Aces Wilde: Immortal Vegas, Book 5

by Jenn Stark

  Nikki’s voice could have held a note of accusation in it, but didn’t. I hadn’t had much time to process the events of the past few days before Armaeus had offered Simon and me the rush job in Israel, and I hadn’t debriefed her on Annika’s unexpected legacy to me. I’d barely debriefed myself.

  “You two talked?” I asked.

  “Nikki was gracious enough to bring me up to speed on your travels,” Jiao said. Her face was eerily unlined for someone with such bright white hair, and her eyes were coal black. But her smile was open and authentic, and I found myself warming to her for no reason. “Madam Soo would not have wanted you to journey so far without protection, however.” Her gaze scanned the airport behind me. “Going forward, you’ll need to accept additional security. Especially given the events of this past week. Your role with the organization is precious.”

  I hitched my messenger bag higher on my shoulder and considered her. “You called in Nigel Friedman, didn’t you? He and I aren’t the best of friends, you should know. But I appreciated his help.”

  Jiao bowed. “Mr. Friedman was the closest option for assistance,” she said, though it felt like there was more to that story. Nigel, for his part, hadn’t tried to reach out to me after putting me on Soo’s plane, so maybe he had simply been in the area. But still…

  “You call on him a lot?” I asked.

  Jiao patted her bag. “There are many arrangements Madam Soo made during her tenure as head of the House of Swords. If you have time for a quiet conversation, there is much we should discuss.” She unlatched the top of the bag, and I saw two thick folders of papers inside. Papers I had a sinking feeling I was supposed to read.

  “Sure.” I glanced at Nikki, but she’d pulled out her cell phone and was tapping furiously on it as she glanced at Jiao over her aviators.

  “Jiao here said she’s been in Vegas since Tuesday,” Nikki said. “Lucky break that she found me when you were heading into town, yeah?”

  I didn’t miss the cautionary riffle in Nikki’s words this time. Sadly, I was too tired to process it. “Right.” I knuckled the grit out of my eyes, savoring the fact that my palms were no longer sliced up. The Magician could seriously chafe my chaps, but he beat Neosporin any day. “Look, my body is nowhere near on Vegas hours. If you guys can stomach another cup of coffee, I could use some—”

  “Drop! Stay down!”

  Nikki barked her words forcefully enough that her command intersected with my lizard brain. Without thinking, I collapsed to the floor like a sack of flour, just as something bright and white went skittering across the gleaming tile, smacking into the nearest trash can.

  A knife? As chaos erupted around me I crab-scrabbled for the thing, making like a pill bug once I got it. Yep—long, thin, and made of Soo’s signature white metal. Christ on a crutch, Jiao had thrown one of my own House’s blades at me. I hadn’t even had a job interview!

  Four feet away from me, Jiao and Nikki were throwing punches at each other like a Boho MMA expo. Nikki might not know Krav Maga, but her days with the Chicago PD hadn’t been so long ago that she didn’t know how to defend herself. I moved to scramble upright, then remembered the second half of Nikki’s command to stay down at the same moment a familiar voice barked from the front doors.

  “Freeze! Police!”

  What the…? My brain seized up as Las Vegas Metro Police Detective Brody Rooks strode forward, his worn loafers slapping against the tile in an angry but controlled cadence. Jiao bounced away from Nikki and allowed Brody to pull her around roughly without seeming to lose a fraction of her poise.

  “My apologies, Miss Dawes. The test needed to be made,” Jiao said as she nodded first at a bristling Nikki, then down at my own slack jaw and crouching body. “You are more prepared than we expected, Madam Wilde, and for that I am only grateful.”

  Nikki grabbed Jiao’s bag from where Jiao had dropped it, her eyes remaining flat as Brody started barking.

  “You have the right to remain silent,” the detective said, signaling to two other uniformed cops to hustle up beside us. By now we’d drawn a small crowd. The apparent danger had passed, but my hopes for an egg sandwich seemed to be dwindling. Brody handed Jiao off to one of the uniforms, then turned to Nikki—scowling at her as she pawed through the contents of Jiao’s bag. “Nikki, that’s police evidence.”

  She pulled out the thick files and handed the bag over to him. “Then it’s a good thing you’re here to ensure chain of custody. Look inside for anything else you need, like maybe the baby Beretta in the front pocket.”

  I turned on her. “A Beretta? She was going to shoot me?”

  Nikki scowled. “Honestly, I have no idea. These files looked legit, but I’ve never seen the woman, you hadn’t prepped me, and something was twistier than a fish on a hook about her from the get-go.” She stared after Jiao as the police officers escorted her to a waiting cop car. “Still, she totally pulled every punch after the first, as if she really was testing me out. Maybe she’s one of Soo’s people, maybe she isn’t. Either way, she set us up. And that’s not cool.”

  “Wait—Soo?” Brody asked. “Annika Soo? What the hell is going on here?”

  “I’ve missed you, sugar lips.” Nikki grinned at me, her good mood returning with suspicious speed. “That was fun, yeah? Not everyone gets attacked every time they get home.”

  “Isn’t she…” My gaze tracked Jiao into the police car. She turned and stared back at me. “Isn’t she on my side? Didn’t you say she was on my side?”

  “Car.” Brody cut off Nikki’s response. “Now.”

  The three of us exited the building and Brody’s sedan was right out front, with his detective credentials guaranteeing he wouldn’t get towed from the taxi lane. We slid into his beat-up sedan in positions that were becoming all too familiar: Brody in front, Nikki and I in back.

  “You want to explain what the hell is going on, Nikki?” he rumbled the moment we buckled in.

  “You know what I texted you,” she said. “Nothing’s changed. Woman shows up saying all the right things, looking the part, knowing shit she shouldn’t know about Sara, but tighter than a tick on a dog.”

  I stared at her. “You did not just say that.”

  Nikki grinned, switching her attention to me. “Her credentials checked out—she’s one of Soo’s top officials, has worked with the syndicate for years. But something was weird, so I told Brody to shoot down here for backup without telling him about Jiao’s background.” She glanced back to Brody. “Good of you to get here so quickly. And that whole ‘Freeze’ thing—gives me shivers every time.”

  Brody’s face didn’t shift. “She had to know you’d contact me.”

  “I’m thinking so, yeah. Everything she did since the moment she ordered coffee was part of a script. Then she moved in public, testing me and Sara and you too, Brody—her attack on Sara went out over dispatch, and you know it was caught on screen somewhere. She was sending a message. I just don’t know to whom.”

  “A message…” I scowled out the window. What kind of message was best sent via police scanners and amateur cell-phone videos? Surely nothing that important, but if not—why go through the motions? Annika Soo had a network of operatives and allies that spanned the globe. There were better ways to communicate with them—right?

  Unless they weren’t the intended recipients of the message.

  My head started to pound as Nikki leaned back in her seat. She hadn’t let go of the files, and I poked at them.

  “So what are those, anyway?”

  “From what I can tell, real estate holdings. Your real estate holdings, to be exact.” Her gaze shifted forward. “Okay, sweet buns,” she said, grinning as Brody rolled his eyes. “You wanna be useful while you’re providing police escort, take us to…” She opened the top file. “Nine Fourteen Tallawanda Drive.”

  “Tallawanda?” His gaze met hers in the mirror. “That’s industrial.”

  “Uh-huh. Well, if Jiao is who she says she is and not a very well-
dressed assassin with piss-poor execution, it’s a warehouse that’s been deeded over to Sara’s name.”

  “What? Already?” Time seemed to crowd in on me as Brody cursed in the front seat.

  “Explain the whole thing at once, dammit,” he bit out, his fingers white-knuckling on the steering wheel. “God save me from blasted female cops. Everything’s a goddamn suspense novel.”

  Nikki dimpled at him. “Wasn’t kidding about how much I’ve missed you. But here’s the deal. I’ve picked up no fewer than five tails since Sara went to Israel.”

  Brody’s groan was audible, but this time it was directed at me. “Israel? Really? Would it kill you to tell me when you’re going out of the country?”

  “Anyway, so this morning was the first time one of them approached me,” Nikki continued. “I did my part dining out in the most visible restaurants I could, which I’ll be billing the Council for, natch, but finally one of them bit. Knew something was a little hinky, but I didn’t sniff a fake so much as, well, hinky.”

  “And she said she was with Soo,” I cut in, sensing Brody’s blood pressure starting to spike again.

  “She did, and apparently Detective Dimples here will have his hands full if she’s as plugged into Las Vegas brass as she said she was. Showed me her files—not her gun, mind you—and asked if you’d be in town. Apparently, Soo owns property in cities across the world, and lucky you, you get to manage them now.”

  “Which you’re also about to explain.” Brody’s gaze slid to me, and I leaned back too. This part, at least, was easy. Or easier, anyway.

  “My last job was for Soo,” I said. “It turned into an audition for her role, which I didn’t expect and wasn’t planning on. But when she died, she asked me to take over for her—and, well…everyone assumed I said yes, and I didn’t correct them.”

  Brody snorted, and I shrugged. “Hey, the woman had just died. I thought they’d…I don’t know, forget.”

  Even as I said the words, they rang hollow in my ears. I couldn’t unsee Soo’s face as she’d stared at me, telling me to take control of the House of Swords. I couldn’t deny the sense that I owed the woman—and her people—something more.

  “Uh-huh,” Brody broke into my thoughts. “And you’ve had no one else approach you since?”

  “Some guys in the Tel Aviv airport, but they could’ve been anyone.”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Now Nikki was scowling at me too. “You didn’t tell me that.”

  “I’m telling you now. They didn’t leave a calling card, and they didn’t try that hard, frankly.” I decided to avoid further mention of Nigel, or of the syringes filled with God knew what. That almost certainly was another black market kingpin on my case, with zero direct connection to Soo. No need to cross the streams of crazy. “I didn’t think that much of it. There was no one in Paris, but I was more careful there, left with fake credentials.”

  “Thank heaven for small favors.” Brody slowed the sedan. “This is the place.”

  We peered up at the building. “Warehouse, doesn’t look abandoned,” I said. “Can you figure out what’s inside without a warrant?”

  “Something to ask our new friend if she stays in lockup long enough,” Nikki put in. “And, hey, it’s in Sara’s name, that should open its doors, right?”

  She turned to me and I nodded. “Permission to search granted.”

  “Noted,” Brody said. “What’s next?”

  There were three other properties in the listing, including another warehouse in an even sketchier part of town, which did look abandoned—and two houses.

  We hit the road.

  A half hour later, I squinted into the sunlight as we pulled up to the first residence. “This is the place?” I asked. “Seriously?”

  It was a palatial estate up in the Summerlin district, a world away from the Strip—though you’d still be able to see all the beautiful lights at night from the rooftop deck. Nikki craned her head out the window, her gaze pinging from her printouts to the view.

  “Curb appeal, total check. Pool, according to the sheets—can’t see it from the street, but it includes waterfalls and multiple spas. There’s indoor fireplaces, six bedrooms, seven bathrooms, media room—oversized walk-in showers.” That stopped her, and when she looked up at me, her eyes were dilated. “We are going to have so much fun here.”

  “Nikki, this isn’t really mine.”

  She flapped a hand at me. “Who’s to say it isn’t? According to Jiao, your name on the dotted line is about to bring you a world of crazy, not all of which is remotely close to good. Might as well float around in your pool for a while thinking about all that, right?”

  “This can’t be legit, though.” The warehouses were one thing, but seeing an actual house at an actual address and imagining it as mine—that finally kicked my brain back online. “This is real live money and real live assets. And I didn’t sign anything. It seems like I should have signed something.”

  “Oh, honey, it doesn’t stop there.” Nikki waved the file folder at me. “You’re either going to be really popular or really unpopular in a very short period of time, once everyone figures out what all you own.” She pounded the back of Brody’s headrest. “Keep going, Jeeves, this next place is completely off the chain—head toward Lake Las Vegas.”

  Off the chain didn’t begin to describe it. We reached the house in a little under an hour, a gated production off Northshore Road with an honest-to-Christmas gate attached to a high wall. Nikki gave Brody the code indicated on her paperwork and it worked like an Open Sesame.

  Though other palatial homes were located on the lake proper, this one sat further back. Beyond the gate, Nikki recited a laundry list of amenities: the pool, the jacuzzi, the nine-bedroom estate house and half-dozen guest cottages. There was apparently a reflection garden, a series of ponds, and a fully equipped gym. The trees looked like they’d been shipped in aftermarket, far more than should have been sustainable in the desert, but between that and the fountains, they gave the place a more hidden feel, an oasis in the desert. The estate sat high on the ridge above Lake Las Vegas, and as we wound up the long drive, something else was immediately noticeable as well.

  We weren’t alone here.

  “What exactly did this Jiao character tell you about the place?” Brody asked, his back going stiff as we passed two black-paneled vans parked off the drive, and a clutch of low-slung, high-rent vehicles. “Get those plates while you’re at it.”

  “On it.” Nikki’s pen was already scribbling down numbers as Brody slowed, but no one halted our progress up the drive, and when we finally reached the terra-cotta roofed master house, all of us were staring.

  The front courtyard was a watery wonderland, arched stone and patterned rock pairing with bubbling fountains that flowed into each other under a thick bower of yet more trees. It was also teeming with people—probably two dozen adults…all of whom looked decidedly familiar.

  “Soo’s people. The ones Gamon had taken,” Nikki murmured, even as Brody nodded. “She stashed them here to recover.”

  “Oh…geez,” I murmured. In that moment, the weight of what Soo had really gifted me sank in. She wasn’t giving me money as she had in the past, not even the power to help the victims of the war on magic. She was giving me the war itself. The resources and power to truly make a difference.

  And not only that. Here were people who could escape a terrible fate, if only I would lead. Here—and so many other places—were Connecteds who could turn to a brighter future, if only I would clear the way.

  Here was a job that wouldn’t end with a trinket safely locked in someone’s vault…instead it was a job that might actually never end. If I took it. If I was strong enough.

  I pushed those thoughts out of my mind for the moment. There were several attendants on the grounds as well, noticeable in their medical scrubs, but the place looked more like a Zen retreat than a recovery center.

  Nikki eyed the personnel. “Does this mean I can’t move in yet?”r />
  I snorted. “Don’t pick out your bedroom. There’s still way too much we don’t know.”

  Brody parked the car. “Gotta be someone in charge in this place. We’ll start with that.”

  We emerged from the car, and even the heat somehow seemed less here, the foothills of the lake region and the intense fountains and trees combining to offer an idyll in the middle of the arid wasteland. I could see why Soo had picked the site, but what had she intended for it? So far as I knew, she’d never stayed anywhere in Las Vegas other than the Bellagio.

  More to the point, why specifically had she given the house to me?

  At the palatial entry to the house, two women stood, their hands folded over their stomachs. One of whom I recognized.

  Madam Peng nodded to us, but my gaze rested on the second woman—a fierce Asian with an almost Vietnamese cast to her features, and the cold stone face of a warrior.

  Brody hadn’t gotten past Jiao, however, and the two of them locked stares.

  “Now I’m starting to get pissed off,” he muttered.

  Chapter Eight

  “You mind telling me why you are not at the precinct?” Brody’s gruff greeting drew a gracious half smile from the older woman, while the second woman’s gaze raked over me. Both females were pristine, while I still carried the heat and grime of Paris on my body. It’d been a long day. Come to think of it, it’d been a long week.

  “A misunderstanding easily rectified, given your quick response and the grace of your office’s commitment to the safety of an organization with such personal ties to the Consulate General of the People’s Republic of China,” Jiao said, her voice quiet and assured. “Should your travels ever take you to one of our consulates in the United States, please use my name.”

  Brody eyed her warily. “I made no response on your behalf, Ms. Peng.”

  Jiao waved her hand, revealing a cell phone that looked like it could blow up the moon. “You authorized several texts to speed my release. I regret the necessity, but Madam Wilde’s life is in danger. When we realized that it was most likely that she would remain in Las Vegas, we had to work quickly to ensure the city’s suitability. But though there is work still to be done, it will be a fitting base for the House of Swords.”