by Jenn Stark
Kreios displayed his hands for me, long slender fingers tipped with nails I would swear had been manicured. The mere thought of that hand being polished, pummeled, kneaded—
“My hands?” he prompted.
I blinked at him. “Not hands.” I shook my head. “Fingertips. No prints.”
“Ah, yes.” He turned his hands over and regarded the perfectly smooth finger pads. “Fingerprints are generally not a necessary affectation, and they take a surprising amount of focus. Most would not notice. Most who did would assume Mr. Grimm had spent some of his untrammeled youth in lines of work for which fingerprints were an unnecessary hazard.”
“I thought about that.” I shrugged. “Then again, your card magically appeared in my pocket earlier today. I’d assumed it was Armaeus, but that little trick is a thing with everyone on the Council, I guess.”
“It passes the time.”
“Dollface, you’ll not believe it… Hello!” Nikki burst into the door with a whirl of brightly colored bags, then stopped fully as her gaze took in Kreios in all his glory. “Sweet Baby Jesus on a tricycle, you should post a warning sign. Give a girl a heart attack, why don’t you?”
“Nikki Dawes. It is always my pleasure to see you.” Kreios leaned back on the glass counter, and I shifted away too, glad to put more distance between me and the Devil. “How may I help you?”
“In every possible way.” Nikki winked, then took in the room. “This place has cleaned up a lot since the last time I was in here. I’m thinking my credit isn’t going to be up to snuff.”
Kreios’s smile teased at his lips. “Most of the items on the display are less than a thousand dollars. If there is something in particular you crave, I’m sure we could work it out.”
As Nikki attempted a strangled response, Kreios shifted his gaze to me. “I’ll have a car sent to the Palazzo tomorrow evening for you.” His gaze flicked over my outfit. “And clothes.”
“Hey—”
“Good.” Nikki had recovered herself. “Clothes for what?”
Apparently, discretion wasn’t in Kreios’s job description. Then again, he was also a big believer in honesty in all things. He favored Nikki with another appreciative glance. “Sara is going to accompany me to the Rarity gala, unless she manages to steal the items we need first.”
“Steal?” Nikki’s brows went up. “From the Rarity? Their security is Techzilla, Inc. Totally top-shelf.”
“Borrow,” I interjected. “Armaeus told me he wants to review at the items and assess their value. If he decides to acquire them after all, I’m sure he’d be willing to pay for them.”
“Willing, yes. Except the Council requires anonymity. An anonymity that Jarvis Fuggeren might not want to grant.” He shifted his gaze to me. “Which brings me to your purpose here. I would like to outfit you in suitable jewelry for the event, but I need to see how your body will react to the various base metals.”
“Be still my heart.” Nikki was back to sounding strangled. “I’ll be over here. Watching.”
“Not at all.” Kreios waved his hand, and a tall, heavily-muscled man appeared in the doorway behind the counter. “There is an extensive collection in the back that you might find interesting, if you will allow Stefan to guide you.”
Nikki’s throat worked as she took in the bald body builder in a sleek black tee shirt and jeans that were slung low on his hips. Even at this distance, I could see her pupils dilate. “That’s for me?” she whimpered.
Kreios waved the man forward, and he stepped up to Nikki, taking her hand like she might break. Nikki dropped her shopping bags to the floor, then blinked at me. “I don’t—”
“Please, take your time,” Kreios said. “Stefan has a habit of tying guests up for a while. We’ll wait.”
Nikki’s eyes might have rolled back ever so slightly into her head, but she went.
“That’s you, isn’t it?” I asked Kreios when they had cleared the doorway. “You’re doing that Dr. Manhattan thing again, like when I’d first met you. Except…” I glanced over to the doorway. “I didn’t realize you could change your appearance multiple times when you manifested a new incarnation. That’s sort of cheating.”
Kreios laughed. “If you prefer to think that, it’s your choice. I consider it more an opportunity to multitask.”
“Yeah, well, how many illusions can you keep going at once?”
“When I am strong? I have maintained five simultaneously.”
“Five.” I shook my head. “That gives a whole new meaning to being a team player.”
“That number of incarnations becomes more of an effort.” He shrugged. “When it ceases to be pleasurable, I no longer see the value. As you might suspect, simply winking out of existence tends to be a bit alarming for people.”
“I can only imagine.” I considered the shop cases again. “So, jewelry? Really?”
Kreios smiled. “A harmless subterfuge. Nikki would not have allowed herself to become distracted otherwise, and I need to discuss the particulars of this afternoon’s assignment.” He flexed his fingers. “It’s good that the Council is getting in the game again.”
Oh? “You haven’t been for a while?”
“Armaeus has held activity to a minimum for decades—rightfully so, I suspect. But he can no longer keep us completely apart from the affairs of man. The affairs of man have a way of prevailing in the end.”
“What made him stop in the first place?”
“Let’s just say that the experimentation of the sixties had a stronger impact on the Council than it should have. We’d been based in Las Vegas for about thirty years by then, and the city was a whirl of graft and booze and money and drugs. Some of that was bound to find its way to the Council, as there are always seats to fill. But twisted up with psychic abilities of an altered level…”
This history lesson on the Arcana Council was already way more interesting than the high school Western Civ class I’d never finished. “What kind of drugs, and what kind of impact?” I tried to imagine Armaeus hopped up on coke or LSD. Failed. “You guys all seem pretty capable of holding your liquor.”
“Some of us better than others. But that wasn’t precisely the experiment that turned the Council inward. Armaeus is a bit of a slave to his concept of balance, and he allowed himself to be swayed by the dark side. Quite literally.”
“What do you mean, dark?” I frowned. “I didn’t think you guys worked with the dark practitioners, not directly. Same way you don’t work with the light.”
Kreios shrugged. “Any may ascend to the Council if the conditions are right. Light, dark, neutral. One must simply be selected by an existing Council member in full standing.” His lips twisted. “And there must be an empty position. It was Armaeus’s error that he didn’t recognize the danger of both conditions being present in a world where the line between real and apparent abilities had effectively blurred.”
I was still trying to wrap my head around the idea of dark practitioners on the Council. “But I’ve met—Sweet Christmas, you mean Eshe?”
Kreios laughed. “Despite her challenging nature, Eshe is neutral. Her abilities to interpret the future would be compromised otherwise. But the Council is now comprised of nine seated positions. How many have you met? Not even half.”
The bells of the front door pealed again, and Kreios glanced up, his smile wide and welcoming toward the young man who pushed into the store. “Simon, well-timed as always.”
“It’s what I do.” The Fool grinned at me, appearing to be every inch the twenty-four-year-old hacker he presented himself as, and I tried not to stare. No way could he be on the dark side. No matter how many times he hacked the Pentagon.
“Hey.” He nodded to me. “Found a new Reposado we need to try once we knock over the Rarity. Seriously smooth.” He waggled his brows. “I promise not to leave you hanging this time.”
“Not going to happen, Simon.” That was the name I knew him by, anyway, but in the short time I’d known him, I’d also heard th
e Fool referred to as Raven, Gwydion, Kutkh, Hermes, and every other trickster god from the mythologies of the world that happened to catch his attention. He refused Loki, of course, since that was overdone, but there was no denying he could pass as a younger, distinctly crazier version of Tom Hiddleston. Which was a good look on him, if slightly unsettling. Especially combined with the double T-shirt, worn jeans, and camo Chucks he was sporting, his wavy hair constrained under a Deadpool skullcap.
How old Simon actually was, I wasn’t quite sure. He’d never told me when he’d been incarnated onto the Council, but I got the impression he was new enough to at least understand the tech revolution, even if he’d been kicking around before the birth of it. Then again, he did tend to favor steampunk anime, so there really was no telling.
Now he fairly bounced on his toes. “So, the airport? Really? Kind of slumming it a bit.” He lifted the leather case I never saw him without, a beat-up messenger bag bristling with electronics. “I bet we can go straight into the show and get what we want.”
“Not worth the risk.” Kreios shook his head. “The Rarity has exceptional security.”
“Yeah, yeah, Techy-zee.” Simon shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked up on his toes. “The black box we recovered from the Binion’s explosion last month was a complete bust, but their hands were all over that place.” He grimaced. “We’ve been trying to track down Techzilla’s power base, but we keep running into minions. Who keep ending up dead.”
“Well, the guy in charge of Binion’s was in bed with SANCTUS, I can tell you that much,” I said. “If you’ve found Techzilla gadgets in the wreckage beyond standard security measures, then the odds are really high that SANCTUS and Techzilla have more in common than a burned-out building.”
“Now that would be something worth exploring.” Simon’s eyes were sharp, almost feral with intensity. He turned to Kreios. “You coming, K? Because if Tech-Z is running security at the hangar, this could be fun.” He shrugged. “And if they aren’t, there’s a great hot-dog stand out that way, and I’m starving.”
“I’m otherwise engaged,” Kreios demurred.
“Your loss.” Simon shifted back to me. “You ready?”
I glanced over to the doorway through which Nikki had disappeared. “And what about her? Eventually she’s going to notice that I’m gone.”
Kreios lifted his elegantly arched brows. “Not for a very long time.”
“Right.” I turned toward Simon as another thought struck me. “Hey—while I’ve got you here, I wanted to show you…” I reached into my hoodie for the crumpled-up drawing of the dragon, but nothing greeted my fingers. The other pocket also came up empty. “That’s…weird.”
I could feel Kreios’s gaze on me. “What’s weird?”
“Oh—nothing.” I scowled and tried again, but the scrap of paper was nowhere to be found. Instead my gaze snagged on the gleaming case of “Atlantean” coins Kreios had featured in the center of the…
Those were gone too. In their place was a set of ornamental jewelry, artfully displayed to catch the light. I lifted my startled glance to Kreios, who watched me with amusement. “I’m happy to answer all your questions, Sara Wilde, when you see fit to ask them. But for the moment, let’s see what magic the Fuggeren family has hidden away from the Council lo these long centuries.”
Simon’s laugh was derisive. “Trinkets, you ask me. A lot of smoke, no fire.”
“Perhaps.” I could tell from Kreios’s expression, though, he didn’t think so.
No—it wasn’t solely his expression. Expressions could be altered, faked. The Devil’s very energy burned differently today. It was eager. Excited. Or was I the different one, with the third eye whammy Armaeus had put on me? I tried to remember my reactions to others—but nothing stood out. I hadn’t noticed any change in Nikki either.
Nikki. I hadn’t heard her voice since she’d disappeared with Kreios’s better half. Or better fifth, whatever. “Go easy on her, okay?” I asked, turning back to him. “She’s frail.”
Kreios smiled. “I assure you she will be in good hands,” he said. “Several of them.”
Chapter Eight
McCarran International Airport was a short five mile drive from the city and seemed smaller than it should be, given how many passengers flowed through its gates. Still, that made for an easy recon mission. We headed toward a cargo building behind Terminal 3, and I surveyed the place critically as we pulled up in our bright white utility van, emblazoned with a FedEx logo.
C’mon, c’mon, c’mon. Too slow, too slow, too slow. I ached to jump out of the van and hit the building on foot, my skin too tight over my bones. Instead, I ran the plan through my head again, locking it down. Get to the goods, assess the goods, and, if the stars aligned, make off with the goods. My favorite kind of job: simple, clean, easy.
Except for all the workers, buildings, and tech standing in my way.
“A lot of bodies for a cargo center. I thought these places were automated.”
“On the inside, sure. Otherwise our job would be a lot harder. Out here, it’s simply a wall of people we have to get through.”
Simon’s voice was tight, amped, but the detachment of his words made me glance at him. “Wall of people? You sound like Armaeus.”
He flashed me a smile. “I am like Armaeus in some ways. Except for the tan, of course. And the big fancy house on the Strip. Not for lack of him trying, though.”
“Oh, yeah?” That was news. “He’s pushing for you to build on the Strip?”
“Well, ‘build’ is more a matter of thinking really hard for a few minutes, but yeah. He wants every active Council member to have a presence on the Strip. Adds to the power base.”
“Even the ones who aren’t actually here?”
“Even those.” His smile turned into more of a grin. “Roxie, at least, is close. She just would rather keep her distance from Armaeus. Sort of like a country club, you know? She shows up to a few meetings, eats a little chicken, and she’s good.”
“Um… Roxie?”
“Dude, the Empress.” He shifted the truck into neutral, letting it idle in the queue. “Maybe stick around the city for a minute and a half, meet the neighbors.” He narrowed his eyes. “Whoops, here we go. This should all be straightforward. Just gotta get you inside.”
The first checkpoint was easy enough. Simon waved his FedEx credentials at the gate as I crouched amid the maze of boxes in the back of the van. We made it all the way to the intake bays before we both saw the problem.
“Is that normal?”
“Not according to my intel.” He adjusted his side mirror. “But it shows me that we are definitely in the right place.”
A tight knot of Las Vegas Metro cops was clustered around a makeshift security checkpoint at the loading dock, talking with someone in a suit. We pulled into the queue to wait for our turn, and Simon lifted a hand to his mouth, chewing on a fingernail as he watched. “Too many questions, too many answers,” he muttered. “I might need to play this remotely, send you in solo.”
“Remotely? How?” I had one hand on the door handle already, my gaze sweeping the crowded swath of asphalt. Another truck moved forward, and the cycle of questions started again.
“I’ve already been out here once this week.” He tapped his credentials against the steering wheel. “Modeling the security and creating a blocker tied to your key cards wasn’t hard. One use only on the cards by the way, but getting out won’t be as much of a problem as getting in. You want to be in a truck or cart if you can manage it—nobody moves around here on foot for any distance. Any one will do. You’ll drive up to a terminal at a cargo check-in point and can talk your way from there. You’re in uniform. People don’t notice people in uniforms.”
“Unless they’re also in uniforms.” My fingers twitched toward the Tarot cards tucked inside my shirt, but I forestalled the impulse. There were too many variables for a clear reading, too many questions of equal importance that needed answering. Without
a firm question in my head, the cards’ usefulness tanked dramatically.
Simon’s voice interrupted my thoughts. “Whoops, cavalry arrived. Maybe our commando cop team is about to be redeployed.”
I refocused on the check-in station, and my hand tightened on the door. Crap. “Um, I know that guy. No way should he be here.”
“Yeah?” Simon turned to me. Whatever he read in my gaze had him reaching for his messenger bag. “Know him how? As in he knows you?”
“You might say that.” I took in Brody’s rumpled brown suit, his tight, no-nonsense stance. Was his suit any more disheveled than when I saw him last, maybe with a smear of bright pink lipstick on the collar? Was his hair any more tousled?
I shoved that line of thinking down. He could dishevel himself with whomever he wanted. Not my circus, not my monkeys. “Trust me when I tell you we don’t want him to know I’m here.”
“Roger that.” Simon was keying in data on a small black device with one hand, his chin up, his expression open and relaxed. “First door is easy. Your key card will get you in. Then in about—” his glance jerked to the dashboard clock—“two minutes, all interior doors will be unlocked for approximately fifteen seconds. By then you’ll be at the second door. It will happen again thirty-seven seconds after that, which is the amount of time it should take you to get to the third door, higher security. From there, ditch your outer suit. FedEx doesn’t go that deep, but airport security does.” He nodded, more to himself than me. “After that, you’re on your own. If I can be there with you, I will, but if not, use this.”
He worked off a watch from his left wrist by stretching the band, then handed it over.
“I’m feeling a little like James Bond right now.”
“I aim to please. Baseline operation is a psychic field neutralizer, in case there are any wards on the place. After that, it’s straight-up safecracker. There are two settings: laser and bomb. Depends on how much of a blunt instrument you need to be. I suspect Armaeus would be a fan of the laser approach.”
