“No, you wouldn’t. You consider me an outsider and only have empathy for those people you consider your own.” She shrugged as much as the metal net would allow. “I often feel the same.”
“So we understand each other.”
“Only if you understand that if anything happens to me, my mate will hunt you down and rip you limb from limb before he kills you.”
“Your mate?” Vano smiled. “I know young Vecchio isn’t truly your mate, just like I know that you’ve had a falling-out. Besides, the boy doesn’t have it in him. He’s soft. Pampered. Everything in this life has been given to him, even immortality.” Vano’s mouth twisted a little. “Power like that handed to someone who didn’t even want it.”
“Power like that should only be given to someone who doesn’t want it.”
“Spoken like a commander of the losing side.” Vano examined Tenzin from head to toe. “Enjoy trying to get out of the net. I imagine you’ll find it quite impossible.”
He slammed the door, and she heard a lock snapped on the outside.
Tenzin began to twist and turn. Vano was right to a point. The metal net was thin and flexible; every time she tried to grab it, it slipped away. When she pushed, it flexed.
How irritatingly clever. She’d have to find out where he’d acquired it.
Nevertheless, it wasn’t something she could break through quickly even with her immortal strength.
“Are you going to make yourself useful?” Tenzin asked. “Or are you enjoying the show?”
René stepped out from the shadowed corner where he’d been hiding. “I admit, I am enjoying this.” He slid his hands in his pockets. “Remind me; why I am staying in your caravan during the day? Oh, that’s right, because you asked me to.”
“Because you owe me,” she said. “Who bailed you out in Singapore last summer, René? That’s right, it was me.”
“When this is over, you’re never bringing that up again.” He curled his lip and knelt next to her. “I don’t even know what this is made of.”
“It is some kind of metal fabric.” She touched a piece between her fingers. “It’s clever. Finely woven, which makes it harder to manipulate. I can’t get enough leverage to tear it.”
“Quite ingenious. How long do you think it would take you to get out without me?”
“More than an hour. Do you have scissors? Wire cutters?”
“Scissors, no. Wire cutters?” He pulled out a familiar-looking red knife. “I believe this has a small saw attached. That should do.”
“Well done.” She heard the knife tear through the fabric over her wrists. “Cut that and then get my feet.”
“I’m taking this fabric.”
“It’s yours.” She twisted her wrists and snapped the plastic ties that bound her hands. “I wouldn’t suggest it for bedsheets.”
Minutes later, Tenzin was free as a bird and sitting on the ground, staring at the door that Vano had locked. “His people are going to do something to the trailer during the day. Break it possibly. Try to drag me out.”
René’s eyes narrowed. “How do you know?”
“Why else would he tie me up in a trailer?”
“I can think of a few reasons to tie you up, but none of them involve murder.”
“Boring,” she snapped.
“Murder?”
“Your flirting,” she said. “It used to be amusing. It’s not anymore.”
He muttered something in French that she didn’t care about translating.
Tenzin spoke to herself. “He doesn’t know I don’t sleep. Why would he?”
René’s eyes went wide. “At all? You don’t sleep at all?”
“You didn’t know that?” Tenzin frowned. “I suppose not—why would you?”
He sounded nervous. “So the past few nights when you’d been asking me to sleep here—”
“I’ve been awake all day, yes.” Something was tingling. Some unknown sense was setting off alarms. “Don’t worry; I don’t stare. Much.”
“How the fuck—”
“Shhhh.” She threw a pillow from the couch at him. “Shut up.”
What was it? Vano clearly had a plan to get rid of her, so what was it?
René sulked in the corner. “Your caravan is much nicer than mine.”
“I’m sure it is. Ben’s is nicer still.”
He rocked back and forth. “It doesn’t shake as much as mine does.”
“That’s because—” Oh.
Oooooh.
She heard it then, the whisper-quiet business of the camp. The sun would be up within half an hour, which meant the darigan were setting about their business, retracting the braces that kept the trailers even, readying for the camp to move.
Except her trailer. No one was readying her trailer to move.
Tenzin smiled. “He’s going to leave us.”
René jumped to his feet. “What?”
“Relax.” She waved him back. “This complicates things, but it’s not the end of the world.”
“Some of us can’t fly, Tenzin!” René was fuming. “Some of us have plans we’ve been working on for weeks that are more important your little feuds with Vano and Ben.”
“You’ll get your treasure,” Tenzin said. “Didn’t I promise?”
“Your deal was that I stayed in here during the day for some reason I now realize was not trying to make Vecchio jealous.” René began to pace. “The deal was not losing the biggest potential score of my immortal life because you pissed off the wrong vampire.” He started toward the door, but Tenzin was on him. She throttled him and sent him flying back into the bed.
“Sit,” she growled. “Didn’t I just say you’d get your treasure?”
“What is wrong with you?” René yelled even as his eyes began to blink longer with every minute. “You should be running outside and telling Radu what Vano did.” He blinked harder. “You should be… tell Vecchio.”
“Ben will be fine.” The last thing Vano would do was hurt Ben. Too many people knew Ben was working for Radu. Not many knew that she was here though. Therein lay the brilliance of Vano’s plan.
Utter silence told Tenzin that René had fallen into day rest. She walked over, bent over him, and slapped him hard across the cheek.
“What?” He sat up straight, his eyes
