by Cate Lawley
“But you can’t.”
“But if I could… You’re right; it doesn’t matter. But how do they—the blood-drinking part of the population—find people to suck on? Volunteers? Mind control? And do the victims remember?”
Alex sighed. “I’m assuming you’ll be more careful with your language when you meet other vampires—” I inhaled to speak, but he shushed me. “I’ve made an appointment for you to meet the Society’s CSO on Friday. There’s no mind control—subtle persuasion, but that’s not even remotely like mind control. Mind control is taboo. That means not allowed. Very bad.”
“I get it.” Not like I could control anyone’s mind. Someone was a little touchy on the mind control thing.
“Most vamps don’t risk live biting any more. Remember, I told you there’s bottled blood at the Society’s headquarters.”
“Ick. Wouldn’t it be all clotted and thick and nasty once you stored it?”
“There are certain natural anti-coagulants that enhance the flavor. There are also witch-crafted stasis bottles that keep blood fresh for weeks, sometimes months.”
I blinked. “Stasis. Wow. But we digress. The real question is how did my blood get sucked, and I don’t remember anything?”
“I’m thinking you were roofied.”
My jaw dropped. That had never occurred to me. I didn’t know why. “Is there some witch brew or special magical concoction that impacts memory?”
“Ever heard of Rohypnol? The sedative?”
“Oh, literally roofied.” I got a tight, panicky feeling in my chest. “If he drank a bunch of my blood, and I couldn’t tell, do you think—”
“No.” He snapped the word out. His tone softer, he said, “You’d know. Vamps heal faster than humans, but you would know.” He caught my panicky gaze. “You would know.”
I chugged the shake, tried to not think too much about how vulnerable I’d been, and chugged some more. “Can I still get drunk?”
“Normal vamps can. Takes a little more—but sure. Feeling the need for a drink?”
I got up and dug around in the very back of my pantry. I thought I had— “Ha! There it is.” I came back to the table brandishing a bottle of Johnnie Walker Black Label. “I don’t normally do scotch, but it’s what we’ve got. Join me?”
He nodded, so I retrieved two glasses.
Alex poured. He lifted his glass and said, “To new beginnings.”
“Heck yes. New beginnings.” I lifted my glass and saluted him.
I was about to find out if my new virus-laden body could stomach booze. I threw back the entire contents of the glass. It burned a little, not so much as I remembered, then it spread through my body with a nice, rosy glow.
I set the glass back on the table and considered the state of my stomach. “The new me might like scotch.”
Alex poured me another.
“So, back to being a witness…on Tuesday, I went to work, I had drinks with my horrible coworkers, and that’s all I remember.”
“How’d you get home?”
“No clue.”
“What time did you leave the bar?”
“Ah.” I got a little excited. “I left work at six thirty and met up with Liz, Penelope, Shelley, and Martin.”
“What was that? That face?”
“It’s Martin. He’s a complete reptile.” I almost laughed when I remembered. “I had this image of him bursting out of an eggshell, fully formed, with this slimy smile. Ugh. He makes my skin crawl with his shiny veneer stretched over his absolutely rotten innards.” I took a sip of scotch. “Sorry, I’ve just never liked him, and he’s always been particularly nasty to me.”
“No problem. He sounds thoroughly unlikable.” Alex cupped his glass, but he’d barely touched his scotch.
“I’ve never seen him eat. What do you think? Vamp?”
“You think that’s a possibility?” He abandoned his scotch to pull out his cell. “What’s his last name?” When I gave him a curious look and didn’t answer, he said, “I’m just checking on his status. I’m not going to have him murdered in his bed.”
Funny that Alex’s brain went immediately to stealthy murder. I really needed to get the scoop on what wizards could do—and assassins and thieves. “Shade. Martin Shade.”
Alex tapped out a text and sent it. He looked up and asked, “Anything else you can remember from that night?”
“That they’re all ungrateful so-and-sos. I always picked up the tab when we went out.” I swallowed a big gulp of scotch. After the burn had died away, I said, “I had some half-baked desire to fit in. Just enough to pick up the tab and go out every time they asked, but not enough to try very hard to be nice.” I shook my head. “Don’t ask. I was a different person.”
“A week ago?”
“Hey, this transformation thing did something—I don’t know what, but it’s been a blessing. In retrospect, I probably should have taken the antianxiety drugs my cranky-old-guy doctor tried to prescribe. But I didn’t, and, as a result, maybe made my life a little more difficult than it needed to be.”
“Or you’re hypercritical of yourself, like a lot of modern women.”
I finished off my drink as I considered exactly what “modern women” might mean. “How old are you?
“Older than you.”
“Huh. Okay, if that’s the way you’re going to be. How long do vamps typically live?”
“That number varies wildly, so I’d hardly say there’s a typical.” I gave him a hard look, which resulted in small huff of annoyance, but then he added, “I’d say chances for a lengthy life greatly increase if you can survive the first three to five years.”
I stopped halfway through slamming my third shake of the afternoon. “There’s a high mortality rate for baby vamps.”
“Well, technically a baby vamp is what we call you guys as you go through the transformation. Three to five years is just young.”
I’d heard about all I could absorb on vamp lore for one day. The tiny synapses in my brain seemed to be struggling to keep up. I chugged the second half of my shake. Or I was too hungry to think straight. But I did have one more question. “What’s the deal with vampire tears?”
“A myth? Vampires don’t cry. Why do you ask?”
“Never mind.” I’d ask Wembley next time I saw him, because it looked like I’d found a gap in Alex’s knowledge.
“I think your phone’s ringing.”
“Huh?” But then I heard the faint buzz. I must have turned the volume down by accident. When I picked it up, I saw I had ten missed texts and four missed calls, all from work. I pointed at the phone. “Do you mind?”
Alex shook his head, grabbed his drink, and moved into the living room.
I steeled myself for a very unpleasant conversation, and answered the phone.
13
SILENT CORPSE, CHATTY SPIRITS
I hung up the phone and went hunting for Alex. I’d need him for this.
He was lounging on the sofa in my living room texting. He’d found the one piece of furniture I was definitely bringing with me to the new house—whenever I got around to moving.
I grabbed Alex’s arm and hauled him to his feet. “I need you.”
“Yes, mistress.”
Once he was on his feet, I grabbed my purse and keys. “Seriously—I’m not kidding. That was my office. Liz hasn’t been in to work for few days now, and she hasn’t called in. Something’s wrong.”
“Liz from Tuesday night?” When I nodded, his demeanor changed. “Give me the keys—I’m driving. And go grab a few of those shakes. We don’t how long we’ll be gone.”
“Good call.” I ran into the kitchen and picked up the last three cans. I’d have to make a pit stop for supplies at some point.
Alex stood with the door open, waiting. “Do you have the address?”
“I know where it is. She hosted the last Christmas party.”
“Nine months ago? Really?”
“It’s pretty easy to find.”
&nb
sp; Fifteen minutes later, Alex said, “Easy to find, huh?”
“It’s one of these three streets. And I know exactly what the house looks like. It’s impossible to miss. It’s this unusual pinky-tan color.”
“Like that one up on the right?”
“Yes! That’s it. And you’re sure you can get us inside?”
“I’ve said I could three times now. Ask again and I’m locking you in the car.”
I looked at the lock on the passenger door. “The locks don’t work that way. You can’t do that.”
He lifted an eyebrow.
Nuts. I bit my tongue.
Alex parked in the drive. There wasn’t a car visible, but Liz’s Mini was probably in the garage. It was that kind of neighborhood.
He pulled the keys out of the ignition and looked at me. “All right. You get out, walk up to the front door as if you’re going straight in. No looking about or lurking.”
“And then what?”
“Then we go inside.”
He got out of the car and started up the walkway.
I slid out of the Jeep as quickly as I could while trying to look as normal as possible.
By the time I got to the front door, Alex had opened it and then pulled it almost shut again. “Go back and wait in the car.”
“No. That wasn’t the deal.”
Alex scanned the surrounding area. As far as passersby could see, we were having a conversation. “The deal’s changed. Get back in the car.”
The little bit of happy that I’d been so desperately clinging to the last few days had deflated with Mrs. A’s death, and now it took another hit. “She’s dead.”
Alex’s face tightened, which was all the answer I needed. “You don’t need to go inside.”
I took a breath and shoved past him. Because I did need to.
She wasn’t my friend, but I’d known her. More than Alex could say. We’d worked together for years. And on some level, Alex must have agreed. Because as stern as his command to retreat had been, he let me pass.
I noticed the smell first. Decay. Not overpowering, but a hint of it in the air. That must have been what had tipped off Alex. I checked the bedroom first. It seemed the logical choice.
When I went to open the door, Alex was there first. He blocked the doorway with his body and held up a finger. “Give me just a second.”
I nodded. I was terrified of what I’d find on the other side of that door, so I was happy to let someone else take that first step.
He walked through the door, and no more than a minute or two later came back out. “It looks like anaphylaxis, just like the other women.”
I nodded.
“You don’t have to go in.” Alex still stood between me and the dead body of my coworker. “There’s no unseeing this.”
“I understand.” I put my hand on the doorknob, and he moved out of the way.
Like the rest of the house, everything was sparklingly clean, but there was an air of untidiness—a crumpled dress thrown atop the armchair in the corner, a pair of high heels kicked off in the corner, and a pile of mail on the dresser. She likely had an exceptional cleaning lady but couldn’t quite keep up the house in between visits. That sounded a lot like Liz.
My eyes had skittered past the bed, where a vaguely human shape lay—but now I let myself look.
Alex must have tidied the sheets, because they were tucked modestly around her body. I stepped closer. Her face and neck were covered in a bright red rash. The pinkish red hue of the rash clashed horribly with the mass of fiery orange-red hair strewn across her pillow. Her eyes were swollen shut. She had furrows scratched into her neck and above her clavicles. Her milky skin stained with a rash and covered in wounds was a grotesque sight. Her hands were tucked under the sheets, but I’d bet she’d have dried blood on them. I leaned in—and saw the bluish tint of her lips and the skin around them.
A touch at my shoulder made me jump.
“Come on,” Alex said. “I made a call, so it won’t be much longer before the police come by to check on the tip.”
I nodded, half hearing him. Then his words fully registered and I turned my back on the bed, on the body, and walked away. “We need to see if there’s evidence of him in the house.”
“Where? This place is pretty tidy. And it doesn’t look like she’s invited anyone over for drinks or dinner. And she didn’t have sex in that bed.”
I really didn’t want to know how he knew that.
I scanned the room, looking for anything, even a hint, that a man had been there. “Wait a sec.” I walked over to the dresser and flipped through the mail there. It was at least a week’s worth, probably more like two. I pulled out the credit card bill and bank statements from the pile. “What about these? Any chance we can see how she spent her money in the last few days before she died?”
Alex snatched them from my hand. “Possibly. Let’s go.”
As I walked out, her body exerted a kind of pressure on me, and I couldn’t stop myself from looking over my shoulder. I was far enough away that I couldn’t see the details—and my mind replaced the missing information with a picture of Liz as she had been. “She was beautiful.”
“I’m sure.”
“No, I mean really gorgeous.” I pulled my eyes away from the bed. “No plastic surgery or sophisticated makeup—just bone-deep beautiful. You can’t see that the way she is now. How she looked, it was so much a part of who she was.” An exasperated sigh escaped my lips. “She always picked the wrong men. Married, mean, abusers, users…”
“Come on.”
“Right—did you check the kitchen?”
“He wasn’t in the kitchen. The front hallway and the bedroom, not the kitchen or anywhere else.”
“How do you know that? Are you part bloodhound or something?” I stopped in the hallway, in front of the main door. “You’re not part werewolf, are you?”
“Werewolves? You are kidding, right?”
“That’s a no, then?”
Alex opened the door and nudged me over the threshold. “Maybe an angry witch transformed an ex into a snake or a frog at some point in the distant past. But there’s no such thing as werewolves.” He pulled the door shut, almost on my toes.
I hopped back. “Tell me you’re kidding. Or exaggerating.” Outside of my fear of snakes, that was wrong on a basic human level.
Alex shrugged and then he placed two fingers—not the pads, but the backs—lightly against the keyhole. A tiny click followed.
“Let’s go.”
“How…?”
When he saw I wasn’t following him, he said, “It’s called whispering or loosening, depending on how you do it. It’s something most wizards and thieves master at a young age. Let’s go.”
I trotted out to the car and slid into the passenger seat. But once inside, I couldn’t help thinking we’d missed something. “How do you know he was only in the hallway and the bedroom?”
“One of my spirit guides told me.” Alex’s facetious tone put my hackles up.
“Come on. Liz may not have been a friend, but I’ve known her for years. You could at least try to take this seriously.”
We were only about a block and a half away, but Alex whipped the car into a curbside parking spot and turned to me with a nasty cast to his face. “I take my craft very seriously. It is a very personal—no, a private endeavor. Your questions are invasive and insensitive. So next time listen more closely and take a hint.” Then he pointed to the approaching police car. “When I say that we need to leave…”
Nuts. A few seconds longer and that cop could have caught us in the house.
“When you say it, you mean it. Got it, and I’m sorry.” And I was. I should have listened, but he could be a little less prickly.
He didn’t say a word, just pulled back out into the street.
Belatedly, I remembered what Wembley had said about wizards and arcane, dark powers. Maybe working with Alex hadn’t been my best idea.
I rode silently next to h
im for several miles. I wasn’t sure where we were headed, but he’d just passed the exit for my condo.
Finally, when I couldn’t stand the silence any longer, I said, “Am I allowed to ask why you always drive, even when we take my car?”
Some of the tension eased from his shoulders. “Sure. I’m a control freak. It gives me a panic attack to ride in the passenger seat.”
And there was that facetious tone again…but this time I really listened. And what I heard was: it made him uncomfortable. Flip, but with an underpinning of truth.
So when he said his spirit guides had told him where the murdering rat had been… “You talk to the dead.” It popped out of my mouth all its own. I gasped and wished the seat would swallow me whole. “Ohmygosh. I’m so sorry. Forget I said that.”
“You’re a walking catastrophe.”
“I swear I wasn’t like this before. It’s like all my filters are gone. I’m sure I’ll get better. Right?” I looked at him, then realized asking for reassurance from the guy I’d probably deeply offended was a less-than-clever idea. “But again—I’m so sorry. Forget I said anything.”
“If you do happen to stumble upon another wizard, just don’t speak. Most of them aren’t as mellow as me.”
I bit my lip.
He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye and then laughed. He even sounded a little amused. “Trust me; those guys make me look like the social chair of a frat.”
“Really?”
“You’re a complete menace. Make an effort to think first then speak when you meet Cornelius. Or better yet, just listen.”
“Uh, who’s Cornelius, and when am I meeting him?”
“Cornelius Lemann is the CSO of the Society, and you’re meeting him in about five minutes.”
Sure enough, we were pulling off the freeway only minutes away from the Society’s headquarters.
14
PARANOIA AND THE INQUISITION
He wasn’t what I expected. Chief security officer sounded so large and important. As Mrs. A would have said, “showy.”
Cornelius Lemann was not showy. He was only a few inches taller than me, and he was quiet. Not his voice—his presence. He exuded a quiet confidence, an utterly believable competence. He had a neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard that seemed to emphasize his piercing blue eyes. And a slight British accent when he spoke—though his conversation seemed as American as my own.
