He gave Vi a nod to let her know he was fine (at least, he would be fine) and she turned back to the girl.
“Well,” Vi began, her voice shifting to warm and friendly, “754821 doesn’t have a very nice ring to it. How about we just call you Seven for now?”
Lucas shot Vi a curious look. Her sharp return look let him know she didn’t want to hit the poor girl with the news that she was Grace Riddick at this point. Whatever. He imagined psychology was a tricky thing, especially in this case.
Seven shrugged. “Fine.”
Taking that as a positive, Vi continued, “Why are you here, Seven?”
Seven’s gaze moved back to the guards outside the door, then up to the camera above them, before landing on Vi once more. “I killed someone.”
Well, at least she was honest, Lucas thought. Most prisoners proclaimed their innocence until the bitter end.
Vi nodded and glanced back down at Seven’s file. “Walter Finnley. Can you tell me why you killed Mr. Finnley?”
“It was my job.”
“When you worked for Sentry?” Vi pressed.
Seven gave a short nod.
“Do you know why Sentry wanted you to kill him?”
Seven shook her head, but Lucas knew why Walter Finnley was on Sentry’s hit list. The fucker had been an ancient vampire with a penchant for draining children. Seven had done the world a favor by offing the bastard. Which brought up another interesting point.
“How’d you manage to kill a centuries-old vampire all by yourself?” he asked.
Those amazing blue eyes narrowed ever so slightly on him. “I was very good at my job. Very good,” she said flatly.
He grinned at her. He couldn’t help it. Having seen her fight while still under the effects of Thorazine, he’d bet that she’d been a hell of a lot better than just very good at her job.
Vi elbowed him again and he turned in his seat to glare at her. “Damn it, woman, that hurts!” he grumbled. “Stop it!”
“We’re here to do a job,” she hissed back, “not find you a pretty girl to flirt with!”
“I’ve already done my part of the job,” he retorted. “She’s exactly who we thought she was. Now we’re only waiting on you to finish your job. It’s not my fault you’re slow as Christmas.”
She stuck her tongue out at him, which he thought was pretty damned immature for an Ivy-League-educated shrink, before turning her gaze back to Seven. “So, Seven, you were a slayer for Sentry?”
Seven met Vi’s gaze steadily. “No.”
Vi glanced at Lucas, her brow knit in confusion. Most humans didn’t know much about how Sentry had been organized. Everyone knew they’d used seers (like Harper) to track supernatural threats, and slayers (like Riddick) to eliminate them. But Sentry employed more than just seers and slayers. Empaths were used as interrogators and human lie detectors, and watchers (certified geniuses with a gift for strategy and logistics) helped guide seers and slayers to their supernatural targets.
So, if Seven wasn’t a seer, slayer, watcher, or empath, and had been on an assignment to eliminate an ancient vampire when Sentry dissolved, that would mean she’d been a…
Holy shit.
“You were a cleaner,” he murmured.
Those blue, blue eyes locked on his. Her expression gave away nothing, but a sudden, slight tension around her mouth and a subtle stiffening of her shoulders gave him his answer.
Vi glanced at him. “What’s a cleaner?”
He gave her a very subtle shake of his head. Vi didn’t need to know that kind of shit. Hell, he wished he didn’t know that kind of shit.
Harper’s mother, Tina Petrocelli, had been one of Sentry’s best and brightest empaths. She’d once told him all about cleaners. Wraiths, she’d called them.
No one ever saw them. They were only called in when everything went bad. When there was a threat no one else could eliminate. A situation no one else had the stomach to deal with. But we all lived in fear of them. If you botched up a job so bad a cleaner needed to be called in, all you could do was take a few deep breaths, pray, and kiss your ass goodbye.
If slayers merely killed supernatural threats to humanity, cleaners nuked every trace of their existence off the face of the earth, including any unfortunate humans who might have seen too much or knew too much.
Tina was one of the toughest women Lucas had ever known. He had ten inches in height and about a hundred pounds on her, but even he wouldn’t want to cross her in a dark alley. And when Tina had told him about cleaners? There’d been fear in her eyes. Genuine, gripping fear.
Anything—or anyone—who scared Tina was not to be taken lightly.
Vi cleared her throat. “And you’re aware that Sentry is no longer operational?”
“Yes.”
“Who told you?”
“Dr. Daniels.”
Lucas frowned at her. Was it his imagination, or did her jaw tighten and her voice get harder at the mention of her doctor?
Vi looked similarly concerned, but let it go to ask, “Did Sentry tell you what you were supposed to do if they were ever shut down?”
Seven’s gaze shifted to Lucas. “We were all supposed to die.”
Vi and Lucas blinked at her in stereo.
Well. That was a bit of a conversation-stopper, wasn’t it?
Chapter Three
Several very pointed questions later (it seemed Seven was no more likely to inadvertently divulge information than her brother—the monosyllabic douchebag), Lucas and Vi learned that in case Sentry was ever exposed to the public, the cleaners were supposed to eliminate each other, one by one. When only one was left, that lucky SOB was supposed to off himself/herself.
A couple of things occurred to Lucas at that point in their conversation. The first was that Seven probably had no idea she was a dhampyre, and most likely, neither had Sentry upper management or the other cleaners, seeing as she was alive and all. And second…it was entirely possible that Seven’s incarceration had saved her life. While the other cleaners were out offing each other Highlander-style, Seven was safely locked away in her own private hell.
Maybe she was lucky, after all.
“Do you know anything about your history?” Vi asked Seven. “Your family?”
“My father put me in foster care. I was adopted, then I was sold to Sentry.”
Sold. Like farmers sold cattle at market.
Jesus.
But Seven was either a master at masking her emotions or…she just didn’t have any. Lucas certainly hoped it was the former. He wasn’t willing to leave Seven here, but neither was he willing to drop a sociopath off in the middle of Harper’s life, especially with a brand-new baby in the picture. Riddick’s sister or not, he couldn’t risk little Haven’s safety.
Vi opened her mouth to ask another question but was interrupted when a man thrust the interrogation room door open with enough force to rattle the walls.
The guy was around six feet tall, weighed probably two-forty. He had the kind of beefy arms and saggy-around-the-middle appearance that told Lucas he’d been an athlete in his youth. But now, at fifty or so, what had once been muscle had long since degenerated into flab. Intelligence flashed in his cool, gray eyes, though. As did cruelty, Lucas immediately noticed. This was a guy who enjoyed the power he wielded. The illustrious Dr. Daniels, Lucas presumed.
He crossed his arms over his chest and stared down his hawkish nose at Vi. “So, little girl,” he began, his gravelly voice adding extra menace to his tone, “you think you can waltz in here and talk to my patient without my permission? The Council will hear about this.”
Seven’s eyes narrowed on him and she hissed under her breath. Lucas blinked at her, nonplussed. She’d shown absolutely no signs of aggression throughout their entire interview. Until now.
Vi straightened to her full height—which still made her look fun-sized when standing next to a burly guy like Daniels—and shoved her glasses up with her middle finger. Somehow Lucas doubted that particular fi
nger choice had been unintentional.
Anyone who didn’t know Violet Marchand might have feared for her safety in a situation like this. But Lucas knew her well. He settled back in his chair and crossed his legs at the ankles. Vi was going to hand this guy his ass in a minute, and Lucas planned to enjoy every minute of it. Too bad he didn’t have any popcorn.
“Oh, I don’t just think it. I know I can walk in here and talk to your patient without your permission, Dr. Daniels,” she said in her icy-smooth voice, putting just enough derision on his title to let him know she thought it—he—was a joke. “And the Council already knows about this. No one told you we were coming because we didn’t want to give you a chance to clean everything up and make yourself look respectable. What we’ve learned—what the Council will learn—is that you’ve been keeping this woman in what amounts to a drug-induced coma for years on a dose of medication that could’ve killed her.”
Shock lit the guy’s expression for a split second before his ego took over once again. “You’re acting on behalf of the Council?”
Lucas winced. The condescension in his tone wasn’t going to sit well with Vi. He almost felt sorry for the loser. Almost.
Vi offered Daniels a smile that could cut glass. “The head of the Council? Hunter? I was in his wedding party last month. His wife? Mischa? One of my dearest friends.”
The funniest part of that? Other than the shocked-shitless look on Daniels’s face? It was an absolutely true statement.
Hunter, a vampire so old he’d had a front-row seat when Christopher Columbus first set foot on American soil, had taken over the Council about two months ago. His wife, Mischa Bartone, was a good friend of Vi’s and Harper’s, and she also held a power position on the Council.
So, pretty much all Vi had to do was tell her friends she didn’t like Daniels, and the dude would be lucky to ever work in his field again. Or, really, in this country. Mischa was a brutal little thing. Lucas could see her banishing Daniels to Siberia for daring to look at her friend the wrong way.
But Daniels was either too arrogant or too stupid to realize the precarious ground he was standing on, because he sneered down at Vi and said, “This is my hospital. I don’t give a shit who you’re blowing on the Council. If I tell you to leave my patients alone, you’ll damn well do it.”
Vi’s expression gave nothing away, but Lucas knew her well enough to realize she was moments away from violence, and that wouldn’t really do anyone any favors at this point. Even if what he really wanted to do was hold this punk-ass bastard down and let Vi wail on him a little.
Lucas stood up and raised his hands in a placating manner. “Let’s just all calm down for a minute.” He turned to Daniels and offered his hand. “I’m Lucas Cooper.”
He left his arms crossed, eyeing Lucas’s hand as if it was covered in dog shit. Then he shifted his gaze, visibly taking Lucas’s measure.
Lucas took a moment’s pleasure in realizing he was at least two inches taller than this douchebag, and while he didn’t outweigh him, he’d be willing to bet he had a good deal more muscle mass. He wouldn’t even need to shift to knock this asshole into the dirt. Making a power-hungry jerk like this feel small, even in the most literal sense, was truly a gift.
“This is my ward,” Daniels eventually said, enunciating as if speaking to a foreigner. “And I own everyone in it.”
Point taken, Lucas thought wryly. You’re the big, scruffy, insecure dog peeing all over the porch to show the other dogs in the neighborhood who owns the place.
He let his hand fall to his side. “Let’s just dispense with the pissing match, shall we? We’ve been sent by the Council to assess this patient and determine if her rights have been violated. If everything was as it should’ve been, we would’ve left and you never would’ve known we were here. But now? She’ll be leaving with us. Do whatever paperwork you need to do to transfer her care over to Dr. Marchand.”
Lucas glanced down at Seven out of the corner of his eye. She hadn’t moved or spoken or made a sound, but her eyes tracked Daniels’s every move. And in her expression, he recognized an actual emotion for the first time since he’d met her.
Murderous rage.
He had no doubt that if he gave her the room for five minutes, she’d rip him to shreds.
Daniels’s lip turned up as he sneered at Lucas. “You vampire rights do-gooders are all the same. Always trying to protect the supernatural freaks. Worried about humane treatment for them.” He snorted. “What you don’t seem to understand is these freaks aren’t human. They’d rip your throat open and drink you dry if given half a chance.”
The hitch in his voice told Lucas that Daniels had personal experience with supernaturals that was anything but pleasant. If he had to guess, he’d say Daniels had lost loved ones to a vampire attack. If he was really the doctor he was pretending to be, he might offer to talk to the man about his issues. But he wasn’t a doctor, or even a nice guy, for that matter, so Lucas didn’t give a shit about this guy’s issues. He was here for Seven.
And besides, Daniels seemed like a complete tool.
Lucas glanced between Seven and Daniels. “I have no doubt she would love to rip your throat open. But frankly, she showed no aggression until you came into the room. I think it would be best if you left.”
A vein popped out in Daniels’s forehead and his complexion took on a tomato-esque hue. He stepped forward until he was toe-to-toe with Lucas. “Maybe you didn’t understand me, boy, when I said this is my ward. So, I’m not going anywhere. Unless,” he added, “you think you can force me out.”
Lucas smiled. He had no doubt he could force Daniels out of the room. Lucas would love nothing more than to grab him by the graying hair, drive his knee into his nose, and drop him to the ground like the sack of wet shit he was. He cracked his knuckles. “With pleasure.”
“Stop!”
Everyone froze and looked back at Seven.
Her eyes remained locked on Daniels. “I have something important to tell you, doctor,” she said calmly.
Lucas frowned at the tone of her voice. It was…off somehow. What the hell was she up to?
Daniels straightened his shoulders. “Yeah? What’s that?”
“Come closer.”
He placed his palms flat on the table in front of her. “Tell me.”
She leaned forward until their noses almost touched. “You should have your guards empty the pockets of any guests before you let them in to see prisoners,” she whispered.
Lucas’s mind reeled and he immediately patted the front pocket of his stolen lab coat. There’d been a pen, a prescription pad, and a paperclip in there. And now, it held…only the prescription pad.
Oh, shit.
But before he could call out a warning, Seven’s suddenly uncuffed hands whipped in front of her with inhuman speed, ramming the pen through Daniels’s hand, lodging it deep in the table beneath.
As Daniels wailed and tried to pull his hand free, a guard burst into the room, fumbling with his gun, but Seven was faster. She shot over the table and yanked the Glock from his grip, then lashed it across his jaw. He went down hard, cracking his head on the table.
Before he could react, Seven leaped onto Lucas’s back like a spider monkey, wrapping one arm around his throat and pressing the barrel of the Glock to his temple. “Move to the door. Now,” she hissed in his ear.
“You bitch,” Daniels cried, still attempting to yank his hand away from the table. “I’ll kill you.”
Lucas could almost feel her sneer. “You’ll have to catch me first, you son of a bitch.”
Chapter Four
Lucas had never been a hostage before. It was a little disconcerting.
Probably no more disconcerting than it was for Seven to be so much shorter than her hostage that it was necessary to ride him like a palomino out the door. But she probably realized bending him in half to get him down to her level would’ve slowed her escape. Smart girl.
“Go,” Vi said. “I’ll take
care of this.”
He hoped she was referring to getting Daniels to make the guards stand down, rather than taking care of the fucker’s hand. But there wasn’t really time to discuss much of anything, so he eased the door of the interrogation room open. Shouts and the clang of the ancient alarm system rang out in the hall. Seven’s forearm tightened reflexively around Lucas’s throat.
“Easy,” he muttered. “If I pass out from lack of oxygen, they’ll shoot you.”
“I’d think that would make you happy,” she said, easing her grip enough to keep him upright, but not enough to let the barrel of the Glock slip from his temple.
“I’d rather not see anyone die today. Least of all me.”
Three guards suddenly filled the hallway in front of them, weapons drawn. Lucas didn’t know their names, but he immediately decided to internally refer to them as Lazy (seriously, the dude had a crazy-looking lazy eye that seemed to be looking straight at his own nose), Hairy (in honor of the dude’s visible nose hair, which looked long enough to French braid), and Paunchy (low-hanging fruit, Lucas thought, since the guy looked to be about ten months pregnant).
“Drop your weapons, or I’ll blow his head off,” Seven yelled.
Lucas sighed. She was either a really good actress, or she was actually willing to kill him. That was disappointing. Why were the pretty ones always crazy? Or in love with someone else?
“Not gonna happen,” Paunchy said through clenched teeth. “You might as well let him go.”
With her arm still firmly around Lucas’s neck, Seven pulled on the Glock’s slide and released it. “Do it! Now!”
“Better do as she says,” Lucas said. “I do believe she’s serious.”
The guards eyed each other, then Seven. Finally they laid their weapons on the ground and raised their hands.
“Kick them away,” Seven said.
They looked like it was killing them to do so, but they complied. A good start, Lucas thought, but the battle isn’t over yet.
Harper Hall Investigations Complete Series Page 62
