Page 85 of Soul Sucker

“Then work faster. We might need to put a guard on these women.”

“I think I’m okay, boss.” Ella glanced around the table. “I feel fairly well protected.”

Vadim opened his mouth to say something about him being all the protection she would ever need and then realized he couldn’t. That galled him far more than he would have expected.

“Anything else?” Feehan asked.

“Have we checked out the two male empaths who graduated with Ella yet?” Alexei said.

Vadim turned to stare at Alexei, who sat at ease in his chair. “Why would we do that?”

“Because the killer is male, and maybe one of these men—who would know all these American woman personally—might have lost it and turned to murder.”

“Mike Nichols and Paul Baker,” Ella said.

“That’s their names?” Alexei nodded to Liz and both of their Fae-Webs shimmered and expanded to meet over the table.

“I can’t see either of them having the nerve to be a serial killer, though. Most nights, they were too scared to come out with the girls for a drink.” Ella half-smiled.

“Do you keep in touch with them?”

“Not really. I think Mike moved across the east coast. I have no idea where Paul went.”

“Who would know?”

“Either SBLE or the Merton office in Otherworld.” Feehan wrote the new names up on the board. “I’m unsure of the protocol. Do male empaths get offered mates?”

Ella reached for her coffee. “Yeah, they do.”

“Do we know if these guys are already mated?” Alexei asked.

Ella shrugged. “I have no idea. You’d have to check with Otherworld.”

“I can do that.”

Vadim tensed as Ella stood up. “I’m going to get more coffee. I’ll be back in a sec.”

He waited a moment, and then followed her out. She knew he was there, but she kept her attention on the vending machine. He waited impatiently for her to face him.

“What’s up, Morosov? Do you need a dollar again?”

He smiled as he remembered his first sight of her and his prediction that she would be trouble.

“No, I just wanted to talk to you about something.”

Alarm flashed across her face. “I thought we’d agreed to keep that to ourselves.”

“Notthat. Don’t you think it is odd that no one has mentioned anything about what happened with the elevators on Friday?”

“In what way?”

“I would assume the SBLE review the security tapes, so why hasn’t someone called Feehan asking what the hell we were up to?”

“I hadn’t thought of that.”

“We need to tell Feehan what happened.” She opened her mouth, and he kept talking. “Not all of it. Just the part about us getting stuck in the elevator.”

“Why?”

---