Lupi 08 - Death Magic

but she’d sure as hell done her best to mislead the U.S. Senate. That made her stomach hurt. But why had the subject of Saturday night even come up? Lily knew the rules. You couldn’t tell a witness what to say, but you could talk about what kind of questions to expect. Croft had done that with her. Not Ruben.
    Had that whole were-you-coached bit just been a way for Bixton to bring up Saturday night? How had Bixton known that she and Rule had stayed for an extra hour and fifty-seven minutes? Had his chief of staff hung around after the party, watching to see when they left? Why would he do that?
    Was it possible that Senator Bixton was one of hers ?
     
     
    TUESDAY she and Rule flew to New York State. Wednesday they returned. Thursday morning at seven ten she was in the kitchen, frowning at the muffin crumbs on her plate. “There has to be a way.”
    “A way to what?” Rule entered the kitchen, sipping from a mug. He was dressed and ready for the day in black slacks, black shirt unbuttoned at the neck, and a black jacket.
    Lily put a hand on her stomach. “To make this thing go where it’s supposed to.” She eyed him. Those were “going out” clothes, plus she’d seen the wrapper from a frozen breakfast burrito. For Rule, a frozen burrito was not a meal. It was a snack to tide him over until he had real food. “Breakfast meeting?”
    “Mmm-hmm. Followed by one that may extend into lunch, but I’ll be free after that. You?”
    “First an exciting round of paper shuffling at Headquarters, then a session with Mika.” The committee hadn’t released her. She and Rule were still stuck in Washington. “Who’re you eating with?”
    “The early meeting’s with a venture capitalist and a Leidolf entrepreneur who needs capital to expand. Leidolf can’t back him, but he’s got a good business, a good plan for expansion. I’m introducing him to someone who might be interested.”
    “Nokolai isn’t?” Rule’s birth-clan was richer than Leidolf. A lot richer.
    “Nokolai is not investing at the moment. Isen wants us to have greater fluidity.”
    “He wants more cash on hand.”
    “Quite a bit more. We’ll be liquidating some assets. Financially it’s not the best time for that, but tactically it’s necessary.”
    War was expensive. “And your other meeting? Something secret you can’t tell me about?”
    He met her eyes steadily. “Not today.”
    Rule hadn’t brought up the Shadow Unit once since Saturday night. Not in words, not with a strained silence or other indirection. That whole meeting with Ruben was beginning to take on the aspect of a dream. How could it have been real, yet Rule was busy arranging financing for a clansman as if the future held room for a business expansion?
    Her lips thinned. She’d forfeited certain rights, hadn’t she? When she refused to join the Shadow Unit, she’d given up the right to ask about it. “Who are you having lunch with, then?”
    “Dennis Parrott wants to discuss the Species Citizenship Bill in more depth.”
    “Wants ammo for his boss, you mean. Or hopes to find out more about your strategy.”
    “I’m singularly lacking in strategy on that front at the moment, so there’s a good chance I’ll learn more than he will. My official slot with him is eleven, but I intend to invite him to lunch. Lily.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “I didn’t realize you were expecting to be able to force the mantle to go where you willed.”
    “I didn’t exactly expect that, but . . .” She huffed a quick, impatient breath. “Eighty-nine Wythe lupi and the mantle never stirred, never gave a hint it wanted to go to one of them. But it has to. If your Lady won’t or can’t take the opportunity we gave her, it must be up to me. How do Rhos make a mantle do what they want?”
    “Rather the way you make your fingers flex or grasp or release.”
    She drummed those fingers on the table. “A baby doesn’t arrive knowing how to use its hands. Maybe I need to—to practice or something.” But she didn’t really possess the mantle. It hung inside her, impervious to her thoughts and will. She didn’t feel it the way Rule felt the mantles he carried. Lily tilted her head to look up at him. “You could do it, right? If you wanted to, you could put the Leidolf mantle in someone from Leidolf.”
    “If he carried the founder’s blood, yes. Apparently that’s the problem with Wythe. Their founder’s bloodline has grown thin.”
    “But it has to go to one