Steal the Night (Thieves #5)(71)

The Italian seemed to count in his head. “Four, no, I’m forgetting that little blonde, so five. With so few to see to my needs, I was forced to send the men in my retinue away.”

“You had five women and you couldn’t share?” I asked, a little shocked.

Marcus waved away the thought. “That is a perverse impulse of Daniel’s.” His lips turned up in a naughty smile, and I was actually happy that Marcus hadn’t let our deep talk from yesterday affect our weird flirtation. I would have missed it. “Of course, cara, I would put aside my distaste for sharing if it means getting my fangs into you.”

I put a hand on my hip. “I’ll let you know the next time I’m accepting applications.”

“You do that,” Marcus replied, invading my space a little. Vampires liked to do that. “Now, you will explain to me why you are down here when you should be upstairs doing your hair or taking tea.”

He got the full force of my index finger poking right into those rock-hard pecs of his, that I was pretty sure he’d done nothing to earn. “You see, Vorenus, every time I start to like you, you just have to turn into a caveman. I’m not taking tea while we’re in the middle of a war. And my hair looks fine.”

“Actually,” Neil piped up, “it could use a flat iron.” I moved that pointy finger in his direction and he quickly backtracked. “Or we could go wavy. Whatever you like, Z.”

Diana looked from Marcus to me, and I could see she was confused as to which one of us had the real power here. She’d been more than amenable when I had asked her to let me in to speak to the prisoner, but now I could see she was faltering. Marcus was a Council member. Women in vampire society didn’t have a ton of power. I needed to establish dominance and I needed to do it quickly.

“Diana, please open the door,” I ordered, my voice a flat monotone that brooked no disobedience.

Marcus’s mouth was a stubborn line of disapproval. “Diana, you will leave the prisoner for the king. The queen has not been trained in methods of interrogation. She will not interfere.”

“Do you think she can’t form a question, Vorenus?” Lee asked, rolling his chocolate eyes.

“I’m sure she would come up with brilliant questions,” Marcus replied sarcastically. “But I have no intention of allowing my queen in the room with a soldier who tried to kill her. You should be fired for standing by and almost allowing her to go through with this insane plan, wolf.”

“Oh, he’s not just standing by,” I commented. “It was his plan in the first place.”

“And I didn’t try to kill her,” a voice pointed out from behind us. “That was Yuri, the wanker, and the faery already blew his brains to hell and back.” Terry stared through the bars of his little prison. He was calm and collected and seemed to be entertained by the show we were putting on.

“We don’t need anything from you,” Marcus snarled in his direction.

“Seems like you do, mate,” the soldier replied casually. “If it helps anyone make a decision, I’ll talk to Mrs. Quinn there.”

“Donovan, she is Mrs. Donovan,” Marcus insisted.

“How about you just call me Zoey.” I wanted to avoid my unfortunate last name problems. I’d come up with the perfectly reasonable plan of keeping my own last name to avoid confusion, but no one would use it.

“Right, Zoey,” the Aussie said. “What kind of questions have you got for me?”

“Diana, if you would please.” I gestured toward the door. She hesitated. “What were your instructions regarding me? I’m not trying to be a bitch, but I assume you were told to obey me, not to only obey me if Marcus says it’s all right.”

Marcus cursed as Diana slipped the key in the door. He seemed to understand I wasn’t budging, so he did what he could. “You will step back, prisoner. Take a seat at the table and keep your hands where we can see them. You will not lay a hand on Her Highness or I will rip your throat out. Is that understood?”

Terry’s eyes were solemn as he backed off with his hands in the air. He sat down in the chair Marcus indicated but kept his hands carefully within our sight. Diana opened the door and Marcus shoved me back, demanding to go in first. I heard Lee say something about vampire drama queens and then he escorted me inside.

Marcus stood over the prisoner, intimidation oozing from his pores. “Soldier, I am…”

“Marcus Vorenus, a venerable member of the Vampire Council, third in line to head, Louis Marini after Niko Rallis and Elof Magnussen. You’re Daniel Donovan’s patron,” Terry started reciting from a file he had probably memorized. “You were born in Rome in 50 AD to parents who were some of the first followers of a prophet named Jesus Christ…”

“Yes, we can see you’re well informed,” Marcus interrupted Terry’s interesting lecture. I could tell he was a little disconcerted. It had probably been a long time since he thought about his parents.

“Not well enough, it seems,” Terry murmured, looking at me in a different light. He bowed his head slightly. “Your Highness, I apologize for my earlier casualness. The Order didn’t believe Mr. Donovan was really a king. It’s been a long time since the vampires had a king and even longer since they had a queen.”

I sat down and sent Marcus a dirty look. “Yes, well, I wasn’t going to mention that since I have no idea what your ties to Vampire are. You could be a spy for Marini for all we know.”