Masked Desire Read online

  “There’s a reason.” She told him about Hiro.

  “In your office?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll be there immediately.”

  No wasted words. She approved. Michaela stood at the threshold and peeked in through the crack in the door at Anjali and Dev as they muttered to each other. Hiro. Of all the people on Pharos to have been killed, he was both the most and least likely. He was a strong advocate for his fellow humans, and Michaela suspected he harbored an active dislike of his supernatural colleagues. Hiro made a habit of phrasing his points in a way that made the arrogant blood of his arcana fellows boil.

  The phone buzzed again and filled her with distaste for this fast-paced modern life. When she was a child, it took weeks for news to travel. Months, even. There was time for people to absorb information and make a sensible decision before they reacted. Not now.

  It was a text from Nadia. C made call before I could stop him. Didn’t see him.

  Michaela breathed deeply. Cormac had no respect for appropriate process at the best of times. She shouldn’t have assumed the gravity of the situation would cause him to behave any differently. Then, as a fey, he could glamour himself when desired. Nadia, young and cocky even by vampire standards, had probably not known he could, or that Cormac was a rule unto himself, not to be halted by irrelevant things such as rules, or protocol, or minding his own damn business.

  “We’ve got incoming,” she called in to Anjali and Dev. “You keep working.”

  She shut the door and stood planted in front of it like a sentinel as a babble of voices rose from around the corner. The six or seven councilors were led by Oksana, the other human representative on the Pharos Council. Uneven red blotches stained her leathery, weathered face and her mouth worked as though she chewed a rubbery bite of steak.

  “Michaela.” Oksana’s voice rang out over the others. “What are you hiding from us? Is it true? Hiro is dead?”

  “Yes.” Michaela kept her voice cool and face smooth but cursed inwardly. It would have been proper for Madden to give the news, but there was no point lying.

  Another reason Cormac should have kept his mouth shut.

  Oksana stiffened. “I demand to be let in.” Michaela looked over the woman’s shoulder to the huddle of councilors, including Baptiste, her own masquerada counterpart. A slight relief pulsed through her. Although she had no problem standing against the group, it was always good to know that Baptiste was there to have her back.

  “You can’t go in, Oksana. We’re conducting an investigation.” Michaela didn’t try to soften the rejection with a gentle touch or tender smile. In her decades as security chief, she’d found the only way to manage the imperious and demanding councilors was to avoid any gesture that might be construed as weakness or reluctance.

  “I insist on seeing Hiro with my own eyes.”

  “No.” Michaela had often dealt with honest grief but didn’t see much anguish when she examined Oksana’s very dry eyes.

  “Michaela is right.” The crowd of councilors parted as Madden approached the door, as imperturbable as always. “There will be a briefing in one hour,” he said. “Michaela will tell you what her team has found then.”

  Madden’s intimidating presence, made more effective by a low-level vampiric compulsion, was enough to disperse the group, albeit with some resentment. Baptiste raised his eyebrows and made an almost imperceptible slashing motion at his throat. Michaela nodded in answer to his silent question: Hiro’s death had been murder. He closed his eyes and his lips moved in a silent prayer as he left.

  When she and Madden were alone, Michaela opened the door. The vampire’s nostrils flared at the reeking scent of blood but aside from a slight flush displayed no other indication that it affected him. “What do you know?” he asked the team working around the body.

  Dev straightened up. “Sir. Councilor Hiro was murdered earlier this morning. We think that he was killed with a single stab wound to the neck and then mutilated further after death.”

  “Why?” Madden gazed around at the mess with his pale eyes. “This speaks of a great anger. Hiro was disliked but I wouldn’t say he was hated.”

  “We don’t know,” Michaela said. The unknowns at the beginning of an investigation both frustrated her and filled her with anticipation. “Nor do we know why he was in my office.”

  Madden rubbed his long fingers along his chin. “This is not good for Pharos.”

  Michaela knew he wasn’t referring to the murder per se, which was of course bad enough. The Council had experienced low levels of infighting over the last year. Hiro and Oksana had rounded together some of the weaker factions and occasionally the vampires to vote against the masquerada and their allies. It had brought the simmering tensions that lived between the groups close to the surface and suspicion had run particularly high after the others had learned about Franz Iverson’s rebellion and the popularity of his belief in masquerada superiority. For many, it confirmed what they had always suspected: the masquerada viewed the rest of them as lesser beings. Michaela and Baptiste had been unable to convince them otherwise.

  Pharos had been created centuries ago for a single purpose—to uphold the Law that kept the supernatural arcane races hidden from the huge mass of humanity. Should the council rip apart, the Law would be upheld only in pockets by arcane rulers strong enough, and willing, to keep their people hidden. Unpoliced, it was inevitable that some arcana, somewhere, would reveal themselves to the humans. Michaela shuddered at the violent effect this would have. She was under no illusions about how humans dealt with what frightened them.

  It would be a bloodbath.

  “We’ll check the security tapes and councilors’ alibis,” she said. Tedious but necessary footwork.

  “Do you think it was one of us?”

  Michaela shrugged. “I don’t want to bias the investigation with an assumption.” The words were rote; both knew the chances were good. Her security had been designed to keep those not affiliated with the Pharos Council out of any of their headquarters.

  Madden chuckled drily. “I’d expect nothing less. Have something to present in an hour.”

  “I will.”

  He turned at the door. “Michaela?”

  “Yes?”

  “Be ready for questions.”

  With that, he was gone. Michaela frowned after him. Why a warning? Then she shrugged. She had fifty-five minutes left and no time to worry about mysteries apart from the one right in front of her.

  Chapter 3

  Cormac swept into the council boardroom, bidding farewell to his bitter little security shadow at the threshold with a big, eat-shit smile and wave that nearly made her head explode. He would have felt pity for the vampire had she not treated him like a prisoner. She wanted to play? Then she’d learn to lose.

  Speaking of losing, he wondered if Michaela had enjoyed her visit from Oksana. Judging from the expression of utter disdain she leveled at him across the table, he thought not.

  Excellent. They were even.

  Michaela opened her laptop and began to tap away, busy organizing some bloody list or another. In the time they’d been councilors together, he’d never seen her without one. Lists, plans, strategies, all laid out and ready to be plugged in and presented, with appropriately colored graphs, at a moment’s notice. He wouldn’t be surprised if underneath her flesh were Excel spreadsheets.

  How dreary, to spend one’s life mapping out the entire journey to prevent any surprises or wrong turns. So safe. So boring.

  The other Pharos masquerada, Baptiste, slid into the tufted velvet green chair beside Michaela and the two chatted in low voices. Unable to eavesdrop, Cormac glanced around the room. The Toronto headquarters were not as chic as some of the other locations—the Cairene building in particular came to mind—but it was the most comfortable. Cormac liked it, and he enjoyed the city. Toro
nto had enough green space that he could soak in the energy all fey needed without going out of his way. Too much concrete destroyed his ability to focus—as well as being hideous. He winced. Truly, humans had an innate ability to kill every enchanting thing in their realm. They were parasites.

  Of course, the arcana seated around the table would probably have done the same thing. Pharos had representatives from all the major arcane groups, two each from the fey, masquerada, witch, warlock, vampire, and were. The lithu seats were vacant, as their people had not attended a meeting since the Pharos was established seven hundred years ago. Other, smaller groups, such as ghouls, were called in when necessary to canvas their opinion.

  Then there was him, the special one. Cormac had managed to wrangle his position from the previous council head after coming into possession of some fascinating information about the warlock’s personal life, but it meant nothing. He had no vote, and no say. The only thing it did was keep him busy enough to avoid insanity, allow for a little intrigue, and ensure he knew at least some of what was going on in the arcane world. It was amusing, and provided an anchor in an otherwise untethered existence. In the endless years of his banishment, Pharos had ended up being the only place where he could return and see familiar, if not necessarily friendly, faces after each of his haphazard journeys.

  Rendell and Drina, the two fey councilors, came into the room talking animatedly. Since they refused to speak to Cormac, a dishonored exile, he didn’t bother to greet them.

  “I heard he wanted to be mated but she refused,” Rendell said. Cormac listened shamelessly. Information was always valuable.

  Also, he wanted to know who they were gossiping about. The fey took mating so seriously that he knew very few who had taken the step. Not even his parents had been mated. Like most, they preferred the much less intense legal partnership.

  Drina’s lilting voice carried from down the table. “That’s why she left, then. I’d refuse too. Who in their right mind would risk mating?”

  Cormac mentally shuddered at the thought of the mating bond. Bond was the right word—mating resulted in an unbreakable union as appealing as being roped to a dying tree. The two fey councilors changed subjects before revealing who the poor lovelorn bastard was. Cormac caught Michaela’s gaze and for a moment had the singular sensation they were the only ones in the room. His hands instinctively sought the wooden hand rests of his chair before pulling back to lay on his thighs. It had been centuries since he’d allowed himself to link with any aspect of the dolma, the natural world. That connection would have exposed him as one of the outlawed caintir, a risk too great to take and a secret he’d buried deep in his heart.

  Michaela broke their glance and a pang of disappointment surprised him. She was too rule-bound for his tastes, attractive though she was. Paradoxically, she was also one of the reasons he continued to return to the Council from his journeys. She was always…Michaela. Whether he’d been gone for a week or a year, she was always the first Pharos member he’d seek out, knowing that when he saw her she would be dressed in the same neat black outfit with her hair tied back in a smooth bun. In her hands would be her laptop or a notebook. She was a small slice of security in this world and he’d come to crave that unchanging support.

  Ironic that it was a masquerada who had provided him with that sense of ageless permanence.

  That she didn’t like him was moot. Few did. Despite her many flaws, he liked her.

  Well, admired.

  Fine. Lusted after. After all, she was stunning, even if she had the emotional capacity of a marigold.

  “Let’s get started.”

  Madden’s deep voice drew Cormac’s attention. Michaela glanced back at Cormac and shook her head slightly as though forcing herself out of a dream. She laid her hands on the varnished oak table and sat still with her head tilted down.

  They were back in the council room, tainted by murder.

  Cormac leaned back to enjoy what he anticipated would be a very interesting meeting. The air almost vibrated with the ghoulish curiosity of the councilors. Madden sat down at the head of the table and nodded to Oksana. “We will find the one who killed your counterpart,” he said. “We stand with you in your grief.”

  A murmur went around the table and Cormac hid a smile. Few, if any, of the arcana muttering their condolences cared if Hiro was dead. Hypocrisy and politics were eager bedmates. Down the table, Baptiste rolled his eyes.

  “I will grieve for Hiro when his killer is found.” Oksana kept her voice steady.

  Madden nodded with approval. “This seems like a good time to hear from Michaela.”

  The security chief’s findings were meager. Beyond knowing Hiro had been killed and how, there was little to tell. There were no fingerprints or a murder weapon. Her office, like all of them, was spelled to ensure privacy, which meant that neither witches nor warlocks could be called in to raise Hiro’s spirit and question it.

  “We’re investigating and will be speaking to each of you today,” Michaela finished. “I know you’ll be happy to cooperate.” Her dark eyes lingered in turn on each individual but deliberately passed over Cormac. He grinned at the stab, subtler than he thought Michaela capable of.

  However, she was still no match for one raised in the Lilac Court. Time to get this show going. “Michaela. Let’s discuss the political angle of Hiro’s death.”

  Madden answered before Michaela could. “What do you mean, Special Ambassador Cormac Redoak?”

  Cormac ignored the deliberate use of his formal title—Madden’s attempt to remind him he had no real role on the Council—and continued to address Michaela. “There are many suspects.”

  “Are you making an accusation?” Michaela glanced up at him with deliberate unconcern. “Because now would be an ideal time to share whatever information you have.”

  “Accusation is a harsh word. Hiro was a man with a strong mind and many ideas. His killer could be anyone.” He looked pointedly around the table and for fun paused at Pilar, one of the two vampires. “Any one of us.”

  The table erupted into predictable outrage. Pilar and her compatriot Abdul both leapt to their feet, fangs bared. Cormac leaned back with his hands behind the back of his neck in a pose that reeked of unconcern and smiled at them. This was going better than he’d expected. The vampires were such a beautifully touchy bunch.

  “Ambassador.” Madden’s voice cut through the din. “Explain yourself.”

  “Michaela is an excellent security chief but I am concerned at the potential for bias in the investigation.”

  Michaela changed the grip on her pen. “Bias? Mine?”

  As tempting as it was, he decided against leaving a pregnant pause that would doubtless send the council right over the edge. He didn’t want this to devolve into a yelling match before he achieved his goal. “Naturally not. However, you are an active council member. Hiro was in your office. Killed in your office, I may add. Your locked office.”

  Baptiste, the other masquerada councilor, rose to his feet with a vicious scowl and Michaela waved him back down to his seat with a casual gesture. “These are all accurate. However, Hiro had a key to my office that we found next to the body. How he obtained it is one of the questions we need to answer.”

  Cormac let the heavy silence say what he didn’t need to. That the councilors thought Michaela was the most likely killer was clear.

  Pilar, the vampire, knocked the table for attention. “The masquerada are the only ones who are openly anti-human,” she said pointedly.

  “That may be so, but I personally am not.” Michaela’s gaze was unblinking.

  “Redoak, is there a point to all of this?” Madden spoke to Cormac, but watched Michaela.

  Cormac paused to make sure all ears were on him. “I offer myself as Watcher.”

  A dumbfounded silence filled the room, broken finally by Michaela.

  “A
Watcher is not required.” Her words were untroubled. Her icy glance said, You bloody bastard.

  “Aye, it is,” Cormac said casually. “As I made very obvious. Shall I go over it again? Hiro is dead. In your office. Only months after the masquerada tried to destroy the Law and enslave humanity.” He smiled inwardly, pleased to have gained a point over her for sending him to his office like a child.

  A slight quiver shook Michaela. Had he finally managed to get under her skin? Years of delicate needling and all it took was a public accusation of murder. Perhaps she would lose control and unconsciously take on a new masque right there in the boardroom, a lapse of etiquette that would demonstrate a stunning lack of discipline. Baptiste laid a hand on Michaela’s arm and both masquerada gave Cormac an identical glower.

  Across the table, Abdul cleared his throat. “As much as it pains me to agree with anything Redoak says, he may have a point. In all our years, we’ve never had a councilor murdered in our own headquarters. It may be best, given the circumstances.” He nodded to Michaela. “A Watcher is meant to protect the investigators.”

  She swept the table with a cool smile. “Our protection is sufficient.” Cormac gave her a long, slow wink that she ignored. Abdul was correct in his interpretation of how the role was intended but Cormac gave zero fucks about intention. He needed to be close to the investigation to see if Hiro’s death was related to the sale of his forest.

  “I agree with Abdul.” Madden tapped the table harder. “This is a special case but it will be noted that the assignment of Ambassador Redoak as Watcher is in no way a comment on Michaela’s competence or culpability.”

  “Agreed.” The word rose as a chorus, even from his fey compatriots. Cormac accidentally caught Rendell’s eye but as always, his rival deliberately looked right through him. The cut direct had been perfected by fey at the Lilac Court, where the protocol of manners had reached a ridiculous degree, and Rendell was acclaimed as one of its most skilled practitioners. Cormac expected nothing more from him. Nor did he want anything but for Rendell to suffer a slow, painful, and preferably hideously disfiguring fatal illness. They had been on opposite sides of the war that had resulted in the deaths of his parents and mentor, and Cormac’s subsequent banishment. While Rendell had not been the one to deliver the blows, his unwavering support of Tismelda had made them permanent enemies.