The chess piece had been moved.
Cordelia noticed it the moment she walked into the kitchen. She'd left the white knight facing the window, the way she always did, the carved L turned toward the door. Now it faced the other way. The L toward the window. Toward where she'd been standing when she burned the copies last night.
She stood in the doorway with her keys still in her hand. The coffee maker was hissing on the counter. The legal pad was where she'd left it. Nothing else had been touched.
Cordelia didn't call him nor she didn't pick up the piece instead she made her made coffee, blacker than the panic that was building up in her heart and sat at the table and looked at the knight for a long time while the morning light moved across the floor.
He'd been inside. While she slept. He'd been in her apartment and he'd turned a chess piece two inches to the left and left without waking her. Cordela wondered if he was trying to pass a message,
I can reach you anywhere. I could have done anything. My restraint is the only gift I have. Don't mistake it for safety.
Cordelia couldn't even drink her coffee. She asked herself when she had started feeling safe around a man who had confessed to four murders and looked at her throat like he was deciding where to bite. Cordelia stood up to pace around her house trying to seem natural just in case they were watching. She tried feeling for her traps and locks but discovered they had all been dismantled, the stake she had hidden was broken into half. She hadn't evn heard or felt anything! And Cordelia would be lyiing to herself if she said she wasn't terrified.
With shaky breaths, Cordelia collapsed on her couch. Could their conversation where Cordelia warned him against bonding her against her consent set him off? Or the fact that Cordelia was taking extra preparations to protect herself? Cordelia could not understand this mad man she had let into her life, she buried her face into her hands. He had no right. She did not give a damn if he was projecting his feelings of his dead wife on her.
Unfortunately for Cordelia she had no time to get herself together as Philippe called at ten.
His voice on the phone was the same as it had always been. Warm. Familiar. The voice of a man who'd made her laugh in a courtyard under string lights while he refilled her glass without asking.
"I've been thinking about your case," he said. "The Veillard thread you mentioned. I found something in the city archives that might connect it to a property in the Marigny. It's not much, but it's a lead."
She stood at the kitchen counter with the phone pressed to her ear. Her no Louis's chess piece was in her peripheral vision. The legal pad with Philllipe's circled name was right beside it.
"What kind of lead," she said trying to sound natural and friendly.
"Documents and financial records." He paused to think. "Can you come by the B&B tomorrow? Afternoon, maybe. I'll have everything laid out for you."
Cordelia took a while to reply. Outside her window, a streetcar passed, its bell distant and ordinary. Was she really doing this for him?
"Tomorrow," she said. "Two o'clock."
"Perfect. I'll make tea." Phillipe said happily while Cordelia hung up. She can't believe she was going to walk into the home of a vampire who had been cultivating her for weeks, who knew what she was to Louis, who had been using her as a lever without her knowledge. She was going to sit at his table and drink his tea and pretend she didn't know what he was.
She was choosing to be bait. Voluntarily. Cordelia was willing to be bait for man with unresolved trauma and terrible boundaries keeping skills. Her mind went to Delacroix's warning as she picked up Louis's chess piece The maker's bond is not a romance, Detective. It is a chain. Cordelia had burnt evidence for this man, the smoke curling into the warm New Orleans night
I am no longer a detective. I don't know what I am.
Cordelia threw the chess piece against the wall, it came down with a plunkkk. Cordelia let out a wail falling to her knees, furious with herself because she knew deep down that she was staying. After a while she crawled to where the knight fell and picked up her chess piece. Called the precinct and asked for Marcus.
Cordelia met him at a diner in Mid-City. She'd chosen it deliberately—not the precinct, not her apartment, not anywhere Philippe's eyes might have reached. Marcus arrived in a rumpled shirt with a file folder under his arm and the expression of a man who had stopped sleeping well around the time his partner started keeping secrets. She slid into the booth across from him. He looked at her. She looked back.
"You look like hell," he said.
"You look worse."
He almost smiled. It didn't reach his eyes. "Tureaud pulled me into his office this morning. Wanted to know where you've been and wanted to know why your case notes are thin and your hours are unaccounted for." He leaned forward. "I covered for you. Told him you were following a lead I couldn't discuss yet and said you'd have something by the end of the week."
"Why." Cordelia asked.
"Because you're my partner." His voice was flat. "Even if you haven't been acting like it."
She looked at him across the scarred Formica table. Cordelia saw the tiredness around his eyes but she could not brush off his connection to Veillard Holdings and the assessor's office and his alledge access to Philippe's financial network. She still didn't know if he was complicit or being used. Cordelia didn't know which answer would be worse.
"Marcus," she began. "The assessor's office. The property crime liaison. You handle that directly."
"Yeah. So?"
"Veillard Holdings. The shell company that's been buying up properties in the Marigny. The money routes through a holding account that connects to your office." Cordelia looked him dead in the eye.
Marcus froze then chuckled awkwardly, "What are you saying."
"I'm saying someone in your department has been feeding information to the people who are moving against Louis Saint-Clair. Someone with access to property records and financial channels. Someone who knows how to make transactions disappear." She held his gaze. "I'm asking if that someone is you."
The silence that followed was long enough to hold a confession. Marcus didn't look away. His hands were flat on the table. His jaw was tight.
"No," he said. "It's not me." A pause. "But I think I know who it is."
Marcus said his name was Paul Dessommes. Mid-level clerk in the assessor's office. Marcus had flagged him six months ago for irregularities in property transfer documentation—nothing that rose to the level of prosecution, just small anomalies. Dessommes had been disciplined. The file had been closed. Marcus had moved on.
"But he's still there," Marcus said. "He still has access and is still logged into the system every day."
"And you didn't think to mention this." Cordelia said angrily.
"I didn't have a reason to connect it to your case until thirty seconds ago." He leaned back. "What is this, Vireaux. What are you into." Marcus voice got lower at the end.
Cordelia refused to look at him. "I can't tell you everything," she said, voice quiet. "Not yet. But I need you to do two things for me."
"Name them." Marcus replied eagerly.
"First. Pull everything you can on Dessommes. Every file he's touched, every transaction he's processed, every property he's flagged. I need to know who he's been feeding information to and how long it's been going on."
"And the second thing."
She pulled a folded piece of paper from her pocket then slid it across the table. "If I don't call you by six o'clock tomorrow evening, open this. Follow the instructions. Don't come looking for me yourself."
He looked at the paper. Didn't touch it. "Where are you going."
"To meet someone who's been lying to me since the day we met."
"Vireaux—"
"Six o'clock, Marcus. Don't open it before then."
He looked at her for a long moment. Then he picked up the paper and tucked it into his jacket pocket. "You're the worst partner I've ever had."
"I know."
He stood. Gathered his file folder but stopped at the edge of the booth. "Don't get killed," he said. "I'm not breaking in a new partner."
He left. Cordelia sat in the diner for a long time after, watching the afternoon light move across the empty parking lot.
She finally went to 14 Rue Dauphine at dusk.
Louis was in the study. He looked up when she came in and something moved through his face—relief, pleasure. He hadn't been sure she'd come back and was trying not to show how much it mattered to him. Cordelia not willing to call him out for the sake of maintaining the comaderie they had between them nor did she want a reason to let her head finally get a one up at her heart so she went straight to the matter.
"Philippe called," she said. "He wants to meet tomorrow. His B&B."
The temperature in the room dropped.
"You're going," he said, anger peeking through. Cordelia's hand shook but her voice remained steady,
"Yes."
"Alone."
"Yes."
He stood. He crossed the room and didn't stop at a careful distance. He stopped close enough that she had to look up to meet his eyes.
"If he touches you," Louis said, "I will kill him and I will make it last, and the accord can burn." he spat, red eyes flaring up. And was Cordelia wrong for finding this moment attractive?
"I know," she said, secretly pleased. "That's why I'm telling you where I'll be."
"Don't." His voice was low. Not controlled—barely controlled, the predator straining against the leash. "Don't treat this like a chess move. You are walking into the home of something that has been alive for longer than this country and knows exactly what you are to me and wants to use you to break me open. This is not strategy."
"I know what I'm doing" Cordelia deflected but internally Louis's protectiveness roused feelings and her cheeks warmed.
"Do you." He was closer now. She could feel the cold radiating from his skin. "Do you understand that if he bites you—if he feeds from you, even once—there will be a bond. You would feel him. Forever. And I would feel you feeling him, and I would burn this city to the ground to make it stop." his hand wanted to reach out to grab her, he hesistated but his hand cupped her cheek softly. Eyes softening when Cordelia leaned into it gazing up at him.
"I know," she said. Cordelia found warmth in his hand despite the coldness. "I sat in Delacroix's living room and listened to her explain it. I know exactly what I'm risking."
"And you're still going." he hissed.
"I'm still going." Cordelia smiled up at him. She knew what she was doing. All thoughts of Louis's dangerousness had flown out of the window.
The thing he kept caged behind centuries of discipline moved through Louis's face.
"You are the most infuriating woman I have ever known." he said softly bringing up his other hand to touch her cheek so both will be cupped by him.
"Good," she quipped. "Keeps you interested."
Louis groaned and leaned his forehead against hers, if he wasn't careful, the blood needed for his brain to function will begin rushing south. His hunger, for Cordelia was barely held at bay. He wanted to protect, he wanted to ruin, he wanted her so mcuh.
"You broke into my apartment" she smiled sharpened and suddenly Louis had a stake pressed up against him. "Last night. While I was sleeping."
Louis just grinned and in a blink of the eye, he had Cordelia pressed up against the wall, hands around her neck, the pressure gentle but firm. Cordelia not one to take things lightly kept the stake pressed upagainst his chest, her eyes dark but her pupils were blown wide.
"If you ever come into my apartment without my knowledge again, I will end this. Whatever this is between US. Do you understand." she drawled out her words but made no move to escape her predicament.
Louis ignored everything else she had said and focused on, "You said us ."
"Don't change the subject." Cordelia gowled.
"I heard you." Hearing was different from following and he was sure Cordelia knew he would not listen. "You said us ." he murmured to her neck as he brought his chest closer to the stake in her arms, It tore through his shirt and touched his skin. They looked at each other.
Cordelia hadn't meant to. The word had slipped out. Liar
"Promise me," Cordelia continued.
"I promise." He said it without hesitation. "No more locked doors just keep the doors unlocked and I'll come in the right way " he smirked. Cordelia rolled her eyes,
"And tomorrow. When I go to Philippe's."
"I'll be close." His voice was quiet. Certain. "He won't see me. Neither will you. But if he touches you—if he so much as breathes on you in a way I don't like—I will end him. I don't care. about the consequences Do you understand." Slowly he took Cordelia's hand that held the stake anad kissed it gently while looking directly into her eyes.
Cordelia flushed and turned her face quickly, "I understand."
They stood in the study. Neither of them made an effort to move away and Cordelia enjoyed Louis's peppered kisses against her neck and Cordelia was afraid she will pop her head with how much blood warmed her cheeks but suddenly froze when she felt fangs . She lurched away without hesistation despite her mind whispering stay.
"Tomorrow," she said moving away from Louis, feet finding the door. "Two o'clock."
"I'll be there." Louis made no move to stop Cordelia's exit. He knew he had pushed her too far.
At the door, she stopped and said without turning. " Was that the first time you'd been in my apartment at night." Cordelia already knew the answer but she enjoyed Louis's silence that descended.
"No," he cleared his throat. "It wasn't."
Cordelia simply hummed and if Louis visited once again and he found himself dodging a swinging platform with stakes attached that was his business..