The drive was a half mile of unpaved one-lane road. The former owners hadn’t gotten around to paving it and the weather had been too unpredictable to put concrete down since we arrived. And it was stupid to plow when the snow was still falling, no matter how much Eli liked the new toys—including the spanking-new John Deere tractor with all the attachments.
“Conditions?” Eli asked, checking his weapons.
“Maybe four inches and falling steadily,” Alex said. “Forecast is calling for eight inches and twenty-four degrees by morning, when the storm blows over. The drive is covered and no one’s been out since the snow started.”
I said, “If Bar-Judas’s fangheads were tracking the call on Ed’s phone—”
“Too soon for tracking by the call,” Alex said. “It’s been”—he touched his mouse to check the time—“forty-five minutes. Even if they knew we were holed up here, near Asheville, and not in New Orleans, it would take them ninety minutes, maybe longer, to reach us in this weather from the city itself.”
“Unless the phone call was a ruse and they already knew where we are,” Eli said grimly to Alex and Bruiser. “Check in at NOLA HQ in case it’s a two-pronged attack. I’m on recon.”
Bruiser tapped his cell screen, saying, “Calling New Orleans HQ,” which meant Leo’s headquarters, still and always, though Leo was gone and buried. The phone was on speaker.
As it rang, Eli swiftly secured his weapons, grabbed a pale gray jacket from the back of a chair, slung a gobag over his shoulder, and vanished into the night. Brute, the grindy riding on his shoulder, followed him out, working the lever that locked the cat door for security with his paws. The massive werewolf was silent and deadly backup.
“New Orleans Mithran Council Chambers,” Wrassler answered.
“George Dumas here. Anything odd happening? Anything on the security cameras?”
The silence on the line was acute; then there was the sound of keys tapping, and Wrassler said, “Checking cameras. And good evening to you too, Consort.”
Consort? I thought.
Bruiser is Jane’s mate, Beast thought. Jane is Dark Queen.
Bruiser laughed easily. “Forgive me. Good evening. I hope you are well.”
Keys kept tapping. “Tolerable. Winter’s over, so that’s always good. Keeps an old man’s bones from aching so bad.”
“We have snow here,” Bruiser said, the two men indulging in the common Southern niceties while I gritted my teeth, waiting for information on what problems were taking place in NOLA. On the screen, the Range Rovers just sat at the entrance to the inn’s driveway, snow accumulating on the vehicles, headlights illuminating the falling snow, the expanse of snow, and the dark trunks of trees striping the snow. Clouds of vapor gathered around and under the vehicles from the tailpipes.
“Nothing showing anywhere. No suspicious activity. No more people missing.”
“More people missing? What?” I muttered, moving closer to the office desk.
Alex said, “Oops.”
I realized my housemates knew things I didn’t. Things they were keeping from me because I was too sick to do anything good about anything awful. I wanted to hit something but I was so weak my fist would be little more than a love tap. “Go on,” I ground out the two words.
“Ronald Roland left Bouvier Clan Home Tuesday last, to pick up supplies, and never returned,” Wrassler said.
Ronald was heir of Clan Bouvier and he wore jeans and six-shooters at his hips. He could rapid fire the pistols faster than a nine-mil semiautomatic and hit any target he could see. I got a knot in my stomach thinking about a Mithran missing. “Who else?” I asked.
“Cooper,” Wrassler said. “Vanished about the same time. It’s been suggested that he’s on the way to see Janie and just didn’t say so.”
“Who’s Cooper?” I demanded, a flash of anger heating me.
“Tex,” Alex said softly.
Tex. I had claimed him. He was mine, part of Clan Yellowrock. Tex was a master vamp, as powerful as any master of the city I had ever known, but was content to do security at Vamp HQ. He was one of few vamps who had a dog, a big slavering mastiff who loved Tex better than peanut butter. “His dog?” I asked.
“We found him in Tex’s house,” Wrassler said.
“Tex would never leave his dog behind,” I said. Someone took Ed and Tex and Roland.
Took kits, Beast thought. Will kill taker of kits.
But the Son of Darkness Number Two only hit the shores a few days ago. He’s in Florida. So who else is here? Who has my people?
Without looking at me, Bruiser said, “If Cooper was coming here, he hasn’t made it. Who else?”
Guilt on his face, Alex muttered, “I’ve been scanning all traffic and security cams for seventy hours on either side of Ronald’s disappearance. Searching for Tex and Ronald.” He raised his eyes to me, his curly hair tangling in his lashes. “I don’t have a starting GPS so it’s not gonna be fast.”
“When did you first hear about all this?” I asked him.
He ducked his head away.
“One other Mithran hasn’t checked in.” Wrassler hesitated before going on, a strange break in words and tone. “Shiloh Stone, missing for a little over seventy-two hours.”
My heart fell and shattered into a thousand pieces.
Shiloh. Molly Everhart’s niece, my scion, also part of Clan Yellowrock, according to my claiming and according to vamp law. This. This is why they hadn’t told me. They knew what this news would do to me. I closed my eyes to shut out the world. Shiloh was a witch as well as a vamp. If any vamp had her and figured out what she was, she’d be killed in a heartbeat. She was young and not well trained as a witch, not a powerful vamp. She was mine to protect. I had let her down. I had let all of them down.
The old familiar guilt wormed through me, telling me I wasn’t good enough, wasn’t strong enough, wasn’t enough in any way. Especially now.
The more rational part of me suggested that if they were being held together, maybe Tex and Ronald could protect Shiloh. That part of me also suggested that if Shiloh was dead, Molly would kill me.
Alex murmured, “Janie knows about the missing vamps. Yeah. All of them. Tex Cooper, Ronald, the heir of Clan Bouvier, and Shiloh Stone.” I realized he was updating Eli in the field, on comms.
“I’ve instituted new protocols since Derek Lee’s car went off into a bayou and he went missing. And since Janie isn’t here,” Wrassler said.
“Derek’s missing too?” I asked, louder. “When? How?” Heat flared through me, anger I hadn’t experienced in months. “And why wasn’t I told?” I demanded of Alex. Derek was the number one security guy at HQ now that I had other titles and responsibilities. “I should have been told.”