“Vilmas,” I said. “Don’t worry about it.” Gil shot me another glare that gently suggested we were going to add yet another bullet point to the presumably extensive list of things he was going to ye
ll at me about.
“Yeah,” Damien said, snapping his fingers, jogging his memories. He waved one huge hand across his face. “You wear it, right? And it gives you magic. Changes how you look.”
I cocked an eyebrow. “That’s not what I heard.”
“Like I said, we’ve got our own legends. Not all of them are accurate. Not all of them are going to be the same.” He leaned forward, close enough that I could smell the sweetness of beer on his breath. “I can tell you one thing, though. All the stories, they point to the same man. They say he was the one who owned it.”
“Who?” I asked. I held my breath, anticipating the answer.
“Uriah Everett.”
12
We collected Asher outside the Dead Dog soon after, peeling him away from Jackie. More accurately, though, we had to peel Jackie off of him. She’d taken quite a shine to the kid, which wasn’t too surprising. Asher could be charming as hell, on purpose or otherwise. He followed after us with a dazed smile, oblivious to the miniature storm brewing in the air between me and Gil.
“That was a travesty,” Gil said, as soon as we’d piled into the car.
I grumbled under my breath. “Your face is a travesty.”
He snarled, glaring at me, the heat pouring off his skin. “What did you just say to me?”
I turned the key in the ignition, ruffling my hair in frustration. “I don’t know, I’m tired, okay? And hungry. And kind of banged up from the fight.”
“The fight that you started unprompted,” Gil said. “We could have just talked things out. There was no need for a blood trial. I already told you that my kind had nothing to do with the killings. What was the point of that?”
I shrugged, starting to get annoyed all over again. “I don’t know. Some light exercise, I guess.” I could feel the sarcasm working its way back into my system. The tequila, that was long gone. Vampire metabolism and some water can do wonders. “Live a little. Carpe noctem. Seize the night.”
“You and your fucking carpe noctem.” He smashed his palm into the dashboard, grunting under his breath. “Be serious with me. I’m trying to talk to you here, Sterling. What if you’d lost?”
Not to be too offensive about it, but Gil was like a dog with a bone when it came to nagging me about nonexistent problems like my “smart mouth” and my “massive ego.” My fingers gripped the steering wheel like iron clamps. I was careful not to apply the same pressure to the gas pedal as I eased us out of the parking lot.
“But I didn’t lose, did I? Don’t pretend that we didn’t end up coming out better than before. We got what we wanted to know, and then some.”
“Yeah,” Gil said, gazing out the window, arms folded. “Like this Filigreed Masque you told me so much about.”
I sighed, breathing evenly to regulate my temper. No good driving angry. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about that, okay?”
Asher leaned in between the seats, poking his head into the conversation, a kid trying to break up a fight between his parents. “Tell him about what? Because you didn’t tell me nothing, either.”
I rotated my hand at the wrist as I rattled out the artifact’s properties. “Old enchanted relic, belonged to the guy who owned the pile of twigs we live in. Different accounts about what it does magically, and – um, and the Scepter of California wants it.”
“The Scepter of California?” You could taste the derision dripping from Gil’s voice. “Are you serious? I thought you told the vampire courts to take a hike? I thought you wanted to be left alone. What do you owe her?”
“I owe her nothing, but this is a great way to keep her off my back. We figure out what’s going on here, I hunt down the Filigreed Masque on the side. I turn it over to Vilmas, and voila – the Scepter’s appeased for another decade or so, and I won’t have the courts riding my ass. Win, win.”
Asher coughed softly. “You and this Vilmas guy, seems like you go way back.”
My fingers twitched, eager to reach for a cigarette. “Yeah. It’s complicated.”
Gil huffed. “The vampire court’s in town, we get in a fight with the Blood of Garm, and we still have zero leads. Complicated is one way to put it.”
“I’m still amazed that entire fight just happened out in the parking lot like nothing,” Asher said. “I love that they don’t care about passersby, or cops.”
“Of course not,” Gil said. “They’ve got a few wolves embedded in the department. Blood trials are off the books. Always have been.”
I squinted at the road, enthralled by the passing of what looked like such a generic skyline. Pines everywhere, on a loop. “I wonder if we can talk to the cops. I hate the idea. No way to make it look plausible. ‘Hi, we’re new in town, and we’d like to ask some questions about some serial killings, the latest of which happened in our backyard.’”