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"Yes, s, propping an ankle on the opposite knee "Bren and I bought this house several years ago from a vampire named Scovill An older vamp What would you say, Bren, two, three hundred years?"
"Oh, much older than that," Brendan said "And not too pleased with how Victor ran things, either He bought a house way back in the Blue Ridge mountains, I think" He shuddered discreetly "Very unpleasant va Foot has finally co the downstairs, but now took up a position behind Duncan and said, "Victor had this place marked as a blood house Why?"
"Oh, that," Erik said disether every weekend,Duncan "Private affairs, very discreet There is a blood house in this area, however On the other side of Leesburg Victor probably did own that one And there’s a second property,house, lots of property I inaled to Miguel "I want to verify the addresses we have"
Erik pulled out his PDA and began conferring with Miguel But Brendan gave Duncan a somber look "What you really want to know about are Victor’s parties, I i for a response When Duncan simply looked at him, he hurried on "That’s what the estate was for He used to coressmen, even the occasional cabinet member, and a whole bunch of lobbyists That was the real purpose of the parties The lobbyists got unfettered access to policyton press, and Victor got paid very, very well for et out of it?" Duncan asked quietly
Brendan looked away in obvious discoain, clearly reluctant to continue
Erik uel, then nodded and dropped his PDA onto the side table "Go ahead, Bren," he sighed "You’ve gone this far, so you ht as well tell the whole sordid story"
"The policys," Brendan said evasively "Soot kickbacks in the forhtened his lips in distaste "Sex, I think"
Duncan frowned Sex? That was the big secret? Men in power being offered sex in exchange for favors? That was so cothe neatly pressed Brendan didn’t want to talk about
"Not just sex," Erik explained, with a sympathetic look in Brendan’s direction "Victor seduced wo wos that I’m quite certain ot them to do men they probably wouldn’t have done either I knoer’s an aphrodisiac and all that, but even that can only carry so far withpaid for these parties?"
"Youhim directly?" Erik clarified "Yes, I think so More than one of them joked about it Victor insisted soh we refused to whore for him We were all professionals of one sort or another, and Victor thought his clients would respect him more if they saw the kind of vampires he controlled, if they saerful he was"
"As if," Brendan ht so, anyway," he continued "And then there were the other parties, the special ones"
Duncan felt Miguel’s attention sharpen behind hiuests liked to talk One of the things they loved to talk about was the special parties That’s what they always called them, ‘the special’ Like, they’d point out a particular woman and say, ‘Hope that one’s at the next special’ Victor didn’t have that kind of party often, maybe a couple times a year, but they were hard-core If you can believe what the ed about--and I do--the women were flat out raped, and by more than one man Some of them were even hurt pretty badly The hed when he talked about how Victor would heal the woht It made me sick, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Victor or his henchmen have a website where you can download a video of his ‘specials’ for a price"
Miguel leaned forward "Surely the men involved wouldn’t want their identities revealed"
"So they filets a shot of a senator’s pasty white ass while he whips soirl"
"Did you report this?" Duncan asked
"To whohts, he was the one to e’d have reported such an abuse And every vampire lord in the country would be after our heads if ent to the huh to testify"