Smolder (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, #29)(22)

“I didn’t mean to affect Blake with it. I was told to try it out in the field gently if the chance arose.”

Dolph suddenly loomed over the other man, as if the extra inches had grown. He asked with each word enunciated almost painfully, as if losing control of his voice would be the precursor to losing control of other things. “What-did-you-do-to-Anita?”

McKinnon spread his hands out like he was showing himself unarmed. Neither Dolph nor I was buying it. “What the fuck did you do to me, McKinnon?”

“We have a coven of witches working with us. It’s supposed to be a spell to strip a vampire of its control over us, so it can’t work mind tricks. It wasn’t supposed to strip you of your control and make the vampire more powerful.”

“That was damn near gibberish,” I said.

“Agreed,” Dolph said.

“Try again, slowly and clearly,” I said.

McKinnon looked from one to the other of us, his arms a little more raised as if we’d asked to see his hands; that worked for me right now. “The witches said that the charm, or spell, I’m honestly not sure which is the correct term and since Blake does more magic than I do, I just want to be clear up front that I’m not up on the latest and greatest magical vocabulary.”

“Fine, the spell, or charm, is supposed to do what exactly?”

“Protect whoever is wearing it from vampires.”

“So will a holy item,” I said.

“Only if you’re a believer; you’d be surprised how many agnostics and atheists go into government work.”

“Not surprised,” I said.

“Keep talking, Pete.”

He looked up at one of his oldest friends as if he hadn’t expected Dolph to be on my side. Pete should have double-checked that before he invited himself to Dolph’s crime scene. “It was supposed to strip the vampire of their powers.”

“Strip them of what powers, exactly?” I asked.

McKinnon blinked at me like the question was hard. “Mind powers.”

“More specific,” I said.

“How specific?”

“No single spell or charm or whatever the fuck it is could cover every vampire power possible.”

“We know it won’t help with super strength or hearing or anything physical,” he said.

“I’m not even counting the physical stuff, so let me ask you one more time. What kind of powers is that damn thing you’re wearing supposed to strip away from a vampire?”

“Mind powers, like bespelling us with their eyes.”

“I damn near fell into Jean-Claude’s eyes just now like a newbie, so that didn’t work.”

“Sorry about that, and I did not mean to throw a monkey wrench in the wedding plans.”

“Thanks for telling the truth,” I said.

“If you’d canceled the wedding and lost the chance to make up with your dad, I’d never be able to look myself in the mirror again, Blake.”

“Good to know,” I said.

“What other vampire powers is the spell supposed to stop?” Dolph asked.

“The witches said . . .”

“Don’t throw the witches under the bus, McKinnon; you’re the one who tricked me into contacting Jean-Claude via mind like he and I were your guinea pigs when you just admitted you don’t understand the magic in the damn charm. This is on you.”

“Okay, okay, you’re right.”

Dolph said, “So what else is the charm supposed to do?”

“Vampire gaze protection, strip a vampire of its special power abilities.”

“What does that last part mean?” Dolph asked.

“Some vampires can cause panic in a crowd, or lust, or some secondary emotion, or even plant thoughts in a person’s head,” McKinnon said.

“Like a vampire telling a cop to shoot another cop and protect the vampire,” Dolph said.

“Yes.”

“We’ve all seen that happen,” Dolph said.

I nodded. We had.

“So why did it make Jean-Claude’s hold on Anita stronger?”

“I don’t know.”

“Why did it make me less able to fight off vampire powers?” I asked.

“I don’t know, but I’d say this is a spectacular failure of a field test,” McKinnon said.

“Ya think?” I said, glaring at him.

“So, you lied to Anita and me when you said if she used her phone to warn her people that your bosses would overhear it and get you in trouble?”

“No, that wasn’t a lie, I swear, but it’s the hate group’s online presence that I’d be more worried about. They have some serious hacker skills. We’ve found them places we . . . I can’t tell either of you but let’s just say unless your phone is encrypted as well as top-secret government lines, the hate group’s hackers will be able to listen in on any or all of the people in your network.”

I almost told them that actually we had some of the highest security that money could buy, thanks to finding out we’d been bugged a few years back. I didn’t know how it all worked, but I knew that people that Jean-Claude and Rafael paid to know this shit had assured us that within reason we were safe. The within reason was because hacking was a lot like torture; eventually every system and every person breaks. But the fact that we paid for that kind of specialty encryption and protection to our phones and everything else was not something to share with a government worker, especially not someone working for a committee that was spending our tax dollars on spells to use against vampires.