Page 120 of Tin God
The thread of irritation in his voice made her smile. “I know what you’re saying. Paulson isn’t like me. Helikesthe numbers on the screen.”
“He likes the chase and acquisition of anything and everything. It’s his form of hunting,” Ben said. “How would you try to bribe someone, Tenzin?”
She turned toward the distant lights of Vancouver and sighed. “I would probably just threaten them. Bribery could be expensive.”
“Okay, never mind.” Ben tugged her hand and pulled her to float over him, cocooning her in the bubble of quiet he created as he flew. “Paulson likes money. He wants money, so he assumes everyone else does too. He offered Zasha money and thinks the lure of that money will control them.”
“That’s very stupid,” Tenzin said. “Zasha is a living reaction, not a calculation. I doubt they’ve even considered what they would do with the money if Paulson actually paid them.”
“Which he might.”
“Which he won’t” —Tenzin corrected her mate— “because we’re going to kill Zasha.”
Ben arched his neck up and kissed her. “Exactly.”
They arrived in Vancouver,following the directions Katya had given them until they spotted the building she’d described, a four-story office building in a sea of office buildings on the edge of the commercial district in Vancouver.
“I haven’t spent much time here,” Ben said. “You?”
“No.” Tenzin pointed her chin at the building opposite the one where they were perched. “But this is the gold exchange.”
A wind vampire named Raven was already waiting, watching the building with steady eyes. Katya had described the vampire to Ben, and Tenzin had a hard time imagining there were two tall, ridiculously beautiful, Black wind vampires in Vancouver with golden-blond braids.
Ben looked at Tenzin gaping at Raven, and he snickered a little bit. “So if I got blond extensions, that would go over well, huh?”
She shook her head. “You couldn’t pull it off.”
“And now I’m a little bit hurt.” He sent a gust of wind over to Raven, laden with their amnis and their scent.
The wind vampire turned her head, caught sight of them in the distance, and watched them with steady eyes before she pulled out a small device and spoke into it. A moment later, she waved them over.
“Ben Vecchio.” Her eyes moved to Tenzin. “And Tenzin?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“I’ve heard of you.” Raven’s fangs fell a little bit. “I’m a little intimidated to work with you guys if I’m gonna be completely honest.”
“You won’t be working with us,” Tenzin said. “We’re here for information.”
The young vampire’s expression fell. “Oh. Right.”
“But obviously, it’s really important information,” Ben was quick to add. “And we were told you know the city really well, so you were the person to talk to.”
“Thanks.” Her expression brightened a little bit. “Uh, yeah, so we’ve been watching for a couple of hours now. Our tech guy, Lang, he’s got a hook into their system, I guess. Less than an hour after Summer went in there?—”
“Summer?” Tenzin didn’t know a Summer.
“Katya’s youngest daughter,” Ben said. “Brigid and Carwyn know her.”
“Yeah.” Raven nodded. “So she went in there, asked some questions. No answers obviously because it’s a gold exchange.”
“Obviously.” Tenzin didn’t trust the exchanges to hold her gold as some vampires did, but they were a useful service if you wanted to move money in immortal circles.
“But messages started flying,” Raven said. “Lang said there were some back to Amsterdam, which is where Paulson has his gold reserves according to what Katya could find out.”
“Matches with what Gavin’s people said,” Ben muttered. “Anywhere else?”
“Lang said no phone calls other than Amsterdam, but there were messages sent—apparently their messaging security is something like tin cans connected by a string—to a server in Iceland, then it bounced around a couple of times before it landed back here in Vancouver.”