“Leanne.”
She held her hands up. “Okay, okay—I just had to give you a hard time about it.”
We both stared at the place where he disappeared.
Leanne cocked her head. “He had really big—”
“Man bits?” I finished for her.
“Yeah.” A slow smile spread across her face. “Oliver is going to be so jealous.”
***
At 4:00 a.m. the following morning my phone went off.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I mumbled.
“No,” Leanne moaned. “Turn off that hellbeast.”
I silenced the phone and rolled out of bed. I could already guess the caller.
Once I exited my room I answered my silenced phone. “I don’t think I like investigations,” I opened.
“Too bad,” Maggie said. “I don’t think our victim likes being dead either. We need you to come in. Another person has been murdered.”
***
It felt like déjà vu, watching the pathologist slide out another victim. This one was Harrison Moore, a middle-aged man with dark hair and a goatee. And just like the last victim, he had an ugly neck wound.
“Harrison Moore. Age forty-three,” Chief Constable Morgan said. “He was found inside the Douglas cemetery. From his belongings he appears to be a necromancer, and his job seems to be what brought him to the cemetery.”
I choked on the smell. He too, seemed to have been scared at the time of his death.
“Just like Catherine O’Connor our victim here was drained almost dry. His body was then placed in a spread eagle position. Maggie, what read did you get off this body?”
“Same as the last one, sir,” she said. “That is to say, nothing other than an overwhelming sense of fear.”
Chief Constable Morgan rubbed his mustache. “I assumed as much.”
The room was too hot and too cold at once. I couldn’t tell if it was the stench of death and preservatives that clung to the room, the gruesome body in front of me, or that I had to help locate the person responsible, but I felt lightheaded.
The chief constable didn’t seem to notice my unease. “From the timeframe of the murder,” he said, “as well as the manner he was killed and the body’s post mortem positioning, one thing is clear.”
He paused to look at Caleb, Maggie, and I. “We have ourselves a serial killer.”
***
Someone knocked on the morgue’s door, and an inspector poked his head in. “Eugene,” the inspector said, referring to the chief constable, “Can I speak to you in private for a moment?”
“Sure.” Chief Constable Morgan glanced at the three of us. “Would you three mind waiting outside for just a minute?”
I wanted to cry with joy at his words. I was going to get sick again if I didn’t get out of here.
“Not at all,” Maggie said.
We walked out of the room, and only then was I able to release the breath I’d been holding.
For a moment we all stood silent.
“A necromancer?” I finally asked. I thought I was catching on to this world, but at times like these, I really felt out of my element.
Maggie gave me a look. “One who raises the dead. Reanimates corpses.”
I curled my lip. “Why would anyone do that for a living?”
“Oh, lots of reasons. But the main one is that it pays really well. When it comes to death, people tend to underprepare and leave a lot of loose ends behind them. A necromancer can reanimate the deceased long enough to settle an inheritance dispute, find a lost family heirloom—anything really that the dead take with them to the grave.”
Throughout this entire discussion, Caleb had stayed silent. I didn’t ask him his thoughts, but his silence piqued my curiosity.
“And it works?” I asked.
“Absolutely.”
I looked at Maggie like she was insane. “Then why are we not using a necromancer to find the killer?”
Maggie laughed. It was a laugh that said I still had a lot to learn. “Necromancers practice the dark arts. It takes a blood sacrifice to reanimate a corpse. And the deader they are, the heavier the sacrifice. The House of Keys does not condone such practices, so we are forbidden by law to use them in our investigations.”
I raised my eyebrows. “So even though a necromancer makes blood sacrifices, they’re still accepted in the community—but vampires aren’t?” I couldn’t understand how the supernatural community could draw an arbitrary line in the sand and declare everything to one side okay, and everything to the other side evil.
Maggie curled her upper lip. My question must’ve hit a nerve. “As far as I’m concerned, our victim is a necromancer and the perpetrator is a vampire,” she snapped. Fair point. “And until the day that changes, we’ll keep the beliefs we currently have.”
“Whoa, whoa,” Caleb said. “That’s not—”
But she wasn’t finished. “Perhaps society and even Andre himself have convinced you that vampires are harmless. They’re not. They have to feed every single night. Off of humans. Thousands of victims have died just like the man in that room.”
I could’ve guessed as much, but I’d truly never thought it completely through. I tended to avoid those topics that scared me. But now I couldn’t.
I was becoming a monster, whether I liked it or not.
No wonder the devil wants me.
***
Caleb put a hand on my shoulder. “You’re not going to be like that,” he said to me. He shot Maggie a dirty look.
“She needs to know,” Maggie said. “It’s not like those bloodsuckers are telling her the truth.”
I bristled at her words. Andre had been nothing but truthful with me. It was part of the reason I’d needed space. I’d seen and heard too much.
“And the Politia is telling me the truth?” I said to her. My anger was beginning to get the best of me. “Don’t bother answering that. It was a rhetorical question.”
Maggie looked as though she was about to put me in my place, but she didn’t get the chance. The door to the morgue opened and the inspector and Chief Constable Morgan stepped out. We watched the inspector walk down the hall. Only when he’d rounded the corner and his steps had faded did the chief constable speak.
He scratched his mustache. “So far, we’ve been able to keep the media out of this, but the individual who discovered Harrison’s body works with the newspaper in Douglas. They’re printing a story on it today.”
He seemed weary. “This is going to make the investigation that much more difficult.”
“We’ll deal with what comes at us,” Maggie said.
“I’m sure we will,” the chief constable said. “If anyone asks you all about the case, your job is to refer them to our station’s contact information. Do not disclose anything yourself.
“I’m going to head up to my office to put together a statement for the inevitable press conference.” He tapped my shoulder and looked at Maggie. “Can I borrow Gabrielle for a moment?”
I didn’t like the sound of his voice. I could already tell by his inflection that I wouldn’t like whatever he wanted to discuss.
“Of course,” Maggie said.
I gave them both sullen looks. What about my consent?
“Great, I’ll chat with you later then, Maggie.” Chief Constable Morgan began walking, while I stood in place, refusing to budge.
Maggie gave me the stink eye.
“Alright, alright,” I huffed. I jogged up to the chief constable, who didn’t appear to notice that I hadn’t been following him.
We didn’t speak until I entered his office.
I took a seat and gazed about the room. It was disappointingly ordinary. I would’ve thought that the guy in charge of p
olicing the supernatural community would just ooze otherness. But nope. He had just your standard plaques and photographs, along with a business card holder and a marble paperweight.
Chief Constable Morgan sat down behind his desk. “Gabrielle, I wanted to discuss this investigation with you privately.”
I studied the man in front of me. I had no idea what type of supernatural he was.
“The community is going to hang you.”
I physically jolted at his words. “Excuse me?” I asked.
“Not literally—but you might wish it after shitstorm they’re going to put you through. You’re the newest vampire. And it’s no secret that you haven’t been meeting with your coven.”
I raised my eyebrows. “I didn’t realize that was common knowledge.”
Chief Constable Morgan leaned back in his chair. “I don’t blame you for choosing to avoid the coven—assisting in the death of dozens of vampires couldn’t have endeared you to them.”
Chief Constable Morgan: the epitome of tactfulness. Not.
“However,” he continued, “the community will be concerned—and the Politia is already concerned—that you aren’t learning to control your abilities appropriately.”
“You think I’m guilty.” I knew it. I knew they felt this way.
“No, no. You have an alibi and we’ve found no evidence that would link you to the crime.” His answer was not really the vote of confidence I needed to hear. “But the supernatural community will assume that you, the youngest, least experienced vampire, are behind the attacks.”
“But you’ve proven I’m not a suspect.”
The chief constable lifted his shoulders. “Public opinion can run counter to and flourish in spite of the facts. If that happens, your education and employment are not guaranteed.”
If he was saying what I thought he was, then my continued work at the Politia and my enrollment in Peel Academy rested on solving this case and preventing the supernatural community from flaying me. A sense of déjà vu washed over me. This wasn’t the first time my genetics had posed such a problem.
“What do you want me to do?” I asked.
“You need to reconnect to your coven. You need to get ahold of Andre.”
***
Chief Constable Morgan kept talking, but I still hadn’t gotten past his words. You need to get ahold of Andre. The thought filled me with both excitement and dread.
“Gabrielle? Are you listening to me?”
I shook my head. “I’m sorry, what?”
“We want you to reconnect with the coven, both so that you can manage your cravings and so that you can keep an eye on the local vampires.”
Now that was just funny. “You want me to keep an eye on the local vampires? The ones that probably want to eat me?”
“It may seem difficult, but—”
I laughed, even though the situation wasn’t funny. “It’s not going to be difficult. Learning how to drive a manual transmission is difficult. What you’re asking me to do is suicide.”
“We need to catch a killer,” he said.
“You’re throwing me to the wolves.”
“Not wolves, Miss Fiori. Vampires.”
“Whatever. Same difference.” He opened his mouth to contradict me, so I rushed on. “The point is, what you’re asking is impossible, and it will probably put my life in jeopardy.”
“Miss Fiori,” his condescending tone grated me, “the truce between vampires and the House of Keys is up for forfeit. This investigation is primarily the coven’s concern, and now they’re making it ours. If these deaths continue, I’m afraid the truce will eventually have no choice but to dissolve.”
I twisted my hands in my lap. “What happens if the truce dissolves?”
“Your kind will be hunted.”
***
I walked out of Castle Rushen in a daze. The sky had a predawn glow to it, bathing the stone buildings around me in shades of violet. I could smell the ocean in the air, and I could hear the sounds of fishermen setting out for a day.
Castletown was almost unbearably beautiful, and it seemed wrong that I could only feel bleak.
I had no options. I might be putting my life in danger by interacting with my coven, but if I didn’t at least try to find the killer, my life and the lives of other vampires could be at stake.
A shiver passed over me. Was that long ago prophecy now coming true? Was my existence heralding the extermination of vampires?
It was too much. The blame, the guilt, the fear I now carried. I worked for the Politia, but it wouldn’t protect me from the community’s backlash, nor would it exempt me from persecution, if the truce dissolved.
And then what? What did that mean exactly? That I and others like me would be imprisoned? Killed?
No amount of action on my part could forgive my genetics. I kicked a nearby trashcan. It’s aluminum shell crumpled in on my foot.
“Damnit!” I shouted, yanking my foot out.
A droplet of water hit the ground in front of me. At first I thought it might be rain, but then I noticed the wetness on my face.
I swiped away my tears. Rosy teardrops smeared along my hand. Why would anyone worry about a girl who cried bloody tears?
I pulled out my phone, the set of my mouth grim. I scrolled down until I saw the contact I wished to call, the two emoticon hearts still next to his name.
Screw the Politia. I wasn’t doing this for them. I was doing it for myself and for the other lost souls who called themselves vampires. Because good and evil weren’t inborn traits. They were choices we made.
I stared at the contact only for a second before clicking Send. And then, for the first time in almost two months, I heard my soulmate’s voice.
Chapter 4
“Gabrielle?”
For a moment I couldn’t speak at all. I wasn’t sure he’d even pick up since the sun had almost risen. His voice sounded hopeful, worried, and reluctant all at once.
And hearing it undid every stupid, idiotic barrier I’d built over the last two months.
“Andre.” My voice broke in the middle of his name. Thank goodness he couldn’t see me because I could feel more hot tears snake down my face, and the world turned pink.
I meant to say, I need your help. But my traitorous mouth formed different words. “I miss you.”
My face flushed. If only I could snatch back words.
I waited a beat. The silence must’ve been only a second or two, but to me, I felt I’d lived a lifetime in that pause. Then he spoke, his voice rough. “I’ve missed you since the moment you slid out of my arms.”
I pressed the palm of my hand to my mouth to hold back a choked sob. More tears slipped down my cheeks. Since when was I this way? I couldn’t believe people enjoyed this—love. It hurt worse than my gun shot wounds had.
“Can we meet up?” I asked.
“Of course.” Who was this Andre, this open, agreeable man? How was I supposed to reconcile him with the emotionless killer I saw that evening at Bishopcourt? Or the frustrating, bossy vampire I met two months ago?
He was probably wondering the same thing about me. Who the broken girl on the phone was. I cringed at the thought.
“Listen Gabrielle,” my heart fluttered at the way he said my name, “the sun’s coming up, so I have to go. You’ll hear from me again this evening. But until then—stay safe.”
“You too.”
The call ended just as the first rays of the sun rose on the horizon. I stared at my phone. There was at least one person who worried about the girl with the bloody tears.
***
School that day started off rough, and it only got worse as the day drew on. By the time I walked into my history class, I expected the whispered and suspicious looks I recei
ved.
The entire school was wondering whether I was the killer.
Today it was almost worse than that first day of class. Back then, my classmates only had their superstitions and deep set beliefs to judge me by. Now, however, someone had been attacked by a vampire, and a vampire was amongst them. I could hear their fluttering pulses, and their fear smelled thick and terrible.
I felt my fangs slide out at the smell; they’d been doing that off and on since I walked into Peel Castle. I kept my mouth closed as I moved to my seat.
I shucked off my bag and slouched into my chair. Hell couldn’t be any worse than this.
I didn’t have to look when Caleb entered the room. The same collective adrenaline rush occurred every day the minute he sauntered into the room.
He dropped a newspaper on his desk and slid into the seat next to me. “Well, shit has really hit the fan this time,” he said.
Usually once Caleb and I had taken our seats, the class would gradually return back to normal. Not today. The smell of fear lingered in the air. My fangs were going to be out all freaking day if this continued.
I picked up the supernatural community’s newspaper from his desk and read the headline.
Vampire Attack at the Douglas Cemetery
Below the title was an image of the taped off cemetery. I skimmed the story. Its author hadn’t placed suspicion on any one person, but the journalist had made it clear that he believed there was unrest within the coven. He mentioned my name, Andre’s, and Theodore’s. The article went into the numerous vampire deaths that occurred the night Bishopcourt burned, and he discussed the possible rifts that must’ve caused.
Somehow the reader was supposed to believe that this unrest led to vampire aggression. Apparently, the inhuman beasts that we were, when we got angry, our vampiric nature led us to commit horrific murders.
I threw the paper back on Caleb’s desk.
The Coveted (The Unearthly #2) Page 3