Dance in the Dark (16 page)

Mark looked at him in surprise. "Yes," He said. "How—"

"There was an article in the newspaper about your disappearance; your wife was most distraught. I realized what was going on when I read the article, and came to find you."

"I…" Mark stared at him, wide-eyed. "And the others?"

Johnnie looked at him in brief annoyance. "Was I supposed to leave them there?"

"Uh—no, of course not. I didn't know if you were looking for them, too," Mark replied.

The other man in the car, an imp, stirred and looked at Johnnie. "Doubt he knew about us; I appreciate it all the same."

Johnnie shrugged, but said, "You are welcome."

"So is it true, what they were saying?" the imp asked. "That you're the son of the Dracula Desrosiers?"

"Yes," Johnnie said. "I am his younger son. Once Mark is reunited with his wife, and my companion has broken the wards upon all of you, the cars will take you wherever you want to go." As he finished speaking, they pulled into the driveway of Mark's house. Rostiya and Pearl came out a moment later, waiting on the front porch.

Mark sighed softly, eyes on his wife. "She knows now, doesn't she?"

"Yes," Johnnie replied.

Sighing again, Mark seemed to gather himself, then opened the car door and climbed out.

Johnnie glanced at the imp. "Best collect your companions and inform them of what I have told you," he said. "I will speak with Rostislav about your wards." When he climbed out of the car, Pearl was shouting and crying and pounding her fists on her husband's chest—but when Mark suddenly pulled her into a tight embrace, she did not protest. Moving to join Rostislav on the porch, Johnnie saw Rostislav smirk and snapped, "What?"

"What did you do, purchase every abnormal who went up for bid?"

"Why does that seem so strange?" Johnnie demanded. "What was I supposed to do, let them all be sold into slavery?"

Rostislav just laughed and shook his head. "Of course not. I guess you need me to break their wards?"

"Yes," Johnnie replied, and dismissed the matter, content to leave it to Rostislav and turn his attention to the problem at the docks. Where was his babysitter?

"What has you frowning so hard?" Rostiya asked when he returned a few minutes later to find Johnnie still scowling.

Tersely, Johnnie explained all that had transpired at the Pits. "That … that doesn't make any sense," Rostislav said. He reached out and splayed a hand on Johnnie's chest, eyes falling shut as he concentrated. He opened his eyes and withdrew his hand a couple of minutes later. "Nothing; there is nothing on you other than the residue of living your entire life surrounded by abnormals. Does your cane have protections of some sort?"

"No," Johnnie said, but handed it over for Rostislav to examine. "Neither does my dagger."

"I am at a loss," Rostislav said, returning the cane and shaking his head. "I think you will have to ask Ontoniel."

Johnnie winced at the mention of his father. Of course, it also reminded him that Bergrin was still nowhere to be found, and really, why had he not reappeared to yell at Johnnie and start in with the 'I told you so'. Had the idiot actually gotten himself killed? The thought turned Johnnie's blood cold, made his gut twist. Surely he had not—

"Johnnie?"

"Hmm?"

Rostiya was frowning at him. "Are you all right?"

"Fine," Johnnie said. He started to ask if they could leave, but Pearl and Mark approached before he could get the question out.

"I can't thank you enough," Mark said, extending his hand.

Johnnie shook it. "No thanks are necessary. I am glad I was able to help. Hopefully you will be troubled no further."

Mark nodded. "We will probably move; find a quieter beach where I don't have to hide as much." He looked at his wife, who scowled, but squeezed his arm. "Really, whatever I can do to repay you, just ask. I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life as some alchemist's slave. You've saved my life."

"I saw a mystery," Johnnie said. "I am glad all will be well."

Pearl stepped forward, nervous and curious and determined. "So—uh—is it true you're a vampire? I'm sorry, this is all so new—"

Johnnie shook his head. "No, I am not a vampire. I am a normal, much like you. My father, however,
is
a vampire. He adopted me when my parents were killed."

"Oh," Pearl said—then suddenly turned and thumped her husband's chest again.

Mark grimaced, but said nothing.

"We will leave you in peace," Johnnie said. "Do call, however, if there is further trouble with you or the others."

"Sure," Mark replied. "I'll see they all get to where they need to go, it's the least I can do. Thank you again, for helping all of us." Johnnie nodded. Mark hesitated, then asked, "Is your friend okay?"

"Yes," Johnnie said, though he was not at all certain of that. "Bergrin is very good at taking care of himself." He hoped. Fervently. There never should have been such a threat to his person, and if he had thought there would be, he would have … well, he probably would have done the same thing. Why had it all gone wrong, he wondered angrily.  Nothing he had bid on—

Him, of course, Johnnie realized, furious with himself. They had probably thought to kidnap him, thinking Ontoniel would empty his coffers to get his son back.

Except …

Johnnie's gut twisted, sharp and painful. He ignored it, and focused on the facts.

Ontoniel's wife had murdered Johnnie's parents. A sense of guilt, and probably duty, drove Ontoniel to adopt Johnnie. As Ontoniel was very traditional, and held much stock in protocol, this had been a very earth-shattering thing for him to do.

He had raised Johnnie like a real son, but the truth was that Johnnie was
not
his real son. He would never marry another vampire, he could never contribute to the family the way Ellie did, he would never hold the more powerful positions in the supernatural world. He was, in a word, a burden. Even his little talent for solving mysteries amounted to nothing, so far as everyone was concerned—including his father.

So would Ontoniel pay a ransom for him?

Johnnie could not see a practical reason that he would. He set Bergrin on him to avoid these problems, he supposed, and Ontoniel did care—but only, Johnnie sensed, to a point. So this entire mess and possibly Bergrin's life, had been for nothing. Ontoniel's honor would demand blood, but it would not require a ransom.

Ellie would require a ransom, not Johnnie.

Unable to continue thinking about it, he bid Mark and Pearl a last farewell.

"I'll stay here and help," Rostislav said, smiling. "Did you want me to send you home?"

"No," Johnnie said, "I will just take a car back."

"Come over later this week," Rostislav said.

Johnnie nodded. "I will." Then he turned away and strode to his waiting car, and slid into the back seat. As the car pulled away, he leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes.

"So have we learned something from all this, Highness?"

Johnnie jerked, eyes snapping open to see Bergrin sitting in the far corner of the opposite seat, so ensconced in shadows that it was little wonder Johnnie had not seen him. "When did you get here?" he snapped, furious. "When were you going to let me know you were here and not dead or bleeding out—" He cut himself off. "You are truly obnoxious, babysitter. Nothing but growling and sniping and skulking about and vanishing dramatically."

"Maybe the next time I tell you that something is bad idea, you will fucking listen to me!" Bergrin snapped.

"Their behavior was illogical," Johnnie said. "Attacking me over the auctions was disproportionate to my actions."

"Criminals don't have to make sense!" Bergrin snarled. "You hurt their pride, you snatched up goods they've been eying for weeks if not months, and you
flaunted
your power. Of course they fucking tried to kill you!"

"The first group, maybe," Johnnie said. "But the second group was looking to capture."

"Yes," Bergrin said.

"You took care of them."

"Yes."

Johnnie was silent, then slowly said, "I am sorry."

Bergrin grunted, then said just as stiffly, "You were trying to do the right thing. Forget it."

"Are you hurt?"

Bergrin smirked briefly. "Only scrapes and bruises. They never stood a chance."

Johnnie shot him a withering look. "You have a great deal of nerve getting on me for arrogance."

"I don't flaunt it to the point of suicide, Highness," Bergrin retorted. "Even you did not think I was more than a local drunk."

Preferring not to think about that, Johnnie moved the conversation along. "So did you inform my father?"

"I thought I'd see if you were going to face the music."

"No," Johnnie said, "but it little matters. Someone else will have already scurried along to tell the Dracula that his silly little adopted human was throwing around money in the Pits." His father was going to
kill
him. Really, though, what was he supposed to have done? Left them all to be bought up by the very same men who had just tried to capture or kill him? Johnnie stifled a sigh and looked out the window, wondering if there was
any
possible way to convince his father not to drag him home and lock him in his room.

"So what did you do with the others you bought?" Bergrin asked, breaking the silence.

"Mark is going to see they get to where they want to be. I left the cars to assist," Johnnie replied. "Hopefully they will not be recaptured."

Silence fell again, and Johnnie resumed staring morosely out the window at the passing glimpses of night-shrouded scenery. He wanted to be back home at the Bremen, playing cards or reading, enjoying a glass of vodka.

Instead, he was minutes away from his father's wrath. He was surprised Bergrin was not yelling at him more than he had.

"So can you actually use that fancy little sword stick of yours?" Bergrin asked.

"Yes," Johnnie said. "My father is very traditional. I am well schooled in swordsmanship, as well as other things. My father would not have given me my dagger if he did not believe I could properly use it."

Bergrin only murmured a thoughtful, possibly doubtful, "Hmm."

Johnnie thought about snapping at him, then decided against it. He did not know what Bergrin had done to make his assailants scream like they had, but he knew even his dagger, impressive as it was, could not begin to compare.

"So how does one become an Enforcer?" Johnnie asked.

Bergrin stirred from wherever his mind had taken him, and glanced at Johnnie in surprise. He smiled faintly, bringing his plain face to life, and making Johnnie think of the Cheshire Cat.
"
One goes down the rabbit-hole
,"
Bergrin said.

"One falls into it?" Johnnie asked dryly. "That seems rather … lax, for so important a position."

"Well, it's not exactly the sort of job one finds in the wanted section," Bergrin replied. "It was your brother, years ago. Slinking off to where you shouldn't go seems to be a family trait. I saw him, I knew who he was, followed him. Some men were ready for him—but they weren't ready for me. I got him back home, left him there. Three days later, your father offered me a job. I was hired on a trial basis for one year, then made a full employee, if that's even the word for it."

Johnnie's curiosity was well and truly piqued now, despite himself. "So do you usually play bodyguard?"

"No, though I have done that a time or six for your brother. Usually I do find and retrieve style work. I have a knack for finding things people don't want me to find."

"Somehow, that does not surprise me," Johnnie said, and realized with annoyance that he wanted to smile.

Bergrin smirked.

Scowling, Johnnie asked, "So why were you switched to watching me?"

"Your father trusts me more than some of the others. He does not want so much as a single hair harmed on the head of his golden boy."

Johnnie snorted at that. Ellie was Father's golden boy. Johnnie was a constant reminder of past tragedies.  A human—a normal.

"You don't believe me?"

"It is illogical," Johnnie replied. "Father dotes on his real son."

Bergrin shrugged and said nothing. Johnnie resumed his staring, until the car finally pulled up in front of the Bremen. Climbing out of the car, thanking the driver, he waited until Bergrin was with him, then led the way inside. A group of wide-eyed, silent, pale-faced men greeted him. Johnnie frowned at them. "You all look like a group of normals who have seen their first ghost."

"Uh—worse," Peyton said, and pointed one finger to the ceiling, indicating Johnnie's rooms. "We just saw a Dracula."

Johnnie froze. His father was
here
? He pinched the bridge of his nose, then managed a brief, "Excuse me one moment." Striding across the room, he quickly climbed the stairs and opened the door to his apartment.