He hoped they were well—
The image of Blay and Saxton standing chest-to-chest, hip-to-hip, in Blay’s bedroom sliced into his brain.
God…damn…that had hurt.
And man, karma was good at its job.
Replugging into reality, he followed that double-jointed pelvis and the Brotherhood into a huge dining room that had been set up to Tohr’s specifications: All the drapery had been pulled across the bank of windows that overlooked the back gardens, and the flap door that he figured led into the kitchen had been barricaded by a weighty antique sideboard. Whatever table had sat in the center of the room had been removed, and twenty-five matching mahogany chairs with red silk seats had been lined up in rows facing a marble fireplace.
Wrath was going to stand in front of the mantel to make his address, and Qhuinn went over and checked that the steel flue was closed. It was.
On either side of the fireplace, there were two sets of paneled doors that opened into an old-fashioned receiving salon. He and John Matthew and Rhage did a walk-through of the room, closed the thing off, and then he took up res in front of the entrance on the left, and John Matthew did the same on the right.
“I trust all is to your liking?” the female said.
Rehv went over to the fireplace and turned to face all the empty chairs. “Where’s your hellren?”
“Upstairs.”
“Get him down here. Now. Otherwise, if he moves through the house, he’s liable to get shot in the chest.”
The female’s eyes flared, and this time when she walked off, there was no exaggeration to her hips, no check-me-out toss of the hair over the shoulder. Clearly the we’re-not-fucking-around message had been received, and she wanted whoever her mate was to live through the night.
In the wait that followed, Qhuinn kept his gun in his palm, his eyes on the room, his hearing fine-tuned for something, anything out of order.
Nothing.
Which suggested their host and hostess had followed orders—
A strange prickling unease tickled its way up his spine, causing him to frown and go from high alert to DEFCON I. On the far side of the fireplace, John seemed to catch the same gist, his gun lifting, his eyes narrowing.
And then a cold mist hit Qhuinn’s ankles.
“I’ve asked a couple of special guests to join us,” Rehv said dryly.
At that moment, two columns of haze pulled up from the floor, the disturbance of air molecules finding forms…that Qhuinn instantly recognized.
Thank fuck.
With Payne out of commission for whatever reason, he’d been feeling like they were a little light on coverage, even recognizing the skills in the Brotherhood. But as Trez and iAm appeared, he took a deep breath.
Now that was a pair of straight-up killers, the kind of thing you really didn’t want against you in any kind of fight. The good news was that Rehvenge had long been aligned with the Shadows, and Rehv’s connection with the Brotherhood and the king meant that the two brothers were obviously willing to come and play a little backup.
Qhuinn stepped up to say hello to the pair, greeting them as the others did with a palm join, a quick pull, and a clap on the back. “Hey, my man…”
“What’s doing…”
“How you been…”
After the hi-how’re-yas were done, Trez glanced around. “Okay, so we’re just going to stay outta sight unless you need us. But rest assured, we’re here.”
After a course of thank-yous from the Brothers, Rehv said a couple of private words to the Shadows…and then the two were gone, misting out of their forms and seething around the floors, that cold draft now a reassurance.
Perfect timing. Less than a minute later, the hostess came back with a diminutive older male at her side. Given the way vampires aged, with a rapid acceleration of physical decline toward the end of the life span, Qhuinn guessed the guy had five years left. Ten at the very most.
Some introductions were made, but Qhuinn didn’t care about that shit. He was more worried about whether the rest of the house was empty.
“Any doggen here?” Rehv demanded as the female settled her geezer into one of the dining chairs.
“As you have requested, they are all gone for this part of the evening.”
V nodded to Phury and Z. “The three of us’ll search the premises. See if that’s right.”
Even though Blay trusted himself, the Brotherhood, and John Matthew, and Qhuinn, he felt a lot better knowing the Shadows were around. Trez and iAm were not just awesome fighters, and inherently dangerous to anyone they declared an enemy; they had a striking advantage over the Brotherhood.
Invisibility.
He wasn’t sure whether they could actually engage while in that state, but it didn’t matter. Anyone who broke in here—like, say, the Band of fucking Bastards—would make an engagement assessment that included only the visible hard bodies in the room.
Not those two brothers.
So this was good.
At that moment, V returned with Phury and Z from their walk-around—and Butch was with them, suggesting the Brother had just arrived via car. “Clear.”
There was a brief pause. And then, as prearranged, Tohr went to the front door and opened the way in for Wrath.
Showtime, Blay thought, his eyes flicking in Qhuinn’s direction before he snapped himself back into focus.
Tohr and the king entered the dining room side by side, their heads together as if they were in deep conversation about something important, the Brother’s hand on Wrath’s forearm like the guy was trying to drive some point home.
It was all an act for the host and hostess.
Tohr was, in fact, leading Wrath by that hold on the arm, taking him over to the fireplace, positioning him right in the middle of the mantelpiece. And that conversation? It was about where the two aristocratic hosts were sitting, where the chairs were aligned, where the Brothers and the fighters were—and the two Shadows as well.
While Wrath nodded, the king deliberately moved his head around as if his keen eyes were taking the details of the room in. And then he acknowledged the host and hostess as they were brought forward to kiss his huge black diamond ring.
After that, the crème de la crème of the glymera began to arrive.
From his assigned spot at the back of the room by the wall of windows, Blay got a good look at each one. Jesus, he could remember some of them from his life back before the raids, before he’d started living at the mansion and fighting with the Brothers. His parents had not been on a par with these males and females, but rather on the periphery—still, his family’s bloodlines had been good ones, and they had been included in many festival celebrations at the big houses.
So these folks were not unknown to him.
But he sure as hell couldn’t say he’d missed them.
In fact, he had to laugh to himself as a number of the females frowned and looked down to their delicately clad feet, Louboutins being lifted and shaken…as if the chill of the Shadows were registering.
When Havers arrived, the race’s healer looked a little frazzled. No doubt he was nervous about seeing his sister again, and he had reason to be. From what Blay understood, Marissa had kicked his ass across the room at the last formal meeting of the Council.
Blay was sorry he’d missed that one.
Marissa arrived shortly after her brother, and Butch went over to her, greeting her with a lingering kiss before leading her, with a proud and protective arm, to a seat in the corner right next to where he was stationed. After the cop helped her into her chair, he stood beside her, big, broad, and mean-looking…especially as he locked eyes with Havers and smiled with fangs bared.