"Were these things here when Jack and Rhoan raided your office a few months ago?"
"Yes."
"So you'd expected them to investigate, and had allowed them entry?" Meaning he might also have removed vital evidence before the raid.
"It's all part of a bigger plan, Riley."
I raised my eyebrow. "And what might that master plan be? To step into your so called brother's much hated shoes? To take over control of the freak empire?"
He snorted softly. "And here I was thinking you knew me better than that."
"I know you well enough to know that you can be ruthless when you choose to be."
His mouth twitched in amusement. "I don't want control of anyone's empire but my own. I told you the truth when I said all I want is survival—and I think Nasia's demise proves I was right to worry."
If he was at all worried, he certainly had a strange way of showing it. At the very least, he wouldn't be sitting so casually behind his desk, in full view of the windows. "Why would he kill his own sister?"
"Blood is not thicker than water when you are raised like we were. Hell, he'd kill his mother, too, if it meant his own survival."
And so would Misha—only right now he was using the Directorate to do his dirty work. "That being the case, why state that you can keep me safe when it's obvious you can't keep yourself safe?"
He rose and walked toward me, a strange gleam in his silvery eyes. It was the look of a predator on the hunt, a predator who had his prey in sight and no intentions of letting it escape. When that look had been evident in Kellen's eyes, my pulse had skipped with excitement, but in Misha's eyes it only succeeded in raising hackles. Quinn was right—Misha didn't want love, he wanted possession. Wanted to own me, rather than just love me.
But then, given what he was, how he was raised, maybe possession was the only thing he knew and understood. Could someone who has never known love, tenderness, or caring ever really return it in kind?
Watching Misha stalk toward me with that look in his eyes, I doubted it very much.
He braced his hands against the wall on either side of me, and leaned close. I pressed a hand against his chest, not forcefully, but enough to stop him kissing me. Even so, his breath washed warmth across my lips, and his aura wrapped me in heat and desire.
"He knows about the Fravardin. He knows that they are loyal to me, and only to me." He pressed his weight against my hand, testing my strength, my will. "I have warned him that if anything else happens to you, they will hunt him down and they will kill him."
Surprise rippled through me. My gaze searched his, but I could see no lie in his eyes, nor sense it in his words. "Why would you do that? Why not use them to protect yourself in the same manner?"
He moved a hand, and brushed his fingers down my cheek. His touch was icy compared to the fiery lust flaying my skin. "What's the point? I will be dead in five or six years anyway."
"But if you don't use them to protect yourself, you might be dead in five or six days." Or five or six hours.
"While I am alive, the Fravardin will do their utmost to protect me. When I am dead, they will keep watch over you."
The thought of having a couple of ghostly creatures hanging about trying to protect me was enough to make me shiver. "Why would they bother when you're dead and the payments stop?"
His aura went on high, bathing me with a fervor as strong as the sun itself. Sweat began to trickle down my spine. Even though I had my shields up high, it was hard to ignore the assault on my senses.
"Because it is written in my will that they will continue to get a retainer as well as the estate in Gisborne, where the tribe currently lives, provided certain conditions are met."
Spirits being paid? How weird was that? "Can they be killed?"
"All things living can be killed. It's just harder to kill what cannot be seen."
"If your boss knows about them, then he probably knows what can kill them."
"Undoubtedly. Problem is, unlike vampires, they don't show up on infrared, and you're the first person I know who has actually sensed them."
First person besides him, obviously. "That's because I'm special—and why crazy men want a piece of me." I thrust him away from me. The cool air eddied around my skin, as pleasurable as water on a hot day. "You need to tell me about your boss."
Annoyance flared in his eyes. "And give you an excuse to walk away? I think not."
"Then tell me about Roberta Whitby—she's the Helki alpha, isn't she?"
He nodded, and crossed his arms. "The pack has gotten fat off the pickings of crime."
"And Roberta has inserted her son into Government ranks?"
He smiled. "No. The true power of a country often lies not in the reins of officialdom, but rather, in the strength of the crime syndicates."
I raised an eyebrow. "Meaning?"
"Is it not often said that the Yakuza is the true power in Japan?"
"They're not a power here, though."
"No, but there are crime syndicates nonetheless, and some of them are extremely powerful, even to the extent of having 'relationships' with certain Government departments."
Was the Directorate one of those departments? Was that how Gautier had become a guardian? Given that Alan Brown, the recruitment officer, was being blackmailed, it didn't take a genius to guess that maybe he was the connection between the Directorate and the man behind the mutants. But how was that happening if Jack and Rhoan could find no sign of messages being passed?
"I'm little more than a glorified secretary," I said blandly. "I wouldn't know about such things."
"Then learn, because the man you seek is now in charge of one of them—and he plans to be the only one that matters."
I studied him for a moment, then said, "I gather he's replaced rather than overthrown?"
Misha nodded. "Far easier to step into successful shoes rather than work your way up the ranks."
"But how? If this man is as powerful as you say, he'd be too wary to let strangers near him."
His smile was cold. Amused. "But not wary enough when it comes to longtime lovers."
"Roberta?"
He nodded. "The Helki pack has long done his dirty work. When Roberta came back onto the scene after her years in Roscoe's labs, she used her aura to enrapture the man. They were lovers for three years before the replacement happened."
Long enough for Roberta to become a trusted lover. Long enough for her to learn his ways and secrets. "So these labs where the crossbreeding is happening—they're not the recent innovation you've led me to believe, but ones that the syndicate have had for a while."
He nodded again. "Talon and I were the only ones who actually set up our own laboratories—though in Talon's case, it was merely to continue our lab father's work."
Because he'd kept what remained of the research notes. "And not very successfully."
Amusement touched his eyes. "He'd be hurt to hear you say that."
"Like I care. How long have these other labs been in existence?"
"They've long been used for drug development. Gene experiments, with all its potential rewards, was the next logical step, and one they took some fifty years ago."
I rubbed my arms, trying to ward off a sudden chill.
Trying to ignore the premonition that sometime in the future I was going to see a whole lot more of those labs than I ever wanted. Only this time from the right side, not the wrong side.
"Meaning the man in charge is in his seventies?"
"No. Meaning the previous head of the syndicate began the work, and the current head continues it."
"So how old is he? The man your boss became, I mean."
"Early forties." Something glimmered in his eyes. Amusement. Or perhaps anticipation. "He holds on to power through bloody force. Be wary when you go up against him."