Borderline (The Arcadia Project, #1)(75)

“How do you plan to get fey essence into an entire company without them knowing?”

“I buy businesses, a little side hobby of mine. My most recent acquisition is a water delivery service.”

“You’re going to drug everyone who works with you.”

“Oh, please, ‘drug’ them? This is not like those ridiculous poisons you humans are so fond of. It’s the actual arcane source of all human inspiration, and it has no side effects whatsoever. You call it norium; it’s native to Arcadia and finds your laws of physics amusing. But until now, its effects have only been available to people the Arcadian nobles and their Project lackeys deem worthy.”

“I don’t think it’s about worthiness,” I said. “It’s about bringing partners together, soul mates. This thing you’re doing . . . you’d be enslaving a few fey to inspire a bunch of strangers, all for your own profit.”

“My donors are willing. There’s nothing in the Accord that says fey can’t give or trade away their own essence. You see, fey have this idea, very strange to your people, that we may do with our own bodies what we please.”

“I thought spilled blood was a huge no-no.”

“There’s no ‘spilling’ involved here; there’s nothing accidental or violent about it. It’s all consensual and hospital clean.”

“Like what you did at Union Station? That kind of clean?”

Oh, the glory of that moment. Her face went blank with shock.

“Yeah,” I drawled a little smugly. “I probably should have mentioned earlier that I know you smuggled Rivenholt out of there. So where is he now?”

I watched her slowly adjust to the fact that I’d taken the reins of the conversation. “I can’t give him to Caryl,” she said. “My project doesn’t work without him.”

“Because you need him as leverage over Berenbaum.”

“Where are you getting this from?” She couldn’t hide her tension. It was exhilarating; she was terrified I knew something, knew everything.

“Is the Seelie Queen one of your ‘connections’ in Arcadia?” I asked. “Is she in on this with you?”

Vivian’s expression relaxed into one of baffled annoyance. “Of course not. I don’t even know her name; they change queens like underpants.”

“So it’s just coincidence that her agent showed up at the train station exactly when you did?”

She made a scornful sound. “No, it’s your fault the damned agent showed up. Who prints out an e-mail?”

Someone with an obsolete phone and memory problems. But I didn’t answer her; I was too busy trying to untangle -mental knots.

Vivian let out a sharp laugh. “You don’t even know why I was there, do you?” She smiled as she took back the reins. I don’t care how long she’d been living among us; there was nothing human about her smile.

“Trying to catch Johnny?” I guessed.

“Darling, I’m the hero of this story. I know I don’t look the part. But I was helping him. You were meant to spot him heading for the train. Then, at just the right moment, I was to make him disappear. Then we’d wrap things up here while Caryl wasted her time flying to New Orleans.”

“Wouldn’t she just call New Orleans and have them handle it?”

Vivian pretended to hold a phone to her ear, speaking in a fake raspy voice. “Hello, National Headquarters, this is Caryl, that teenager you put in charge of Los Angeles. I’m afraid I’ve lost a viscount.” She laughed. “No, no, you don’t know Caryl very well, do you? Anyhow, that damned faun stopped him before we could even set up the red herring.”

“So you weren’t working with Claybriar.”

“Darling, my allies are rare enough that I’m not likely to stand and watch one get beaten unconscious on a railroad track.”

That feeling again, like watching a duck turn into a rabbit. “That—that was Claybriar’s blood, then.”

Her smile vanished. “I thought—” She gave me a long look. “Oh God. You had no idea what happened at the station.”

“Not until you just told me.”

“A bluff!” She laughed nervously and ran a hand back through her hair. “Oh, we do need you, darling.”

“I’m supposed to believe Johnny beat the snot out of an agent of the Queen?”

“Don’t go making Johnny the villain either. He had no choice.”

“There’s always a choice.”

“No, darling, literally, he was under a compulsion. But I’m not going to explain that part. Suffice it to say he could not return to Arcadia, and Claybriar was going to force the issue.”

“Because Johnny abducted someone.”

“Ugh, no! Johnny hadn’t abducted anyone! And he told Claybriar as much. But he had broken the Accord, so Claybriar didn’t care. He went all Tommy Lee Jones about the whole thing.”

“How did Johnny break the Accord?”

“I’m not going to tell you that, either. But the penalty for Accord violations is death. Even trivial violations. Rivenholt had no choice but to get Claybriar out of the picture.”

“You mean kill him.”

“No, no, I’d never let someone die who could still be useful. You might want to keep that in mind as you’re considering my job offer.”