Rocked by Love (Gargoyles, #4)(52)
“Come on. Sit.” Kylie urged him to a spot on the sofa opposite Knox and turned for the kitchen. “Just let me run and get you a plate. Be right back.”
Vic jumped to his feet like someone had just goosed his ass. “No!” He seemed to hear the panic in his own shout and cleared his throat before repeating much more calmly, “No, really, Kylie. I—I can’t stay.” He pulled a hand out of his pocket and held out a small red thumb drive. “Here. I cleaned up your image and saved it on here. Although next time I see you, you’re going to explain how you came across such crappy footage of Richard Foye-Carver at some kind of a candlelit social.”
Kylie had reached out to take the drive, but when she heard his joking words, her fingertips went numb. “Richard Foye-Carver?” she repeated dully.
“Yeah, not exactly his usual photo op.” Vic eased toward the hallway, keeping wary eyes on both Dag and Knox. “So, um, give me a call this weekend if you’ve got time for, you know, coffee or something. I’m speaking Sunday morning, but otherwise I’m pretty open.”
In the corner, Kylie could see Dag’s glowering expression and hear the subtle rumble of his muffled growl, but frankly, everything had sort of faded into the background with Vic’s news. Her mind kept trying to wrap around it as she walked her friend to the door, but every time she thought she had it, the slippery nugget of information would slide away.
Pasting on a poor imitation of a smile, she waved to Vic as he jogged down the steps and out into the night. Then she closed the front door, reset the alarm with trembling fingers, and slowly made her way back into the living room.
Wynn was the first to voice her thoughts. “Did that kid seriously just say the video is of Richard Foye-Carver? You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Oh, if only, Kylie thought, sinking back to her seat and gazing down at the small device in her hand. This opened an entirely different can of worms than the one she had been prepared for.
Richard Foye-Carver was a name most of the developed world would have recognized if they heard it. The scion of a wealthy family, Carver grew up in the world of international business and high finance, evolving over the years from young playboy to wealthy-in-his-own-right tycoon, to renowned philanthropist and human rights activist. He appeared regularly in news reports from one third-world location or another, shedding light on the sad plights of the world’s poor and persecuted.
And Kylie was supposed to accuse him of leading a cult of demon worshippers who were attempting to bring about the end of the world.
She could hear her bubbeh’s voice. A mensch tracht und Gott lacht. Man plans, and God laughs.
But really, did He have to make everything quite such a comedy?
From the sofa, Knox scowled. “This name holds meaning for you.”
Wynn snorted. “Yeah, a little bit. The guy is a famous international figure, known as being a champion of the little guy and an all-around pseudosaint.” She gave a brief potted biography of the man, ending with the thoughts that had already run through Kylie’s mind. “Not only would no one believe a word anyone spoke against the man, but getting near enough to stop him ourselves would be next to impossible. The man has his own private security team that’s probably better trained and certainly better equipped than the U.S. Army, and he never goes anywhere that the press doesn’t follow and film everything he does, darn near up to using the toilet.”
“It’s useless.” Kylie slapped the drive down onto the coffee table and glared at it. “Finding out his identity is essentially worthless to us. Yeah, we know who he is now, but we can’t do a darned thing with that information. We might as well not even have it.”
Dag stepped up behind her and crouched, his big body nearly surrounding her. “I do not agree with that,” he said, flicking the drive with one finger and making it spin. “You say it is impossible to get to this man, and I say there is no one who cannot be reached, especially when a Guardian is involved.”
“And I’m saying we couldn’t get to him if he were a normal human being without getting our heads blown off. That’s without even adding in the dangers that come from him being able to use black magic on top of everything else.”
He tilted his head a bare inch. “That does make things a bit trickier.”
Kylie opened her eyes wide and turned to Wynn. “Their heads really are made of rocks, aren’t they?”
“No.” Wynn defended her fiancé and his brother, laying her hand on Knox’s knees. “Well, maybe sometimes.”
The big Guardian frowned down at his witchy mate. “You doubt my ability to assassinate one member of the Order? When I have another of the brethren at my side? I take issue with this insult.”
“It’s not an insult,” Kylie said. “It’s an observation based on known data.” When both gargoyles would have protested, she held up a hand. “Give it a rest, guys. No one is questioning your kick-ass macho fighting skills. Chill.”
Wynn murmured her agreement, and the Guardians settled back but continued to look disgruntled. Of course, they almost always looked disgruntled, so Kylie ignored it.
Along with the images that flashed through her mind of the one occasion when she’d seen Dag looking a long, long way from disgruntled.
She cleared her throat.
Now that the initial shock of Vic’s revelation had passed, she forced herself to get a grip and do what she always did—figure out what came next. “Okay,” she said, as her foot started bouncing under the coffee table. “We just need to regroup a little and figure out where we really stand. So what do we know?”