30
I poured more beer into my bowl of ice cream, beaming as the ale frothed.
“See how it does that?” I whispered to the ten Indebted I’d insisted come inside the room instead of lurking outside. They couldn’t stand out there for the entire thrall.
The women exchanged looks.
“Hold out your bowls,” I instructed.
The small bench beneath the mirror was piled with at least five flavours of ice cream. And beer.
The vampires hesitated a second too long.
“Out,” I snapped.
What was wrong with them?
Laurel had the sense to hold her bowl out. The rest followed her lead.
I weaved down the line, belching as I tipped my favourite beer, Wren, into their bowls. “See? It’s a beer float. An adult version of a Coke float. We just swap Coke for beer. The ice cream is still the same.”
The leather-clad row of women tested the mix.
I finished mine in the time it took them to take a nibble. “Well?”
Their expressions smoothed.
Laurel was alone in grimacing.
“You don’t like it?” I asked her sweetly.
She lifted a shoulder. “No.”
“None for you then.” Storming to her, I snatched the bowl away and shovelled the rest in my mouth.
Laurel grinned, and I pointed a finger directly at her face.
“I like you,” I declared, grinning too.
Tossing aside the bowl, I pulled her into a tight hug and stroked her back. “I’m so sorry you live in a prison cell.” I blinked at the rest of the women. “All of you. It breaks my heart.”
Laurel returned the hug. “Thank you, Miss Tetley.”
My gaze riveted on the smallest of the gathered women.
“Excuse me. Am I boring you?” I hissed.
The vampire leaped, shoving her phone in her pocket. Too late.
I bore down on the hazel-eyed beauty.
“Hand it over, young lady.” I extended my palm.
The woman peered at me. “I’m sixty.”
Channelling my grandmother, I set the full force of the Le Spyre glare on her. Sighing, she reached into her leather jacket pocket and slapped the phone on my palm.
I stared at the open app.
“Pinterest,” I murmured in surprise.
Interesting.
Retreating to my massive bed, I crawled into the middle and lay on my back, scrolling through the app.
“Stomach hurts,” I informed Laurel.
“It’s because you ate a litre of ice cream in an hour.”
Someone was jealous of how much I could put away.
I scanned the various blogs on Pinterest. “Wow, this has so much stuff on it. I’ve never been on before.”
“I like the travel entries,” the owner of the phone offered.
Odds were that she’d never get to see anything outside than Bluff City. The Indebted lived in comparative squalor to their brethren—no wonder she longed for escape.
My eyes landed on a blog titled 35 Home Craft Projects.
Hmm.
Clicking on the picture, I flicked through the web page. “Shit, you can do a fuckload with crates. Who knew?”
I thought back to how devoid of life Laurel’s room had been. No pictures, no warmth—except for the threadbare blanket.
“You guys just need a little happiness,” I choked out. Scrolling through the remaining projects, my gaze alighted on the very last one.
Perfect.
“I need to go out and get supplies.”
I had a shiny new bank card and over thirteen thousand dollars.
The vampire pursed her lips. “You’re not cleared to leave the tower during the thrall. I can send someone out for them. What do you need?”
I was going to infuse their prison cells with warmth, that’s what. The Indebted wouldn’t know themselves when I was done. “How many Indebted in this tower?”
“One hundred and twenty.”
Phew, I’d be busy. Lucky I had two and a half days before Kyros’s boner went away.
Smiling, I rattled off my list of items.
I hiccupped the words to “Catch a Shooting Star”, near tears as I flung the new bedspread out over the mattress in the last room.
While waiting for the craft supplies, I’d decided each Indebted needed a new duvet. I called Angelica and snatched the master key from her before pillaging tower rooms at random to borrow blankets. Some of the rooms I’d thieved from appeared lived in, but that didn’t matter. They had money, the Indebted didn’t.
I hiccupped through the rest of the lullaby and tucked the edges of the blanket in around Fernando who’d I’d caught napping when I barged in.
His eyes were wide and fixed over my shoulder.
Glancing back, I studied Laurel’s wide grin before returning to my tucking ministrations so the blankets were right up to his chin.
I knew blankets would make them happy.
Fernando’s wide eyes shifted to me.
“There you are. Sleep tight,” I told the man, blowing him a kiss.
He didn’t respond, probably overwhelmed with receiving the meagre scrap of kindness.
My lower lip trembled at the thought.
“I didn’t miss anyone, did I?” I turned to Laurel.
Pinterest woman answered. “That’s everyone, Miss Tetley.”
I beamed. Good.
Laurel’s phone buzzed.
“Your supplies are here,” she said after skimming the message.
I waved my crew of Indebted out of the way. “Why didn’t you say so?”
I hustled for the first elevator, the last of my crew leaped in just before the doors slid shut. The women exchanged grins as we rode up.
Totally happy.
When I arrived back at my room, my door was open and bags littered the floor.
“There are one hundred and twenty?” I asked the young woman Laurel had sent to the craft store. She wasn’t part of my ten but seemed kind of familiar.
The vampire straightened, eyes on my feet. “One hundred and twenty pinecones, Miss Tetley. A hot glue gun, hot glue, burlap ribbon, and twine.”
Yes, yes, yes!
“I’m going to make you one too.” I bopped her on the nose. “I’m going to make everyone a decor pinecone.” My smile faded as I looked at her again. “Where do I know you from?”
Laurel cleared her throat. “Deana recently joined our ranks after draining her human boyfriend.”
The night came hurtling back to me. The way her fangs had lengthened as I stood cowering and confused in my office.
Red tears slipped down Deana’s cheeks.
Her shoulders shook, her sorrow and guilt filled the room.
“I saw what happened,” I said grimly.
She covered her face. “I loved him and I killed him.”
“Your control slipped.” I agreed, patting her arm.
Deana straightened, not wiping her face. “I deserve my punishment.”
I stared. “How much do you owe?”
She flinched. “One million. Kyros should’ve given me more.”
Her guilt reminded me so much of my own. Perhaps Kyros saw her remorse would be punishment enough. A family was mourning because of Deana. Ryder died. That warranted punishment. I just couldn’t be comfortable with the Vissimo’s method.
To be made a slave...
Turning from her, I ripped open a sack, selecting a pinecone from within.
“I’ll make you a pinecone first,” I announced.
She’d feel better in no time.
I stuck the final diamante to the last pinecone. I’d remembered my destroyed gown from Rory and torn it to bits, adding a bit of extra glam to each hanging pinecone.
My body ached from two and a half days in a hunched position—and too many beer floats.
Fuck me, how much ice cream had I eaten? Why the hell was I making decorative pinecones? It had seemed like a normal thing to do th
irty seconds ago. Now, not so much.
Empty beer bottles littered the mirror bench space. It looked like a racoon had ransacked my room.
“Have I been acting like a crazy person?” I asked aloud.
The Indebted no longer stood in an awkward row against the far wall. They sprawled on the floor and on the bed around me. One of them was even eating a beer float.
I grimaced. Gross.
Had the thrall made me do all this weird shit?
Laurel was sitting against the front door. “Yep.”
“Don’t feel like you need to spare my feelings.”
Her lips curved.
The rest came back to me. Oh, shit, I’d ransacked rooms in the tower for blankets.
I flushed. “Please tell me you haven’t handed the pinecones out yet. We need to burn them.”
“All handed out,” a woman quipped. I couldn’t remember her name.
I flopped back on the bed. “That’s really embarrassing. Can you guys tell everyone to chuck them out? I bet they look like shit.”
Who in their right mind wanted a hanging pinecone?
“They won’t chuck them out,” Laurel said quietly.
I moaned, turning to look at her. “I seriously wouldn’t be offended.”
Laurel pressed her lips together.
I held up the pinecone in my hand. I’d glued a burlap bow at the base of the stalk and wrapped twine around the stalk itself, forming a loop to hang the cone upside-down. Three black diamantes caught in the light.
I held the embarrassment out, my eyes squeezed shut. “Who’s this one for then?”
“An extra. We had a spare pinecone,” another Indebted piped up. The sides of her head were shaved, the top a floppy arrangement of beach waves that she totally pulled off.
I chucked the pinecone on the bed. Ouch. My stomach was really sore.
Laurel’s phone chirped. She pressed it to her ear as I massaged my stomach. Felt like I was having food octuplets.
“What’s the time?” I asked the closest vampire.
She leaned around three of her comrades to peer at the alarm clock. “4:00 p.m.”
Huh. Twelve hours of the thrall to go. “Time flies when you’re making a dick of yourself.”
Bright blue eyes appraised me. “We don’t think of what you did that way. No one has ever made something for me. It’s probably the same for most of us.”
A lump rose in my throat, and I battled against it. Okay, maybe I wasn’t as clear-minded right now as I thought—though more lucid than the last two and a half days that was for fucking sure. Karaoke was my limit when it came to making an object of myself. Turned out the thrall symptoms got stronger the second time.
That would’ve been nice to know.
“Miss Tetley,” Laurel said.
Her tone was so strange, I nearly gave myself whiplash spinning to look at her.
She extended the phone out to me. “It’s a client from Black. They got your number from Mr Polton.”
Mr Polton. Henry? The future husband of Bess.
I took the phone, frowning.
“You’re speaking with Basilia Tetley.”
A thin voice crackled from the other end. “Miss Tetley, I hope you don’t mind me calling you directly. I’m sure you’re a busy woman.”
I glanced around the room, eyes landing on the spare pinecone, empty tubs of ice cream, and strew of beer bottles. An Indebted choked back her laughter, and I threw her a grin.
“Not at all,” I replied, though the woman sounded sorry not one bit. “I understand you’re an acquaintance of Henry.”
“Yes, his aunt through marriage.”
“Lovely to meet you, Mrs….?”
She let out a short laugh. “Where are my manners? Mrs Maria Fenton.”
I rolled my eyes at another of the Indebted, who snickered.
“Mrs Fenton, how can I help you today? I hope Henry and Bess are well?”
“Oh, yes. They started IVF yesterday.”
“I’m so glad to hear that! My fingers are crossed for success.”
I heard the smile in her voice. “We all are. But I rang you because my husband and I have decided to sell our property in Black, 102 Victoria Avenue. Henry told us about the decline in the market, but… well, he also told us you were able to get them a very good price.”
Laurel snorted loudly.
Crap. I really hoped Kyros couldn’t hear this conversation. Or anyone other than the Indebted.
I chose my words with care. “I’m certainly able to present you with an honest range. The market in Black is steadier than Green, but there’s a downward trend across the board in Bluff City. In one year, your property won’t be as affected as Henry and Bess’s, but you will make less than you would by selling now. You’d have made even more last year, if I’m honest.”
“Our neighbours were saying the same,” Mrs Fenton mourned down the line. “My husband and I have worked too hard to let this asset devalue before our eyes. We sold all of our other properties to afford it, and we’re both regretting the move right now, I tell you that.”
That was pretty sad, actually. “It’s never nice to feel that your empire’s at risk. Did you have a timeline for sale?”
“I have no immediate ties here. My husband will be working abroad from mid-month. My children are grown and moved out. Last night, I looked into the market in Hamburg. Moving there would remove the constant commutes for my husband. While a change of culture would be a new challenge for me, I find myself strangely excited by the thought of living in Germany for a year.”
“What colour was rolled tonight?” I mouthed at Laurel.
She shook her head once.
Not our turn. The roll wouldn’t happen until midnight tonight.
Blast.
I could lay the groundwork.
Mrs Fenton was still speaking. “My husband flies out mid-next week. So we’d love to meet with you as soon as possible to discuss it. I’d like to fly out with him if I can.”
Holy shit. This wasn’t happening to me.
I darted my eyes around and settled on my plan of attack. “A year abroad in Germany sounds like a dream. And of course you want to fly out with him. Being apart from your loved ones is no easy feat. Here’s what I propose. Live Right keeps up-to-date records of properties in Bluff City. If you give me half an hour, I can pull up any records we have of your address. Then I’ll be able to give an informed rundown of what you and Mr Fenton can expect.”
The relief in her voice was plain. “That would be much appreciated. I’m sorry to rush you like this. I’m sure it must be near the end of your workday.”
I didn’t even know what day it was, but this time when she said sorry, she meant it. “I’m happy to help any relation of Henry and Bess. You’ll hear from me within the hour.”
We exchanged goodbyes.
“I’ve got a reputation,” I murmured after hanging up.
Eek. I hoped selling houses for maximum valuation didn’t get back to Kyros.
None of the Indebted spoke a word, but each of them concealed a smile. Yep, I was a crappy employee.
“What’s Angelica stored under on your phone?” I asked Laurel.
She arched a brow. “Angelica.”
“Original,” I teased.
Her number was right at the top.
“Miss Tetley?”
“I got a call from someone in Black who’d like to sell. What are the dice looking like doing tonight?”
“You received a call from Black?”
I made a face. “A person who owns a property in Black. They’re more than a house, Angie.”
“What’s she got?” a deep voice asked in the background.
My stomach clenched at the gravelly sound. Kyros.
“Why did they call you?” Angelica enquired after a beat.
I crossed my fingers behind my back. “I secured their nephew’s house last week—the Poltons.”
“I remember.”
I tempered my im
patience. “The roll?”
“Yes, I have the stats pulled up in front of me.”
Oops.
It was kind of hard to tell what was real and what was remaining PMS thrall stuff.
“Seven is the most likely roll,” she said. “It’s Kyros’s favourite number.”
“I’m unsure how that’s pertinent to the discussion.” She was relentless.
“The most likely roll would put us on Blue. But Black and Red are the second most probable rolls.”
That meant shit, really. A three was rolled just last week, which was one of the lowest probabilities. Except what if the dice roll did put Clan Sundulus on Black? I was still looking for a way to make reparation for the turn bungled by Fyrlia attacking me. This was it.
“The owner is waiting for my call,” I told Angelica, bouncing off the bed to pace between the listening women. “I’d like to meet them face-to-face tonight to deliver the information. A prelim. Stringing them along will be easy if Black isn’t rolled tonight, but my gut says they won’t sign same day like the others. All their savings are invested in the property. If I go tonight and Black is rolled an overnight might be possible.”
“Miss Tetley, the thrall won’t finish for another... eleven and a half hours. You can’t leave the tower before then.”
“I feel fine.”
“I’ve received one hundred and twenty complaints of stolen bedding in the last three days. Would you know anything about that?”
I gasped. “A thief got into the tower?”
“We have footage of you wrapping Deana in a blanket from Level 59 and singing her a lullaby. When I gave you the master key, you assured me it was to select a room with better Feng Shui.”
Christ. “Okay, I took the blankets. That’s how I know my mental facilities are restored. I’m not doing this for me, Angelica. How many properties in Black are offered up on a platter like this?”
Silence.
“Exactly. My ten Indebted will come with me. I’ll be back in the tower before Kyros has time to freak out.”
The phone crackled.
“I do not freak out.” Kyros’s voice flooded down the line.
“Oh, hey, Kyros! How’re you doing?”
A growl reverberated. “Miss Tetley, you will not leave this tower.”
“You don’t want me to secure a property in Black? Are you crazy?”
Blood Trial: Supernatural Battle (Vampire Towers Book 1) Page 37
