5

Adam

While I traveled by bus, Adam made do with a luxurious private jet. That is kind of how my life goes.

“YOU CONTACTED HER?” ASKED ELIZAVETA IN RUSSIAN as she put Mercy’s repaired necklace into Adam’s hand.

Elizaveta usually spoke to him in Russian, and mostly that was fine. Adam’s mother had spoken Russian in their home throughout his childhood, leaving him almost as fluent in it as he was in English.

But leaving Mercy behind when he’d just found her was painful. And whatever the old witch had done to allow him to contact Mercy, now that their brief conversation was over, it had left the werewolf magic, both his pack ties and his mate bond, in a state of outrage—a painful state. The combination of loss and pain left him unable to speak in Russian or English.

He closed his fingers around the necklace and drew a deep breath. When that wasn’t enough, he shut his eyes and rested his head against the back of the airplane seat. His wolf was fighting for control in a way it hadn’t since he’d been very new—and had been pretty much since Mercy had gone missing.

He’d forgotten how tiring it was to fight the beast to a standstill. He’d had decades to become complacent, to believe that he had a handle on just how bad things could get. As the hours had passed, and Mercy was no closer than she had been, the wolf had fought and fought and fought.

When his mating bond had found Mercy again, faint though the signal had been, just after he’d gotten on the plane, he’d thought he would be back to normal. But once the wolf figured out just how far away Mercy was, how poorly the bond was functioning . . . He’d found a quiet corner in the plane designed to please the kinds of people who rented private jets as a matter of course and had been trying to meditate to keep his beast under control when Elizaveta found him.

She’d sat down on the floor next to him with an ease a woman of her age shouldn’t have had and handed him a small bottle of Russian vodka.

He’d handed it back. “Thank you, but not right now.”

She took the bottle and took a long drink before capping it and tucking it away somewhere in the layers of her clothing.

“To break a werewolf’s mating bond,” Elizaveta said, “this is something very difficult—but to block it?” She laughed gently and patted his cheek. “Such a thing is child’s play to such as I. Witches like me and werewolves like you have existed in the same places for centuries. Much werewolf lore has been passed down in my family and others.”

She spoke in Russian, and the wolf quieted as he let himself be comforted by the way it brought back childhood memories of his mother sitting beside him and explaining how the world worked to him in much the same voice.

“I have a book written by my great-grandmother,” she said. “It is all about werewolves. A whole section of it deals with mating bonds and pack bonds—which are different aspects of the same magic. I am sure that many witch families have copies of this book—or one like it. She tells us that a specific kind of circle of warding, one that does not let magic pass in or out, will block the bond. With a day to work, I could put together something that could do it for a few hours. Give me a week and the right ingredients, and I could block it for longer.”

“So the fact that I can feel her now is only a sign that whatever they have been using to block our mating bond has burned out?” he asked.

“A sign that something has changed,” Elizaveta said. She pursed her lips and nodded to herself. “Perhaps we could ask her.”

“I’ve tried,” Adam told her. “I think that our bond is working fine, but we are just too far away. Without the pack for me to draw upon for power, we might have to be in the same city to make real contact.”

Elizaveta snorted. “Adya, you underestimate me. If you have something of Mercy’s, I can use your bond to give you a few minutes to talk.”

In that moment, he’d have given her his heart, dug it out of his chest in order to hear Mercy’s voice. But that would have been dumb, and in the end, all Elizaveta had needed had been Mercy’s necklace.

He wasn’t stupid, so he made her work her magic in the biggest of the rooms in that huge plane so that the vampires and Honey would be there if something went wrong and he lost control.

Elizaveta had come through for him again, as she always had.

So now he knew that Mercy was alive.

Eyes closed, heart pounding, Adam pressed his body back into the leather chair. Mercy had even rescued herself from the monsters. But now she was lost and alone somewhere in Europe. Both he and his wolf found that unacceptable—but much, much better than knowing that she was bleeding and taken by vampires, which was all he’d had before.

The monster inside him didn’t want to fly to Italy and treat with a vampire. It wanted to go to Italy and kill all the vampires. All of them everywhere. Then find Mercy, take her home, and barricade her in their home so that no one else could take her from them. Part of Adam’s trouble in bringing the wolf under control was that he pretty much felt the same way. Only his intellect could see how disastrous that might be. Still, his heart fought on the side of the monster.

Elizaveta—he knew because he could smell the faint whiff of her scent, a blend of tea-tree oil and herbs—kissed his forehead. Then she stood up and said, “I am an old woman, and this has tired me.”

“And hurt you,” he said, opening his eyes to look up at her.

Witchcraft was powered by pain, the witch’s or someone else’s. She had dug a knife into her scarred forearm and cut a slice of skin. When she’d burned it in the incense, she’d had to grit her teeth—as if burning her flesh had done even more damage to her.

“I’m sorry,” he told her.

“Don’t fret, Adya,” she said. “A little pain, and it is gone. Pain and I are old friends. I am going to go use one of the back rooms and sleep on the couch.”

Mercy was scared of the old witch—as she should be. Elizaveta was dangerous. Her own family was terrified of her. But she reminded Adam of his mother—her accent, the way she smelled, her turns of phrase—and he couldn’t be afraid of her.

“Sweet dreams,” he said, and she smiled at him with her eyes.

No one spoke until she left the room.

“So what did you learn?” Stefan asked.

“Has Bonarata harmed Mercy?” asked Marsilia.

Adam realized that he didn’t know—and that set the wolf off again. He gritted his teeth and fought for control. If Bonarata had done something to Mercy, he would have known it. She was all right. Tired. Sad. But defiant—even toward him—and funny. She was all right.

“Adam?” asked Marsilia.

“Leave him be,” growled Honey. “He needs a moment.”

—

HONEY HAD NOT BEEN HAPPY THAT ADAM HAD CHOSEN her to travel with vampires. She didn’t have much experience with them—and that’s how she’d preferred it.

He’d explained that he needed her because the Lord of Night was addicted to werewolf blood—and preferred females to a degree that was pretty rare in a creature as old as he was. Most predators became quite practical about their food after a few centuries. Adam intended to use Honey, if he could, to distract Bonarata. He trusted her to be able to defend herself from the Lord of Night if everything went sideways.

To prove that no matter how old Adam got he would never understand women, telling Honey he was using her as bait for the nastiest vampire on the planet made her happier with his decision.

“It really isn’t just Mercy,” she’d said.

“What isn’t just Mercy?”

“The reason that my status in the pack has risen,” she said. “I thought it was just Mercy who was behind the shake-up in the pack organization.”

“No, Honey,” he’d told her. “It is you. It always has been you.”

“Bonarata has a pet werewolf,” Honey said.

“I know.” He waited for her to elaborate, because Honey didn’t do much casual talk.

“Lenka,” she said. “I didn’t know her very well, but she and Peter were lovers before I met him. His first, as human or werewolf. They weren’t in love, either of them, but he liked her, even after she picked her Alpha instead of Peter. It sent him wandering, though, until he found my pack. And me. I always figured I owed her for that.”

Adam put a hand on her shoulder. Werewolves need contact more than humans do. It had taken him a long time to understand how important touch was, but he didn’t forget it now.

“She was strong,” Honey said in a low voice. “Strong and brave and true. She had a moral compass that always pointed north. She was like Mercy in that, but without the sense of humor—Lenka took herself and the world very seriously.”

Honey closed her eyes and rested her cheek against his hand. “When Bonarata took her, we were in Russia. Peter was restless, and he liked to travel.”

Submissive wolves—and their mates—were welcome in any pack they chose to honor with their presence. Alpha werewolves practically needed a treaty drawn up to move around. Only Mercy’s kidnapping meant he didn’t have to bother with the politics that were usually a basic part of any travel plans he made.

“We didn’t hear about it for almost a decade,” Honey said. “How Bonarata killed the whole pack—Peter’s first pack. Most of the pack, anyway. He didn’t kill Zanobi or Lenka, and we heard how that was a lot worse. Peter was wild.” Her breathing was labored, as if it hurt to draw in air and let it out.

But she didn’t say anything about why Peter hadn’t done something—or if he’d tried and what had happened. Knowing Peter as he had, Adam couldn’t believe that Peter hadn’t tried something.

“Will Bonarata know you?” Adam asked.

“No,” she said. “We never met.”

Honey had pulled away from his touch then. She wiped her eyes with her thumbs, and he pretended not to see. She looked away for a moment, then met his eyes. “You think I can do this? I don’t know anything about vampires.”

“I think,” said Adam slowly, “that you’ve never let anyone down in your life. You won’t fail for any reason other than that old vampire is just too powerful or too smart—or because the rest of us fail you. I honestly believe that you are our best hope for winning.”

After a moment, she nodded. “Okay. I’ll do my best.”

Bonarata had sent the second e-mail by then, the one Marsilia had predicted. It had come very early in the morning, just before the vampires retired for the day. The e-mail had been . . . a real piece of fiction.

Bonarata had been coming to visit Marsilia when he’d happened upon a terrible wreck. The mate of the oh-so-famous Adam Hauptman was dying from a tragic car accident. He had scooped her up and taken her to his home, where the healer in his employ had fixed her up. Having done so, he was concerned lest more harm come her way—as her rescuer he felt some responsibility for her continued safety. He therefore invited both Marsilia and Adam to come to Milan and convince him that Mercedes would be safe in their care. He allowed them two people each as well as the pilot and copilot of the airplane.

Wasn’t that just swell of him? The problem was, the Lord of Night really was powerful enough that it was necessary to play his game as long as he was willing to avoid outright attack. Adam hadn’t just taken Marsilia’s word about that—he’d called Charles. And information wasn’t the only thing he’d called Charles for.

“I need a pilot,” Adam told the Marrok’s son, after absorbing everything that Charles knew about the Master of Milan. They both knew he was asking if Charles would be that pilot.

“Da says I can’t do it.” The edge in his voice told Adam that Charles wasn’t happy about that. Adam didn’t even ask how Bran had found out about Mercy. Adam’s pack knew, and someone would have called the Marrok to keep him informed. The Columbia Basin Pack might no longer be affiliated with the Marrok—but habit was a difficult thing.

Charles continued speaking. “He is keeping his distance from you to save us all, he said. Too many people know me. He is right about that. He said that it’s likely Bonarata expects me to be your pilot; otherwise, he wouldn’t have made such a direct reference to the flight crew. People like him don’t pay any attention to the staff.”

Of course. Adam had missed that. He’d been distracted.

“He’s right,” Adam said. “Of course he is right. And if you are not a surprise, then you become . . .”

“Da called it a ‘complicated hostage,’” Charles said dryly. “I told him that I could protect myself, and I got a lecture on diplomacy. Apparently that wasn’t the point. If I go, I become a thread that leads to my father. Which makes me very interesting—too interesting for the delicate balance of manners and power that Marsilia is organizing in the hopes of getting everyone, including Mercy, home safely. He might be willing to throw everyone else away for a chance to take Da down, so I have to stay here. I might chance it anyway, but as it happens, I’ve had a run-in or three with Bonarata; he knows my face.” Charles cleared his throat. “Da told me to tell you that he very much expects and trusts that you will get Mercy home safely.”

At that point, Adam hadn’t slept since the vampires had taken Mercy, and it was beginning to affect him. But he was still sane enough to trust Bran’s judgment. “If he says you wouldn’t be an asset, he’s probably right.” Where did that leave him? Oh, yes. “So do you know of a plane we can hire to take us to Italy? Someone who won’t be surprised or worried about carrying vampires and werewolves?”

Adam’s firm had two or three charter companies that they used. But the vampires added a serious problem to the whole thing—no one could afford for humanity to find out about vampires. Vietnam would be a kindergarten tea party compared to what would happen if people discovered there were vampires feeding on them and playing games with their minds.

“That I can help with,” Charles said, and he gave Adam a phone number. “It’s a small firm but big enough for this. The pilot and owner of the company, Harris, is a goblin, so you won’t have to hide anything from him. He flies out of Northern California.” His voice gentled. “He’s a good pilot. He’ll get you where you are going. Then you can go fetch our Mercy home before she destroys the Lord of Night’s holdings and causes a war.”

Adam couldn’t help but laugh. She would, too, if she could. But even if she thought she was indestructible, he knew better.

“Thanks,” Adam said, his voice ragged. “I needed the reminder. Mercy is pretty good at survival.”

“It’s a Coyote thing, survival,” Charles said. And Adam suddenly realized that Charles, too, was under no illusions as to the identity of Mercy’s real father. “Get some sleep, Adam. You’re getting foggy, and you can’t afford to be anything less than your best.”

—

HE’D FOLLOWED CHARLES’S ADVICE ABOUT THE PLANE and about the sleep. He’d decided on Honey. Then he’d made the difficult decision of who his second person would be. Aiden was right out—he was a target for the fae. Adam didn’t have the resources to protect the boy and retrieve Mercy at the same time, no matter how useful the fire-touched Aiden would be. Joel was out because without Aiden to help him control the tibicena fire spirit he held, he was too likely to be a liability.

Another time, Adam would feel pretty good about taking Warren or Darryl and leaving the pack with only one of his top two people. But right now there were too many balls in the air.

Aiden’s status as most wanted by the fae was the biggest issue. Though the Gray Lords had agreed to leave him alone, recent events had lessened Adam’s faith that they had absolute control, even of their fellow Gray Lords.

Aiden represented too much possible power, and the absence of both Adam and Mercy would be a tempting time for some independent fae to make a play. Especially since Mercy had been kidnapped, which made them appear weak. Like the werewolves, the fae were predators, and weakness would be an almost irresistible draw.

And the pack’s resources were strained trying to make their territory safe from supernatural predators. It was a delicate balance that would need both Warren and Darryl to keep a lid on troubles at home when Adam left.

But the attack had not been aimed at the werewolves alone, no matter how personal it was. It had been aimed at the coalition of supernatural powers that Bonarata seemed to believe existed in the Tri-Cities, a belief that Marsilia had been encouraging for a long time.

So they should travel with a fair representation from the membership of their imaginary support group, right? Adam appreciated the irony that Bonarata’s attack was making real the alliance whose imaginary existence was, probably, the catalyst for the Master of Milan’s kidnapping of Mercy. So he’d contacted Marsilia and suggested that instead of three vampires and three werewolves, maybe they should find a couple of other people to bring.

Marsilia hadn’t been difficult to convince. As she’d said, there were only two other Master Vampires in the Tri-Cities. One was crazy and his loyalty was doubtful—and she didn’t want to bring him into contact with Bonarata. Stefan had agreed to go, but she would still have had to bring at least one underling vampire, which would be a tacit admission of weakness.

They settled on a representative from the goblins. Adam hadn’t known who the leader of the goblins in the Tri-Cities was, but Marsilia did, and he’d agreed to come. They weren’t a long-lived race, as fae went, but they were clever and more powerful than most people gave them credit for. Adam liked that they were often underestimated. Marsilia liked that they were old allies of hers. They were, Adam had found, more reliable and oddly honorable for one of the fae folk.

As for Adam, his first pick for the empty slot was Zee. The old fae had grumbled and grumped—because he badly wanted to come—but finally told Adam that he would not be an asset. Like Aiden, he was too likely to draw attacks from outside interests who would otherwise stay out of matters that did not concern them. Moreover, he and Bonarata had had interaction in the past. One in which the vampire had not come out on top. If they were going to try to negotiate—and Marsilia and Charles (coming to the conclusion separately) believed that was the best way to get Mercy out alive—then Zee could not come. Adam hadn’t asked Tad. Like Aiden, Tad was too likely to be a target for European fae looking for power. Equally possible was that he would draw fire aimed at Zee.

Adam didn’t trust any other fae enough to bring them into this. So he had asked Elizaveta Arkadyevna Vyshnevetskaya, and the old Russian witch had been very pleased to accept.

Very pleased.

He was glad that she’d agreed to come, too.

His beast, his heart, and the abused pack magic all subsided eventually. He opened his eyes to see that, outside of the witch, they were all still gathered in the smaller of the airplane’s little sitting areas.

Honey sat on his left, Stefan on his right. Marsilia and Honey were in the facing seats, Elizaveta’s empty one in the middle. The goblin sat on his heels in the walkway and looked perfectly comfortable doing so.

With the shades pulled, the quiet rumble of the engines was the only real indication that they were in an airplane. This plane had been built to shepherd captains of industry, sheiks, and princes. The floor was carpeted, and the seats were creamy leather and polished walnut.

“Adam,” said Marsilia after a moment, her voice oddly gentle. She asked, “Are you all right? Did you speak with her?”

He rubbed his face and moved to the edge of his seat. “I did.” He gave his comrades a genuine smile. “You know Mercy. She escaped and is now traveling somewhere in the luggage compartment of a bus. How does that change our game?”

“He will be furious,” said Marsilia. She smiled, a surprisingly sweet expression on such a dangerous woman. “Somehow, when she is destroying other people’s carefully laid plans, she is not so annoying.”

“Fabulous,” said the goblin. “Such a clever coyote is your Mercy.”

Mercy had seemed frayed, but Adam would never admit that in the present company. “Never admit weakness before your enemies” had been his mantra long before he’d been Changed, and he wouldn’t betray Mercy’s, either. He’d just met the goblin—and Marsilia was not a fan of his wife.

“Do we continue to Milan?” Adam asked. “Or divert to another country and try to find Mercy before he finds her?”

“Milan,” said Stefan. “This isn’t an isolated incident—something he can only do once. Next time, he might make a more lethal move.”

“What if the fae threw in with us?” Honey asked. “Would that be enough to back him off?”

The goblin, who went by the human name of Larry Sethaway, shook his head. “Never happen,” he said. “The fae would rather watch the battle, then pick at the corpses like the carrion crows they are.” He grinned briefly, fully aware that in the supernatural world, it was the goblins who were looked upon as scavengers. “Can’t hardly get them all pointed in one direction if they were all dying of thirst and there was only one place to get water. I don’t mind them as noncombatants, but I’d just as soon keep them off the field. You don’t know who they’ll decide to kill first, your enemies or you.”

The goblins didn’t consider themselves fae, though the reverse wasn’t true. Most of the fae looked upon the goblins as sort of lowborn, weak, stupid cousins. Some of the fae looked upon them as food—and the goblins never forgot that.

Larry could pass for human, though some of his kind could not. When he’d met them at the airport, he’d been wearing dark glasses to cover his yellow-green eyes, and leather driving gloves to hide his four-fingered hands. Here in the plane, he’d left off both.

“I agree,” said Marsilia. “Both with Larry and with Stefan.” She smiled a little, a cat’s smile. “Let’s not tell him we know she’s gone. Let’s see what he chooses to do now that he’s lost her.”

“Will he believe we don’t know?” asked Honey. “She’s Adam’s mate.”

“The only reason we know she escaped is because Elizaveta was able to use their bond to work her own magic,” Marsilia answered.

Stefan nodded. “And Wulfe told him that your mate bond is erratic. If you act as if you don’t know, he’ll probably believe it.”

“He might just tell us that she escaped,” Marsilia said. “But I don’t think he will. It betrays a weakness, a mistake. He doesn’t like admitting to real mistakes, only pretend ones.”

“Like if he killed her,” murmured Stefan. “Oops. I accidentally killed your wife, poor thing. I hope you didn’t care for her too much. I just don’t know my own strength.”

“Would he have done that?” asked Honey. “If she hadn’t gotten away?”

Stefan glanced at Marsilia, who glanced surreptitiously at Adam.

“I am very glad Mercy managed to get away,” Marsilia said finally. Adam knew diplomacy when he heard it.

“What would you have done with me,” said Adam very quietly, “if he had killed her while you were trapped in here with me?”

She met his gaze with her own. “Died with everyone else if you lost control or destroyed this plane,” she said. “But you wouldn’t have given Iacopo—Jacob,” she corrected herself with a cool smile. “You wouldn’t have allowed him such an easy victory as that. I know you too well. But Mercy is not dead.”

She leaned forward. “I have not lied to you about the danger we face. I do think that we may come out of here with nothing worse than an unplanned trip to Europe. But there is an equal chance that he will start killing—and if he does, all of us will die.”

Larry leaned his head in the direction of the cockpit. “Including our pilot and copilot? Such a shame. He is quite beautiful for one of our kind.” The pilot, he meant. The copilot was a werewolf, though not Charles.

Marsilia smiled at the goblin, and Adam realized, somewhat to his surprise, that she genuinely liked Larry. He wasn’t used to associating Marsilia with such a . . . gentle emotion as that.

“No flirting until we are back home and your wife can’t blame me,” she said.

Larry shrugged. “No harm in looking, is there?”

Stefan stiffened. He looked at Adam. “Mercy is trying to get my attention. Do you have any message for her?”

“Tell her to stay safe,” Adam said. “See if she knows where she is yet.”

He made note that Stefan’s bonds with Mercy were able to function at a greater distance than the mating bond. He didn’t like it, but he made note of it.

Stefan smiled compassionately. “It is a simpler thing,” he told Adam, “the tie between vampire and prey, than the one between mates—as the bond between master and slave is simpler than a marriage. And Mercy is bleeding.” He held up a reassuring hand. “From a few small wounds only. But the blood feeds her call.”

He took out a pocketknife and cut a shallow wound on his thumb. He put the bleeding digit in his mouth, then froze.

Adam was determined not to be jealous. He was too worried about Mercy to be jealous. If she could contact the vampire, then they had two ways to find her.

Two was better than one. If Adam died here, Stefan could still get Mercy to safety.

Even the wolf thought so.

—

IT WAS NIGHT AGAIN WHEN THEY LANDED AT THE PRIVATE airport Bonarata had specified. There would be no trouble from customs; Adam’s pilot (and the owner of the company) had assured him that all of the paperwork had been taken care of. His pilot had also timed the flight so they landed on the morning side of midnight. Adam was pretty sure that Bonarata didn’t own the airstrip, but he wouldn’t need to. Being the Lord of Night meant he would have lots and lots of minions.

Bonarata’s people met them as they exited the plane. There were six of them, all male, all vampires, all dressed in the exact same very expensive suit. Dark hair cut into the same style—like Ken dolls but not so handsome.

One of them stepped forward and spoke in British-accented English. “My Master bids you welcome to Italy. He would have met you himself, but business matters kept him away. No need to see to your luggage; it is my honor to see that it makes it to your rooms with all haste.”

He signaled, and three of the vampires headed to Adam’s left toward the plane.

One of them smelled familiar.

This one had been among those who stole Mercy from him. Adam noted his face very carefully. There was nothing remarkable about his face—but Adam would remember it for a very long time. The vampire caught him at it and involuntarily met his eyes.

Adam let the wolf surface for a moment, let the vampire know that he’d been recognized.

The secret weakness of all vampires—and it was a big one—was that they all feared death. The only way any vampire was Made was because they feared the ending of life enough to give up everything in order to survive. Everything, including the person they had been.

Adam saw fear rise into the vampire’s eyes, and he was momentarily satisfied.

“Adam?” Honey said, and there was a note in her voice that told him he’d missed something important.

He turned his attention to the matters at hand.

“It was not made clear,” the vampire repeated, “what your preferred sleeping arrangements were?” He was so carefully not looking at Marsilia that Adam turned and raised an eyebrow at her.

“I wasn’t certain what would please you,” she said apologetically.

She intended to play second to his first. Adam wasn’t alone in his determination to use weapons that weren’t purely physical against Bonarata. He thought of how he would feel if he saw Mercy playing devoted follower to another man and had to fight back an inappropriate growl.

Marsilia smiled at him, and it was an intimate smile, a lover’s smile—a little deferential still. And Bonarata’s vampire saw it for what it was.

If Mercy were playing a man like that, Adam would know she was about to stab that man in the back. His wolf settled. Mercy wasn’t above playing roles and fighting dirty when the odds weren’t in her favor. As long as she felt she stood on the side of the angels, she wasn’t particular about how her enemies fell.

Marsilia was no more ethical in that way than Mercy—and far more vindictive. Bonarata had chosen his addiction over her, and she had not forgotten nor forgiven it. Bonarata would eat glass at the sight of her catering to what he thought were Adam’s . . . what? Needs? Ego? Distracting Bonarata would be to their advantage. Hadn’t Adam told Honey that he was going to use her to do that? Marsilia could play that game, too.

He did wish that Marsilia had discussed this aspect of her plans with him—but even as he thought it, he knew why she hadn’t. Marsilia knew that he wouldn’t have agreed to play ball. He didn’t cheat on Mercy, not even mild flirtation for appearances.

What were his choices now? Expose Marsilia? Reject her? He thought about that one. He could do that without making her lie apparent—but the whole point was that Bonarata saw them as a united front, not to leave Marsilia exposed as a target.

Honey, he trusted, could protect herself from anyone but herself. Marsilia . . . she was strong as hell, but she was vulnerable to Bonarata.

“Adam?” Marsilia asked again, this time touching his shoulder. He didn’t back away from her touch, though he wanted to.

Adam glanced at Honey and Larry, then shrugged. In for a penny, in for a pound—Mercy might, on a very bad day, have a moment of weakness that would let her believe that Adam would cheat on her with Marsilia. But—

“Give us a suite that will sleep six,” he told the vampire. She would never believe that he’d also sleep with Stefan, Honey, some goblin he’d never met before, and—holy cow—Elizaveta. She’d know that this was the easiest way for him to make sure all of his people were safe. And to really stick a bug in Bonarata’s peace of mind while he did so.

Adam looked at his people and said, “We might as well share space as spend the night running down hallways.” He turned back to Bonarata’s head minion and let the thought that they were going to be in a vampire’s lair—a consideration, not a cause for alarm—come and leave his eyes. Then he said casually, “Or days, I guess.”

“Mercy might object to Larry,” murmured Stefan. He was going to play along.

“Larry might object to Mercy,” said Larry in the exact same tone.

“You should be so lucky as to have Mercy pick you,” said Stefan shortly and, Adam’s wolf noticed with sudden sharp interest, totally honestly.

Adam shrugged again. “Mercy can organize us as she sees fit when we get her back.”

“It will be like a vacation,” said Honey in sultry tones, because Honey was sharp as a tack and a fine actress. “We haven’t had one of those in a long time.”

Honey sold the lie with her body language and her voice—and gave it just enough to be believable. Most of the other supernatural folk kind of thought that the werewolves, who touched a lot more than was a comfortably human norm, all probably slept with their pack mates anyway. And those stories were fed by the now-vanishingly-rare Alpha who felt like that was the only way he could dominate his pack. Come to think of it, those would probably still be fairly common in Europe, where there was no Marrok to deal with them.

“That is not your reputation,” said Bonarata’s minion, sounding a little . . . shocked. Which he shouldn’t be, given the stories Adam had heard about Bonarata’s parties. The minion was looking at Marsilia, and Adam wondered abruptly if the vampire was old enough that he’d known Marsilia before she left.

“A suite,” said Marsilia shortly, but her body leaned into Adam. Her heart was racing—unusual for a vampire, but she’d been very stressed since this had begun. Adam could relate, but he gave her a reason for her racing heart by caressing her face lightly.

He let his wolf rise just a bit—rage and lust smelled very similar. In his experience, vampires weren’t good at sorting through emotions, though they could smell them very nearly as well as a wolf. But the vampires’ emotions were skewed, they were selfish creatures by definition, and it left them in trouble when it came to sorting someone else’s out.

“We have a suite with three bedrooms,” said one of the vampires. “We can house your pilot and copilot in servants’ quarters.”

“My pilot and copilot?” Adam said. “They will stay with the plane.”

“I’m afraid that won’t be possible,” said the head minion. “My Master made a special request that they, too, accept accommodations with us.” He smiled slyly. “We could bring trundle beds if you want them in your rooms, too.”

Adam looked over his shoulder to see that the two men were climbing out of the plane with the small bags they carried with them. The pilot was as good-looking as Larry had said, tall for a goblin, with sandy-gold hair and robin’s-egg-blue eyes. He watched the vampire escorting him warily, temper in the set of his shoulders. But Austin Harris was smart enough not to argue with Bonarata’s people.

Harris reached out to steady his copilot without looking at him when he wobbled on the ramp, too busy watching the vampire to watch his feet. The copilot was medium height and average-faced, and so intimidated by the vampires that he very nearly clung to the side of Harris. The copilot was a werewolf. The way he sought protection from Harris told Adam—and anyone else who was watching—that he was submissive. It was dangerous to be that submissive when surrounded by vampires.

Bonarata’s head minion cleared his throat. Right, he wanted an answer to his question.

If Adam pulled the pilot and copilot into the suite, it would look like they were afraid. Which they were. But it would also look like an insult, making clear that they did not expect Bonarata to keep guesting laws.

Adam raised his eyebrows in surprise. “Does Bonarata sleep with every damn person he hires? Give them their own rooms.”

He glanced over his shoulder at the pilot and the werewolf again. Harris met his eyes with a worried gaze and then glanced at his copilot. “One room would be better,” he said.

“Better give them one room with two beds, I suppose,” Adam said. “Someone as scared as he looks to be isn’t going to sleep well alone in a vampire seethe. If we can’t make him comfortable, the pilot is going to have to fly us home all by himself while his copilot sleeps.”

“That can be arranged,” said the minion, who was watching Harris with interested eyes. Predatory eyes.

“I trust in the honor of the Lord of Night that those two will be safe from the seethe,” Adam said softly.

The minion started, looked at Adam, and flushed when he realized that Adam had seen his hunger. The minion closed his eyes and went very still.

“They will be our guests,” he said after maybe half a minute of blank face and quiet body. “My Master’s word on it.”

So Bonarata could get and give information through his minions—at least through this minion. Adam would remember that.

Adam glanced at Harris and the wolf again. Putting a handsome man and a vulnerable one in the middle of a seethe . . . if Bonarata didn’t have iron control of his vampires, there might be trouble.

Then he thought of Marsilia’s assertion that Bonarata didn’t like making mistakes—though he didn’t mind hiding behind an apology and the claim of a mistake that wasn’t really a mistake.

Bonarata’s vampires probably wouldn’t attack Harris and his man by accident. But if it was in the Lord of Night’s best interests to have them trapped here without a pilot . . .

Adam sighed audibly and said, “Oh, put them somewhere near us. At least that way if someone starts screaming, there’s a good chance we will hear them.”

The vampire drew himself up. “Do you doubt my Master’s honor?”

“No,” Adam said. “But I won’t trust the self-control of vampires I don’t know when presented with prey that looks like this.” He waved a hand at Harris, who raised a good-looking eyebrow.

“Sorry,” he apologized. “This is really what I look like. I don’t have enough magic to keep up glamour.”

When things might get dangerous and I might need every ounce of power I’ve got, the goblin pilot didn’t say. Probably the vampires wouldn’t hear the unspoken message—and if they did, likely they’d understand the reasoning behind it.

Harris frowned suddenly at Adam. “And you have no room to talk.”

“Yes,” Elizaveta said venomously. “We are all beautiful here. Can we get going? Or do I need to get the makeup mirror out of my purse so you two can admire yourselves a little longer?” She looked at the vampire. “I hope there are sufficient bathrooms in the suite. I don’t like to share”—she glanced at Adam, laughter in her eyes—“bathrooms.”

Bonarata’s minion nodded, but he wasn’t really paying attention to Elizaveta, which was a mistake he might regret. It didn’t do to forget that she was a power who could make even the Gray Lords of the fae back down. Instead of paying attention to someone who could make him wish she was only killing him, he was staring at Harris’s copilot, who had been doing a pretty good job of being unnoticeable.

“That one is a werewolf,” he said abruptly, as if he’d just figured it out.

Harris frowned irritably. “I was told that this involved vampires. I have five people who can fly this bird from the US to Europe, excluding me. Four of them are humans, so I brought the werewolf. He doesn’t belong to Hauptman’s pack. I cleared it with Hauptman.” He turned his frown to Adam.

“I was told a pilot and copilot were acceptable,” said Adam coolly. “What race or species they belonged to was not specified.”

The vampire was doing its mind-out-of-body thing again. When he came back, the vampire’s body language changed entirely, and the beast who lived in Adam’s heart suddenly took notice. Adam didn’t know who was looking out of the head minion’s eyes, though he had a good guess. One thing Adam knew was that it certainly wasn’t the vampire he’d just been talking to.

“Are you Charles Cornick?” the vampire asked the man standing just behind Harris.

The werewolf’s jaw dropped. “Oh, hell no, sir,” he said in a shaky voice, his shoulder bumping into Harris’s.

He might as well have screamed “I’m a victim” to the biggest predator in Europe. Adam could see the urge to attack slide into the bodies of all the vampires in the area—including Marsilia and Stefan.

Adam pinched his nose and closed his eyes briefly as the weight of responsibility fell on his shoulders. He had to keep all of these people safe—and they were going to be doing their best to get themselves killed. Some of them because he had asked it of them. The only shining thread in this whole mess was that Mercy had managed to extract herself: Bonarata did not have Mercy.

Harris’s copilot continued to babble, the smell of his panic filling the air. “Have you ever seen Charles? He’s about twenty feet tall, and he’s Native American. Do I look Native American to you?”

“Leave him alone, Bonarata,” said Adam. “He’s not your food. He is . . .” Adam surveyed the trembling wolf without affection, but sighed. “He is under my protection.”

“I thought you said he wasn’t one of yours,” the vampire observed.

“He doesn’t belong to my pack,” Adam said. “But for the purposes of this trip, he put his neck on the line for me. That means he is mine to protect.”

Bonarata’s puppet turned to Adam. “My apologies,” Bonarata said through his puppet’s mouth. “But you pricked my temper, because I am most disappointed. I was sure you’d bring the boogeyman of the werewolves. I’ve been looking forward to meeting him.”

“I did ask,” said Adam coolly. “But the Marrok forbade it. Charles is very good at ending people . . . monsters, let’s say, and the Marrok apparently thinks that bringing him here, where there are so many monsters to be slain, would be a bad idea. Maybe he believes that. Maybe he believes this is my problem, not his—and he doesn’t want to risk losing Charles. Or maybe he is reluctant to deal with the headache of the power vacuum that your death at Charles’s hands would leave in Europe. It would be nearly as large a mess as the death of Jean Chastel, the Beast of Gévaudan, left.”

“Charles didn’t kill the Beast,” said Bonarata. The vampire’s voice wasn’t as certain as it would have been if he knew what he said was a fact.

Adam shrugged. “I wasn’t there when Chastel died.”

Charles had been, though, and rumor persisted in laying the old villain’s death at Charles’s feet—as if Charles’s reputation needed any help from killings he hadn’t performed. Whether it had been at Charles’s hand or not wasn’t the point. Adam was just reminding Bonarata that even powerful old monsters could die.

“Master,” said a soft voice. It belonged to the vampire who had been on the crew that had taken Mercy. “You asked me to remind you when you were close to harming one of your own.”

Bonarata, still possessing his minion, nodded. “Grazie, Ignatio. Hauptman, I look forward to meeting you and yours in person. My people will escort you to my home.” Then the vampire staggered, dropped to his knees, and shivered in a fit very like a grand mal seizure.

Ignatio—and Adam stored his name for future reference—waved, and a couple of the vampires picked up their fallen companion.

Ignatio bowed. “If you would be so kind as to follow me?”

As they moved toward the waiting vehicles just off the runway, Adam walked behind Ignatio and to his right. “Your scent was on my wife’s car seat along with her blood,” he murmured, though everyone in their group would hear him. Quiet, he had found, could be a lot more menacing than loud.

The wolf wanted to kill him, but Adam understood about being a soldier and taking orders. Still . . .

Adam said, “I will remember.”

“Pack remembers,” Honey added.