Bitter Blood (The Morganville Vampires #13)(116)

“Shane’s just trying to protect us! Oliver’s betraying you,” Claire blurted. “He’s working with—”

She didn’t have time for more. Oliver was right on her, hand gripping her throat as he lifted her effortlessly off the carpet until her feet dangled and kicked uselessly. She clawed at his hand, but he wasn’t going to let her breathe. Panic blinded her, smothered her, and all she knew for a few seconds was that she was going to die before she could make things right again with Shane.

Myrnin reached down, grabbed the silver-tipped bat, and hit Oliver right between the shoulder blades, hard enough to knock him off-balance. Claire was dropped to the carpet, where she whooped in a breath.

“Enough!” Amelie said. There was pale color high in her cheeks, and a furious red glitter in her eyes. “I’ve had enough of your foolish chatter and your betrayals. You come here unasked; you threaten my consort. I am done with you all. I’ve coddled you too long. I’ll start with you, Collins.”

She grabbed Shane by the shirt when he tried to dart out of her way, and pulled back her other hand, claws sharp and extended. In one more second, she’d do it. She’d kill him.

“No!” Claire shouted through her agonizingly sore throat. “He’s working with Naomi; Oliver’s going to kill you!”

The Founder froze, and for a second her eyes went entirely back to gray as she stared into Claire’s face, reading what Claire hoped was utterly the truth as she knew it.

And then Amelie let go of Shane and started to turn toward Oliver.

Oliver grabbed the bat out of Myrnin’s hands and swung it at the Founder’s head with deadly, blurring speed; even for a vampire, that blow would have been fatal if it had connected…but Amelie moved like water, flowing out of the way and taking Oliver’s arm as it passed, then twisting until the bat flew out of his grip. It shattered the windows beyond in an earsplitting crash, sending glass flying out into the night. The baseball bat whipped end over end to land almost a hundred feet away on the grass of the park below.

Amelie shoved Oliver face-first into the wall, pinned his arm behind him, and said, “Tell me why. Why?” She didn’t doubt it; Claire saw that. Oliver’s attempt to kill her had been clear enough. He cried out, and she twisted harder, though it was obvious from the expression on her face that she was hurting herself by hurting him. “Oliver, why do you betray me?”

He laughed. It was an awful, empty sound. “I don’t,” he said. “I was never loyal to you, you foolish woman. I’ve made a lifetime of toppling rulers. You’re only the latest, and the most rewarding.”

Amelie turned her head toward Claire and Myrnin. “He cannot be working with Naomi,” she said. “She’s dead.”

“Sadly, and convincingly, not,” Myrnin said. “I saw her with my own eyes. I am fairly certain Claire has her facts straight.”

“And where in God’s name have you been, then?”

“At the bottom of a pit,” he said. “Which accounts for my current state of dress. Although Shane assures me it is not so odd.”

Shane hadn’t made a sound, and he hadn’t moved; he’d probably judged, very rightly, that it was time to make himself a smaller target. From the way his lips tightened, he wished Myrnin hadn’t mentioned him at all.

But Amelie didn’t seem to care. She bent, picked up a silver-coated stake, and pressed it against the skin of Oliver’s neck, just above the spine—just enough to tint the skin and start it burning. “So go traitors,” she said. “In the old days, your head would have ended up as a decoration for a spike. I suppose I will have to settle for something less…satisfying.” There were tears in her eyes, then tears coursing down her pale, still face. “I trusted you, you traitor. I suppose I should have known better. I’ve never been lucky in love.”

“I never loved you,” he said. “Kill me. It changes nothing.”

“It changes everything,” she hissed. “You’ll not die yet. Not until you help me find my wayward sister. Then I will allow you to die. But not yet. Not yet.”

“Why wait?” said a low, sweet voice from the doorway, and they all turned—even Oliver—to see Naomi standing there, with Michael behind her. And Hannah Moses, carrying a crossbow with a heavy wooden bolt already in place. And more, behind her—humans and vampires alike. “Thank you, Claire. Sometimes a pawn is the very thing to use as a sacrifice to lure the queen from hiding.”

At Naomi’s regal nod, Hannah raised the crossbow and fired the bolt straight at Amelie.

It was impossible that it would miss, and it didn’t, but…something happened, a blur of movement Claire couldn’t understand until it was over, and Oliver was standing in Amelie’s place, swaying. The wooden bolt was in his heart.

He dropped to his knees, then collapsed.

Amelie was a blur, heading for the broken windows. Hannah had a second bolt in the bow, and Naomi grabbed the crossbow, aimed, and fired just as Amelie leaped out into the night air.

It hit her cleanly in the chest. Claire gasped and watched her tumble gracelessly down to crumple on the grass below.

“Satisfactory,” Naomi said. “Though I have no notion why Oliver chose to put himself in the way. Take them all to the cage. Now.”

Not even Shane tried to fight, this time.