Psychic Undercover (With The Undead): A Paranormal Mystery (SDF Book 1)

by Amie Gibbons

  I told him absolutely not. We’d be busted so freakin’ fast if he showed up at a vamp and fed party.

  “Remember,” Grant said as we pulled up to the front gate in the van, “we’re there to gather information. Be subtle, chat, mingle. No one goes off on their own.”

  We put in our earbuds and Amanda said something to the gate guards to get us past them. I glanced at the monitors to make sure everything was workin’ okay.

  “Whoa,” Amanda breathed over the earbuds.

  “What?” Grant asked.

  “Damn, you guys need to see this place.”

  “We’re not here to sightsee, Stone. Is there a good place to let us off and park the van?”

  “Probably behind the pool house, Grant,” she said after a moment.

  “Probably?”

  “I will make sure it is or find another spot, sir.”

  The van stopped and we got out when Amanda gave the all clear.

  The view was blocked by the, I’m assuming pool house. We did our checks on the tech and walked around the pool house.

  Whoa so did not cover it.

  The grounds sprawled around us, going on far enough to have the pool, its house, and a tennis court, and that was just on this side of the mansion.

  And it was a mansion. It rose in front of us, all white columns, wraparound porch, and balconies on both upper levels, like somethin’ outta an antebellum movie.

  “Jaw up, Ryder,” Grant said. “I’d think you saw houses like this back home.”

  “Oh, I mean, we have a nice house, but this… this is like a plantation. I was wonderin’ how they’d get five hundred plus people into one party. Never mind, no fire marshal needed here.”

  “Ryder, breathe.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “So you really think another demon will show?” Dan asked.

  “I know it,” Grant said.

  “Sir?” I asked.

  “Gut feeling, Ryder.”

  Huh, maybe his famous instincts were part of his magic?

  ###

  “Hey!” Len greeted a little too brightly when he opened the door. He was in a grey suit with a purple top and matching hat. “No invites of course, but...” He stepped back, the meaning clear: ‘Come in if you can.’

  So we did.

  “Won’t that no invites thing keep out vamps?” I asked.

  “If they haven’t been invited before, yes,” Len said. “But we chose this place because so many of us have been here for some party or another that I can guarantee everyone who wants to come will be able to.”

  The house was split in the foyer by large sweeping stairs, living room on one side and what was probably a dining room judgin’ by the corner of a table I glimpsed on the other.

  The large living room was a treat for the senses. The carpet was beige and plush. Thick, dark green velvet curtains covered the many windows, and the furniture was all squishy leather lined with velvet pillows. The walls were covered with soft, off-white wallpaper with gentle gold swirls, and all lined with modern art and shelves covered in leather bound books.

  Classical music played in the background and I could tell it was live before I could even see the musicians.

  “There’s tons of people you need to meet,” Len said, takin’ my arm and leading me into the living room, the guys close behind.

  “Is the queen going to be here?” I asked.

  “Possibly. She sometimes comes to things like this, but if she does, well… we’ll deal with that bridge if it comes up. So, we’re all really excited. No nest in history has ever worked with human cops like this. This is the beginning of a new era.”

  “We’ll see,” Grant said.

  “Oh, so serious.” Len tossed a pout over his shoulder and Grant frowned. “Lighten up, Special Agent Grant. This is supposed to be fun.”

  “No. This is work.”

  “Can’t it be both?” Carla walked up to us in a fantastic leopard print dress I could never pull off in a million years, from a group of other well-dressed partygoers congregating in the living room. There were maybe forty of them, suggestin’ we really did get here early. I had no idea if there were any of the ones I met at the club Thursday night, they all blended together after a bit, and I plastered a smile on my face.

  It was gonna be a long night.

  “Over here.” Len led us to the bar set up at the back of the room.

  The man next to the bar turned and waved at us. He looked like an aged Calvin Klein model with his impeccable black suit, thick silver hair and classic, chiseled features.

  “Guys, this is Tom. He’s the owner of the property, and kind enough to let us take over his house at the last minute.”

  “Hey, I’m Ariana.” I held out my hand.

  “Hello, love,” he said with a strong British accent as he took my hand.

  Flash.

  A young boy, maybe seven, cried as he held the hand of a young woman wearing black.

  He was perfectly groomed and in a smart black suit. The vision focused in as he lay a white rose on the chest of a boy who looked exactly like him in a coffin.

  “Mommy, why isn’t Colin coming back?” he asked in a small voice.

  The women fell to her knees and pulled him into a hug. “Because God wants him now, baby. It’s okay. It’ll be okay.”

  “But I’m going to miss him. Can’t we ask God to give him back?”

  The child’s confusion washed over me and I knew it would be months before he truly grasped what death meant.

  “Ryder?” Grant asked as my eyes refocused.

  “What did you see?” Tom asked.

  I guess Len told him about me.

  “Um, you want me to say it out loud?” I asked.

  He grinned. “Why not? We’re all friends here.”

  “You at your twin brother Colin’s funeral. You gave him a white rose.”

  “Oh.” His face fell as he blinked and backed away. “You really are psychic.”

  “You thought I was lying, darling?” Len asked.

  Tom nodded and gulped.

  I looked from Tom to Grant. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  “I asked.” He took a deep breath and walked away.

  “He can handle vampires, but not psychics?” I asked Len. He shrugged.

  “Why did you tell him?” Grant asked.

  “He’s hosting,” Len said. “I know he’s not the traitor.”

  Grant got up in his face. “Not the point. You don’t compromise an op. You don’t tell people about her. You got that?”

  “Look out, you’re turning me on.” Len’s smile faltered and Grant’s glare stayed right in place.

  “You don’t put her at risk. You. Got. That?”

  Len gulped. “Yeah… got it.”

  Grant backed off and I sighed, rubbin’ my chest bone.

  “How many people did you tell?” Grant said.

  “Tell what?” Len said.

  Grant met his eyes again and Len grinned, but it didn’t reach his eyes.

  “I, ugh, told a few people,” Len said. “Bigger draw, you know?”

  “She’s not a fucking sideshow. And you just blew this op.”

  “No! I only told people who were… I mean, only ones who could be trusted.”

  “If they know about her, then others do, and all we need is for it to get to that one person who’s here tonight, who shouldn’t know, because they’ll be able to avoid her in a big crowd, and we’ll never know it.”

  “The people I told can be trusted.”

  “To keep their mouths shut?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s what Quil said about you.”

  Ouch.

  Len’s face fell and Grant walked off.

  Something told me he’d be back soon.

  “I swear, Ariana, I didn’t tell anyone who’d ever do this, and most of them already knew from the nest meeting anyway.”

  I rubbed his arm. “Yeah, but Grant’s got a point. You
told people, they tell people, and then secret’s out. And all it takes is the wrong person knowing to put everyone in jeopardy.”

  “There a story there?” Len asked as he grabbed one of the glasses of already poured wine and handed it to me.

  “I, uh, told the wrong person I was psychic a bit after I got my powers. Kind of tried to keep it under wraps after that.” I took a long sip, not even tasting anything past the metal coatin’ my tongue.

  Len stared at me.

  “One of my friends had a big mouth, no clue who told the wrong person there, but I… um, was kidnapped.”

  His eyes flew wide.

  “Yeah, by a group that wanted me to use my powers to help them. They were one of those groups of people who are hired to go around the country to riot and cause trouble, you know? They wanted me to help them keep the operation under wraps, tell them when the cops were onto them. I didn’t know what I was doing and couldn’t see the future, and they didn’t believe me. They had me locked in a converted barn for over two days. And they…”

  I took another long gulp. “Well, it wasn’t fun. It could’ve been worse. Sooooo much worse. One of them… he wanted to try to break me, thought I was holdin’ out on them. If the others weren’t there, he would’ve… Anyway, Grant was leadin’ the team of FBI agents assigned to my case. He busted in, gun up, scared one of the guys into peeing. The bad one, well, he tried to run and Grant knocked him out so fast. I’d never seen anything like it.”

  “He saved you,” Len said, lookin’ at something over my shoulder.

  “Well, there was a whole team behind him, but yeah, Grant was the one up front and knockin’ out teeth. Anyway, he untied me, made some joke about me singin’ and they’re all still in jail for kidnapping and conspiracy.”

  “I haven’t heard this story.”

  I turned and smiled as Quil wrapped his arm around my waist. Grant stood next to him. So they were what Len had been lookin’ at?

  “Hey, sweets.” Quil gave me a quick kiss.

  “About time you got here.”

  My eyes drank him up. He looked good in his black suit and greenish blue top.

  “You saved her?” Quil asked Grant.

  “We did,” Grant said.

  “How did you know she wasn’t some kind of demon?” Quil asked and I turned my head and glared. “I just mean those people could have had a demon trapped or something else with power, who just looked like an innocent girl, and these guys didn’t know for sure before they saved you.”

  “She was reported missing by human parents,” Grant said. “And I knew. We were looking for her over a day, and we found her because of the singing. A demon doesn’t sing when it’s trapped. It fights to get out.”

  “She’s got great lungs,” Quil said.

  “Yes, she does,” Grant said, lockin’ eyes with Quil.

  Was I missing something?

  “Introduce us to others,” Grant said after a moment. “Not sure it will do much good after you opened your mouth, but we can try.”

  Len’s mouth worked and Quil said, “He’s my man, this is on me, Grant. I’ll take care of it.”

  “You better,” Grant said. “Let’s go.”

  “Of course,” Len said.

  “You ready?” Quil asked, takin’ my hand.

  I downed the rest of the glass, grabbed another and nodded.

  “Good.” Grant led the way and Len had to quick march to get to the first small group before him so he could properly introduce us.

  “Hey, darling,” Len said to the first vamp we came to, a short, baby-faced one with black hair and eyes so dark they were nearly black, and kissed him hello.

  Grant held up a warnin’ finger at Dan.

  “This is Sampson DuMaj,” Len said. “And Sam, these are the feds.” Len indicate us dramatically. “Special Agents Grant.” He paused. “What’s your first name?” Grant shook his head and Len rolled his eyes. “Fine, and this is Jet Kowalski, Daniel Bridges, and Ariana Ryder.”

  The vamp shook everyone’s hands and I got a quick film cut of him being turned on the ground with firing overhead.

  Len decided the one on one meet and greet would take too long, so he jumped onto the bar and waved widely to get everyone’s attention.

  “Everyone, these are the federal agents of the FBI’s Special Division Force.” He introduced us all, said we’d be coming around, and told everyone to have fun and mingle.

  Him and Quil led me around the room after my teammates peeled off.

  It took a while for Grant to leave, but it was a crowded room and I was with two guys who so far had proved pretty trustworthy, as far as watching out for me, at least.

  Dan was flirting with Stephanie when we found her. Quil made her shake my hand and all I got was her being bit two years ago. She was a bomb maker workin’ for the DOD before she was turned.

  I shook more hands than I could count and had a First Impression off of about half, I guess I met more at the club than I thought. But nothing tellin’ me if any of them were traitors.

  They all knew this time what I was, and every single one wanted to know what I saw when I touched them.

  “Ohhhh, really?” Minnet, about the millionth person in, asked after I told her I saw her when she was on stage for the first time as the lead ballerina. I got a double-whammy off her and the second was of her being bit after a performance by a young man, or rather a young looking vamp, who loved her dancing. “You can get two off one touch?”

  “I’ve gotten as much as three off one touch,” I said. “Actually, I’ve gotten three coherent ones. I was drunk once, and only once, believe you me, and the entire world was a mix of visions. I saw about ten at once and just couldn’t keep track, so everything was a ton of colors and voices that I could only get one or two words outta before I focused on another. That wasn’t pretty. Grant had to take me up to the hotel room and lock me in there cuz I wanted to go out and play with the colors and unicorns. According to him anyway. I don’t remember anything after my fourth drink.” I frowned. “Or was it my fifth?”

  “And you saw all that in that two seconds?” she asked. Even after two-hundred years touring around the world, she still had her melodious French accent.

  “Yup.”

  I found out pretty fast vamps are touchy-feely. They hugged and stroked arms, and weren’t shy about the public displays. They didn’t do anything gross really, there was just a lot of kissing going on, and they hung all over each other.

  I know the touchin’ made Grant uncomfortable. Not them on each other, it was when they treated us like one of them that he started to get his lemon look.

  My hair, arms, and even neck were stroked more times than a puppy in a pet store. I don’t mind people touching me, I’m always runnin’ my hands all over everything. I did even before I got my visions.

  But Grant didn’t like it. I saw his hand twitch to his gun more times than I could count. I was just waitin’ for one to try to kiss him. Now that would have been funny. And potentially disastrous. But none tried to kiss any of our team. At least, not that I saw.

  I made the rounds, Quil guiding me the entire time. He had no problems giving the other vamps quick kisses hello and I’m sure it should’ve seemed stranger to me than it did. Honestly, they all acted like it was so normal, it stopped bugging me the third or fourth time he kissed someone else.

  Although, it may have been the alcohol makin’ me so tolerant.

  Len made sure to keep the drinks coming and I had four glasses in an hour to keep my visions going strong, way too much for me.

  We met everyone there so far in the first hour or so. No traitors, which was a good thing, but it meant the vision marathon had been a waste of time.

  I collapsed on one of the poufy chairs in the furthest corner I could find without wandering to one of the empty rooms. Quil sat with me, and lay my head on his cool, hard chest to stroke my hair.

  “You did great.” He kissed my burning forehead.

  “My brain
’s on fire.”

  “I noticed. Do you need an aspirin?”

  “Doesn’t help. I tried in the past.”

  “Has it gotten hot enough for you to go to the hospital before?”

  “Never life threatenin’, but I seem to have a high boilin’ point. It goes up to about one oh four or so and I’m fine.”

  “I think it’s higher than that now. Let me know if you need blood, okay?”

  “Oh okay.” I closed my eyes and dozed on his chest.

  People and vamps fluttered about me. Some stopped to talk to Quil, and I just lay against him. Even when they sat down with us and started petting me, I didn’t move.

  “How are you doing?” Grant’s voice broke through some time later.

  “I’m cookin’, General,” I said. “Nobody came up with… er, nobody’s showin’ up as a traitor.”

  “Why is she slurring?”

  Was I?

  “She’s got a high fever and that’s with alcohol helping her psychic powers,” Quil said. “I’m getting worried.”

  “She needs food and water now,” Grant said. “I’ll be right back.”

  “Does food help the fever?” Quil asked.

  Took me a second to realize he was talkin’ to me. I shrugged.

  “Is there food in the kitchen or somethin’?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Quil said.

  I drifted off again and too soon something shook my shoulder.

  “Come on, Ariana,” Grant said, softer than I’d ever heard him speak to anyone. “We need to get some food in you.”

  Something smelled delicious and I cracked my eyes to see Grant holdin’ a plate of roast, mashed potatoes and green beans, and a bottle of water.

  My stomach rumbled and I nodded, takin’ the plate, sitting up more, but keepin’ half my weight on Quil and the couch.

  Grant handed me the water and I chugged half of it before going for the food.

  “Okay,” I said after a few minutes and another bottle and a half of water, “I feel better. Little more sober. Little more with it.”

  “We’ve got more people coming in,” Quil said. “Are you up for this?”

  “She needs to rest,” Grant said.

  “No, it’s okay. I can keep going. The alcohol is really helping with the vision exhaustion and the food and water got my fever down.”