“No problem.” Chris swiveled around to open the middle drawer of her filing cabinet and took out the vendor’s order confirmation. “When can I expect the reimbursement check?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Read the terms of the bid,” she suggested. “There’s a ten percent penalty surcharge for every day the delivery is late. Which means you will be paying us the entire bid amount, plus twenty-one days times ten percent of the order. . . . Do you want me to calculate that total for you?”
“You can’t do that.” The sound of paper flipping came over the line. “I didn’t bid on this job to pay you.”
“Page seven paragraph fourteen says you will.” Chris glanced at her calendar. “So I’ll need either the penalty check or the rest of the ammo by Friday at the latest.” As the supplier began to swear, she held the phone away from her ear. Another button lit up. “Have a wonderful evening.” She punched the button. “Christian Lang.”
“Sorry I am to bother you, lass.” Turner, the master of the armory, sounded grim. “But we’ve a situation brewing with the continentals that wants sorting out. Sooner rather than later.”
Chris translated Turner’s diplomatic jargon into plain English: There was trouble with visiting Kyn, probably the group Burke had warned her were coming in from Europe. Stronghold protocol required all warriors to be escorted to the armory upon arrival in order to surrender their weapons. “But they just got here.”
“Aye,” Turner said, “and we’d be much pleased to see them go.”
The weapons master, a congenial Irishman who Chris knew got along with everyone, sounded ready to personally show them the door, too. “How bad is this brew, Mr. Turner?”
“Blood’s not been shed,” he said. “Yet.”
This was just getting better and better. “What caused the situation?”
“Someone posted a summons from the high lord for all to read.” Turner muttered something under his breath before he added, “Soon as they did, the boasting and insulting commenced.”
Lucan and Samantha had not yet come down from the penthouse suite; Rafael, Lucan’s second-in-command, was currently in the islands training their newest warriors. Herbert Burke, Lucan’s tresora and the highest-ranked mortal in the jardin, had left an hour ago to pick up a courier from the airport.
That meant she would have to handle this. Her first major tresoran intervention. Chris ran her fingers along the chain she wore, shifting the weight of the silver cross hanging under her blouse. “I’ll be right there.”
To get to the service elevators, Chris had to walk through the club, and braced herself for the blast of music that hit her in the face as soon as she stepped outside. Now that the Twilight craze had leveled out, she didn’t spot too many wannabe Edwards or Bellas, but there were plenty of True Blood groupies doing their best to clone Sookie, Bill, Tara, and Eric. A group of sullen Anne Rice diehards, still clinging to their repro lace-cuff and velvet-jacket decadence, occupied one corner, while here and there the undecided stuck to their slinky noncommittal club wear while eagerly flashing their fake canines at anyone who strayed from their vamp herd of choice.
Chris sometimes wondered how the patrons would react if they ever discovered that the hulking, bland-faced bouncers stationed in and outside the club could show them some very real, very lethal seven-hundred-year-old fang.
At least the mood of the crowd seemed less aggressive tonight, Chris thought. On Friday a couple of Lestats had bumped padded shoulders while getting their Louis red wine coolers, and neither had been satisfied by exchanging sneered insults. As soon as the first drink was hurled, the guards had moved in, but a glass to the skull of the other Lestat had resulted in an ugly gash that unsurprisingly didn’t heal spontaneously. The guards had removed the pair before the sight and smell of blood had riled up the crowd too much, but the mess left behind had forced Chris to close down the bar for the night.
She spotted a glitter on the carpet by one of the barstools and stopped to pick up a piece of broken glass one of the cleaners had missed. Beside her, a wannabe Elvira stretched out her cheap stack boots under Chris’s nose. As Chris looked up, the girl used an arm covered with gleaming tribal ink to elbow her chunky companion. “Look, Heather. I think it’s an Avon Lady.”
Three years ago no one would have even noticed her, but now Chris looked out of place. She didn’t have time to play a round of I’m-Legit-and-You’re-Not, especially with someone who thought her tragic home perm, too-small fishnet tights, and pot metal bling made her the Queen of the Damned.