House Rules - Chloe Neill Page 0,105
Ethan’s anger rose and expanded. I’d seen him angry before, but nothing compared to the fury before me.
“Did Carlos, perchance, have a signet ring with his initials carved into it?” Ethan asked.
Morgan’s eyes widened. “Yeah, he did, actually. A big gold thing. He wore it on his pinkie like he was a mobster.”
“Thank you,” Ethan said, and without ceremony hung up the phone. For a moment he stood there, simply breathing, taking in what we now knew.
So Michael Donovan had been sired by Carlos, made a vampire against his will. Michael was now using Carlos’s signet ring, and someone—Michael?—had dumped two bodies at a property Carlos, or maybe now, his estate, had owned. But why?
“Why would Michael Donovan care about the warehouse?”
Ethan shook his head. “I don’t know. It must have been meaningful to him somehow. Otherwise, there are easier ways to hide a body.”
“And how did he get into Navarre House? Jeff said the biometric security was linked to vampires Celina sired, not current members of Navarre House.”
“Michael Donovan was sired by Carlos, and Carlos was sired by Celina. The chemistry would be the same for both, as they’d both carry her particular mutation.”
If that was true, Michael Donovan could be our killer.
Ethan cursed. “That son of a bitch. I let him into my House, Merit. I asked him for advice and shared our security protocols with him. How could I have been so stupid? How could I have been so naive?”
“Oh, God,” I said, looking up at him. “I told him I had the map, and then you walked in, and that’s when he left. Does he know? Does he know that we know?”
“Christ,” Ethan said, vaulting from his seat and running to the front door, then out to the gate where humans now stood watch. I followed behind.
“The brown-haired vampire,” Ethan said, then indicated a height. “Is he here?”
The humans exchanged a glance. “He left,” said the one on the right. “About five minutes ago.” She put a hand on her revolver. “Is there trouble?”
“We aren’t sure. What was he driving?”
“Tonight, a black SUV.”
Just like the vehicle that had lured Oliver and Eve into the alley and stopped me and Ethan on the street a few nights ago.
Ethan swore out another string of curses, this time including words I’d never heard before; in fairness, some of them may have been in Swedish.
“Assemble the team, if you would, Sentinel. I think it’s time we explore a plan to handle Michael Donovan.”
* * *
Luc, Malik, and the guards were easy to assemble. We gave them an overview of our theory, then called Catcher, Jeff, my grandfather, and Jonah, as Scott’s proxy, and patched them in by phone. I considered calling Morgan, but thought it best to wait until we’d finalized a hypothesis.
When the Cadogan vampires took seats around the Ops Room table, Ethan got the ball rolling.
“We believe the man I hired as a security consultant, Michael Donovan, is the killer of Oliver, Eve, Katya, and Zoey. He also injured a member of my House.”
He paused to allow a moment for shocked noises and expressions.
“Morgan Greer has confirmed that Michael Donovan was made a vampire by Carlos Anthony Martinez, Second to Celina before Morgan was appointed. Unfortunately, Carlos made Michael a vampire without his consent and, in fact, over Michael’s strong objection. We believe Carlos is deceased.
“We believe Michael killed Oliver and Eve and placed their bodies in a building owned by Carlos’s estate. We have learned he stamps his documents with a signet ring that bears the initials ‘C.A.M.,’ and that once belonged to Carlos. Because Celina made Carlos, and Carlos made Michael, we believe that would have given him entry into Navarre House despite their biometric protocols.”
“Jeff,” I asked, “do you think that would work?”
“Without a doubt,” he said grimly. “Vampirism is genetic, so Celina’s genetic marker would be the trigger. If she sired them, or she made a vampire who sired them, they’d be there.”
Ethan nodded at me. He’d been right about that.
“We also know Michael drives a black SUV of the same approximate size and color of the vehicle that lured Oliver and Eve into the alley and followed me and Merit.”
“Our working theory,” Luc said, “is that Michael Donovan was made a vampire mostly without his consent. He takes that personally, maybe has a secret vendetta against vampires who took away his humanity and so on and so forth. He’d have to be a self-hating son of a bitch, but we’ve heard weaker reasons