Thicker than Blood (Zoe Bentley Mystery)

by Mike Omer

  “So,” she said. “Nate said you have some questions. Are you two journalists?”

  “I’m a psychologist,” Zoe said.

  Tatum leaned on the counter, deciding to let Zoe run the show.

  “Okay. What is this? Are you writing some sort of academic paper?” Carmela asked.

  “Something like that. We’re interested in a specific case. A person in Chicago.”

  “Uh-huh. What do you want from me?”

  “Did you hear about other people with your . . . condition in Chicago?”

  Carmela raised an eyebrow. “Other vampires, you mean?”

  Zoe hesitated for just a moment. “Yes.”

  “Sure. There’s a whole community here.” She said it matter-of-factly, and Tatum wasn’t sure if she was being ironic or serious.

  “A community of vampires?”

  “Yeah. Ninety-six, last time I checked.”

  “Seriously?” Tatum blurted.

  She shrugged. “Why would I lie? You think vampires are so rare? There are over five thousand self-proclaimed vampires in the entire world. And those are just the ones we know about.”

  “All drinking blood?” Zoe asked.

  “Nah. Some are psychic vampires.”

  Tatum tried not to roll his eyes. “Psychic vampires?”

  “You know, that tone you have right now? Not cool. Yeah, psychic vampires. They drain psychic energy.” She shrugged. “Or that’s what they say. I don’t go around knocking down people’s beliefs. Stones in a glass house and all that.”

  “But you feed on human blood, right?” Zoe asked.

  “Well, duh.”

  “And you believe you need it to survive?” Tatum asked.

  “I need it to stay healthy,” she said. “I get headaches and dizzy spells. Sometimes all my joints ache. A little blood, and it’s all gone.”

  Tatum’s and Zoe’s eyes met.

  “Oh, yeah, I see what you’re thinking,” Carmela said. “Placebo effect, right? You think I have some made-up psychological illness, and when I drink blood, I get better because I believe it’s helping me.”

  “What do you think?” Zoe asked.

  “I wish that was the case,” Carmela said. “Hell, I’d love to find out I don’t need blood. It’s not like they sell it in the supermarket. Sometimes it’s a real pain in the ass to get some. But I didn’t find anything else that helps.”

  “What first made you think that blood helps?” Zoe asked.

  “I always had headaches and dizzy spells, even as a kid,” Carmela said. “Then, when I was thirteen, I drank some of my friend’s blood on a dare. And guess what? Poof—no more headache.”

  “Back to the case at hand,” Tatum said. He suspected Zoe could spend all day talking to Carmela about vampirism. He wasn’t particularly interested. “Can you give us a list of all, uh . . . self-proclaimed vampires in Chicago?”

  “Hell, no.” Carmela screwed up her nose. “You think I’d go and out all the community like that? The majority of them are totally in the coffin, won’t even tell their parents, not to mention two randos.”

  In the coffin. Tatum had to smile.

  “This is very important,” Zoe said.

  “Yeah? So’s our secrecy. What do you think happens if people around us figure out we drink people’s blood? Do you think they’d care it’s all voluntary? They’d lynch us.”

  “We won’t tell anyone,” Tatum said.

  “Dude, no offense, but I just met you guys, and it’s pretty clear both of you are freaked out by my identity.”

  Well, you do drink people’s blood. Tatum kept his mouth shut, but judging by the way Carmela eyed him, he didn’t do a great job at hiding the way he felt.

  “We can get a warrant for that list,” Tatum said.

  She stared at him. “Didn’t you say you’re psychologists?”

  “She’s a forensic psychologist,” Tatum said, leaning over the counter, fishing his badge from his pocket. “I am a federal agent.”

  Well, at least now all three of them were freaked. Carmela looked as if he’d just announced he was Van Helsing or Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

  “You two should leave,” she blurted, taking a step back.

  “One of your friends killed a woman a couple of days ago,” Tatum said. “We need to know who.”

  “I don’t know anyone who killed . . . everything we do is voluntary. We use donors!”

  “Until one of you flips out, kills someone for her blood.”

  “I’m telling you, no one in the community would ever kill anyone.”

  “You know them all that well? All ninety-six?”

  A flicker of hesitation. Both of them leaned over the counter, eyes intent on Carmela.

  “Look,” Carmela said, her voice trembling, eyes wet. “I don’t even know them that well? I don’t go to the parties or the events? And I’m not a lifestyler or anything—I don’t have a cape at home?” Her tone shifted, each sentence ending in a question. “I just need a drop of blood every now and then to feel okay? It’s not like I have a list of crypts in my pocket, or whatever?”

  “But you have contacts,” Tatum said. “Emails, probably some sort of Twitter users. Hashtag Chicago-vampires-for-the-win? Do you really want us to get a search warrant for your computer and phone?”

  They couldn’t; he knew that. No judge would sign it. And if she had two brain cells, she must have known it too. But there’s knowing, and there’s really knowing. And when you were afraid, even the things you usually took for granted were suddenly examined again. He watched her frantic tear-filled eyes, imagining what was going on in her mind. Could they really do that? What if I’m a suspect? What if they took me to an interrogation room, like on TV? And all the news articles about police brutality, and unconventional investigation techniques, and dirty cops who didn’t follow the rules, were playing into their hands, inflating her fear.

  “I know this guy,” she finally blurted. “He’s also a vampire, but he knows everyone here. Like, totally everyone. He’d be able to help you two for sure.”

  “Give us his name.”

  She shook her head. “No. I’ll talk to him first. No way am I outing him to you two without making sure it’s fine with him first.”

  The slightest pressure would get them the guy’s name, phone, address, and favorite color. But they also wanted cooperation. And it wasn’t like this woman was going anywhere.

  “Fine,” he said. “Set up a meeting with him. But if we don’t hear from you soon—”

  “You will,” she exclaimed. “I promise you will.”

  CHAPTER 16

  Zoe fished another pizza slice from the box, her eyes intent on the screen, poring through a long document in fascination.

  She’d been half-sure Carmela was deluded when she had talked about the number of self-proclaimed vampires. As soon as they returned to the office, she began researching it online and quickly found something named the Atlanta Vampire Alliance. The alliance published the results of some surveys filled out by over a thousand individuals from the vampire community. The amount of data was immense, and Zoe was pleasantly surprised by its quality. Data and graphs were her drug of choice, and she was happy to see at least one vampire seemed to share her affection for them. She read off her findings to Tatum.

  “There’s a high correlation between self-identified vampires to self-identified Goths.” She took a bite from her pizza.

  “Not much surprise there.” Tatum grunted.

  “Yeah.” Zoe had to agree. She scrolled down a couple of graphs. Her bandaged finger prickled slightly. She half regretted her decision to let the librarian drink her blood. It was a bit creepy, and she kept remembering the sensation of the woman’s mouth around her finger. A shiver ran down her spine. Yuck.

  When she was a teen, she loved shows and books about vampires. They had an inherent sexiness to them. But whatever the allure was, Carmela the librarian didn’t have it.

  Tatum rolled his chair over to her cubicle a
nd took the last slice of pizza from the box. “I have a few leads from ViCAP, but nothing that really clicks,” he said. “And none of the cases are in Chicago. I’ll do some phone calls tomorrow, follow up on the names, see if I can locate them.”

  “Okay.” Zoe closed the document. As much as she was interested in the vampire community, she doubted these statistics could help them tighten their killer’s profile. “There’s a Chicago PD database for local crimes. I used it in the Alston case.”

  Tatum groaned. “Fine, I’ll talk to O’Donnell tomorrow about it.”

  “Why don’t we do it together right now?” she asked. “We could finish up with it in a few hours.”

  “Seriously?”

  She glanced at him. He seemed weary, his eyes bloodshot, his shirt rumpled. They’d been working nonstop on this case for more than a week, trying to squeeze every minute from their time in Chicago. But it took its toll. She opened her mouth to tell him never mind, it really was late, when someone cleared his throat behind her. It was one of the agents, a guy named John. Or was it Jerry? She was almost sure it was John.

  “Hey,” John-or-Jerry said. He stretched it out, saying it throatily, like Fonzie from Happy Days. “How are you two doing?”

  “Fine,” Zoe answered.

  “You leaving for the day, John?” Tatum asked.

  She was right—it was John. Zoe felt an inkling of satisfaction.

  “Yeah, I wanted to tell you a few of us are going to head out for a drink. We were wondering if you want to come.”

  He spoke to them both but looked solely at Tatum.

  “That sounds nice,” Tatum said. He glanced at her, giving her a smile. “What do you say? I could use a break.”

  She was surprised to realize that a small voice in her head wanted to go. Not because she needed a drink or because she was tired. But because it sounded nice to go out with a group of people.

  But it was a very small voice. Drowned by the fact that it would be a waste of time. That Glover was out there. That they wouldn’t have invited her if it wasn’t for Tatum. That she’d have to make small talk, and the music would be loud.

  “You go ahead,” she said to Tatum. “I might join you in a little while. I want to wrap up some stuff.”

  “You sure?”

  She nodded. “Leave me the car. I’ll call you once I’m done.”

  Tatum left with John. She heard him say something unintelligible, John laughing heartily. She considered getting up and following them.

  Instead, she called O’Donnell.

  The detective answered almost immediately. “Hello?”

  “It’s Zoe Bentley. I wanted to ask—you have some sort of database of local criminal activity, right?”

  “Yeah,” O’Donnell replied. “The CLEAR system.”

  “That’s right,” Zoe said, recalling the acronym. “Can I log into CLEAR?”

  “You’ll need a username and password, but it’s no big deal; federal agents can get them. You need to submit a security form signed by your chief.”

  “I hoped to log in today.” Zoe bit her lower lip. “Can you give me your username and password?”

  “Forget it. I’m not giving you my user. I can’t even imagine the shit I’d go through if anyone found out I gave my user and password to someone unauthorized.”

  Zoe expected as much. “Can you run a few searches for me yourself?”

  “Listen, Bentley, it might surprise you, but I have my own leads to pursue.” She sounded edgy, exhausted. “If you want, you can drop by here. The office is almost empty—we’d practically have it for ourselves. I’ll let you use the system from my computer. How’s that?”

  “Drop by the station?” Zoe asked.

  “You’re in the FBI office, right? It’s just a ten-minute drive. Call me once you get here.”

  Zoe had already put her coat on. “See you soon.”

  O’Donnell wasn’t kidding when she’d said they’d have the office to themselves. Zoe found the silence almost eerie.

  The Violent Crimes Section in the station was a large open space with three rows of L-shaped desks, each one with its own tidbit of personality. One had a bunch of potted flowers, the next was covered in Post-its with brisk unintelligible scrawls, a third lined with family photos. But they were all empty, their occupants long gone for the night. When Zoe had arrived, one other detective still worked in the corner of the room, but he hardly bothered glancing at Zoe as she followed O’Donnell to her desk. When the detective left, he grunted something that could have been good night, and O’Donnell answered in kind. And then it was just the two of them. The desk was just wide enough so they could sit side by side, their shoulders inches apart.

  O’Donnell was going through a thick stack of printed papers—Catherine Lamb’s phone call activity—matching calls to contacts, marking numbers that appeared repeatedly. Zoe sat by her side in front of the computer, the CLEAR system open. She carefully went through murder cases or violent cases that involved bite marks, needles, or strange cuts. She made a note of any case that seemed worth investigating further, noting the location, the date, the detectives in charge. Zoe usually accompanied this kind of methodical work with music. But in the thunderous silence that encapsulated them, she suspected it would bother O’Donnell, even if she wore earphones.

  The problem with her search was that needle marks appeared frequently in the case files when the crimes were drug related. That added a lot of noise to the results, making the search for patterns almost impossible. She wondered if she should ignore the cases that involved needles altogether. After all, the medical examiner had mentioned that the needle marks on Catherine’s arm indicated inexperience. Even if unsub beta had attacked someone before, it was more likely he’d bite them or cut them to drink their blood. On the other hand, she didn’t want to miss anything important. She bit her lip as she contemplated her dilemma.

  “I need the computer for a sec,” O’Donnell muttered.

  “Sure.” Zoe tried to move away, but she couldn’t back her chair more than a few inches without ramming into the desk behind her. She was about to stand up and do the shuffling dance—squeeze behind O’Donnell to let her through—when O’Donnell simply leaned over Zoe, grabbing the computer mouse. Zoe awkwardly pushed her chair to the corner to give O’Donnell access to the keyboard. The detective smelled of lavender. She wore a different shirt than she had that morning. She must have showered in the station. That made Zoe think of her own odor after a very long day.

  O’Donnell was intent on the screen, a strand of blonde hair draped on her cheek. She had very long eyelashes. It was a weird thing to notice—Zoe never paid much attention to eyelashes.

  “Just two more,” O’Donnell said. She was checking some names to see if they had a police record.

  “Sure, no problem,” Zoe said.

  Both names returned blank results. O’Donnell pulled away. “Thanks.”

  “It’s your computer.”

  O’Donnell nodded distractedly. She marked a line on the page. “Where’s Agent Gray?”

  “I think he went out for a drink.”

  O’Donnell raised an eyebrow. “Really? Leaving you to do all the dirty work?”

  Her tone was teasing, casual, but Zoe frowned in annoyance. Tatum had worked his ass off on this case, had in fact volunteered to work on it. They’d worked weekends and deep into the nights. The mere thought that O’Donnell would suggest Tatum was slacking off raised Zoe’s hackles. “We’ve been working really hard on this case for a very long time.”

  “It’s okay, I was only—”

  “I don’t see your own partner sitting here, contributing anything to the investigation.”

  It was as if a layer of frost instantly coated the air between them. The tiny smile that had been hovering on O’Donnell’s lip dissipated. “Right.” Her voice was sharp, angry. She turned back to her papers.

  Zoe turned back to her search queries, feeling that jolt of indignation that came when masking guilt
.

  The next twenty minutes stretched as she did search after search. She’d decided to keep looking for cases with needle marks. If it made this evening longer, it couldn’t be helped.

  Her stomach grumbled. They’d been there for a couple of hours, and she hadn’t really eaten a proper dinner—just two slices of pizza. But seeing as there was hardly any noise in the room, her stomach’s growling filled the space, almost sounding like the rumble of distant thunder. She shifted uncomfortably. Cleared her throat. Another growl. O’Donnell’s lips quirked slightly. She opened a drawer, got a jar out of it, placed it between them. It was full of assorted nuts.

  “Help yourself.” She opened it and took a handful. “It’s my night snack.”

  “Thanks.” Zoe took a few nuts, ate one, enjoying the saltiness. “These are good.”

  “Only the best for my guests.” Her tone was still cold.

  “Your partner probably has a good reason for not being here,” Zoe suggested as a peace offering.

  “I don’t have a partner.”

  “Oh. Isn’t it mandatory for detectives in your department to work in pairs?”

  “There are exceptions.”

  “Are you one of the exceptions?”

  O’Donnell didn’t answer, flipping a page in the call records. Zoe waited it out, but it seemed like their discussion was done. She sighed, turning back to the computer. Conversations seemed so easy when other people had them. But for Zoe, a conversation was a delicate butterfly she invariably managed to squash.

  After ten minutes, O’Donnell placed the stack of papers on the desk with a loud thump. “Well, Catherine Lamb sure talked on the phone a lot, and with a bunch of different people.”

  “Anything stand out?” Zoe asked, glancing at the pages. The top sheet had some rows marked with a bright-green marker.

  “A few repeat numbers. The most frequent number is her father’s, both ingoing and outgoing calls. She has two female friends who talk to her occasionally, though lately they initiated all the calls, and the conversations were short. She talked with Patrick Carpenter every three or four days, and there are a few other repeat numbers here. She was both the church’s administrator and a religious counselor, so I guess the variety of phone calls is no surprise.”