"What the hell are we doing here?" Sean demanded.
Gregori opened the door. "After you."
"We need to go to the safe house. Take me there now."
"No." Gregori strode down the hall. How the hell had this mess happened? As far as he could tell, the fate of Vamps around the world now depended on how well he could babysit the president's daughters.
"You can't tell me no." Sean followed him. "I'm in charge of this operation."
Down the hall, the door to the MacKay security office opened, and Angus and Emma MacKay stepped out.
"Did ye finish yer meeting with the president?" Angus asked.
Before Gregori could answer, Sean lunged in front of him, jabbing a thumb toward him. "This idiot's not doing as he's told. He was supposed to take us to the safe house."
Gregori glared at Sean. "Who's the idiot? You had the Secret Service pick us up there. I don't consider it safe."
"Of course it's safe," Sean insisted. "The president just made an alliance with us."
"Och, that's good news," Angus said.
Emma smiled. "Well done, guys."
Gregori shrugged. "I wouldn't bank on it yet." He still had to take the daughters out dancing. And keep them happy, or he and his friends were screwed.
"That's why we should stay in D.C.," Sean said. "We need to be close by for further negotiations."
Gregori shook his head. "We'll just teleport."
Sean gritted his teeth. "I can't teleport."
"Learn how."
"I can't!" Sean ran a hand over his buzz cut hair. "Don't you see the bind I'm in? I have to keep acting like I'm human. If they find out the truth about me, they'll fire me and I'll lose their trust."
"He has a point," Emma said. "Sean can help us more if he retains his current position."
"All the more reason for him to stay away from the safe house." Gregori turned to Sean. "What if your CIA buddies came to see you during the day and found you in your death-sleep?"
He gulped. "I - I would be in the basement. Garrett wouldn't let them down there. He would protect me."
"Garret works for the CIA," Gregori gritted out. "He'll do whatever Caprese tells him to do."
"And he knows the truth about you, aye?" Angus asked. "Did ye no' train him to hate vampires as much as ye do?"
With a grimace, Sean paced away a few steps. "It's not fair! I'm the same person I was before. I've worked for the CIA for over thirty years! Why would they think I've suddenly become a monster?"
Gregori scoffed in chorus with Angus and Emma.
Sean gave them a sheepish look. "Okay. I get it. I was a little . . . judgmental toward you guys."
"Ye were an arse, Whelan," Angus muttered.
"Fine." He scowled. "Rub it in. But how the hell am I supposed to keep my job when I'm . . . Undead?"
"It's better than being dead," Gregori told him wryly.
"If ye end up getting fired, ye can always work for me," Angus suggested.
Sean grimaced as he raked a hand over his hair. "I'll have to think about it. I'm still trying to . . . adjust."
"Have you told your wife yet?" Emma asked.
"No. She thinks I've been overseas for the last two weeks. I . . . don't know how to break the news to her."
Emma patted him on the shoulder. "Once she gets over her shock, it will all be for the best. She can see Shanna and Caitlyn again. And once she sees how adorable her grandchildren are, she'll recover soon enough."
Sean's face softened. "Those kids are really special."
Gregori exchanged a look with Angus. Those kids were a lot more special than Sean knew. "Back to the matter of the safe house - it's not really safe. Not when that ass**le General Bond is claiming the world would be better off without us."
Sean snorted. "Well, you didn't help matters by threatening to snap his neck."
Angus stiffened. "What?"
Gregori winced. "It's a long story. Before we get into it, I think we should get our guys back here."
Angus nodded. "Agreed. I never did like that safe house."
Sean huffed. "I went to a lot of trouble to set that up for us. And that's where the CIA will contact us for further negotiations."
"Then Garrett can remain there and relay any messages to you," Angus said. "Like it or not, Whelan, ye're in our world now, so ye have to start doing things our way."
Five minutes later, Angus, Robby, and Phineas had teleported the shifters and everyone's luggage back to Romatech. Phil was transported back to the Dragon Nest Academy to help guard the school since most of the women and all the children were there. The remaining MacKay Security and Investigation employees filed into the conference room along with Sean Whelan and Coven Masters Roman and Zoltan.
Gregori sat at the table in the same seat he'd occupied the night before. As he gazed around the table, seeing some of his best friends - Phineas, Robby, Olivia, Howard, Angus, Emma, Zoltan, and Roman - the pressure to succeed bore down on him. Had he done well tonight or totally screwed up?
"So the president has agreed to help us?" Roman asked.
Before Gregori could answer, Sean jumped in. "Yes, he has. He ordered the director of Homeland Security to scrub the video, and the whole vampire story will be declared a hoax."
Cheerful comments reverberated around the table.
"Excellent work." Roman smiled at Gregori.
Olivia tilted her head, studying him. "You don't look very pleased, Gregori."
He shrugged. "It was like a poker game with a lot of maneuvering and bluffing going on. Even though the president agreed to get in the game with us, he has yet to show his hand. I'm not sure what he's expecting from us in return."
"But it was an excellent start," Sean insisted. "President Tucker was eager to form an alliance with us, and he seemed quite willing to trust us."
"Because he wants something," Gregori muttered.
"At least we have his support," Roman said. "What about the other men?"
Gregori took a deep breath. "The Homeland Security guy was ordered to get rid of the video, but he doesn't really trust us because I refused to give him a list of all the Vamps in the country."
Angus winced. "Nay, we canna do that."
"The CIA director wants to be our ally so he can use us as a weapon against their enemies," Gregori continued. "The secretary of defense and national security advisor are suspicious and not readily inclined to trust us. General Bond of the Joint Chiefs of Staff would prefer to wipe all the vampires off the planet. That's why I didn't think we should remain at the safe house in D.C."
A moment of silence settled in the room.
Roman sighed. "I guess it will take them a while to learn to trust us."
Gregori nodded. "I tried the safe-and-harmless routine, but they were interpreting that as weak and worthless, and they only want us around if we're useful. I had to prove we were worth saving, or they might agree with the general that it was better to just eliminate us."
"So how much did you tell them?" Zoltan asked.
"Tell them?" Sean scoffed. "He showed them. He bent an iron rod, zipped around at vampire speed, teleported, and threatened to break the general's neck."
Everyone gasped.
Gregori shot Sean an annoyed look. "It was a demonstration of strength so they would respect us." He adjusted his tie. "I believe it was an effective strategy."
"Apparently so, since you weren't arrested," Emma said. "And the president agreed to help us."
Gregori shrugged one shoulder. "He has an agenda. A humanitarian mission, he called it, that involves teleporting somewhere."
"We can do that." Angus leaned forward. "Did he say where?"
"No." Gregori fiddled with his cuff links. "But I believe it involves taking his daughter."
Angus sat back with a surprised expression.
"You mean Madison Tucker?" Olivia asked.
Gregori shook his head. "The oldest daughter. Abigail." He was met with blank looks. "She's not well-known." But she was fascinating.
A small part of him was excited about seeing her again. He wanted to know what she was up to, why she was hiding, what made her tick. And how good she would feel in his arms. He winced. She's the president's daughter, you fool. A bigger part of him knew she represented sheer disaster. If the CIA knew what kind of thoughts he was having, they'd have a hit man assigned to him in a second.