Death's Mistress (Dorina Basarab, #2)(34)

A handsome young Asian guy burst through the door energetically enough to send the lock flying. He was in the black jeans, boots and muscle shirt of a bouncer, the latter untucked to hide the gun at his back. He started to say something, then stopped, gaping. His eyes flicked from the body on the floor to the head in the sink, then back to the body. His mouth dropped open.

“Don’t just stand there!” Raymond spluttered. “Kill her!”

The vamp jumped at the sound of a voice coming from the gory head, but his eyes obediently made the rounds again, looking for a target. And passed over me without so much as a pause. He saw me, but assumed I was human, which put me in the same threat category as the paper towel dispenser.

I gave a little wave. “Dhampir,” I added helpfully.

He blinked and finally focused on my face. He took in the delicate bone structure I inherited from my human mother, the dimples I received from the iffier side of the gene pool and my unimpressive height. “You are not!” He sounded almost offended.

“No, really.”

“You don’t look like a dhampir!”

“You’ve met one?”

“No, but . . . a dhampir would be taller. And you’d have a tail.” His eyes flicked downward for a second, and he looked almost disappointed at my human-looking butt.

“That’s a myth,” I told him gently.

He still looked skeptical, so I flashed my tiny fangs. They’re vestigial in my kind, since we don’t drink blood, but they got the message across. His eyes widened, and he retreated a step before he caught himself. “Dhampir!”

“Out of curiosity, what did you think had decapitated the boss?” I asked, as he went for his gun. I’d expected that, and mine was out before he’d completed the gesture. The reflexes aren’t a myth, or I’d have been dead a long time ago.

He looked at my Glock. It’s a .45. He’d pulled out a tiny little .22.

“Size really does matter,” I observed, and he scowled.

“Oh for—Go get help!” Raymond ordered.

The vamp’s eyes shifted back to his master, and some of his initial panic returned. “But sir. Lord Cheung is here!”

“What?” Raymond suddenly looked more freaked out than when I’d decapitated him. “But he’s not due until midnight!”

“I believe his plane arrived early.” The vamp’s eyes kept flicking back and forth between the two parts of the boss, as if unsure which one he should be addressing. He finally settled on the head. “He commands your presence, sir.”

“Oh, shit! Oh, shit!” Now Raymond was the one looking around wildly.

“What’s your master doing here?” I demanded.

But Ray wasn’t listening. “If he’s here early it must mean—Oh, shit!” His body gave a sudden heave and wrenched itself off the floor, only to stumble into the side of the sink, slip on some blood and go back down.

“Must mean what?”

“That you’re too late! He’s going to kill me before the Senate gets the chance!”

“That’s why you were cowering in the bathroom?” For once, I hadn’t had to go round the perp up. He’d already been in here when I arrived. I’d thought it convenient, but I had wondered. It’s not like vamps actually need to use the facilities.

He shot me a purely venomous look. “I wasn’t cowering! I needed someplace quiet to think. To figure out how—” His lips abruptly snapped shut, and those pale eyes narrowed on my face.

I sighed. Why did I get the feeling that this nice, easy assignment had just gone pear-shaped? “And your master wants to kill you because . . . ?”

“There may have been a slight . . . misunderstanding . . . about some merchandise.”

“You stole from the vampire mafia?”

“Something was misplaced, and it wasn’t my fault!”

“Of course not.”

“Look, all you need to know is that—” He stopped, staring past me at the guard. “What are you doing?”

The vamp looked at the gun he’d aimed at my head. “I’m going to kill her?”

Raymond rolled his eyes. “Oh, for the love of—Can you at least try to keep up?”

The vamp lowered the weapon and stood there looking awkward.

“What do I need to know?” I prompted.

“That there’s not one portal,” Ray said hurriedly. “There’s a whole network, and I know where they are. Well, most of them. More than you’re likely to find on your own—that’s for sure. You get me out of this, and I talk. You leave me here and I die, and don’t think you’re going to find anyone else to squeal!”

Great. I should have known Mircea wouldn’t give me two easy jobs in a row. But this was going to be a real bitch. For one thing, it meant I couldn’t leave the body behind as I’d planned. Ray was already decapitated; all his master had to do to be rid of him was to stake the heart. And a lumbering corpse was going to be a bit harder to hide than a head in a bag.

And for another, there was Cheung. The job had been to kidnap a fifth-level screwup, not to face a first-level master and who knew how many subordinates. The only smart thing to do was to wish Ray good luck and get the hell out.

And that was exactly what I would have done, except I didn’t think Mircea was going to be too pleased if I showed up empty-handed. I needed this job and I needed his help. I was going to have to come up with something.