Well, that made two of us who were ill at ease, since I would have much preferred to have been killing him right now. If I thought I could have gotten away with it, I would have lured Vaughn to some dark corner and strangled him with his own tie. No muss, no fuss, no blood on my clothes. I’d even gone so far as to propose the idea to Fletcher on the ride over here, but he’d shot me down the way I knew he would. Even I would admit that it wasn’t the smartest plan, but taking Vaughn out as quickly as I could had its appeal.
Our target had been on Dawson’s guest list because he’d done some work on buildings at the dwarf’s coal mines, and also on his mansion, and he was the reason that Fletcher and I were here. Fletcher wanted to check out Vaughn’s security—or lack thereof—in person before we moved on to the next phase of the job.
Unlike some of the other movers and shakers, Vaughn hadn’t brought any bodyguards along with him. In fact, according to what Fletcher had been able to uncover, except for a few guards at his estate and a couple more who served as drivers, Vaughn didn’t employ any other giants specifically to protect him.
Then again, he didn’t need to, given his Stone magic.
Still dispensing glasses of champagne, I maneuvered through the crowd and over to Vaughn’s corner of the room until I was close enough to feel the magic emanating off him. Stone elementals were fairly rare, but Vaughn had the more common elemental trait of constantly giving off invisible waves of magic, even when he wasn’t using his power. In his case, a sense of solidness continually rippled off his body, as though his muscles and bones were encased in cement, instead of just skin, and your hand would shatter if you tried to punch him in the jaw.
Besides Vaughn’s abuse of Charlotte, his magic was the other most troubling thing about him and the one that could be the most dangerous when I finally went in for the kill. Vaughn wasn’t the strongest elemental I’d ever encountered, but it felt like he had a decent amount of power, more than enough to make anyone think twice about messing with him. I’d have to put him down quickly when we had our inevitable confrontation—
Vaughn’s phone chirped. He pulled the device out of his jacket, stared at the screen, and frowned. Then he tucked the phone away, excused himself from the woman he’d been talking to, and strode out of the room. I wondered what could be so important that would make Vaughn leave the party. Well, I was going to find out.
I glanced over at Fletcher, who was whipping together a raspberry sauce to top the molten dark chocolate soufflés that he’d prepared earlier. I tipped my head at Vaughn’s retreating figure, and Fletcher gave me a tiny nod, telling me to go ahead. He knew as well as I did that any information we could gather about Vaughn might be useful in plotting his death.
I moved through the crowd, passing out glass after glass of champagne. Elliot Slater had already diminished most of my supply, so it didn’t take long. When my tray was empty, I headed toward the open double doors, as though I were going to the kitchen to replenish my stock of bubbly. I might do that . . . eventually. But right now, I was much more interested in what Vaughn was up to.
I glanced around to make sure that no one was watching me, then slipped out of the dining room and followed my target.
Cesar Vaughn strode through the halls of Tobias Dawson’s mansion like it was his own. His strides were long and purposeful, indicating that he knew exactly where he was going. I wondered whom he might be meeting. A business associate to negotiate a hush-hush deal? A rival he wanted to warn away from a potential project? A secret lover? It could be anyone.
Vaughn rounded a corner and disappeared from sight. I hurried after him—
“Hey! Where do you think you’re going?”
I whipped around at the sound of the voice behind me.
A woman dressed in the same tuxedo clothes that I wore strode down the hallway toward me. She clutched a clipboard in one hand, while a headset arced across her head like a plastic crown, unsuccessfully trying to flatten her frizzy black curls. Meredith Ruiz, the event planner for tonight’s dinner and many others that I’d worked. She stopped in front of me and straightened up to her full height, which was a few inches short of five feet, since she was a dwarf.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Meredith snapped.
I gave her my best, most innocent, and most clueless smile and held up my empty tray like a shield in front of me. Too bad the metal wouldn’t actually protect me from her wrath. “I was headed to the kitchen to get some more champagne. Thirsty crowd tonight.”
Her brown eyes narrowed, sizing me up, but I kept right on smiling at her, as if I were doing absolutely no wrong instead of being up to absolutely no good.
“Well, the kitchen’s the other way,” Meredith said. “Come on. I’ll take you there.”
I glanced over my shoulder, but Vaughn was long gone. I bit back a curse. Of course he was. But that was just luck for you. A capricious mistress at best, one who would give you a break every now and then but mostly just screwed you over time and time again. My bad luck was one of the most frustrating things about being an assassin. Because no matter how many times I reviewed someone’s file, no matter how much I planned, no matter how careful I was, something inevitably came up that interrupted my schemes. Like a nosy event planner appearing at exactly the wrong moment.
“Come on,” Meredith said, gesturing with her hand. “This way. Let’s go.”
“What’s the rush?” I asked, still playing dumb and innocent.
She snorted. “You had the right idea to go get more champagne. Believe me when I tell you that you do not want these folks to be thirsty—or sober.”
She clamped her hand on my arm and started dragging me down the hallway. An easy thing for her to do, given her dwarven strength. My hands tightened around my tray, and I considered bashing her over the head with it. But the flimsy metal wouldn’t put so much as a dent in her thick skull. Besides, she wasn’t my target, and collateral damage was something that Fletcher had taught me to avoid at all costs.
“Something wrong?” Meredith barked.
There was nothing I could do. Not without arousing even more of her suspicions, so I shook my head and let her march me down the hall in the opposite direction from Vaughn.
Meredith led me to the far side of the mansion where the kitchen was. That was bad enough, but she also watched while one of the wine stewards poured several fresh glasses of champagne and arranged them on my tray.