Wild Things (Chicagoland Vampires 9)

“Hello,” I said.

“Thank you for meeting me.”

I nodded. “I don’t know how much time I’ll have.”

“I understand, and I’ll get right to it. We have reached an unusual time, Merit. A precarious time. Two members of the GP are dead.” She paused. “And the present leadership is weak.” She meant Darius, the current head of the GP.

“So we’ve heard.”

She linked her hands together and rested her forearms on the gate, her gaze on the ride as it rotated. “Leading the GP requires a certain cachet, a certain attitude. Due to recent events, Darius has lost both. It’s time for him to step down. And that brings us to the favor.”

She looked at me, paused for a moment, and then let loose the request she’d flown nearly four thousand miles to make.

“I want Ethan to challenge Darius for the head of the GP. And I want you to convince him to do it.”

Chapter Eight

DEEP-FRIED TRUTH

My heart and head went numb, shocked by the request.

She wanted Ethan to challenge, outright, the head of the GP? I couldn’t imagine anybody, much less Darius, would take kindly to the idea. Just by trying to leave the GP we’d ended up with murder at our doorstep. We were still dealing with the fallout from that decision, which was why I was at a carnival in Loring Park, Illinois, in the freezing air of February.

And then there was the other issue: The GP was in London. Ethan would have to go there, live there, and work there while I stayed in Chicago, honor bound to serve Cadogan House.

My heart jumped in my throat. “We aren’t even part of the GP anymore,” I said. That was the only defense I could think of, the only words I could put together.

“Not the GP as it was before,” she said, turning to lean back against the railing. There was a glimmer of strategic excitement in her eyes. She and Ethan had that in common.

“The GP as it could be. A different kind of organization. A federation of Houses, not a dictatorship. And not led by a vampire who lords himself over the rest of us.”

I almost snorted. If she didn’t think Ethan would lord himself over the rest of us as head of the GP, perhaps she didn’t know Ethan as well as she thought.

“You don’t think he’d try to take control?” I asked. “You don’t think he’d impose his will on the Houses?”

She tilted her head at me, an expression that reminded me she was a vampire—a predator—of repute. “You would convince me he’s ill suited for the job.”

“He’s stubborn.”

“Not so stubborn that you aren’t in a relationship with him.”

She had a point, so I tried a different tack. “He has enemies, and challenging Darius would only make more.”

Lakshmi nodded gravely. “The road would not be easy. Ethan has enemies, certainly. His campaign would be difficult. There would be many to convince, to bring to his side. Travails to overcome.”

“What travails, exactly?” The Canon had been shady about the process of getting a new king.

“He’d have to demonstrate his worth and fitness for the position. Convince the Prelect’s council he is worthy of the task, that he is powerful and strong.”

I grimaced. Harold Monmonth had been the Prelect. And we all knew how that had ended up.

“And then the Houses vote,” she said.

“That all assumes Darius steps down peacefully.”

She nodded, acknowledging that. “There is no point in being coy. Ethan would have opponents from the beginning to the end. But he is worth the battle. He’d bring peace and honor to the GP, which have been lacking of late.”

Handy, I thought, that she was a member of the GP. Bringing honor to the organization would help her—raise esteem for her and the rest of them. Bring her power that she’d lost in the recent drama.

But there was power, and then there was power . . .

“Why not run yourself?”

She slipped her hands into the trim pockets of her coat. “Because I’m too young. Because Ethan has more allies—even those who don’t have insignia above his door. They know him. They don’t know me. And there are . . . skeletons in my closet.”

“Skeletons?” I asked without moving, like she was an animal I might frighten away.

But she was wise enough to avoid the trap. “My life is no concern of yours, Novitiate. We all have our secrets to bear.” She looked at me for a moment. “You’re in love with him. I can hear it in your words, see it in your eyes. The fear of loss.”

I waited a beat, unsure of her motives, and nodded. “I am.”

Her eyes flattened. There was a different kind of predator in her eyes now. “You aren’t the only vampire that needs him. We are endangered, and you must consider whether your needs as an individual are more important than the needs of your House, the Chicago Houses, the American Houses, all the Houses in the GP. Ethan Sullivan, I believe, has the opportunity to become a Master of Masters. And consider this: If Ethan doesn’t become the new head of the GP, who will?”

We looked at each other for a moment. “You’re in Chicago because the GP wants to extract some price of the House. What is that price?”

She looked at me for a moment, taking my measure. And, I belatedly realized, sending her soft and delicate tendrils of glamour, sweeping curls of it, to test me and my defenses. My endurance. My stubbornness. Fortunately, I had some immunity to that kind of magic.

“That,” she concluded, “is also not for your ears.” She put a hand on mine. “This will not be an easy road to travel. I understand that. But it is the right road. I know you understand that and will make the right decision.”

With that, she tucked her hands back into her pockets and turned toward the exit, her heels clacking on the asphalt with every step. After a moment, she disappeared into the crowd, leaving me in a sea of humans with worry in my heart.

I did the only thing I could think of. I grabbed my phone and dialed up my partner.

“Hello?” Jonah said. “Merit?”

“Lakshmi’s here. In Loring Park. She came to talk to me.” The words flooded out.

“Wait,” he said, “hold on a minute.” I heard him speak, murmuring to others around him, and then a door opened and closed.

“Sorry, I was in our ops room,” he said after a moment. “What’s this about Lakshmi?”

“She came here to talk to me. I owe her a favor because she gave us information about the location of the dragon’s egg.” The Faberge-style egg had been a gift from fairies to Peter Cadogan, the House’s founder. On the GP’s orders, Monmonth had stolen it in order to bribe the fairies to war with Cadogan. He’d been successful, which was another mark against him.