Dark Lover

Chapter Seven

As Mr. X crossed the parking lot and headed for the Caldwell Martial Arts Academy, he caught a whiff of the Dunkin' Donuts across the street. That smell, that gorgeous, thick smell of flour and sugar and hot oil, was heavy in the morning air. He looked over his shoulder, watching as a man emerged with two white-and-pink boxes under his arm and a huge travel mug of coffee in his other hand.

That would be a nice way to start the morning, Mr. X thought.

Mr. X stepped up onto the sidewalk that ran beneath the academy's red-and-gold awning. He paused, reaching down and picking up a stray plastic cup. Its previous owner had been careful to keep an inch of soda in the bottom so his or her cigarette butts could enjoy floating around while they waited for someone else to throw them away. He pitched the nasty swill in the trash and unlocked the doors to the academy.

The Lessening Society had turned a corner in the war last night, and he was the one who had done the deed. Darius had been a powerhouse of a vampire, a member of the Black Dagger Brotherhood. One hell of a trophy.

It was a damn shame there was nothing left of the corpse to mount on a wall, but Mr. X's bomb had performed adequately and then some. He'd been at home, listening to his police scanner, when the report had come in. The op was everything he had planned it to be, perfectly executed, perfectly anonymous.

Perfectly deadly.

He tried to recall the last time a member of the brotherhood had been taken out. Well before he'd joined the society decades ago, certainly. And he'd expected to get a few pats on the back, not that such accolades motivated him. He'd figured he might even get a bonus out of it, maybe an expansion of his sphere of influence, maybe a greater geographic radius in which to work.

But the reward… the reward was more than he'd expected.

The Omega had paid him a visit an hour before dawn. And conferred upon him all the rights and privileges of Fore-lesser.

Leader of the Lessening Society.

It was an awesome responsibility. And exactly what Mr. X had been angling for.

Power granted was the only form of praise he was interested in.

Walking with long strides, he headed for his office. The first classes would start at nine, and there was plenty of time for him to lay down some of the new rules for his subordinates in the society.

His first instinct after the Omega had left was to send an announcement out, but that would have been unwise. A leader gathered his thoughts before he spoke; he did not rush to the podium to be adored. Ego, after all, was the root of evil.

So instead of crowing like a fool, he'd gone outside and sat down in a lawn chair, looking over the meadow behind his house. In the dawn's nascent glow, he'd reviewed the strengths and weaknesses of his organization and allowed his instincts to show him the way to manage both. From the tangle of images and thoughts, patterns had emerged, the future becoming clear.

Sitting behind his desk now, he signed on to the society's secured Web site and made it clear that a change in leadership had occurred. He ordered all lessers to come to the academy at four P.M. that afternoon, knowing that some would have to travel, but none was farther away than an eight-hour car ride. Anyone who did not show up would be excised from the society and hunted down like a dog.

Gathering the lessers together in one place was rare. At this time their numbers hovered in the fifty to sixty range, depending on the number of kills the brotherhood got in on any given night and the number of new recruits that were brought into service. The society's members were all in and around New England. This concentration in the northeastern United States was dictated by the prevalence of vampires in the area. If that population moved, so would the society.

As had been the way throughout the generations of the war.

Mr. X was aware that getting the lessers to Caldwell for an audience was critical. Although he knew most of them, and some of them rather well, he needed for them to see him and hear him and measure him. Especially as he redirected their focus.

Calling the meeting in the daylight was also important, as it would ensure they weren't ambushed by the brotherhood. And he could easily pass it off to the academy's human employees as a seminar on martial-arts technique. They would hold the gathering in the large conference room in the basement and lock the doors so they wouldn't be intruded upon.

Before he signed off, he posted an account of his elimination of Darius, because he wanted the slayers to have it in writing. He detailed the kind of bomb he'd used, the way to manufacture one from scratch, and the method for hardwiring the detonator into a car's ignition system. It was so easy once the thing was set. All you needed to do was arm it, and then the next time the engine was started, anyone in the car was turned to ash.

For that split second of payoff, he'd tracked the warrior Darius for a year, watching him, learning the rhythms of his life. And then two days ago, Mr. X had broken into the Greene Brothers BMW dealership when the vampire had sent his 6-series in for service. The bomb had been set, and then last night Mr. X had walked by the car and activated the detonator with a radio transmitter without missing a step.

The long, concentrated effort to set up the elimination was not something he shared. He wanted his lessers to believe he was able to execute such a flawless move on a whim. Image and perception played important roles in the creation of a power base, and he wanted to start building his command credibility right away.

After signing off, he leaned back in his chair, steepling his fingers. Ever since he'd joined the society, the focus had been on reducing the vampire population through civilian eliminations. This would remain his overall goal, of course, but his first decree would be a change in strategy. The key to winning the war was taking out the brotherhood. Without those six warriors, the civilians would be naked against the lessers, undefended.

The tactic was not a new one. It had been attempted in generations past and discarded numerous times when the brothers had proven either too aggressive or too elusive to be taken out. But with Darius's death, the society had momentum.

And they had to do something differently. As it stood now, the brotherhood was cutting down hundreds of lessers every year, requiring the ranks to be fed with new, inexperienced slayers. Recruits were trouble. They were hard to find, hard to induct into the society, and not as effective as seasoned members of the society.

This constant need to bring in new men led to a critical weakness for the society. Training centers like the Caldwell Martial Arts Academy served an important purpose in identifying and enlisting humans to join the ranks, but they were also points of exposure. Avoiding interference by the human police-and protecting against a siege by the brotherhood-required constant vigilance and frequent relocation. The moving around from place to place was disruptive, but how else could the society stay stocked and yet the centers of operation not be ambushed?

Mr. X shook his head. At some point he was going to need a second in command, though he wouldn't bring one on for a while.

Fortunately, nothing he was going to do was particularly complex. It was all basic military strategy. Marshal your forces. Coordinate them. Acquire information on the enemy. Advance in a logical, disciplined manner.

He was marshaling his forces this afternoon.

As for coordination, he was going to arrange them into squadrons. And he was going to insist the slayers start meeting with him regularly in small groups.

As for information? If they were going to take out the brotherhood, they needed to know where to find the brothers. This would be difficult, though not impossible. Those warriors were a cagey, suspicious lot who kept to themselves, but the civilian vampire population did have some contact with them. After all, the brothers had to feed, and it couldn't be off one another. They required female blood.

And females, even if most of them were sheltered like precious art, had brothers and fathers who could be persuaded to talk. With the proper incentive, the males would reveal where their womenfolk went and who they saw. And then the brotherhood would be revealed.

This was the key to his overall strategy: A coordinated program of capture and motivation, focused on civilian males and the rare female who was out and about, would eventually lead to the brothers. It had to. Either because the brothers became incensed that the civilians were being used so roughly and came out with all daggers flashing. Or because someone talked and their locations were divulged.

The best outcome would be to find out where the warriors spent their days. Taking them down while the sun was shining, when they were at their most vulnerable, was the course of action with the highest probability of success and the lowest likelihood of society fatalities.

All things considered, killing civilian vampires was only slightly more difficult than knocking out your average human. They bled if you cut them, and their hearts stopped beating if you shot them, and if you got them into the sunlight they burned up.

Killing a member of the brotherhood was a very different proposition. They were monstrously strong, highly trained, and they healed up fast, a subspecies all their own. You had one shot with a warrior. If you didn't make it mortal, you were not making it home.

Mr. X stood up from the desk, taking a moment to study his reflection in the office's window. Pale hair, pale skin, pale eyes. Before he'd joined the society he'd been a redhead. Now he couldn't remember what he'd looked like anymore.

But he was very clear about his future. And the society's.

He locked the door behind him and went down the tiled hall to the main arena, waiting by the entrance, nodding at the students as they came inside for their jujitsu lesson. This was his favorite class, a group of young men, ages eighteen to twenty-four, who showed a lot of promise. As the fleet of guys in white, belted jujitsu gis bowed their heads to him and addressed him as sensei, Mr. X measured each one, noticing the way their eyes moved, the way they carried their bodies, how their moods seemed.

With his students lined up and prepared to spar, he continued to look them over, always keeping an eye out for potential recruits to the society. He was searching for just the right combination of physical strength, mental acuity, and unchan-neled hatred.

When he'd been approached to join the Lessening Society in the 1950s, he'd been a seventeen-year-old greaser in a juvenile delinquent program. The year before he'd stabbed his father in the chest after the bastard had knocked him one too many times in the head with a beer bottle. He'd hoped to kill the man, but unfortunately his father had survived and lived long enough to go home and kill Mr. X's mother.

But at least dear old Dad had had the sense to blow his own head all over the wall with a shotgun afterward. Mr. X had found the body on a visit home, right before he'd been caught and thrown into the system.

On that day, as he'd stood over his father's corpse, Mr. X had learned that screaming at the dead wasn't even remotely satisfying. There was, after all, nothing to be taken from someone who was already gone.

Considering who'd sired him, it was no accident that violence and hatred were thick in Mr. X's blood. And killing vampires was one of the few socially acceptable outlets for a murder streak like his. The military was a bore. Too many rules, and you had to wait until an enemy was declared before you could get to work. And serial killing was too small-scale.

The society was different. He had everything he'd ever wanted. Unlimited funds. The chance to kill every time the sun went down. And, of course, there was that all-important opportunity to mold the next generation.

So he'd had to sell his soul to get in. That was not a problem. After what his father had done to him, there hadn't been much of it left anyway.

In his mind, he'd definitely come out on the money side of the trade. He was guaranteed to be young and in perfect health until the day he died. And his death would be predicated not on some biological failure, like cancer or heart disease, but on his own ability to keep himself in one piece.

Thanks to the Omega, he was physically superior to humans, his eyesight was perfect, and he got to do what he liked best. The impotence had bothered him a little at the beginning, but he'd gotten used to that. And the not eating or drinking… well, it wasn't as if he'd been a gourmand anyway.

Besides, making blood run was better than food or sex any day.

When the door to the arena opened abruptly, he shot a glare over his shoulder. It was Billy Riddle, and the guy had two black eyes and a bandaged nose.

Mr. X cocked an eyebrow. "You sitting out today, Riddle?"

"Yes, sensei." Billy bowed his head. "But I wanted to come anyway."

"Good man." Mr. X put his arm around Riddle's shoulders. "I like your commitment. Tell you what—you want to put them through their paces during the warm-up?"

Billy bowed deeply, his broad back going nearly parallel to the floor. "Sensei."

"Go to it." He clapped the guy on the shoulder. "And don't take it easy on them."

Billy looked up, his eyes flashing.

Mr. X nodded. "Glad to see you get the point, son."

When Beth walked out of her building, she frowned at the unmarked police car parked across the street. Jose got out and jogged over to her.

"I heard what happened." His eyes lingered on her mouth. "How you feelin'?"

"Better."

"Come on, I'm giving you a ride to work."

"Thanks, but I want to walk." Jose's jaw set like he wanted to argue, so she reached out and touched his forearm. "I won't let this scare me so badly that I can't live my life. I've got to walk by that alley at some point, and I'd rather do it for the first time in the morning, when there's plenty of light."

He nodded. "Fine. But you're going to call a cab at night or you're going to get one of us to pick you up."

"Jose—"

"Glad you see it our way." He walked back across the street. "Oh, and I don't suppose you've heard what Butch O'Neal did last night?"

She almost didn't want to ask. "What?"

"He paid a little visit to that punk. I understand the guy had to get his nose set again after our good detective was finished with him." Jose opened the car door and dropped down into the seat. "Now, are we gonna be seeing you today?"

"Yeah, I want to know more about that car bomb."

"Thought so. See you in a few." He waved and peeled away from the curb.

But by three in the afternoon, she still hadn't made it to the police station. Everyone in the office had wanted to hear about her ordeal, and then Tony had insisted they go out for a big lunch. After rolling herself back into her cubicle, she'd spent the afternoon chewing on Turns and dallying with her e-mail.

She knew she had work she needed to be doing, but finishing up the article she was drafting on those handguns the cops had found was just not happening. Not that she was under any kind of deadline. It wasn't as if Dick was in a big hurry to give her front-page space in the Metro section.

No, what he gave her was editorial work. The two latest pieces he'd dropped on her desk had both been drafted by the big boys, and Dick wanted her to fact-check them. Adhering to the standards he'd gotten familiar with at the New York Times by being a stickler for accuracy was actually one of his strengths. But it was a shame he didn't care about sweat equity. No matter how many red marks she made, she had yet to get a shared byline on a big boy article.

It was nearly six when she finished editing the articles, and as she dropped them in Dick's inbox, she thought about skipping the trip to the police station altogether. Butch had taken her statement last night, and there was nothing more she needed to do about her case. More to the point, she was uncomfortable with the idea of being under the same roof with her attacker, even if he was in a holding cell.

Plus she was exhausted.

"Beth!"

She winced at the sound of Dick's voice.

"Can't talk, I'm going to the station," she called out over her shoulder, thinking the avoidance strategy wouldn't put him off for long, but at least she wouldn't have to deal with the guy tonight.

And she did want to know more about that bomb.

She bolted from the office and walked six blocks to the east. The station house was typical of 1960s-era muni-architecture. Two stories, rambling, modern for its time, with plenty of pale gray cement and lots of narrow windows. It was aging with no grace whatsoever. Black streaks ran down its flanks as if it were bleeding from a wound in the roof, and the inside looked terminal as well. Nothing but nasty, chalky green linoleum, fake-wood-paneled walls, and chipped brown trim. After forty years of cleaning, the heartiest of dirt had moved into every crack and fissure, and the grime wasn't coming out without a spray gun or some toothbrush action.

And maybe a vacate order from the court.

The cops were really good to her when she arrived. As soon as she set foot in the building, they started fussing over her. After talking them down off the walls while trying not to get teary eyed, she went to dispatch and chatted with a couple of the boys behind the counter. They'd had a few folks brought in for soliciting or dealing, but otherwise it had been a quiet day. She was about to leave when Butch came through the back door.

He was dressed in a pair of jeans and a button-down and had a red windbreaker in his hand. Her eyes lingered on the way his holster crossed over his wide shoulders, the black butt of his gun flashing as his arms swung with his gait. His dark hair was damp, as if he were just starting his day.

Which, considering how busy he'd been the night before, was probably the truth.

He came right up to her. "You got time to talk?"

She nodded. "Yeah, I do."

They walked into one of the interrogation rooms.

"Just so you know, the cameras and the mikes are off," he said.

"Isn't that how you usually work?"

He smiled and sat down at the table. Linked his hands together. "Thought you should know that Billy Riddle is out on bail. He was sprung early this morning."

She took a seat. "His name's Billy Riddle? You're kidding me."

Butch shook his head. "He's eighteen. No priors as an adult, but I hacked into his juvie file and he's been a busy boy. Sexual assault, stalking, some petty theft. His dad's a big shot, so the guy's got one hell of a lawyer, but I talked to the DA. She's going to try to plea him hard so you won't have to testify."

"I'll take the stand if I have to."

"Good girl." Butch cleared his throat. "So how you doing?"

"I'm fine." She wasn't about to have Hard-ass play Dr. Phil on her. There was something about the radiant toughness of Butch O'Neal that made her want to appear strong. "Now, about that car bomb. I hear it was probably plastics, and the detonating mechanism was blown sky-high. Sounds like a professional hit."

"You eat yet tonight?"

She frowned. "No."

And considering what she'd pulled down at lunch, she should be skipping breakfast tomorrow morning, too.

Butch got to his feet. "Good. I was just going to hit Tul-lah's."

He walked over to the door and held it open for her.

She stayed put. "I'm not having dinner with you."

"Suit yourself. Guess you don't want to hear about what we found across the alley from that car, then."

The door slowly eased shut behind him.

She was not going to fall for this. She was not going to—

Beth leaped out of the chair and went after him.