Blood Ties Book Two: Possession. Jennifer Armintrout

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СКАЧАТЬ asking a woman her age.

      “Sorry,” Anne said sheepishly. Then, brightening, she asked, “Do you want the tour while you wait?”

      “Sure,” I answered for both Max and me. I wasn’t about to stroll the halls of the Movement without him there to protect me in case some bored assassin got a hankering to kill.

      Anne motioned for us to follow her as she walked to a set of double doors and slid a badge through a card reader. There was a buzz, then the lock popped loudly. She opened the door and ushered us inside.

      The inner sanctum of the Movement was decorated similarly to the lobby, but doors with badge readers lined the hallway. Sentries were posted at regular intervals, clad in the same black uniform I’d seen the assassins wear the night they stormed Cyrus’s mansion.

      “All the rooms with blue labels like these are safe ones in the event of a security breach.” She pulled one door open to reveal an office. A woman in a long, flowing caftan and a high turban looked up blandly from a pile of paperwork. “Something I can help you with?”

      “Just pointing out the safe rooms to our visitors,” Anne said cheerfully before she closed the door again.

      “So, what are safe rooms?” I had to admit, the security around Movement headquarters wasn’t as impressive as I’d imagined it to be.

      “Safe rooms are exactly where you want to be when you hear the security breach countdown announcement,” Max interjected. “If someone manages to get in, Anne can pull the alarm. You’ve got thirty seconds to get into a safe room—they’re all unlocked—before the UV lights come on.”

      “Frying any vampire roaming the halls,” she finished for him. “Pretty cool, huh?”

      “Pretty cool,” I agreed, sounding for all the world like a mom trying to imitate her teen daughter’s speech. “But what if it’s not a vampire? What if a human gets in?”

      “We have a contingency plan for that,” Anne replied smugly. “A furry contingency plan.”

      “Werewolves.” Max made a disgusted noise. “They’re not affected by UV lights. They do a manual sweep of the halls and kill anything still out there.”

      The idea that at any time someone could flip a switch and subject us to unnatural, but seriously harmful, daylight unnerved me, and I flinched as the fluorescent bulbs flickered above us.

      “Don’t worry,” Anne said with a laugh. “Only a handful of people have the security breach code. Keeps us safer that way.”

      The tour continued through a maze of downward sloping halls. Each level had heightened security, like the Pentagon back home. Anne explained what some of the rooms contained, and I nodded politely, but my mind kept wandering to my worries over Nathan.

      “And this,” she said, sliding her card through a reader and opening a heavy door, “is where our tour ends. General Breton’s office.”

      “Well, thanks,” I offered lamely. “This has been…educational.”

      “You mean boring.” Anne sighed dramatically. She might have been hundreds of years old, but she had the sarcastic American teenager act down pat. “Just imagine living here.”

      “Wah, wah, wah,” Max teased cheerfully. “We’ll see you on the way out.”

      Anne left us at the door with a little wave. Before Max could enter the office, I put my hand on his shoulder. “Okay, I get it. High security, superparanoia. Why are we here?”

      “We’re here because we need to help Nathan.” Max put his foot in the door and let it close a bit. “Listen, it’s pretty clear that whatever happened to him was a spell someone cast. The Movement can help us find out who.”

      “How? Do they keep a database of all witches, too? It would be impossible! Do you have any clue how many fifteen-year-old Sabrina wannabes there are out there?” I wanted to kick the wall, I was so frustrated. “Can you just please give me a straight answer? You always have before!”

      “Fine!” He scanned the hallway before he spoke. “We’re here to see the Oracle.”

      “The Oracle?” I repeated, a ridiculous image of the magic mirror from Snow White popping into my brain.

      “She’s a vampire, a really old one. She knows things. She knows practically everything, and what she doesn’t, she can find out. But she’s dangerous.” Max blew out a breath, as if he knew the inevitable was about to come. “I was hoping I could convince Breton to let me in to see her.”

      “Without me, right?” What was it with male vampires that they thought I needed their constant protection? “No way.”

      “Carrie, you don’t understand. She’s completely unpredictable, and she’s got this telekinesis thing…She can kill you, Carrie. With her mind. Now, I’ve got no one depending on me. If I get poofed to dust, fine. But you need to be around for Nathan. I’m not gonna be responsible for getting you killed.” His mouth set in a grim line. “And my impassioned speech is not moving you at all.”

      “Not an inch.” I eyed the door. “Do you think this general will go along with your plan?”

      Max considered a moment. “I think we have a better chance with him than with some of the others. Just let me do the talking, okay?”

      My jaw dropped. “You know I want to help Nathan! Do you think I’d do something to jeopardize our chances?”

      “Not intentionally.” He opened the door and motioned me inside.

      “What do you mean, not intentionally?” I demanded. But he wouldn’t say anything more. I sighed and walked in to our meeting with General Breton.

      5

       Resistance

      “What were you like before you died?”

      The question startled Cyrus. He’d thought the Mouse asleep. If anyone could sleep through the noise the Fangs made upstairs. It seemed almost as soon as the sun went down, the music started and the engines roared to life, and then there was the inevitable screaming. Usually, the Mouse endeavored to be asleep before then. Having days of experience with them, she knew the Fangs’ feeding schedule.

      Cyrus would have been asleep himself, if he’d had the testicular fortitude to take the bed from her. He comforted himself by reasoning he liked the sounds of the screaming upstairs. He tugged his thin blanket in a futile attempt to cover his entire body. The hideous, polyester preacher clothes bunched with every movement, but he shuddered to imagine the rough upholstery against his naked skin, so he kept them on.

      “What do you mean?” he asked now.

      She rolled to face him. She’d stopped cringing from him, at least. Maybe the dark helped. “They brought you back from the dead. What were you like before you died? Were you…the way you are now?”

      “Human?” Cyrus sniffed derisively. “No, I wasn’t human.”

      “No.” Wrinkles of frustration creased her brow as СКАЧАТЬ