That sounded like the worst idea in the world. I thought the queen’s presence would flatten Amelia until all the magic was squished out. However, there was no way I was going to tell the queen she was not welcome.
Peter Threadgill had looked up sharply when the queen had announced she’d watch. “I don’t think you should go,” he said, his voice smooth and authoritative. “It will be hard for the twins and Andre to guard you out in the city in a neighborhood like that.”
I wondered how the King of Arkansas had any idea what Hadley’s neighborhood was like. Actually, it was a quiet, middle-class area, especially compared to the zoo that was vampire central headquarters, with its constant stream of tourists and picketers and fanatics with cameras.
Sophie-Anne was already preparing to go out. That preparation consisted of glancing in a mirror to make sure the flawless façade was still flawless and sliding on her high, high heels, which had been below the edge of the table. She’d been sitting there barefoot. That detail suddenly made Sophie-Anne Leclerq much more real to me. There was a personality under that glossy exterior.
“I suppose you would like Bill to accompany us,” the queen said to me.
“No,” I snapped. Okay, there was a personality—and it was unpleasant and cruel.
But the queen looked genuinely startled. Her husband was outraged at my rudeness—his head shot up and his odd gray eyes fixed me with a luminous anger—but the queen was simply taken aback by my reaction. “I thought you were a couple,” she said, in a perfectly even voice.
I bit back my first answer, trying to remember who I was talking to, and said, almost in a whisper, “No, we are not.” I took a deep breath and made a great effort. “I apologize for being so abrupt. Please excuse me.”
The queen simply looked at me for a few seconds longer, and I still could not get the slightest indication of her thoughts, emotions, or intentions. It was like looking at an antique silver tray—a shining surface, an elaborate pattern, and hard to the touch. How Hadley could have been adventurous enough to bed this woman was simply beyond my comprehension.
“You are excused,” she said finally.
“You’re too lenient,” her husband said, and his surface, at least, began to thin somewhat. His lips curled in something closely approaching a snarl, and I discovered I didn’t want to be the focus of those luminous eyes for another second. I didn’t like the way the Asian gal in red was looking at me, either. And every time I looked at her haircut, it gave me the heebie-jeebies. Gosh, even the elderly lady who’d given my gran a permanent three times a year would have done a better job than the Mad Weed Whacker.
“I’ll be back in an hour or two, Peter,” Sophie-Anne said, very precisely, in a tone that could have sliced a diamond. The short man, his childish face blank, was by her side in a jiffy, extending his arm so she could have his assistance in rising. I guessed he was Andre.
The atmosphere was cuttable. Oh, I so wished I were somewhere else.
“I would feel more at ease if I knew Jade Flower was with you,” the king said. He motioned toward the woman in red. Jade Flower, my ass: she looked more like Stone Killer. The Asian woman’s face didn’t change one iota at the king’s offer.
“But that would leave you with no one,” the queen said.
“Hardly true. The building is full of guards and loyal vampires,” Peter Threadgill said.
Okay, even I caught that one. The guards, who belonged to the queen, were separate from the loyal vampires, whom I guessed were the ones Peter had brought with him.
“Then, of course, I would be proud to have a fighter like Jade Flower accompany me.”
Yuck. I couldn’t tell if the queen was serious, or trying to placate her new husband by accepting his offer, or laughing up her sleeve at his lame strategy to ensure that his spy was at the ectoplasmic reconstruction. The queen used the intercom to call down—or up, for all I knew—to the secure chamber where Jake Purifoy was being educated in the ways of the vampire. “Keep extra guards on Purifoy,” she said. “And let me know the minute he remembers something.” An obsequious voice assured Sophie-Anne that she’d be the first to know.
I wondered why Jake needed extra guards. I found it hard to get real concerned about his