by P. S. Power
That meant he had a good vehicle, and showed up not too much later than she’d told him to, clean and ready for work.
She walked to the door of Lenore’s office.
“Hey, I’m going to Candles and More for a bit. Call it fifteen minutes? Is that all right with you?”
The strawberry blonde looked up at her and nodded.
“That will be fine. Are you courting the Mages to be on our side in this then? It’s… Not the worst plan.”
She let her head move side to side.
“Well, we may need them to find whoever is really behind this. I’m betting a Greater Demon or Mage. Right now at least. Not a real wager though, since I have no money. Everything is going into the new blood project. Oh, I called about the counter?”
“I heard. Good work. Run up a bill and give it to Linda when she returns the map?”
It made sense, so Eve did it first thing, using enough speed that she had to be careful not to break the pen or rip the paper she was writing on. Then she dashed over to Candles and More, just in time to walk in with Mark. He’d showered for them, and everything.
Then she started calling out, since it was important that Lisa know who was there. Taking her by surprise now had to be a poor plan. She’d been tricked once, but even hinting at it now would probably cause something to blow up.
One way or the other.
Chapter three
Given everything, the woman didn’t really look awful. She’d clearly been a little light on sleep, which showed up as dark circles and bags under her eyes, but that was all. Even at that, she could hide it all with make-up if she wanted. She was clean though, and that counted for a lot. She hadn’t decided that the best defense was making herself too disgusting for anyone to ever want to touch again, for instance.
Her face was confused, when she saw who was standing there, though she managed to smile a bit for both of them. Eve cut through the bullshit with a wave.
“Mark volunteered to come in and take over for Warren. The whole thing right now over on our side, well, you get that, right? If it affects us, it might do the same to you over here. So he felt you might want the help.”
That meant that she and Marcus had to get Lisa caught up on everything, since whatever she’d been up late doing it hadn’t been monitoring television for the latest news. She ran to her office in the back of the strongly scented store, and put on the local AM news channel, which did talk radio during the day.
Eve was ready for the news to either not exist or be horrible, but the man on the air sounded to be roughly… Bland about the whole thing. He was conservative, but was showing support for the Vampires, since it was out that most of them were actually conservatives too.
That, was a thing that she hadn’t counted on at all. If most of the people on the Right saw it that way, they might not have as many problems as she feared. Better, it was even true, more or less. As far as voting went, Vampires either didn’t do it, or were pretty Republican.
After five minutes Lisa went wide eyed, catching on better than most had.
“The stuff with Warren?”
Eve shook her head.
“Maybe connected? Probably not, but it would be best if the Council didn’t have to put out a press release letting everyone know that this was all down to some Mage or another controlling Vampire minds. And, oh, by the way regular Humans of the world, the Mages can do that to you too…” She wasn’t making it into a threat, not yet. Lisa wasn’t the one doing that kind of thing, after all. Neither was Mark or Bob. Which was why they were the right people for the job at hand.
“I have to get back to work, but anyway, Marcus here is stepping up. Mark, you still need to make your work-outs down at the power lifting gym, and Lisa, remind Bob to get someone in to work with the new guy here on healing magic? Wards and all that too, unless you have that stuff down already?” She looked at the man, never having bothered to ask that kind of thing before.
He looked away and then nodded.
“Sure. I don’t do that much magically speaking. I can, but… Really it doesn’t come up all that much.”
She threw that noise out with the back of her hand, waving it at him cutely.
“Good. Stop being lazy, then. You should be handling eighty, ninety percent of what comes in for now. Bob and Lisa need to be getting with their higher ups in case this is a real problem and not just me being wrong. I… have to run.”
There was an actual person standing at the counter, a man that seemed Human to her, even from a distance.
He was dressed nicely enough, and had a pad in his hand, along with a black ink pen. It was a little strange, but he seemed normal enough. The energy inside of him was all pink and inviting.
“Hi! Sorry, I was visiting over at the candle shop. What can I get for you?”
The man looked at her and then didn’t smile. Given that she was a pretty girl, and used to that kind of thing, having a man not respond to her was a bit telling. What it said she didn’t know, but…
“I’m Brent Wise, from the Oregonian? I was wondering if you might answer some questions about the allegations that this place is a front for Vampire activity?” He seemed a bit embarrassed to be asking at least, which was a good thing in her book.
He should be.
Eve was about to lie, but then tilted her head at the man.
“I don’t suppose you’d be willing to explain that? Who’s saying it and all?”
“Wait, you aren’t just going to deny it?” He was suddenly a lot more interested in her, it seemed, and leaned forward. Smelling delicious. She moved back a little, since biting a reporter was probably always going to be a poor idea.
“Nope. If you share with me, I’ll do the same with you. Understand, if you lie about us, you won’t live to see the morning. So make sure you get it all exactly right. Some of the people that you’re going to be dealing with won’t put up with sloppy work. Tell me, who told you what, exactly?”
He checked his notes, which he seemed to have four pages of.
“It just says, Jonas. I don’t have more of a name than that. Does that mean anything to you? He said that this place, the entire chain of stores, was actually owned and run by Vampires and used as a sort of meeting place? That you sell blood from here? Human blood?”
Lenore walked out of the back, her face collected and calm, and she was clearly ready to stuff the man into the trunk of her car. Probably dead. That wouldn’t work though, since things were all over the news, and if Jonas was off calling reporters one by one, then things weren’t just going to go away on their own.
Looking at her boss, she shrugged.
“Jonas is Rich Swerlin’s assistant. A New Vamp. That means he’ll be up all day. So, uh, Brent… What do you want to know? We probably shouldn’t say anything, but then you’ll just write that we had no comment and make us look guilty and like we’re hiding things, won’t you? I suppose it’s too late to try and convince you that this is all about role playing games taken way too far? That really is part of it.” It wasn’t, but hey, lying to the press was fair game, wasn’t it? They weren’t the police. Not that she wouldn’t lie to them, too.
Lenore shook her head a bit, and then held up a single finger.
“Let’s call this in and see what the Council wants done?” That would probably involve death for the reporter, even if that wasn’t going to make any difference in the long run. Too many people already knew the story and Eve was willing to bet that it was huge online.
It made her want to go and check herself, but she didn’t bother mentioning it, since Lenore fled the room rather directly.
They could just compel the man, and make him not only leave, but forget about the whole thing, but they couldn’t do everyone in the whole world, could they? There were whispers from the next room, but five rather awkward minutes later, the boss lady came out again, and spread her hands.
“It seems, and I don’t know that I agree with this, that we’re supposed to simply answer any
questions that anyone has of us? About public information. If you want to know whom I’m dating, then you’ll have to soften me up first, like anyone else.”
The man seemed relieved, or possibly less tense, then. Like they were really going to do more than send him away. It would make for a better story if he had information.
Eve stood back, knowing that Lenore would do a better job with things, since they might well still be hiding a lot of information from the public. Things that she wouldn’t have been briefed on yet.
“Great, can I get your names?”
“Lenore Hawthorn, and Eve Benson.” She waited, poised and ready to simply pounce on the man, it seemed like, though the man didn’t really get that yet.
He scratched the names out slowly, asking for spellings. She had told him to make sure he got everything right, on pain of death, hadn’t she? It was a real enough thing, too, so she didn’t take it back. If he screwed up, he was probably toast. Maybe even if he got it all correct, depending on how things all fell out. She was a bit put off by the fact that anyone higher than her was willing to even say anything.
“So, are you both Vampires? Or, Human, um, slaves to Vampires?”
Lenore shook her head, firmly.
“Slavery isn’t allowed in the United States, Mr. Wise. That goes for Vampires, too. To answer your question, yes. Both my colleague and I are Vampires.”
He pulled a small camera from his right hand pocket, and then looked sheepish.
“I don’t suppose I could get a picture? Can you do the eye and fang thing? That was pretty impressive, on television last night. We can’t really compete that way, but whoa!” He actually jumped back, as Lenore flashed her fangs at him.
She didn’t go red eyed, but Eve did, since it was part of what the man would want for his pictures. He recovered enough to snap several, and then check them to make sure they were coming out all right.
“This is good. Very good. So, you… Drink blood? Crosses and garlic aren’t making a showing at Thanksgiving dinner? Do you eat food?”
There were more questions than that, and Lenore actually covered all of it pretty openly.
“Crosses do nothing, of course. Garlic has a strong odor, but won’t drive us away, and we can enter places as easily as the next person. As a rule we don’t uninvited, because it would simply be rude to do otherwise. We do consume blood, but only to form links to others, so that we may draw energy from them. They need to be alive for that, and we never take enough to harm them, since that would be counter to survival. We don’t eat, for the most part. Some of us can manage to nibble a bite every now and then, but it isn’t a habit of mine. Eve?”
She shook her head, then lied, knowing that doing so would be important, soon enough. Darla and the others had been right, and she knew it. The real trouble was going to come from the religious people that would instantly think they were all demons.
“We do holidays, though. We like parties, and a lot of us are really religious and conservative. God is a big part of our community. I’m Catholic, myself, but… Lenore, you’re Baptist, right?”
There was no hesitation at all, but she shook her head.
“Lutheran. Most of us follow the religions we were born into, but there’s no rule saying that we have to. There are even a few atheists in our clans. Not many, of course. Being what we are informs most of us that there is more outside of ourselves than what Humans regularly get to know about.”
“Really? That’s new. I don’t think anyone has thought to ask about that yet. So if I call up Richard Swerlin, he’d tell me that you’re all into God?”
Eve nodded a bit.
“Yeah. He would. If you can get a hold of him? I mean, don’t get me wrong here, I’m going to try and kick his behind as soon as I see him, but it’s the truth. It’s like regular people though. I mean, I’m a Catholic, but I haven’t been to confession in a while, you know? Life gets in the way, just like with everyone else. Plus, not all of us like to be up during the day.”
She stopped there, but Lenore took over, her face pleasant, if forced to be that way.
“It’s rather torturous and painful to some of us. The new breed of Vampire can walk in the light without effort, but the rest of us must fight horrible pain to do so. Even right now both Eve and I are in agony. We’ve simply learned not to let it show. It doesn’t take direct exposure either, even being inside offers little relief, until the sun sets for the day.”
Then the man asked about boring things, like what powers they had and all that. He didn’t ask for tests or anything, and after forty minutes, where Eve kept mentioning how important god was, and how they very definitely weren’t demons or anything like that, and loved them some church and holy water, the man left.
When he was out of earshot she turned to Lenore, feeling half panicked.
“I laid it on too thick, didn’t I? The whole religion thing…”
“A trifle, perhaps. I did take your plan however, and agree with it. Setting the mood and groundwork early will be important. We should recommend it to others. I don’t suppose you could use your contacts to get in touch with Mr. Swerlin? If he still lives, I mean. Before you kill him yourself?” There was no hint that she wasn’t serious about that last bit, though it was a bit insane.
“I just said that I was going to try and kick his ass. Which, by the way, is pretty tempting. I don’t know if I can do it, but someone has to. He outed all of us, not just himself. It was implied before, when he said he and his wives were Vamps, that there were more of us, but a lot of people didn’t believe him. No one did, really. I mean, I knew first hand that Vampires were real and I kind of thought he was fake at first, you know? This though, it’s forcing all of us to respond now. To play this game that no one was ready for. We didn’t get three years to set things up, and get our families ready for the news, did we? I mean, mine knows, but how rare is that? So, unless he really was controlled by someone else, yeah, I’m going to be kicking his behind.” The part where it probably wouldn’t work didn’t get said. She was pissed, but it was mainly for other people. For Lars and his gang at the role playing thing. For other Vampires that didn’t have what she did, and who would end up being really hurt if everyone knew who, and what, they were. A lot of people working for Human businesses would probably be losing their jobs, for instance.
She’d gotten a really sweet deal, thanks to her friends and the work she’d put in first, but a lot of them found out that Vampires were real when they woke up dead one day, and killed a family of four for a snack, not knowing any better. It wasn’t the same thing at all. The problem though was that Richard Swerlin was much older than she was. Hundreds of years at the very least, and his powers would reflect that. Just getting mad and rushing him wasn’t exactly a great plan. Not if she wanted to survive the fight. Part of her started to work out how to get it done then. She’d need to use all the speed she could, and find out a lot more about any weaknesses he might have first. Eve knew how to fight, but it would probably come down to powers, not skill, that way.
It did when you were dealing at a certain level of raw strength or speed.
Did he have any special psychic powers? For that matter, did she? The idea wasn’t impossible, but other than trying a bit of compulsion on a drunk guy once, on her very first day, she really hadn’t done anything like that yet. It had all been about work, to tell the truth. That, and running fast. These things needed to be known before she went for him.
Lenore gave her a considering look, instead of telling her she was being stupid, which, naturally, she really was. Making threats against someone that could kill you and get away with it was really dumb. Especially in the press. Even if it had been meant as hyperbole.
“I honestly don’t think that Mr. Swerlin will survive long enough for you to extract your pound of flesh. It would be interesting to see, however. You should suggest the concept to him when you reach him?” There was a long look at the phone, as if to explain it all.
She got o
n the thing, and was redialing for the seventeenth time when the local television news crew came. The reporter was a younger woman, who didn’t seem experienced if her body carriage and the fact that Eve didn’t recognize her at all counted. Probably the girl that the others at the station were willing to throw away, if the whole thing turned out to be a massive joke or game. That, or they believed it and sent in the nervous young brunette as a Human sacrifice to placate them?
Yummy.
The phone picked up right then, so Eve held up her hand, getting the news people not to speak for a bit.
“Representative Swerlin’s office, this is Jonas, may I help you?”
“Hi, Jonas. I need to talk to Richard, if that’s doable? This is Eve Benson, from the Vancouver local area?” She nearly said embassy, but no one else had yet, including Jonas, that she knew of. Doing that would be announcing that there were other things in the world, at least to the intelligent people out there. That wasn’t needed yet. It was probably coming, but for the moment, there was no need to risk anyone else, or their families.
“Uh… He’s in a meeting right now, may I take a message?”
“Interrupt him. Otherwise I’m going to have to run from here to Maine. That would take a while so, how about you help me out? Also, is Keeley there? I left a message for her, but she hasn’t gotten back to me. That’s kind of rude, but what can we do? She only jumps to my calls every other Thursday.” It was name dropping, but it also worked.
After all, even though she’d met Jonas a few times, at parties and with Rebekah, he didn’t recognize her name, did he? There were probably more Eve’s in his world than her, and she wasn’t a Human anymore. The few times they’d met in person, she had been.
