Boundary Crossed Read online

  “The more people there will be who want her for something,” I finished. I nodded. “And although I mostly trust Simon, I don’t know about . . . the rest of Clan Pellar.”

  A sly half grin appeared on Quinn’s face, but his voice was nonchalant as he said, “Speaking of which, how did it go with Mama Pellar?”

  “Oh, fantastic,” I said sarcastically. “We’re best friends now. I’m going to her house tomorrow so she can braid my hair.”

  The grin erupted on his face. “That bad, huh?”

  “I take it you know what I am,” I said.

  Quinn nodded. “Maven told me when I called to report in last night.” He shrugged. “For what it’s worth, I didn’t know about boundary witches, either.”

  “You still could have warned me,” I pointed out. “Before I went to the Pellars’ place.”

  “I’m not your girlfriend, Lex,” Quinn said frankly. “If you can’t handle Hazel Pellar disliking you, how can I count on you to help me protect my boss?”

  I hated to admit it, but he had a point there. “So you’re saying,” I grumbled, “that I’ll never be a good henchman if I can’t suck it up?”

  Quinn laughed out loud, sounding surprised again. I got the feeling he didn’t laugh a lot.

  “Tell me about Kirby,” I prompted.

  The smile dropped off Quinn’s face as quickly as it had appeared. “Kirby is bad news,” he said shortly.

  I waved my hand to indicate that he should continue. Quinn sighed. “Look, when Maven and Itachi moved to Colorado, the vampires who came with them spread out over the state’s bigger cities. I don’t know why Maven and Itachi decided to stay in Boulder, but when they did, Itachi forced a few vampires to move with them. All of the vampires in town are either new, like me, or . . . problematic.”

  “What does that mean, ‘problematic?’”

  “It’s a ‘keep your enemies close’ kind of thing,” Quinn explained. “Most of the vampires who live in Boulder fucked up somewhere along the way. Including Kirby.”

  “What did he do?”

  “He was pimping female vampires out to humans.”

  I contemplated that for a moment. “Like, literally pimping? Not a metaphor?” Quinn nodded. “So Itachi is against illegal behavior?”

  He started to answer, then reconsidered. “I don’t think Itachi has a problem with prostitution in general,” he finally said. “But Kirby was also pressing the johns’ minds to think they’d gotten laid when they hadn’t. They were paying for nothing.”

  I snorted. “Sounds like they kind of deserved it.”

  “Maybe,” Quinn allowed. “But it was only a matter of time before one of them realized he hadn’t actually gotten laid and decided to start some shit with Kirby or one of the girls. Part of Itachi’s job as dominus is to stop problems like that before they happen.”

  “Dominus? You said that before. I don’t know what it means.”

  “Remember when I said vampires have a feudal system of government, at least in this state?” Quinn said. “‘Dominus’ is the Latin word for the upper class of vampires.”

  “What class are you?”

  “Villani,” he said shortly. “The servant class.”

  “How many classes are there?”

  “Technically just the two. New vampires are all villani. Once you’re strong enough to start making your own baby vampires or strike out on your own, you become a dominus. Some vampires never leave the villani class, though.”

  “Huh.” I thought that over for a moment. “You said ‘technically,’” I pointed out. “‘Technically’ there are only two classes.”

  Quinn hesitated. “I’m not sure how much I’m supposed to tell you,” he admitted. “At any rate, all you need to know is that Kirby outclasses me, but I’m here on Itachi’s orders. And Itachi is Kirby’s sworn dominus.”

  I thought about pushing him further, but there really wasn’t much point. Frankly, I was surprised he had come right out and admitted he couldn’t tell me. “So Kirby has to answer your questions, but he doesn’t have to be nice about it,” I summed up.

  “Exactly.”

  We turned onto College Ave, and I got my first glimpse of the Sigma Pi fraternity house. Kirby, Quinn explained, was an honest-to-goodness frat boy.

  The frat house was a monstrous building, with several wings and a long, semi-circular sidewalk that was mostly covered by illegally parked Jeeps, Audi wagons, and fancy SUVs, all of them much nicer than my ten-year-old Outback. Boulder is a town full of rich kids, which I couldn’t get too smarmy about. Technically, I’d been one of them.

  Young frat-boy stereotypes were busily unloading crates and plastic shopping bags from the vehicles. It’s Friday night, I remembered. They were throwing a party.

  “How is this even possible?” I wondered. “I mean, he can’t go to classes, right? Does he even drink beer?”

  “Technically, we can eat or drink anything,” Quinn said wryly, “but we can’t digest anything but blood, so we have to throw it up afterwards.” He shrugged. “Kirby doesn’t live in the house, and the other fraternity brothers think he takes all his classes at night and online because he has a part-time job.”

  I was flabbergasted. “That sounds ridiculously complicated. And temporary. I mean, if he’s not aging . . .”

  “He’s about five years into his Van Wilder bit now,” Quinn told me, parking his sedan behind the last station wagon in the line. “He can only keep this up for another year or two, but that’s long enough to annoy the hell out of Itachi, which I think is the whole point.”

  “Oh. Revenge for breaking up Kirby’s prostitution ring?”

  “I would avoid using the word ‘revenge,’” Quinn said carefully. “Feuds can start when you throw around words like that. I would call it ‘acting out a little.’ But yes, Kirby was annoyed that he had to move to Boulder, so he got himself accepted to CU so he could force a time limit on his stay here. He’ll eventually have to ‘graduate,’ and he’s hoping Itachi will feel it necessary to send Kirby somewhere else.”

  “Oh.” I thought about all that for a few seconds. “Who’s Van Wilder?”

  We walked past the sea of cars to the line of brick archways that formed the entrance to the house. Quinn reached out and snagged the shoulder of the nearest brother, a short, big-eared freshman holding the beer tap he’d obviously been sent to fetch from one of the cars. “I’m looking for Kirby,” he said to the kid. “He around?”

  The kid swallowed nervously a few times, looking from Quinn to me and back, and then blurted out, “Kirby not seen, have I,” and darted into the building.

  Quinn and I exchanged a glance. “Let me try,” I suggested. Quinn made a little “after you” gesture. I saw another young-looking kid carrying a garbage-bag-sized sack of chips and a trough of dip. He was tall and broad-shouldered, with a great bushy beard and dark hair covering his arms and hands. I stepped into his path. “Excuse me, I’m looking for Kirby,” I said, polite but firm.

  In a perfect imitation of the first guy, the kid looked nervously back and forth between us, then gave a tiny nod and opened his mouth. Instead of speaking, he just let out a warbling cry, halfway between a roar and a bird call. He, too, ran into the house.

  I shrugged at Quinn. “All things considered, that was not a terrible Chewbacca impression,” he said thoughtfully.

  “Should we keep trying?” I asked. “Or just go in?”

  “I can’t go in without an invitation,” he reminded me. “From someone who lives here.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  An older kid came hurrying through the same archway that the hairy boy had entered, heading straight toward us. It took me a moment to recognize him as the other guy in Darcy’s picture. I tilted my head toward him so Quinn would look, too. “Yeah, that’s him,” he muttered under his breath.

  Kirby was bu
ilt like a wrestler: short and muscular, with a “don’t start with me or I’ll flatten you” expression that eased up a little when he saw Quinn. He still had that aquiline nose, but he must have done something to disguise the prematurely thinning dark hair I’d seen in Darcy’s photo, because now it looked thick and lustrous.

  “Sorry about that, guys,” he said in a relaxed, jovial tone that didn’t match his hard-ass appearance. “The pledges are only allowed to speak in the manner of the movie characters we’ve chosen for them. I see you’ve met Chewbacca.” He shook his head happily. “Kid’s not going to have an easy time picking up girls tonight, let me tell you.” In a quieter voice, he added, “Shake my hand and smile, Quinn, people are watching.” Quinn reached out and shook, plastering on a warm smile to match the one Kirby was displaying. Then the frat-boy vampire looked at me, his eyes running up and down me in an interested manner that made me want to cross my arms over my chest. I resisted the urge. If he’d been an ordinary punk college kid, I would have said something, but the guy could probably bench press my Outback. “Who’re you?” he asked me.

  “Kirby, this is Lex. Lex, Kirby. She’s being considered for a job with Itachi,” Quinn said succinctly. “Did you hear about Victor and Darcy?”

  Kirby’s eyes narrowed. “Not here,” he muttered. In a conversational voice, he added, “Sure, you’re almost there. Walk to the corner with me, and I’ll point out the street.”

  The three of us trooped to the edge of the semi-circular sidewalk, where Kirby pointed down the road, pretending to give us directions. “Yes, I heard that they’re dead,” he said quietly. “And I know they had it coming. I had no idea they were planning to try to kidnap a founding baby.” A doubtful expression crossed his face, and he corrected himself. “Well, a null baby, I guess. Itachi put the word out that she’s protected now.”

  I’d believed Maven and Itachi when they’d promised to protect my niece, but it was nice to have the independent confirmation. I cut my eyes to Quinn, letting him take the lead. “They both pledged troth to you,” he said, his voice as low as Kirby’s.

  The other vampire nodded. “I made Victor myself. Took Darcy on when she came to Boulder a couple of years ago and started rooming with Victor.”

  “And who are you pledged to?” I broke in, just in case Quinn was wrong about the chain of command.

  Kirby’s fake-friendly expression wavered as his eyes narrowed at me. “Itachi, same as him,” he retorted, tilting his head at Quinn. Kirby’s eyes were on me, and he didn’t see the little flicker on Quinn’s face as he said this. I filed that away for later.

  “How often did you see the two of them?” Quinn asked.

  Smiling again—just a friendly college kid chatting with some out-of-towners—Kirby shrugged. “I’d check in with them once or twice a month, or they’d check in with me. And before you ask, no, they never mentioned doing any side work, and they weren’t showing off a sudden influx of cash or bragging about a new job. We would meet somewhere, they’d tell me everything was fine, I’d remind them of the rules, and we’d split.”

  Quinn pulled the photo out of his pocket. “Is this you?”

  Kirby’s glance was quick and careless, his face revealing nothing. “You know it is.”

  “Who’s the fourth person?”

  The friendly, open expression Kirby had been forcing suddenly faded. “That’s Nolan. He’s one of the Denver vampires.” He gave Quinn a quick glance. “I haven’t seen him since the purge.”

  Quinn asked a few more questions after that, but Kirby really didn’t seem to know anything more about Victor and Darcy’s plans. “Look, I gotta get back to the party before this looks any more suspicious,” he said, his face still cheerful. “Good luck and all. If anyone asks between here and the car, you two are trying to visit your nephew at Tau Kappa.” Without waiting to see Quinn’s response, Kirby turned on his heel and disappeared into the throng of people near the house’s archway.

  Quinn shot an annoyed look at Kirby’s back and started toward his car. “Come on.”

  A DJ had set up giant speakers and a table while we were talking to Kirby, and as Quinn and I walked back to the car, “The Fallen” by Franz Ferdinand came pulsing out of the speakers. It seemed pretty appropriate.

  Back in the car, I asked, “How is it possible that Itachi put that guy in charge of two other vampires?”

  Quinn tilted his head to the side as he thought that over. “It’s just kind of . . . how they do things,” he said at last. “I can’t really think of a comparison, except maybe Alcoholics Anonymous.”

  I chortled. “Sorry, what?”

  “Sponsors,” he said, completely serious. “In AA you have a sponsor, and you also become a sponsor. The whole thing is this big system so you learn responsibility.”

  “That sounds ridiculously stupid,” I argued. “What’s to stop Kirby from turning all his vampires against his boss?”

  “Because Itachi is the only vampire in Colorado who can officially sanction kills,” he said shortly. “Kirby might enjoy needling Itachi, but he knows exactly how far he can push him. Trust me, Kirby’s dominus responsibilities are the one thing he takes seriously.”

  He was staring through the windshield, where we could just barely see Kirby standing in a loose circle with four of his frat brothers. As we watched, Kirby put Chewbacca in a headlock and started laughing.

  “I don’t think he was involved,” Quinn said finally, mostly to himself. “Kidnapping a baby so you can train her the way you want, to do the things you want to do—that’s a long-view move. I don’t know Kirby all that well, but I just don’t think he’s a long-view kind of guy. I could see him knocking over a liquor store, sure, but kidnapping a baby?”

  “He could have been the . . . you know, the fence,” I offered, uncertain of the terminology. “The middleman for another buyer.”

  Quinn shook his head again. “Kirby’s got plenty of money. That whole prostitution thing, which was a hell of a risk, was just for his own amusement. And selling a baby isn’t particularly amusing, nor is the kind of heat that would have come down on him if he’d gotten away with your niece.”

  In front of us, Kirby had finally released poor Chewbacca and was telling the throng of brothers a story with great enthusiasm, waving his hands around to emphasize the point. The other frat boys were hanging on his every word, watching Kirby with the fervor of cult members. “I agree,” I said finally. “It doesn’t seem like his style. But do you think he knows something he’s not telling us?” I wished we had gotten Kirby alone so I could have tried the mind-pressing thing again; I was way too new at it to experiment in front of a big crowd of college kids.

  Quinn shrugged and started the car. “If he does, we’re not going to find out tonight,” he said pragmatically.

  “Denver next?” I asked.

  “Denver next.”

  Chapter 23

  Boulder is only about thirty miles northwest of Colorado’s capital and biggest city, and in perfect traffic you can make it there in forty minutes. But since plenty of people work in Boulder but live in the much less expensive Denver area, there were a lot of commuters. The traffic was far from perfect by the time we began the trek south.

  Quinn called Itachi on the way and got an address for Nolan. When he hung up, I asked, “Did he tell you anything else about the guy?”

  He shook his head. “Not really. I’ve heard a little about him, though. He was a big player during the purge.”

  “I don’t know what that means,” I said irritably. I was getting really tired of playing catch-up. Every time I thought I had a decent grasp of the Old World, someone started talking in made-up terms.

  Quinn tapped his fingers on the steering wheel, his face expressionless as ever. Finally, he said, “Remember I told you there are no werewolves in Colorado?”

  “When I was in the hospital, yeah.”

&n
bsp; “Well, this whole state used to be werewolf paradise, with a pack in most of the bigger cities. Then one of the alphas, Trask, decided to take over all the packs.” Quinn eyed me. “You ever met a wild dog? Or a pack of wild dogs?”

  Some unpleasant images from Iraq flashed in my head before I could push them aside. “Unfortunately.”

  “Trask turned his people into that, or gave it his best shot, anyway.” Quinn’s voice was perfectly level, his voice betraying no emotion at all. He might as well have been describing the history of deforestation. “Of course, a few of the wolves tried to stand up to Trask. He killed them, too.”

  I stared at him. “Someone had to have noticed.”

  Quinn lifted a disinterested shoulder. “They did, but the Old World is like the Wild West. You stake your claim on a patch of land, and you do your best to defend it. As long as Trask wasn’t drawing enough attention to alert the foundings to our presence, no one wanted to challenge him. He was too strong.”

  “Someone must have stepped in,” I objected. I didn’t like bullies, and I really didn’t like the kind that got away with killing people.

  “The witches did—sort of,” Quinn confirmed. “When Trask was on his rampage, three of Colorado’s big clans got caught in the crossfire. One of their leaders decided something had to be done.”

  “Hazel,” I whispered.

  Quinn nodded. “Hazel went to the oldest, most powerful vampire in the United States, and she begged for help.”

  “Itachi?”

  A brief, amused smile graced Quinn’s face. “Maven is the one with the serious power. Hazel went to her.” It was the most unguarded thing he’d said yet, and I saw him glance over at me, unsure if he’d overstepped. I made my face neutral. “Anyway. There’s a whole long story, but basically the witches cut a deal: if Maven killed Trask and forced all the werewolves out of the state, Hazel and her clans would swear total loyalty to the vampires for a period of twenty years.”

  I remembered the way Hazel had reacted when Simon explained that Maven wanted me trained. “And Maven really did it.”