“Maybe,” I said. “Have you heard any talk lately of someone wanting to unseat Slade’s power?” Ever since Slade asked me to help him, I’d wondered if a rival might be behind the murders. A male like Slade didn’t run a dark-races underworld without collecting a few enemies. And now that he was working for the Despina, it stood to reason the rivals might resent his broadening influence.
Bianca frowned at the seemingly random question. “There are always vamps who talk big about wanting to be the one in power.”
“But have you noticed any changes? Anyone talking bigger than the rest of late? Especially since Slade made his deal with the Despina?”
The domme’s lips wrinkled in distaste. “Oh, sure. Lots of local vamps consider themselves enemies of the Dominae. When Slade agreed to work with the new bitch in charge, a lot of vampires said he couldn’t be trusted anymore.” She paused, as if remembering something. “You know, now that I think about it, I did hear that this one guy had a major hard-on for getting Slade out of the picture.”
“Who?”
“I don’t remember the name. The last name started with an ‘M’ maybe. But I do remember he owns a strip club in Alphabet City.”
I closed my eyes and cursed. “Tiny Malone?” Before she confirmed it, I already knew I was right. I’d had a run-in with Tiny months earlier, the last time I worked for Slade. That slimeball triggered my gag reflex.
She snapped and smiled. “That’s it. Apparently he’s trying to unite some of the local vamp business owners against Slade.”
Adam looked at me. I’d told him about my run-in with Tiny months ago so he recognized the name, too. “Did Tiny approach you?”
She grimaced. “He sent his goons to threaten me. I told them to go fuck themselves. Slade isn’t an angel but he’s always been fair. Plus, I think it’s a good thing he’s trying to mend fences between the exiled vamps of New York and the new leadership out West.”
I grabbed a pen and paper from her desk. “This is my phone number. If you think of anything else that might help us, please call me.”
She folded the sheet and stuck it in her cleavage. “Sure. Anything I can do to help find Liam’s killer.”
We turned to go, but I paused when something caught my eye. I pointed to a flag over the door. I hadn’t seen it when we first walked in. It was a red triskelion set against a black background. “What’s that?”
Mistress Bianca smiled. “That’s the symbol for vampire S&M community. The mortal version is all black, but we vamps modified it with red for obvious reasons.”
Those reasons being a vampire’s preternatural bloodlust as well as the telltale red hair that marked every vampire in existence.
“Hmm.” I made a mental note to keep an eye out for it. “Learn something new every day. Thanks for your time.”
11
The next evening, I decided to make good on my promise to speak to Maisie. No point in putting off the inevitable. I had about an hour until Alexis was scheduled to come over so we could formulate next steps, which also happened to give me a handy excuse to extricate myself from my chat with Maisie if it went sour.
I found my sister on the rooftop terrace outside her apartment. She stood at the wrought-iron railing, looking up at the waxing moon. She hadn’t heard me arrive, so I took a moment to watch her—and work up my courage. Here, far above the city’s traffic, it was quiet. Quiet enough for me to hear that she was whispering to herself.
I wasn’t sure if it was the white hand repeatedly tugging on the black clump of hair. Or how her lips moved in hushed conversation. Either way, chilly fingers danced up my spine. But I couldn’t stand there forever, putting off the inevitable. Clearing my throat, I walked toward her.
As if someone had snapped their fingers under her nose, she jerked to attention. She turned slowly and her eyes narrowed a fraction for a moment before recognition lit her irises. She released the strands she’d been torturing and smiled.
I pasted a grin on my face. “Hi, Maze.”
“Sabina!” Her arms wrapped around my neck. After a brief hesitation, I hugged her back, trying to ignore the urge to push her away instead.
Her enthusiasm made my stomach contract with guilt. She’d hugged me like this the first night we’d met. Despite fifty-some years and a chasm of issues to overcome, she’d welcomed me into mage life like she’d always known me. Like we’d been real sisters our whole lives. No one before that moment had ever been so accepting of me, so genuinely glad I was alive.
The memory made me regret my earlier uncharitable thoughts. After all, like Giguhl kept reminding me, it wasn’t my sister’s fault she had issues. He never said the next part of that thought, but I always filled in the missing words silently to myself: It was my fault she was so fucked up. And now I could finally do something to help her.
“I’m glad you came to see me.” She was holding on longer than she should. I backed away smoothly, my hands still on her shoulders to soften the rejection.
“Really? I thought you might not want to see me.”
She frowned. “Why?”
I paused, wondering if she’d forgotten about her freak-out a couple of nights earlier. Instead of reminding her, I quickly said, “I know you like your privacy.”
Despite being the same height, it seemed as if she looked up at me. Like a child. “It’s not that I like to be alone; it’s just easier than…” She trailed off with a shrug that felt like an accusation. I mentally filled in the rest: Easier than watching you all pity me.
“I’m sorry I haven’t visited more often. It’s just been busy and Rhea said you weren’t feeling well,” I finished diplomatically.
Her mouth worked for a second. “I feel much better now.”
I eyed her. Honestly, she did look good despite her general twitchiness. Maybe it was wishful thinking but her cheeks had more color. There was also an air about her, an energy that was missing before, I guess.
“What have you been doing different?”
She leaned in to whisper. “I stopped sleeping.”
My face tightened into a frown. “I don’t follow. Why would that make you healthier?”
“Don’t tell Rhea. She’ll make me take herbs so I’ll sleep.”
I picked through my thoughts, trying to avoid potential conversation land mines. “Don’t you want to sleep?”
“No!” She shook her head so hard her hair fell into a limp curtain around her face. “When I don’t sleep, the bad memories stay away.”
I ran my hands down her arms to grab her hands. “Maisie? Look at me.” She looked up until her hair parted to reveal two haunted eyes. “Bad memories? Or bad dreams?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “I think they might be flashbacks.” She rubbed her face, as if she could scrub away the memories. “It’s confusing.”
According to Rhea, it was normal for people recovering from trauma to have nightmares about their ordeals. But as far as we’d known, Maisie wasn’t having any dreams at all. If she was wrong and the flashbacks really were dreams, this was big news. “Have you told Rhea about this?”
“No, Sabina. Promise me you won’t tell her either.” Her voice was cold with fear. “Or Orpheus. No one can know.”
“But why? Maybe Rhea can help you stop having the flashbacks. She said that the dream incubation might help—”
“No,” she said, her voice panicked. “I don’t want to do that.”
I rubbed her arms, trying to comfort her obvious distress. I was torn about keeping this information from Orpheus and Rhea. But I put that issue aside for the moment. “Can you tell me what you saw in your dreams?”
She swallowed. “I—I can’t speak of it.”
I blew out a breath, trying to keep my patience in check. Don’t push her, Sabina. “I still think you need to tell Orpheus about this. With the Imbolc festival coming up, he’s pretty determined to make you have a prophecy again.”
She was already shaking her head before I stopped speaking. “I can’t. He’ll make me sleep. I can’t sleep again, Sabina. Don’t make me.”
Her whole body trembled now. Time to change tacks. “How long has it been since you slept?”
“Not long. A couple of nights.” She moved closer. The fingers of her right hand weaved through the air like she was playing an invisible piano. “I have a system.” While her right hand continued its air sonata, her left hand came up to tug on the lock of hair below her ear. Up close, I could see the stray hairs clinging to her fingers. “Have to trick the circadian rhythms. I stay up all day. At night I go to bed, but I set an alarm to wake me every thirty minutes.” She smiled at her cleverness, revealing fangs gone gray. “That keeps me from entering the REM state.”
My mouth fell open. As a half vampire, like me, Maisie’s natural cycle was to sleep during the day and be awake all night. Also like me, she was immune to death by UV ray that plagued all other vampires, but our bodies had a hard time keeping up with the sun’s weakening effects long term. It could be done, but only with massive infusions of fresh blood to repair the damage.
“Please tell me you’re drinking plenty of blood.” For someone in her weak physical state, her body definitely wouldn’t be able to keep up with the sun, lack of sleep, and no blood.
She swallowed and looked away, like she was ashamed. “Rhea was making me take intravenous infusions twice weekly. But my thirst has increased since I stopped sleeping,” she said. “I have been supplementing with bagged blood.”
I let out a relieved breath. When we’d gotten back to New York, it had been a struggle for weeks to get her to take any blood at all. If she’d told me she’d shunned blood, too, I’d be forced to go directly to Rhea with this information. But knowing she was at least taking care of herself in that regard allowed me a few extra days to convince her myself without bringing in the big guns.