The Damned (42 page)

Her breath caught as if he had punched her in the stomach. Her heart stuttered.

“What are you saying?”

“You know what I’m saying.” His eyes glistened. “You need to have a life, with a man. That’s your calling. I’m not a man, Jenn. And I never will be.”

“No,” she choked out. She fell to her knees in front of the cage and put her hands through the bars.

He hissed and pulled himself away from her. His eyes blazed with red, and his fangs extended.

“Get her out of here!” Antonio shouted. “Holgar, please!”

Strong arms gripped her and lifted her to her feet, putting distance between her and Antonio’s prison. Holgar. She struggled against him, but he held her tightly.

“Antonio!” Jenn cried, reaching for him.

Antonio whirled around, his back to her, doubling over.

“Go,” he ground out.

Holgar forcibly walked Jenn to the door, opened it, and pushed her through. She burst into tears. Then arms came around her—Father Juan and Skye. Weeping, she stumbled as Skye led her away. She tried to turn back, but Skye held her firmly.

“Don’t look back, my angel,” Skye said. “Just come with me. I won’t leave you. Any of you. When we’re done in Washington, I’ll work night and day to figure out how to help bring Antonio back to us.”

“He
is
back,” Jenn said. But she knew that wasn’t true. She cried harder, and when she thought she couldn’t cry any more, fresh tears slid down her face.

Jenn began to feel rivulets of calm within the wild river of her grief. The witch was casting spells to soothe her.

“Jenn,” Skye whispered, “I’ll bring the Circuit up to date on all this. The witchly communities will
have
to see that they must get involved.”

“What about Estefan?” Jenn asked her. “Does he have a circuit, too?”

Skye hesitated. “I don’t know. These are things we need to figure out. Things have been happening so fast.”

A van lumbered past them. Skye gripped her hand; Jenn knew Father Juan and Antonio were inside. Jenn bowed her head as Skye murmured over her in Latin.

Good-bye, Antonio. Vaya con Dios.

She put thoughts of him away, as if in a box, to be opened later.

Then she wiped her face and headed back toward the barn, where the planning session was still in full swing. A figure was standing just outside the double-door entrance, an Uzi over his shoulder. Noah.

As she approached, he reached in his pocket and pulled out something. It was a pack of gum. With a trembling hand she took a stick, unwrapped it, and popped it in her mouth. It was cinnamon, her favorite.

“I’m quitting smoking,” he told her. He quirked a lopsided grin. “I noted that you aren’t a big fan.”

She tried to smile, to feel flattered. The best she could do was a nod.

“Jenn? Good,” her grandmother said, as he and she walked back inside. Esther held up a cell phone. “Marti just got a call. The press conference will be held next Friday. That’s six days and eighteen hundred miles.”

“Plenty of time, if we kick it,” Jamie said.

“Not enough time,” Noah murmured.

“It doesn’t matter,” Jenn told him under her breath, and went to join the others.

P
ARIS,
F
RANCE
A
URORA

Aurora rested on the brocade settee, enjoying the view of Paris at night. She liked hotel rooms. No matter how bad the mess, one didn’t have to clean it up. She rather liked the washes of red on this particular white carpet. It gave a touch of color to the gold and ivory design of the massive suite.

Louis, her lieutenant, entered her sitting room. The man bowed low, and unlike some, he meant the courtly gesture.

“Where do we stand?” she asked, crossing her legs as she leaned back her head.

“Our troops are assembling,” Louis said. “And the resistance is back in America, chasing after Solomon.”

“And Antonio de la Cruz is back at the university?”

“Our lookout at the airport confirmed it,” Louis assured her.

She suppressed any telling reaction of relief. They had to believe that she was in full control. In truth, however, she was petrified that her sire would find out that she had had Antonio de la Cruz—and that she’d lost him. It had been stupid of her to take him back to Las Vegas. But she didn’t have connections in Russia, and she’d been unnerved by what had happened to Dantalion.

She’d thought to frighten Dantalion a little by picking off some of his monsters before she grabbed Antonio. But after she’d left the palace grounds, his entire headquarters had blown up. She’d sent some vampires back to have a look. They’d sent pictures to her phone. The wreckage was incredible. There was no sign of Dantalion himself, but it was quite possible he’d been blown to such tiny bits that he was still “there.”

“There’s something else,” Estefan said as he casually entered the room. Aurora was irritated with the Dark Witch for not knocking and asking permission to enter. Estefan was pushy and presumptuous. What
had
the little White Witch seen in him?

“Go on, Estefan,” she said imperiously.

Estefan paused as if for dramatic effect. He looked so smug. Aurora had just about had enough. Louis looked irritated too. Maybe it was time to get rid of Estefan.

“Sergio Almodóvar is in Madrid,” Estefan announced.

She and Louis both blinked at him in surprise. “Madrid?”

“Sí.
And he’s getting ready to go to Salamanca.”

Alarmed, she leaped to her feet. Sergio would
not
take her prize. “Let’s go,” she said.

M
ADRID
S
ERGIO
A
LMODÓVAR AND
P
HILIPPE
G
AUDET

While Philippe Gaudet looked on, Sergio sat on his throne in the bloodstained chamber and remembered every detail of the last time he had set eyes on Antonio de la Cruz. In 1942. In the center of this very room, surrounded by Sergio’s subjects. On a night designed to honor Antonio, the young vampire had presented Sergio with a Hunter. And then Antonio had fled. Why? What had happened to him that night?

Sergio wanted to know. Had to know. And so did Sergio’s sire, who at this very moment stood on the brink of creating the Vampire Kingdom here on earth. His sire was very interested in Antonio. If one vampire could lose his way as completely as Antonio had, it could happen to another. To many. Such a catastrophe could not stand. Sergio’s sire wanted to study Antonio—and Sergio would do anything to give Antonio to him.

“You’re firm in your resolve,” Sergio said to Philippe Gaudet. Philippe was a vampire like his brother, Christian Gaudet, who had ruled the French Quarter of New Orleans. After Aurora had murdered Christian, Philippe had come in secret to Sergio to exact his revenge. “You’ll join with me to take Antonio before Aurora gets him.”

Philippe nodded. “If you let me stake her. Aurora killed my brother. She’s lower than the dust on my boots.”

“Done,” Sergio said. Sergio wanted to believe Philippe, but he’d been betrayed before. “And you’re sure she’s in Paris?”

Philippe nodded. “I have excellent spies. The resistance recaptured Antonio, and they took him to Salamanca University. He’s there now. And Aurora’s planning to go in after him.”

Sergio smiled. “But she’s not there yet.”

“She’s not there yet,” Philippe replied.

Sergio tapped his fingers on the arms of his throne. “If only she’d come to me. She was always so competitive. I already told our sire what she did. She
had
Antonio, Philippe. But rather than bring him to me, or to our sire, she played with him.” Sergio didn’t add that apparently Aurora had managed to return Antonio to his natural vampiric state. He would force Aurora to tell him how she’d done it, before she died.

Philippe shrugged. “Then she deserves what’s coming to her.”

“Agreed,” Sergio said, but his unbeating heart felt small and cold in his chest. The story of Aurora Abregón and Sergio Almodóvar was the stuff of legends.

Maybe I won’t let him kill her. Love is so complicated.

And inconvenient.

“Then you have my support. The vampires of Gaudet will be there,” Philippe said.

“Vale,”
Sergio said, rising. He gazed at the exact spot where Antonio had dropped the Hunter. Such pride. Such a vampire. He would have been a prince. Then he had become nothing but the lapdog of humans. Since Aurora had gotten through to Antonio, Sergio should reward her, not kill her.

After he captured Antonio himself.

“We should get ready,” he told Philippe.

As Sergio’s boots echoed on the stone floor, he heard:
I will kill her; I won’t. I will; I won’t.

He just couldn’t decide.

S
ALAMANCA
F
ATHER
J
UAN,
A
NTONIO, AND
H
EATHER

Heather had spent
forever
in the cage down in the dark, dank basement of the university. She’d heard rustling, movement—which turned out to be rats—and she couldn’t get Father Giovanni to tell her anything about what was happening. He was afraid of her.

She liked that.

When the door opened, Heather was surprised to see that another priest and the vampire were both there. She remembered both of them vaguely, like a long-forgotten dream. This Cursed One seemed somehow different to her than her fragmented memories of him, though. More like . . . her.

“Heather, how are you?” the vampire asked very slowly.

She hissed at him.

The priest ventured closer than the vampire did, and he spoke low, soothingly. “We’re sorry we’ve been gone so long.”

“Jenn,” Heather said.

“What?” the priest asked, looking at her. She remembered now: His name was Father Juan.

“I smell Jenn.” She closed her eyes. Her sister’s scent was coming, very faintly, from both of them. They had been with her. They had seen her.

“She’s doing well,” Father Juan assured her.

Heather hissed again. “I smell fear on you. I smell
terror
.”

Father Juan bowed his head. “It’s true. I am afraid.”

“Not on you. On
you
,” she said to the vampire. “And I smell other things.” She backed away from him.

“What?” the vampire asked her. Antonio. That was his name. He loved her sister. Her sister, who was human. While she, Heather, was not.

“Death,” she told him. “You reek of it.”

E
N
R
OUTE TO
W
ASHINGTON
, D.C.
T
EAM
S
ALAMANCA
M
INUS
A
NTONIO
AND
E
STHER
L
EITNER
’
S
D
EFENDERS

Our mission has changed so much
, Jenn thought.
We were trained to kill vampires, not hijack the airwaves. This is more up Noah’s alley. And Antonio’s, when he fought the Germans back in World War II.

Three dozen people in eight vans and cars were driving toward Washington, D.C. Jenn’s mother had stayed behind in Montana. Jenn and Noah were sitting on the floor of a panel van with the passenger seats taken out for roominess. Noah had been trying to explain how “the operation” was going to work. He had diagrams and sketches of cell phones, cell towers, radio towers, and satellites, and her eyes were glazing over. Apparently, it was more complicated than holding up a boom box. She was having major doubts about the plan, and she had attempted to express them. But no one had paid attention. People were tired of sitting around in the wilds of Montana.

Noah, Jamie, Eriko, Skye, and Holgar were in sleeping bags on the floor. Taamir had gone in a different vehicle. Jenn and Noah were the only two still up. They were chewing cinnamon gum and staring at documents together. She had no idea how old he was. If he was in the Israeli special forces, he must be in his mid to late twenties.

Younger than Antonio by a long shot.

He sighed and looked at her.

“This is crazy, this whole thing,” he said around his gum. “Washington will be crawling with vampires and loyal humans. Loyal to the established regime,” he added. “We need more time.”

Great minds think alike
, she thought.

“We’re out of time,” she said, remembering her last conversation with Greg. “Maybe there will be a miracle.”

“I’m very pragmatic,” he told her.

“Hey, Israel, pipe down. Some of us are trying to sleep,” Jamie groused.

“Jamie,” Eriko reproved.

“The Voice of the Resistance said he’d help,” Jenn reminded Noah. Through Father Juan’s efforts to locate and unite resistance cells, “Kent” had e-mailed him and offered to help. He said he would put them on the air. Noah was double and triple-checking to see if Kent could deliver on that promise.

Jenn’s cell phone rang. It was Father Juan. Her heart skipped beats as she connected. Noah very politely moved away as best he could, picking up a map of the National Mall, where Solomon and President Kilburn would hold their press conference.

“Jenn,” Father Juan said. “How are things?”

She lowered her voice. “I’m kind of . . .”

“Having second thoughts?” he filled in. “Kent called me directly. He confirmed everything. He wants to meet in an Internet café off the I-70 in Maryland. He’ll give me more details if you agree.”

“Good,” she said. “But I’ll have to run it by the others.”

Noah looked over at her, and she held up a finger to indicate that she’d fill him in later. He nodded and unwrapped another stick of gum.