by Zoe Allison
Vale was frowning. “Soon? How soon?”
Amber shrugged. “You’re not the only one who’s good at keeping things to yourself.” And with that, she smiled and ended the call.
Vale was still frowning. He turned to Vic. “What do you think she meant by that?”
Vic put her arm around his waist. “I think your sister is coming to our rescue.”
He shook his head. “I do not want them here.”
She tugged him into her. “Why not?”
He glanced at her, and lifted his arm round her shoulders. “I wanted to sort everything out myself and let them have time away in peace.”
“You don’t have to do it all on your own,” she said quietly.
He kissed the top of her head. “I think I just envisaged myself arriving to see them with no baggage, having tied up all the loose ends from this extremely long mission.”
Vic rested her head against his shoulder and placed her other arm around his middle in a hug. “It isn’t all on you. It’s better if we do it together.”
He gave her a squeeze. “I appreciate that.”
They arrived at HQ and climbed out of the car. Once they were heading up in the elevator, Vale pulled her close and ran his fingers through her hair. “When this is all over…” He hesitated.
She lifted her hand to his face. “When this is all over, what?”
The elevator stopped. He kissed her forehead and smiled. “We’ll speak about it later.”
“Okay,” she replied, disappointed. They left the elevator and started along the corridor for Priyanka’s office.
Vic knocked the door, starting to feel anxious about seeing her after her embarrassing outburst before.
Priyanka shouted, “Come in!” and Vic opened the door. Priyanka had her phone pressed to her ear as she waved them in, continuing her conversation.
Vic leaned in to Vale’s ear. “Is it okay if you give us a minute first? I want to speak to her alone to apologize.”
He kissed her cheek. “Sure. I will go check on a couple of things then return.”
Vale left, closing the door behind him.
Vic turned back to Priyanka, who seemed stressed compared to her usual unflappable demeanor. However, she didn’t appear angry, which gave Vic hope that she hadn’t irreparably damaged their working relationship.
Priyanka gestured for Vic to take a seat while she finished up her call. She placed her phone on the desk. “Victoria.”
Vic’s heart sank. Normally she would address her as ‘Vic’. The formality wasn’t a good sign. She decided it best to get to the crux of it. “I owe you an apology.”
Priyanka nodded, appraising her with her dark eyes.
Vic’s pulse accelerated. “I promise I wasn’t snooping in here when I found that mask. I happened to notice the drawer was open and it was visible. And I’m sorry for losing for my temper and falsely accusing you.”
“In front of everyone,” Priyanka added.
Vic’s mouth went dry. “I’m sorry for that too.”
Priyanka leaned her elbows onto the desk. “Let’s get one thing clear. You don’t owe me an apology for suspecting me. You found some incriminating evidence that pointed toward me, so you quite rightly questioned that. It’s something that we all need to be doing in the current climate, with a mole in our ranks.”
Vic waited for the ‘but’.
“However,” Priyanka said, “we need to go about things in the proper manner. If you suspect someone, the first port of call is a discussion with his or her direct superior. We certainly do not call people out in front of a group of colleagues, particularly when those colleagues included agents who were under my jurisdiction in the hierarchy, effectively undermining my authority before I was proven guilty.”
She was correct, although only Lorenzo ranked under Priyanka, and in reality, Vale was her superior. However, that was beside the point, as Vic hadn’t known that at the time.
“You’re right,” Vic said. “I accept responsibility for that and will gladly take any punishment you deem necessary.”
Priyanka studied her. “I don’t think punishment is needed. On this occasion, anyway, provided nothing like it happens again.”
“Thank you,” Vic said. “It won’t.” She wondered if she should mention that she knew Vale’s secret but decided it was more respectful if Vale told Priyanka that himself.
“Okay,” Priyanka said. “We need to brainstorm. I’ve called a meeting in ten minutes and I want you, Vale, Lorenzo and Gareth to join us. I’ve also got Catarina, Zaina and Li Wei coming.”
Vic smiled with relief. She had been very concerned that she might get cut out of the group after her behavior, when she was perhaps the most invested in stopping Harvey. “No problem.”
“The only thing is,” Priyanka said, “I still can’t get hold of Gareth. Have you had any contact with him?”
Vic frowned. “No. Hasn’t he contacted anyone at all?”
“No. Not since he called in Harvey Moore’s name.”
Something niggled the back of Vic’s mind.
“Anyway, we’ll see if anyone at the meeting has an update from him,” Priyanka continued.
Vic decided to give Priyanka the information she had planned on earlier, when the planted mask had distracted her. “I think that Moore’s plan involves building an army to move against The Organization.”
Priyanka raised her eyebrows. “An army? So the malevolent are working together again.”
“Yes. That’s the reason for attacking large-scale buildings. A group of them are going in and draining everyone inside. Moore has found that the practice results in enhanced abilities.”
Priyanka met her gaze. “Abilities including a change of facial appearance, I take it?”
“Yes,” said Vic.
Priyanka pursed her lips. “Do we know what else?”
Vic shook her head. “Not yet.”
Priyanka sighed. “A few small details, but no bigger picture. I feel we’re struggling here.”
“I know,” Vic said. “But we thought we could start with a list of people who had access to the labs for the DNA testing. The mole is likely on that list.”
Priyanka frowned. “You mean they falsified our test, to hide the fact that Moore’s followers can change their appearance?”
“Yes,” Vic said. “They were clearly hoping we wouldn’t find out about that ability.”
“I wonder why,” Priyanka said slowly. “Why go to such trouble? We were bound to find out sooner or later.”
Vic hadn’t thought about that. “Good point.”
Priyanka picked up her phone. “Come on. Let’s go see if anyone else has come up with anything.”
They got up and left the office, heading to the meeting room. When they arrived, everybody was present except for Vale and Gareth. Vic lifted her phone to call Vale in case he had gone back to Priyanka’s office and wondered where they were. It went straight to voicemail. She messaged him to tell him to come to the meeting room.
Where is he that there is no signal?
* * * *
Vale left Vic to it in Priyanka’s office. He was sure they would have their misunderstanding worked out and forgiven quickly. He decided that rather than going to his own room, he’d head up to the annex and check in on his search. Climbing the stairs, he felt as if he was one hundred times lighter than on his previous ascent.
He opened the door at the top of the stairwell and entered the annex, realizing that the reason for his lightness of being was not merely the fact that they were edging toward cracking this case, but because of Victoria. Soon the mission would be over, and they’d be free to spend some quality time together. The thought of that brought him a profound sense of joy.
The screen was sleeping and he entered his login details, waiting for it to fire up. He smiled. Perhaps Vic would want to come with him to visit Amber and Hayden.
Sighing with satisfaction, he scanned the screen as a notification saying ‘positive match’
flashed up. This was a new alert, not the previous one that had showed Glassmarsh as a link to Moore. He smiled. Things really were looking up. He clicked on the alert to show the new picture.
The smile froze on his face as he took in the photo of the agent on screen. His heart thudded in his chest and he tilted forward as his knees buckled, grabbing the desk in front of him to stop himself falling.
* * * *
Priyanka called the meeting to order. “Thank you, everybody, for attending. We’re all here to brainstorm The Organization’s next move after the attack by a league of malevolents against our headquarters in New York. This is the information we have so far.” She brought up a list on the virtual screen, which included the large-scale attacks and blood consumption, the link between Moore and Glassmarsh and the malevolent league’s ability to change facial appearance.
As the ensemble started talking through possibilities, Vic glanced at her phone screen. There was no word back from Valentino. She typed out a quick message to Gareth too, asking him where he was.
She glanced up and took her turn to speak. “We think the mole is likely to be someone who had access to the labs on the DNA from Erik Weber’s body. They falsified the result to make it appear as though the body wasn’t Erik’s in order to keep us from finding out that Moore’s group can change their facial appearance.”
Zaina spoke up. “Can they change their face to resemble anyone they like?”
“We don’t think so,” Vic said. “It needs to be someone they’ve drained…a human. And they have to gorge themselves on a massive amount of blood from multiple people before they can achieve it. The dead human that they mimic then ends up taking on the vampire’s facial appearance permanently. But when the vampire dies, their face reverts back before they turn to ash.”
Li Wei pulled his laptop toward him. “We need a list of the people who had access to the lab work. I can assimilate that information.”
“Thank you, Li,” Lorenzo said. “How quickly can you make that list? Our mole’s name will be on it, so once we have that, our next step is obvious.”
Catarina pushed her glasses up her nose. “Interrogate the mole?”
“Precisely,” Lorenzo said.
“I only need a few minutes,” Li said.
Just then the door opened, and Vale walked in. Vic marveled at the way his presence caused her heart rate to soar, even under these conditions. She smiled, waiting for him to make eye contact and sit next to her. However, he deliberately avoided her gaze as he took a seat between Lorenzo and Priyanka. He mustn’t want the others to realize what was going on between them.
Lorenzo leaned over to Vale and spoke to him quietly, presumably updating him on their discussion so far. Vale glanced over to where Li was typing on his laptop.
Zaina addressed Priyanka. “I think it’s safe to say that we need to talk munitions. If they’ve attacked one of our bases, they might strike again.”
Priyanka leaned to Vale and spoke to him quietly.
He nodded. “Tell us what you recommend, Zaina.”
“Do I have permission to give full disclosure?” Zaina asked.
“Yes,” Priyanka confirmed.
Zaina got up and opened a case at the back of the room. She lifted out a black vest and tossed it to Catarina, the nearest person at the table. “This,” she said, “is the latest in our designs. It’s a vest which provides protection against a malevolent spear to the heart.”
Catarina turned it over in her hands. “It’s very light,” she said, peering at the material over the top of her glasses.
Li glanced up from what he was doing. “What if the spears are tainted?”
Zaina took her seat again. “It protects against that too.”
Murmuring broke out and Catarina passed the vest on to Vic. It really was very light. She could hardly believe it would prevent the power of a spear thrown by a vampire, never mind block the corrosion of a tainted weapon. She rolled her shoulder, remembering the searing pain. On lifting her gaze and surveying the room, she could tell that the vest was news to everybody except for Vale and Priyanka. She passed the item on to Li, who examined it.
“How does it work?” Lorenzo asked, watching Li study the vest. Vic had a feeling she could guess.
Vale cleared his throat. “We managed to distill a substance that we derived from Amber’s bloodwork. It can be used as a repellant to weapons wielded by the malevolent.”
Everyone in the room had clearance to know of the presence and abilities of the Impervious. It had been disseminated to the heads of department after the fall of Lord Glassmarsh.
Vic had been correct in her assumption that the work on the development of the cloaking tech at Angelique’s prison had been adapted for use in the vest. She watched Vale, but he still didn’t look at her.
“Okay,” Li said, “I’ve got the list.” He brought it up onto the virtual screen.
“Great,” Lorenzo said, studying the names. “So…we have everyone in the room, the two lab techs who treated the samples, two other departmental heads and Mr. X.”
Vale was studying the list. “There’s someone else on there too.”
Lorenzo squinted. “Who? Everyone is here.”
Vale glanced at Priyanka. “Gareth is not.”
Lorenzo surveyed the room, clearly realizing that, although invited, Gareth was still AWOL.
The niggle that had been at the back of Vic’s mind became clearer. Gareth had been off grid before—when she had confronted the masked person in Vale’s office. Then he had resurfaced, a little while before the mask had turned up in Priyanka’s office. A cold feeling settled in the pit of her stomach. Gareth had also been the one to collect the DNA sample from the Webers. No. It can’t be. He’s a good person and my friend. She glanced up again, trying to make eye contact with Vale. Was he thinking the same thing?
Vic’s phone buzzed with an alert. She startled, realizing that everybody else’s had done the same. The screen carried the same notification as for the New York attack, except this time the location was London.
Chapter Fourteen
Lorenzo broke the silence. “Here?” He went to the window. “There’s no sign of an attack.” He took out his phone. “I’ll call down to security.”
The iciness in Vic’s stomach spread through her core. Harvey had the upper hand, and they were still largely in the dark, reacting to everything he did rather than anticipating any of his moves.
Lorenzo hung up his call. “Nothing,” he said. “Security says that the notification didn’t come from them.”
Catarina looked at Priyanka, then Vale. “Gareth?” she asked quietly.
“It seems that way,” Vale said, glancing at Priyanka. “He is the only one from that list who is meant to be here but is not.”
“It can’t be,” Priyanka said. Her eyes were pained. She didn’t offer any explanation as to why she disagreed, but it was clear to Vic why that would be. The cold feeling in her stomach seized her heart. Where the hell are you, Gareth?
“There are others on that list,” Lorenzo said, nodding at Priyanka in solidarity. “The lab techs and a couple of other departmental heads who aren’t in the building right now.”
“That notification cannot be instigated from outside the building in question,” Vale said. “So those heads are not under suspicion. The lab techs are unlikely to have the necessary clearance to put out that level of security alert, but lock them both down, just in case.”
“Okay,” Lorenzo said, anxiety in his dark eyes, and lifted his phone again.
Vic tried to make eye contact with Vale a further time, but he still wouldn’t look at her. She started to feel nauseated His behavior was becoming decidedly odd. Where had he been between Priyanka’s office and here? She cleared her throat. “I assume we think that Gareth is somewhere in the building?” She stared directly at Vale as she spoke.
Finally, he met her gaze. There was a strange look in his eyes. Sadness mixed with disappointment. “If he is the mole,
then yes.” He shifted his eyes off her again, glancing at Priyanka quickly.
The sight of his pained expression made the sick feeling in her stomach rise into her chest. The annex. Vale must have gone up there to check on his search. He knows.
Priyanka was sifting through information on the virtual screen, appearing stressed. Images were flashing up of the GPS signals from all the operatives’ cell phones in the London HQ. But Gareth’s didn’t appear. He must have it off.
Lorenzo’s phone started ringing and he picked up. “Okay, I’m putting you on screen now,” he said into the phone.
Szymon, the head of security’s face appeared on screen, his dark eyes grave. “We have a situation.”
Priyanka addressed him. “Apart from the alert?”
“Yes,”
“What is it?”
“There’s a man here, asking to see you.” Szymon said.
“Me?” Priyanka asked, frowning.
“Not just you, all of you. Everyone in that meeting room.”
Vic held her breath, surveying the shocked expressions around the room.
“He asked for us all by name?” Vale said.
“Yes,” Szymon said. “He was even aware of what room you’d be in.”
“Who is he?” Vic asked, though she already knew the answer.
“He says his name is Harvey Moore.”
The room erupted.
“Quiet,” Vale said, and everyone obeyed. “Is he asking to come up to us?”
“No,” Szymon replied. “He wants you all to come down here, to the lobby.”
“Okay,” Vale said. “Tell him to give us ten minutes. Clear the lobby and keep your distance. Any sudden moves and you stake him.”
“Yes, sir.”
The call ended.
Vale and Priyanka glanced at each other, then Vale addressed the room. “Everybody put on one of Zaina’s vests and assemble by the elevator.”
Zaina led Lorenzo, Li and Catarina out of the meeting room. Vic brought up the rear. She approached Priyanka and Vale, unsure whether she wanted to speak to him anymore. She was terrified about what he was going to say. She went to file out with the others, but he caught her arm. “Wait.”
