“He didn’t mention her when he was here. And when he attacked me, he didn’t recognize her name.”
“He could have forgotten, repressed it,” Ethan said, but he didn’t look convinced by that. “He called me. Knows all the history.”
“True. But his appearance, right now, was oddly coincidental. And he’s here, at least in some part, because the Circle is paying for it. Just at the moment when the Circle is making a concerted bid for control of the city’s vamps.”
“You’re suggesting he’s an imposter.” Ethan’s tone went hot. “I’d know if he wasn’t who he says he is. It wouldn’t be possible for someone to pretend that well.”
But we lived in a world of fairies, gnomes, harpies, shifters; that’s what bothered me. Since when was anything impossible, magically or otherwise?
Before he could say anything else, my phone rang. I pulled back, found Catcher’s number, answered it. “Merit.”
“We’ve got something new on Jude Maguire, starting with the fact that Jude Maguire isn’t his real name. Jeff did an image-surf—”
“Hey, Mer,” said Jeff’s voice in the background.
“Hey, Jeff. Image-surf?” I prompted.
“And we found a photograph, think we found Maguire’s previous identity. His name was Thomas O’Malley.”
“Does that matter?”
“Yeah,” Catcher said. “I think it does. Judge for yourself.”
“Send it to Ethan’s mail,” I said, and walked to Ethan’s desk, sat down behind his computer.
“Oh, do help yourself,” Ethan murmured, watching.
I pulled up the program, waited for the photograph to come through, and when the alert rang, clicked it.
I nearly dropped the phone. “Crap on toast,” I said, borrowing Mallory’s curse, and gestured Ethan to come look.
It was a photograph from a college yearbook, two guys standing side by side, an arm over each other’s shoulder, bottles of beer in their free hands. Their hair was fashionably long, just brushing their popped shirt collars. They looked casually wealthy, confident, and very content with their lot.
They, according to the caption below the photograph, were Thomas O’Malley and Adrien Reed.
“I’m going to put you on speaker,” I said to Catcher, and put down the phone so Ethan could hear.
“They went to college together,” Catcher said. “O’Malley got popped for larceny, changed his name, if not legally. Jeff says there’s no record of it.”
“When you’re friends with Adrien Reed, who needs a judge?” Ethan muttered.
“Yeah,” Catcher agreed. “There was barely a record of the photograph—Jeff found it buried in an online alumni forum. Wouldn’t surprise me if Reed tried to scrub the records. In order to hide the connection.”
“Let’s not get carried away,” I said. “I’m sure Reed took a lot of pictures with a lot of people.”
“This wasn’t just a throwaway,” Catcher said. “They were buddies, frat brothers. O’Malley was in Reed’s first wedding. Pre-Sorcha. First wife’s name was Frederica. No pictures that we could find—also likely scrubbed—but there’s a line item in the society pages. Reed and Maguire are friends,” Catcher concluded. “Which makes me wonder if Reed is also part of the Circle.”
“Jesus,” Ethan said. “All the money. All the connections. Why would he risk that?”
“Maybe that’s the wrong order of things,” I said. “Maybe he got the money, the connections, because of it. But if we’re right, why the attempt on King at Reed’s house?”
“Maybe Reed wanted a bird’s-eye view of King’s downfall,” Catcher said. “Wanted to watch a competitor suffer.”
“Or wanted to confirm the hit had gone down,” Ethan said. “There was, after all, some question whether that would take place. And to let it happen in his own home, he was incredibly confident King’s death wouldn’t be traced back to him.”
“That could be,” Catcher said. “For now, this is just speculation. We don’t have any hard evidence linking Reed to Maguire, as he’s now known, the Circle, or anything else. But it’s a first step. I have to go. We’re going to look into the King-Reed angle more. I’ll keep you posted.”
By the time I said thanks and hung up the phone, Ethan had grabbed his suit jacket and was headed for the door.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m going to pay a little visit to Adrien Reed. And this time, I’m driving.”
Chapter Twenty-one
FRANKLY, SENTINEL
He didn’t give me time to argue, tattle, or grab Brody. In order to keep Ethan from going alone, I had to settle for sending Luc a message as I climbed into Ethan’s Ferrari and he squealed out of the basement parking garage and onto the street, just missing the gate by a hair.
“What, exactly, is the plan here?” I asked as the engine hummed through Hyde Park.
“I want to talk to him. I want to talk to him about Balthasar. I want to talk to him about Navarre. I want to talk to him about the hell he’s put us and our friends through for the last week. I want to talk to him about attacking my Sentinel and attempting to use her as a hostage.”
“All good questions,” I said, nodding my agreement. “But keep in mind that we don’t actually have any evidence he’s done any of that.”
“Frankly, Sentinel, I don’t give a damn about evidence right now. I care about this unmitigated asshole having the stones to admit what he’s done so I can begin planning how to destroy him.”
“So this is just going to be a light social call to a millionaire in the middle of the night, then.”
When Ethan growled, I decided this wasn’t the time to mitigate tension with sarcasm. Seeing as how I didn’t have much else to contribute, I settled back and began to answer Luc’s panicked messages.
* * *
The front door was locked, no welcome party tonight, no cadre of limousines in line to drop off visitors. Ethan pressed the security panel beside the door.
“May I help you?”
“Ethan Sullivan for Adrien Reed.”
“One moment please.”
There was a pause, then a beep, and a woman in a dour black dress opened the door, gestured for us to come inside. The moment we did, two guards stepped forward, scanned us with handheld wands.