Rose endured the hug. It felt genuine enough, the sort of familial expression two good friends would share, but she couldn’t shake the tension it induced in her. Piper must have noticed. She withdrew and favored Rose with a questioning grin.
“I get the feeling we’re not meeting at my house because you all have something on your mind.” Piper gave Matt a nod of acknowledgment before turning back to Rose.
“Someone killed Barbara Griffith,” Rose said.
“I heard.”
“Was it you?” Rose saw no reason to exchange pleasantries for five minutes before getting around to the question she wanted answered. Better to rip that bandage off right away.
“No. Why would I?” Piper met Rose’s eye without flinching, though Rose expected nothing less. She had fought next to Piper when they took the fear factory. While the diminutive vampire appeared harmless, Rose knew a beast lived inside her, one more cunning than Rose realized.
“Got any idea who did?” Matt asked.
Piper shook her head. “Why would any vampire attack Society? Death wishes are one thing, but that’s like poking a sleeping giant. It’d give them an excuse to exterminate as many of us as they want.”
“Back at the con in Kentucky, you said you would kill Barbara to get her out of my way.” Rose drew all the discernment she could handle in anticipation of Piper’s next words. She wished she could have brought Myra on this trip but had decided against it since that would have put almost the entirety of the Order’s leadership team within Piper’s grasp.
“That was a joke, girl.” Piper looked offended. “I don’t go around executing succubi—I don’t go around executing anybody.”
“Except other vampires.” Rose’s discernment brought her nothing, but observation told her she had struck a tender spot when one corner of Piper’s mouth curled up in what might have been a grin but verged more on a sneer. “You got us to help you overthrow Felix when we weren’t ready, and you’ve moved on to take out many more like him since. How many other vamps have you killed?”
Piper remained silent for a long moment, fog curling about her legs like loving spirits come to pay homage to their queen. Rose couldn’t see her eyes for the darkness, yet she could feel Piper’s gaze boring into her.
“You’re right,” Piper said at last. “I didn’t stop at Felix. Taking him out was a stepping stone to seizing more territory up north, mostly because his offspring and peers moved against me after that. Me and mine were fighting for our lives most of the last three weeks.”
“Why didn’t you tell us that?” Matt asked.
“Because you all made it crystal clear I wasn’t to go adventuring outside my territory. I couldn’t expect any help from you, so I didn’t bother asking for it.”
“But you did,” Rose said. “Go adventuring, as you put it, outside South Carolina. From what we’ve heard, you’ve been fighting your own kind up and down the east coast.”
Piper glanced at Olivia before turning her attention back to Rose. “Those others of my ‘own kind’ didn’t give me any choice, did they? They threatened friends of mine. In fact, in one case, they killed a vampire I had known for fifty years. He died because he knew me. I can’t let that sort of thing stand. I took out the vamps who did it.”
“And set up your daughters to control their former territory,” Matt said in a flat tone. “Did you think Society would ignore that sort of thing?”
“What would you do if someone killed your good friend and threatened to do the same to your family, Matthew? You’re an incubus. It’s easy for you. If you didn’t go after them yourself, and probably get away with it, you could at least plead for help from Society. Someone might even assist you. A human could call the authorities and get the bastards locked up for life. Vampires don’t have either luxury. I can’t turn a vampire in for murder. In the first place, no human would be able to capture them, and even if they did, Society would charm them free and then execute me for revealing our kind to the world. If I sought justice from Society directly, the elites would laugh me into chains. There’s no justice for my kind except the justice we create. That’s the hard truth.”
Rose couldn’t deny Piper’s logic. She had spent more than an entire human lifespan under the thumb of both Society and her fellow vampires. It made sense she would rail against both once she gained the power to do so.
“If it wasn’t Piper, that leaves the Irish.” Rose turned to Matt, who nodded.
“You mean Alice McAleese.” Piper nearly growled the succubus’s name.
“You’ve had dealings with her?” Rose asked.
“She’s tried to kill me on three separate occasions. I might not like how my family’s treated here in the States, but at least no one’s trying to exterminate us—not like Europe. The Irish have been systematically murdering vampires there for the last ten years. They make a sport of it like fox hunting.”
“I didn’t know,” Rose said in a small voice. She supposed she shouldn’t feel surprised. No one in Society particularly liked vampires. They tolerated them, sure, but they also kept them politically and, often, financially weak. It made sense the Irish, who seemed to her like an extreme instance of their American counterparts, would take such an ideology to the next, horrific level.
“If you want to know who killed Barbara Griffith, I’d start there.” Piper folded her arms, nodding as if deep in thought. “I’m sure you know the Irish are worming their way into your Society.”
“It’s not my Society,” Rose said. “But I take your point, and, yeah, we’ve heard.”
“What better way to sow distrust in your leaders than to take out Griffith?” Piper asked. “Now, Alice has every succubus with the least bit of power vying for leadership. That sort of destabilization leads to panic. Who can the succubi trust when everyone is backstabbing everyone else?”
“Alice and the Irish,” Matt said, nodding. “We might hear some odd rumors coming out of Europe and the Near East, but at least things are stable there.”
“Exactly.” Piper put her hands on her hips. “Who’s passing those rumors anyway? Alice’s opposition. They’re just a bunch of backward succubi holding onto tradition—crusty old politicians clutching at their power base, afraid of new ideas.”
“And the Irish’s way of dealing with vampires only strengthens their argument,” Rose said in sad wonder.
“Exactly.” Piper gazed down at a spillway filled with rushing water below them. The full moon shone in its wavering surface. “I know I’ve broken our treaty a couple of times, and I’m sorry for that, but I swear I’ve had good reasons. If there comes a time when you have to choose between your family or our agreement, I hope you choose family. I’ll understand. I’ll forgive.”
“If I had known that was the problem, I would have done the same.” Rose joined Piper at the bridge’s guardrail, its rusted steel cold under her palms. “But you didn’t tell us that. You went radio silence. If we’re going to make this alliance work, we have to communicate.”
“You’re right. I’ll do better. I’ve never had to consult with anyone about anything before. From now on, I won’t make a move without letting you know how and why.”
“And we’ll do the same,” Rose said.
Piper turned to lean her back against the rail, focusing on Matt, Grace, Olivia, and Tanner. “So now that our fence is mended, what are we going to do about the Irish? All this time, you’ve been concerned about shortening my leash and I’ve been focusing on beating back my own kind to save my neck, Alice has been twisting Society to her will. Sooner or later, she’s going to own it outright if we don’t do something to stop her.”
Rose nodded in the dark, her face set in a chiseled expression of resolve. “I couldn’t agree more. She’s been working to split us apart; I say it’s past time we send her packing.”
12
Sought and Forgotten
The offices of Run Time Error, one of many companies owned by the Order, wouldn’t have impressed executives from the li
kes of Microsoft or Google. The five-story tower with the company’s blue and orange logo plastered on top looked shabby next to the buildings surrounding it in Atlanta’s skyline. But that didn’t fool Rose.
Run Time Error, which started life as a computer programming advice website, had expanded tremendously since its inception five years ago, transforming from a two-person operation to a sixty-employee enterprise with a software repository and database backup facilities housed on-site. Much sought after for consulting, they had recently expanded their teleconferencing software to include 3-D imaging with connections to offices around the planet. Much of that growth took place in the last four months after the company hired a young programming phenom named Randall Moss.
A bank of ten turnstiles neatly split the building’s main entrance in half, with a security desk on one end and a steel wall on the other. The guards behind the desk eyed Rose and Matt in askance until the couple clicked their ID badges against a reader and the turnstiles’ spinning arms let them pass. Rose and Matt, through the Order, owned one hundred percent of Run Time Error. The guards might have been surprised to learn Rose’s and Matt’s badges, which they received in the mail that morning, gave them access to every room in the building.
“Not exactly cutting edge, is it?” Matt whispered. “I expected something out of a techno-thriller movie.”
“It’s like every elementary school I ever attended,” Rose agreed. Her heels made an annoying click on the shiny, gray epoxy floor. She wished she had worn sneakers like Matt.
“Elevator’s this way.” Matt pointed to a sign affixed to the wall.
“Shouldn’t we wait on Moss? He was supposed to meet us.”
“Maybe he got hung up.”
They rounded the corner as the elevator dinged and Moss stepped out. Rose, who hadn’t seen the young incubus in months, stifled a shocked intake of breath. The man standing before her looked more like Moss’s father than the slim, energetic hacker she had trained with at Camp Den. His lank hair hung in clumps to his shoulders. An unkempt beard, patchy yet as long as Rose’s hand from wrist to fingertips, sat on his chest like an overgrown spider. He wore wrinkled jeans with an equally wrinkled Schlock Mercenary t-shirt and a pair of brown Oxford shoes so worn the seams had busted in several places.
“Hi, guys.”
“Hey, Moss.” Schooling her face against her instant repulsion—Moss smelled like a cosplayer on day three of a hot con—Rose gave him a hug. He grew stiff, perhaps taken aback by the contact, but didn’t resist.
Matt, obviously the brains in their couple, settled for a handshake.
“It’s good to see you both.” Moss pressed the elevator’s up button without meeting their eyes. “You were pretty mysterious on the phone. What’s up?”
“We need to track someone without them realizing it,” Matt said. “Probably by cell phone, but however you do it is fine with us.”
The elevator doors slid open, and Moss stepped inside. Rose cringed inwardly at getting cooped up with his stench, but she had been in worse positions.
“Tracking people’s easy,” Moss said. “Who’s the target?”
“A succubus named Alice McAleese.”
Run Time Error’s development lab—Rose read the name off a placard at the entrance—put the building’s outdated facade to shame with its cutting-edge design and modern technology. Housed on the eastern side of the fourth and fifth floor, the lab sprawled across three sections of the edifice. Computer stations run by technicians, some standing, others reclining in gaming chairs, dotted the space.
People nodded at Moss as he led Rose and Matt to the lab’s sole office. A curtained window next to its door read Randall Moss, President—Research and Development. Moss ushered them inside and shut the door.
Unlike the man himself, Moss’s office was tidy. Five screens aligned in a gentle curve stood atop his pressed wood desk. Behind one monitor, facing away from Moss, stood a framed picture of Leslie Phelps, his old flame and Rose’s best friend. Leslie, dressed in tac gear and cradling her beloved M40 sniper rifle, smiled at the camera, her gleaming eyes so full of life and eagerness it nearly split Rose’s heart in two.
“This from the day we graduated?” Rose picked up the frame, her eyes going misty.
Moss nodded without looking at her or the portrait.
“I miss her too,” Rose said and placed the image back on the desk. Moss clearly had no desire to reminisce.
His seat creaked under his weight when he sat. “So, who is Alice McAleese?”
Together, Rose and Matt explained what they had feared to discuss on the phone. Filling in forgotten parts for one another, they brought Moss up to speed on the Irish, the crisis within Society, and Torres’s bid for election—all of which seemed new to him.
Sometimes, Rose forgot what it was like to be a regular succubus living a day-to-day life entirely removed from Society, the Order, and vampire treaties. For a moment, she felt jealous in the extreme toward Moss, stench and all.
“You got the phone she called you on?” Moss lifted an inquisitive eyebrow.
Rose unlocked it and handed it over. “Want me to navigate you to her number?”
“Nah.” Moss poked and brushed the screen several times before he grunted.
“That a good sound or bad?” Matt asked.
“Give me a sec.” Moss hooked a cord to the phone and started typing on one of the three keyboards at his station. He did this in silence for a few minutes before he grunted again. “She called you from a throwaway phone.”
Matt whispered a curse. “That means we’re out of luck?”
“No.” Moss spun the screen around on its stand. It showed a high-def image of a large, balding man with a star-shaped scar on his check standing at a counter inside a kiosk. “Either of you recognize that guy?”
Rose nodded. “He’s one of Alice’s guards. I don’t know his name, but he was there the night she paid me a visit at my parents’ house.”
“He bought the burner phone with a corporate charge card that belongs to a shell company. I’ve traced it back to the main corporation, which is called Seana Enterprises. Where do you think they’re based?”
“Ireland,” Matt said with a laugh. “I’d lay money on it.”
“And you’d win, too.” Moss spun the screen back to face him.
“Does that do us any good, though?” Rose could feel Moss’s excitement through his natural-born charm, something that had been missing only a minute before, but that didn’t guarantee he had solved their problem. Programming always excited him.
“It does, because your Alice McAleese sits on the board of Seana Enterprises. In fact, according to the documents of incorporation, she’s the majority stockholder.” Moss clicked the mouse a few times, typed something, and grinned. “Gotcha.”
“You found her phone?”
Moss nodded as his grin spread into a smile. “It amazes me how little people think about their cybersecurity. Living in this age, and with all the horror stories you hear of assholes stealing identities, you’d think they’d hire competent professionals to protect their data. Your Alice went to all the trouble of having Scar Cheeks purchase her tosser phone with an obscure credit card, then put her real phone number on her corporate website. That wouldn’t be enough to track her under normal circumstances, but let’s face it, I’m damned extraordinary.”
He turned the screen around to face them. It showed a map of Manhattan with a red tack stuck into it. “She holds a lease on that place, and her phone is there now.”
“Moss,” Rose said, her eyes wide. “You’re not extraordinary, you're scary, and I love it.”
“Is there a way for you to dump this information to our phones when we need it?” Matt pointed at the screen.
“I can do better than that. I’ll write an app dedicated to following her. Shouldn’t take more than a couple of days. I’ll want to test it a bit before I give it to you.”
“Perfect,” Rose said.
“Do you min
d me asking what you plan to do to her? You going to ice her?” Moss had never been squeamish when it came to tactical work, and from the look on his face, Rose didn’t think he had become so anytime recently. He was genuinely curious.
She shook her head. “Not if I can help it. We’re just going to send her a message: get the hell out of the States and don’t come back.”
“And if she doesn’t take the hint?”
“I’ll hammer it home.”
13
Intimidation
Better than his word, Moss delivered the tracking app less than a day after their meeting. Not only did it work as promised, but it also provided a pattern-of-life function built to track Alice’s movements, detail repeated actions, and subsequently deliver a prediction of future travel choices. From it, and a bit more snooping on the internet, Rose’s team determined Alice maintained two residences: the one in Manhattan and a second in DC—the two major spheres of influence within Society. Using both gave her access to the billionaire succubi on Wall Street and the political types in the capital.
It took another week for Rose and Matt to lay out a plan, gather their people, and coordinate an attack with Piper and her daughters. Alice spent most of her time on Capitol Hill these days, wooing senators, congressional representatives, and judges to her side by day and sleeping at her DC condo by night. According to Moss’s app, which took into account her phone history since her arrival in the United States several months earlier, she would maintain this pattern for another month before switching back to her Manhattan apartment. Given her habitual movements, she tended to return home early on Sunday nights, when Congress conducted no business. Most Sundays—and this one in mid-April was no exception—Alice spent most of her time schmoozing with elite succubus families at their homes or meeting them at upscale restaurants. Afterward, she would return home for a challenging workout in her home gym, perhaps a movie, and then bed by 10 p.m. to get an early start on Monday.
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