32 | TO CATCH A KILLER |
HIS MISTAKE WAS THAT he had left the shadows to say hello to his wife. The minute Kingsley Martin had taken off his spellcloak to say hello to his beautiful wife, Ara had spotted him. “There,” she said. “There he is.”
He was smiling and laughing as he kissed Mimi on the cheek. Ara was surprised to find she was even more striking than she had heard. The famous Mimi Force, now Mimi Martin. One would think marriage or the underworld would have aged her, changed her, but she was as glorious and beautiful as ever, if not more so.
Ara felt a little jealousy at the affection between them. You could tell from across the room he was mad for her. For a moment she thought that maybe Edon was right—there was no way Kingsley Martin would take a little mortal girl over Mimi Force. Anyone could see he loved her. But there was only one way to find out—detain and question him.
“Let’s go get him,” she told Edon.
The investiture ceremony had cleared the tents; everyone was gathered in the main hall now, to watch Oliver take the blood of the Coven into his immortal spirit. It was harder to cut their way through. Ara kept an eye on the couple, but Kingsley disappeared again.
“Where is he?” she whispered to Edon.
“Lost him. He’s cloaked again.”
“No! It’s him we want. Let’s go.”
They separated and Ara scanned the party. Onstage, the Regent was taking the cup in his hands and drinking the blood of the Coven. The audience was silent, attentive, as Ara and Edon snaked their way through.
Your blood is my blood. My heart is your heart. My soul is your soul.
When it was over, the newly crowned Regis smiled and disappeared with his human familiar. They walked toward the back rooms, toward the shadows.
Then she saw him, a flash of his dark head. Kingsley was following them, hot on their heels. He looked intent and focused.
“There he is,” she said.
What did he want with the Regis?
What was Kingsley up to?
But the crowd was packed tightly, and they couldn’t fight their way through without giving away their position. They couldn’t let him know they’d spotted him, couldn’t risk him getting away. But by the time they’d found the hidden door that led to the hallway, there was a blood trail and footprints leading out to the kitchens.
Blood. So much blood… but whose?
Ara drew her gun. Edon was at her elbow. “I’ll go after them, you check out the room,” he said and left, following the trail of blood.
Ara burst through the door.
“Hands up!” she cried, horrified at the sight in front of her.
Finn Chase, the Regent’s human familiar, was lying in a pool of her own blood, bleeding from the wounds on her neck, and Kingsley Martin was looming over her, blood on his shirt and jacket.
“You’re making a terrible mistake. This isn’t what it looks like.”
“DON’T MOVE!”
“I’m merely trying to help,” Kingsley said.
Ara wavered. Her training, her orders were to kill an enemy on sight. Shoot to kill. She had done it to the Nephilim and she would do it to Kingsley. Shoot, she told herself, shoot.
He stood up and faced her. “Now if we can discuss this as civilized adults—”
She shot him.
Kingsley fell to the ground.
But not a moment later, before she’d had time to understand what she’d done, he got up again. Kingsley picked the bullet out of his dinner jacket and flicked it to the ground, leaving a hole in the coat. “I liked this tuxedo. My wife is going to be very annoyed with you,” he said, wagging his finger.
“But I shot you,” Ara said, still holding her gun.
“So?” Kingsley shrugged.
“These are demon-killers.”
“Well, there’s your problem. I’m not a demon.” He smiled, just as she realized her mistake. He was no demon, but a Dark Angel. A Silver Blood. She should have used the crescents. What did Rowena say? Use the shanks if you want to be standing after meeting a Silver Blood.
“I was telling you the truth,” Kingsley said. “Use your training to figure out if I’m telling the truth. Listen to me. I didn’t kill her. Oliver did.”
She did. He was right. He wasn’t lying. “The Regis—did this?”
“It appears so,” Kingsley said. “But like I said, things are never quite what they seem.”
Edon thundered into the room. He shook his head. “I followed the blood trail—it was Mimi and Oliver, but they’re gone. I let the chief know, though, and Venator teams have been sent out. They’ll find them.”
“I can explain everything,” Kingsley said.
“You can tell your story at headquarters,” Ara said, slapping silver cuffs on him. “I need it on record for the chief.”