Aces Wilde: Immortal Vegas, Book 5 (21 page)

Of course he’d been wearing a vest.

I squeezed off two more shots, enough to send the Nigerian skittering back behind the island, and Nikki dropped to her hands and knees, uncharacteristically silent. Whether she was dead or injured or playing possum I didn’t know, but Mobo’s rich laugh reverberated off the acres of granite and stainless steel, distracting me.

“You shouldn’t bring a sword to a gunfight,” he chortled.

I winced, popping up over the countertop to confirm that the Honjo Masamune remained where I’d flung it, propped against the far wall of the kitchen. Too distant to reach, and my Jedi Force skills were sadly lacking at the moment. I didn’t think it would spontaneously leap into my hand just because I willed it so.

That left the gun, but that was okay. I liked guns.

Mobo was on the move, evidently deciding that Nikki was down for the count. He headed toward the back of the kitchen, as if daring me to follow him.

“You would never have survived this visit,” he gloated. “That Nigel didn’t know it paints him as the fool. Alaina’s Cups would not have let you live, not with your connection to the Council. The Pents are also no fools. They remain close enough to keep tabs, but lifetimes apart in position on mortal and immortal magic. They will never be servants to a greater power again.”

“You think so highly of Alaina, why’d you kill her? Doesn’t that go against some kind of code?” I inched along the counter as well, but Mobo seemed content to toy with me. I could hear him throwing down one pistol, doubtless pulling others free. And here I was with a gun and a sword I couldn’t reach. Stupid.

“Because Aces really are wild cards,” Mobo said. “And I’ve been dealt into an entirely different game. You think the Houses are no match for the Council, and you may be right. But there’s a new player on the board now, and she will take no prisoners.”

I grimaced. He could only mean Gamon. I crawled across an open space, and a bullet pinged at my left ankle, making me lurch to the side. Mobo’s laughter rolled across the kitchen again. “She wants you alive, if I can manage it. The money’s triple for that. But don’t think it’s for your conversation. She plans to harvest every last piece of you to build her army even stronger. And then, when she takes the Council apart, she will use their own precious pet against them.”

My eyes flared wide. Mobo was right about one thing—I did have abilities. Abilities I might not know how to use, but they were there…dormant.

Dormant but within reach?

I focused on Soo’s pendants against my collarbones, but had no idea how to direct them. And I couldn’t go all fugue state and simply give myself over to the rage growing within me. Not with Nikki so close.

Nikki
. I reached the edge of the counter where she lay sprawled, my heart pounding as I sought out her gaze. She stared at me out of a face coated with blood and smoke, but when our eyes met, she winked.

Her right hand appeared useless for the moment, her shoulder severely dislocated, but her left hand still clutched her Beretta. I hadn’t even known she’d been carrying a second gun.

Relief surged through me, but I kept going, picking up my pace. “You ever wonder how much the Council would pay you not to slice and dice me?” I asked, playing to Mobo’s avarice. “I can guarantee you it’s more than Gamon would pay.”

“Ah, but one betrayal is smart, two is bad for business,” Mobo goaded back. “And Gamon’s pockets are as deep as her reach is long. I will not betray her.” He spoke the words a little too loudly, as if even the walls had ears, and I pulled myself into a crouch. I only had one shot at this. I needed to make it good.

“You have chosen the wrong ally after all, Mobo,” I called out, deepening my voice by several octaves as I surged upward with an Academy Award-winning performance. I swirled my hands impressively in front of my chest as if I was massaging an air kickball, and Mobo halted the swing of his gun, his eyes riveted on me. “You have heard of the powers I have, and now you will—”

Two gunshots rang out simultaneously. It was as if Mobo’s body had nowhere to go, a punching bag stuck between rival combatants. He fell backward and then thrust forward, his eyes still wide and startled even as twin bullet holes started gushing rivers of blood.

I turned to Nikki, crying out as she sagged forward.

“Scalp wounds always bleed like a bitch,” she gasped, dropping her gun on the floor as she sagged to her knees…then rammed her shoulder against the edge of the counter. Her expletives rang out across the kitchen as her shoulder popped back into place.

“An excellent shot.” Nigel stepped into the corridor behind Mobo’s body, rolling him over. “I can’t say I’m happy yours entered first, though. Mine was the better vantage point.”

“Anything to shut up the great and powerful Oz here,” Nikki cracked, her voice only a little thready. She winced as I pressed a towel to her face, wiping off the worst of the gore. “Was he really buying that?”

“He was buying something.” Nigel’s voice sounded a little strained, but I didn’t have time for him yet.

“Are you hurt bad?” I asked her. “Can you walk?”

“Gut wound. Too close to the damn windows.” Nikki winced as I pressed the towel against her side. Even Mercault’s kitchen towels were luxury on steroids, and she scowled down at the blood staining the thick cloth. “You know that’s never gonna come out. Might as well be mustard.”

“Sara—”

“Hang on.” I cut off whatever Nigel wanted to say, draping Nikki’s arm over my head as I noticed a second patch of red. “Shit, Nikki, your leg?”

“That was all Mobo. Dickhead.” She growled. “Missed hitting me full-on, though.”

I grimaced, moving with her toward Nigel, who was looking at me like I’d grown two heads. “Luc? Is he dead too?”

“No. Mobo’s bullet went wide, but Luc went down with a convincing thud, banking on the chaos to keep him out of the fray.” He smiled wearily. “There’s a reason why he’s lived so long.” Nigel seemed to shake himself into awareness and stepped forward, “Let me take her. I’m bigger than you are.”

“Hey,” groaned Nikki. “I’m sensitive.”

But no sooner had Nigel settled her weight onto his shoulders than he turned to me. “Perhaps that might explain Mobo’s surprise at your performance,” he said quietly, nodding behind me.

Both Nikki and I turned, and while she said something, I couldn’t hear it—couldn’t process anything except what was right before us.

There, hovering above the kitchen counter, was the Honjo Masamune, twisting and spinning in place, exactly how I’d been guiding my imaginary kickball. It pointed at the space where Mobo had been standing, but as I breathed out a startled “Whoa,” it flicked again toward me, the point of its mythical blade mesmerizing in its lethal beauty.

“I can kind of see how Mobo might have gotten distracted,” Nikki said, her words barely audible. “Can you, uh, tell it to sit?”

“I have no idea.” Swallowing, I took a step toward the blade and lifted my hand, exactly as if it were a wild creature I was somehow expected to tame. Before I embarrassed either of us, though, the blade suddenly clattered to the counter, inert.

“Good God,” Nigel breathed. “When did it start doing that?”

“Pretty much right now.” I hesitated, then picked up the blade, once more feeling the shock of its power in my grasp. The sword had championed me. And more importantly, it had kept Nikki alive, all without shedding a drop of blood.

Pretty good trick for a samurai sword.

I slid it into its scabbard at my hip, surprised at how natural the movement was. Maybe I could learn to wield the thing after all.

The courtyard was a mass of activity by the time we got outside. I folded Nikki into a Parisian version of a minivan that was about the size of a toaster, but she could almost lie straight. There were no emergency vehicles this far out, but the hospital in Amboise had a full surgical suite, according to Nigel. He sent three armed guards with Nikki and a car trailing behind. He watched the vehicle bounce off the lawn and onto the drive with a fierce scowl, and I liked him better for it.

Luc stood surveying the mess, then looked up as we approached. “Pretty clean job, it seems, for all of that,” he said in his querulous French accent. “Didn’t see Mobo turning so quickly, though. Alaina had her doubts.” He spat. “Should have listened.”

“And you should have kept me apprised of that.” Nigel turned his sour glare on the bombed building. “Mercault isn’t going to like it.”

“He’s got about six more châteaux in the valley. He’ll survive.” Luc lifted a hand and rubbed his chin, then transferred his gaze to me. “You’ve certainly made an impression.”

“So Alaina was Cups, Mobo, Wands?” I asked, my mind split between the question and the image of Nikki’s face, spread with blood and grime. “That leaves you what, Pentacles?”

“Or Coins, if you prefer to call a spade a…well.” He shrugged. “Unlike Nigel and Mobo, I didn’t split my allegiance between Houses. Gets messy when you do that. As you can see.” He gestured to the mess. “Alaina was exclusively Cups, Mobo played in both Wands and Coins. Had to have, in order to plant those bombs, I’m thinking. They’ve been there awhile.” His expression was bleak. “Mercault will have to spend more money securing anywhere that bastard went.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa…” What they were saying finally dawned on me, and I stared, rocked by the realization. “
Mercault
is the head of the House of Coins?”

Nigel and Luc stared at me, then Luc shot him a glance. “Not much gets by her, does it?”

Nigel lifted one shoulder. “It’s a gift.”

At that moment, a soldier trotted up, waving a familiar-looking cell phone. I swiped for my pocket out of habit, even as the man stopped in front of us. “It’s been ringing constantly,” he said with an apologetic smile as he handed it over.

“Thanks.” I frowned as I scrolled through the calls, instantly worried about Nikki.

But it wasn’t Nikki’s name on the screen—it was Father Jerome’s. Over and over again.

I clicked through to the voice mail, meeting Nigel’s gaze.

Then started running.

Chapter Nineteen

We reached the outskirts of Paris in less than two hours, arriving at Jerome’s secondary safe house well after the area had been cordoned off with police tape. I ducked under it, Nigel on my heels, ignoring the gendarmes as they tried to stop me first in French, then English.

“Sara! Sara—” I turned as a familiar voice called out, then Father Jerome was there, hastening forward with a dirt-stained face split by a wide, relieved smile. “You didn’t have to come, I told you we are fine, I was simply worried—”

“Do you know anything more?” I stood back and surveyed him critically. As always, he wore the simple clothes of his position, black pants and black shirt with the white collar, no robe or cap to distinguish him further. He shook his head.

“There was simply the blast. The front windows were blown out, you see? We were away from the house by accident, actually. Wednesdays are usually quiet days, but the museum—” He held my hands, and his weren’t the ones shaking. “No one was hurt, Sara. The children are safe.”

“You’ll have to move them.”

“It’s already done.” Father Jerome looked up, noticing Nigel for the first time, his gaze pinging back and forth between us. “You’ve been hurt. You said there was a similar explosion, that your friend Nikki was injured. Others killed.”

“Windows blown out there as well,” Nigel said crisply. “If I may?” He gestured to the house, and I nodded, feeling slightly awkward at giving the man permission to do anything. He stopped briefly to show something to the police, who also nodded him on his way. No one had more fake identities than Nigel Friedman. Which made me wonder why he kept the name Nigel Friedman.

Father Jerome linked his arm in mine and steered me toward the gardens. “What is happening, Sara? What have you stumbled into?”

I forced my own breathing to steady. Father Jerome was unharmed; the children were safe. The bomb that had been set in this house hadn’t been followed this time by a horde of Gamon’s operatives—though it could have. Should have, really. The safe house didn’t have a phalanx of guards around it. It didn’t need to—it was supposed to be secure.

I tightened my jaw, the sudden image of a skull overrun by scouring beetles flashing in my mind. That was what Eshe’s shield had shown me, what Gamon’s operatives were capable of. That was the fight I was undertaking. Poorly, as it happened.

“How many of Gamon’s children went through here, how long ago?” I asked, a new image of tattooed arms assaulting me. “Any one of them could have been the leak.”

“Or a hundred other children in a hundred other places,” Father Jerome said quietly. He lifted his hand to brush my cheek. “Your friend, she will be all right?”

“She will.” I nodded too quickly. Nikki had been admitted for overnight observation, to her strident and outspoken dismay, and I’d spent most of the ride into Paris assuring her that Nigel wouldn’t leave my side. She’d then asked to speak to him, and while I couldn’t hear her side of the conversation, he seemed to be of a mind to agree with everything she said. “She got pretty banged up, worse than I thought, but—she’ll be okay.”

“And how banged up did
you
get, this time? How damaged will you be the next?” Jerome didn’t continue with a tirade, contenting himself with patting my hand as we walked together beneath the trees. Then his words took a decidedly different turn. “The children have started to speak of you again. The gifted ones. They have a name for you.”

I pulled away from him. “Is it a name you can repeat in public?”

“It’s an interesting one,” Jerome said. He released my right hand and it dropped to my side, my left still resting on my sword. Surprisingly, the gendarmes hadn’t blinked when I’d come striding up with a thirteenth-century blade strapped to my body, but then again—this was France.

Jerome waited until my attention wandered back to him, smiling benevolently as I blushed. “You do not sleep enough for all the lives you live, Sara. You’ll have to be more careful.”

“I’m fine,” I said, giving him my best healthy-and-happy grin. “Distracted is all. So—the children have given me a nickname?”