Linda Robertson - Wicked Circle

Menessos considered it. “No. I trust Risqué. The only unease I feel stems from not knowing where my Erus Veneficus is.”

Johnny was dreaming. He was racing across white sand toward a giant clock. As he neared, he could tell the brass disk at the bottom of the pendulum was taller than he was. He gauged the swing of it. The ticktock beat was much too fast, cluing him in that time was running out as more and more sand gushed from the base of the clock, raising it higher, farther away. He had to get through!

Only a few feet from the pendulum, he felt the rush of wind in its wake. He planted his foot and it sank in the sand more than he expected. He had to lift his other leg high and fast to step up onto the clock’s base. The ticks and tocks were so loud here.

Momentum carried him into the path of the pendulum—

His eyes opened.

He still heard ticking.

His nostrils filled with the scent of the cement beneath him. Cement ? He was in the den. In a kennel. Memory of the rooftop rushed back to him. Red—

He sat up—and spotted the source of the ticking.

A woman was striding toward him, carrying a file. The tips of her heels were clicking on the cement floor. She was blond and wore a trim lavender business suit with a too-short-for-the-office skirt. She had shapely legs, and her pace was lithe and unhurried.

She also smelled of wærewolf.

Johnny stood.

“Good morning, sire. I’m Aurelia, your assistant and Zvonul liaison.”

Her voice was warm and friendly. Too friendly. She assessed him up and down, and Johnny became more aware of his nakedness.

“You had a rough night.” Her gaze fell to something in the cage behind him.

The remnants of a side of beef lay on the floor. The hay that was supposed to be in this kennel was piled up at the edges, pushed into the adjacent kennels.

He remembered agony, a pain like he was being eaten alive from the inside out. He recalled thrashing about and howling. What the hell?

Red!

Mind racing, he recalled all that he’d done and her reaction. I’ve fucked everything up. God damn it. I knew I shouldn’t trust myself. . . . I’ve failed. I failed me, but worse, I failed her.

“Let’s acquaint ourselves in your office,” the woman said. “After you’re dressed.”

Ten minutes later, Johnny had collected himself, mostly, and entered his office, dressed in black jeans and an Ozzy Osbourne concert tee. A tray rested on his desk, a plate with an insulated cover not restricting the aroma of the bacon and eggs underneath. There was also coffee, milk and orange juice.

He ignored it all, sitting and picking up the phone in one motion. He was punching in Persephone’s number when his new assistant walked in. “Aurelia—”

“You may call me Aury, if you like.”

“I have a few things to take care of first. Then I’ll see you.”

She sat across from him. “I can wait.”

“Do it somewhere else.”

Aurelia crossed her long legs unhurriedly. “You want to make sure that I understand I am not your top priority. I get it, Mr. Newman. But please try to remember I work for the Zvonul and am here to aid you.”

He tore his eyes from her thighs and said, “Aurelia, I don’t play games. If I say I have other things to do, I do. It’s not a show meant to put you in your place.”

“Then you need me more than you think you do.”

Johnny shoved the receiver onto the cradle. “You will wait somewhere else.”

“Pout, pout.” She strutted out.

Kirk appeared in the doorway but directed a whistle after the leggy blonde who’d just passed. “Dude. It’s good to be the king.”

Johnny couldn’t stifle the single laugh at the movie reference. “What do you need?”

“It’s William. He’s awake, but he’s not responding. Beau’s calling an ambulance.”

“Send someone with him.”

“Renaldo is still here.”

“He’ll do.”

Kirk left, calling out, “Hector wants you to call him.”

Johnny picked up the phone again and punched in the number for Seph’s satellite phone.

She didn’t answer. When the voice mail picked up, he couldn’t bear to leave a lame recorded apology. He hung up and dialed the house number.

No one answered that either.

Jaw clamped, he dug out his cell phone and found the number for Menessos. He couldn’t call that—the sun was up and the vamp was tucked in with his dirt bag—but a secondary listing was that of the haven. He called that number.

It rang and rang without going to any kind of message service. Pissed and worried, Johnny let it ring. There had to be some Offerlings or Beholders around somewhere.

Finally, someone picked up. “Hello?”

“Ivanka?”

“Da.”

“This is Johnny. Where’s Persephone?”

“Who?”

“The Erus Veneficus.”

The heavy sigh that answered him made his stomach ice over. “I know the shabbubitum were there last night. What happened, and where is Seph now?”

“No idea.”

Great. I need to know what’s happening and I get the one person in the haven who can barely speak the language and isn’t big on details. “What do you mean you don’t know? What happened?”

“She mark our boss two times. She Make him like Offerling to her.”

An awful thought occurred to him. “Did the shabbubitum take her?”

“They try.”

“Ivanka. Tell me what happened!”

“She fly away on broom. Creature pursue her. Neither come back.”

He stood. Damn this den for its concrete walls that block cell phones! I could be on my way to my car— “Who’s out searching for her?”

“All Beholders. All Offerlings.”

“Did they check her house?”

“Mountain already there.”

Right. Duh. “Write down these numbers . . . ready?”

“Wait . . .”

Johnny groaned impatiently.

“My arm broken. Be patient or I no write number.”

Be nice to the Offerling you want to call you if they find anything out. “What happened to your arm?”

“Strange man at E.V.’s house. Bastard snap like twig.”

“When? Yesterday?”

“Da.”

No wonder Red was acting so weird when she came to do the ritual. Then I— The guilt he felt was so sharp he cut off the words before he could even think them. He gave Ivanka the numbers. “Call if you learn anything, but I’m on my way over there. I’ll get some of my men organized and we will help with the search.”

“No. Stay away. Forget her.”

“Ivanka—”

“E.V. betray us. She betray you, too.”

The phone went dead.

This wasn’t right. He had to do something. He had to go and find her—

He couldn’t ditch the press conference. The Zvonul had set it up, and if he was a no-show he’d be getting his “kinghood” off to a terrible start, discrediting the Zvonul and making wærewolves everywhere look unreliable.

I have a few hours. I can search a while and then go to the announcement.

He had just hung up the receiver when Aurelia reappeared in the doorway with her arms folded over her chest, the file dangling to the side by her fingertips. “It’s nine o’clock. We have six hours until your press conference. We have to find you a suit and write a brief speech. We have to have your security team assembled and briefed. We have to scout the location and pinpoint the best positions for security placement before the reporters begin arriving, and they do tend to be early, vying to gain the best vantage point for their cameras. So can we get started while there’s still a chance to pull this off and look professional?”