Tegan approached Rio with deliberate movements and carefully guided him away from the female and out of the field of debris around their feet. The big male's steps were heavy, lacking the grace that used to come so naturally to him. Rio leaned heavily on Tegan's shoulder and arm, his bare chest heaving with every deep breath he hauled into his lungs.
That's it, nice and easy, Tegan coached him. We good now, amigo?
The dark head bobbed awkwardly. Tegan glanced to Tess as she knelt down and began collecting the shattered glass and porcelain from the foyer tiles. Have you seen Chase around tonight?
Not for a while, she said. He and Dante are still out on patrol.
Tegan smirked. Four months ago, the two males had been ready to tear out each other's throats. They'd been tossed together by Lucan as unwilling partners when Darkhaven agent Sterling Chase showed up at the compound with info about a dangerous club drug called Crimson and to solicit help from the Order in getting the shit off the streets. Now he and Dante were almost inseparable in the field, had been ever since Chase left the Darkhavens and came on board officially as a member of the Order. The pair of them are a regular Mutt and Jeff, eh?
Tess's eyes held a trace of humor as she looked up from the mess in front of her. More like Larry and Curly, if you ask me.
Tegan exhaled a wry laugh as he steered Rio into the hallway. He brought him to the mansion's elevator, walked him inside, then pushed the code to begin the journey down to the underground headquarters of the Order.
After dropping Rio off in the warrior's compound apartments, Tegan headed back to the tech lab to check in. Gideon was at his post, as usual, the blond vampire rolling back and forth on a wheeled office chair, working his magic on no less than four computers at the same time. A wireless cell phone headset curled around his ear and he was giving a string of coordinates over the small mic that arced toward his cheek.
The consummate multitasker, Gideon looked up as Tegan entered the lab, gestured him over, and brought up a set of satellite stills on one of the monitors. Niko's got a possible lead on that Crimson lab, he informed Tegan, then went back to his conversation as his fingers flew over the keyboard of another machine. Right. I'm running a check right now.
Tegan stared at the images Gideon had called up on the screen. Some were known Rogue lairs--most of them former lairs, due to the efforts of the Order--and others showed Rogues and Minions coming and going from various locations in and around the city. One face caught Tegan's eye more than the rest. It was the human Crimson dealer, Ben Sullivan.
Although Dante had taken the bastard out last November, the whereabouts of his manufacturing lab were yet unknown. Problems with the drug had simmered down in the months since the Order got involved, but so long as the Rogues possessed the means to manufacture more of the shit, the threat of a resurgence in Crimson use among the Breed still existed.
Hold up. I'm getting a match on a location out in Revere, Gideon was saying now. Yeah, whaddaya know, I think it's a legit lead. You guys wanna do a drive-by down by the Chelsea River, see what you find?
Tegan zeroed in on the photo of Ben Sullivan's grinning, busted-up face. The human had killed a lot of young vampires with his drug, including Camden Chase, Elise's teenage son. If not for Crimson, that kid would never have turned Rogue and had to be put down. And a gently bred female like Elise wouldn't be holed up in that slum apartment downtown, out of her head with grief and anger, and hell-bent on some maternal brand of vengeance that was probably going to get her killed too. A weight settled on Tegan as he considered all the bloodshed, the centuries he and the others like him had been fighting this battle against the savage side of the Breed. There were peaks and lulls, of course, times of relative peace, but the unrest was always there, burrowed deep within the race. Festering and corrupting.
It's fucking never going to end, is it?
Sorry?
Tegan didn't realize he'd spoken until he glanced over and saw Gideon looking at him over the rims