absolutely nothing to do with any of it. “Back to the Reapers,” I said. “Do you know what they want?”
“That I can answer. They want the Wolf Diamond,” Saiman said.
I waited for him to elaborate but he just sipped his martini. He wanted to be prompted. Fine. I obliged. “What is the Wolf Diamond?”
“It’s a very large yellow topaz.”
“Why the name?” Jim asked.
Saiman pondered his martini. “It’s the precise shade of a wolf’s eye. The stone is bigger than my fist.”
A flashy prize. The topaz itself would be very valuable owing to its uniqueness, and the presence of the stone gave the tournament a nearly legendary flair: a contest between the mightiest warriors for a fabled gemstone and glory. In reality, it was a sick game, where lives were thrown away for the sake of soft bills. Glory? There was no glory in dying for somebody else’s money and glee.
“How did you acquire the stone?” Jim asked.
“It was bought by one of the House members and donated to reward the winner of the upcoming tournament. It’s an extravagant prize, in line with our current style. People who patronize our venue expect exotic.”
A topaz bigger than a man’s fist was certainly exotic. I searched my brain for any rudimentary gem lore. Topaz was one of the twelve apocalyptic stones protecting the New Jerusalem. Naturally yellow and expensive, it was rumored to have a cooling influence on one’s temper and to protect the wearer from nightmares. The generic “protection” property was the default setting for all precious stones—that was what people said when they had no clue what the stone did or when it had no mystic properties whatsoever. I made a mental note to find a gemology book and look up topaz.
“I’ve traced the history of the stone three owners back to a German family,” Saiman said. “It doesn’t appear to have exhibited any supernatural properties. There are a number of legends attached to it, a completely normal occurrence for a precious stone of this size. The predominant belief seems to be that the stone possesses virtue and can’t be sold or taken by force, but must be gifted or won, or it will bring death to the one who stole it. I’ve been unable to determine if that’s rubbish. The Reapers seem to feel the curse is true. They approached the House shortly after acquisition asking how they could obtain the stone. Given their propensity for violence, I expected them to attempt theft or burglary, but they have done neither.”
I frowned. “Since we know very little, identifying them would be the first step.”
“And how do you propose we do that?” Saiman arched an eyebrow and gave me a seductive smile. It failed both because he was Saiman and because he looked like a woman.
“Simple. We kill one.”
Saiman pondered this.
Talking through it was a piece of cake. Doing it would be a completely different matter.
“We know that the Reapers travel in packs, which makes them difficult to follow. We also know that they disappear into Unicorn Lane, which makes them difficult to track by scent and magic. However, we’re in possession of a tracking unit whose range covers the entire Lane. We kill a Reaper and plant a bug into his body. Once they leave, we track them to the exact spot in Unicorn and approach it at our leisure. We observe their headquarters. There are all sorts of interesting questions that can be answered. How many of them are there? How are they organized? Do they have guards? Are these guards human? How do they get food? What do they eat? Is there a crew that goes out to forage? Can we apprehend the foragers and”—tear them apart a shred at a time until the damn bastards tell me how to fix Derek—“and question them?”
“You seem sure you can kill a Reaper.” Saiman stared into his empty glass, seemingly amazed by the disappearance of his martini.
I thought of Derek dying slowly in the tub of green liquid. His bones broken, his face gone, his body hurting . . .
Saiman shifted in his love seat. “Kate, your sword seems to be emitting a vapor.”
I put a leash on myself. “Get me into the Pit. I’ll take care of the rest.”
“I would love to, but I can’t.” Saiman waved his arm in disgust. “The Reapers are scheduled for one final bout before the tournament, which is a team event. The bout has been advertised as Stone class. You don’t qualify.”
“I can do it,” Jim said.
Saiman shook his head. “As much as I would love to have the Pack’s chief of security in the Pit, you wouldn’t qualify either. Stone class means an extra-large fighter.”
True. Jim was never a heavyweight. Even in his half-form, he was lean, quick, and lethal, but not bulky.
“I do have a Stone fighter available.” Saiman smiled. “Me.”
That beating I had taken from the Pack must’ve done permanent damage to my hearing. “Me who?”
“Me as in myself.”
I squeezed my eyes shut.
“What are you doing?” Saiman asked.
“I’m counting to ten in my head.” It worked for Curran; surely it would work for me . . . Nope, not feeling any better.
I opened my eyes. “I kill on a regular basis. So please understand that I say this with the full weight of my professional expertise behind it: you’ve gone off the deep end. You’re enthusiastic but unskilled, and you lack the physical strength and reflexes needed to kill a Reaper. If you enter the Pit, you will die horribly and in great pain and I won’t be able to jump in there and pull you out.”
“You’ve never seen me fight in my original form.”
A vision of golden-haired Adonis dancing through the snow flashed before me. “Yes, but I saw you dance. Your original form, while devastating to horny women and gay men, isn’t likely to slay any Reapers. You’ll get your head bashed in and we’ll lose an opportunity to plant the bug.”
Saiman smiled, a thin stretching of lips without any humor. “That was not my original form.”
Touché. “In that
case, I hope your original form is a two-headed dragon spitting fire.”
“Give me an opportunity to fail,” Saiman said. “I promise that my corpse won’t interrupt your ‘I told you so’ speech. The bout is tonight. May I count on the two of you to act as my crew?”
What choice did we have? “Fine.”
Saiman rose. “I’ll have to make a formal appearance for the first part of the evening. After the fight, provided we accomplish the actual kill, the Reapers will be grounded by the Red Guards for one hour to allow us a head start. The House doesn’t wish any friction between fighters outside the ring. That will give the two of you ample time to arrive in Unicorn and make the necessary preparations. I’ll stay the night in the Arena, in my private rooms, to recuperate.”
Or he would stay the night in the morgue. The thought hung in the air like a funeral shroud. None of us mentioned it.
CHAPTER 15
AFTER JIM AND I WERE FINISHED WITH SAIMAN, Jim dropped me and the Pack horse at my apartment. I wanted to go back with him. I wanted to be there in case Derek woke up. I had this irrational idea that my staying close would somehow fix him.
But it wouldn’t. If I had gone back with Jim, I wouldn’t have slept, and I needed sleep and food badly. The Reapers wouldn’t take kindly to having one of their own knocked out of their lineup. If Saiman managed to deliver on his promise, they might come after us. I needed to be rested and sharp. So I took a shower, scrubbing every square inch of my skin and hair with scented soap to kill the smell of Jim’s posse, ate cold beef with black bread, tomato, and a little cheese, took a much-prized and expensive aspirin, and passed out.
I awoke at eight because my phone rang. I raised my head off my pillow and stared at it. It rang and rang, filling my head with noise. The answering machine came on and a familiar voice made me sit straight up.
“Kate.”
Curran. Oy. Two hours of sleep wasn’t sufficient to deal with him.
“Call me as soon as you can.”
I picked up the phone. “I’m here.”
“You’re screening your calls?”
“Why not? It saves me from conversation with idiots.”
“Is that an insult?” His voice dropped into a deep growl.
“You’re not an idiot,” I told him. “You’re just a deadly psychopath with a god complex. What is it you want?”
“Have you seen Jim?”
“Nope.”
“He didn’t call you?”
“Nope.” But his goons beat the daylights out of me.
“What about Derek?”
“Nope. Haven’t seen him either.”
There was a momentary pause. “You’re lying.”
Shit. “Now what would make you think that?”
“You didn’t ask me if Derek is okay, Kate.”
That will teach me to have delicate diplomatic conversations first thing in the morning.
“That’s because I don’t care. You told me you’d bring me in on the investigation. You promised me full cooperation and interviews. That was Friday morning. It’s Sunday now. Forty-eight hours have passed. You blew me off, Curran. Just like always. Because you expect me to trip over my feet in a rush to help you, but the precious Pack can’t cooperate with outsiders. What you hear in my voice is apathy.” And bullshit. Lots and lots of bullshit.
“You’re rambling.”
Curran two, Kate zero.
“This is very important, Kate. Jim defied me. He’s refused a direct order to pull his crew in. I can’t let it stand. He has seventy-two hours to decide what to do. Then I’ll have to find him.”
“You’ve known Jim for years. Doesn’t he get the benefit of the doubt?”
“Not for this.” The hard shell on Curran’s voice broke. The alpha vanished for a moment, leaving a man in his place. “I don’t want to have to find him.”
I swallowed. “I’d imagine he doesn’t want you to find him either.”
“Then help me. Tell me what you know.”
“No.”
He sighed. “For one moment, forget it’s me. Put aside your ego. I’m the Beast Lord. You’re a member of the Order. You’re subordinate to me in this investigation. I order you to disclose the information. Do your job.”
It stung. I was doing my job to the best of my ability. “You’re mistaken. I’m not subordinate to you. You and I are on equal footing.”
“I see. Is Jim with you now?”
“Yes, he is. We’re having rough sex. You’re interrupting.”
I hung up.
The phone rang again.
Answering machine. “. . . not helping, Ka . . .”
I picked up the phone, held it for a second, and hung up. I didn’t want to lie to Curran. Even if it was for his own sake. Making shit up and trading witty barbs just wasn’t in me at the moment.
My bedroom was full of comfortable gloom, except for a narrow slash of light, which snuck through the gap between my curtains to fall right on my face. I stuck a pillow on my head.
I was drifting off into dreamland, the pillow on my head blocking the annoyingly persistent ray of light, when I heard a key turn in my lock. My door swung open.
The only person with a key to my place was the super, and he would never enter unannounced.
I forced myself to lie still, my limbs loose. Some picture I presented: my butt in white cotton panties sticking out, my head under the pillow. Not the most advantageous fighting stance.
I lay, hyperaware, all my senses straining. Very soft footsteps approached the bed. Closer. Closer.
Now!
I whipped about, launching a sweeping kick. It caught the intruder in the midsection, eliciting a distinctly male groan, and he went down. I leapt off the bed and lunged for Slayer, but it wasn’t where I’d left it. I dropped and saw it far under the bed. He’d kicked it on his way down.
A steel hand grasped my ankle. I flipped on my back and hammered a kick into his shoulder that had the entire force of my body behind it.
He groaned and I saw his face. “Curran!” I would’ve preferred a homicidal lunatic. Oh, wait . . .
That second of amazement cost me: he lunged at me, knocked my arm aside as if it were nothing, and pinned me to the floor. His legs clamped mine. He held my right arm above my head, my left between our bodies, and leaned, his face only inches from mine, my side touching his chest.
He wrapped me up like a package. I couldn’t move an inch.
“I thought you were some sort of maniac!” I growled.
“I am.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Looking for Jim in your bed.”
“He isn’t here.”
“I see that.”
Little golden sparks danced in his dark gray eyes. He looked terribly pleased with himself and slightly hungry.
I squirmed away from him, but he just clamped me tighter. It felt like fighting in a straitjacket made of heated steel. There was absolutely no give in him. Pinned by his Beastly Majesty. I’d never live that down.
“You can let me go now,” I told him.
“Do I have your permission?”
“Yes, you do. I promise not to hurt you.”
A hint of a grin curved his mouth. He had no plans to let me go. And I couldn’t outmuscle him. Crap.
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”
He bobbed his head up and down, the smile like a smudge of white paint across his face.
“How did you get in?”
“I have my ways.”
The light dawned on me. He was the one who had replaced my door two months ago, because I was rather busy trying not to die. “You kept a key to my apartment. You bastard. How often do you come here?”
“Once in a while.”
“Why?”
“To check on you. Saves me the trouble of sitting by the phone waiting for your ‘come and rescue me’ calls.”
“You don’t have to be troubled: there won’t be any more calls. I’d rather die than ca
ll you.”
“That’s what worries me,” he said.
His legs pinned mine, his thighs hard like they were carved of wood. His chest pressed against my breasts. If I could turn a little to the right, my butt would slide against his groin. A little to the left and my face would end up in his neck.
Magic Strikes Page 13
