Marius never cracked a smile, and Fleur's own teasing one faded away. The expression on her cousin's face made her think of her feelings for Dain. And suddenly she realized that, what he'd seen her do-how could he accept it? He couldn't, and anything between them would be as impossible as Marius had always said. Vampires and humans were different species. Period.

"So, would you like to tell us exactly what you were doing down there?" Marius asked. "We felt you only when we sensed your danger."

"What? Oh." Fleur shrugged. "I went to see the dogs," she said sullenly.

"Apparently. Go on."

"I asked Dain to take me to see one of their informants. I wanted to hear from the dogs for myself."

"And?"

Fleur looked away, trying her hardest not to snap. "I didn't get very far. It was horrible. I think I've made a mistake that's just-I honestly thought I was ready."

"Ready?" Marius prompted.

"Ready to show everyone that I hold control. That I know what I'm doing. That losing Christian and Ryan as leaders and my stepping into their shoes did not weaken us." "That you 'hold control.'"

"Yes. Instead, the humans saw how weak I am. Which reflects on all of us. I made us look weak tonight. I thought I knew what I was doing," she repeated.

"I don't think they'll see it quite like that. Fearlessly snapping a werewolf's neck with "your teeth doesn't exactly make us look weak."

"I wasn't fearless. I was..." She would have said out of control, but she didn't want to bring up again the reputation she'd gotten after making Hayden a vampire. Ironically, she'd deserved that reputation.

Warrick waved off her words. "You'll probably have the dogs a.n.a.lyzing what you did for weeks. They'll never figure out who did it. There's too much going on in the city right now for anyone to think it was you. The dogs' investigative abilities leave something to be desired anyway, I'm sure."

She gave her cousin an exasperated look. "War, the two humans I was with will know. I was ridiculous. I completely lost my mind. And I lied."

Marius glanced up. "What do you mean, lied?"

"An omission, a fudging sort of thing. I as much as told Dain Reston that I'd been amongst the dogs before. I should have known about that strange energy we two species seem to project when we're riled up. I mean, I have been amongst dogs, but it was..." She felt herself going red. "I think it was just in a shop or something. In any case, I've never seen them so angry-and not when I've been so angry. I'd never even actually seen the Change. The intensity of it was incredible."

"Yes. It is when you don't know what to expect. Part of what you felt is because you're Warrior cla.s.s," Marius said. "You're right about the training, though. You needed more. But then, none of us guessed it would come to this."

Fleur sat up. "Speaking of which, there's something I really want to talk to you all about. You need to stop protecting me. If I'm to recover from my past and the mistakes I've already made in the present, I'll need every advantage I can get."

There was silence all around as her cousins eyed each other.

"How are we not an advantage?" Ian asked, with some amazement.

"You're always right there, right at my back. It's got to stop."

Marius frowned. "As Protectors, we're not only intuitive, Fleur, but we have a kind of... holy bond, if you will, to defend the lives-body and soul-of those who lead our people. You know that."

"I don't think we need to point out that we're a little thin these days as far as who else could inherit your position," Ian added.

Fleur nodded. "I understand that. And I'm... grateful. Of course I'm grateful. But you're undermining my ability to see my actions through. You're undermining my ability to learn from my mistakes. It's possible you're even undermining my ability to earn the respect of the a.s.sembly. I'm sure they believe you control my puppet strings."

Warrick sat forward. "That's ridiculous! Everyone knows-" "Everyone does not," Fleur said gently. "Now, I love you all very much. You're my family. But you simply must let me go. You must. I promise I won't disappoint you." Marius rubbed his temples as he and his brothers thought about her words. Ian shrugged. Warrick nodded.

Marius finally sighed. "Agreed. One last bit of advice, though," he said.

"I'll always welcome your advice."

"The lying about your experience is dangerous, Fleur. I can tell you that. Putting yourself in a position

where your credibility is suspect... We can't afford to have the humans mistrust us, unless we have a good reason to believe-" "That they ordered my brothers killed. I know. Maybe if I explained-" "What would you say?" Warrick asked skeptically. "That I was scared I'd reveal how untested I was." Marius made a sound. "You'd tell the humans that?" "Well, I'd tell Dain," Fleur said, without thinking. Marius gave her a curious look. "Why would you tell him? Is he special in some way?" Fleur started, surprised. "Well, no... I... No. It's that he's very..."

"Don't do it, Fleur. Trust me. Don't get involved." Fleur gave him a long look. "YoM've been involved. Time and again, you've been involved. How do you dare lecture me?" She knew she was treading on thin ice, but she figured her cousin should be able to take as good as he gave. "I wonder why you're never dangerously tempted to bite them, the ones you love. It can't just be the politics, can it?"

There was a very long silence. Ian and Warrick exchanged glances.

Finally, Marius answered: "Political differences between the species are useful in that they tend to make you think twice before you act." Fleur raised an eyebrow, disbelieving. "And that's why you didn't bite them? You just said, she's human, I'm vampire, and that's that? That's all it took?" She felt ashamed. Hayden had asked, and she had broken vampire law. Every time she looked at Dain, she wanted to bite him, devour him, bridge the gap between them. Her cousin's answer brought her up short.

"Well, Fleur, it's never really come to that, you see. The ones I've loved have never asked." Marius stood up very suddenly and left the room. "Well," Ian said brightly to cover the silence. "Drink, anyone?"

Warrick reached for the decanter. "Definitely."

"Make mine a double," Fleur said with a sigh. "I don't think I'm going to bed anytime soon."

Kippenham looked about as tired as Dain felt, but it was nice to know the suits were working hard on this, too. Tapping his gold championship ring against the desk, Kipp surveyed Dain's latest report in the blue glow of the reader screen, then looked up, a dubious smirk on his face.

"Fleur Dumont went down to Dogtown with you and Cyd to meet a werewolf informant, and she panicked?"

"Yeah."

He broke into a broad grin. "Vamp-werewolf one-on-one. It's been a long time since we've seen that kind of action."

Dain felt more annoyed than amused.

His boss pushed the reader aside. "I'm amazed this didn't make the evening news. I thought Cooper had for-hires in the subways. Anyway, it's for the best. How's the vamp thing looking from the inside? Are you getting the picture?"

"Well, the a.s.sa.s.sination wasn't an inside job. From what I know about Fleur Dumont and her three Protectors... they didn't pull it off. If anything, they're feeling more stress because of it. And Fleur is..."

"Is what?"

Dain found it a little difficult to expose Fleur's flaws to the boss. But he had to. "Okay, Fleur Du-mont is weak. She's untrained. She's got a lot of promise; it's just not all pulled together. You know what I'm saying? I mean, she can obviously kick some serious b.u.t.t, but she just wasn't raised like anyone ever thought she was going to take a leadership role. And these Protectors seem more concerned about keeping her alive than stirring up trouble in Crimson City."

"Okay, so you don't think it's them. What else?"

"I don't think it's any of the vampires who are in the Primary a.s.sembly. It just doesn't follow that they pulled a coup and blamed it on us. Why would they need a scapegoat? That being said, there are always rogue groups to think about. It's possible that any one of the vampires from a rogue group which doesn't subscribe to the party line could have been involved. But from the information I've collected to date about the Dumonts and the vampires who answer to them..." He just shook his head. "I don't see them commandeering one of our mechs and... There's just no evidence."

Kippenham stared out the window. "This does give us some insight into the shaky ground the vamps are standing on right now as far as leadership."

Dain felt horrible. He didn't like the idea of letting anyone know Fleur was weak... but this was his job.

"We processed the forensics material left behind by the mech but didn't learn anything," Kippenham said after a pause. "So, that route is dead. I've got people out on the streets looking for it, but it's either been deleted already by someone we don't have a connection with... or it's got more of a sense of survival than we would have expected for a machine."

Dain pulled the reader toward him. "What file is it?"

Kippenham put his palm over its screen and pulled the reader back toward him. "Actually, it's cla.s.sified. Suffice it to say, we didn't learn anything that would be useful for you to know."

It took a long, uncomfortable moment for Dain to process what his boss had just said. "Urn, okay. Well, can you tell me what the torn paper was all about? Did it test for anything unusual?"

Kippenham waved the question away. "It was just paper. We didn't get anything from it."

Meaning, if they had gotten something, he wouldn't be telling Dain. There was a pause while Dain tried to read between the lines. He came up blank. Finally, he got to the point. "I have top clearance," he said softly. "Or has that been changed?" And he'd thought they were friends.

"That's not been changed," his boss said carefully. "We've just had to establish a new cla.s.sification in response to the current environment."

"Would that be extra top clearance?" Dain asked sarcastically.

Kippenham put his hand on Dain's shoulder. "Dain, we've been friends for a long time. And I'd like it to stay that way. But the mech program is going under even higher security than ever before, because of the malfunction. We need to tighten the circle. And that means we've got to limit the number of people with access to the information."

Dain looked down at the gold ring pressing into his shoulder. "What is it exactly you expect me to do on this a.s.signment, then? My mission is to collect in-tel relating to who could have wanted the Dumont brothers dead. Who set all this up? Who arranged to have the mech do it? Yet the mechs are now essentially off limits to me."

"An unfortunate necessity, but yes. Keep Cyd on the dogs; you continue to monitor the vamps. That's all we-"

"If I don't have a total understanding of how the mechs fit into the picture, it's sort of like you're running me around on a fool's errand."

Kipp's hand finally slid off his shoulder, and Dain felt an almost palpable sense of relief. He felt like slugging the guy.

"Come on, Dain. This isn't a fool's errand and you know it. We need you to keep doing what you've been doing. You're our eyes and ears on the streets. You've got an in with the vampires, and that's where we need to keep you focused. We need to make sure this doesn't blow up. We need to protect ourselves until we can find out what's going on, and we need to keep everyone calm."

Dain nodded slowly.

"Which is going to become more difficult in the near future."

"Why is that?"

"Because we're going back to the old Preemptive Defense Initiatives."

"I knew it." At least Kippenham had said something. Dain had kept his mouth shut just to see if the boss would bring it up. He needed to know just how much information they were concealing from him. He still wasn't sure.

"It's temporary. Just to get things settled down. I suppose you've read the report on the increase in species activity against humans?"

"There might be a little vice versa, too." The bureaucrat-speak was making Dain's head spin. Who was needing protection here? Everyone was being attacked-except the werewolves. "PDI is a wartime policy," he said. "We're still in a truce. n.o.body has declared anything yet. And taking away freedoms for some species and not others will only stir things up."

Kippenham smiled indulgently. "Well, maybe. But this is how we're going to do it. n.o.body's declared war yet, true. But this is one way to make sure our side gets an advantage."

Dain was horrified, but there wasn't any arguing.

"Under wartime restrictions, we need to up the security and close our task forces to smaller, more intimate groups of people." Kippenham tilted his head to the side. "Dain, you know it's nothing personal, but info from the top is going to get a lot harder to come by."

"Right. I know."

"Good. I'd like you to make sure you pa.s.s that information along at the next team meeting."

"Right. Got it." Dain stroked the stubble on his jaw for the sole purpose of trying to cover the vein that had started throbbing.

"Now, we haven't really covered the werewolves."

"Well, because of that incident," Dain said as he gestured to the reader, "I didn't get a chance to talk to anybody on the inside. I sent Cyd her a.s.signment last night to have her follow up and file any findings. But I don't have to tell you she's probably not too happy with me right now. By the way, this wasn't Cyd's fault at all. I completely accept responsibility for bringing Fleur, and I should have made sure she knew what she was doing."

Kippenham studied him for a moment, tap-tapping his ring on the desk. "How is it with you and Cyd, anyways? How is she doing these days? In general."

Dain looked up in surprise. "Same as always. She's fine. Why?"

The boss cleared his throat. "Is she... using on the job?"

Dain kept his gaze steady. "I couldn't say," he said evenly. What is this, some kind of interrogation? Of your own people, Kipp?

"You have an obligation to report her if she jeopardizes the work in any way," Kippenham remarked.

"Yeah, I know," Dain replied.

"We're done, then."

Kippenham stood up, slapped Dain on the side of the arm, and headed out. After a while, Dain stood up too. He slipped his security badge from his wallet. Out of curiosity, he stuck it in the reader and selected the b.u.t.ton to view his personal profile. He found his privileges to travel on the base at will had been revoked. Someone wanted him away from the mechs.

How he'd gone from being a member with open privileges to being completely decla.s.sified, he didn't know. Considering that he'd been hanging out with the vamps most of the time since this thing all started-Jesus, maybe that was it! Maybe they thought he'd been compromised because of his feelings for Fleur, and they were concerned he would pa.s.s on information. Hadn't Cyd suggested that? But they couldn't know what he felt. Because he wasn't even sure what he felt.

But maybe Cyd had-nah, not a chance. No way.

Dain got the h.e.l.l out of the building and turned off in the opposite direction. He reminded himself that Kippenham was a good boss. But all it took was the smallest shift in information, in power, in perception and good was maybe not so good anymore.

Dain flagged down a hovervendor and bought a cold soda. He'd have preferred a beer. He stared at the cola, thinking that normally he'd have been fine drinking a beer on the job. No big deal-not in the battlefield. But things weren't normal anymore. And Dain was feeling paranoid.

He took a swig of soda and shivered. The night mist had evaporated as the sun began to push its way into the city like a rising crimson tide, but the air was still chill. And suddenly, Dain felt so tired he just leaned against the wall of a building. Using his free hand as a visor, he stood and watched the sun come up.

It was the kind of moment where one realized that a major shift had taken place. He'd just lost a certain amount of power. How much, he couldn't say. But somewhere, somehow, someone had made a concerted effort to take him out of the game. Without access to the mechs, he was confined to only what he could learn in the vampire and werewolf communities. And that bothered him.

It also wasn't normal for the boss to ask him about Cyd-not when there were clearly bigger things to worry about. Heck, it wasn't normal for the boss to ask him about Cyd at all! He'd have to have one of those talks with her, the kind he generally tried to avoid. If she was getting sloppy enough to attract attention and have it get back to the bigwigs, she was getting too sloppy. And if she was getting too sloppy, her personal life was creeping into her professional life, which was what she'd just accused him of. And that just wasn't going to work. Besides, he didn't like the idea that she might be slipping. Was she concealing things from him, unable to ask for help? Of course she was. He was the same way.

He punched up her code on his comm device. "Cyd, where the h.e.l.l are you?"

Silence.

Sheesh. How many times did a guy have to apologize? "Cyd? Look. I'm doing the rounds today-you know, just sort of taking the pulse of the city. I thought maybe we could go see some of your informants on the way."

He punched redial on her code a couple of times, sort of the way one punched an elevator b.u.t.ton to hurry things up even though it was obvious nothing would change. Then he had to laugh. Trust Cyd to miss out on one of his very rare, full-blown apologies.

He checked his messages on the comm pack. Fleur Dumont would like to see him at his convenience. Dain wanted to see her, too. Sure, he'd like to confirm she was still in one piece mentally and physically. And, yeah, he was definitely in the mood to perpetrate just the kind of mindless act he knew Kippenham would disapprove of. But really, he just wanted to see her again.

Fleur had screwed up royally, and he had a right to be p.i.s.sed; but somehow he just couldn't hold what had happened against her. It was a sure sign of something really twisted when a guy got b.u.t.terflies in his stomach just because a certain name appeared in his voice mail in-box. Cyd knew what she was talking about. He keyed in a response and sent it out. "If you want to meet with me tonight, meet me at my apartment. I'm heading out."

He knew he was tempting fate. He knew that putting himself in situations where Fleur Dumont could break down his defenses and give him an excuse to question his own actions was a bad idea. But at the moment, bad seemed to have a way of feeling really, really good.