The Long Way Down (Daniel Faust #1)(75)

The bartender jumped out from behind the bar to get in our way, holding up his hands. “Sorry folks, no admittance. Bathrooms are over—”

He froze, taking a stumbling step back as Caitlin flashed molten copper eyes at him. When she spoke, her teeth were too many, too sharp, for any human mouth.

“Move,” she hissed. She gave him a charming smile as we passed, wearing her human mask once more.

I’d been here enough times on business to know that we wanted the door at the end, the one with the placard reading Private and the best lock in the building. I gestured to the knob.

“Want me to pick that?”

Caitlin thought about it for a moment and shrugged.

“Nah.”

The door blasted open under the heel of her calf-high boot, swinging wide and slamming against the inner wall. Nicky, sitting behind an army-surplus metal desk and eating lunch, froze with a forkful of steak halfway to his mouth. Justine and Juliette leaped up from their chairs. The cambion twins flashed fangs as they hissed and crouched.

“Bitches leave,” Caitlin growled.

I stared at her. “Did…did you just quote Robocop?”

She gave me a wink before looking back across the office. Nicky nodded slowly.

“Do as she says, ladies,” he said. “I’ll be fine.”

“I don’t know if you can back that up,” I said, taking one of the chairs and dragging it over to the other side of his desk. The decor in Nicky’s office hadn’t changed since the seventies, just a cheap little hole-in-the-wall. You’d never know half the rackets in Vegas were run out of this room.

The twins slunk out the door. Justine paused on the threshold. Suddenly she leaped at Caitlin, fingernails hooked into claws, going for her eyes. Caitlin spun and grabbed Justine’s wrist in one hand and her hair in the other, using the cambion’s own momentum to force her down on her knees. Justine’s wrist bent back at a bone-grinding angle.

“Yield!” Justine gasped, gritting her teeth. “I yield!”

Caitlin kept the pressure on for a few more agonizing seconds before letting her go. Justine pushed herself up to her feet, rubbing her wrist, hovering on the verge of tears.

“I was just playing,” Justine whined. Juliette met her at the door, taking her sister in her arms and glaring daggers at Caitlin.

“She’s so mean,” Juliette said. “Why do you have to be so mean all the time?”

Caitlin shut the door in their faces. Dusting off her hands, she walked over to join us at Nicky’s desk.

“You have to excuse the girls,” Nicky said. “They’re a little, uh—”

“Sociopathic?” I offered.

“I was gonna say high-spirited, but sure, that works too.”

“Do you know why we’re here?” Caitlin asked.

“I know that when a cop asks you that, they want you to do their job for them. Pardon me if I don’t fall all over myself bein’ helpful. And what are you doing, Danny? You and the Wingtaker here, that’s a team-up I didn’t see coming.”

“I’ll tell you what I’m here for,” I said. “I’m here to save your ass.”

Nicky chewed a bite of steak, taking his time.

“That’s nice. You’d wanna do that why, exactly?”

“Because Lauren Carmichael is using you, and somebody else is playing her. There’s only one way this ends if you don’t listen to us. Badly.”

“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” Nicky said flatly, his gaze drifting toward Caitlin. “Don’t know any Lauren anybody. Never met her.”

“I’m going to say two magic words,” Caitlin said. She loomed over his desk with murder in her eyes. “I’ve never said them in my life, and you’ll likely never hear them again. Listening?”

“I’m all ears,” Nicky said.

“Transactional immunity.”

That got his attention.

“I’m still listening,” he told her, “but I’m maybe not entirely sure what you’re offering me immunity for.”

I leaned back in my chair. “Let me paint you a picture. Lauren needed help setting up Carmichael-Sterling Nevada. She was an out-of-towner with big ambitions, and you were the guy who could pull the strings and secure the permits to make the Enclave happen.”

“I help lots of people,” he said, “in exchange for a nominal commission fee of course. What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing. But while you were greasing her wheels, she figured out what you really are. She brought you in on her real scheme. Problem is, how do you stall five murder investigations? There’s always blackmail, but that’s so messy, and payback’s always a risk. Lauren figured it out, or maybe you did. Why not use the ring to snare a succubus? And you knew just the target, somebody who’s been a thorn in your side for a long, long time.”

Nicky gave Caitlin a nervous glance, but he held his tongue.

“You used Caitlin’s powers to turn Detective Holt into a pleasure junkie,” I said. “He danced to your tune so long as he got his daily fix. It was the perfect setup. Sitri’s hound was out of your way, you had a homicide cop on a leash, and Lauren’s crew was free to open the Etruscan Box. A ceremony which, I’m sure you know, would drag Prince Sitri out of hell and give Lauren the chance to enslave him. Coincidentally leaving his throne vacant and your father primed and ready for a power grab.”