Dragons Luck

“Half a good plan,” Jerome said. “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll tag along while you pass the word, then we’ll find the women. The more I think about it, the more it occurs to me that you should have someone covering your back for a while.”

“Hey, Mai. C’mon in. I was just about to call you.”

Valerie stepped back from her apartment door to let her friend in.

“Griffen just buzzed me to let me know he was calling a war council,” Mai said, entering the apartment and flopping down on the sofa. “I thought it might be a good idea if we talked first.”

“I was thinking the same thing,” Val said. “Do you think there’s anything to the idea that he’s being set up?”

“I really don’t know . . . but there’s always the possibility,” Mai said. “One thing I am sure of is that it’s time we put a few more cards on the table.”

“You mean . . .”

“I mean we’ve got to tell him about Lizzy,” Mai said. “If we’re going to sort this mess out, he’s got to have all the pieces. That means letting him know who the players in town are.”

“You think she’s behind the setup . . . if there is one?” Val asked with a frown.

“Not really,” Mai admitted. “But as crazy as she is, we can’t rule her out completely.”

“Big Brother is going to freak,” Valerie said, shaking her head. “From what he said when he called, Jerome is already giving him grief about not sharing the information that Flynn and George are in town. When he finds out that we’ve been holding out on him as well, he’s going to blow his stack.”

“Can’t be helped.” Mai sighed. “Now he needs to know. We’ll just have to tell him that we thought it would distract him from the conclave and decided to handle it ourselves.”

“He’s going to love that,” Val said with a grimace. “What about the other thing?”

“Which other thing?” Mai said.

Val pulled herself up to her full height and patted her stomach.

The two women looked at each other for a long moment, then as one shook their heads.

“I don’t think so. Not now,” Valerie said. “Lizzy is my problem. So is this.” She touched her belly.

“One crisis at a time,” Mai agreed.

Forty-six

Even though it was late, the hotel lobby bar was still open. During its stay, the conclave had spent enough time and money in the bar to convince the management to schedule extra help to keep it open as long as they had customers, and tonight looked to be a banner ring.

Griffen had come and gone, and now a goodly percentage of the attendees had gravitated to the bar both to absorb and discuss the news he had brought.

“I don’t like it,” Tail declared, glaring into his drink.

“The whole situation abounds with things not to like,” Margie said, cocking her head at him. “Which thing in particular don’t you like, Tail?”

Surprisingly enough, of all the tactics the organizers had scheduled in an effort to get the various groups at the conclave to interact, the one that seemed to have been the most effective was the unscheduled poker game. Since that game, the participants had tended to hang and drink together, preferring each other’s company to that of their own specific group.

“I don’t like the idea of the cops poking around the conclave,” Tail said with a grimace.

“I’ll wager we’ve all had to deal with the cops at one time or another.” Margie shrugged. “No reason this time around should be any different.”

“Lot o’ differences.” Kane spoke up. “For one ting, dere are a lot of us dat have gathered in this here place. Too many maybe. Means de little tings dat make us different and we could normally cover on our own get blown up, dey get exaggerated. How many here you trust to not slip up, keep traps shut ’bout every little ting?”

“There’s also the minor detail that we’ve got a body that is being tied directly to us,” Lowell put in. “I myself don’t like the bit about him being staked through the heart.”

“See? I’m not the only one who’s worried,” Tail said triumphantly.

“I’m not saying that there’s nothing to worry about,” Margie said, raising her hands defensively. “I just think we’d be better off spending our time getting our stories straight instead of just sitting around and fretting. For example, what are we going to say about Slim and Griffen? That’s the main reason they’re coming around, isn’t it?”

“I think I can handle that, since I was there,” Lowell said.

“I’ll just tell them the truth. That there were some harsh words tossed back and forth, but nothing beyond that. Nothing to kill anyone over. What’s more, McCandles didn’t even show up until it was almost over. If anything, there was more bad blood between me and Slim than between Slim and McCandles.”

“Bad blood. Good one dat, vamp,” Kane said with a wink.

“Not sure you should say such a thing to a cop now. Wit how Slim was killed and all.”

“Why not?” Lowell said. “They don’t know I’m a vampire. To them, I’m just another attendee of a weird convention. All of us are.”

“So you sayin’ we cover for him?” Kane said.

“I’m not covering for him. I’m just going to tell them what happened,” Lowell said. “Besides, I don’t think he did it.”