Just as a precaution, Priscilla sniffed the air, scenting for blood. She could only smell the dust that hung heavy in the air, despite a recent cleaning in the front of the house. Satisfied that at least no one was bleeding, she pushed the door open. Olivia waited inside for her, brandishing a tube of lipstick.
Again, Priscilla found herself on the receiving end of a surprised look. Olivia gave her a once-over and then whistled.
“You look fantastic,” Olivia muttered. “I didn’t know you owned anything but button-downs and jeans.”
Priscilla sighed. “We can save the criticisms of my wardrobe for later, Olivia. Could you please help me look presentable?”
Olivia tutted. “You hardly need it. But I’ll do it.”
Priscilla waited impatiently for Olivia to finish applying a layer of makeup. She forwent concealer, as Priscilla’s skin was supernaturally smooth and free of blemishes. Instead she slathered on a coat of eyeshadow, mascara, and applied lipstick. A few minutes later, Olivia took a step back and smiled.
“Perfect. Arthur will flip.”
Priscilla winced. This lie was going to get awkward fast. “Thank you, Olivia.”
“Knock ’em dead, tiger,” she teased, pushing Priscilla toward the door.
From the moment she stepped into the hall, Priscilla knew that the evening dress had been a misstep on Anna’s part. The debutantes and their mothers were all swathed in soft pastels, making Priscilla’s bold wardrobe choice stick out like a sore thumb. The only people she could spot in the dining hall who were dressed in any color as dark as hers were the men, all of whom were clad in dark suits. Arthur was sitting unobtrusively at a table close to the door.
She walked straight-backed to her table, ignoring the looks she was getting from the debutantes. She had a job to do, and by Jove, she was going to do it.
The next hour passed in a blur of nervous energy as debutantes were presented to the gathered crowd to polite applause. The only one who truly stood out to Priscilla was Clarissa Montgomery, who was being escorted on the arm of an attractive man in his mid-forties. Her father, presumably. Clarissa looked sallow, despite the full face of makeup she’d applied. She appeared to have shrunk and gotten thinner, despite the relatively short time since her brother’s death. She gave the crowd a patently false smile in response to their applause and exited the stage. No human would have noticed it in the gloom, but Priscilla’s vision was acute enough to catch the sagging of her shoulders and the look of anguish that crossed her face. She yanked her elbow free of her father’s at the first opportunity and took a table away from her friends and family.
It was only because she was paying attention to the girl that she spied Clarissa leaning across the table to talk to a rather snobby-looking girl. The girl said something that Priscilla couldn’t hear and then slipped Clarissa a cigarette as deftly as if she were passing a baton. Clarissa’s shoulders sagged further, this time in relief. Clarissa stuffed it into her clutch and then stood, striding for the back hallways that led toward the exit. A moment later, a pair of girls followed, leaving the snobby-looking one at the table by herself. No one else seemed to notice, too focused on the ceremony.
Priscilla elbowed Olivia gently in the ribs and leaned in so her friend could hear her over the announcer. “Can you take over for a moment? I need to speak to Arthur.” After all, that was at least part of why she’d brought him. He needed to know that Clarissa had left.
Olivia nodded and Priscilla did her best to discreetly cross the room to Arthur. It didn’t quite work as she’d planned. Several people gave her dirty looks as she made her way over to his table.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “The ceremony isn’t even done yet. It’s not like we can just—”
“Clarissa left out the back way,” she whispered, keeping her voice low enough that his neighbors couldn’t easily eavesdrop.
Arthur’s back stiffened. “How long ago?”
“A minute ago, I’d say.”
Arthur all but dragged her toward the front door. This time they received several orders for them to sit down and watch the show. Arthur ignored all of them. It was a relief to step out into the evening air when they reached the front doors, which had been propped open for any latecomers.
“Which way do you think she went?”
“There’s only one exit that way, unless she snuck out a window. I’d say we need to go east.”
Arthur didn’t argue. They set off at a brisk jog. It hadn’t caught her notice until this moment that his leg had healed from the injury he’d sustained last year. At least, it was well enough he could jog. Priscilla kept pace with him, though she could have gone faster. He was the one with a badge and a gun, after all.
“What is she doing?” Arthur said, his voice a little ragged due to the jog. “Doesn’t she know what a bad idea this is? The hall is where it’s safe.”
“The hall is also where her family is, and she didn’t seem too happy with them,” Priscilla answered. “She seemed very upset with her father, for some reason.”
Arthur grunted in acknowledgement and looked like he was about to say something more when they were interrupted by a protracted scream.
Abandoning any pretense of humanity, Priscilla sped ahead of Arthur, reaching the edge of the building in a matter of minutes. She smelled blood before she saw it. When she rounded the corner, she found two of the girls that had snuck out with Priscilla kneeling next to Clarissa’s prone form.
“What happened?” she demanded, striding forward. One of them shrieked and backed away, letting Clarissa’s head fall to the ground with a thump. The lit cigarette in Clarissa’s hand rolled away, and Priscilla caught a whiff of what was inside it. Cannabis, not nicotine. Wonderful.
“This guy, he just—” one of them began, eyes too wide. She was shaking hard. “He just—Oh God, he—”
“I didn’t do it!” the other girl gibbered. “We were just having a smoke, I swear—”
“Big!” the first girl gasped, ignoring her companion. “He was bigger than us. And he just came out of nowhere and shot Clarissa! He shot her! Right in the neck!”
“You’re bleeding,” Priscilla pointed out, taking the first girl by the arm. She held her breath, in case the scent tempted her. There was an inches-deep graze on her forearm.
“Oh my God,” the girl gasped. “He shot me too!”
Arthur was wheezing by the time he came around the corner, gun drawn. He searched the vicinity, cursing when he found no criminal to shoot.
“Priscilla, is she—”
“Dead,” Priscilla confirmed, kneeling to examine the girl’s throat. The blood pooled around her was too large. The killer must have severed an artery. She’d bled out in the minutes it had taken Priscilla to arrive.
Arthur’s expression morphed into one of rage. “Damn it!”
“What do we do?” one of the girls babbled. “What do we do? What do we do?”
“You, call 911. Tell them you’ve been injured during a shootout,” Arthur instructed. Priscilla knew the order was more to follow procedure and give the girl something to do other than contaminate the crime scene, rather than any hope that Clarissa could be saved. The girl’s wound was actually very minor and probably wouldn’t need more than a few stitches.
He turned to the second girl. “You, go get Lucas and Nora Montgomery. Tell them I’ll need them outside of the front gates when the paramedics arrive.”
Both girls stared at him for a long moment before their brains could process the orders he’d given them. Then they both fled back into the house to do as he said.
“And I, sir?” Priscilla asked tersely. “What am I supposed to do?”
Arthur fixed her with a hard look. She knew his anger wasn’t meant for her. Despite their preparation and forewarning, they’d been too late to save a child. Again. This death was one Arthur would be blaming himself for.
“I want you to get the hell out of Dodge, Pratt,” Arthur said quietly. “I don’t want you getting th
e blame for this, do you hear me? Go home. Close shop if you need to.”
Priscilla nodded. She understood him perfectly. That didn’t mean she wanted to go.
“Promise me, Pratt,” he hissed. “Get out of here and don’t involve yourself in this again until I’ve calmed things down. This is going to be a media frenzy.”
“Understood sir,” she said solemnly. “I’ll stay out of your way.”
If you stay out of mine, she added silently.
She was going to track down Martino Romano and shake the answers out of him, if she had to. Two innocent kids were dead, and she knew that he knew something about it.
Priscilla wanted blood for it.
Chapter Nine
Priscilla hadn’t thought she could get any angrier than she’d been on the fifteen-minute journey home. She’d been wrong. There were unwelcome guests in her bakery.
“Now that’s more like it,” Ava enthused as she walked through the door. “What a beautiful gown! And I hear you have a date. It seems as though you’re turning your life around just fine without me, Priscilla.”
“What is he doing here?” Priscilla growled, stalking toward Martino. He was the last person she’d expected to find in her shop. Maddison was frozen like a deer in the headlights behind the counter, staring between them. She’d been in charge of the shops for the night while Priscilla and Olivia catered the Debutante ball.
“He said he needed to see you,” Maddison explained, tone meek.
“Is that so?” Priscilla said acidly. Maddison cringed, despite the fact that Priscilla’s anger had not been aimed at her. At another time, that would have made Priscilla feel guilty. As it was, she couldn’t summon anything but blind rage.
Her fangs itched to find the cluster of veins and arteries in Martino’s neck and tear them open. Her thirst, which she had been trying desperately to suppress during the crisis, surged to the fore and all she could think of was taking a bite of Martino Romano.
“I’m sorry, Priscilla. I should have called you, but they said they’d wait,” Maddison babbled. “They’ve been here for the last hour or so and they ate the rest of Anna’s fruit dessert—”
“An hour?” Priscilla asked, her rage abruptly abating. If he’d been here for the last hour, he couldn’t possibly be the killer. She glanced at Maddison for conformation. She really ought to have taken Arthur’s advice and had a CCTV installed in her shop.
“Yes, cara mia, an hour,” Martino said with a wry smile. “And your little sparrow has given us impeccable customer service. I’m sure my review will be most favorable. Provided you don’t tear my throat out before I have an opportunity to write it.”
“Her name is Maddison,” Priscilla snapped, more out of habit than actual anger. “Knock it off with the Italian endearments or I’ll aim for your femoral artery and make it painful.”
Martino just laughed. “Something has you in a bad mood, Signorina Pratt. I just came to discuss business with you. Is this a bad time?”
“Another child has been murdered, so yes, it’s a bad time,” Priscilla said, slumping into a chair. Her head was beginning to ache, and it struck her for the first time just how long she’d gone without a proper feeding. The last time she’d had anything to drink, it had been the blood that Olivia had drained off her hamburger before cooking it.
Maddison’s eyes widened. “Another one? You can’t be serious.”
Avalon looked startled at the news. She knew that Avalon liked kids, deep down. Martino, however, didn’t look fazed by the news. It was another mark against him in her book, but that didn’t mean he was a killer.
Priscilla buried her face in her hands. “It was Clarissa Montgomery. I saw her sneak off. By the time Arthur and I reached her, it was too late. The killer was already there, waiting for her. I just don’t know how he did it.”
“I wish I could say I was surprised, cara m—” Martino cut off suddenly when she raised her head a fraction to glare at him. He swallowed compulsively and began again. “I wish I could say I was surprised. But this is actually less collateral damage than I was expecting to find.”
Priscilla’s temper flared once more and she bared her teeth at the short magician who sat across the store from her. “I may be opposed to killing, but I might make an exception on maiming, just for you, Romano.”
Martino wagged a finger at her. “Don’t be so hasty. You will need my willing cooperation to catch this killer, signorina.”
“I don’t know. I’ve got a witness who can corroborate the fact you’re obstructing an ongoing homicide case. I think it’s at least enough information to have you detained for seventy-two hours, don’t you think?”
Martino didn’t appear fazed by the threat. Despite Arthur’s claims that he had a squeaky-clean record, she was sure that Martino must have had dealings with the police in the past. He was too calm facing down two vampires and the threat of police action. He lifted a cookie off his plate with serene calm and bit into the macadamia nut cookie that Maddison had baked in her absence.
“You are an excellent cook, Signorina Pratt. I wonder how? Most of the vampires I know in LA cannot prepare a TV dinner, let alone all these lovely confections.”
“Stop waffling and get to your point, Romano,” Priscilla said.
Martino shrugged. “I could tell you, but it would require certain sacrifices to be made on your part, Priscilla.”
“What kind of sacrifices?” she asked, the question coming from between her teeth.
She’d been fully prepared to kill or maim the man for setting foot in her shop. Now, even knowing that he was innocent, at least of murder—at the very least he hadn’t pulled the trigger himself—she still wanted to take a bite of him. There was something in his smug demeanor that she disliked intensely. She didn’t see how Avalon, even with her propensity for making bad choices, could stand to be with this guy.
Martino shrugged. “I’d just need a teensy promise from you, Signorina Pratt. A favor owed, and a debt my family can collect at a later date.”
“The Sicilian Mafia, right?”
Martino blinked once in surprise before his smirk grew even wider. “As smart as you are beautiful, I see. You gathered that only from the tattoo?”
“And the trail of slime you leave everywhere you go,” she said.
He chuckled. “My papà would like you very much, Priscilla. You have a certain spirit he likes in his recruits.”
Avalon blinked once in surprise as Martino said that. Surely she hadn’t been so dense? What did she think he’d been hinting at all this time? That he wanted to play parcheesi? Surely even she couldn’t be that naive.
“I’m not joining the mafia,” Priscilla said coldly. “End of story. You can explain your involvement to Arthur after a few days in a holding cell.”
She pushed away from the table, punctuating her words with the strident squeal of a chair. She wanted out of this dress, and suddenly, closing shop early sounded like an excellent idea. She could feed, catch up on the baking she would normally have been doing over the past few days, and turn in early, if all went well.
“Suit yourself,” Martino called after her as she made a beeline for the stairs. “But you won’t catch him before he leaves town. Once they are all dead, he will leave town and never return. He doesn’t leave loose ends, and he won’t stop until the work is done.”
Priscilla halted and turned slightly on one heel. “Can’t you just be a decent person, Romano? Turn this guy in to Arthur. He’ll make sure nothing more happens. You might even get a medal.”
Martino shook his head and waved away the suggestion as if it were only so much pipe smoke. “I’m not a rat. I may not be a capo, but nothing, and I mean nothing, is gonna make me break the code. We don’t talk to cops.”
Another self-satisfied smile stretched his too-full lips. “Now, if you were to take the vow,” he shrugged. “Then you’d be family, wouldn’t ya? And there’s no harm in talking to family.”
Priscilla just stared at them
both for a long time. He couldn’t be serious. She’d read enough books about the American mob to know what he was asking. He wanted her to take the omertà, the mob’s version of a vow of silence. A sworn-in member of the family agreed not to give evidence to cops, and swore loyalty to the mob family in question. Once you were in, you didn’t get out without bloodshed. Most people who broke the omertà died. If she agreed to take the vow, she’d have to act alone on any information she found. Priscilla was sure that wouldn’t go over well with Arthur.
Avalon had been uncharacteristically silent during the entire exchange, nibbling away at her cookie. Priscilla turned her gaze on her godmother.
“Do you have no taste?” she asked, giving her a soft shake of the head. “He’s no good. What do you see in him?”
Avalon’s eyes flicked down to her plate and she said nothing. Priscilla snorted. “All right, then. If that’s all you two came to say, I want you out of my shop.”
“But Priscilla—” Ava began weakly.
Priscilla pointed to a sign she’d had mounted next to the door. “I reserve the right to refuse service to anyone, Avalon. That includes my godmother and her slime-bag of a boyfriend. Get out before I call the police.”
At first, neither of them moved. Then Martino stood abruptly and circled the table, pulling out Avalon’s chair so she could stand. Avalon polished off the cookie in a few bites, still not looking at anyone.
“We’ll go now, stellina. I know when we are not wanted.”
Martino draped a shimmering wrap around Avalon’s shoulders and chivvied her toward the door. Avalon gave her one last pleading look before ducking out the door. Martino kept her door open to give them a final parting shot, letting snow flurries fly in.
“If you change your mind, Signora Pratt, you know how to contact me.”
“I’ll do that,” Priscilla said coldly. When hell froze over. Then she crossed the room, shoved him lightly out the door, then shut and locked it behind him.
A Bite of Blueberry Page 9
