by Reinke, Sara
Jackson raised his hand, calling out something in greeting to the pair that Brandon missed as he walked abreast of his friend. Valien waved back, friendly enough, and when Jackson bee-lined across the front yard toward him, Lina and Brandon followed.
“Hey,” he saw Valien say to Jackson, his mouth stretched in a grin. The two of them exchanged hand grasps in a similar, ritualistic fashion as Jackson had with Duke Parker, then finished up by clapping each other affably on the shoulders.
“…remember Brandon?” Jackson said, turning to Brandon so he caught the last of the inquiry.
Valien fixed his gaze on Brandon’s face and nodded once. “Yeah,” he said. “Sorry again about yesterday, man.” Holding out his hand to Brandon, he added, “No hard feelings, I hope.”
Brandon shrugged as he accepted the shake as if to say, It’s all good, then glanced from Valien toward the girl standing behind him. In that moment, as their eyes met, it felt like a jolt of electricity went through him and his breath catch in the back of his throat.
“This is my sister, Pilar,” Valien said, glancing over his shoulder, noticing Brandon’s distraction. “This is Brandon. He’s a friend of Jackie’s, in town for a visit.”
The girl, Pilar, was barefooted, dressed in a pair of jeans cut short enough for the white pouch of her hip pockets to be visible below the frayed hems. It was obvious to Brandon when the breeze huffed against her, pushing the thin cotton of her T-shirt into the outward swells of her breasts, that she wasn’t wearing a bra beneath. At this unexpected, momentary glimpse of her nipples, standing out in relief against the pale fabric, he felt for all of the world like another electrical charge just surged through him. All at once, he found himself wondering what it would be like to taste them, to lift her shirt back and let his tongue trace slow, concentric circles around each nipple, sliding one between his lips, tasting the salty-sweet tang of her soft, warm flesh.
When a hand fell against his arm, he snapped out of his daze, and jerked in guilty surprise to find Lina speaking to him. “We didn’t really get a good look,” she was saying.
He blinked at her stupidly. Obviously he’d just missed a large chunk of some sort of conversation between her, Jackson and Valien that she’d thought he’d been following by lip reading. He suspected, given Lina’s statement and the pointed look she was giving him at the moment, that it was about the dead body. Whether word had already reached Valien of its discovery or Jackson or Lina had mentioned it, he didn’t know.
Yeah. Closing his hand in a fist, he bobbed it once, mimicking a nod, not quite sure what he was agreeing to. To his embarrassment, he realized he was now sporting a burgeoning hard-on that threatened to tent out the front of his shorts. When he glanced again at Pilar, he found her glaring at him murderously, as if aware of his attention, his arousal, and was pissed by it.
Shit. Humiliated, he tore his gaze away, then wheeled about in a clumsy circle and staggered toward Latisha’s front door. He felt Lina catch his arm again and he glanced back at her without turning around.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, puzzled and somewhat worried.
It’s nothing, he told her telepathically, easing away from her hand, hoping like hell she wouldn’t notice his erection, too. I just…I have to take a piss. That’s all. Really.
He didn’t wait for her reply, and instead headed straight for the porch. The door wasn’t locked, thankfully, and he hurried inside, breezing past Latisha in her bathrobe, cup of coffee in hand, with little more than a strained smile and a nod as he ducked into the bathroom, then closed and locked the door.
Goddamn it, he thought, as for the second time as many days, he treated himself to a cold, miserable shower. He told himself that at least Latisha wouldn’t be too suspicious. They had just returned from a jog, or so she thought. When he’d finished, he reached for the water, shutting it off, then tilted his head back and struggled to reclaim his breath.
What the fuck is going on? he thought. He’d never reacted to any woman like that in his entire life—Brethren or human.
Not even Lina, he realized in guilty dismay.
Stumbling out of the tub, he wrapped a towel around his waist, then blinked at his reflection in the mirror above the sink.
What the hell’s wrong with me?
****
I think I’m going to try and hook Brandon and Pilar up, Jackson signed to Lina as the two walked across the front yard toward their mother’s front porch. Moments earlier, Valien Cadana had roared away behind them on his motorcycle, the wind whipping in his dark hair. His sister, Pilar, had disappeared into their house shortly before that, having remained mostly quiet during their brief interaction with her brother.
Caught completely off-guard by Jackson’s comment, Lina stumbled in surprise. With a yelp, she fell down, catching herself with her hands, grinding grass stains into her knees.
“Are you alright?” Jackson asked aloud, getting his hands beneath her arms and helping her stagger clumsily to her feet.
She nodded, embarrassed. I’m fine, I’m fine, she signed, shooing him away. As she dusted off her shirt, she glanced at him. “Why…uh…on earth would you want to do that?”
Oh, you know, Jackson signed now, a clear indication he was trying to be coy. Pilar’s been seeing a real prick. Valien’s wanting her to find someone more her type.
Lina struggled not to scowl. And you think that’s Brandon? she signed. When he nodded, it became even harder to repress her frown.
They’re the same age, Jackson told her pointedly.
“Oh, yeah.” Lina rolled her eyes as she muttered this aloud. “There’s a hell of a lot in common. Next you’ll tell me they both like soup.”
Come on. Jackson laughed, nudging her with his elbow. Pilar’s a really nice girl. Cute, too.
Yeah? Lina cast a dark glance off her shoulder. I hadn’t really noticed.
And I think it would do Brandon a world of good, Jackson signed. Leaning into her, jostling her playfully for a second time, he added with a wink, I don’t think he’s ever even kissed a girl, never mind been laid.
Lina choked, stumbling across the threshold as Jackson held the door open for her. She lost her footing again and went tumbling for a second time, this time searing rug burns into her knee caps and palms.
“You alright, Lina?” she heard her mother ask, and she looked up to find Latisha coming out of the kitchen with a fresh cup of coffee, still dressed in her pink quilted bathrobe, her hair tucked behind her ears.
“Uh, yeah.” With a grimace, she limped to her feet, flapping away Jackson’s attempts to help her. “Just clumsy, I guess.” She went to her mother, leaning in to kiss her cheek. “Morning, Mama. I hope we didn’t wake you.”
“Not at all. You kids have a good run?”
“Oh…” Lina shrugged. “It was okay. There was, uh…” She cut a glance at Jackson. “…something going on over on Coral Drive. A bunch of police cars and stuff. We didn’t stick around long enough to see much.”
The bathroom door opened and Brandon came out. He’d taken a shower, apparently, which surprised and puzzled Lina. He’d taken off so quickly from the yard earlier, she’d thought something was wrong, despite his assurances to the contrary. She’d wondered if maybe he really had hurt himself somehow when he’d fallen earlier, or if the crime scene had upset him.
“Hey,” she said. “You okay?”
He’d redressed in his running clothes, but mopped at his wet hair with a towel. When he met her gaze, he smiled somewhat sheepishly and nodded. I’m fine, he signed, draping the towel over his shoulder to free up both hands. Just got overheated, I think.
I think I’m going to try and hook Brandon and Pilar up, Jackson had told her outside, and all at once, Lina found herself feeling fiercely possessive—and not at all fond of Valien Cadana’s really-nice-and-cute-too sister.
Not if I can help it, Jackie, she thought with a frown.
****
Brandon walked into the lanai to dig out a chang
e of clothes from his suitcase while Latisha and Lina went into the kitchen to organize breakfast. As he leaned past his bedside table, however, he noticed he had a new text message on his cell phone that he’d received sometime earlier that morning. It was from Augustus: Please let me know you’ve arrived in Florida.
Brandon frowned, still not entirely convinced anymore that Lina was wrong and that Augustus wasn’t manipulating him somehow. We’re here, he typed back. Got in late yesterday afternoon. Everything is fine so far. No sign of any trouble.
That is, he added to himself, unless you counted the dead person they’d found in the culvert a few hours earlier. Oh, and the strange sense I keep getting of other Brethren around me. That’s kind of troubling, too. Not to mention the girl I met today, the one whose bones I wanted to jump right there in the middle of the neighbor’s front yard. Otherwise, everything’s just swell.
He hadn’t expected any immediate reply, considering it had been over an hour since Augustus’s text had been sent, and was about to put his phone back on the table when a response came through.
Keep your mind open, Augustus said. Your senses sharp. Just in case.
Thanks, Grandfather, Brandon wrote. Hesitating with the phone in his hand, he took a long breath, then typed again. Something did happen today, though. I don’t know what it means.
I can be there in less than a day by plane, Augustus said.
Brandon smiled, the first genuine one he’d managed since the mortifying and bizarre encounter with Pilar. All at once, despite the past, despite Lina’s admonitions and the conflict it kept causing between them, any misgivings that might have rekindled for his grandfather were gone. I’ll be damned. He’s worried about me.
It’s nothing like that, he wrote, and then he tried to explain. He told Augustus every last humiliating detail of what had happened that morning, because he feared he was losing control, not just of the bloodlust, but of himself.
That happened to me once, Augustus said. Of all of the responses Brandon might have expected, this wasn’t among them, and he blinked in momentary surprise.
It did? he asked. When?
A long time ago, Augustus replied. Shortly after Christmas, 1792.
For a long moment, there was nothing more, then another message came onto the screen. In it, Augustus said simply: It was the night I met your grandmother.
CHAPTER FIVE
“Thanks for coming in,” Elías Velasco said to Lina as he stepped through the door of a small interrogation room. She, Brandon and Jackson sat in metal folding chairs on three sides of a small rectangular table. Velasco settled himself into a fourth seat on the vacant side, and placed a thin manila file folder onto the table in front of him.
“No problem,” Lina said. Coming up with an excuse to get the three of them out of the house without raising Latisha’s suspicion hadn’t been anywhere near as hard as she’d feared. After a light brunch, Latisha had retreated to her room again to rest. Worried, Lina had followed, watching from the doorway as her mother had slowly sat down against the edge of her bed, then swung her legs around so she could recline.
“Let me help you, Mama,” she’d said, going to her side, getting an arm around her narrow shoulders.
“I’m fine,” Latisha had answered. She’d tried her best to offer a reassuring smile as she’d patted Lina’s cheek. “I think you were right. Yesterday was too much for me, all that cooking. I’m still feeling worn out.”
“Sleep then, Mama, as long as you like—as much as you need.” Lina had kissed her mother’s brow. “We’ll take care of ourselves this afternoon. And we’ll order out for supper tonight.”
In the interrogation room, Jackson leaned back enough in his seat to fold his arms across the breadth of his chest. He awarded Velasco a courteous enough nod during their reintroductions but still had a slight cleft between his brows. Upon their arrival at the precinct, as Velasco had requested, they’d been escorted to the room, then left there awhile—long enough, in any case, to get on Jackson’s impatient nerves.
“This shouldn’t take long,” Velasco began.
“Good,” Jackson interrupted, his scowl deepening. “Because we’ve been sitting here for at least twenty minutes already.”
“I’m sorry about that,” Velasco said with a smile. “And I appreciate your patience. Here’s what we’re going to do. Basically, I’m going to ask each of you to repeat what you told me earlier this morning, only this time…” He pulled out a small digital recorder from his coat pocket and set it in the middle of the table. “…on the record. I’ll have the statements typed up and printed out, then have you come back in a day or two to review and sign them.”
“Is all of this really necessary?” Jackson complained.
For the life of her, she couldn’t comprehend why her brother was behaving like such an ass. Granted, she understood that he had never been a cop, couldn’t anticipate or appreciate the procedural process like she could, couldn’t be excited just to be a part of it—no matter how small the role—but still. He doesn’t have to act like he’s being singled out as a suspect, she thought, shooting him a glower, which Jackson completely ignored. This ‘hassled by the man’ bullshit isn’t getting us out of here any faster.
Seeming unbothered by Jackson’s hostility, Velasco continued to smile. “Afraid so.” He glanced across the table at Brandon, then over at Lina. “Should I…write this down or something for him?”
Brandon seemed as impatient and unhappy about being there as Jackson. He kept fidgeting in his seat, shifting his weight, toying with the key to the rental car, or worse, punching text messages into his phone. She couldn’t see what he was typing, or to whom he was corresponding, but given the fact he seemed to be not-so-nonchalantly trying to prevent her from doing this, she figured it was his grandfather.
If he hadn’t been so damn squirmy, she might have thought it was about the body they’d found, and the fact they’d been called in to give statements, in which case she could have reassured him there was nothing to worry about; it was all standard procedure and there was no need to call in Augustus’s precious army of litigators to rescue them. But because he seemed so uneasy—unusually so, even if he thought they were in some kind of legal trouble—she suspected that he kept texting Augustus about something else entirely, though for the life of her, she couldn’t imagine what.
Brandon had only just now tucked the phone away and glanced up, clearly having missed what Velasco had said. Although he looked at Lina, inquisitive, Jackson answered on his behalf.
“He can read lips,” he growled at the detective. “Same as me. That’s why he sat across from you.”
Velasco laughed clumsily. “Oh. Right.”
True to his word, the detective recorded each of their statements, with Lina interpreting Brandon’s aloud, then snapped off the recorder. The entire process took less time than their initial wait in the interrogation room—a fact that wasn’t lost on Jackson, apparently; when Velasco scooted his chair back and stood, offering his hand in thanks for their trouble, Jackson had uttered a soft snort and a scowl before accepting.
“If you think of anything else, give me a call,” the detective said to Lina. He pulled his wallet out again and handed her a business card.
While Jackson and Brandon went on ahead out the door and into the corridor beyond, Lina hung back. The cop in her longed to ask what he’d seen when he’d ducked into the culvert to examine the body. It had been badly decomposed, that much she had seen—and smelled—enough for herself to know with certainty. She wanted to talk shop with him, pick his mind, just like she would have without hesitation or reservation in the not-so-very-distant past.
“So, uh…” She cut a glance toward the hallway as she accepted the card. Brandon and Jackson had already walked out of sight. “Any idea how long that guy had been down there?”
“Can’t say,” he replied, tucking the digital recorder back into his coat pocket and collecting his folder. “Judging by what I saw them scrape
out of that culvert, I’d guess maybe a month. At least. But then again, that’s not really my thing. I’m just filling in. Our regular homicide detective’s on vacation.”
“What do you do normally?” she asked.
“Me? Gang investigations. I was recruited last year to come to Bayshore. I’m originally from Miami.”
“Recruited?”
He nodded. “You ever hear of Los Pandieros?” When she shook her head, he said, “They’re big-time players down in Miami. I dealt with them a lot when I was on the force there. They’ve been digging in here over the last couple of years.”
“You think they had anything to do with the body in the canal?”
She’d hoped that by her past as a cop, he might loosen up and talk to her. Instead, he smiled again, thin and crooked. “Sorry. I can’t really comment on an open investigation.”
She smiled and nodded politely at this, but in truth, she was disappointed. For a little while at least, she’d remembered what it felt like to be a police officer; to be back in a station, taking part in a questioning—albeit on the opposite side that she’d grown accustomed to. The sounds of phones ringing, papers rustling, computer keyboards clacking and radios crackling—it had all reminded her poignantly, if not painfully, of what she’d lost, what she’d given up when she’d run away with Brandon.
And I miss it, goddamn it, she realized sadly.
****
All afternoon, Brandon fought the urge to draw Lina aside and talk to her, tell her about what had happened with Pilar Cadana. Somehow the idea that he’d inadvertently stumbled upon a seeming nest of Brethren vampires living right next door to Lina’s mother disturbed and unnerved him even more than the fact he’d discovered a dead body pretty much single-handedly less than eight hours ago.
