Heidi's eyes glowed. "Like a dream."
Declan winked at her, satisfied when a flush spread across her face.
"A union between our two security forces would create an undefeatable force," Olivia said. She perched on the edge of the table. "Traditionally, the successor in your family isn't named, until he finds his wife. Something about a balance of power, because your kind can't handle your magic."
"New generation, new rules," he said with a shrug. "Heidi will tell you I handle my magic well, and there's no one else in my bed except her, certainly not a wife."
Olivia was studying him again. "Think about it, Declan. You'll be my equal on Friday. You can make the decision your father never wanted to."
"I'll consider it."
"Heidi will tell you when and where. If you're finished, the door is behind you."
"With your permission, I'd like to visit with the Professor," he said.
The Professor was revered by Sucubatti and Incubatti alike. As the oldest living creature in either society, he was also the keeper of ancient histories and sought out by historians and students. He and the other Benefactors Incubuses who remained with the Sucubatti after the War lived in a row of houses outside the wrought iron gates enclosing the hundred acre campus belonging to the Sucubatti.
"That side of campus is open. I'm well aware you visit the Professor regularly," Olivia said. "But thank you for asking. You've got a politician buried beneath that Incubus surface."
"Always a pleasure, Olivia," Declan said with a smile.
"The pleasure is all mine," she said just as graciously.
Declan turned and left, trailed by Wes. The double doors closed behind him, and he whipped off the suit jacket. Accustomed to meetings and the tailored suits that filled one closet, he found the uniform unusually stifling today.
"You okay?" Wes asked.
"Sweating like a man with a secret in the clutches of a Succubus," Declan replied. He unfastened the top two buttons of his shirt and rolled up his sleeves. He refused to acknowledge the affect Olivia had on him while standing before her. Now, he became aware of how fast his heart was beating and the fact her heady scent the smell of sex and flowers was stuck in his nose.
His tight chest didn't relax until he stepped outside the building and filled his lungs with the cold, misty spring air. Declan shrugged and flung the suit jacket over one shoulder. His senses cleared.
Wes was grinning. "Never seen anyone make you sweat before."
"Dad warned me, but I was not expecting Olivia's magic to be so strong," Declan admitted. "Or to see Heidi. Or for ..." Zoey to be so close. He barely stopped the words, but with Olivia's sex magic clogging his senses, his sudden urge to track down the soul-mate intended for him was almost too strong to resist.
"You did good."
Declan met his brother's gaze and shook out his arms, forcing his thoughts away from women.
"We got what we wanted," Declan said. "Even though Dad refuses to tell us why we want it."
"I think he knows who killed Julius."
"I'm guessing Olivia does as well."
"I got that impression, too."
They walked quietly to the car awaiting them. Their driver had it running and warm, and Declan sank into the backseat, welcoming the warmth after the chilly air.
"Professor's," he told the driver then addressed his brother. "You have any insight into what Dad's doing?"
"Not this time. He might be pissed someone knocked off an Incubatti or he might be looking for something else," Wes said. "You know Dad. When we need to know, we will."
"I'm not satisfied with that anymore."
"Ask him." Wes was amused.
Agitated as much by his first official diplomatic mission as he was by the proximity to her, his soul-mate, Declan usually followed his father's orders without thinking twice. No one trusted his father to reveal the truth, but they knew he valued family above everything. Whatever the truth was, it wasn't going to hurt his sons, or they'd know.
Today it wasn't enough.
The driver pulled in front of a restored Victorian house with a purple facade, one of a handful of similar houses outside the gates.
"I'll be a few minutes," Declan said and opened the door. He didn't bother with his jacket and trotted to the house and up the stairs.
He knocked and waited, peering through the glass of the front door to watch the teetering old butler. It took him two minutes to make it down the hallway to the front door and open it.
"Good evening, Emmitt," Declan said. "I'm here to see Alexander."
The butler pushed the screen door open with effort. Declan patiently waited for the ancient man to step out of the way. The moment he set foot in the Professor's foyer, he smelled the sweet cigar smoke coming from the study down the hallway. He followed the scent and paused at the door to the study, knocking on the frame.
The Professor was dozing at a massive desk. A red-tipped cigar was caught between the knuckles of two fingers. The fire in the hearth was lit, rendering the study too warm. Books lined the walls, mantle and lay stacked on every other open surface.
Declan knocked louder. The Professor's head lifted. His smile was quick and open. He had sparkling brown eyes, a head shaved before it was able to go bald and a slightly hunched form.
"Declan, come in!" he said cheerfully.
"Professor." He crossed to the older Incubus and offered his hand. Concern flickered through Declan as the Professor stood. His grip was weaker this time than last, his shoulders a little more stooped. Worst of all, his Incubus magic was faint, a faded glimmer instead of a warm glow.
The Benefactors were forbidden by the Succubae they served from collecting sex energy. Without it, their immortality and youth trickled away. The Professor had turned from one of the most powerful Incubuses in existence to one of the weakest over the course of a hundred years. Even so, he shouldn't be weakening this quickly, unless something was wrong. It had only been three months since Declan last saw him.
"How are you?" Declan asked.
"Fit and full of vinegar, as always."
Declan resisted the urge to help the older man, who walked slowly to the plush armchairs before the hearth. The Professor sat and motioned a gnarled hand towards the one across from him. Declan sat, unable to shake the feeling that something was wrong with the Incubus.
"Your father said you'd come by today. You came to see the Sucubatti?" The Professor's gaze was nonetheless sharp despite his age.
"I did," Declan answered. "I'm taking up more of the official duties, the new face of the Incubatti Enforcers."
"Good. You will serve your people well."
For a moment, Declan forgot the Professor had chosen to live with the Succubae over the Incubuses. Something about the elderly man put him at ease, but he reminded himself that the Professor was only to be trusted so far.
"I intend to," he said with confidence. "Did my father mention why I'd be by?"
"Yes, a little. Some trouble involving an Incubus."
"Professor, an Incubus was killed last night. I wanted to ask you if you had any insight into what might be going on, if there's any sort of emerging threat to our society."
"Emerging threat? No, I wouldn't think so." The Professor appeared thoughtful. "I always thought the threat came from your direction."
Declan ignored the too accurate comment, waiting. The Professor's eyebrows quirked, and Declan sensed he, too, knew more than he was letting on. He couldn't help but feel irritated at his father once more. There was no telling what Ethan and the Professor talked about.
"The penalty for such a thing is death," the Professor murmured. "I'm afraid I can provide no insight, Declan."
Declan sat back. "Olivia granted us permission to host an inquiry. She'll be choosing the interviewees."
The Professor frowned.
"If there's something I should know ..." Declan trailed off.
"Not to my knowledge."
It was a lie, but Declan said nothing.
"I will say that there is no threat to the Incubuses. I think, if anything, it was an accident," the Professor said.
"Someone does not accidentally kill an Incubus. It would take a team to lure in even a weak Incubus with sex magic. It's not something your street nymphs normally do."
"Street nymphs!" The Professor's laugh was warm and rich. "Very fitting."
Declan allowed a small smile.
"Speaking of Halflings." The Professor's eyes sparkled. "It is time for your quarterly status update on your sweet soul-mate."
For the second time in an hour, Declan was uncomfortable. His eyes went instinctively in the direction where she was, towards the center of the campus.
"No changes," the Professor reported. "Zoey is wild, undisciplined, irreverent of any kind of authority and uncouth, to boot. She'll keep you from being sucked into a boring life of diplomacy and politics. She's perfect for you."
"That could be a problem," Declan said.
He trusted the Professor with Zoey, the woman who was supposed to be his soul-mate, but not with the secrets of his society. He rubbed his jaw. The thought of her caused nothing but turmoil. Part of him hoped she got herself killed fighting Cambions. The other part of him checked up on her regularly. What he learned made him even less willing to bring her into the Incubatti society like he was supposed to.
"It is not a choice, young man."
"I know, Professor, and I'm working on accepting that," he replied. "But a woman with no discipline doesn't belong at my side leading my society."
"Were you to meet her, you might think differently."
Declan kept further expression of his doubts to himself. The woman he marked as his years ago quite by accident while at a club had ensnared him in a way even Olivia hadn't. He knew what his duty to her was. He wasn't ready for her then and definitely not now, when his father's plan was about to up heave the world as they knew it.
The Professor was gazing at him expectantly.
"As long as Zoey is ... alive," Declan managed.
The Professor laughed again.
"I am grateful for your assistance."
"It is an honor to serve you and a delight to keep her from killing herself on these wild missions she goes on."
"Have I caused undue strain on you, Professor?" Declan frowned, concerned for the aging Professor. He ignored the flicker of concern for the woman whose face he didn't even remember. If he stopped avoiding her, he had to start the sacred, three-stage mating rite.
"I admit, I am not as strong as I used to be, and she grows stronger. But it is no strain, Declan. I truly view it as an honor."
Declan clenched his jaw, wishing he hadn't asked. The Professor was too much of a gentleman and too proud of an Incubus to admit directly he wasn't able to handle his ward. The weariness of his tone and his even weaker form made Declan feel an unfamiliar, unwelcome sensation: guilt.
"If you need anything from me with regards to her, call," he said at last.
"I will, Declan."
A few weeks before his father's plans were executed, he had to deal with this. Declan had hoped to postpone the inevitable until he was forced to deal with it, or his soul-mate died in battle. It wasn't exactly a noble sentiment for his father's successor. Yet he held hope that the Professor didn't need to call.
"Take care, Professor," he said and rose.
"You, too, Declan."
Declan rose, not at all satisfied with the interaction. While he enjoyed talking to the Professor, he didn't enjoy the reminder of who the ancient Incubus housed.
In the waiting car, Wes was on the phone when Declan dropped into the backseat. He motioned for the driver to take them home and waited for Wes. After a moment, Wes hung up.
"How's the Professor?" Wes asked.
"Cheerful as usual. No info from his end, except he doesn't think this was a hit."
"I find the timing odd. In a few weeks, everything goes to hell."
"I think the same," Declan said grimly. "Was that Dad on the phone?"
"Yeah. He's pleased with your arrangement. No word on what he wants. He said we'd figure it out."
"That's never a good sign."
"No," Wes agreed. "He wants to talk to you when we get back."
Declan nodded. They rode in silence back to the massive apartment building overlooking Rock Creek Park, a stretch of protected forest on the northeast side of Washington DC. The driver dropped them off in the private garage under the building, and Declan fixed his shirt and tie as he walked with Wes to the entrance to one of his father's multiple subterranean operation centers. This one acted as their temporary headquarters, until the new one was completed.
Wes parted ways with him at a hallway dividing the locker and gym area from the corridor housing the command and control elements of the Incubatti. Declan replaced his jacket, but left it unbuttoned as he went to his father's office. He knocked and entered. Ethan, one of the five Council-members charged with leading the Incubus society, sat with his feet propped up on the conference room table at one end of his large office. A man best described as rakish, Ethan appeared little older than his sons, kept young by a steady diet of pasta and sex.
"Howdy, son." His Texan twang was the opposite of Declan's Southern accent, reminding Declan of the violent era of the Wild West his father grew up in.
"Hey, Dad," Declan said and sat. "Wes told you about the meeting?"
"Yeah. You did good." Ethan's whiskey-colored eyes were sparkling. "Except the Heidi-thing. Get rid of her, Declan."
"I've been enjoying myself."