Omega

by Susannah Sandlin

  She looked at the floor. “Go ahead, laugh. Everybody else is going to.”

  He cleared his throat. “Actually, it’s pretty.” When she looked up, he smiled, and it was such a sweet expression she almost smiled back. Almost. This was Will, after all. It wouldn’t last.

  “Why’d you do it?” He walked around her, taking in all sides. “It makes your eyes look greener.”

  She hazarded another look at his face, but saw no sign of the jester.

  She swiveled to study her image in the mirror again. Her hazel eyes did look a deeper green beside the dark hair, and her skin, always fair, more porcelain. “I did it on impulse, because of something Aidan said last night, about Matthias recognizing me by my hair if I got caught while I was on patrol.”

  Will sat on the edge of the bed. “Maybe. But if he got close enough, Matthias would scent Mirren’s bond on you no matter what your hair looked like.” Aidan required all his scathe members to be blood-bonded to either Mirren or himself, partly so they could use their mental connection to find anyone who was in trouble. But Randa knew a big part of the reason also was so that they’d know if anyone tried to defect or betray them. Since they’d been sold out by a former human in January—a big screwup that ended up with Krys getting turned to save her life—they’d also required all humans to be blood-bonded to a master vampire whether they were fams or not.

  She sighed. “Well, it’s done. And, uh, why are you turning green?”

  He held up his paint-covered right hand. “It’s a fashion statement. Like it?”

  “About as much as I like my hair. What’s planned for tonight—more patrols? Or are you taking some people to Opelika?”

  Will told her what happened in the exit room, including how he got his hand covered in green paint, and all thoughts of silly things like hair fled. Dogs were bad, bad news. Randa didn’t know how canine noses compared with those of master vampires, but she’d put money on the dogs. Guess it was time for her new look to make its debut.

  “We need to convince Mirren to fill in that space.” And she’d smelled enough food scents wafting from the kitchen area to know exactly where he was. Glory had taken charge of the kitchen. She also ate about an hour before Mirren woke from daysleep and wanted to feed so her blood would carry traces of whatever she’d consumed. Randa thought it was kind of gross, but it seemed to work for them.

  She followed Will into the hall, and they walked side by side toward the kitchen wing. He kept turning to look at her.

  “What? If you’re going to laugh at me, go ahead and do it.”

  He held up his hands in self-defense. “I didn’t say a word.” But he grinned so broadly his fangs showed. Damned vampire. She’d known the kinder, gentler Will would be a short-lived thing. He’d shown amazing self-restraint so far.

  Sure enough, Mirren was sitting at one of the tables in the community dining room outside the kitchen, with Glory on his lap. God, what would it feel like to have a man look at her the way Mirren looked at his mate? He was the biggest badass Randa had met—and she’d met a lot of them on military bases—but his features grew almost soft when he looked at Glory. And the way he was looking at her now, they’d have been off doing something more intimate if Will and Randa had arrived any later.

  Will coughed, a bit too loud and obvious to be natural, and Randa could’ve sworn Mirren growled at him. Then the big man’s gaze landed on Randa and his annoyed frown gave way to a surprised frown. “What the fuck did you do to your hair?”

  Glory thumped Mirren on the head, slid off his lap, and stood with her hands on her hips, studying Randa and ignoring her mate’s grumbling. “I like it. Turn around.”

  The couple dozen people sitting in the big dining room swiveled to look as well.

  Terrific. She turned slowly, letting everyone get an eyeful.

  “I think it was a good move.” Glory picked some dishes off the table next to Mirren and took them to the sink. “I mean, your red hair is gorgeous, but it’s such an unusual color it drew attention to you, even when you stuck it under a cap. You can blend in better now, and once all this crap is over, you can always strip the dye out and grow it back out. Or you might decide you want to keep it this way so you can—”

  Mirren interrupted. “Glory, st—”

  “Yeah, yeah, vampire. ‘Stop,’ he always tells me. He thinks I talk too much.”

  Mirren raised an eyebrow, but he looked more amused than angry. “You guys patrolling downtown tonight, or you want the Opelika run?”

  “We need to talk first.” Will put an arm around Glory and hugged her. Randa had seen them together a couple of times before Matthias’s attack had driven everyone underground, and they seemed close. Not close enough for Mirren to get jealous—even Will wasn’t that much of a playboy. He just had an easy way with people, except her.

  Had that been her fault? Maybe so. But he’d done his part too.

  Cage and Hannah were already in the conference room—Hannah had known they needed to meet. Aidan was talking to Mark, she said in her solemn, adult-child way, and would be there soon.

  “Mark thinks he wants to leave, but he will die if he does.” Hannah fiddled with a tassle on her pink boots, still a little girl in so many ways. “He will use drugs again, like he did before he met Aidan. He has to stay here even though his future…” She stopped and shook her head, a frown wrinkling her smooth forehead.

  Cage leaned toward Hannah. “What do you see in his future?”

  “I don’t know.” Her voice rose on the last word, and she threw her Hello Kitty purse across the room. It hit the concrete wall and spilled little girl purse things on the floor: a tube of lip gloss, a pen, a notebook, a mirror. Randa slipped out of her chair and began gathering the items and putting them back in the bag. Will leaned over and handed her a pink cell phone that had skidded near his foot. Not that they could get signals down here, but they all still carried phones. She and Will exchanged uneasy glances.

  Cage spoke softly to Hannah. Her adult familiars, who’d acted as her parents for the past three years, had reluctantly left her behind to return to Atlanta. She was using a substitute feeder she shared with Cage, and Randa wondered how much of her frustration was not being able to control her psychic abilities and how much was losing the fams she’d come to think of as more family than familiar. Maybe Cage could help her.

  Being a vampire might give you immortality—as long as no one chopped off your head, scrambled your brains, tore out your heart, or threw you into a sunlit field—but it exacted a terrible toll on family. For a few moments, Randa let her mind go to a dangerous place, to her twin brother, Rory. Until last month, she’d been able to keep up with her dad and brothers by following Rory’s blog. She knew their next-oldest brother, Robbie, was engaged and that the eldest had his first baby on the way. Rory was unsettled after his army discharge, playing in a band and trying to find himself.

  They all thought Randa had died, and life inevitably had gone on.

  A month ago, Rory had stopped blogging for no reason she could discern. Before Matthias had invaded Penton, Randa had hoped to take some time off, drive to Tennessee where he was living, and try to spot him. Just to make sure he was OK. Now that wasn’t going to happen, not for a while.

  The Penton scathe was her family now, and she wouldn’t leave them.

  She shook off the worry and returned to her seat, sliding the Hello Kitty bag across the table to Hannah. The girl was staring at the clasped hands resting in her lap and seemed still and closed off. Cage looked at Randa and shook his head.

  “What’s up?” Aidan came into the room but stood in the doorway instead of sitting. Things with Mark must have been bad. His injury during the attack on Penton had at least spared him the sight of watching Melissa die. Things were grim for Penton, and she wasn’t sure Aidan could convince Mark that living here was worth slogging through.

  Like quite a few of Penton’s humans, Mark had struggled with drug addiction before meeting Aidan. The scath
e leader took hard cases from the Atlanta shelters, many of whom were unvaccinated, and helped them through withdrawal with a combination of enthrallment and counseling. They were clean by the time he told them what he was and gave them the option of coming to Penton or trying to forge their old lives back together on their own. There was a no-relapse policy, though. Anyone who slipped got their memories wiped and a trip back to Atlanta.

  Randa was pretty sure Aidan wouldn’t let Mark return to that life, even if he didn’t believe in keeping people in Penton against their will. If he had doubts, Hannah’s insight into Mark’s future would convince him.

  After a quick update on Mark, Aidan turned his attention to Will. “Tell me what’s going on.” Will gave a concise account of the dogs and what he’d tried to do to mask the scents, but Aidan was frowning by the time he finished.

  “Closing up that exit has to be first priority. Mirren, I know you don’t like leaving us with a single exit, so get to work figuring out how to get the manpower to create a new one.”

  Mirren leaned against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest. “I’m on it. Until we do fill that exit in, we need to keep armed guards there night and day. I’ll round up human guards for tomorrow’s day shift.”

  Randa saw the opening she’d wanted. “I’ll take tonight’s watch.”

  Aidan nodded. “You and Will both guard the church exit, I’ll take the back hatch. Cage, you ready to meet Matthias? The sooner we can get info on what he knows and what he has planned, the better. We’ll have to break your bonds to me so Matthias won’t scent you as mine.”

  Cage was laser focused, and Randa wondered if she’d ever see him again. Even the least suspicion that he was a plant and Matthias would kill him.

  He gave a grim nod. “Ready and steady.”

  Cage slung his hastily stuffed backpack over his shoulder, took a deep breath, and walked into downtown Penton. He’d approached from the east side, as if hiking all the way in from Atlanta with nothing to hide.

  He’d been doing patrols outside of town, so this was his first postattack look at the little community he’d come to love. Now it reminded him of the bombed European villages he’d seen after World War II, piles of rubble alongside burned shells of buildings, punctuated by an occasional storefront left inexplicably whole and untouched but for broken windows. Looking at it hurt. Everything these people built had been honest and good.

  He made himself a promise. If he survived this, he’d help rebuild Penton. He had an obligation to go back to England and try to replicate this place, but not until the original town was whole again.

  He’d hoped to take a look in the Baptist church before being spotted, but no such luck. The door to the church opened, and a tall, thin man stood in dark silhouette against the interior lantern light. Cage could feel the weight of examination from a block away. He lifted his arm in a wave and angled toward the church. Time for his opening performance.

  From Will’s description, Cage thought the vampire he was about to meet had to be the infamous Shelton Porterfield. Tall, thin, with washed-out blue eyes silvered in hunger, an oversized beak of a nose, and stringy white-blond hair that fell over his forehead in the shape of a comma. Definitely Matthias’s second-in-command.

  “You better have a good reason for being here.” Shelton’s drawl carried authority, but Cage recalled Will’s account of how cowed the man had been when Will had arrived at Matthias’s Virginia estate to rescue Mirren and Glory six weeks ago. Will had easily gotten the jump on him. Mr. Porterfield could be intimidated.

  “I’m here to see Matthias Ludlam.” Shelton assumed his most formal upper-class accent and stiff-upper-lip demeanor. “As an envoy from the Tribunal’s UK representative, Edward Simmons.” He and Edward had come up with the alibi in case he ever ran into trouble. He figured if this situation wasn’t trouble, nothing qualified.

  Shelton frowned and looked him over. Cage assumed a casual stance but threw his shoulders back and never dropped his gaze. He studied Shelton for telltale body language and was satisfied. Shelton had lost his swagger. He wet his lips, jiggled his hands, frowned, and looked down the street. The man was trying to decide what to do with his sudden, unexpected visitor.

  “Stay here while I talk to Matthias and see when he’s available. Mr. Ludlam’s a busy man; he can’t just talk to anyone who wanders up.”

  Cage shrugged. “No problem. I’ll ring up Edward at his New York office and tell him Matthias will see me when he has time. Pity, that. The United Kingdom organization has been a supporter of Matthias’s work here in Penton. Edward will be disappointed that Matthias doesn’t have time for one of his staunchest allies.”

  He turned back in the direction from which he’d entered town and walked away. When Shelton called after him, he allowed himself a brief smile before turning to respond.

  “Wait.” Shelton’s voice rose with a quiver. “No sense in running off. Matthias is here. Come on, we’ll find him. But”—Shelton wet his lips again, a nervous tell—“I…Well, how do I know you’re who you say? You might be one of Aidan Murphy’s scathe.”

  What an idiot. Cage gave him a level look. “Do you scent Murphy’s scathe on me? Come a little closer, Mr. Porterfield.”

  The fool actually took a step backward. “How’d you know my name? Mr. Simmons wouldn’t know me.”

  “Edward makes it his business to know the major players. We know that Shelton Porterfield, formerly of Virginia, is Matthias’s second here. I had your description and, in fact, knew you were the perfect man to expedite my meeting with Matthias. You have a reputation for being very efficient.” And he had some swampland in the Scottish Highlands to sell if the man bought that lie.

  Cage reached in his pack and pulled out a forged British passport with his photo and a real letter of introduction from Edward, including the leader’s personal seal and the stamped insignia of the Vampire Tribunal. All quite legitimate, except, of course, for his real business here and Edward’s true allegiance.

  He handed the papers to Shelton, who read the letter with a gradual relaxation of tense shoulders. “Sorry for doubting you. We’ve got to be careful around here—these goddamned rebels are ruthless. They’d not hesitate to take Matthias down, and the Tribunal is relying on him to take care of Penton so they can focus on how to meet this pandemic vaccine crisis.”

  Yeah, more likely so they could continue their graft and corruption and, judging from his last conversation with Edward, formalize a policy that would allow the black market sale of unvaccinated humans. If the vampire ruling body was seriously considering sanctioned human trafficking, they were all beyond fucked. Edward thought if they could get Aidan on the Tribunal, he’d have enough charisma and persuasion skills to turn them around. But first, Aidan had to survive and they had to turn enough Tribunal members to get him a fair hearing.

  Which meant this had to work. He had to find out what Matthias was doing and figure out a way to give Aidan the upper hand.

  “No problem, Shelton. I’m sure Matthias appreciates your thoroughness. Shall we see him, then?”

  Shelton bobbed his head and started walking in the same direction from which Cage had come. “Matthias has taken the office at the old clinic. Part of it was damaged in an explosion, but the office is still usable and has electricity.”

  Cage knew he had to not appear too well informed, especially of the last few days’ events. “I noticed a lot of damage around town. Fire damage, rubble. What happened?”

  Shelton shook his head. “Might not want to ask Mr. Ludlam that. We almost had all of them, with some careful planning, the bombs, the fires. A lot of ’em died, but some managed to get away. Not only Murphy, but Kincaid—you heard of the Slayer?”

  “I’d heard Mirren Kincaid had joined forces with Murphy, yes.” Cage looked ahead, avoiding eye contact with Shelton lest he start laughing at Will’s description of how frightened the man had gotten in his only close encounter with Mirren. Now that he’d met Shelton, he could visua
lize it. “I also hear Kincaid is quite a swordsman, that he still has his original battle sword, in fact.” A downtown battle against a small army of starving vampires, who had been led to Penton by Matthias’s people, had already become the stuff of legend among the Penton residents. Some said Mirren took off twenty heads; some said forty.

  “He fucking lops heads off with that sword of his—you’ve never seen anything like it.” Shelton practically shivered. “He’s a monster.”

  Given what Will had told him about Shelton—he’d at least hinted that Shelton had tried to sexually molest him—this son of a bitch was a bigger monster than Mirren Kincaid could ever hope to be.

  If Cage’s long life had taught him anything, it was that monster wasn’t measured in size or physical strength, but in blackness of heart and soul.

  Cage remained quiet the rest of the walk to the clinic, while Shelton chattered more than any second-in-command should. As a result, Cage now realized Matthias knew the Penton scathe and their humans had escaped into something called Omega, that he knew it was underground and accessed beneath the church, and that Shelton was virtually living in the church sanctuary in case any of them tried to come out. In other words, Matthias was too damned close to finding them all, just as they’d feared. He hoped Mirren would get the exit plugged before that happened.

  They reached the clinic entrance, and Cage followed Shelton into the brightly lit lobby. He understood why Matthias had picked it for his headquarters—it was one of the few buildings in town that still seemed to have electricity and be mostly intact. The overhead fluorescents shot their painful glare into his dark-adjusted retinas, and he squinted against the light.

  At the end of the long central hallway, Shelton stopped and knocked on a door to his left. He waited a few seconds, then tentatively opened it. “Matthias? We have a visitor from the Tribunal.”

  Matthias came into view through the doorway, his face compressed in a frown and mouth open, probably to give Shelton a good tongue-lashing. He recovered quickly upon spotting Cage, however, and his face smoothed into a practiced smile. A politician’s face, whose pleasant expression never reached the shrewd brown eyes peering cautiously from beneath dark brows and salt-and-pepper hair.