Page 17

A low chuckle. “Fine. But I have some that may concern you.”

“I sincerely doubt that.”

“You might reconsider when I tell you it also concerns that human you used to mess with. Ophelia, wasn’t it?”

I come to an abrupt stop, turning to face him. He stops walking, too, and can’t quite hide the flash of fear that breaks over his face at whatever it is he sees on mine.

He clears his throat and gathers his courage. “Tell her to back off. We have no interest in her or the Bureau poking around our affairs, especially now that her sister’s the one running the show.”

It was a shocking bit of news to hear Blair had stepped down as Director. Though perhaps less so when I’d finally gotten through to him a few days later to talk about it.

He’d sounded lighter than he’s been in years, and I’d caught a brief, deeply contented murmur as he’d pulled away fromthe phone to answer something asked of him by a laughing, feminine voice.

A voice I strongly suspect belongs to a human with a scent like orange and ginger.

And now that Cleo’s taken command of the Bureau, it appears things are about to get very complicated for Ophelia here in Boston.

I look Vincent up and down. “Who are you to be handing out orders?”

He puffs his chest out, a poor imitation of the vampires I’m sure he thinks he can emulate. “I speak with Philippe and Marcus’s authority.”

Ah. That would explain the arrogance.

Give them a bit of power, these up-and-comers, and they run wild with it.

But Philippe’s always been good at illusions, and apparently he’s still as convincing as ever if he’s made this fool believe it was anywhere near his best interests to come and speak with me tonight.

I’m not in the mood to entertain any disrespect from my formerbrother’scoven, even if the fact that this idiot is here, issuing orders, confirms at least some of Blair’s suspicions about the role the covens might play in all of this—Philippe’s especially, with Cassandra’s warning to Cleo considered.

It’s my turn to chuckle, though there’s not an ounce of humor in the sound. “I very much doubt you do. Tell them if they have something to say to me, or Ophelia, they can say it themselves. Not send some lackey to do their bidding.”

He opens his mouth to continue arguing the point, but I have no patience for it. I have no patience for anything right at the moment, not with my irritation reaching its limit and the faintest stirrings of dread just beginning to unspool in my gutover the idea of Ophelia having found herself on the coven’s radar.

“Our conversation is at its end,” I tell Vincent, letting every bit of threat and authority I’ve made for myself these four hundred years seep into my voice. “I would suggest you accept that and leave.”

Another pulse of gratifying fear in his arrogant expression.

I don’t wait to see if he’ll make the sensible choice to heed that suggestion before turning and closing the distance to my car. I don’t even look at him as I slide into the driver’s seat and turn the ignition, peeling out of the lot.

I don’t spare him a single thought more, since mine are all currently occupied.

With a dull, humming sort of static clouding my good sense, I connect my phone to the car’s speaker system.

“Cas?”

“Change of plans,” I tell Serra. “I have something I need you to help me with tonight.”

I can almost hear her frown on the other end of the line. “Oh yeah, and what would that something be?”

“Perhaps I misspoke. Rather, there’s someoneI need you to help me find.”

7

Ophelia

It’s a banner fall afternoon in Boston.

Sun shining, streets bustling just after the noon hour, crowds thick on the downtown sidewalks as I watch the passersby through the window of the small record shop I’m loitering in.