Drink Deep - Chloe Neill [107]
I walked toward them, and waited until the workers left my father alone. “What are you doing here?”
“Public service,” he said. “The office is just up the road, and we happened to have the truck ready for a conference at a building in Naperville. We decided it could be put to a better use, so we hurried down here.”
The reason might have been legitimate, but I still questioned his motives. I couldn’t help it; my father brought out the worst in me. I’d always been a stranger where my family was concerned, and the business with Ethan hadn’t helped. My father thought he’d been doing me a favor—gifting me with an immortality I hadn’t asked for—but that didn’t make it any less of a violation.
He gestured behind me, and I glanced back. Dusty and scraped men and women stood or sat on curbs nearby sipping water.
“This was a nice thought,” I said. “But you can’t use bridges that were burned a long time ago.”
He used a box cutter to slice through the plastic wrap on a new bundle of bottles and passed one over to me. “That’s the difference between you and me: I refuse to believe bridges were burned. Every moment is a new opportunity.”
I accepted the bottle of water, and let that stand in for any additional thanks. I walked across the street to the curb and sat down, my muscles aching from the work.
I’d taken a single sip when Jonah sat down beside me. He looked as filthy as I did, streaks of mud and dirt on his jeans and T-shirt.
“Everything okay at Grey House?” I asked.
“Yeah. The damage didn’t extend that far.” He scanned the street, eyes narrowing when he saw the truck. “Did your father suddenly become charitable?”
“Not without an ulterior motive. A suggestion?”
Jonah took the bottle of water from me and took a long drink. “What’s that?”
“While you’re busy having my back, don’t be surprised when family members are there to stab me in it.”
“That’s what partners are for,” he assured. “Well, that, and getting you out of Dodge when things get dicey.” He gestured toward some humans on the other side of the street who were beginning to look at us askew. Maybe they recognized us as vampires, maybe they didn’t. Either way, they weren’t thrilled about the destruction in their neighborhood, and it looked like they were looking for someone to blame.
“We’ll go to Grey House,” he said, a hand at my elbow to help me up. “We’ll convene there and we’ll make a plan and we’ll get this thing figured out.”
“You think it will be that easy?”
“Not even close,” he said. “But it’s RG rule number one: Make a plan.”
I guess a plan was better than nothing.
Scott Grey’s vampires were taking shifts assisting in the aftermath of the destruction, and he’d set up food and aid stations in the House’s open atrium for any vampires in the vicinity who needed a break. He also gave me a quiet spot to give Catcher a call.
“How are things up north?” he asked.
“Pretty bad,” I admitted, and gave him the lay of the land . . . and the magic. “It looks like Claudia was right and we’re looking at elemental magic. Water. Air—”
“And now earth,” Catcher finished.
“Yeah. I didn’t see any hint this time that Tate was involved, but his magical imbalance theory is looking more plausible. And if he’s right, that means someone has the Maleficium. I want to talk to Simon.”
“And your suggestion for getting past Order bitchiness?”
“Remind them the world might be ending? Tell them we think the Maleficium is at work. Have my grandfather call them, or tell them the former mayor—who may or may not be some kind of ancient magical being—may or may not be trying to herald in a new era of evil. Tell them whatever you want. But make them understand.”
He murmured something about women and hormones, but when he hung up the phone, I decided I’d made my point.
Jonah stepped