by Martha Carr
He raised an eyebrow. “What made you ask that?”
“The way they’re staring at you.”
There is no way she can hear them. Maybe she simply knows dogs better than I thought. “I ordered a few big-ass steaks, no sides, and told the guy to slip the trays through the door and hightail it out again.”
“Oh, good.” Chuckling, she opened the door. “They’re gonna think we’re having some kinda private party of our own in there. Or that we’re keeping a dangerous, rabid creature in the hotel room.”
“Let ʼem think whatever they want, darlin’. Someone’s gotta serve those steaks and we gotta go.”
“You’re the best, Johnny!” Luther called.
“Wait, wait, wait.” Rex stood and trotted toward the door. “Aren’t you gonna say goodbye—”
“Holy shit! Rex! Check this out!”
“What?”
“This dingo looks exactly like that bitch you picked up in Goodland.”
“Are you kidding me?” Rex spun and raced toward the bed for a flying leap.
“Woah! Did you see that? She took down a whole—”
Johnny pulled the door shut and turned to head down the hall. “They won’t even know I’m gone.”
He drove their rental to Manhattan’s Financial District and pulled up to the curb at 8:36 pm. The valet in front of Falcon Towers took his tip and widened his eyes. “Sir, did you mean to—”
“Yep. Keep the change.” He closed the door, turned toward the building, and his eyes narrowed. The valet pulled their SUV swiftly into the lot and the street grew quiet. “Does it seem weird to you that no one else is steppin’ outta their cars?”
“If you were one of these assholes wanting to get in on the bidding, would you run the risk of being late?”
He snorted. “Nope.”
“There you go.” Lisa’s heels clicked on the front walkway toward the building. “I’m kinda glad there’s no one else to see us roll up driving our own car. Everyone else would’ve had a driver.”
“Yeah, so did we. And he’s cheaper too ʼcause he’d simply be payin’ himself. I’m talkin’ about me, by the way.”
She smirked as the doorman opened the door. “I meant private drivers.”
“I know what you meant, darlin’. I still don’t see the difference.”
“Welcome to Falcon Towers,” the doorman said, inclined his head, and glanced from the dwarf to the well-dressed, fit woman who stood so much taller than him. “Are you visiting someone this evening?”
“Yeah.” Johnny cleared his throat and glanced at the elevators. “We’re goin’ to the penthouse.”
“Ah. Yes. May I see your invitation?”
He drew the engraved gold card from his pocket and flashed it at the doorman.
“Very well. If you’ll make your way to the last elevator, Dennis will take you up.”
“Thank you.” Lisa grinned at the man and batted her lashes as Johnny slid the invitation into his pocket again. The doorman nodded and watched them move down the lobby toward the last elevator.
“Are you Dennis?” Johnny asked the man standing behind the open elevator doors.
“Yes, sir. That’s me. Do you have your invitation?”
The dwarf flashed it again, and the elevator operator clasped his hands behind his back with a small nod. “I merely need to authenticate it, sir. If you don’t mind.”
“I kinda do, yeah.”
“We were invited, darling.” Lisa smiled sweetly at him. “Let the man do his job.”
Gritting his teeth, Johnny handed the invitation over and sniffed. She’s playin’ that one a little too far if you ask me.
The elevator operator took the invitation graciously and inserted the end of it into a small card-reader he took from his pocket. The device emitted a soft beep and flashed a green light, and the stolen invitation was returned to him. “Up to the penthouse.”
“Uh-huh.” After pocketing the golden card, the dwarf tugged on the lapels of his dinner jacket and stared at the floor counter ticking up to the top floor and the penthouse above it.
“Have you heard anything about what’s waiting for us up there?” Lisa asked.
The man frowned at her in surprise but recovered quickly. “No, ma’am. I think those details are meant to remain in the penthouse. But all the other guests did seem particularly…excited.”
“Well, that’s a relief.”
Johnny turned slowly to frown at her. Lisa’s only reaction was to give him another sickly-sweet smile before she stared at the floor counter, holding her clutch in both hands.
When they finally reached the top, the door opened and the operator gestured with a white-gloved hand toward the entrance of the penthouse. “Enjoy your evening.”
“Thank you very much.” She stepped out first, and he forced himself to not adjust his dress slacks as he followed her.
“Did you ask the elevator guy for information?”
“It’s not a big deal. Do you have any idea how much information the concierges and doormen and even elevator operators hear during a regular day?” She shrugged. “He’s good at his job, though. He didn’t offer any info but still gave us something to look forward to. Assuming we were here to have fun.”
“Oh, we’ll have fun. Then, we’ll hightail it to the hotel with the girl.”
Two half-Kilomea security guards in matching tuxedos and with heavy-duty assault rifles stood on either side of the foyer entrance. They regarded Johnny with contempt, and their oversized eyeteeth protruded half as much from their hairy faces as their full-blooded cousins’.
The dwarf jerked his chin at them. “Hell of a night, huh, fellas? Do they give you a shift drink during this gig?”
The guard on the left grunted and glanced at the black, steel-toed boots he’d refused to switch out for dress shoes. “Invitation. Sir.”
Johnny slid his hand into the inside pocket of his dinner jacket and flashed the golden card at the guards. “What if you gotta hit the john? Do you need to sign off on that, or you go in shifts when nature calls?”
The guard on the right couldn’t pull his gaze away from the relatively modest neckline of Lisa’s dress that only left about half her figure to the imagination. The rest of the skintight ensemble took care of the other half. The bounty hunter pointed at him and looked at the other guard. “He doesn’t talk much, does he?”
She chuckled and caught his forearm to lower it to his side. “Don’t pay attention to him, gentlemen. He gets like this when he’s excited.”
The left-hand guard grunted again and nodded toward the penthouse behind him. “You’re good.”
“Yes, we are.” She tugged her partner along with her as the other guard turned to look over his shoulder as she walked away. His counterpart punched him in the arm and shook him out of his stare. “If you talk to everyone like that tonight, Johnny, you’ll blow our cover.”
“Please. Everyone in this building is an asshole at some level. An asshole who doesn’t pretend to be a fucking saint? That’s refreshing.”
“Maybe rein it in a little. We still have a long night ahead of us.”
He grimaced. “Don’t remind me.”
They stepped into the sweeping main room of the penthouse, which was already filled with the East Coast’s widest selection of crime bosses, syndicate owners, and drug lords. Scantily clad women with frilly, ruched bonnets walked around serving hors d’oeuvres on glistening silver trays. A champagne tower rested against the far-right wall.
To the left of center against the wall of windows that looked out over Times Square was a stage, and black curtains had been hung between the side of the stage and another door leading to the penthouse’s more private rooms. The bar was set up in the kitchen to the right of the foyer, and Johnny headed that way first.
“There’s something we forgot to cover,” Lisa muttered as she walked gracefully beside him in killer stilettos.
“I don’t think so.”
“I don’t think we sh
ould use our real names. Call me Candace, okay?”
He chuckled. “Do you know how many times some douchebag lookin’ at you in that dress is gonna think he’s so smart by callin’ you Candy instead?”
“Go with it. What do you want me to call you?”
He turned slowly to look at her. “Johnny.”
“That’s not—”
The dwarf waved her off. “The only name I’m usin’ is my own, darlin’. I don’t think these are the kinda folks who worry about rememberin’ first names.”
She smiled at two Azrakan who walked past. The female’s crown of horns was much smaller than the male’s, and she glared at Lisa while her partner examined the agent from head to toe and flicked a forked tongue between his lips. The female snarled and pulled him along with her across the penthouse.
Johnny stepped up to the bar laid out on the eight-foot-long kitchen island’s granite countertop. “What’re you drinkin’, darlin’?”
“Oh. Gin and tonic, please.”
The dwarf rapped his knuckles on the counter. “Extra lime for her. I’ll have a Johnny Walker Black. Double. Straight.”
The bartender nodded, already looking sweaty and hot beneath the high, stiff collar of his shirt and the heavy, well-tailored black vest over it. He set the glasses down in front of them when he finished and nodded. “Enjoy yourselves.”
“Open bar?”
“Yes, sir.”
“It’s gonna be a good night.” The dwarf raised his drink in a silent toast to the man and took a long sip. “Let’s go get our mingle on, huh?”
Lisa finished squeezing the extra limes into her drink. She turned to face the magical mobsters entertaining themselves with low conversation and stuck the tiny cocktail straw into her mouth. “Let’s.”
They headed toward a group of three Kilomeas without illusion charms who stood beside the champagne tower. The biggest one wore no dress shirt beneath his leather vest made to look like a suit vest, but at least he’d donned a pair of brown slacks almost the same color. I don’t care how hairy those bastards are. They should cover up like the rest of us— Oh, shit.
Johnny settled a hand under her elbow and steered her away from the Kilomeas.
“What are you doing? Isn’t that Garreth Browel?”
“The big motherfucker? Yeah.” He cleared his throat. “But the two-legged wildebeest on his right is Malek Ordus.”
She shook her head. “Who?”
“Does New Jersey’s Fang ring a bell?”
“Oh…”
“No, no.” His hold on her elbow tightened slightly. “Don’t look at him. I collected a bounty on him in ’97. While I didn’t expect him to be out livin’ the life so soon, they don’t pay me to keep tabs on these assholes after the fact.”
“Right. So the Kilomea are off limits tonight.”
“Only those.” He nodded at an Atlantean woman in a black dress cut so low it might as well have been a light robe she’d shrugged onto her naked body and forgotten to close all the way. She sipped a drink of something black-green and viscous and looked incredibly bored as the males around her of multiple different races vied for her attention with stories of their exploits and monetary values in the billions. “But there’s Ameyna the Heiress.”
“And she looks like she’d appreciate a distraction. That’s Clyde Ambrose next to her. He runs the import-export smuggling off the eastern seaboard.”
Johnny chuckled. “Is that what your bosses call heavy munitions these days? Import-exports?”
“I’m trying to keep a low profile, Johnny.”
He smirked and glanced meaningfully at her outfit. “You should’ve worn a different dress, then.”
“What’s wrong with my dress?” Her tone took on an unexpected harshness but the small smile that bloomed on her lips was completely real.
“Absolutely nothin’.”
They drifted slowly toward the group of crime bosses gathered around Ameyna the Heiress. Johnny raised his whiskey to his lips and gestured toward the chandelier. “You know, I like what they’ve done with the place. I woulda put a rack up myself. I got a sixteen-pointer at home over my ballroom, but I guess they were goin’ for a more open feel.”
Lisa pressed her lips together and looked at him in surprise. “You never cease to amaze me with your eye for interior design.”
“What can I say? It’s a gift and a curse.”
She took a long sip of her gin and tonic to keep from laughing.
He stared at the chandelier. Yeah, she didn’t see that comin’. I can shit-talk my way into snobbery like the rest of ʼem. And I wanna rip that fucking monstrosity from the ceiling.
One of the hors d’oeuvres girls walked past with a silver tray in her hand. “Beluga caviar?”
“Oh. Thank you.” Lisa stretched to take one of the delicate crystal saucers beneath each hors d’oeuvre, glanced at Johnny who stood a foot below the server’s tray, and handed him the saucer before she took another.
The server’s frilly lacy bonnet fluttered on top of her golden curls as she nodded at them and continued her rounds through the penthouse.
The agent almost burst out laughing when she saw her partner scowl at the gooey black pile on the saucer. “What’s wrong?”
“What is this? It looks like shit on a fancy plate.”
“It’s Beluga caviar, Johnny—”
“I know what it’s tryin’ to be. But trust me, this ain’t fresh.”
“And you know that simply by looking at it?” Smirking, she lowered her head to sniff the tiny pile with four artisanal crackers spread along the saucer beside it.
“Lemme tell you somethin’, Candace.” Johnny sniffed. “The only way to eat caviar is to slip a hook through the fish’s cheek and slice the belly open yourself. I don’t care what kinda fish it is. That’s fresh. This was canned and shipped from Italy or somewhere crazy like that. Untaxed too, I reckon. No one in this room took the time to fish and slice for this pile of— Uh-uh.”
With a soft chuckle, Lisa slid her clutch under her arm and held both her drink and the crystal saucer deftly in one hand so she could scoop a mound of Beluga caviar onto one of the crackers.
“Oh, come on. Did you hear what I said?”
The cracker crunched in her mouth and her eyes widened. “It’s perfect.”
Rolling his eyes, he lifted his drink to his lips and set his saucer on the tray of a passing server returning to the kitchen. “You’re only doin’ that to get a rise outta me.”
“If that’s what you wanna think, go ahead. I’m taking the little enjoyments where I can get them.”
“Uh-huh.” He looked at her and raised a finger to the corner of his mouth. “You got a little somethin’…”
“Oh.” With a self-conscious laugh, she wiped the stray cracker crumbs and fish eggs from her mouth and scanned the penthouse. Quickly, she leaned toward him until her lips were inches from his ear. “We should start pretending to have a real conversation and listen to what these strutting peacocks let slip to the Heiress. I heard one of them say auction.”
Her delicate perfume smelled like she’d watered it down before she put it on—barely strong enough that anyone close enough would get a hint of something sweet. He took another sip of his whiskey and watched a group of wizards in silk suits and a compact man with a hooked nose and a diamond-studded watch who stared at him and the gorgeous woman who stood over a foot taller than him. That perfume wasn’t part of the plan.
“I’ve been listenin’, darlin’.”
Smiling sweetly, Lisa moved away from him and straightened before she took another sip. “Good.”
Chapter Twenty
Reynaldo chuckled. “I wouldn’t go so far as to say that. Even if they did provide much more fleshed-out descriptions, I doubt they’ve had enough time to discover everything about each lot. What are there? Two dozen?”
“Twenty-seven,” Ameyna replied in a low, drawn-out hiss.
“Like I said. Practically two dozen.”
/>
“And there are more of us than that here tonight.” The half-wizard who stood beside the Atlantean Heiress raised his drink and smirked at her. “And many more who bid before this little get-together began. How many do you think will go home empty-handed when the night’s over?”
“You mean other than you, Marco?” A shifter with a long, thick black ponytail tied back with an emerald-studded brooch lifted his glass. “We’ll see.”
Marco’s face took on a deep red flush and he swirled the champagne in his wide-bottomed glass quickly. “You’re placing your bets in the wrong pool, Cal.”
“That’s rich coming from the man who’s supposed to fix the Preakness.” Cal darted the man a feral grin. “How much did you lose last week?”
“Not enough to keep me from bidding.” Marco sipped his champagne. “I haven’t seen your name up on the auction board since, what? Two nights ago.”
“I’m merely biding my time. Trust me, wizard. I didn’t come here simply to watch the rest of you have all the fun.”
Ameyna sipped her sludgy drink and the glittering black snakes of her hair wove constantly as they watched the other crime lords in the penthouse for her. Each of them had a half-carat diamond affixed to their sleek foreheads above their eyes. These cast a halo of glinting white dots across the Atlantean’s plunging neckline and the lapels of the other bosses standing around her.
“And what about you, Heiress?” Reynaldo asked. “I heard business is good for you in the Houses. I’m interested to hear what you’re looking to find tonight.”
She gave him a sideways glance but didn’t move her head. “I’m not telling you which lots I’ll bid on, human.”
Ignoring the slight against his non-magical lineage, Reynaldo chuckled softly. “I merely wondered why the East Coast’s most successful and alluring madam comes to bid on this particular auction.”
The snakes in her hair closest to the man stretched toward him with a chorus of hisses. “A few of my regulars have asked for something to fulfill some of their more…acquired tastes.”
Cal uttered a low, growling chuckle. “Like that shifter girl?”
