Twice Bitten

by Lynsay Sands

  "Apparently," Elspeth said with a shrug.

  "Then why wasn't she charged in this instance?" he asked at once.

  "Because I didn't want her charged," Meredith said firmly. "At least not on my behalf. I got my money back and I didn't want to go through all the trouble of a court case and the embarrassment of admitting to being conned like that. Besides," she added solemnly as she took the tea bags out of the pot, "Madeleine already has other charges to deal with. With or without my charging her, she is going to jail."

  Elspeth merely nodded and murmured, "Thank you" when Meredith poured tea into her cup.

  After ascertaining that Meredith didn't want to charge Madeleine, Elspeth had taken the woman to the police station and ensured she confessed to the other illegal activities she'd been involved with. Meredith hadn't been the first victim. In fact, Madeleine Cartwright hadn't even been her real name. Her birth name was Nina Albrecht. She'd taken on the Madeleine alias because she was already wanted by the police for several similar cases in Alberta, as well as fraud, shoplifting, and writing bad checks. Madeleine/Nina had been arrested on the spot, and since she'd already tried to evade the previous charges by fleeing to Ontario and changing her name, she wouldn't be let out of jail until the court case, and then she wasn't likely to get out for some years.

  "What branch of the police department do you work for?" Wyatt asked Elspeth as his grandmother poured tea into his cup.

  When Elspeth hesitated, it was Merry who answered.

  "She works with a special division that goes over information and tips and decides which are most likely to need investigation, and which are bogus. She also sorts out the threat level involved with the ones that they deem are real," Merry told him, excited color in her cheeks.

  Wyatt's eyebrows rose and he eyed Elspeth speculatively. "Something to do with Crime Stoppers?"

  "Oh, no, it's far more extensive than Crime Stoppers," Meredith said at once. "They get tips and leads about things from all over North America; the US and Canada both. And it isn't just called-in tips. They track large purchases of certain items and such. It's a new initiative," she told him proudly, repeating Elspeth's own explanation a month earlier. "And very exciting."

  "I didn't realize that any of our branches of the police worked directly with the US," Wyatt said, the suspicion in his eyes growing. "Except perhaps the Royal Canadian Mounted Police or the Canadian Security Intelligence Service."

  Elspeth hesitated, and then just shrugged. Now that the adrenaline was dissipating, her earlier exhaustion and pain were returning and she simply couldn't be bothered to make up more lies or defend herself. She considered slipping into his mind to remove his suspicions, but was too tired even to do that. Meredith's grandson could think what he liked for now. She'd deal with him later if he became a problem. Her gaze slid over his hard eyes and grim expression. Wyatt was a very attractive man, or would be if he smiled, she thought.

  "Elspeth?"

  She glanced to her mother, eyebrows rising as she took in her concerned expression.

  "You are swaying in your seat and you have got blood on Meredith's chair," she announced, getting to her feet.

  Frowning, Elspeth looked down to see there was a smudge of blood on the pale gray, faux leather chair she was perched on . . . and she was indeed swaying, she noted with a little concern of her own. More worrisome than that, though, she was starting to have trouble focusing her eyes. She really should have grabbed blood when she got home this morning rather than stumbling to her room. She'd intended to but by the time she'd pulled into the driveway, her only objective had been to get to her bed.

  "Can you stand?"

  Elspeth refocused on her mother to see that she'd grabbed one of the napkins from the holder in the center of the table and was waiting to clean up after her. Nodding, Elspeth forced herself to her feet, but had to grab the table to steady herself as the room began to revolve around her.

  Wow, I'm not in good shape, Elspeth acknowledged with surprise as she noted the way her legs were trembling. She was also sweating like crazy . . . and now the pain was becoming unbearable. Oh jeez, this isn't good, she thought with dismay.

  "Not good at all," her mother agreed in a grim voice as she quickly wiped the blood off the chair. Crumpling the napkin in her hand, she then scooped Elspeth up as if she were still a child.

  Elspeth gasped with surprise and glanced wildly around.

  "I took control of them," Martine said even as Elspeth noted that both Meredith and Wyatt had blank expressions on their faces. Carrying her out of the kitchen, her mother added, "I've given them both a memory that you were weary and we left them to reminisce so that you could retire."

  "Oh," Elspeth breathed and allowed herself to sag in her mother's arms.

  "Do not fall asleep," her mother growled as she carried her out of Merry's apartment and upstairs to Elspeth's. "You have got some explaining to do."

  Two

  "What happened?"

  Elspeth jerked awake at her mother's question, and glanced around to see that they were entering her apartment. She'd obviously dozed off for a few seconds there, she thought as her mother kicked her apartment door closed behind them and continued, "How were you injured?"

  "It's nothing," Elspeth muttered, and then frowned when her mother carried her into the living room, heading for her white sofa. "Not the couch! The blood will ruin it. Take me to my room. My bed has a protector to keep blood off the mattress."

  Her mother paused, and pointed out, "The girls are sleeping in there."

  "The girls can move," Elspeth said abruptly. "It's my bed."

  "But where will they sleep?"

  "A hotel?" Elspeth suggested dryly. She hadn't invited them here and wasn't at all pleased at this "surprise visit." She wasn't giving up her bed.

  Her mother stiffened.

  Suspecting she'd read her thoughts, Elspeth relented enough to say, "There's an air mattress in the linen closet. They can blow it up and sleep in the living room."

  Nodding stiffly, Martine carried her into the hall leading to the bedrooms. Of course, Elspeth's bedroom door was closed. Her younger sisters must have closed it behind them and gone right back to sleep. Too bad. She wanted her bed. Elspeth leaned down to turn the doorknob when her mother paused.

  "Wake up, girls," Martine caroled as she approached the bed. "Up and out of bed, please."

  Neither girl obeyed, but Julianna did groan and pull her pillow over her head to muffle their mother's voice.

  "Julianna and Victoria Argeneau Pimms, get up this instant!" Martine snapped.

  That did the trick. Both girls opened their eyes and sat up at once.

  "What's going on?" Julianna asked, peering at them bleary-eyed.

  "Why are you carrying Elspeth?" Victoria asked on a yawn.

  "Because she is bleeding and obviously injured," Martine snapped. "Now, both of you up and out of that bed at once. Julianna, pull the blankets back so I can lay Elspeth down, and Victoria, go fetch some blood from the kitchen."

  The twins scrambled to do as they were told, Victoria bounding up to run across the bed in her pink babydoll and leaping off to race from the room. Meanwhile, Julianna crawled out to stand next to the bed so that she could fold the sheet and duvet back.

  "Why are you putting her here?" Julianna asked suspiciously.

  "Because it's my bed," Elspeth said dryly as her mother set her down and she sank into the soft, still-warm sheets.

  "But we're sleeping here," Julianna pointed out with a scowl as their mother straightened and hurried out of the room.

  "No, you're not," Elspeth countered. "You and Victoria can sleep in the living room on the blow-up mattress. It's in the linen closet."

  "You're a terrible hostess," Julianna complained, stamping her foot. "You should be the one on the air mattress."

  "I'm not a hostess at all. You weren't invited," Elspeth pointed out in a sharp voice. "And stop stamping on the damned floor. I have neighbors."

  "
So?" she asked with irritation. "If they come up to complain, we'll take control and send them on their way."

  "You will do no such thing," Elspeth growled. "You'll be kind and courteous and apologize nicely and then leave Meredith and her grandson alone."

  When Julianna merely glowered, Elspeth narrowed her eyes on her sister and asked, "Whose idea was this visit?"

  She shrugged unhappily. "Mother was driving us crazy. Without you there to deflect some of her attention, she is beyond unbearable. So I suggested a visit to see if I wouldn't like to move here too, and then, of course, Victoria wasn't staying behind without me. Unfortunately, now Mother's decided that we should all move here," she ended with misery.

  "Seriously?" Elspeth asked with dismay.

  "Yeah, I know. Nightmare city, huh?"

  "The nightmare is that I put up with that crap for over a hundred years before the pair of you were even born, and then I waited until you were both done with school before I finally moved to another continent to escape it, and you two couldn't last even two months before you came chasing after me, dragging her along with you?"

  "You don't know what it's like," Julianna complained as Victoria returned carrying several bags of blood. "She won't let us go anywhere alone. Not even to the bathroom when we're out at restaurants, for God's sake. She makes us go together. And if we take more than a couple minutes, she follows to check on us."

  "At least you have a twin to go with you," Elspeth pointed out. "Mother insisted on walking me to the bathroom like a two-year-old until I was over fifty."

  "See! So you know how bad it is," Julianna said at once.

  Victoria nodded as she dumped the bags of blood on the side of the bed. "It's cray cray."

  Elspeth narrowed her eyes, refusing to feel sympathy for her sisters. She'd been the sole focus of their mother's vulture-like hovering for one hundred eleven years before the twins were born, and then she'd stuck around until now before making her great escape. She'd known her sisters wouldn't last as long as she had, but six weeks?

  "Not even two months," she repeated grimly.

  "It's easier with you around," Victoria said pleadingly. "Mother's focus is spread around a bit more, rather than lasering in on us."

  Elspeth laughed without humor. "Well, I have news for you two. You aren't living here with me. Mother will no doubt buy a house somewhere on the outskirts of the city and move the two of you in there with her, and you're still not going to have me around to take some of the flak. At least, not in the house."

  "No," Julianna groaned with dismay.

  Victoria, however, predicted, "She'll make you move there too."

  Elspeth shook her head firmly. "I'm out, and staying out."

  "Yeah. Until she takes control of you and makes you move," Julianna said dryly.

  Elspeth stiffened at the suggestion. She'd thought she'd escaped that sort of thing when she'd moved to Canada, but there was no reason her mother couldn't do that again just because they were no longer in England. This was exactly why Elspeth had arranged everything for the move ahead of time without telling her mother. She'd even waited until Martine was out of the country with her father and the twins before calling to tell her she was moving. She'd made that call from the taxi on the ride to the airport. It hadn't prevented Martine giving her hell over the phone, but at least she hadn't been able to stop her. Now, thanks to her sisters, all that effort had been for nothing.

  "Julianna, Victoria, fetch the air mattress out of the linen closet and get it ready. You two should be in bed," Martine said firmly as she returned carrying a bowl of steaming water, a washcloth, and a towel. "And Elspeth, you get started on consuming that blood," her mother ordered as she set the bowl of water on the bedside table.

  Elspeth promptly picked up one of the bags Victoria had dumped on the bed and slapped it to her fangs. So long as she had a bag in her mouth, she couldn't be made to talk. Of course, she couldn't prevent her mother from reading her mind and talking to her, she realized as her mother caught her arms to pull her into a sitting position and then set to tugging her jacket off as she accused, "You lied to me."

  "Uh-uh," Elspeth muttered around the bag in her mouth.

  "You said you were coming here for a teaching position. That you could not continue to teach in England because everyone knew everyone else in the industry and it would soon become obvious that you were not aging. That it was smarter for you to move out of country and you preferred Canada because we have so much family here." She tossed the jacket aside and set to work on the long-sleeved black cotton shirt she wore as Elspeth nodded vigorously to indicate that had been the truth.

  Her mother ignored the gesture and continued, "And yet here you are, not teaching, but working as an Enforcer, hunting down rogues."

  Much to her relief, the bag at her mouth was just finishing at that point. Ripping it from her mouth, Elspeth said quickly, "I will be teaching at the university as soon as the summer classes start. I just thought since I had some time on my hands I'd help out at the Enforcer House until then. You know how shorthanded they are what with more than half their force down in Venezuela. They need help. And I'm not hunting down rogues. I'm mostly analyzing the tips and deciding which are soft calls and which are more dangerous."

  The last few words came out muffled as her mother had forced her other arm out of her shirt and chose that moment to tug it off over her head. Tossing it aside, Martine turned to survey her blood-covered side and back. Her mouth tightened. "How does analyzing tips get you stabbed?"

  Elspeth twisted around, just barely managing to get a look at the large wound in her lower back. The sight made her wince. It was much nastier than the slice she'd taken to the leg. Unfortunately, her assailant hadn't just stabbed her in the back. He'd twisted the knife, carving a two-inch hole that was taking much longer to heal than a normal knife wound would. Grimacing, she met her mother's gaze and said, "It was--"

  "Do not lie to me and tell me you have not been going on calls," Martine snapped, cutting her off. "I read your mind and already know you checked out a tip tonight on your way home."

  Heaving a sigh, Elspeth shook her head. Honestly, having a mother who could read your mind was a real pain. It made for extremely well-behaved and miserable children.

  "Fine," she said, the word short. "I sometimes go on soft calls on my way home if they're on my route. Mortimer doesn't know," she added quickly. "And I only ever check out the soft calls, or what the hunters call joke jobs. They are the ones I assess as not being dangerous."

  "Well, you got it wrong this time," her mother said, her expression tight. "This was not a soft call. It was dangerous."

  "It was a soft call," Elspeth assured her. "There was no rogue immortal involved, just a mortal with mental health issues. He was delusional and certain his neighbor was a vampire." Scowling, she added, "Unfortunately, once I realized that, I let my guard down. I followed his wife into the kitchen to talk to her about getting him put in the hospital. He must have been listening outside the door. He decided I must be a vampire too, and the minute I left, he stabbed his wife for colluding with vampires. I heard her scream and rushed back inside, but he was waiting behind the door. He stepped out and stabbed me from behind when I entered."

  Pausing, she sighed wearily and then shook her head. "I was too startled to react until he'd twisted the knife, and then he got in a slash on my leg as I turned to confront him. But then I knocked him out and called the mortal police to tend to the woman and take the husband into custody. But," she added firmly, "it was just a mortal. A soft call."

  "Hmm." Mouth tight, Martine urged Elspeth to turn onto her uninjured side on the bed so that she could wash away the blood on her back.

  Much to Elspeth's relief, when her mother finished cleaning the area, no more blood bubbled to the surface. The bleeding had stopped and the wound itself was smaller. Healing.

  "If he was mentally disturbed, you couldn't wipe his memory alone," her mother said with a frown. "Did you call M
ortimer so that he could arrange it?"

  Elspeth lifted her gaze from her wound to meet her mother's eyes. Grimacing, she admitted, "No. I planned to tell Mortimer all about it when I go in tonight. I thought it could wait since the man is mad and no one would take him seriously anyway."

  "Not good enough," Martine said sternly. "I will call Mortimer immediately and have him take care of it." Martine set the bloodied cloth in the water and stood up. "What is the man's name and where was he taken?"

  Elspeth rattled off the information, relieved to have the woman turn her attention to something else. Otherwise, she had no doubt her mother would be even now continuing to strip her to get to her leg. It was the kind of thing she'd fled England to escape, being controlled and treated like a child. And she'd done it. She'd got away and lived like a real grown-up woman for six whole weeks.

  "I presume you at least took control of the police and ensured they didn't remember you?" Martine asked as she picked up the wireless phone on Elspeth's bedside table and punched in numbers.

  "Of course, Mother," Elspeth said with exasperation.

  "Do not 'of course, Mother' me. You did not ensure the madman was handled. How am I to know you did not leave the police with their memories too?" she asked sharply.

  "Because I'm not an idiot," Elspeth said resentfully, but her mother wasn't listening. Mortimer had apparently answered.

  After gesturing sternly at the blood bags on the mattress next to her, Martine moved away to explain the situation to Mortimer.

  Elspeth grabbed another bag and popped it to her fangs with relief. She should have headed to the refrigerator and taken in blood the minute she arrived home the first time. In fact, seeking out her bed instead had been incredibly stupid. If her sisters hadn't already been occupying it, and she'd simply have flopped on the bed and passed out . . . Well, she wouldn't have died, but she would have woken up in horrible pain later.

  Elspeth could only think that shock from her injuries was the reason she hadn't gone for the fridge when she first got home.

  But it had been anxiety and a shot of adrenaline that'd had her racing down to her landlady's door the moment she heard that a man had let her mother and sisters into her apartment, she acknowledged as she tugged the empty bag off her fangs and slapped a fresh one to it. She'd feared the worst for Meredith. That either the woman had suffered a heart attack or stroke and a friend or family member had been in the apartment gathering things for her, or that someone had broken in and, having tied up Meredith, had pretended to be the landlord when her mother and sisters had knocked.