Chapter Eleven
"Well, now, that was quite a performance your little Dr. Linn gave tonight, Josef. Mind explaining where you took her?"
Coraline was in a rare tear. Her carefully planned out revealing of herself as Morgan Vincent had been spoiled. By the time she was able to get control over the assembled guests, Alison Linn was gone!
Josef had seen Coraline in much worse rages over the years so he just shrugged and put on his innocent act again. "How would I know? You were right next to me, you saw as much as I did. My guess - the butler did it!"
Secretly he had a pretty good idea but it was always best to hold your cards close to the vest. And it served nobody's purpose for Coraline to get her hands on Alison. Beth's poor little scientist friend was being used as a pawn in a very dangerous game. Of course, with vamps, there could be no other kind.
He'd heard the rumors about Coraline resurfacing again and had made discreet inquiries. Turns out that after taking her punishment for using the compound, she somehow convinced Lance and their sire into doing more sophisticated research into their bloodlines. Designer blood? Or maybe something along the lines of what Lola had cooked up to sell to non-vamps.
His best guess was that this continuing bad economy was affecting these European vamps much more than the Eurasians, whose emerging human trafficking markets were forcing everyone to look for new ways to make money.
The economy here was so bad that he had been invited to buy into Coraline's little enterprise which was why he had slipped over to Paris this evening but he hadn't known until hours ago who was behind Davis Labs Intl.
Somehow it hadn't surprised him to learn of Coraline's involvement but he had been shocked that old world vamps such as Lance would have gotten involved. It was more than worrisome when that happened. Hmmn, Lance showing himself around was another item someone should know about. He had tried to warn Mick that something was up but his ungrateful friend just was not in the mood to hear about it.
Still, he had gotten several very interesting reports from Logan and knew that Mick had his own kettle of fish to fry.
He slipped away in search of the kitchen.