Chapter Nineteen
Bishop wasn’t going to think about what Anja was doing in Kursik’s penthouse. As long as he kept busy, he could focus on something else. At least that’s what he aimed for. As he checked the audio on the gear for the third time in a row with no success, he had to admit he was a little distracted.
She had a point, he had no right to tell her who she could and couldn’t see. If Kursik wasn’t her Sire, then he had absolutely no reason to interfere with her business. So why couldn’t he seem to leave her alone?
“Head’s up.” Mason didn’t bother to wait for a reaction, lobbing a soda can at Bishop’s head.
Bishop reached up and deftly snatched it out of the air without looking. “Hey, did you get me those reports on the Stenger case I asked for?”
“You bet. I scanned it before I sent it to you. It’s pretty much like you thought. He was tenderized a little then bled out, probably into the mouth of someone we know. It’s kind of a sloppy cover up really, usually they make a half hearted attempt to disguise the neck wound. But it isn’t raising any flags in the department. Why the interest on this one?”
Focusing on the electronics on the work bench, Bishop decided it would be easier to dodge the question than explain something he didn’t fully understand himself. “It’s… complicated.”
“Yeah, I’ve been hearing a lot of that lately,” Mason muttered, taking a seat on the opposite side of the workbench and grabbing the gear out of his hands. Bishop resisted the urge to pull it back. He knew Mason was much better at that stuff than he was, but now his fingers were decidedly empty.
“Did you talk to Cage about the surveillance op I mentioned before?”
“Yeah, about that…” Mason looked up and Bishop cut him off before he had a chance to ask.
“Can he do it or not?”
“Babysit your girlfriend while she sleeps?”
“She’s not my girlfriend, and I have a valid reason for watching over her,” Bishop scowled.
“You have gone way off the reservation on this one, buddy.” Mason shook his head, setting the gear aside, fixed in a fraction of the time it had taken Bishop to monkey with it.
“What are you talking about?”
“You are completely obsessing over this girl. The Order isn’t supposed to be used for your own personal agenda.”
“I’m not…”
“Is it ‘cause she’s banging this Kursik guy?”
“Okay, first off… don’t ever say that again in my presence, and second, I think I’ve proven over the years that I’m enough of a professional to keep my feelings separate from my job.”
“That’s just it, bro. You don’t know how to keep them separate because you haven’t dealt with any feelings for as long as I’ve known you. All you are is the job.”
It was true of course. It was simpler that way, far easier to heal a physical wound than a tear in his heart. Bishop had carefully distanced himself from anything that might penetrate that armor. At the time he’d made the choice it had seemed like his salvation, the only way to endure what he’d lost, but now… “What do you want me to say?” he shrugged. It was the way it had to be.
“Tell me what’s really going on with you. I thought we were tight.”
“We are…”
“So if you can’t talk to me, who can you talk to?”
Bishop let out a long breath. “Fine, but not here. Come on.” Maybe it was paranoid, but he knew anything said could be picked up by any number of sources in the building, and he’d rather not have his disgrace broadcast throughout the organization. To his credit, Mason didn’t bat an eyelash when he led him out of the building, falling into step beside him as he headed for the park.
“Strolling in the park by moonlight… you’re not gonna tell me you’ve got a crush on me now, are you?” Mason gave him a sappy grin.
“I can’t help it, it’s the dimples,” Bishop shot back. It felt good to smile and let off a little steam, and he started to relax the further away they got from HQ. He was taking a big risk in telling Mason, but he was right. If he couldn’t tell his best friend, who could he tell? “So, as you may have guessed, I have been a little… distracted lately. Ever since Anja came to town.”
“Hold the little,” Mason nodded.
“What I didn’t tell you, is that she didn’t just come to town. She’s lived here all along.”
“I don’t get it. So why are you just now starting to go all stalker over her? Because Kursik came to town and is trying to horn in on your territory?”
“No, I mean yes, it bothers me that Kursik is…” Bishop made himself stop before he got things all twisted around. “Let me start at the beginning. I met Anja a few days ago.”
“But I thought you guys went way back?”
“That would be the part where I lied to you,” Bishop fixed him with a grim smile, anticipating an outburst, but Mason took it in stride.
“Sneaky. I bought it hook line and sinker. Go on.”
“I met her a few days ago because she was just turned a few days ago.”
Mason halted in his tracks. “Wait, wait, wait… how is that possible? I saw her put Serena down at the Hart the other night. That was no noob move.”
“It gets better. Her Sire completely bailed. She woke up in the morgue with no idea what happened to her, or who turned her.”
“That seems… unlikely,” Mason frowned pensively.
“It’s unusual yes. Wait… are you saying you think she’s lying about not knowing who turned her?”
“No, I’m saying that’s a very powerful bond you’re stepping into the middle of. If it was a choice of loyalty to you and loyalty to her Sire to keep her secret, who do you think she would choose?”
Bishop hadn’t thought of that before. Was Anja playing him? Mentally he replayed the way she looked at him, so full of trust. The refreshing naïveté about the vampire community, the way her face had crumpled when he’d told her she didn’t mean a thing to him, the little catch in her voice when she started to cry… There was no way those innocent blue eyes were just an act. “You’ve met her, do you think she’s capable of that kind of a deception?”
“First impression… no,” Mason admitted with a tilt of the head. “But why wouldn’t her Sire want to claim a total biscuit like her?”
“I don’t know. I thought maybe Kursik was her Sire at first. It would explain the enhanced abilities and his interest in her.” Not that anyone needed a real reason to be interested in Anja.
“But now you’re thinking no?”
“He told her that Carys was her maker.”
Mason let out a low whistle. “Now there’s a blast from the past.”
“Tell me about it. I’ve thought more about her in the past week than I have in the past hundred years. Longer maybe.”
“Are you thinking Carys might still be alive?”
It was tempting to spin fantasies that she was still out there, wreaking havoc in that special way that was hers alone, but in his heart Bishop knew she was gone. “No, I saw her die.”
“Is that why you didn’t turn Anja in? Because she reminds you of Carys?” Mason asked gently.
“No. I don’t know. Maybe.” Bishop lifted his face to the sky, but no answers came.
“Glad to see you’re thinking clearly, buddy.” Mason clapped him on the shoulder.
“I know I should have brought her in, but there’s something about her… can you see her locked up? What that would do to her? None of this is her fault, why should she have to suffer because some asshole bit her and left her to die all alone?”
“Because that’s our job,” Mason replied mildly. “And not to be a downer, but it’s something she’ll have to face sooner or later.”
“I’m shooting for later if I have anything to say about it.”
“You know you’re seriously deranged, right?”
“Why?” Bishop frowned. Not that h
e didn’t spot the craziness of the situation, but coming from Mason, it was like the pot calling the kettle black.
“Eventually her Sire is going to make himself known. You might be forced to put her down, did you think of that?”
Bishop refused to entertain that thought for even a fraction of a second. If it came to that, he would move heaven and earth to find a way to spare Anja that fate, even if it meant saving her for someone else. For now, he was desperate to find a plausible solution for her to survive the situation she found herself in. “You know, the more I think about it, the more it feels like we’re dealing with an Ellri,” he mused aloud.
“That’s crazy. When was the last time you head of an Elder turning anyone?”
“I know it’s a stretch, but the pieces fit.”
“Why would an Ellri turn her and then abandon her like that? They wouldn’t have anything to fear from the Order.”
“I don’t know, but it would explain her blood, and it would explain the way she was turned.”
“Wait, what about the way she was turned?” Mason’s brow crumpled in confusion.
“She was found dressed in full Viking regalia, with runes carved on the floor of the abandoned house she was turned in.”
“Huh. You didn’t mention that little tidbit before. So whoever turned her was either old school or a total nutjob with a Viking fetish.”
“Exactly.”
“What happens when he comes back for her?”
That was the question he faced each time he started to think about giving in to his attraction to the girl. Because if he could be honest with himself for once, he had to admit Anja had gotten under his skin. In that scenario though, he had to ask not what he wanted, but what did Anja deserve? At the end of the day Bishop didn’t know if he was capable of giving her what she needed. “Then I’ll ask him for his papers and move on.”
“That’s it?”
“What do you want me to say? You said it yourself, how could I possibly compete with a bond like that? Especially against an Ellri, you know the law as well as I do. No one stands between and Elder and what he wants.”
“True. But you never know what an Elder’s agenda is. You might have a good forty or fifty years with her before he shows up to stake his claim.”
“And you think that will make it easier for me to let her go?” Better never to open that door to begin with.
“Well, that would solve her problems, she wouldn’t need any papers as the progeny of an Elder, and she wouldn’t need you to run interference with the Order anymore so you’d be in the clear. Hell, you might even get some sort of a reward for keeping her safe for him.”
And she wouldn’t need him anymore. Not as a mentor, and certainly not as a protector. Probably not even as a friend after the way he’d treated her. Would that be easier or harder? “What would you do, if you were in my shoes?”
Mason let out a long sigh. “Besides shop for some new clothes? Seriously, you should look into a little color every now and again. The world is not just shades of gray.” Bishop didn’t bother to comment, he just waited for Mason to get it out of his system and continue. “I’m a gambling man by nature. I’d probably figure out a way to get her chipped and scoop her up before any other vamps came sniffing too close.”
Figure out a way to get her chipped. It probably wouldn’t be that hard to accomplish. He’d have to forge some documents to get her into the system, but that shouldn’t be too difficult. Many of the old ones resisted getting a subdermal chip implanted and didn’t carry papers with them, relying on their blood to carry them through any question of identity. He couldn’t deny that the urge to protect her was strong, and this would certainly accomplish that, whether he took it any farther on a personal level or not.
“It’s not a bad idea,” Bishop allowed. “A good place to start at any rate.” He felt better now that he had a plan of action for the immediate future.
“You know you can’t adopt her as your own though.”
“I’m well aware of the vows I took.” More than most, he had accepted the Jacari as the driving force in his life, there was nothing else.
“I’m just saying…”
“She doesn’t test as a newborn. I wouldn’t have to list her as mine. I could say Carys was her Sire. There aren’t many still alive who could dispute it.” He could do this, he could make it work. He could be her mentor. That would keep Anja safe and he could still see her and she wouldn’t have to keep making those puppy dog eyes at him whenever he told her to go away.
“And if her Sire shows up to lay claim to her?”
Bishop honestly couldn’t answer that one, not yet. “That will be an interesting day,” he allowed with a grim smile.
“Sounds like you’ve got it all worked out then, good luck,” Mason clapped him on the shoulder again. “I just have one question.”
“What’s that?”
“Does she have a sister?”