by HELEN HARDT
She took the twenty and stuffed it into her cleavage. “Obliged,” she said again, “but that’s not the only reason I came. I won’t turn it down, but I meant what I said. The ashes are payment for some time.”
“Oh.” Still, her advice had been well worth the twenty bucks. “What have you come to do for me then?”
“I have news for you. But first things first. There’s a vampire woman who’s breeding. Your boyfriend’s sister.”
“Emilia. Yes, I know.”
“She’s ill. Very ill. If she’s not treated, she will be in danger of losing her baby and her life.”
“Oh!” I touched my fingers to my lips. “I’ve heard pregnancy and childbirth are sometimes difficult for vampire women. Is there anything we can do to help her?”
The grandmother I’d never known popped into my mind. She’d been beautiful, at least in the photos I’d seen of her when she was young.
“Yes,” Bea said. “She’s suffering from severe morning sickness. It’s worse than usual because the baby she carries has B positive blood. She’s B negative. The baby’s blood is attacking her and making her ill. She needs relief.”
B positive. That blood type again. But Bea had her information wrong. “That’s not how it works. When a mother is negative and a baby is positive, the mother’s immune system attacks the Rh positive cells as a foreign substance, which destroys the baby’s red blood cells and causes hemolytic anemia. This is Emilia’s first baby, so she’s probably not affected. It’s more of an issue with her next baby. Even so, treatment with immunoglobulins will take care of the problem. She’s under the care of a physician. I’m sure he’s taking care of her and following protocol.”
“But this is a vampire pregnancy, dearie. Things are different. Everything comes down to blood with vampires,” Bea said. “‘We are all sculptors and painters, and our material is our own flesh and blood and bones.’”
“Thoreau again,” I said.
“A genius,” Bea said. “Women are sculptors. They create life within them and bring forth art from their bodies. Their material is their flesh, blood, and bones. But vampire women are prisoners of blood at times. You can help, dearie.”
“How can I help? It sounds like you can help.”
“You will help through me. If I show up at this woman’s home with a remedy, she won’t accept it. But if you show up, as a nurse, she will.”
“Why doesn’t she just ask her doctor?”
“Her doctor is a learned man, but this remedy is new.”
“How do you know about it, then?”
“I see all.”
She’d been quoting Thoreau again. Was he inhabiting her? Probably not. Thoreau was a writer and philosopher, not a physician or scientist. He wouldn’t know anything about vampire medicine.
“Who is with you, Bea?”
“No one is with me.”
What the hell? It couldn’t hurt. “What is the remedy for Emilia?”
She pulled out a crumpled piece of paper from a pocket in her skirt and placed it in my hand. “Give her this. It will help with the sickness and help her to carry her child to term.”
I flattened the paper and glanced at it.
Nettle leaves, gingerroot, peppermint, chamomile. Wild yam.
Wild yam?
“But—”
She stood. “It will help.” When she got to the doorway, she turned. “I almost forgot. I have news for you. That book on the table? It’s a fake. Someone has been here. Someone stole the real one.”
The paper fluttered from my hand.
She hadn’t come to give me a remedy for Emilia. Emilia was under a physician’s care and was most likely fine.
She’d come to warn me that someone had stolen the Vampyre Texts.
Chapter Fourteen
Dante
My heart pounded. “A problem?”
“Someone has contested this will,” the judge said.
I looked to River. Can you fix this? I hoped he understood.
“I’m trying,” he whispered so only I could hear. “Nothing is happening.”
What was going on? Was this judge a vampire?
“Who would contest the will? My sister and I are our father’s only heirs.”
The door to the courtroom opened, and a whoosh of energy hit me like a bolt of lightning.
“Mr. Guillaume Tyrus Gabriel,” the judge said.
Emilia, River, and I all stiffened as Bill entered.
“Mr. Gabriel is the deceased’s father,” I said. “No provision was made for him in the will.”
Bill waved a hand, and all the humans in the courtroom went glassy-eyed. “Really, Dante,” he said. “Did you think you’d get away with this?”
Emilia, River, and I stared at him, our eyes wide.
“What did you just do?” Emilia asked.
My father had said he’d never heard of a vampire being able to glamour a group of people. But Bill had done it, and if Bill could do it, perhaps another vampire, an elder, could also do it. Not only a courtroom of people, but a hospital full of people.
Bill ignored Em’s question. “You won’t get away with this.”
I bristled. “Get away with what? Claiming our father’s estate? He’s dead, Bill. You know that as well as we do.”
“That’s not the issue. The money is yours. I’m not denying that. But I can’t let you have it.”
“You have no power over it. It’s what our father wanted. He helped us find his body so we could get the money.”
“Yes. I’m aware of what has gone on. Did you really think you could keep everything from me?”
“Dad?” I said.
“Your father is otherwise occupied,” Bill said.
“What the hell did you do to him?” I said, baring my teeth.
“Nothing. He’s my son. I would never bring any harm to him. Not that I could in his current state anyway. I just made sure he was out of the way for this little session this morning.” He came closer, meeting my gaze. “Formidable, Dante. Very nice. But those teeth will do you no good until you can control them and learn to use them properly.”
“Dante…” Emilia urged.
“Stay out of this, Em. In fact, River, get her out of here.”
“Uh…hell, no,” Em said, whipping her hands onto her hips.
“I’m staying too,” River said. “Look, Bill, you have no right to do this. We need Uncle Jules’s money. He wants us to have it. People are disappearing. The woman I love has disappeared!”
He loved? River loved Lucy? “Riv?”
“Sometimes it takes losing someone to realize it,” River continued. “We’re going to find out what’s going on, and we’re going to find out the secrets behind what is happening.”
“I’ve told you the Texts will bring you only darkness,” Bill said. “Why didn’t you listen to me?”
“Because you’re different,” I said. “You’ve been different since I returned. River and Em even see it now. My father sees it. Whatever you saw in that book changed you, Bill. We need to find out why. And how. I need to understand what’s happening between Erin and me, and I need to find out why women are going missing from hospitals. Women who all have the same blood type. B positive. You know who else has that blood type, Bill? I do.”
“Why does that matter?” he asked.
“Because it’s genetically impossible for me to have it. That’s why it matters. When’s the last time you talked to Jack Hebert? Both my mother and father were Rh negative. Em is Rh negative. It’s genetically impossible for two Rh negative parents to produce an Rh positive child. Jack swears I am my parents’ child, and I look just like my father, so he can’t explain it. If the answer is in that damned book, I am damned well going to find it.”
“Dante, the book will not give you any answers.”
“No, Bill, the book didn’t give you any answers. Maybe it led you to darkness, but it won’t lead me there.”
“It will, Dante.”
“It won’t.
I’ve been to hell. Nothing in that book can be any worse than what I’ve already been forced to endure. And if it is? Then I’ll find my way out. I’ve found my way out of darkness before. You have no idea what I’ve been through, and my father went through worse and got out.”
“Your father died, Dante.” He sighed. “I can’t lose the three of you as well.”
My heart softened. A little. “Is that what this is about? You losing us? We’re not going anywhere.”
“That’s right. Which is why I’m contesting this will. I’ll tie it up in court for years to keep you from getting your father’s money. And when time runs out for me there, I’ll glamour the administrators to keep it going. I can’t allow you to pursue this dark path.”
“Too late. Fuck up my father’s will if you have to, but I still have the book, and I’ll find the money to translate it one way or the other. Count on that.”
“You won’t. You no longer have the book, Dante.”
“It’s sitting on Erin’s coffee table as we speak. I saw it before I left this morning.”
“It’s not. Never will you find out the secrets of the Texts. For your own good. The book in your home is counterfeit. I had the real one stolen.”
Rage surged inside me, and my blood turned to boiling plasma in my veins. “You what?” I growled, my gums itching and tingling more than they ever had. Every fraction of every millimeter they lengthened forced more electricity through my body, currents charged with anger and madness.
I snarled at my grandfather, a man without whom I wouldn’t exist.
For an instant, I felt regret.
Only for an instant.
He would not keep me from the truth.
He would not.
I balled up all the electric energy inside me and hurled it at the judge sitting on the bench. I thought not in words but in images, showing him what I needed him to do, forcing him to do my bidding.
The people in the courtroom began moving, their gazes no longer glassy.
“As no contests have been filed concerning the estate of Julian Guillaume Gabriel,” the judge said, “all assets are now the legal property of his heirs, Dante Julian Gabriel and Emilia Vivienne Gabriel, in equal shares.”
Outside the courtroom, Bill grabbed my arm and pulled me aside.
“What happened in there isn’t possible,” he said.
“Apparently it is.”
“This isn’t you, Dante. I won’t allow you to continue.”
My fangs were still descended, and I snarled. “You have no fucking choice.”
“Don’t let this be who you are. Please.”
The look in his eyes startled me, unnerved me even.
I’d expected to see anger, determination. Maybe pleading.
But I didn’t.
Bill’s eyes held something I’d rarely seen him emote.
Fear.
Chapter Fifteen
Erin
I awoke with a start. My body was stiff from lying on the couch.
What a dream! Dr. Bonneville had come to my door, and then she had morphed into Bea. It had been so real. Bea had quoted Thoreau again, and she’d been talking about Dante’s sister and her pregnancy. She asked for vodka, and then she’d told me she had a remedy, and she’d given me—
I looked in my hand.
No crumpled piece of paper.
I looked at the floor.
No paper there either.
Yes, definitely a dream.
Nettle leaves, gingerroot, peppermint, chamomile. Wild yam.
Words—words that had been written on the piece of paper in my dream.
But it was only a dream. Those things couldn’t possibly help Emilia have a healthy and successful pregnancy. I’d never heard of wild yam, anyway. Was there such a thing? Sweet potatoes growing in the wild? Probably not.
I drew in a deep breath and looked at the clock on my phone. Dante would probably be home soon. The rest of the day would be spent wading through red tape and getting Julian’s assets transferred.
I jolted when Dante burst through the door, followed by River and Emilia.
“Hey,” I said. “Did everything go okay?”
“You could say that,” River said. “We got the will through probate, anyway.”
“What’s the problem, then?”
Dante walked toward me and grabbed me in a tight embrace. When he finally pulled away, he looked at me, his face unreadable.
“What is it?” I asked.
“I’m not sure. Remember how I was able to glamour the night administrator to help get your leave of absence?”
I nodded.
“Today I apparently glamoured a judge.”
River shook his head. “You did way more than that, Dante. You reversed a glamour on an entire courtroom, as well. You reversed the glamour of a vampire elder. What you did is technically not possible.”
“Okay. Start at the beginning,” I said.
“If you’ll excuse me,” Emilia said, “I need to go throw up.”
For the first time since the three of them had walked in, I took a good look at her. She was green. Truly green. This was bad morning sickness.
I looked at my hand, where Bea had put the piece of paper in my dream. “Are you feeling okay?”
“I’ll be better after I puke.”
I nodded. No use talking to her until she did what she had to do.
I turned back to Dante and River. “Tell me everything.”
Dante opened his mouth but then shook his head. “You tell it, Riv. I still can’t even believe it.”
“None of us can,” River said. “But it happened. Bill showed up at court to contest the will.”
My brows shot up.
“Apparently he didn’t want us getting the Texts translated because it would lead us to darkness, so he decided to tie up Uncle Jules’s money so Dante and Em couldn’t afford to do it. Dante got angry. I mean, really angry, and somehow he reversed Bill’s glamour on the judge and the entire courtroom.”
“Dante?” I said.
He shrugged. “I don’t know how I did it. I know I couldn’t do it again.”
“What he did isn’t possible,” River said. “A vampire’s glamour gets stronger with age. I can’t glamour a roomful of people yet, but Bill apparently can, and he did it today. Everyone in the courtroom went glassy-eyed when Bill entered and started talking to us about why he was contesting the will.”
“Where was Julian?” I asked.
“Bill had him tied up doing something. We’ll find out what it was when we see him next, I guess.” River shook his head. “I still can’t fucking believe it.”
I touched Dante’s arm. He was cold as ice. “What did you do?”
“I have no idea. I was just really angry. So angry.”
“Your teeth were frightening, man,” River said. “I’ve never seen them like that.”
I cupped Dante’s cheek. His teeth were completely retracted. I’d seen them sharp and ferocious. And they’d been even more so earlier?
“Can you remember anything you did?” I asked.
“I can’t. I don’t think I was thinking at all. I was reacting purely on instinct, and I managed to get what we needed.”
“By doing the impossible,” River said again.
“Clearly it’s not impossible if he did it,” I offered.
“I’ll never be able to repeat it. I have no idea how.”
“You will be able to repeat it.”
I jolted at Julian’s voice. He stood before us as he always did, wearing the same clothing.
“Dad, where have you been?” Dante asked. “We could have used you this morning.”
“Obviously you didn’t need my help,” the ghost said. “You’re coming into a strange new power, Dante. One I don’t have. River doesn’t have. Bill doesn’t have. I can’t explain it, but I can try to help you learn to control it.”
“How, if you don’t have the power?”
“I’ll teach you how to control
your glamour. Once you know how to do that, you should be able to control any glamour power, no matter how intense.”
“We need to get started then,” Dante said. “What happened today was pretty daunting. Where were you, by the way?”
“My father sent me on a wild-goose chase. I should have seen what he was up to, and I’m sorry I didn’t. You learn at an early age to trust your parents, and until now, my father has never been unworthy of my trust. I also didn’t expect him to try to contest my will.”
“No one’s blaming you, Uncle Jules,” River said.
Emilia emerged from the bathroom. “Hi, Daddy.”
“Hi, sweet pea. Are you all right?”
“Not especially. This pregnancy sickness is the worst.”
“Your mother had it bad both times,” Julian said. “It’s normal for our kind. Although…have you seen Jack lately? I don’t like your skin tone.”
“I see him in a few days.”
“I think we should take you in now,” River said. “I agree. You don’t look good.”
She scoffed. “Thanks.”
Bea’s face emerged in my mind. Maybe she had truly come to me in a dream to help Emilia, not just to warn me that the Texts had been stolen.
Nettle leaves, gingerroot, peppermint, chamomile. Wild yam.
Would those things help her? I had no idea. “Try some saltine crackers,” I said. “You need to stay hydrated too. I know it’s hard when you feel sick all the time, but you have to think of the baby’s health.”
“Believe me, none of that ever leaves my mind. But saltines don’t help. I throw up everything I eat. It’s been that way for the past week.”
“I don’t like the sound of this,” Julian said. “Let’s get you to the doctor.”
“I agree with your dad,” I said. “It sounds like you have hyperemesis gravidarum.”
“Hyper what?”
“Just a fancy term for severe morning sickness. You might need IV fluids.”
“It’s normal for our kind,” Julian said again.
“The sickness? Or her color?” River asked.
“I admit neither of your mothers ever turned green,” Julian said.
