Chaotic (4 page)

W
ere the blood drops still wet?
I almost reached up to one before snatching my hand back. Look, don’t touch, stupid. Standing on my tiptoes, I moved the light closer to the specks. They glistened. Still wet, but drying.

I swung the beam to the floor and found faint smears of blood that would go undetected until they turned on the lights in the morning . . . or noticed they were one security guard short.

So where was . . . ? Follow the trail.

I stopped at a door a few yards away. Tissue over my hand, I turned the knob.

I half-expected a body to fall out on top of me. Too many horror movies, I guess.

The door opened into an office. I shone my flashlight around. Nothing.

As the door closed behind me, I grabbed it and twisted the knob, to make sure it wouldn’t lock me inside. Reassured, I eased the door shut, and moved toward the center of the room.

As I walked, I picked up a twinge of trouble. Yes, this had to be the right place. So where was the . . . ?

A booted toe protruded from behind the desk. I hurried to it. The desk faced the wall, with a wide gap for computer cord access behind it, and that’s where the killer had stuffed the body. One end of the desk was against the adjoining wall and the other against a metal filing cabinet, so I had to crawl onto the desk to peer behind it.

I shone the flashlight beam into the gap, and bit back a yelp.

I resisted the urge to pull away. With something like this, I was sure the council would expect a report, so I had to get a good look.

A man lay faceup in the gap. His eyes stared at me, wide with that last minute of “I don’t believe this is happening” horror. His security uniform shirt was a mess of gaping holes, the edges torn, shredded, unlike anything a knife would do. The flesh beneath the holes looked . . . mangled. Chewed. It looked as if he’d been—

A hand clamped over my mouth.

“Found something you were missing?” a voice hissed.

I kicked backward. My foot connected, but a second arm clamped around my neck, and yanked me off the desk. It spun me around, and I found myself looking into a pair of blue eyes so cold and hard that my heart leaped into my throat. Karl Marsten.

“Did you think I wouldn’t smell the body when I walked by?” His voice was as cold and hard as his eyes, all traces of smooth charm gone. “You would have been wiser to let me leave through the front door.”

I pulled back my fist and plowed it toward his gut. He caught my hand easily and squeezed. Tears of pain sprang to my eyes.
Oh God, you stupid, stupid—

He brought his face down to mine, and the thought dried up.

“I’m going to let go,” he said, his voice calm. “If you scream, I will crush your fingers. Do you understand?”

I blinked back tears and nodded. He took his hand from my mouth and released the other one just enough to stop the throbbing pain, but still gripped it so tightly that I didn’t dare even try to wiggle my fingers.

“I will only ask you this once,” he said. “Who do you work for?”

“The—I told you—the—”

“Interracial council,” he interrupted. “Is that so? Then tell me, which delegate of the council hired you?”

“I was approached by a representative—”

“Which delegate?”

“He’s not a delegate. He works for them.”

He exhaled, as if in frustration. “All right, then. Which delegates have you met?”

“None. I only work through my contact—”

He cut me off with a humorless laugh. “Oh, they have you well trained, don’t they? I’m sure this story has worked well for you in the past, but it falls a little flat when dealing with someone who actually knows the interracial council, knows most of the delegates, and knows, beyond any doubt, that they do not have employees or recruits or ‘agents’—”

A noise from the hall. Voices. Marsten half-turned, his attention diverted just long enough for me to ram my spiked heel into his shin and wrench my hand free.

He grabbed for me. I kicked and lashed out at the same time, my nails clawing his face. He fell back. I ran for the door, threw it open, and raced into the hall.

A split-second decision: run toward the voices or away from them? Running to them might have been safer, but I couldn’t—wouldn’t—endanger others. I’d already underestimated Marsten once.

I tore down the halls. Marsten’s soles squeaked behind me as he wheeled out of the office. That reminded me that he was in flat dress shoes . . . and I was in heels—with no hope of outrunning him.

I grabbed the first doorknob I came to. Locked.

I dove for the one across the hall. As my fingers closed around it, I saw Marsten running toward me. The handle turned. The door opened. I darted through, and slammed it.

Even as I turned the lock, I knew I might as well not have bothered. It was a flimsy household privacy lock, one that could be snapped by any strong man, let alone a werewolf.

I reached for my purse but it wasn’t on my shoulder. It must have fallen when Marsten yanked me off the desk. No purse . . . no gun.

Marsten’s footsteps had slowed to a walk. Of course they had; he didn’t need to hurry. I’d trapped myself in an office with no second door, no windows, no way to escape.

Blockade the door.

The council backup team was on the way. If I could slow Marsten down long enough to call Tristan—

The footsteps stopped inside the door. The handle turned.

Someone laughed—the sound close by—and the handle stopped turning. A drunken giggle. A voice, growing closer.

I grabbed the sides of the metal filing cabinet. It didn’t budge. The printer stand? Like that would slow down a werewolf.

“Oh,” someone said near the door. “Didn’t see you there.”

“Unless you’re staff, this hall is off limits,” Marsten said.

“Oh, right, we were just—”

“Lost,” the woman giggled.

“Then I suggest you turn around, go back to the end of the hall, and follow the sounds of the party. You can’t miss it.”

I looked around for something to block the door, but anything big enough was too heavy for me to move. Outside, the man was telling Marsten to mind his own business, but his companion was already moving away, and calling to him to do the same. No time to phone Tristan. I needed—

My gaze rose to the ventilation shaft over the desk.

Oh please. You
have
seen too many movies.

I silenced the inner voice, and climbed onto the desk as Marsten threatened to call security. As much as I appreciated the distraction the couple was providing, I prayed they moved on before Marsten gave up trying to handle them discreetly.

As the woman cajoled her partner away, I quickly unscrewed the ventilation cover with a quarter from a dish of coins on the desk.

“I’m coming, I’m coming,” the man slurred, then muttered a parting obscenity at Marsten.

As the man’s footsteps faded, I yanked on the cover. One side came free. I tugged again, but the other side caught.

The footsteps were almost gone. Palms sweating, I fumbled for a better hold. The cover popped off with a
ping
that I was sure could be heard throughout the museum. I shoved the cover into the shaft, grabbed the edges, heaved, and managed to get inside up to my breasts. Then I found myself stuck, upper torso in, butt hanging out, legs flailing, arms trembling with the strain of just holding myself up, with no extra strength for hauling the rest of me through.

Goddamn it! I’d been spending three evenings a week at the gym, and I couldn’t do better than this?

The door handle turned.

Shit, shit, shit! I’d never make—

“And another thing, asshole,” the man’s voice boomed from the end of the hall.

One last push, boosted by a wave of relief, and I heaved the rest of my torso into the shaft.

“Come on, Rick!” the woman called. “Do you want me to go back to the party?”

I wriggled and twisted, getting my legs in and my body turned around so I was facing the shaft opening. I tugged the cover from under me, hooked my fingers through the slats, and pulled it into place just as the doorknob twisted, and the lock snapped.

Marsten threw open the door, fast—as if he expected me to be standing there armed with a heavy stapler. Door wide, he paused in the opening, gaze tripping across the room, nostrils flaring.

Nostrilsflaring . . . Werewolf . . . He could smell me.

Damn it! I tried to twist around. My shoulder knocked against the metal. A dull thump, but he heard it. Of course he heard it.

Werewolf. Heightened smell, heightened hearing, heightened strength . . .

I knew all this, so why did I keep forgetting until it was too late? I was out of my league. Way out of it, and I would pay for my hubris—

“Let’s make this easy,” he said, his smooth mask back in place. “You don’t want to play hide-and-seek with me. I have all the advantages, and a low tolerance for frustration. So we’ll skip the games. If you feel safer in your hidey-hole—” He scanned the room. “You’re welcome to stay there. You can hear me, and that’s all that matters.”

He turned slowly, searching for me even as he said he wouldn’t. Bastard.

I shifted my shoulders, testing my space limits again. Too tight. I’d been able to turn around with the vent open but, without that added space, I was stuck. No, not stuck. I could move backward. Awkward, slow, and probably loud, but if it came to that, I would. He’d barely fit in here—if at all—so I could still move faster than he could.

“Whoever you are, you’re of no interest to me,” he continued. “That means I have no particular desire to hurt you. So you have a choice. Tell me who you’re working for, and I’ll step aside and let you out this door. Refuse, and I’ll use you for leverage. That’s not a position you want to be in.”

I stayed still and quiet.

“I don’t have all night,” he said. “Nor do you. When I hear your associates approach—which I’m sure will be soon—I’ll sniff you out, and the choice will be made. After that, whether you walk out of here depends on how willing your employer is to negotiate.”

I said nothing. As he moved, his nostrils flared, still searching. Then he stopped and smiled. His gaze lifted to the ventilation shaft.

“Ah, there you are.”

A quick leap and he was on the desk. As he pulled off the cover, I scrambled backward. I got about five feet before my shoulders hit the sides, stopping me. While I struggled to back up, he peered into the shaft and smiled, his teeth glinting in the dark.

“I do believe you’ve backed yourself into a corner.”

I wriggled, but the shaft had narrowed, and the more I moved, the tighter I wedged myself in.

“Are you going to tell me who you work for?” he said.

“I already did,” I snarled.

“And I told you, I know better.” His voice was calm, conversational, no trace of the cold fury from earlier. “You’re obviously a bright young woman, and quite capable of thinking on your feet, as you proved earlier, so why you insist on sticking to this story—”

“Don’t bother. I know who I work for, and nothing you say is going to make me second-guess that—or betray them.”

He lifted his hand to his mouth and rubbed it, his gaze searching mine.

“You didn’t kill that security guard, did you?” he said.

“Kill—!” I gritted my teeth. “We both know who—and what—killed him, so don’t try pinning that on me.”

“That spot on your dress. I suppose you’ll tell me it isn’t blood.”

I snorted. “It’s the marinara sauce from the damn mussels you threw at me in the buffet line.”

“I
threw
—?”

He rubbed his mouth and growled. Or I thought it was a growl, until I saw his eyes dancing and realized he was laughing.

“All right. Here.” He reached into the shaft. “Come on out of there. I believe we both have a problem, and we’d best set about resolving it before your ‘associates’ arrive.”

“You really think I’m a fool, don’t you?”

He tilted his head, as if considering it. “A fool? Young, yes. Reckless, yes. Naïve, probably. But foolish? No. Not foolish. You—”

A sound from the hall. A door opening, then closing. He swiveled, his eyes narrowing as if tracking something I couldn’t hear. His gaze shot to the door handle and he mouthed a silent oath.

“Couldn’t lock it, could you?” I said. “That’s the problem with breaking things. They tend to stay broken.”

He shushed me, grabbed the vent cover, and knocked it back into place. Then he peered through the slats and whispered, “If you want to find out whether I’m lying—and I think you do—stay there and stay quiet.”

M
arsten jumped off the desk and was halfway
to the door when it opened. Two men strode in, guns in hand. Part of the council security force. I recognized both from other operations.

I crawled forward, ready to push open the vent. Then I stopped, palms against the cover. I didn’t need to eavesdrop to know Karl Marsten was full of shit. I heard the web of lies he’d spun when I’d first confronted him with the theft. He’d say anything to get out of this—to use me to get out of it. Yet there was reason to stay up here, hidden and silent, the perfect position to watch Marsten, and make sure he didn’t try anything. Or that’s what I told myself.

A man strolled in. Mid-thirties, average height and slightly built, with light brown hair and a delicate, almost feminine face. Tristan, my council contact.

“Ah, Karl,” he said. “I didn’t know you were a patron of the arts.”

“Tristan Robard,” Marsten said. “I’d say I should have known, but I’d be lying. After the last time, I thought you’d have the sense to leave me alone. I guess I overestimated you.”

Tristan’s eyes narrowed. “I should give you credit, though,” Marsten continued. “You have quite a clever setup here. And your young agent. Well done. A beautiful young woman lays the most irresistible traps and, it seems, even I’m not immune.” He paused. “Aren’t you going to ask where she is?”

“Not terribly worried.”

Marsten smiled. “Oh, but you should be. The one problem with using beautiful young women as bait? They make equally irresistible hostages.”

“So you have her.”

As Marsten nodded, I opened my mouth to call out and let Tristan know I was safe—

Tristan smiled. “As I said, not terribly worried.”

I blinked, but shook it off. Of course Tristan would say that. He was a skilled negotiator. He wouldn’t let Marsten know he had leverage.

“I don’t think your superiors will approve of that attitude,” Marsten said. “Oh, but your superiors have nothing to do with this, do they? This is personal. A little boy lashing out because the big bad wolf embarrassed him.”

Tristan’s jaw set.

“I didn’t embarrass you, Tristan,” Marsten continued. “You did it to yourself. You offered me a job. I turned it down—respectfully and politely. But that wasn’t good enough, because you’d already promised them I’d do it. If I refused, you’d need to explain that you’d over-reached, and there was no way you were doing that, so you came after me. I was happy to let the matter rest—a rejected business proposition, no cause for animosity—but you came after me.
That
was your mistake.”

Tristan give a tight laugh. “My mistake? You’re the one being held at gunpoint, and you’re talking about my mistake? Delusional to the end.”

Marsten only shrugged. “If you say so.”

Marsten stepped forward, as if ready to go with them. Then he stopped.

“I’ll suppose you’ll want me to tell you where I hid that security guard you had killed. Backup plan, I presume?”

Tristan said nothing, only reached for his cell phone. Marsten’s gaze flicked to the vent shaft, then back to Tristan.

“So you didn’t trust your girl to do the job. If she failed, you’d still have a mauled security guard, found at the scene of a jewel theft, a little tale you could take to the interracial council.”

Tristan only smiled, gaze still down as he checked messages on the phone. “I think the Pack would be more interested in that story.”

“Ah, of course. The werewolf Pack. A clever plan, and one that might have worked . . . if I hadn’t been part of the Pack myself for the past two years.”

Tristan looked up.

Marsten laughed. “Not very good at doing your homework, are you? That’s obvious from that preposterous story you told the girl. Working as an agent for the interracial council? I’m sure Aaron, Paige, Adam, and the other delegates will be thrilled to know they have a team of secret agents working on their behalf.”

Marsten caught Tristan’s look and smiled. “Surprised I know their names? Your story probably works much better on those who don’t know the delegates personally. I could toss a few more names at you, including the werewolves, but I doubt you’d recognize them, and they wouldn’t appreciate me filling that void for you.”

He paused, head tilted, feigning deep thought. “Oh, but I do have another name, one you might find infinitely more interesting. You know who Paige Winterbourne’s husband is, I presume. You can’t possibly be that out of touch.”

Tristan stiffened.

“Ah, you do know. A very nice young man. I did some work for him last year. Quite pleasant.” Marsten frowned. “I hear his father isn’t always so pleasant, though. A decent employer, I’m sure . . . unless he finds out one of his employees has been building his own little spy network behind his back.”

“I haven’t been doing anything behind Benicio’s back. He knows all about my initiative. And he’s very impressed.”

“Oh? So this is a Cabal-sanctioned hit? Funny, I could’ve sworn it smelled like personal revenge. Well, what do I know? A Cabal kills a Pack werewolf . . . that shouldn’t cause too much trouble. Or I suppose it won’t if the Cabal doesn’t know about it.”

Tristan waved to the guards. “Get him out of here.”

He turned, and Marsten started to follow. Then one of the guards spoke up.

“Sir? What about the girl?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t worry about her,” Marsten said. “She’s quite resourceful. I’m sure she’ll get herself free, if she hasn’t already. But the security guard? Now that’s a problem. You should—”

Tristan turned sharply. “Hope’s still alive?”

“Is that her name? Of course she’s alive. You didn’t think I’d—” Marsten shook his head. “I suppose, considering who I’m talking to, I shouldn’t need to ask. Oddly enough, I find the best hostages are the live ones. Yes, Hope is fine and, as I said, will almost certainly free herself, so there’s no need—”

“Where is she?”

“The question is: where’s the dead guard? The girl can take care of herself. That guard, sadly, is beyond—”

“Where is she?”

Marsten paused and rubbed his chin, as if realizing he wasn’t going to talk his way out of handing me over. I’m sure he had some self-interested reason for not wanting to do so, but I was grateful for the effort nonetheless. I didn’t know how I’d face Tristan, knowing the truth.

Oh God . . . the truth.

My stomach heaved. I’ve been tricked. The whole time I’d been up here, listening as the facts rolled out, I’d processed them without absorbing them. Without
letting
myself absorb them—

“She’s in a janitor’s closet,” Marsten said. “Tied with her own handcuffs, which I thought was appropriate. I can take you there—”

“You’ll wait here. I’ll come back for you when I’m finished with her.”

Finished with me? What did he mean by—?

I pushed the thought away and, as Marsten gave Tristan directions to the closet I’d used earlier, I scrambled for an escape plan. Yes, escape. Maybe I was being paranoid, and Tristan had only meant he’d return when he’d finished freeing me. Yet Marsten’s life
was
in danger. And I’d put it there.

Tristan left with one guard. When he was gone, the second one backed up to the desk and, gun still trained on Marsten, slid his rear onto it.

I eased the vent cover out. Marsten’s gaze shot up, but he looked away before the guard noticed, then flicked his fingers, telling me to stay where I was.

As quietly as I could, I moved the cover into the shaft, and laid it down beside me. Marsten’s gaze met mine and he shook his head, in case the waving hadn’t been understood.

When I grabbed the edge of the vent, he threw me one last glare, then cleared his throat.

“You do work for the Cortezes, I presume,” he said to the guard, his voice loud in the small room.

The guard said nothing.

I gauged the distance between us, then pulled my legs forward, moving into a crouch.

“I’ve heard the Cabals frown on this,” Marsten continued. “Employees taking outside jobs. Yes, I know, you’re working for a Cabal AVP, so one could argue it’s not truly moonlighting, but I suspect Mr. Cortez wouldn’t be so quick to see the distinction.”

I braced myself on the edge of the opening.

Marsten continued. “An AVP using Cabal resources for a personal vendetta? I’ll wager Mr. Cortez would like to know about that, and would richly reward—”

I jumped. Marsten leaped to the side, out of the range of the gun. I hit the guard in the back. An
oomph,
and he fell forward. Marsten snatched the gun. Then he tossed it to me. The move caught me off-guard, and I scrambled for it but was too late, and my hand knocked it flying. The gun ricocheted onto the desk, and tumbled down behind it.

Marsten grabbed the guard around the neck. The guard flailed. Marsten swung him off his feet and bashed his head against the filing cabinet. As the guard’s body went slack, Marsten looked over at me, still crouched on the desk, staring.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “I didn’t kill him.”

The last licks of chaos rippled through me. I shuddered, eyes rolling in rapture. Marsten’s brows arched. I turned the shudder into a more appropriate shiver of fear.

“You’re sure?” I said. “He looks—”

“He’s fine.” Marsten kneeled beside the guard as he pulled my handcuffs from his pocket. “Though I do hate to waste these on him.” Another dig into his pocket and he tossed me my scarf. “Since you did such a good job tying this earlier . . . ”

We secured the guard. Then Marsten waved me to the door as he double-checked my knot. My fingers brushed the knob, but Marsten yanked me back.

“I was going to look first,” I said.

“You don’t need to. I can hear them.” He looked around. “You take the vent.” He grabbed my arm and propelled me to the desk. “Go headfirst this time, and you’ll be able to squeeze through.”

“After you,” I said.

“No time. Just—”

“After you.”

He gave me a look, as if contemplating the chances of stuffing me in the shaft himself, then, with a soft growl, hopped onto the desk. He grabbed the edge of the shaft, and easily swung himself up and in, then paused in the opening, his rear sticking out.

“It’s very narrow,” he said. “I’m not sure I can—”

“Try,” I said, and gave him a shove.

He wriggled through, then reached back between his legs, and helped haul me up. The door clicked. No time to replace the cover. I pulled my legs in, scrunched down on my hands and knees, and followed him.