by Red, Lynn
Jamie pushed the button on her intercom. Why am I about to defend this guy? Why am I, Jamie Ampton, notoriously cold, calculating and budget conscious Jamie Ampton, about to defend someone who is stealing shit?
"What?" Erik snapped.
She'd forgotten she had the button down. "Oh, sorry, anyway, the reason he's stealing things is because you aren't doing anything. We both know you're not going to try and blow a bunch of the town's taxes on old people you didn't know existed."
Erik grunted. "Yeah, did you know they existed, wise, er, bat?"
At that point, she had to bite her tongue. "Yeah, okay, got me there."
He chuffed smugly. "Well then what is it you want me to do? How am I supposed to feed a bunch of people I didn't know existed? How about we get some magic tunas and use those magic fish and some magic, uh, pancakes or something to..."
"You have no idea what you're talking about, do you?" Jamie quirked a smile. "You never change."
"That's true, on both counts, but I'm lovable as all hell, huh? Anyway, get down here, both of you. Pee Wee," Erik started talking to Norman. "I want you to bring me a bagel with cream cheese, cheddar cheese, a hamburger patty, a sausage patty and three eggs. And Jamie?"
"A bucket in which to vomit after you eat that?" she asked, shaking her head.
"No, just bring yourself. You're the smart one. Pee Wee can handle the bucket. Wait, what bucket? I don't need any—"
She let go of the button and hit the power on the intercom in one smooth motion. With one step, she was halfway to the door. With a second one, she'd turned around, grabbed the pile of papers on her desk that she'd been poring over, and headed back out.
I knew they were there, but I had no idea how many there were. No idea how desperate things had gotten. Well, let’s just say that even vampires have hearts from time to time.
When she hit the bottom of the stairs that led from her attic office to the main floor with all the others - her hearing was so sensitive she had to get away from the noise, or she could hear everything - the whole place was buzzing with activity. Strange, for just after nine in the morning on a Thursday.
At least in Jamesburg.
She turned to dodge two people rushing through the halls and then narrowly avoided a third. Erik's head came poking out of his office, and he beckoned, arching his eyebrows the same way a normal human - or even a normal shifter, Erik was definitely neither - would stick out a 'come here' finger.
"What's with all the suits?" she asked, gliding inside his office and closing the door behind her.
Erik was fuming. "I have no idea! No clue, not a single one in the world. These crazy dipshits showed up at eight-thirty and started asking questions!"
"Eight-thirty, huh?" Jamie grinned. "That's really rude of them. It's almost like they expect this place to run like a normal courthouse."
A knock at the door made Erik cringe. "I wish Izzy were here. She always handles these sorts of people better than I do."
"You mean people-people? As opposed to growly ones that spend a lot of time scratching themselves in public?"
He sighed. "Yeah, something like—"
"Sorry to interrupt." A suit with a tall man inside who wore his hair in a plastered-back sweep stepped through. "But I can't find anything you said I'd find in these records, and knocking wasn’t doing any good."
Jamie was gawking, and the man apparently picked up on it. "Oh, good to meet you," he extended a hand. "Agent Craig Branson, Tennessee Valley Authority." His eyes went to rest on her shoulders. “Are you okay?” he asked when her wings twitched under her jacket.
“Yeah, scoliosis from when I was a kid. I’ve got bad shoulder blade muscles,” Jamie said as she pursed her lips. "Isn't the TVA like fifty years dead?"
"Something like that," the man responded cryptically. "We took over."
Nodding slowly, Jamie shook his hand. "Erik? What are they doing?"
He shook his head as Agent Branson turned his attention to the completely empty desk behind which Erik spent most of his time. Slowly, Erik reached down, and pulled a bottle of Jameson's out of the desk.
"Rough job, mayor? Sorry, Alpha. Is that right? The notes are mussed up and no one quite knows what to make of either you, or this town."
Erik was starting to get irritated. Jamie could see it in the way his eyes were starting to get a little more yellow than they normally were. Wolves were always such damn giveaways.
"Hey, uh, Agent Brosnan?"
"Branson."
"Right, yeah," Jamie said. "Maybe we can hold off a minute? I'm the jack of all trades in this place. If you give me a minute to talk to my boss, I'm sure we can straighten out whatever needs straightening."
"I'm not so sure," Branson said in a business-like way that made him seem colder than even Jamie. "These books are a mess."
"Well, give me a chance. There's a waiting room down at the end of the hall. Why don’t you and the other Agent Mulders - and yes, that's a joke - go down there and wait. I'll come get you when I know what the hell's going on."
Branson didn't like it - not one bit, but he did as she asked, probably more out of a desire to get done with whatever he needed to, than any sort of deference at all.
"I don't even know how to make sense of all this shit," Erik said, as Norman finally wandered in with the bagel and the bucket, having missed all the fun. "Wait, why did you bring a bucket, Pee Wee?"
"Er, well you asked me to, remember?"
"The hell would I want a bucket for?"
Norman started getting legitimately flustered, and, as he usually did when that happened, he turned red, and little beads of sweat popped up on his upper lip.
"Be nice to him, Erik," Izzy said, pushing past Jamie and Norman, and into the office. "He's your cousin. Stop being a dick."
Jamie laughed, silently, scrunching her nose to make sure she didn't do a goose impersonation. "Why did you want a bucket, Erik?" she asked, not able to keep herself quiet. It was Erik's turn to get flustered, but when he got mad, he hit things, or threw things, so Jamie quickly calmed him down by shaking her papers.
"My paper shaking brings all the wolves to the yard," she said, feeling very proud of herself for making a semi-relevant pop culture reference, though judging from the blank looks on everyone except Izzy's face, neither of the males in the room kept up with top forty radio. Or good music.
"You're priceless," Izzy said, displaying the first smile Jamie had seen cross that face since she started her second trimester. Or maybe it was halfway through the first. Who’s counting? "But let’s get down to it. The TVA is auditing the town ledgers. To answer a bunch of questions before they get asked, no I don't know why, no I don't know why the TVA is doing it and not the IRS, and no I don't know why Agent Branson looks so much like Kyle McLachlan in Twin Peaks."
Once again, the two girls chuckled while both of the clueless werewolves exchanged a look of commiserated confusion.
"You two probably spent most of your spare time watching pro wrestling, huh? That's why you get along with Ash so well." Jamie cocked a languid eyebrow and then closed her eyes, imagining a houseful of bears and wolves hooting and screaming at WrestleMania.
"So?" Erik asked defensively. "What's wrong with that?"
"Well, it's fake for one," Jamie said.
"Ugh, son of a bitch, here we go. You should quit while you're ahead." Izzy rolled her eyes and muttered, but from the sound of things, she'd been down this road at least once before.
"Uh well, I'll have you know," Erik said, putting his hand on his hip. "Everyone knows it's fake. It's no different than watching a long choreographed fight scene, or a dance, or a ballet, with a storyline behind it, and a lot of body slams and aerial leaps!"
"Yeah!" Norman said, getting visibly excited. "And oh my God, it was so awesome when Andre the Giant would come out and everyone got all nervous. And then there was that guy with the snake, and the—"
"What about the guy with the stringy, greasy mullet?" Jamie asked. "And
boobs bigger than hers?" she pointed toward Izzy, who was well endowed at the least of times, but now, six months out from a wolf birth, was pretty damn impressive.
Erik and Norman exchanged a glance and both started shaking their heads. "Yeah? Which one?" Erik asked.
"The fact that you had to ask speaks more volumes than you can imagine," Jamie said with a wry grin. "Dusty Rhoads, for the record."
"Holy shit could he work a mic! American Dream, baby!" Erik began reciting the lyrics to the wrestler's entrance music, and before long Norman started in. And then, to the absolute amazement of everyone, when they stopped singing an a cappella rendition of the song, Jamie was still humming the tune.
They all turned to her, two faces beaming and a third ripe with disgust.
"I, uh, anyway," she said, a slight flush coloring her white cheeks underneath the face framing tendrils of hair that fell from her bun. "About those files, right? Hey, how about those files, Izzy?"
"I'm going to choose to play both the high road and the efficacious one here, and pretend I didn't just hear that or see that, or anything else."
Jamie nodded solemnly. "You're a good friend. I'd never live it down. I'd definitely lose my "too cool for school" card if everyone found out I know the tune to about fifty wrestler's entrance music."
Izzy shook her head as she opened one of the files she'd brought along. "Right, anyway, moving along. The problem with what's happening is that for whatever reason, the TVA wants to go through Jamesburg's books."
"There's a library down the road," Erik said, with a grin so smug it could have filled an empty milk jug labeled 'smugness goes here' and then crossed his arms over his chest. Norman went for a high five, but Erik shook his head almost imperceptibly before brushing his shaggy dark-blond hair back away from his face.
"There's a library down the road that hasn't had a budget in two years," Izzy fired back. "They don't even have the latest Nora Roberts books, much less the city's tax ledger, but good try, frat boy."
"Damn," Jamie said, mouth open. She extended her hand for a high five, which Izzy slapped, completely ignoring the two men who couldn't believe what they were watching. "I've heard burns before, but that one would have made Mark Twain proud." Then, turning to Erik, she said, "That's a literary joke. He was funny, Mark Twain. Did a lot of burns."
Erik narrowed his eyes. "I know, I read Frankenstein. I know exactly who he is."
Izzy exhaled heavily. "He's faking dumb. At least I hope he is," she said. "But we need to get down to business. These guys, Branson in particular, aren't looking for anything that will be easy to find. I'm not sure exactly what it is they are looking for, but—"
The door to Erik's office swung open, creaking as it did. "I'm looking for proof - anything, any sort of proof - that shows this town is allowed to exist."
Damn, he does look like Kyle McLachlan, Jamie thought. "Do you have a recorder you talk to? Does it have a girl's name?" She closed her eyes tight as soon as she spoke, irritated at herself for having actually spoken instead of just thought.
"No," he said plainly. "But if I did, her name would be Diane. Now, can we move on from the outdated television references?"
A hushed silence descended over the room, everyone looking back and forth, searching for something to say.
"Good," he said. "Now, what do you have there? Ledgers?"
Izzy handed the ancient looking tomes over. "Just budget ledgers. Going back to the 70s. I don't know how much use they'll be, but—"
"I'll decide that," Branson said, taking the leather bound books with a grin so smug it could rival Erik's. "Although I'm afraid I might catch some kind of spore-borne plague if I open this."
At that, Jamie blew a puff of air across the cover. The resultant dust cloud blew straight into the grim-looking Agent Branson’s face. He just smiled, seeming not to react at all, and said a quiet thank you. "And now, I'm going to need a place to stay," he said. "I'm going to be here a while, I think. If all your records are this annoying, it's going to take at least a year."
"Don't say things you don't mean," Izzy said.
For some reason, Jamie didn't feel as prickly about the new guy in town as everyone else. It might've been that he was able to successfully joust with her verbally, or it might've been that he really didn't seem that threatening, or being realistic, it could very well have been that Jamie's dry spell was bordering on legendary, and she hadn't seen Ryan since she dropped him... well, yeah, dropped him.
"Shit!" she said, out of nowhere, remembering that her erstwhile bear not-boyfriend had apparently left West and Elena's care the night before. "I forgot something. Are we done here? Or do you all need something else?"
She promised not to let him go without checking on him, because - yeah - she'd never actually bit a bear before. She didn't know what kind of effect either the bite, or the antiseptic saliva would have. Sometimes it didn't do anything at all, but like with the cows, it may act as a pretty high-schedule narcotic.
Branson was staring at her, brow furrowed. "I had some questions, but—"
But, she was already out the door. "I'll call you later, see if you need anything, all right Erik?"
He didn't have time to answer either.
"I guess it can wait," the dark suited man with the slicked back hair and the very reasonable tie-tack said. "Is she always like that?"
Erik chuffed a laugh, but said nothing. Izzy, on the other hand, wasn't anywhere as irritated by, or threatened by the presence of, authority. "No," she said. "In fact, I've never seen her act like that. She's normally so calm and collected and cool headed. Usually by the time she gets upset, something's already gotten so bad it takes a miracle - or a little hoodoo to fix."
Erik shot a glare in her direction. "Er," she corrected. "I meant that figuratively."
The look on Agent Branson's face was at once confused, and at the same time, not at all. Which was a little concerning to those in the room paying attention. Which, for once, was Erik and Norman. Erik took silent notice, and watched with a raised eyebrow as Branson collected his things, thanked everyone for their help in a tone that dripped just a little bit of sarcasm, and took his leave.
"Well," Erik said with a smile that was somehow dashing, "that got out of hand quickly. Didn't it?"
Izzy looked from Norman to her mate and then back again. "Give me that bucket," she said. "And yes, it did."
-6-
“Ain’t a thing in the world I can do about how I feel except pretend that I don’t feel it. That always turns out great.”
-Ryan
I can't believe I was out for three days. What the hell did she drug me with? I know they said it was just... whatever, vampire magic serum or whatever, but three days?
Ryan paced back and forth down the long, thick rug running along the hall outside of his study.
And how did I let her get the jump on me? I must be slipping. I can't let that happen again. I can't let my guard down, not even if I'm in—
He cut off his own thoughts with a loud snap of his fingers. Ryan Drake didn't fall for people. He brought them to their knees. He called the shots, not the other way around. Ryan shook his head and frowned deeply, pressing his fingertips into his temples.
Need to think. Need to think.
But when he did, all he could think about was her. Those slate gray eyes, that long, flowing hair so black it looked blue in the moonlight. He still felt the way her lips tingled on his neck, still felt the trill of excitement as she sunk in her teeth, and still hummed with anticipation that he'd never forget.
The way her legs locked around his waist, and how she'd held him so helplessly, as though he were nothing at all, nothing but a child, playing at being a man. He wandered into the study and collapsed into one of the thick, heavily-padded chairs. Ryan let out a soft, ironic laugh, and slid two fingers through the handle of his twenty-ounce coffee mug. He turned the hefty vessel around in his hands, letting the steaming Earl Grey warm his palms as he read the words Let Me Sew
, Let Me Sew, Let Me Sew. Snowflakes and a Santa Claus on a sled rounded out the mug's decorations.
A corner of his mouth curled into a smile. This mug, like so much else around him, was a fading memory of a long-gone life.
His study was sparsely decorated. A couple of pictures of his aunt and uncle, a handful of knick-knacks, and some Jungian self-help books were about all there was to see, aside from the massive mahogany desk that stood in the center of the room, standing sentinel over absolutely nothing of any importance.
Opening the desk, Ryan slid free a leather ledger book, bound with a string around something that looked like a family crest. In reality, it was just a decorated circle of leather, but the idea of a family crest had always entertained him in a bleak, hopeless, darkly humorous way.
He unwound the cord and in one smooth motion, slid on a pair of absurd reading glasses that were obviously intended for a school librarian - they were covered in images of apples, books, and for some reason, tape measures. He'd never figured that one out. Balanced on the end of his nose though, they gave him the perfect vision he needed to read his tiny handwriting.
The muscles running down the side of his neck where Jamie had bit ached slightly. Each time he moved that arm, he felt a twinge, and then of course, he was back inside his own head, remembering the way she felt against him, the urgent heat of her body, the way she'd sucked, and how it made his head feel like it was floating.
More of the memories were coming back as time went on. He remembered her pushing the hair out of his face after he'd fallen and her talking to him gently, slowly, like a doctor helping a scared kid go into surgery. Jamie had cradled him for a time, but then his memory just went black. He assumed whatever it was that knocked him out took hold, because nothing he could do brought back any more.
Touching the mug to his lips, he sipped gently at the tea, then took a longer, deeper swallow. The warmth spreading through his belly relaxed the tension, but did nothing to banish the thoughts of her.
