"All right," I murmured to Owen, tucking my pad back into my bag. "I'm going in. Keep an eye out. If something goes wrong, you, Finn, and Bria get out of here. I'll find a way to slip out, make it back to the beach house, and meet up with you."
"I don't want to leave you alone here, Gin," Owen murmured.
"I know," I said in a soft voice. "I know that you want to come with me and protect me more than anything else. And that's why I love you. But I've got work to do. That's the other thing I love about you - you let me do what needs to be done to help other people."
Owen's broad shoulders tightened with tension, but after a moment, he let out a small sigh and nodded his head. I brought my hand down, brushing my fingers against Owen's. He reached out and caught my hand in his for a second before letting go.
"Be careful," he whispered.
I smiled, even though he couldn't see it with his back turned to me. "Always."
I left Owen's side and strolled over to Dekes. The vampire held out his arm to me, and I looped my hand over the crook of his elbow. Once again, I felt that crackle of elemental power in the air around him. I half expected to get a jolt when I touched him, just like I had a few months ago when I'd taken on Elektra LaFleur, an assassin who'd had electrical elemental magic. But my fingers settled against his arm, and all I felt was the rich, expensive fabric of Dekes's suit.
Still, the feel of his magic - whatever the hell it was - brushed against my skin and clung there like a spider's sticky web. It wasn't an uncomfortable feeling, not exactly, not like Mab's Fire power had always been with its hot, sharp, pricking sensation, but it was enough to make me even more cautious around the vampire.
"Are you ready for our interview?" Dekes said.
"Of course. Thank you for making time for me."
The vampire smiled, showing me a little more of the two fangs in his mouth and the hunger burning in his eyes. "Anything for a beautiful woman."
Dekes led me inside, then up two staircases to the third floor of the mansion. To my surprise and frustration, two giant guards separated themselves from the crowd outside and trailed after us. I'd hoped to shove Dekes into the first dark, secluded corner that we came to and tell him what was what, but that wasn't going to happen with his two goons a mere three steps behind us and even more guards roaming through the hallways. I could take out the giants easily enough, but add Dekes and his mysterious elemental magic to the mix, and the situation could quickly spin out of my control. So I decided to wait and see how this farce played out. Sooner or later, Dekes would have to send his men away - unless he liked to f**k in front of an audience. Maybe he did. Stranger things had happened to me as the Spider. If it came to that, well, I'd think of something. I always did.
While we walked, Dekes chatted about various pieces of art that we passed. Paintings, statues, carvings. Most of the items were things you'd find in the home of any wealthy businessman. But the deeper we moved into the mansion, the more I noticed other things - quirky things, odd things, even downright bizarre things. A marble chess set sitting on a table between two empty chairs. Cases full of guns, knives, swords, and other weapons. Miniature airplanes dangling from the ceiling on thin strands of fishing line. A row of lockets, each one open to show the faded locks of hair curled inside. Even a display of antique dolls in frilly dresses. Their open, empty, staring glass eyes seemed to follow me as we strolled past them.
Dekes also seemed to have a fascination with pirates and shipwrecks. Gold coins, silver goblets, jewel-crusted daggers, and more glittered in glass cases, along with small, perfect models of the ships that the plunder had supposedly come from.
All of the items were clean, polished, and in mint condition, even the dolls. If Finn had been here, he would have been salivating, especially over the gold and the jewels. But Dekes just strolled by all the finery, barely pausing to glance at it before moving on to the next room, the next case, and the next treasure that it contained. He had all these fine things, exquisite things, but it seemed like the vamp had long ago lost interest in them, as if knowing that he possessed them was enough, and he had no further need to admire or even look at them ever again.
"Your home is lovely," I said. "You seem to be quite the collector - of all sorts of unusual things."
"Mmm. Yes, I suppose you could say that I'm a collector. Some would call my tastes eclectic, but if I see something that I want, then I go after it," Dekes murmured. "No matter what it is and what it takes to acquire it. The biggest, the best, the most expensive, the most delicate, the macabre, and the unusual. It fascinates me, the things people hold dear, the things that they value."
"And what's your favorite thing to collect? Paintings? Sculptures? Antiques?"
He smiled, and for a moment, I felt a surge of elemental magic roll off him. "Nothing so mundane as that. I simply enjoy surrounding myself with beautiful, powerful women."
I wondered at his odd answer, but I kept the conversation going, mindful of the two giants still watching me. "It seems to me like you already have one of those. Your wife is quite stunning."
Most men would have bragged long and hard and loud if they'd had a beauty like Vanessa on their arm and in their bed, but Dekes waved a hand, dismissing my comment. "My wife has her uses. That's why I married her. But I find the old saying to be true - variety really is the spice of life. I tend to live for the moment and all the pleasures that can be had in it."
His words were meant to be seductive, the kind of sly double-talk that rich men indulged in with women they thought were beneath them but wanted to f**k anyway. Still, something in the vampire's tone worried me. There was a smugness in his voice, a note of sly triumph, like he knew something that I didn't. It worried me - and I didn't like to be worried.
Finally, we reached a pair of double doors at the end of a long hallway. By this point, we were in an entirely separate wing from the pool where the press conference had been held. Except for the two giants trailing us, I couldn't have asked for a more perfect spot to have my chat with Dekes. We were far enough away from the south lawn that no one would hear the giants or the vampire scream if I decided to kill them. But instead of making me feel better, the deserted location ratcheted up my tension.
In my experience, nothing was ever this easy. I could almost see a giant cartoon anchor hovering in the air over my head. I just didn't know when it was going to drop on me - and how bad the damage would be when it did.
"And now, another one of my pride and joys," Dekes said in a vaguely bored voice.