Bite Back 05 - Angel Stakes (32 page)

Yelena was still working. She’d gone into the pantry so that the light from the screen couldn’t be seen outside.

One place left for me to search. The basement.

I stood in the hall and listened. Nothing, even to my wolf ears, except the near-soundless hum of my laptop.

Why the apprehension?

There was a short curve of stairs down to a mini-landing and a plain door. I took the steps and stopped again.

The little stairwell was the sort of place that a family’s clutter would accumulate in a house that was lived in. Coats, scarves, ski hats, kid’s sled, outdoor shoes. Even a bachelor staying here infrequently would use it. Maybe keep a bicycle here. Sports gear.
Something
.

It was empty and it smelled of air freshener.

The door was locked. An internal door down to a basement with no other access. Locked.

Why? What’s inside?

I checked the edges of the door for any obvious wires that might show other security alarms, but if there were any, I couldn’t see them. The lock wasn’t anything advanced—a standard lever lock.

Easy.

Five clicks and a twist. The bolt slid back with a quiet
snick
.

I pocketed my picks and gripped the handle.

Basement. Forsythe.

Not that basement. Not that girl. I’m in control.

The uneasiness just seemed to swell as I pushed the door open, my wolf senses reaching.

Silent. Air stale. Dust. Old scents. Hints of beer and takeout food. Sweat.
Excitement?

There were no external windows to the basement, so even with wolf sight, I was faced with a depthless dark.

I let a sliver leak from my flashlight.

Gasped.

Figures in cloaks stood around the room.

“Amber?” Hissed from the kitchen.

“Spooked myself, sorry. It’s nothing,” I lied. “Nothing.”

I sat down heavily on the last step.

Not a secret meeting of the Klan.

The humor felt flat.

I didn’t need the light, didn’t need to explore, and I was still sitting there, hugging my legs, when Yelena came down.

“Got it copied. There’s something you should…” She stopped. “What’s wrong?”

“Close the door and turn the light on,” I said.

It was a big basement, nearly as broad and long as the house above it. That much I’d sensed sitting in the dark, listening to my heartbeat.

The light came on and Yelena gave a wordless grunt of surprise.

I got up and lifted one of the dust sheets that’d given me a shock.

“Gimballed disco lights on tripods,” I said. “Double up as photo studio lights.”

I turned and pointed toward the back, where there was a broad table shape hidden under more dust sheets. “DJ station. Probably a computer system these days instead of turntables. Speakers. Video cameras.”

A worktable ran the length of the back wall. “For the beer and pizzas.”

Yelena walked to the side wall and parted the drapes there.

“Wall of plasma screens.”

And at the front, the only difference from the basement at his parents’ house all those years ago—a huge sofa. The kind that folded out into a bed.

“This is sick,” she said. “Completely sick.” She’d been there at my sessions. She’d seen, through my eyes,
seen
this basement.

“He doesn’t use this house often,” I said.

My voice was level, but my whole body felt cold.

“He’s fixated.” I waved at the layout. “This isn’t an accident. This is what he does, how he does it. A party with his friends. Then he drugs a woman and rapes her. He does this over and over. Maybe after all this time, he can’t do it any other way.”

I was guessing, but it felt like picking a lock in my mind. You twisted and probed, unable to see what was happening, and then suddenly there was a point where you could feel the tumblers lining up and you knew the lock was open.

“And if he’s not doing it here, he’s doing it somewhere else,” I said. “A place that has a basement just like this one.”

Wherever it was he went on all those trips when people thought he was coming here.

“You should see this.” Yelena sat down on the floor and opened the laptop. “I haven’t had time to look through all of it, though I’m guessing he wouldn’t leave anything really incriminating in this house. But there’s this…the drafts of publicity announcements for that new show Tove told us about.”

Tomorrow’s Faces
. Just as Tove had said.

It was an expensive-looking press pack on the screen. The kind of images and text that the TV industry would blitz newspapers and magazines with to promote a show before its premiere.

It was a talent show, specifically targeted at teenage girls from low-income backgrounds or depressed economic areas. Young girls, thirteen to fifteen. Promising fame and fortune for a special few—a Cinderella-type rags-to-riches story.

Girls in poverty. Desperate to get out. Girls maybe without strong family support. Or access to lawyers if things went bad. Maybe even girls no one would miss if they disappeared.

There was a sick certainty in the pit of my stomach.

We’d gotten nothing from this house about his other criminal activities, but I was sure now that Forsythe was not an opportunistic rapist. He was a sadistic, organized rapist.

And he had been since he’d raped me. Maybe even before.

Now he had a show which was going to feed him with young girls desperate to make it in LA.

He’d had twelve years of this kind of behavior because I’d let him. Because I’d run away.

“Not your fault,” whispered Yelena, sensing what was going on in my mind.

I couldn’t agree.

“We have to go,” I said. “Or I’m going to vomit.”

Yelena flew us into Van Nuys in the early morning.

I envied her having something to focus on. I dozed restlessly, unable to fully relax, coming back time and again to blaming myself for what Forsythe had been able to do over the years. For what he might still do, if I didn’t stop him.

It was still dark and Elizabetta was waiting for us with one of the Altau patrol vans and a security team. A stark reminder to me that there was more going on in LA than my intention to do something about Forsythe. I had responsibilities to the Athanate and the Were, but I intended to spend every minute I could spare getting something on Forsythe that could nail him to the wall. Or, failing that, finding a way to make him disappear without it coming back on me and the Athanate. Now that Ingram was involved in Emergence, I was beginning to realize we needed to watch our step as far as working outside the law. The last thing we needed was him telling the government that we were a bunch of lawless renegades.

It was Yelena who broke the silence as we settled into the back of the van. “What do we need to know this time?”

Elizabetta combed fingers through her long, blonde hair and closed her eyes for a moment.

“Easy things first. Ibarre’s strategy of trying to undermine Skylur by discrediting you has gone nowhere for him. But what he has managed to do is to focus the meeting’s attention on the detail of possible plans for Emergence.”

“Cart before horse,” I said, and she nodded.

“Specifically, the meeting’s been looking at legal systems, because of Ibarre,” she went on. “Correia has jumped on this, pointing out that Skylur is calling for backing on Emergence without any detailed plan on how Athanate legal systems might interface with human legal systems.”

“That’s crazy,” I said. “It depends on the governments of countries at the time. What’s Skylur supposed to do? Plan every single detail and caveat and alternative plan before they’ll agree that he can actually start the project?”

Of course, Emergence had started back in Denver with Agent Ingram, but it was up to Naryn to decide who else would be allowed to know.

“And it’s not just the government, it’s also dependent on the creed of the Athanate in any one country,” Yelena said.

Elizabetta held up her hands. “There you have the last day and a half of debate. But everything may change now.”

“Why?”

We eased out onto 405. Traffic was still light, but getting heavier every minute.

“Panethus and the Hidden Path are neck and neck,” Elizabetta said. “They argue points, they lose some, they gain some. However, Diakon Huang has indicated that today he will grace us with his official presence and join the debate. However they calculate the weight of his vote, he represents a large block, so whichever side of the argument Huang backs, wins.”

“I’m supposed to stay away from him,” I said. “Did Skylur specifically say that I should attend the meeting today?”

“Huang requested your attendance as liaison for the Were.” She grimaced. “Just don’t let him catch you without Skylur or Tarez around.”

Crap.

“Has Huang given any indication of which way he’s likely to go?” I asked.

Elizabetta shook her head.

That made me uneasy.

Huang and the Empire might have an interest in the Assembly, but Kaothos was still what Huang was really after.

Enough to make Huang come down on the side of Panethus, if there was a chance we could find her and Kaothos for him?

What had Skylur said?
Nothing is as important as Emergence
. What if Huang persuaded him that the only way that Kaothos could work for Emergence was if she was embedded in an Empire Adept community?

We came off Ventura and turned south on Hollywood. The van slowed in traffic.

“There’s nothing more I can add to that at the moment,” Elizabetta said. Her heart rate ramped up and an evasive look came into her eyes. “But I have news on Forsythe.”

I immediately felt a stab of guilt. I wasn’t responsible for making Elizabetta spy in the way she was—that was Skylur. But by using her to find out things about Forsythe, I had to share that responsibility.

“I haven’t said how much I appreciate what you’re doing,” I said to Elizabetta. “Not just for me, for all of us.”

Her smile was pale.

“I’ve had a lot of support from you and your House.” She sighed and looked up at the roof of the van. “It’s…difficult. But you know, the worst is not what people think it is. For me, the worst thing is that Jefferson Reed’s actually a good man. A
good
man. He doesn’t deserve what’s happening. What I’m doing to him.”

I wasn’t sure what to do, but I felt awkward not doing anything, so I took her hand and held it. This talk about Reed was a diversion; she was reluctant to say something. I’d wait; we had time.

“I’m not sure how much longer it can go on with Jefferson,” she said. “Not because of any problem of mine. No, it was stupid of me to allow him to meet you two at the restaurant.”

“I understand,” I said. “No one can blame you.”

She smiled again, a fleeting movement of her lips. She clearly thought someone
would
blame her.

“Jefferson went from being a bit puzzled about what had happened to me since I left LA, to being downright suspicious after he met you. I found new data searches on his laptop for both of you, and of course that opens a whole new can of worms. Once he finds out how little he
can
find out about either of you, he’s going to start wondering what we’re all really up to. My position will be compromised, and you all will be on the LAPD’s radar.” She bowed her head. “Well, what happens, happens. I’ll need to tell Skylur today.”

“We’ll tell him together.”

“There’s another thing,” she said.

“Hmm?” I could feel that this was another diversion. I was itching for her to get back to Forsythe.

“Dante.”

I felt a spurt of irritation at Dante. Was she going to get me into trouble with Skylur?

“What?” I said. “She went AWOL. She’s back?”

“No, but she did call Dominé.” Elizabetta ran a hand through her hair again. “She’s probably safe.”

A chill in my belly: payback for my self-centered irritation at Dante.

My House. Mine. ‘Probably’ wasn’t good enough.
“Where?”

“She’s got an unpaid job as a gofer on Forsythe’s new show. People do it all the time in the industry. You know, meet the stars, gain ‘experience’, catch a break.”

Now it felt like I’d been kicked in the stomach. “What the hell does she think she’s doing?”

Elizabetta managed a genuine smile at me.

“She’s trying to impress you, Amber,” Elizabetta said. “Trying to prove she’s worthy. Worthy of your House. Not a liability, but your own intrepid spy. She’ll be safe enough if she keeps her head down. Anyway, even if he knew who she was, there’s nothing Forsythe could do on those sets. They’re full of witnesses.”

“I…” I shut up. How could I say to her that my House shouldn’t risk themselves in any way to gain information on Forsythe, when I compared that to what Elizabetta herself was doing?

Elizabetta didn’t seem to notice how much it’d affected me, her attention firmly fixed on what she’d been avoiding talking about.

She started speaking, the words coming abruptly. “The data I’ve been pulling off Jefferson’s computer? I’ve had time to work through the subdirectories. It’s information from everywhere, federal databases right down to reports from his CIs, his confidential informants. It looked like background stuff Jefferson was collecting in case they ever got to arrest him. I read it and thought it was exaggerated until I read the federal report. I’m not sure even Jefferson believed what’s in those files until he got hold of that FBI report.”

“You’re going to tell us he’s a serial rapist, using his TV show to find girls,” I said. “We know.”

She shook her head, refusing to look at me.

“That’s…” she swallowed. “That’s his sideline.”

“
What?
”

“I’m not diminishing what he does with those girls…what he did to you and Tove. But the FBI report says there’s someone in SoCal who’s a big wheel in an international trafficking network.”

“Trafficking,” Yelena said. “Women and children for the sex industry?”

Elizabetta nodded.

“And the CIs say it’s Forsythe?” I said.

“No one credibly names him, but the description is a fit: someone based in LA, big in the industry, and who has contacts in the DA’s office and the police. And there are details on murders that all point to Forsythe. Jefferson and his boss are certain it’s him and that he’s a kind of regional boss for the southwest. This network, they traffic people into the States from all over the third world and a lot of them come in through Forsythe’s organization.”

Like a business. Trucks come in, trucks go out. Warehouses. Inventories. Accounts. Wastage.

The horror of it leached into my head.

“Jefferson doesn’t think the shows are a completely separate thing,” Elizabetta said. “Young women apply from all over the country. The production teams hold ‘cattle calls’ in every major city, and the lines to get in stretch for blocks. You’re talking thousands.”

“It wouldn’t be difficult,” I said. “They separate out a few.”

Gullible girls. Girls desperate for fame and fortune, or just desperate. Girls who’d leap at a chance for a ‘special callback’. Girls with no one looking out for them.

“That’s his specialty, that’s what bought him his position in the network. He supplies girls kidnapped here to be sold as sex slaves elsewhere. There’s a premium…a premium in some places for young American or Canadian girls with spirit. Especially strong or privileged girls. The buyers value that. They value it because they enjoy destroying it.”

Yelena muttered something in Athanate, then followed it with: “He is
sick
. They are all sick.”

The van stopped.

We’d arrived at the conference center.

I stumbled out of the van in silence, feeling dazed.

The early sounds of the city filtered in: cars, sirens, voices, all floated on the cool morning breeze. And against the lightening eastern sky, a helicopter was silhouetted, thudding away somewhere on its business. Traffic? News? Hospital?

None of them aware.

The three of us hugged each other, seeking some thin thread of comfort to shield us from the horrors of Elizabetta’s words.

It all felt unreal, remote.

We’d driven here down broad highways that swept through the Los Angeles basin. We’d passed down bright streets decorated for Christmas shoppers, their neon happiness broadcast to the watching night.

And we’d slipped by all of it, cocooned from this waking world, its colors sliding across the inside of the van like a message we couldn’t read.

A million people stirred around us, readying themselves to join the day’s pulse of life, to pour through the LA streets, obedient to the call, following the rules.

And through that throng passed others, unseen or just glimpsed. True monsters, that took the shape of men and remained invisible. Creatures that did not heed the call or follow the rules. Formed as if from the shadow cast by the world. People could pass their lives without seeing the monsters, but the monsters created an undertow, a riptide, pulling the brightness of life down into the darkness, where it became invisible with them.