Lover Awakened

As the partition closed, Zsadist slid the dagger into his chest holster. Then he moved to the seat across the aisle and leaned back against the window, shutting his eyes.

John knew better than to think the male was asleep, because his breathing didn't change and he didn't relax at all. He just didn't want to interact.

John took out his pad and pen. He wrote neatly, folded the paper, and held it in his hand. He had to say thank-you. Even if Zsadist couldn't read, he had to say something.

When the van stopped and the partition opened, John left the paper on Zsadist's seat, not even trying to give it to the warrior. And he made sure he didn't look up as he hit the steps and headed across the road. He did stop on the front lawn to watch the van leave, though, snow falling on his head and shoulders and duffel.

As the bus disappeared into the gathering storm, Zsadist was revealed standing across the street. The Brother flashed the note, holding it up in the air between his first and middle fingers. Then he nodded once, put it in his back pocket, and dematerialized.

John kept staring at the spot where Zsadist had been. Thick bundles of flakes filled up the footprints the male's shitkickers had left.

With a rumble the garage door opened behind him, and the Range Rover reversed its way over. Wellsie put the window down. Her red hair was coiled up high on her head, and she was wearing a black ski parka. The heater inside the car was going full blast, a dull roar almost as loud as the engine.

'Hi, John.' She reached out her hand and he laid his palm on hers. 'Listen, was that Zsadist I just saw?'

John nodded.

'What was he doing here?'

John dropped his duffel and signed, He rode home on the bus with me.

Wellsie frowned. 'I'd like you to stay away from him, okay? He's… not right in a lot of ways. Do you know what I mean?'

Actually, John wasn't so sure about that. Yeah, the guy was enough to make you think fondly of the bogeyman sometimes, but clearly he wasn't all bad.

'Anyway, I'm off to pick up Sarelle. We've run into a snag with the festival and lost all our apples. She and I are going to make the rounds of some spiritual folks, see what we can do about this so close to the date. Do you want to come?'

John shook his head. I don't want to get behind in Tactics.

'Okay.' Wellsie smiled at him. 'I left you some rice and ginger sauce in the fridge.'

Thank you! I'm starved.

'I figured you would be. See you soon.'

He waved at her while she backed down the rest of the driveway and took off. As he headed for the house, he noticed absently how the chains Tohr had put on the Rover made sharp gouges in the fresh snow.

CHAPTER 41

'Stop here.' O opened the Explorer's door before the SUV even came to a halt at the base of Thorne Avenue. He angled a quick look up the hill, then shot the Beta behind the wheel a real wake-your-ass-up stare.

'I want you to circle this neighborhood until I call you. Then I want you to come to number twenty-seven. Don't head into the driveway, keep going. There's a corner in the stone wall about fifty yards later. That's where I want you.' As the Beta nodded, O snapped, 'You fuck this up and I'll put you under the Omega's feet.'

He didn't wait for the slayer to throw out some kind of bullshit, have-confidence-in-me babble. He hit the pavement and ran up the road's gradual incline. As he jogged he was a mobile arsenal, his body weighed down by the weapons and explosives he'd hung on himself as if he were a paramilitary Christmas tree.

He went past number twenty-seven's twin pillars and eyed the driveway that disappeared between them. Fifty yards later he was at the juncture of the stucco wall where he'd told the fool Beta to pick him up. He took three running strides and leaped into the air, all Michael Jordan and shit as he went for the top lip of the ten-foot wall.

He closed the distance with no problem, but then his hands made contact. The blast of electricity that shot through his body was a real hair curler. If he'd been human still he'd have been toasted, and even as a slayer, the jolt was enough to leave him breathless as he pulled himself up and then plunged down the other side.

Security lights flared, and he took shelter behind a maple tree, taking out his muzzled gun. If attack dogs came at him he was ready to pop them, and he waited for the barking. There was none. And there was no rush of lights going on in the mansion or the pounding feet of security guards either.

While he waited a minute longer, he assessed the place. Back of the house was grand, all red bricks and white trim and sprawling terraces with second-floor porches. Garden was a pip, too. God… The annual upkeep on a monster spread like this was probably more than average folks made in a decade.

Time to close in. He moved across the lawn toward the house in a crouch, running in a cramped shuffle with his gun up in front. When he got in tight with the bricks, he was elated. The window he was next to was fitted with tracks that ran down its long sides, and on the top of the thing there was a discreetly disguised boxy transom.

Steel retractable shutters. And there was a set on every window and door, it looked like.

In the Northeast, where you didn't have to worry about tropical storms and hurricanes, there was only one kind of homeowner who threw those puppies over every slice of glass: the kind who needed to be protected from the sun.

Vampires lived here.

The shutters were up because it was night, and O looked inside the house. It was dark, which wasn't encouraging, but he was going in anyway.

The question was how to do the breaking and entering. It went without saying that the place was alarmed up the ass and wired for sound. And he was willing to bet that anyone who ran electric current around the top of their fence wasn't going to ADT it. This was going to be some sophisticated technology.

He decided his best move was cutting the power, so he went hunting for the main electrical line into the mansion. He found the utilities spinal cord around the back of the six-car garage, nestled in an enclave of HVAC shit that included three air-conditioning units, an exhaust blower, and a backup generator. The main power line's thick, metal-encased vein came up through the earth and split, plugging into a series of four meters that were whizzing along.

He put a short-fused load of C4 plastic explosive right at the trunk and then rigged another setup like that at the nerve center of the generator. Stepping behind the garage, he triggered both remotely. Two pops broke out, and the flare of light and the smoke faded quickly.

He waited to see if anyone came running. No one did. On impulse he peered into a couple of the garage bays. Two were empty; the others had very nice cars in them, so nice he couldn't even tell what kind one of them was.

With the juice cut off, he jogged around and cased the front of the house, skirting behind the boxwood hedge that ran down the facade. A set of French doors was perfect for entry. He put his gloved fist through one pane, shattering the glass, and then sprang the lock. As soon as he stepped inside, he started to reclose the door. It was critical that the contacts for the security alarm were in their proper place if an alternative generator kicked in— Holy… Moses.

Those were lithium-powered electrodes on the doors… which meant the contacts didn't run on a current. And—shit—he was standing right in the middle of a laser beam. Jesus. This was very high-tech… as in Museum of Fine Arts, the White House, the pope's bedroom high-tech.

The only reason he'd gotten into the house at all was because someone had wanted him to.

He listened. Total silence. A trap?

O stayed frozen, barely breathing, for a little longer and then made sure his gun was good to go before he