by Keri Arthur
By the time I’d finished, dusk had given way to night, though that was something I knew thanks to my vampire genes. The quality of light streaming in through the windows certainly hadn’t altered any.
The doorbell rang as I padded naked toward my bedroom. I paused, head tilted to one side as I listened. I couldn’t hear any sound to suggest who it was, so I walked across to the nearby comm screen and pressed a button. Charles's countenance appeared, and his expression was an odd mix of frustration and annoyance.
I pressed the audio button and said, “Who is it?”
“Charles.” His voice held a slight edge. “I’m sorry to call on you unexpectedly, but you weren’t answering my messages and I was worried.”
Worried I might have found another suitor, I suspected. Like the animal variety that had once roamed this world, a female cat shifter had the final say on who could and couldn’t court her, and it was the males who had to strive for her attention and favor. In the camps, at least during the war, it wasn't unusual for women to have many children with different fathers, although those who were not nomadic did tend to stick to the same mate. It was a trait that had, at times, made my missions that much more difficult.
“Please, come in.” I pressed the access button and, as the door opened, swung around and headed for the stairs.
“And I’m sorry to have worried you,” I said as he walked in, “but I’ve been visiting an ill friend.”
He paused to watch me come down the stairs and the annoyance in his expression gave way to desire. “I do so like it when you answer the door so divinely dressed.”
“You caught me just getting out of the shower.” I motioned to the small cabinet to one side of the autocook. “Would you like a drink?”
He hesitated and then nodded, his expression somewhat rueful. “I would like far more than just a drink, but it is hardly polite to ravish you senseless without at least paying lip service to the niceties expected of polite company.”
“Indeed.”
I followed him across the room, retrieved the whiskey bottle and a couple of glasses, and poured us both a drink. I took a sip and then leaned on the counter between us and said, “So am I now officially talking to a member of the House of Lords?”
“Yes.” His gaze was on my breasts rather than my face. “I took the oath two days ago.”
“Is that why you were trying to contact me?”
“Indeed.” His expression was somewhat distracted, his gaze following the slight rise and fall of my breasts as I breathed. “There’s an inauguration ball on tomorrow night. I wanted you to come with me.”
“Charles,” I murmured, somewhat archly. “I will come for you anytime.”
His gaze jumped to mine and then he laughed, a deep, warm sound that tugged a smile to my lips. “Good.” He drained his whiskey and set the glass down on the counter. “Have we done proper justice to the niceties yet? Because my desire for you is so strong, it’s taking all my control not to leap over this counter and ravish you here and now.”
I downed my drink and placed the glass beside his. “Jumping over the counter is possibly not something a centenarian such as yourself should try.”
“Ha! A challenge. Prepare to be molested very thoroughly, my good woman.” He easily vaulted over the counter then lightly grabbed my arm and tugged me into his. “The thought of losing myself in your luscious body once again is all that has gotten me through the tedium of the last few days.”
And with that, he kissed me. There was nothing tentative about this kiss, nothing measured or slow. It was heated and urgent, and spoke of the desire I could feel trembling through the body pressed hard against mine.
I wrapped my arms around his neck and returned his kiss. It might not have held the same sort of urgency or desire, but—unlike many of my targets in the past—I did in fact like Charles. And sex with him was at least pleasurable, which was more than could be said about many of those other targets.
After a while, he stepped back and stripped off, tossing his clothes onto the counter rather than neatly folding them as he usually did.
Then he picked me up, deposited me on the counter beside the untidy pile, and began to caress and tease me. For a man in a hurry, he did a damnably good job of making sure I was ready for him. But as his breathing got faster and the lust stinging the air so strong it was all I could smell and taste, he nudged my legs further apart and then thrust into me. From that moment on, there was little sound other than those of enjoyment. I didn’t bother opening the door to my seeking skills, as I could feel the urgency throbbing through him and knew it wouldn't be long before he came.
Afterward, he rested his forehead against mine and said, “Sorry. I didn’t mean for that to happen so quickly.”
I laughed softly. “We have a whole night ahead of us. There’s plenty of time for me.”
“That,” he said, slipping his hands under my rump and picking me up without withdrawing, “is very true. Shall we continue at a more leisurely pace in your bedroom?”
He didn’t wait for me to answer. He simply carried me upstairs—a rather amazing feat that belied his age. The rest of the night did indeed continue at a slower pace, the long bouts of sex interspersed with soft talking and even some sleep. And though I did use my seeking skills to search through his memories, none of the people he'd dealt with over the last few days even slightly snagged my instincts. Certainly none of them resembled the woman we were chasing—which didn't really mean much when we were dealing with someone who could change their form at will.
It wasn’t until we were eating breakfast the following morning that I broached the question of the ball. “What does it actually involve? I’ve never been invited to one before.” I wrinkled my nose. “I’m not even sure I have something appropriate to wear.”
He laughed. “Wear as little as possible, and you’ll fit in just fine.”
There was a teasing note in his voice that left me uncertain about believing him. “I’m being serious, Charles. I don’t want to make you look bad.”
He leaned forward and stole a quick kiss. “You won’t. And I am being serious. I’ve attended a couple of recent balls in my father’s place, and trust me, the brighter and gauzier the gown, the more fashionable the woman is considered.”
“Are we talking about the same people who wear neck-to-ankle white tunics?”
He grinned. “Yes. The elite present a very different front to the world than they do in private.”
“Huh.” I grabbed another pancake off the pile and smothered it in cream and honey—two things I hadn’t had in decades, and something I’d sorely miss once I got back to the bunker and my more basic autocooks. “What actually happens at these things?”
He shrugged. “A lot of talking, drinking, and eating. There’s one section where I’m formally introduced and the family’s seal is passed to me, but after that, just dancing and fun.”
I raised my eyebrows at the anticipation in his voice. “What sort of fun?”
“The decadent kind.” He pointed his fork at me, expression serious but a glint in his eyes. “I will remind you, however, that no matter who you might choose to play with, you’re to come home with me.”
Meaning the ball devolved into some sort of sexual free-for-all? That certainly wasn’t something I’d been expecting. While male shifters didn’t mind healthy competition for a female’s attention, they did not like to share once they’d won it. Ménages à trois and orgies generally weren’t something they participated in or even approved of.
Of course, over a hundred years had passed since I’d spent any time amongst shifter camps, so things certainly could have changed. And it wasn’t as if I’d spent any time amongst Central’s elite.
“I might,” I teased, “if you promise to order me another of these most excellent breakfasts.”
“Deal.” He glanced at the time and sighed. “Time for me to go. I’ll pick you up at eight this evening. Don’t be late—or overdressed.”
I followed him across to the door and tried not to let either relief or tiredness show in my expression as I kissed him goodbye. Jonas had been right—I wasn’t fully recovered, and even though I had managed to catch some sleep last night, I needed a whole lot more.
But that wasn’t on my immediate agenda. Not only did I have to head out to the bunker to both see my little ghosts and update Jonas, I also needed to buy something suitable to wear for tonight. The clothes Nuri had arranged for Catherine’s use were rather exotic compared to my usual wardrobe of military garb, but I doubted they were—in any way—up to the standard Charles expected tonight.
I called to Cat and Bear and then went upstairs for a shower. They arrived just as I was getting dressed. As usual, they danced around me happily, but this time, their sheer exuberance made me feel old.
The little ones wanted us to tell you that they miss you, Cat said, when they finally calmed down. But Jonas is managing to keep them amused.
Meaning, I thought in amusement, he was probably being inundated twenty-four seven with their happy chatter and little pranks.
And Jonas said not to come back for a day or so, Bear added. The museum is being watched.
Unease stirred and my smile faded. “That's not exactly a new development.”
In fact, we’d been working on that very assumption ever since he'd moved into the museum.
Yes, Cat said. But yesterday Nuri was handed a hunt-and-kill order to contract out, and it was for someone fitting your description.
The unease deepened to dread. “My actual description or one of my false identities?”
Both, she replied. But not this one.
I guess that was at least something. I wearily rubbed a hand across my eyes. While it was a rather logical step for Dream to take, it did mean the identity she’d stolen was someone with the contacts and the power to get such an order approved.
And it also meant I'd have to disappear behind a light shield whenever I wanted to go to the bunker and maintain this identity while I was within Central. And though I'd gone for months wearing a visage other than my own during the war, I knew from experience that the longer I was forced to maintain it, the more unsettling it became. It was almost as if my body started rejecting my altered form.
“That doesn't explain why Jonas wants me to keep away from the museum,” I said. “He knows I can get there unseen.”
Yes, but there's more. While Nuri refused to distribute the contract to interested parties, someone outside her network has accepted it. He paused. And Branna has disappeared.
It didn’t take a mathematician to put those two things together and come up with a possible answer.
I should have hit him harder in Chaos, Bear added fiercely.
“It's never a good thing to kill without provocation, Bear.” Even if I had done it, both in the past and more recently. But at least I did have a reason for my more recent kills.
I think Branna is an exception to that rule, he replied.
I smiled. While he often acted and sounded like the teenager he was, there were moments like this when he—and Cat for that matter—sounded so much older.
“I gather Nuri is attempting to find him?”
Yes, but Jonas said he's been working with the group for a long time, and he knows their contacts and methods well. They do not expect him to be found for a few days, hence the warning to stay away. Cat's energy patted my arm. We’ll act as go-betweens until Branna is caught.
“Good idea.” I paused, and frowned. “But that still doesn't explain why I should stay away. Branna's not magic or psi sensitive. Like everyone else, he wouldn't see me if I was using a light shield.”
No, but there are charms that warn a wearer if someone is using either magic or psychic powers, and charms that prevent the use of both personal magic and psi powers against the wearer. Four of Nuri’s have gone missing.
“Personal magic? As opposed to what, exactly?”
Cat mentally shrugged. He didn’t explain it.
Maybe because most people would be familiar with the term—and maybe because it was pretty self-explanatory. It could have simply meant spells directed at a particular person rather than greater spells, such as the rifts or the soupy-feeling shields that protected them. “Four?”
Two for him, two for someone else, they think.
The very last thing we needed was Dream getting her hands on charms like that... although as an earth witch of some power, it was rather odd that she hadn't already created such charms herself. Especially when she knew I was a face shifter and obviously using other identities.
Had the rift she, Winter, and Sal been caught in somehow erased some of her magical knowledge, just as it had erased much of Sal’s memories of our time together during the war? Was she able to create the rifts, but do little else?
Or was it more a case of the rifts taking so much of her time and power that she simply didn't dare risk creating simpler magic?
I closed my eyes and took another of those deep breaths that didn’t do a whole lot to calm the inner tension. In the end, the answers to any of those particular questions didn't really matter. Only the fact that Branna had probably accepted a kill order on me did.
“Can you ask Jonas to find out what the charms look like? And tell him I'm attending the inauguration ball with Charles tonight, so I'll need to know before then.” I hesitated. “And ask him if Branna is aware of my Cat identity.”
Because if he was, it would make going to the ball a whole lot more dangerous.
If he could get into the ball in the first place, that was. He might have accepted the kill order, but would he really go so far off the rails in his desperation to kill me that he’d forsake reason and be utterly willing to jeopardize the very future of our world by joining forces with Dream?
A large part of me wanted to give him the benefit of doubt—until I remembered the murderous gleam that entered his eyes whenever he was in my presence.
And if he had lost everything he valued in the war, as Nuri had suggested, then perhaps he figured he had nothing to lose—even if everyone else did.
Plus, why would he snatch four such charms if he wasn’t working with someone else?
I'll go see Jonas now, Bear said.
“Thanks, Bear,” I said, but I was talking to the air. He’d already disappeared.
I grabbed a coat from out of the wardrobe and then headed downstairs.
Are we going out? Cat said, excitement in her tone again.
“Yes, because I need to buy a dress for the ball tonight.”
What’s a ball?
It was such a simple question, but one that made me want to cry. It wasn’t fair that my ghosts never had the chance to experience such things, either before or after their deaths. “It’s a place where people wearing their prettiest clothes get together to eat, talk, and have fun.”
Can we come with you?
I hesitated. If the ball was everything Charles had claimed, then I certainly didn't want them there. They might technically be over a hundred years old, but in some respects they were still very much the age at which they'd died—fourteen and eight respectively. While they were both well aware of what I'd done as a lure, in all the years since the war's end, I'd never let them accompany me whenever I went into Central seeking adult company for an evening. And I'd certainly refused to let them be present whenever I'd been with Sal or with Charles.
“We’ll play it by ear,” I said eventually. “If things get heated, then I’ll ask you to leave.”
I can’t wait to see the dresses! Cat spun around me as I caught the elevator down to the ground floor. You should get something very pretty.
I smiled. “And you can help me pick it out.”
She clapped her hands in delight. You will look like a princess!
My smile grew. While fairy tales hadn't exactly been part of a déchet’s education, I'd spent the years since the war reading just about anything I could get my hands on, be it dry old manuals on how to fix the va
rious bits of vital machinery within our bunker or the wide variety of fiction I’d found in the personal lockers and trunks. When I'd gotten through all that, I’d gone into Central and stolen some more. And when I’d discovered the fairy tales, I'd read them all out loud to my little ones. While ever-practical Cat liked her princesses to be no-nonsense and self-reliant, she'd always loved the scenes where they dressed up in pretty dresses and captured the prince’s love. She was very much a romantic at heart, even if by design we déchet shouldn't even understand the concept.
I walked over to the nearest cross street and then up to Victory. While the shops and cafes in the outer ring of streets tended to be small, with their contents spilling out onto the pavement and filling the air with a riot of scents and color, the closer you got to Victory and the park that was Central's green heart, the more serene and orderly it became. Even those who'd ventured out so early moved with a superior sense of style and grace I could never match. And while the people who lived and worked in this sector didn't look anything alike physically, almost everyone was clad in either white or gray outfits, which lent to the overwhelming feeling of whitewashed uniformity. It certainly made the pale pink of my tunic seem bright by comparison.
I walked along the street until I discovered a boutique displaying the sort of dresses Charles had described and, after a slight pause, walked in. An older woman clad in vivid orange immediately appeared from a rear room and greeted me warmly.
“And how may I help you this morning, madam?” she said.
I hesitated again, and looked at the surrounding extravagance of silk and gossamer. “I need a dress for the inaugural ball tonight.”
Her face immediately lit up, and for the first time I wondered if I had enough credits on the RFID chip to pay for such a dress. Nuri had added extra to the initial five hundred, but I had no idea just how much.
