by R. E. Carr
“Well, yeah,” Bernard said with a shrug. “You’re a bloodsucker who can barf flammable acid. Like we would really leave you alone.”
Gail looked over at the now red-faced giant otherwise known as Williams. He seemed to retreat under his mass of long curls and wild beard. She frowned deeply at him. “I thought you knew me, Tom,” she said, letting the disappointment drip from her fangs. “I’m going to go eat someone, since all my work is a mess.”
“Gail!” she heard him call after her. She marched all the way out to the parking lot, peeling off her lab coat and unbuttoning her top few buttons on her way to the car.
“You are a ferocious, powerful, creature of the night,” she chanted as she stared into her nonexistent reflection in the side mirror of her appropriated nineties Taurus. “You are a ruthless killer, a noble monster, and the biggest damn badass you can possibly be.”
She smiled at her sledgehammer perched in the passenger seat. “Tonight, you are gonna kick ass, take names, and eat like a queen. Isn’t that right, Baxter?” she asked her inanimate companion.
Not a half hour later, she found herself perched in the corner of a diner, nibbling on undercooked bacon and sipping milky tea, a paperback splayed open on her placemat while she listened to the new Taylor Swift album on her phone. Soon she was so lost in her story, tapping her feet and making her headphone cables sway, that she almost missed a flicker out of the corner of her eye.
“What now?” Gail asked as she slid her napkin into her book and slammed it shut. She let out her breath slightly as she saw a scruffy, slovenly Steven DeMarco shuffling towards her booth. “Do they have me LoJacked or something?”
The waitress sneered a little as she got a whiff of Gail’s new companion. Steve plopped into the booth across from Gail, rattling her dishes and nearly sloshing her fresh tea. Steve let out a little belch and waved over the confused girl.
“You’re in a bathrobe in public,” Gail hissed.
“This dude abides,” Steve said, before turning to the waitress. “Coffee, and a steak, and eggs, my dear. Also, can you lean in a little, there’s something on your collar.”
Gail watched, gobsmacked, as the woman gave Steve a tremendous eye roll but still leaned over so that her sizable front assets were easily within his grasp. He whispered into her ear, and the poor girl’s face went pink. She giggled. “You’re incorrigible!”
“You’re in my bathrobe in public,” Gail deadpanned as she took in the floral, quilted pattern. The waitress stumbled back and gave Steve a wink.
“I’ll see you later, cutie,” the girl said, sashaying away.
Steve yawned, and Gail had to wave away the eighty-proof waft of halitosis. She looked around the lip of the table and saw her lambskin-lined house shoes on Steve’s hairy feet. “How do those even fit you?”
“I couldn’t wear socks,” he said with a shrug. “You must have barges in your granny shoes. It’s probably from being on your feet all day. Why are you looking at me like that? Gail?”
“How the hell did you find me?”
Steve raised a brow. “Because you texted me and told me to meet you here.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Yes . . . you did.”
“No, I—” She grabbed her phone and unlocked it with a furious bit of thumb action. She whipped the screen around triumphantly. Her gloating faded slightly as she realized in her fury she was showing her playlist rather than her text history. She sighed and began tapping again, finally grinning as she could display no recent texts sent.
“Wow, you nicknamed me Ex-Jaeger Pendejo. I’m flattered.”
“That was Javier’s nickname for you, not mine. I’m telling you—”
“What do you think he’d say about my being at your place last night?” Steve asked with a smirk.
“He’d probably be disappointed that I didn’t let you drown in your own vomit in my bathtub,” Gail said, gritting her teeth. “But I knew I’d need a shower before work.”
Steve whipped out his own phone and showed where ‘Serbian Sweetcheeks’ had clearly sent a message for him to meet her at the Wendy’s Diner on the east side of town. Gail shook her head.
“I didn’t send it.”
“Well, it could be a memory-wiping vampire. Maybe my mom came to visit.”
“Or someone spoofed my phone and is spying on me. Damn it, how did you even get here if I have the bloodsucker-mobile?”
“I told the guy who lives downstairs to drive me here,” he said flatly. “So, how long do you think it will be before someone tries to kill us, since it must be a trap?”
Both vampires looked over the other’s shoulders. However, the universe only responded with the threat of hash browns barely touching Steve’s steak and a scorching carafe of coffee. The moment the waitress walked away again, Steve pulled a flask out of one of his robe pockets and loaded up his coffee.
“You could have gotten dressed before leaving the house—”
“Didn’t feel like it,” Steve said as he plowed into his steak. Gail watched in disgust as a few rogue dribbles landed on her robe. “I wonder if we were lured away so that mom could attack the werewolves. That would be different . . . different and probably futile.”
“But if they go after the werewolves, that would be Paige too. Don’t you even care about your family?”
“Clearly not as much as you did, babe.”
“You obnoxious, boorish—”
“You know, the way your cheeks flush and your eyes light up when you’re angry is hilarious. I have got to tease you more often. By the way, why are you hiding out here in suburbia, looking like a sexually-frustrated librarian, instead of skulking around the strip mall fortress? Tired of watching your ex drool all over my great-granddaughter?”
“Fuck off, Steve.”
“Looks like a librarian, swears like a sailor.” Steve sighed around a mouthful of half-chewed steak. “You, my dear, are the complete package of unattractiveness right now.”
Gail shook her head slowly. Steve waited patiently, but she refused to give him the satisfaction of a verbal response. She did scan the diner one more time.
Steve pawed listlessly at his phone. His cracked lower lip rolled up a bit as he surveyed his notifications. “Oh, you set the lab on fire? Is that why you are in hiding?”
“Bernard set the lab on fire. I helped put it out,” Gail said with an eye roll. “Are you even wearing pants?”
Steve looked down. “Nope.”
“Ugh.”
“It’s nice to know that my lack of pants is more concerning to you than some mysterious force spoofing your phone and luring us to this ridiculously cute restaurant with rather spectacular coffee. Do you think it’s my mom? Sneaking and spying is really her thing, isn’t it?”
“It is actually,” a new voice said as an intoxicating-smelling carafe slid onto the table. Three mugs followed. Both Gail and Steve froze as a tiny waitress with a pink frock and gingham apron smiled at them. She wore her ginger hair in a perky ponytail and had a mask of freckles forming a thick band across her eyes.
“Mutter, bist du das?” Steve asked, blinking rapidly.
“Aber ja!” she replied cheerfully. Her eyes flashed bright green. “Aesaekkiya! Naneun neoui eommaya.”
“Excuse me?” Gail asked at the sudden shift of languages. Steve stared, confused as well.
“You really need to learn Korean, my boy. It’s the language of your family, your true family,” the waitress said as she pulled a chair to the end of their booth and sat down. Their regular waitress walked right by the scene without skipping a beat. “Germanic languages always make me sound like I’m about to spit up hair. Even English is a bit guttural and dirty, but I’ll defer to it for our young guest here. Oh, congratulations on your escape, Miss Harker. I’m glad that you take after the rest of your family.”
“How many of your goons are around, sheriff?” Gail blurted out as she eyed the exits. The freckle-faced version of the sheriff smiled wickedly.
“Enough,” she replied. “Any in particular you’d like to see?”
Gail bit her tongue. The gesture only made the sheriff smile wider. Her smile faded as she turned and took a good look at Steve. “Are you wearing her robe?”
“It was convenient,” Steve replied flatly. The sheriff raised a brow. Before Gail could protest, Steve reached across the table and took Gail’s hand. “Now would you do me a favor and stop scaring my girl, Ma? Also, why the hell are you wearing Claudia’s face in the middle of Nashville? She wouldn’t be caught dead here.”
“Exactly,” the sheriff replied.
“So that’s what Claudia looks like,” Gail noted. She flinched slightly as Steve gripped her hand tighter, but one quick glance from him stopped her from jerking away. “You really didn’t do her justice in your description, dear.”
“Would you rather your twin sister showed up, Harker?” the sheriff asked. She raised a brow at Steve. “As for you—you have moved on rather quickly after your pathetic display the last time I was here, haven’t you? What happened to true love for your poor, dear Georgia?”
“Humans die, and we move on.”
“Finally, you’re making sense. You could do worse than one of Mina’s lost lambs, especially now that her former lover has met an unfortunate end. Truly, these are times when we must band together and remember our family and friends.”
“What do you want?” Steve asked, his voice still flat but his eyes surprisingly bright and focused on his mother. He squeezed Gail’s hand again. She noticed a large pair of dark-skinned hands holding a newspaper, blocking the view of whomever was now sitting at the two-top by the door.
“I wanted to make sure you were alright,” the sheriff said, now pouring warm blood into the mugs for them. “Even though it was only an Azarola that died, Javier is a bit older and better connected than the usual random killing.”
“Random?” Gail blurted out.
“It’s a random killing until my investigation in Detroit is completed. Javier had a great many enemies built up over the centuries, and he was also wandering in the wilds of Mina’s so-called free city. He’s no warrior. A pack of animals could have gotten lucky . . .”
Steve squeezed Gail’s hand and gave her the tiniest of head shakes. She did her best to find some Zen and settle her fluttering insides. The sheriff continued.
“Anyway, I am more concerned about losing a good contact. Mina is also upset at her loss of prestige by allowing such a crime to happen in her domain.”
“And you don’t think that someone would have killed Javier in Detroit just to rattle Mina?” Steve asked. “Make her either run for allies or retreat off the field?”
“When did you start getting a mind for intrigue, boy?”
“When I got thrown in the middle of it. Or maybe when the king murdered my wife—”
“Who told you that?” the sheriff asked, raising a brow. “Arthur didn’t kill Georgia.”
“Oh, come on—” both Gail and Steve started.
“Arthur swore under oath that he did not compel the killer, and no traces of miasma were found in the perpetrator who confessed quite lucidly to the crime. I know you have your doubts, but I am still the sheriff and do have a duty to the truth.”
“But—”
“Believe me, nothing would be more convenient for me than to catch my brother lying under oath, wouldn’t it? I’m sorry, but in this case, the worst I can accuse him of is leaving Georgia alone with an enraged, bloodthirsty monster which is hardly a crime. I am sorry, but you must accept the fact that you cannot blame Arthur for everything. Your friend lost his mind and killed your wife—”
Steve banged his fist against the table. The sheriff’s smile grew strained. Gail blinked a few times. Gail finally choked out, “You said Arthur ordered Georgia’s death.”
“I can’t believe that Geoffrey would—” Steve started.
“Wait, are you saying that Georgia was killed . . . by Mr. Lambley?”
6
“Mr. Lambley,” Georgia whimpered as she fluttered her eyelashes open. Dull pain throbbed from her shoulders to her hips, and a mix of sweet and medicinal aromas filled her lungs. Her arms and legs lay limply around her, with only her head barely able to tilt side to side. Bright light flooded her vision.
A fuzzy shadow came into view. Georgia squinted until she could just make out luminous, black eyes and gleaming fangs. The stranger smiled awkwardly. “Don’t move,” he said in a dreadfully thick, unknown accent. “It will hurt very bad if you move.”
“I’m . . . not . . . dead,” Georgia croaked. The stranger’s smile tightened a little.
“Let us not dwell on details,” he replied. “Just tell me, do you think your heart is lighter than a feather? It is sort of important right now.”
“What?”
Pain filled her chest, followed by an eerie numbness. The stranger held something bloody and pulsing in one hand. The other reached down and pulled up a mask. Georgia watched, confused, as a man with the head of a jackal walked away and plopped a heart onto an old-fashioned bronze scale. On the other side he set an ostentatious hot-pink feather. “Sorry, should be an ibis, but this was the closest I could find in America.” He put the feather on the other side of the scale, and then tapped the top. The stranger made a few annoyed grunts as the heart side simply didn’t sink. Indeed, the feather dropped like a stone. “Oh dear, I guess I should save you since you are all worthy and stuff.”
The cold radiated through Georgia’s chest. She fought to breathe and stared, horrified, at the oozing lump that looked decidedly heart-shaped. She looked to the left and saw a large machine pumping blood into her center mass. The stranger in the mask shrugged.
“I suppose I should see if I remember how to put it back in there, eh? On the bright side, if this doesn’t work, you will at least go to what you call heaven. Sorry! I honestly have never had this happen before. My bad!”
Georgia promptly passed out.
“This has to be some sort of joke,” Gail said, reaching for her new mug of steaming blood-drenched coffee. The sheriff shrugged evasively at the head of the table. Steve snatched his new mug and promptly spiked it from his flask.
“Life is a joke, Sweethear— err . . . Gail,” Steve muttered. “And I don’t believe it for a second that Geoffrey would rip out Georgia’s throat.”
The sheriff rolled her eyes. “What has happened to the youth of our kind? We are vampires, and despite what my sister feeds the masses, we are not sparkling sissies who want to brood and drink animal blood from cups. I’m shocked you haven’t dated a high school girl yet, boy.”
A small giggle slipped out of Gail’s lips before she could stifle it with a sip of her beverage. Steve’s eyes turned red, and he snarled, sending awful bourbon breath across the table.
“The perpetual clown Steven has lost his sense of humor? Oh my,” the sheriff said with a sigh. “I thought you were over the human.”
“Geoffrey isn’t a killer—”
“You of all people know that is a lie, boy.”
Gail kept slurping quietly, her gaze darting between the two other vampires. Steve’s fangs extended menacingly, but he held his tongue. The sheriff turned her attention to Gail.
“So, tell me everything you know about vampires,” she said with a wicked smile.
The sheriff’s smile faded as Gail set her cup down, planted her own smile, and replied, “No.”
The sheriff blinked a few times. She looked over to Steve who gulped his loaded coffee in a single swig. “I said—”
“I know what you said, but it doesn’t work on me anymore. I remember you now. I remember how you used to accost me in the bathroom and force me to tell you everything I knew, and then you’d kiss me, and I’d forget it all. I remember how you used me as a spy because I was always your favorite. Unfortunately for you, my little transformation did more than change my eating habits. It broke your power over me.”
“And you think it’s wise to te
ll me this, girl?”
“I think you’d figure it out anyway, so it would be pretty damn stupid to get caught lying to you, right? In fact, it’s pretty dumb for all of us to be playing games if someone is willing to blatantly kill vampires and their assistants.”
The sheriff raised a brow and turned to her son. “Keep her.” Waving towards the door, the newspaper folded down, and the smiling face of Mr. Sugar appeared in view.
“How . . .?” Gail mused. She watched Mr. Sugar closely as he strode to their booth. It was only as he motioned for her to slide towards the wall that she saw the piece holstered under his blue, silk jacket. They waited the few awkward seconds for the table to be shifted to compensate for the much larger man trying to squeeze in. The legs echoed loudly against the floor, prompting curious looks from other patrons. After a few uncomfortable moments of silence, the sheriff finally rose to her feet and went hunting for another mug.
“It is good to see you again, Miss Harker.” Mr. Sugar said looking at Gail with a small smile.
“Good to see you too,” she replied, still eyeing the faint outline of a holster. Across the table, Steve groaned and flopped his head back.
“What is this gonna be? A conversation or what?” Steve whined, his speech slightly slurred.
“It’s still a conversation,” Mr. Sugar reassured. “But it’s not one that you will like, I fear.”
“Oh yes, speaking of conversations,” the sheriff said, plunking down a fresh carafe and one more mug. Gail zeroed in on the fresh red spatters on the sheriff’s half-apron. “How come in all that blathering you did to make Geoffrey Lambley feel all confident and empowered, you failed to mention that he was the only vampire in a century to kill a werewolf?”
Steve looked away.
“Killed a werewolf? Yeah, that never came up. Maybe it wasn’t so bad that he beat you up, Steve,” Gail offered.
“The common belief is that the Pendragons are tougher and scrappier, rather than cold-blooded killers like the Jaeger, but that is just perception and PR really. Arthur was always a bear. He seemed cute and gentle until backed into a corner, and then he’d rip you apart with his claws. Mordred inherited that singularly vicious spirit, so why wouldn’t his children? Mina’s influence isn’t that great despite what she makes everyone think.”
