“We tried that last time. It didn’t work so well,” I said.
The front door banged open, and we all jumped, again, because every loud banging noise was going to make us jump for weeks from here out.
Cormac walked in a moment later. My first impulse was to hug him just as hard as I’d hugged Grant, but I resisted. Tina got as far as jumping up before restraining herself. Cormac looked even more prickly than usual at the moment, frowning, taking in the room at a glance as if confirming that everything was okay. His gaze finally rested on Grant.
>
“You’re Odysseus Grant,” he said, then looked at me for explanation.
“Yeah,” I said. “Anastasia gave him a tip.”
“Anastasia?” He didn’t sound confused so much as disbelieving.
Grant stood. “And you must be Cormac Bennett … and Amelia Parker?”
This time, Cormac scowled at me. I said, “Once I started calling him for advice about deciphering books of shadows, I sort of had to explain everything.”
He waved me off. “Everybody okay?”
“Yeah,” Ben said. “We’re just trying to figure out if this is Roman’s next move and what we’re going to do about it.”
“Same as always, stake the bastard first chance we get.”
“I think we’re on about our fifth chance,” I said. “It’s not working.”
Grant said, “He’ll need to go to Yellowstone, and he’ll need help, a place to stay, minions—do you know any of the vampires in that area, who he might call on for help?”
“There aren’t any,” Cormac said. “At least not any established Families. There might be a few loners, but the population up north isn’t big enough to support vampires. Denver’s the only city with a good-sized Family in the region.”
I stepped back, hand on my head. Thoughts fell into place, rattled me—like an earthquake. “That’s why Roman’s been so interested in us, why he’s worked so hard to get the city under his control.” He’d sent minions, vampires, magicians, over and over again, to undermine me and Rick, to put his own people in place. And I thought he was just pissed off at me. “I guess it’s nice I don’t have to take it personally anymore.”
“Well, he’s finally got Denver,” Cormac said. “At least, his enemies aren’t in charge anymore. He’s using Denver as his base, he’s got to be around somewhere. Kitty, you know all the vampire hideouts in town?”
“Only some of them,” I said.
“Then we start there. He’s bedded down in one of them. We’ll work in teams and cover more ground.” Cormac took charge of what was turning into a physical assault plan. That was his area of expertise anyway.
We collected weapons, discussed tactics. Ben and Cormac shared what they knew about hunting vampires, and it turned out Grant knew something about it as well. I made a list of vampire-owned locations in town. Roman would never bed down in a place I knew about—he’d have a secret lair set up somewhere. We’d run all over the place—in a town that was in chaos from a natural disaster—and never find him. I was daunted.
We were going to need help, so I called Detective Hardin. Her line was busy—of course it was, the police were probably stretched to the breaking point. But this—this was important.
I shouldn’t have worried; a few minutes later, she called me. “We’re all on call, running around like chickens with our heads off. Please tell me you and the rest of the gang are okay.”
“Angelo was killed last night.” And I killed him … “Roman’s probably in town. Want to help us go after him again?”
She hesitated a moment. Probably going over her vast list of fires to stomp out. Which crisis would she move to the top of the list? “Hell yeah, I do. I’ll see who I can round up to help.”
“Bring stakes.”
“You know it.”
I hung up the phone and beamed at the others. Maybe I couldn’t work a crossbow worth anything, but I had my own resources. “Hardin’s in,” I said.
Half an hour later Hardin arrived in her sedan and brought a patrol car and two uniformed cops with her. Cormac, Tina, and Grant were going to look for Roman at Psalm 23, while Ben, Hardin, and I dropped by the lair at Obsidian and a couple of other downtown safe houses I knew about. If we found any of the Family’s human servants, we’d try to recruit them. We’d hope the aftershocks didn’t get worse.
* * *
THE GALLERY looked different in daylight hours. Plain, unassuming. Like a hundred other downtown storefronts and businesses that had been here forever. A little run down, a little lonely. Concrete and chipped paint. It seemed smaller. The earthquake hadn’t seemed to cause it any damage. I wondered if the tremor had affected the vampires downstairs at all. I supposed the building could collapse and bury them, and as long as they weren’t exposed to sunlight, they’d be all right.