Page 11 of Countdown to Murder
I walked to the back of the main cabin compartment, looked to see what was in the warmer, and was pleased to see hamburger patties, with buns and condiments in the small refrigerator. I popped some burgers in the microwave, and Mira joined me when the smell permeated the plane. She ate a burger patty dipped in mayo without a bun while I ate four burgers with buns and all the fixins.
“How tall are you?”
“Four eleven.”
“I think Ember might be a few inches taller, but she’s small, too. You’re skinnier, though.”
“I’m surprised Drake put so much information about supernaturals on our tablets. Especially telling us what Sloan and Ember are.”
“That was there for your information since I already knew. The employment paperwork you signed gave the company the right to tell other employees what you are,too. The text on the tablets will change shortly before we land, and all mention of anything supernatural will be removed. No one knows what trigger is used, but my theory is that it’s done based on altitude and not time. That way, even if we crash or have to make an emergency landing, it’ll be scrubbed.”
She took the information in without responding, so I moved us to the next subject. “I’m assuming you have experience assassinating vampires?”
“My training was sufficient for this. Yes.”
“That wasn’t what I asked, Mira.”
Those cool, honey-colored eyes focused on me with zero emotion, and I wanted to shake her to make her feelsomething.
“It’s the best answer I’ll give you.”
Right, because she wasn’t going to admit to murder over and over. She’d done so once, but she’d had to be shown the safeguards put in place before she would. I didn’t blame her, but I needed more information.
“Real-world experience or not?”
“Yes.”
“Okay then. Shields?”
“Impenetrable so long as they don’t drink from me.” One would think an emotionless voice would be knife sharp and icy cold, but hers was merely cool, and far from sharp.
“Mine are as well, and Ember and Sloan have strong shields, so we’re good there.”
I breathed in, trying to get a sense of her, and for the first time, I picked something up. Not an emotion, but heat, as if more of her blood was near the surface of her skin. My dick picked it up as arousal, and I had to focus to keep it from getting hard.
I wasn’t certain I believed the asexual thing, but I needed to be professional until we finished this op.
Chapter Six
We landed on a single-runway landing strip in the middle of a field, with no commerce around the airport. I supposed this was where the movie star came when she wanted to get away from people. Thankfully, a limo was waiting for us, along with the leader of the outside team plus the client’s driver. They met us at the plane and helped cart our luggage and equipment to the car. I thought back to my notes — the driver and his wife lived full-time in the mansion and were responsible for maintenance, and for keeping the kitchen stocked in case their boss got a wild hair to visit.
I looked at the mountains all around us, and at the trees closest to us in the valley. We had a few hours until sunrise, but lions have excellent night vision. As in Chattanooga, the colors were gone, with only a few stragglers holding on at lower elevations. It was twenty degrees colder here than it’d been at home, which meant it was barely above freezing. I’d have preferred Miami. Mira had put a coat on over her suit before leaving the plane, but my suit jacket was enough.
Once we were in the car and moving, with the partition up so the driver couldn’t hear us, I made quick introductions. “Mira, this is Jones. Jones, Mira,” I turned towards Mira. “Jones hasn’t been out of the Marines terribly long. He rarely uses unnecessary words, but when he does, they’re usually colorful.”
Jones nodded to Mira and looked back to me. “The Miami crew and the client made three stops on yesterday’s flight, and changed planes to chartered aircraft during two of them, to try to lose anyone who might try to follow them. I arrived earlier in the day with more people, and we secured the residence in preparation. The client landed in Stowe at approximately 1820 yesterday, and we had her in place before sunset. No overnight incursions appear to have happened, Sir.” He leaned back in his seat and relaxed a little. “You couldn’t pay me to live in that condo in Miami, but I’d kill someone’s sweet little grandmother to live in this house. Fuck, it’s nice, and it’d be easy to defend if we weren’t possibly dealing with a flying damned motherfuckin’ vampire.”
“It sold for nearly ten million dollars, so it’d take more wetwork than that to buy it. Also, you should tell Mira you’re joking.”
I’d hung out with him enough to understand his sense of humor, but Mira’s hand had formed a fist when he said the part about the grandmother.
He smiled at Mira. “Yeah, I was joking. Unless someone’s grandmother is trying to kill someone I’m supposed to protect, she’s safe from me. You got a grandmother you’re close to?”
“No.”
Jones looked at me, clearly uneasy with her one-word answer, but I wasn’t inclined to explain. “Tell me about our client. Is she afraid? Angry? Frustrated? Chill?”
“Terrified. We can’t tell her she’s probably safe during the day, and in fact, we don’t know that for a fact. Even if it’s a vampire, there’s a chance he or she will send minions to do the actual kidnapping during the day if we let our guard down. She’s trying not to act afraid, but she doesn’t know we can smell her fear.”
