Meanwhile, across the table, Yalena didn’t seem the least bit surprised. More like relieved it wasn’t her rib cage the gun was pressed into this time.
At least, not until Alaric came crashing down beside them.
Then he got a reaction out of Yalena. Her mouth formed a perfect little O of surprise.
Which got even bigger when Alaric seized Gerald by the neck with one hand and brought the flat of his blade smartly down on Gerald’s wrist with the other, causing him to drop the pistol in pain.
Alaric looked down at the.22 Ruger on the floor with a smirk.
“Planning on doing some target practice later?” he asked Gerald. Gerald opened his mouth and let out a hiss, revealing a set of extremely pointed incisors…along with a curled, pointed tongue that darted in and out of his mouth like a snake. Meena, her eyes wide with horror, jumped from her chair and hugged the wall, knocking some Shenanigans memorabilia onto the floor.
“Oh, my God,” she cried. “He’s-”
“Yes, he is, isn’t he,” Alaric said calmly, still holding the vampire by the throat. “Do me a favor, will you? Reach into my coat.”
Meena lifted a shaking hand, then plunged it into the deep pocket of Alaric’s trench coat.
“Got it?” he asked as he felt her slim fingers close around what was at the bottom of his pocket.
“Got it,” Meena said, pulling out a small crystal vial and studying it curiously. “What is it?”
“Holy water. I want you to throw it in his face now.”
The vampire hissed with even more venom upon hearing this and clawed at Alaric’s arm.
Meena looked from the vial to the vampire, her expression horrified.
“I can’t do that,” she said, shocked.
“Yes, you can, Meena,” Alaric said. “He’s not a man anymore. He’s a monster. Look at him. And he just tried to shoot you.”
“It’s not that,” Meena said.
“I don’t want to upset everyone in this nice restaurant by cutting his head off,” Alaric said. It was true. Everyone at the tables around them had lain down their Sticky Wings and was staring, clearly confused by what was going on. “But I need to subdue him somehow. So please do as I ask and throw some holy water in his face. It’s really all right. He’s already dead. So you won’t be hurting him.”
“No,” Meena said, shaking her head. “I mean, I really can’t do that. That’s Stefan Dominic, the new star of Insatiable. I knew I’d seen him before somewhere. It was that picture Yalena showed me on her cell phone. He’s Gerald.”
“Great,” Alaric said, looking heavenward.
This was, without a doubt, the worst assignment he’d ever had.
Chapter Forty-six
1:00 P.M. EST, Saturday, April 17
910 Park Avenue, Apt. 11A
New York, New York
Emil wasn’t certain how to console his weeping wife. He had never seen Mary Lou quite this upset.
“It’s probably only for a little while, darling,” he said as she threw armfuls of designer clothing, most of it still on the hanger, into her hard-sided Louis Vuitton suitcases. Because it was the maid’s day off, there was no one to pack for her.
“I love this apartment,” she sobbed. “I don’t want to go. And I’m going to miss all the sample sales!”
“We’ll be back in no time,” Emil said.
In no way did he believe this was true. But he said it to comfort her, since she was crying so violently.
“And there’ll be lots of shopping in Tokyo,” he pointed out.
“T-Tokyo!” Mary Lou echoed miserably. “What’s there for me in Tokyo? Nothing!”
Exactly, Emil thought to himself. No one for you to be hosting dinner parties for or sending e-mails to.
But he didn’t dare say any of this out loud.
“You’ll love it,” he said instead. “And I really don’t think you need to bring so many dresses. We can pick up whatever you need when we get there.” He added, a little hesitantly, since he didn’t want to upset her further, “Do hurry, darling. I saw the vampire hunter leaving on the elevator with the Harper girl a little while ago. They’ll be back shortly, I’m sure. I don’t think we have much time.”
“Meena!” Mary Lou snarled the name like it was a curse word. “After all I did for her! For her to be the one to turn on us!”
Emil looked furtively at his watch.
“I don’t think she had much of a choice,” he said. “And you were the one who set her up with the prince. I’m not sure what you thought would happen. It’s never good to mix our kind with the humans.”
Mary Lou had been trying to close her suitcase lid. It wouldn’t shut. Emil wasn’t sure if it was this fact or his remark that caused his wife to lose what was left of her patience and scream, “I was human when you met me! Remember? Are you saying we don’t mix?”
“Not at all, darling,” Emil said. He reached out, flipped back the suitcase lid, and began tucking in all the loose sleeves and fur cuffs that had been sticking out. “I’m just saying, pleased as the prince is with Miss Harper-and he seems to like her very much-it stands to reason that with all the attention the dead girls have been getting in the media, the Palatine would come sniffing around. And of course, that means they’d figure out where we are. And now…well.”
Mary Lou, sniffling, slumped down onto the bed next to the suitcase, her normally perfect blond hair limp. Her eye makeup was smeared as well.
“If he’s going to kill us, why doesn’t he just come already, then?” she demanded. “I’d rather be staked than have to leave Manhattan!”
Emil thought this was a particularly dramatic sentiment but didn’t say anything, since his wife was already so overwrought with emotion. He himself was feeling somewhat at loose ends from his very early morning encounter with the prince, who’d appeared unexpectedly on his terrace, then come strolling into his living room from the balcony doors.
“My lord!” Emil had cried. “Is everything all right?”
“No,” Lucien said. His shirt had been unbuttoned to the waist, showing off his lean physique. Emil wished he’d been taken when he was in such prime condition and not, as had been the case, when he’d been so close to middle age. “There’s a Palatine vampire hunter next door in Miss Harper’s apartment.”
Emil nearly dropped the glass of human blood he’d been drinking for breakfast.
“What?”
“Yes,” the prince had replied grimly. “I would suggest you and Mary Lou find alternate lodgings immediately.”
Emil hadn’t been sure he’d heard the prince correctly.
“Sire? Wouldn’t it…shouldn’t we…” Emil was babbling, but honestly, what else was a man supposed to do in the face of such a pronouncement? “I mean, shouldn’t we just…kill him?”
“I’m afraid we can’t,” Lucien said, sinking into one of Mary Lou’s favorite overstuffed living room chairs. “Meena’s psychic, you know.”
This statement had completely perplexed Emil. “What?” he’d asked again. Rather stupidly, he supposed. A century younger than the prince-fortunately for him, from what he’d heard concerning the things Lucien had gone through at the hands of his newly turned father-he’d never quite gotten used to the fact that he was related to royalty and was never certain how to act around him.
“She can tell how everyone is going to die,” Lucien explained. “Humans, anyway. And so can I, when I’ve drunk from her.”
He didn’t look very happy about it.
Suddenly, Emil understood what the prince had been doing all night.
How extraordinary. He’d never heard of a psychic before, not a real one. Not one who could give consistent predictions.
And for Lucien to be able to make predictions now too…of course it would be better if he could predict something more interesting than when a human was going to die…such as the score in sporting events.