Vince ducked his head, concerned. “I don’t know how you keep her as level as you do.”
Pike frowned, his long, scarred face bunching up. “My mother was worse,” he said, then put a hand to my back and propelled me forward. “This way, Morgan. You have two minutes to come up with a concession speech. You’ve seen what Constance will do if she has to force one from you. Best hope she doesn’t catch anyone in evidence with which to encourage you.”
My thoughts went to Nash, and then Joni with her red-smeared lips and soft whimper of fear. “I know where the elevators are,” I muttered, and he gripped my elbow hard enough to make me try to jerk away.
“No mischief, Ms. Morgan,” he said, giving me a shove into Don.
“Knock it off!” I said loudly, and heads across the lobby turned. But it was the sparkle of pixy dust that set my pulse racing. Jenks.
Empty bag tight in my grip, I went into the elevator. I had to talk to Jenks. He could get to evidence and tell Trent where the Brimstone was before they got themselves in too deep to get out. Pike sidled up beside me, and Vince and Don flanked us.
“Congratulations, Mr. Welroe,” Don said as the doors shut. “Constance will be pleased.” He took a breath, muttering, “For a fucking moment, anyway.”
Vince tapped a button and, seeing which one it was, I stiffened. The media floor. It was down two levels, deep enough that the undead could hang out without risk of light poisoning, but not so deep that the media couldn’t get their live feeds to work. Zack and Constance would be lower. Much lower.
I didn’t see any pixy dust, but I was sure that Jenks was in the elevator shaft. “It doesn’t matter if the Brimstone is at Piscary’s,” I said as we started down. “I’m not going to make any public announcement. And you can be sure as hell I’m not going to convince Zack to, either.”
“He’s already seen one person eviscerated,” Pike said. “You think he’ll sit and watch another?”
“Fine. Put me in front of a live camera,” I said with a sneer. “I dare you.”
Pike frowned as the elevator dinged, and we all looked forward as the door opened and the noise and warmth of too many people in too small a space rolled in. “There she is!” someone exclaimed, and I winced at the sudden clicking and the glare of a bright spotlight finding us.
Pike leaned to push the button to close the door.
“Ahh . . .” Vince started, and Pike shook his head, eyes narrowed and black hair swinging.
“Constance,” Pike said, and Don’s lips parted.
Vince, too, was not happy. “She wants Morgan to make an announcement first.”
Pike turned, showing some fang as he all but pinned Vince to the wall with his stare. “And I don’t want to take Joni’s place,” he said softly. “Morgan isn’t here to capitulate. You put her in front of a camera, and she’ll rally the city, not hand it over.”
I tightened my death grip on my empty bag as the doors opened up to a brightly lit hallway. We were deep underground now, and my skin tingled at the pheromone residue soaked into the cold tiles. No wonder Ivy always came home hungry. . . .
“She needs some convincing yet,” Pike said, then gave me a push into the hallway.
“Will you stop shoving?” I said, glaring as I caught my balance. “I came here of my free will.”
“And you will die if you don’t give it to Constance.” Pike pinched my biceps and started forward. His long legs struck a pace that was a shade longer than mine. He was edging into a living vampire’s faster reflexes, too, and I had to hustle to keep from being dragged along. Gray and soothing, the walls and floors absorbed the sound. We went through a set of guarded double doors into the lower executive lounge . . . and then I balked as if running into a wall.
But then again, I sort of had. The pheromones were heady, hitting me as if I’d been sipping tequila all day. Instead of relaxing, I stiffened, tingles racing from where Pike held my arm. Crap, I might be in trouble, I thought as I felt for that splat gun pellet under my tongue and scanned the beautiful faces turning to us.
I’d never been to the lower, executive floor, but Ivy had told me it was like a perverted pleasure palace, the front looking as any luxurious Fortune 500 lounge would, with bland artwork and a low-key wet bar serviced by professionals who went home at the end of the day the same way they’d come in. Behind it was a maze of rooms, each one more unique and tailored to the undead’s varying tastes. The people working there pretty much stayed there. And as I took in the crowded outer lounge, with vampires draped over every square inch as they played court to Constance sitting on the central couch, I quashed a rising worry.
Turning Pike down in my belfry was one thing. Saying no to a master vampire in the belly of the I.S. tower . . . was another.
“It’s Pike. And Morgan!” I heard someone say, and Constance looked up, the surrounding conversations silencing until only the enormous TV on the wall playing a pre-news game show was left.
Her white, high-slit, low-cut dress stood out against her dark skin, drawing the eye like a beacon among the gold, black, and red clothing surrounding her. Jewelry hung around her neck, clinking when she turned to us, eyes pupil black and focused with a skin-crawling intensity. Zack sat to her left, and her arm draped over his shoulder as she cuddled him close. Someone had put him in an uncomfortably tight suit and slicked his blond hair back. His tan was obvious amid the predominantly pale faces, and when he met my eyes, his leashed hatred and frustration vanished in surprise.
A woman slumped to Constance’s right, her long red hair matted as she pushed against the corner of the couch as if trying to crawl into the cushions to hide. It had to be Joni even though her clothes didn’t mimic Constance’s anymore. A chill dropped through me as I caught a glimpse of a red-smeared mouth and the new red-rimmed slash under her ear. Constance had been at her. Recently, by the look of it.
That’s a different wig, I thought when the pale woman jerked, startled when Constance pulled her arm from Zack and rose in a tinkle of jewelry. The kid slid down the couch and away from her, and my lips parted when I realized Joni was wearing exactly what I had been the first time I’d seen Constance, right down to the vamp-made boots and the big hoop earrings. She’d dressed her doll to look like me, then brutalized her and drank her blood.
Take a picture of her for my album, echoed in my thoughts, chilling me. Crap on toast, Constance had this physiological warfare down to a science. Trouble was, I didn’t think it was intentional. Intentional implied a plan, and this shell of a woman had only a savage instinct left to her.
Hands at her hips, Constance sent her gaze from me to Pike. He had inclined his head slightly to lower his eyes. It was a surprisingly obedient gesture, even if his hands were clenched. “I gave instruction for Morgan to make a statement on tonight’s early news,” she said, her high voice holding anger, and people at the back began to slip out the side doors. “Why is she here?”