Juliet leans back into the couch, crossing one leg over the other. There’s something relaxed about her, or maybe it’s confidence. Like she’s untouchable. Like she doesn’t have anything in the world to worry about. And maybe that’s because of her German Shepard husband beside her?
“My best friend, Elena Godfrey, has been doing business in New York for years,” she says. “She met some asshole named Augustus who bragged about being a Baron, said he ran this city.”
A sound of disgust comes from my lips. “Did he try to proposition this Elena?” I ask.
“He did, actually,” Juliet says, raising an eyebrow to accompany her disgusted smirk. “Said he’d prefer she were human. Said all kinds of other disgusting things. I take it you know Augustus?”
“Knew,” I answer with a sneer. “He was going to be my father-in-law. My fiancé took him out for some other disgusting behavior.”
“Glad to hear Karma is still doing her job,” Juliet replies. “Though, I’m kind of surprised Elena didn’t take him out herself. She’s never had much tolerance for dicks like that. Anyway, that’s how we knew about the Barons. I take it that’s what the rest of you are?”
“We’re missing one other, maybe two, but Cliff’s whereabouts are unknown at the moment,” Sysco answers. “But you’ve got the rest of us.”
“Interesting how things seem to stay consistent without any kind of communication about it,” Juliet says, and it looks like she’s fighting a smirk.
“Juliet,” Roman warns.
“They’re practically the same,” Juliet counters her husband.
“Don’t,” he says, unconvinced by his wife.
I raise an eyebrow. “It’s okay. You don’t have to tell us about your secret council of vampires in Chicago.”
Roman’s look is deadly serious and utterly annoyed. But I just smile and shake my head.
“Look, we can all keep our cloak and daggers, but how about we get down to the reason you asked to meet with us,” I press on. “We were kind of in the middle of something.”
“I like her,” Juliet says as she holds my gaze. “You’re different, which is good, and exciting. And you don’t beat around the bush.”
“A few years back, we had an issue in Chicago with a necromancer,” Roman says, taking control of the conversation before I even have a moment to process what Juliet said. The man is even more direct than I am.
“Excuse me?” I blurt. I blink at the beautiful man with white hair and icy blue eyes twice. “Did you just saynecromancer?”
“I did,” Roman confirms. Sysco swears, but Harry doesn’t seem bothered. Not much rattles Harry. “He brought a really bad man back from the grave in Chicago. Wrecked a lot of havoc. It was all under the direction of someone else, someone worse. In the end, we caught the bastard and determined that he didn’t deserve to die. But we banished him.”
“From the entirety of the United States,” Juliet fills in details. “We told him if he ever returned, there would be consequences.”
Roman crosses one ankle over the opposite knee. “I have an extensive security team in Chicago, but my network runs… wider than the city. A week ago, facial recognition scanners picked up his face at JFK. A day later, we caught him on some cameras in Manhattan.”
“When you say necromancer, do you literally mean someone who brings back the dead?” Sysco asks. I can see his thoughts spiraling. “Like, they were in the grave, heart stopped, dead?”
“I mean, Markus Lontoc brought back a man who had been dead for five years,” Juliet says, her expression hardening. “The man was bones and some hair. And then he was a fully restored man capable of horrendous things, same as he was before he died.”
“Holy shit,” Sysco breathes, shaking his head in disbelief.
“Any idea what he’s doing in New York?” Harry asks.
“We haven’t been able to get much of any footage of him,” Roman admits. “I can’t just hack into every camera in the city. But the little bit I’ve been able to get ahold of, it seems like he’s looking for someone.”
“Someone alive?” I question. “Because Manhattan isn’t known for its graveyards. Bodies get hauled off the island elsewhere. There isn’t enough room to bury people here.”
“We don’t know yet,” Roman says. “Like I said, we’ve been unable to get too much footage. Markus has had some suspicious ties in the past. Run with some shady people. We were hoping you might have some ideas what he might be up to.”
“There’s plenty of despicable people in this city,” Sysco says, shaking his head. “You’re talking way too general right now. We’re going to need more to go off.”
“I know,” Juliet says with a nod. “It’s not much. But Markus has to know that he’s putting his life at risk. We made the ramifications of him coming back into the country pretty clear. So, if he’s willing to risk it, it isn’t for something good.”
“We were hoping that we could get your help, your cooperation, in finding the necromancer,” Roman says. I can tell he doesn’t like asking for our help. But I also see it in his eyes: he is not in his own city, and he knows it.
