“Sloppy.” Eli said.
“Yeah. And no limos, no armored cars; just ordinary cars right off the car lot. That’s odd.”
“Or you’ve been spoiled by Leo and his über-rich cronies.”
Which wasn’t something I wanted to consider, but was a possibility.
Along the side street, the building boasted three arched openings sized for horse-drawn carts and wagons, solid-looking wooden doors closed over them. An alley ran along the other side, a windowless brick expanse two stories tall, the upper story painted with an old ad for Brown & Williamson Tobacco. The back of the building had only one entrance on the ground floor and it was sealed shut, guards standing to either side, both wearing vests with small sub guns of a make I’d never seen, tucked under their arms.
Eli murmured a soft curse. “They’re carrying German UMP .45s. Even people with military connections have a hard time getting those, and they cost a fortune. Now you know why there aren’t any limos. They put their money into firepower.”
I pulled on Beast’s night vision to get a better look. I had seen pics of the UMP on the H&K website. It was a vicious little weapon. Not worth a dang at any distance, but it would chew a body in half at close range.
Fully automatic weapons were never covered in the constitution’s ruling on citizen militia members owning and carrying guns. They were not used for hunting. They were used for killing sentient beings. Period. Which is why I didn’t carry them, own them, or want them around, despite the number of such weapons Eli owned, and despite how handy they would be against vamps.
I looked over the guards’ heads to see a second-story door open for fresh air. “I don’t like the fact that there’s only one door open on the ground floor.”
“I’ll stay by the entrance while you talk business.”
“And shoot anybody who tries to lock us in.”
“That’s the idea.” We were both packing silver shot rounds, so shooting a bad guy with fangs meant he’d likely stay down. Shooting a human with anything had the same effect, but I was not here to kill anyone. That was not in the plans.
Eli parked the SUV one block down, doing a fast parallel parking job but with one front tire on the sidewalk. When I looked my question at him, he said, “Saves us time if we get blocked in and have to jump the curb.”
I studied the area and realized he had chosen a spot that would let us pull out over the sidewalk and down a side street. I was used to bikes and they were easy to get out of narrow spaces, so I didn’t think about getaway routes as a matter of course. Eli made me think outside my own coffin-sized box. I got out to adjust the weapons on my person, and the smell of vamp hit me like a wrecking ball. I put a hand on the SUV to steady myself and sniffed. A vamp smorgasbord met my nose and I opened my mouth, drawing in air over my tongue. Beast reared up in my mind and sniffed with me, parsing the scents.
Good vampire smell, Beast thought.
I grimaced. Not that long ago, Beast had thought vamps smelled like things to hunt. Not so much now that she was chained to Leo—something I had to correct as soon as I figured out how. My new mantra: Get free from Leo.
I adjusted my weapons, chambering rounds but safety-ing everything. Popping Velcro loops, making sure the blades would slide free, and hearing Eli do the same on the other side of the vehicle. There would be a tug-of-war at the door, Hieronymus’ goons trying to take weapons off me and me not letting them go. I had a statement to make and keeping my weapons was going to be part of that. I wasn’t dressed in vamp-hunting armor, but I wasn’t dressed like a little old lady for Sunday church either. I repositioned the ash and silver stakes in my bun, fanning them out like a deadly halo. I’d had to smash them into the hair on the ride because they kept hitting the top of the SUV.
This event should be a simple business meeting, but with vamps nothing is ever simple. They were always trying to see who was an alpha predator and who was prey. So this little conference was going to be a dance on a knife blade, poised and balanced, having to prove myself on one side but not going too far and getting myself sucked dry on the other. I was much better at getting myself in trouble than anything else, but no way was I coming across as prey.
Lastly, I pulled a dirty white handkerchief out of the glove box and tucked it into my décolletage. I saw Eli watching and I said, “Insurance.”
It was a hanky with Leo’s blood on it. The scent claimed me as his. Bruiser, Leo’s primo, had marked me with it once to keep me safe. I’d been ticked off about it back then. Times had changed. Or maybe I had changed.
In theory, the MOCs of one city were supposed to respect the life and “property” of another MOC, but it didn’t always work that way in real life. I had no idea if Leo had enemies in the crowd I was about to meet, enemies who would kill me to tick off the blood-sucking fiend I worked for. Come to think of it, Leo likely had enemies everywhere.
For safety reasons, I had to go in looking like the Enforcer I was, but, technically, I wasn’t here in the capacity of Leo’s Enforcer. I was here outside of that job description and the safeguards it provided, so a little scent reminder of the biggest bad among the Big Bad Vamps might be a good thing.
“Ready?” Eli asked. I nodded and headed toward the door; Eli fell into step a little behind me at my left. I could hear the roar of voices and the plink of music from inside and smell the vamp scent. It made my nose itch. Ahead of us, two male vamps walked arm in arm, heads together, either chatting or necking—which had a totally different meaning with vamps. The wind swirled and they both slowed, turning to look at us, catching our scents. I saw human-looking eyes widen before the vamps seemed to disappear. Even over the distance I could hear the pop of displaced air as the bloodsuckers achieved super vamp speed.
“Oops. Most vamps don’t like my scent,” I said as a warning to Eli. “They smell another predator.”
We kept moving, and three steps later two armed blood-servants rushed out the front door, weapons at the ready. I took a slow breath and felt Eli do the same, though neither of us missed a step or seemed to tense visibly. The humans pointed small submachine guns at us, but we just kept walking. Along the street, the security types moved in, forming a loose half circle near the door. The music from inside went silent. So did the voices.
“Looks like our cozy couple spread the word that something dangerous is approaching.” Eli said.
“Afraid so. And here I thought being an invited guest would make it easier.” I could think of four ways to handle this: stop and chat and get strong-armed, shoot them all and likely die in the ensuing firefight, run like my pants were on fire and lose total face, or take them before a fight could even start.
I drew on Beast and felt her pawing, milking my mind, her claws bringing on a headache. Strength flooded my system with a burst of Beast-adrenaline. My pace didn’t alter, but I smiled—a Beast-type smile, all teeth. I felt her looking out at the world and knew my eyes were doing that weird glow thing they do when she’s close to the surface.
We reached the door. I acted like the thugs weren’t there and put one foot on the single step. The two guys from inside moved quickly in front of me, close enough to make a wall of their chests and guns. I didn’t slow. I hit out fast, striking one in the side of the neck with my right fist. Pivoted hard. Kicked the other in the left knee. It was so fast and balanced, it worked like a single move. I heard a gag, a pop, and an agonized scream as I pushed between them and they started to fall. I walked into the warehouse-turned-party-room as if I owned it, trusting Eli to make sure I really did. Behind me, the sounds indicated that Eli further incapacitated the men I had taken down, and then started in on the rest of the security. Good thing vamp blood heals their servants’ injuries so well. My booted feet rang on the old wooden floors in the silent room as I left my backup behind.