Or, maybe he hadn’t gotten laid for a long time and he’d imagined it all in the euphoria of finally getting a woman into bed.
He smiled faintly as he lifted the first cup of morning coffee to his lips. He was almost glad of the cynicism, for he’d learned that wearing a protective shell in matters of the heart was by far the safest way of dealing with them. There’d been women, there’d been a wife, and their thoughts, feelings, and needs always came to grind against his mind and work their way inside to where he didn’t know what was him and what was them. Had he ever been truly, soul-deep in love with any of them, perhaps it would not have mattered. He’d never had a soul mate.
Perhaps now . . .
Oh, please!
He put the cup down on the desktop hard enough to slop hot coffee over his hand. “Damn!”
The door opened as he shouted. “You’re not in a very good mood this morning,” Sela said, her large frame filling the doorway. “And it’s only going to get worse.”
“What’s Grace done now?” was his first reaction. Followed by, “Did anyone ever teach you to knock?”
“Not part of my civil service training. And why are you suspicious of Grace?”
“Call it a feeling.”
She grinned. “A man of your abilities should never doubt his feelings.”
“We’re trained to be observers,” he reminded Sela.
“Then why are you in here feeling, when you should be in the conference room or with your controller, observing?”
Good question, but then, Sela’s empathic and telepathic talents were nearly as finely honed as her skills in navigating the intricacies of the government’s bureaucratic structure. The cynical part of his mind pushed away fond thoughts and sensual memories. Business was business, and protecting turf was a big part of business here in the Capital. He needed to find out if Olympias was a potential friend, enemy, or rival, even while at the same time thinking they might have some kind of future as lovers. There was personal, and there was business. Falconer could operate on both levels. Sela was the one he called on for sensitive assignments, looking into areas that might affect the project’s security or funding.
“Her name is Olympias,” he answered Sela. “We met at last night’s party.”
A wicked glint appeared in Sela’s dark eyes. “She took you home and had her way with you.”
Falconer did not dispute her intuition. “She is a very high-level psychic, I think.”
“You think?”
“I couldn’t completely read her. She couldn’t completely read me.” He tapped his forehead. “I’m not sure we did it on purpose, but we danced a little in here. I don’t know what either of us learned. I need to know who she works for, and I don’t think I can be objective about it. Find out who she is. Go Walking through some government offices if you have to.”
Sela brightened considerably at the prospect of doing a little interdepartmental snooping, but she still asked, “Why?”
He smiled. “I want to ask her for another date.”
“You could have just gotten her phone number.”
“What’s the use of having the resources of a government agency to call upon, if I can’t abuse the power? Now,” he said, getting up from behind his desk, “tell me what Grace is up to.”
“She invited us over to her place last night for a practice session.”
“Practice?” Falconer asked suspiciously. “Is she trying to adapt past life regression for Walking?”
“How’d you guess?”
“I am psychic, you know.”
“I’ve heard that somewhere.”
“Is that what she’s up to?”
“Did you really think she’d give up after one failed session? If we hadn’t all seen the same thing, she would have considered it a stupid idea and given up on it. But we did see the same place, the same images, crazy and unbelievable as those images were. Something real happened. You really think our Gracie is going to give up until she figures out what happened and how to refine Regressive Observation into a way to objectively look into the past?”
“Regressive Observation?”
“That’s what she calls it. Apparently she got some pointers from her friend who does past life regressions and—”
“She discussed what happened with a civilian?”
“Jeremy, Donald, and I are civilians, Colonel Falconer,” Sela answered, a little huffy. “If you mean did she discuss details with an outsider, of course not. She got pointers on a hypnosis technique, then she invited her fellow civilian coworkers to her apartment for a little get-together.”
“You practice Walking outside secured areas?”
“No. We had pizza. We did discuss researching methods of psychic time travel. A field of endeavor, which, as you know, has no connection to the mission statement and activities of the Walker Project.”
“If there’s no connection, why are we having this conversation?”
“Because I think that what Grace is thinking about trying could be very dangerous.”
“Messing around with any type of astral projection is dangerous. It requires controls, procedures, safety nets. It probably shouldn’t be done at all. We do it all the time, but there’s a possibility it’s driving us all crazy.” Seeing vampires, for example, that was evidence that Walking was taking its toll.
“Now you tell us.”
He did not appreciate Sela’s sarcasm. “You knew the job was dangerous when you took it.”
“Why are you talking in comic book this morning, Mike?”
“Probably because we’re discussing Grace.”
“I know you care about her.”
“Enough so that I don’t want to see her—or any of you—end up in a padded room. That is where the things we do can lead, especially if we do it on our own, outside of laboratory conditions.” He eyed Sela suspiciously. “Tell me you aren’t involved in any psychic time traveling schemes.”
She let out a bark of laughter. “After seeing vampires last time? I don’t think so. Donald and Jeremy, though . . .” She shrugged. “Donald’s young and enthusiastic. Jeremy’s ambitious to prove he’s the government’s hottest psychic. Grace just wants to learn new stuff. Her enthusiasm could drive the other two into experimenting with her. You will nip it in the bud, I trust.”
Falconer nodded decisively. “Count on it.”
“Right now?”
He glanced at his watch. “No. I’m due to Walk through an African embassy before a Delta Force team goes in to rescue hostages. They’ve been told they’re getting their intel from someone on the inside, and that someone is me.”
Sela sighed. “All right, all right, I get it. We do important work providing information that can save American lives. I’ll let you get to it.” She turned back toward the door, but couldn’t resist a parting shot. “I’ll be spying on our own government programs if you need me.”
Olympias tapped Mike on the shoulder as he stepped into the gray mist and said, “Nice way to run an intelligence op.”
He whirled, sending the mist around him swirling into a small funnel cloud. “What are you doing here?” he demanded, stepping through the tornado he’d created.
“Here is certainly a subjective term, isn’t it?”
He spun slowly around, becoming fully aware that they were not exactly anywhere. His face did not show concern, and he certainly wasn’t afraid, but there was a hardness about him as he came to face her again. He was a warrior prepared for battle, and Olympias found this attitude far more attractive than she wanted to admit. She’d sworn off military types long ago, but a woman from a time when everyone carried sharpened blades couldn’t help but respond to the combination of steely purpose and testosterone.
“How did you do this?”
“I have my little ways. Don’t worry, being connected like this won’t last long. Cool it,” she advised. “I’m not going to bite you.” She gestured, stirring the fog.
“Where are we?”
“On
neutral ground,” she answered. “The link you have to your body isn’t severed, but you can’t see it right now.”
“How?”
“We call it dreamriding or dreamwalking.”
“We?”
“Let’s not discuss how or where we’re having this conversation, Mike.”
Corporeal they were not. She was asleep in her bed, with the dog snoring next to her. She supposed he was sitting or lying in an office or lab somewhere in the Washington area. She didn’t know his physical location, since it was his spirit she’d gone looking for this morning. After a long search, feeling her way in deep darkness, she came upon a silver thread of light, and followed it.
She’d found Mike Falconer wandering around a darkened mansion that reeked with the concentrated essences of fear and tension. She realized that he was consciously projecting his consciousness, using it to spy on someone. The intense emotions might have drawn her attention if she hadn’t discovered something very significant while following him as closely as his shadow through the rooms and halls of the faraway house.
Olympias had really discovered two significant things. One was that she enjoyed being near the distilled spiritual core of the person who wore the body of Michael Falconer. This came as no surprise and didn’t bear talking about during this meeting she’d arranged here in limbo. Perhaps it was not wise to step into his awareness and let her presence be known, but she had a few questions about the second thing she’d discovered, so she let him become aware of her presence after he finished his job.
“You’re the ghost,” she said.
“Not unless you’ve killed me, I’m not. Then you’d be dead, too,” he added.
“The party line is that we aren’t dead, just different.”
“We?”
“Never mind. You won’t remember this conversation anyway.” Olympias was relatively certain she had complete control of the situation. She’d managed to slip into the deepest part of his awareness while his attention was elsewhere. She wanted him to confirm what she thought was going on. Then she would go away and decide what to do about him, and what was obviously a government-run psychic spook program.
She moved very close to him. She cupped his face in her hands and let him try to get away from her. After a few moments of being unable to budge, he became very still, staring furiously into her eyes.
“I saw ghosts when I went back to the park the other night. The ghosts of five people. They weren’t ghosts at all, were they? What I saw was a residual image from whatever it is you do. You left similar but fainter images all over the building back there. What is it you do?”
She’d asked the question with all the ability to bend another psychic’s will that was at an ancient Nighthawk’s command. It still took quite a mental struggle before Falconer answered her.
“Walking,” he said. “We call it Walking.”
“You went walking in the park?”
“Yes, but not in the usual way. One of my team devised an experiment to try to find out what happened to me in the park. We attempted to Walk back in time.”
“And what did you see when you Walked back in time?”
“Vampires,” he answered promptly.
“Thought so.” Shit. She stared very deeply into his eyes, going deeper still into his mind. “But you don’t believe in vampires, do you.” The words were a command, not a question.
His answer was automatic and sincere. “Of course not!”
“You won’t let anyone else on your staff believe in them, either.”
“Of course not,” he answered again. “That would be too dangerous.”
Olympias found that to be a very interesting answer, but she didn’t question it. Instead, she kissed Michael Falconer very thoroughly, spirit to spirit, building a fire of passion between them. She left him with only feelings of desire and pleasure when he thought of her, building up emotions she found already simmering in his mind. She left him the gift of their sharing mutual pleasure and wiped every other memory and suspicion from his head.
She did the best she could do, then she let him go, surprised at her own reluctance to return to her own empty bed.
Chapter 10
ROGER BENTENCOURT PULLED into the carriage house that had long ago been converted into a garage behind Rose’s home, switched off the engine, and sat in the car, composing himself before going inside. He had planned to return home before sunset, to greet Rose in her bed when she awoke, but rush hour traffic had spoiled his plan for private time with his vampire lover. He always felt better when he was with Rose, even though he was painfully aware the peace she brought him was all a result of being allowed to share her blood and body. He made himself sneer at his automatic devotion, but he couldn’t deny the soothing properties of being with Rose. She was beautiful, he very much appreciated her body, though he valued her malleability more. Everyone needed some form of stress relief, his happened to be a silly old vampire.
There were four bays in the large old garage. The household had three cars, and Bentencourt noticed that all three vehicles were in the garage. That meant Alec was home. Bentencourt permitted himself a sigh, but didn’t let it bother him. Alec was an annoyance, but really only a minor hindrance to the way Bentencourt ran the nest. Fortunately, Alec was greedy, self-involved, and clueless about the true nature of power. Alec would have made a perfect guest on one of those who-wants-to-be-rich-and-famous television game shows. He liked thinking that he knew everything and that making money was the fast, easy way to power.
Alec, like most of the strigoi population, was deeply brainwashed into ignoring their powers, and their superiority to mortals. Bentencourt saw no reason to enlighten the vampire population to their own slavery, not when it came in handy in his own plans to rise to power.
Bentencourt forced down his contempt for Alec. It would not show when he entered the house. He would try to avoid Alec, but he would smile when he next encountered the male vampire, and politely offer Alec another bit of financial advice that would send Alec scurrying out of town once more.
Alec was easy to deal with. Bentencourt’s real annoyance was that his plans were not going as swiftly as he’d hoped they would once he’d set Lora on Falconer. He wasn’t used to being impatient, yet he had to keep reminding himself that it had only been a few days since his scheme had been set in motion. It wasn’t as if the plan was set in stone, or was on a precise timetable. He had to use what there was to work with, find and make opportunities, and be flexible. The basic plan was to take Olympias down and set Rose up as the senior nest leader in the area. It had to appear as though the vampires of Washington had united to overthrow a rogue who abused the Laws of the Blood from her position as an Enforcer and temporarily replaced her with a just, Law-abiding nest leader until the Council could sort things out.
He would be the power behind Rose before and during this period of uncertainty, and he would infiltrate all the other nests with his allies and supporters. Once he ruled the local vampires, they could then quietly infiltrate every branch and bureau of the government with a small army of slaves he’d persuade his friends were necessary for their own protection from the powerful mortals. He’d always known the Council would send another Enforcer after the coup, but by the time the newcomer settled into the job, Bentencourt would have his moles in place. It would be better if the slaves belonged to him rather than to vampires he influenced, but he had to work with the tools that came to hand for the next few years. The point was to have an organization already in place once he came into his full powers. Start from scratch now, and his rise to power when he made the change would be swift enough to take the Council off guard.
Then—good riddance to the antiquated, outdated, totally ridiculous Strigoi Council. Though he would rather conquer at the head of an army, as he had done in the past life when he had been Philip of Macedon, he would still rule the world. This time the late Philip’s vicious bitch of a wife would not stand in his way. Olympias would not stop him.
Olympias herself had given him ammunition to use against her when she ordered the nests to evacuate their homes. He wished his plan to seduce Sara Czerny were going faster, but the slave was feeding him some useful information. Perhaps she wasn’t the type for subtle manipulation, not that he thought his overtures had been particularly subtle. She didn’t seem to pick up on his hints that her psychic ability was strong enough for her to become a companion, and that he was offering her the chance to be his companion once he became a vampire. Perhaps the loyal little slave needed to be presented with evidence of how Olympias had lied to her. Or perhaps Sara had become infatuated with this suicidal vampire she’d told him about and wanted to become this newcomer’s companion.
“Silly fool,” Bentencourt murmured. He got out of the car and headed with measured steps through the garden and toward the house.
He knew full well that Sara was going to belong to him. Olympias would be disposed of, but Sara was invaluable. Sara was the most powerful Enforcer in the country’s chief of staff. Sara quite literally knew where all the bodies were buried. Sara knew everything there was to know about every nest, strig and, most importantly, every Enforcer in the country. Sara controlled all the slaves already working within the government. Bentencourt needed Sara, and he was going to have her. All he needed to do was make her hate Olympias and love him, even before they shared any bloodbond. He wanted her to gladly betray Olympias for him. It appeared this Andrew person might need to be gotten out of the way first, but Bentencourt believed he might have a use for a suicidal vampire.
His frustrations left him as he smiled at this thought. Of course, there was some information he needed first, to see if the scheme was at all viable. Fortunately, he already needed to have a conversation with the one person he knew that took a devoted interest in strigoi history, rumor, and gossip. He truly did value Lora as a member of Rose’s nest. He thought he might even miss her when she was gone.
There were voices raised inside. He stopped to listen in the hallway outside Rose’s sitting room. Shouting was not a sound Bentencourt was used to in this house, but he liked it. Dissent was what the plan was all about. The loudest voice belonged to Alec.
Laws of the Blood 4: Deceptions: Deceptions Page 14
