Page 25 of Awaken the Dragon
“Reece and Aiken can get the team situated out here. You and Ziva go in with us,” Theo told Bleu.
Bleu nodded. He wore a gray suit, black Italian leather shoes and a long black coat. A black fedora completed the outfit. Between Bleu and Aiken, Theo wasn’t sure which Drakon spent the most money on clothes. Ziva wore a short orange dress that hugged her body, five-inch heels and long dangling earrings that gave her the appearance of a movie star, but Theo knew she could also stop a man’s heart with a deadly swipe of her tail. Theo looked around and realized none of them looked like the dragons that breathed just beneath their human skin.
Bleu walked to the right of Theo, and Ziva was on Shola’s left as they entered the building. Two tall women dressed in white suits—pants and jackets buttoned with no shirt beneath—stood in the entryway. They immediately looked at Shola and stepped forward.
“Ms. N’Gara, we have been waiting for you. Follow us this way.”
After speaking the first woman turned and began walking while the second one reached out to grab Shola’s hand. Theo immediately moved to push the woman’s arm away.
Both women stopped.
“She must come with us. We will get her ready for this evening.”
“She is ready,” Theo said.
“She is not dressed properly. We have to prepare her for tonight’s events,” the woman stated.
Theo stared at them. Their skin appeared dry even covered with makeup, their hair was cut very low, and silver bars pierced their earlobes. He didn’t like it, the eerie feeling easing over his skin, not the way the women looked.
“I’ll go with her,” Ziva said.
“We can take her,” the second woman insisted and again reached for Shola.
This time Ziva stepped close so that her face was only inches from the woman’s. “Either I go with her, or she doesn’t go at all.”
A quiet, yet volatile, stare down lasted a few seconds until the first woman nodded and began walking once more. The second one fell into step right behind her. Ziva and Theo exchanged questioning looks.
Shola sighed. “Here we go.”
Theo was certain that was despair he heard in her voice, but before he could think on it too deeply, Bleu touched his arm, and Ziva and Shola followed the woman.
“This place is full of newborns,” Bleu told him as he stared past the entryway, into the open space filled with people.
There was a black runner going down the center of the floor and the people stayed on either side of it. Men and women, at least two hundred of them.
“The itinerary called this an engagement party,” Theo said as he stepped into the room. “But there are no tables and chairs for sitting and eating and no music for dancing.”
From beside him, still scanning the place, Bleu added, “Everyone is dressed in white. They’re only talking to each other, none of them have even looked this way.”
They were completely inside now, the air just a bit chillier here in the banquet hall. Theo stepped onto the black runner to test Bleu’s theory—nobody stirred.
“Newborns wouldn’t give off a stench, and I wouldn’t be able to see them because they haven’t yet taken their full vampire form,” he said as they continued to walk, both of them taking slow, measured steps.
“But they’ll fight to the death if given the signal by their creator.” Bleu’s voice was a low cadence with the barest hint of a British accent. “We could be in the midst of a trap.”
Alarm settled like a weight over Theo, and he stopped in the center of the room, turning in a complete circle, looking all around. “A trap for who?” he asked Bleu but didn’t wait for the older man’s response.
Chapter Nine
Shola stood alone in a room with red velvet walls and gold crown molding. The doorframes were gold, as were the doorknobs and light fixtures. A sectional couch sat in one corner, a darker crimson color than that of the walls, with at least half a dozen pillows covered in different gold-and-red designs. Across the room was a round glass table, the legs of which were gold-painted iron that matched the legs of the four high-back and red cushioned chairs surrounding it. The crystal decanter sitting in the center of the table was filled with what she presumed was red wine, a stemmed glass on each side. The room had no windows and only one door to come in and get out. In short, it was gaudy and creepy as hell.
The women who looked like evil twins were gone and had instructed Ziva to wait outside the door, which Shola was certain they had locked. Ziva had checked the room first and, after noting the single door, agreed to stand guard on the outside until it was time for Shola to make her entrance. That time could not come soon enough because she was becoming claustrophobic. It wasn’t because the room was small, because even though it wasn’t as large as her room at the Office, it was bigger than her bedroom at home in Mobo.
There were two reasons why Shola was ready to leave the enclosed space. The first was that the box Bleu had covertly slipped to her when she climbed out of the truck was heavy in her small purse. Aiken must have picked up the delivery when he was at the hotel earlier today and brought it back to the Office. Bleu, who seemed to be a supervisor over everyone and everything—except for Theo—in the mountain dwelling, had been tasked with giving it to her. Shola’s heart had been thumping wildly since the moment that box touched her hands. Wrapped in brown paper and about the size of a watch box, there was weight to it because of what was inside and a strong energy buzz because of what she knew she would do with them. The knowledge that she now held the nine blessed river rocks that would help her complete her task made her heart race. Adrenaline pumped through her veins with such ferocity her arms and legs shook with the force.
The second reason she was ready to leave was the clenching at her throat that left her struggling for her next breath. It had started just a few moments ago, creeping up from the pit of her stomach and grabbing her as if an actual hand was there wrapping long cold fingers around her slender neck and squeezing. She coughed.
And then there was a touch at her shoulder.
