Akio kept his own vigilance, understanding Michael didn’t want the human with him at the moment. “I’m afraid I don’t know that term,” he finally replied.

  Sabine brought her gaze down from the chalet’s roof and turned to Akio. “What term?” She thought about what she had just said. “Oh, branleur? It, uhh…” She thought about it a moment. “’Wanker,’ the English would say ‘wanker.’”

  Their discussion was interrupted when an explosion occurred out of sight.

  “Shit!” She turned and was going to run toward it, but her arm was held fast. She turned to Akio, who was looking toward the chalet but didn’t seem concerned. She tried to pry his fingers off. “Michael—”

  His fingers didn’t budge. “Is ok. You can keep trying, but you won’t be able to pull them off, and trust me, the Archangel is fine. The reason he went ahead is so you don’t run into that,” he nodded toward the chalet where the explosion had occurred, “and have your body parts become part of the wallpaper.”

  Her head turned from Akio to the chalet and back. Akio released her arm and she surreptitiously rubbed where his hand had grasped it. “You’re kinda strong for a short guy.”

  Akio grunted and tried another smile. “Big things come in small packages.”

  Sabine looked at Akio for a moment, then her eyes narrowed. “Was that a comment about, uh…” Her eyes glanced down and then back up to Akio’s face, which was a study of calm and repose. “No, never mind. I’m sure my mind is just making things up.”

  They both turned when they heard boots crunching on gravel to see Michael coming down a path between the chalet and the tall brick wall some fifteen feet away.

  Sabine stepped away from Akio and looked at Michael’s coat. “How did you…” she started as she walked around him. Michael stood still, his head turning around first one way and then the other, tracking her. She put out a hand to rub his arm. “How did you not get anything on you?” Looking at him, she asked, “You can switch into your misty stuff that fast?”

  “I can and did,” he answered. “However, if you were there I would have had to grab the two of you as well. Doing that is a bit of a pain, and I would have been less than pleased with myself if I had missed. Better to skip the mistake than court disaster.”

  “How many?” Akio asked Michael when he turned toward him.

  “The one fire trap I accidentally tripped. Three more of those, once I figured out how I missed it. Five normal traps and some poison.” Michael turned to look back at the chalet. “I think I found most everything. Sabine, you might want to stay out here.”

  Sabine nodded. “I’m good, but I’m not indestructible. I’ll keep the perimeter clear.”

  Michael turned and walked back to the chalet. Akio patted her shoulder as he stepped past her. “Keep your guns handy. We don’t know if anyone has been notified.”

  Sabine’s head swiveled to the gate. Moments later she was heading in that direction. “God,” she called over her shoulder, “I hope so!”

  Akio heard her open a door as he entered the house behind Michael.

  William received a buzz on his small phone. He lifted it and listened for a moment before he replied in a gruff tone to the person on the other end of the line. “Take ten and go find out who is messing with my home, the home I wish to come back to someday.” He paused as the other party asked him a question. “No, I doubt it is him. Not if we have explosions happening. Hmmm? Yes, if you find anyone in the house, you may do with them as you please. Just don’t kill them in the chalet if you can help it. I don’t want a complete mess to clean up. Also, don’t let them go. Either kill them or enslave them. Yes, you can do that as well. Ok, goodbye.”

  He snapped his phone case closed and went back to reviewing the extensive architectural drawings of the Hadron Collider. He marked the exits and other places he might be able to make exit holes out of the large ring and sub-ring for his new permanent lair.

  Sabine looked around and considered the difference between when she had first been saved by these two men and now.

  Her reunion with her cousin James and spending time with his friends Kirk and Timothy had been enjoyable, but she had still wanted to see Akio again. She smiled, trying to figure out if the Japanese man had been joking or not. Had he actually made a sex joke? She didn’t get the vibe that he liked her.

  Dammit, it was all too confusing. Sabine wasn’t sure if she was attracted to him because he saved her, because he gave her a way to fight back, or because he had a hot body that oozed sex appeal.

  Maybe all three.

  She sat herself down in a corner where two walls came together. She was in the dark. Not that it would have mattered, she thought to herself. The sounds of people coming toward the chalet were loud enough to wake the dead.

  Well, shit. She thought about Michael and Akio. That includes the mostly dead.

  “It’s feeling too damned weird,” Adlar whispered to his boss. Adlar was dark-skinned, but Derick was so dark Adlar thought he could make a moonless night seem like daylight at times.

  “Yes,” Derick agreed and turned to the others in the squad. “It feels wrong, people. Shut your mouths and try to be silent.” He pointed to the three in the back who had been talking. “You three swing around to the north and come in from the garden side.”

  “Why do we have to swing around?” Hoary hissed.

  “Because you three are going to give the rest of us away with your constant joking around,” Meinard, another in the squad, hissed back.

  “You need to get a life,” Hoary commented.

  “You need to get laid and grow the fuck up,” Meinard retorted.

  Hoary’s friend Darnell chuckled, “Well, he’s likely to grow up before he gets laid.”

  “Probably,” Derick’s voice broke into the conversation, “that won’t happen because of your childish behavior. Now, go north and enter through the garden.” His eyes fairly gleamed at them in the dark. “And if this is a vampire, I hope he chokes on your bones.”

  Hoary slapped his two friends. “Derick said ‘boner!’”

  “Bones, you ass!” Derick shook his head in frustration. “If you fuck up the Duke’s chalet, he will probably end you and my life will be better for it.”

  The three started toward the north, still whispering amongst themselves.

  Adlar watched them go. “What do you call those three?”

  “I call them bait,” Derick admitted when they were out of earshot. He turned to his number two man. “If we don’t hear any screaming in a few minutes, we will go in the front.”

  Adlar and the others who had stayed behind chuckled.

  “I doubt it,” a female voice told them. “I think your people are dead, and if you don’t slowly step back and return to where you came from, you will be too.”

  “Where the hell?” Derick’s eyes were trying to figure out where the voice had come from. The Duke’s chalet had high stone walls, and the voice hadn’t come from up top.

  “On the left,” Adler whispered. “I think she is hiding in the shadows by the wall.”

  “Hiding?” The female chuckled. “Boys, I don’t need to hide from you. I just need to stay outside of the blood.”

  “What blood is that?” Derick asked. Behind his back, he was giving instructions to his team with hand gestures.

  “You know, the blood from your wounds when a sword cuts you open?”

  Derick smiled, his teeth gleaming in the moonlit night. “I doubt that anyone is going to sneak up and cut anyone, little girl. I see you in the shadows in the corner. Me and my men,” he waved behind him, “will be enjoying your cries of pleasure this evening.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “You and who?”

  “Me and…” Derick turned to point to his team and stopped. He saw five of his people dead on the ground and a short man with brightly glowing red eyes and a gleaming sword staring back at him.

  “Finish them,” Akio commanded, and two shots rang out in the night. Both men’s heads snapped around from the power of the bullets, and both bodies slumped to the ground. Sabine walked out of the shadows and holstered her pistol. “The other three?”

  “I killed them before I came over here,” Akio told her.

  “I thought as much,” Sabine admitted. “Michael?”

  “Felt them from quite a distance, and had me come out to hunt.”

  “Oh.” She looked at the men. “Did you, uh, need to…”

  Akio smiled. “I don’t drink blood from humans, Sabine.”

  “Right.” She looked around. “Do we have much more to do inside?”

  “Come on in.” Akio walked around the bodies and went toward the house. “I know the front is clean of traps.”

  Sabine looked him over as they went into the chalet. “How did you not get any blood on you?”

  “Practice, little one. Lots and lots of practice.”

  Chapter Eight

  Nagoya, Japan

  The black box was almost invisible against the night sky. Yuko figured that if it weren’t for her vamp senses, she might have had difficulty locating it in the middle of the park where they had landed. She sniffed the air—no trace of Were scent.

  Strange, she thought, not too concerned.

  She trudged up to the container and opened the door, stepping into the semi-lit cabin.

  “And what time do you call this?” Eve demanded playfully from the other side of a bank of consoles.

  Yuko glanced around. “Where are—?”

  Eve smiled. “Still out. I checked them in, to the arcade’s hotel for when they’ve worn themselves out playing games. We can collect them in the morning. Besides, I didn’t want them to see your example,” she said, winking.

  Yuko giggled. “Right,” she said, contemplating a protest and then deciding she was too tired to be witty right now.

  “So,” Eve pressed, “what happened after we spoke?”

  Yuko pulled out a seat and slumped down. “Not much. We left the restaurant and finished our date elsewhere.”

  Eve’s voice was serious. She peered at Yuko from between two computers. “No more attacks?”

  Yuko shook her head.

  “So,” Eve continued impatiently, “tell me about the date!”

  Yuko’s complexion flushed slightly. “It was…wonderful. We ate fish and chips sitting at the port. And we talked and talked. He told me all about his parents and his grandparents and about the stories they used to tell about us.”

  Eve raised one eyebrow. “I thought we wiped their memories.”

  Yuko bowed her head for a moment as she spoke and sat up in her chair a little. “Yes, but they would record it on paper and then extrapolate in between. Hirano swore that his grandfather’s recountings were exaggerated each time he retold the story, and with no real memory to go off, he was just inferring from his incomplete notes.”

  She paused.

  “Though he did get something right.”

  Eve held her gaze intensely. “What was that?”

  Yuko grinned. “That you were the most intelligent and overwhelming non-human entity he could ever have imagined.”

  Eve frowned. “He wrote that?”

  “He did,” Yuko confirmed. “Even made Hirano question whether you might have been fiercer than the fiercest vampire or Were!”

  Eve stood up and walked around the computers so she could see her friend better as they talked. “Wow. And yet he didn’t seem scared when we met.”

  Yuko pursed her lips. “I think he figured that since you were with me, it was one of his grandfather’s confounded suppositions.”

  Eve chuckled. “It sounds like they’ve been quite fascinated with our comings and goings.”

  Yuko sighed, looking across the room as she sat back in her chair. “Yes, this is true.” She paused, remembering their conversations. “You know, he seems pretty fascinated with this whole concept of space and Bethany Anne having put ships up there. He kept asking all kinds of questions.”

  Eve paused, processing. “You don’t suspect he’s a spy, do you?”

  Yuko shook her head. “Oh, no, not at all. Just, he’s curious. Fascinated. It’s a good trait if we’re going to spend time together again,” she hinted noncommittally.

  Eve grinned. “You mean you’re going to see him again?”

  Yuko smiled. “Yes. Well, he asked me, and I said yes. So…”

  Eve looked concerned for a moment.

  “What is it?” Yuko asked, sensing something was wrong.

  Eve shook her head. “It may not be a good time. What with Michael being back and the danger factor rising… I mean, you were attacked tonight for no good reason.”

  Yuko started nodding slowly. “You have a point. Those guys weren’t run-of-the-mill criminals. They were trained professionals, and they were after me, for sure.”

  Yuko thought for a minute more, her glow and excitement gone.

  Eve cocked her head. “What are you thinking?”

  Yuko’s eyes seemed to turn down at the edges. “I think I need to tell Inspector Hottie I can’t see him anymore.”

  Eve was quiet. “Are you sure you want to do that?” she asked finally. “You’ve waited so long to have a relationship with someone who gets your world.”

  Yuko’s eyes had dropped to the floor of the cabin. “I know,” she said distantly. “But if he had gotten hurt tonight, I wouldn’t have been able to forgive myself.” She sighed. Eve could sense her pain. “And besides, just knowing he’s alive in the world brings me happiness. I need to make sure it stays that way.”

  Yuko shook her head, hauling herself out of her chair. She busied herself with tasks—anything to distract her from the hollowness growing in her chest where before she had felt so full she had thought she would burst from happiness.

  Eve stood quietly for a moment before broaching her next question. “Do you have any more idea who they were? I haven’t got any footage from the restaurant at all.”

  Yuko glanced up, her mood much soberer. “None at all?”

  Eve shook her head. “They just don’t have it.”

  Yuko frowned. “That’s…odd.”

  She mused for a moment, looking around the Pod before continuing her thoughts. “Well, as to what we do know… We’ve made a lot of enemies over the years, but I have no idea why anything would have changed now. Unless…

  Eve blinked. “Unless?”

  Yuko pursed her lips and pulled herself closer to the computers, booting one up. “Unless news of the ArchAngel has spread and these forces want to try and take us out before the ArchAngel crushes them.”

  Eve frowned, voicing Yuko’s counter-thought. “You’d think it would make them want to keep a low profile.”

  Yuko shrugged, watching the computer screen. “Unless they feel desperate.” She tapped a few keys and brought up a map of the country. “Either way, we need to be away from here to regroup.”

  Eve stepped over to her screen to look at what Yuko was doing. Seeing the map, she placed her hand on the back of Yuko’s chair. “Where are we going?”

  Yuko pointed at a lake in the middle of the country. “Otsu,” she said quietly. “It’s remote, and it will give the others some downtime to normalize from the battles they’ve been in recently.”

  Eve nodded. “I’m sure they’ll appreciate that. However…” She hesitated a moment. Yuko looked up, and Eve put her hand on her shoulder. “You don’t have to run away from Hirano.”

  Yuko lowered her eyes. “I’m not, I swear. I’m trying to keep him safe.”

  Eve didn’t push the issue. She nodded and returned to her computer to make some preparations for their trip the next morning.

  Yuko added softly. “I’ll go see him in the morning. Let him know.”

  Eve nodded again and went back to work.

  Peckham, England

  “In that building there,” Officer Oscar Williams pointed to the dark brick building. His partner looked to where Oscar was pointing.

  “Put your damned finger down!” Leo hissed. “You’re going to get us tagged!”

  Oscar yanked his hand back. The two officers were in the shade of a tall edifice three blocks from the large black building, soot having stained the bricks of the outer walls centuries back.

  “What’d’ya mean?” Oscar asked his salt-and-pepper-haired partner. “We got the tip that the man we’re looking for is in that building.”

  “And he is going to stay there,” Leo told him. He slapped his partner on the arm and nodded down the street away from the black building. “Let me buy you a pint, and I’ll explain something I was hoping to keep you out of for at least another six months.”

  Leo swept his fingers through his hair and started walking away, tucking his hands into his uniform jacket. Oscar took one more look at the building, then jogged to keep up with his partner.

  Leo shook his head to quiet his partner when Oscar tried to start a conversation. As they walked, the two officers nodded to the ladies on the street and shook a couple hands. “Here,” Leo called over his shoulder and dipped into the Green Antlers Pub.

  Oscar was surprised when Leo waved to the barman and kept walking toward the back. The two stepped out of the smoke- and beer-fume-filled bar into a hallway, and Leo reached up above a door and grabbed a key. Ten feet farther he reached up on the wooden wall, twisted a small piece of wood aside and inserted the key, then turned it and pushed open the portion of the wall that was a hidden door.

  He waved Oscar inside the room after making sure no one had followed them.

  Closing the door behind them, Leo pulled off his hat and tossed it onto a chair. The room was fairly large and included a couple desks up against one wall, a table large enough for ten, and a bar at one end. “They keep the bar stocked for us.” He waved Oscar to the bar. “Take a drink—you’re going to need it.”

  “Well,” Oscar walked over to the bar and grabbed the bottle of whiskey he recognized, “not going to argue with a free drink.” Oscar stopped before he poured and turned to Leo. “It is free, right?”