Just then, the front door was thrown open, hard enough to make us all jump, and lo, there was the prince of darkness.
"Are you all right?" Sinclair demanded, crossing the room in swift strides and peering at my face.
"Please, come in," I said sarcastically. "Don’t forget to wipe your feet. And I’m fine. There was no need to rush over here. Where are your shoes?"
Jessica coughed. "I sort of promised him I’d keep him apprised."
I forgot about the fact that Sinclair was in a suit, a topcoat, and bare feet. "You did what?"
"Never mind that now," Sinclair said impatiently. He was running his hands over my face, my neck, my shoulders, my arms.
I slapped his hands away when he started to raise my shirt to look at my stomach. "No, let’s talk about that right now." Before I could work up a good rant, I realized I was suddenly very tired. Extremely tired. I shook my head to try to throw it off, and realized that it was a lot lighter outside. "Uh-oh," I managed, just as Sinclair and the living room tipped away from me, and the carpet rushed up to my face.
"I hate that," I said, exactly fifteen hours later. I opened my eyes and was startled to see Sinclair with his jacket off, sitting in the chair beside my bed, reading. "Jesus!"
He winced. "Please don’t call me that. Good evening."
"This is so bogus! How come you don’t have to sleep all day?"
"I’m quite a bit older than you are. Now." He slapped the book shut. I saw it was one of Jessica’s collection of antique school books. Dumbest hobby ever, except maybe for golf. "Tell me everything that happened last night."
I ignored the command. "Did you sleep at all?" I asked suspiciously. Oh, I knew him of old.
He smirked. "I did rest beside you for a few hours."
"Pervert!"
"No, but if I was such a thing, taking advantage of you would have been simplicity itself."
"Have I mentioned how much I strongly, strongly dislike you?"
"Ah!" he said, looking pleased. "We’re making progress. From hate to dislike."
"Strong, strong dislike. Where are my roomies? I don’t want to have to tell this story a thousand times."
"We’re here," they chorused, walking into my bedroom.
"And so am I," Tina added, trailing them. "Are you all right. Majesty?"
I’d given up on trying to get her to call me by my first name. I ignored Marc’s chortle and replied, "I’m fine. I only got shot once."
A muscle jumped in Sinclair’s cheek. Weird. I’d never seen that before. "They shot you?" he asked with scary calm.
"My car’s a lot worse off than I am, believe me. Which reminds me, we have to go get it tonight. And my purse. In all the excitement—"
"From the beginning, please."
I told them. I didn’t leave anything out. And nobody interrupted, not once, which was a brand new experience.
"They knew you were a vampire," Tina said when I finished. She looked very, very troubled.
"Uh, yeah. Good point. How did they know? I mean, most vampires don’t even believe it."
"And how did they know about the other vampires?" Marc asked.
"Well, it must be … I mean, maybe a vampire is siccing these guys on us?" I guessed.
"Probably a vampire," Jessica said at once. "Who else would know who’s dead and who’s not?"
Sinclair nodded. "And they were waiting for you." He looked cool as a cucumber, but his hands kept opening and closing into fists. "They knew you were coming."
"Apparently so." I hadn’t really had time to think about how weird that was. "Quit doing that, it makes me nervous. Oh! I almost forgot!"
I jumped out of bed and practically ran over to my dresser, where I’d placed the bullet after tossing my clothes in the hamper. "I have a clue!" I said proudly, holding it up.
"That’s great, Nancy Drew," Marc said with fake enthusiasm.
"Shut up. Check this out, you guys." I gave it to Sinclair, who examined it briefly and passed it to Tina.
"This is a hollow-point," she said, very surprised.
"Yikes," Jessica said. "A vampire gun expert."
"I like to keep busy," she replied mildly. "I’ll take a look at it later."
"I was thinking we could show it to Nick," I said.
"Detective Nick Berry? I don’t think that’s wise at all," Sinclair said. "Best he stays out of our business."
"He might already be in it. He pulled me over the other day and had all sorts of questions. Don’t worry," I said, because Tina and Sinclair both looked alarmed, "your mojo’s holding. He didn’t remember about me being dead and all."
"Still, he sought you out," Tina said, looking troubled.
"It was just a coincidence," I said uneasily. "He recognized my car and pulled me over."
There was a short silence, broken by, "You should rest," Sinclair ordered, getting up from his chair. "Spend the night in bed."
"I spent the day in bed, and that’s plenty."
He ignored me, as usual. "Tina and I will put our heads together and—"
"I’m fine, how many times do I have to tell you? Stop clucking. And I have to work tonight, I can’t stay in bed."
"You will not be going to work."
"The hell!" I glared up at him. "Stop trying to boss me around, when are you going to learn?"
Jessica cleared her throat. "Uh, Betsy."
I ignored her. "I never listen—"
"I have learned that."
"—and it just pisses me off."
"Bets."
"Frankly, you could do worse than listening to me," Sinclair snapped back. "This faux independence of yours is growing tiresome."
"Faux?" I cried. That meant fake, right? Probably. Stupid French! "Listen, jerkoff—"
"Betsy!" Jessica seized my arm in a grip that would have hurt like hell if I’d been alive. "Girl talk," she said to the room at large, then dragged me into the bathroom.
I extricated myself, with difficulty, from her grasp. "What? I’m in the middle of something, here. What did you have to say to me right this second?"
She lowered her voice; we were both well aware of vampire hearing. "I wanted to stop you before you said something worse."
"Girlfriend, I haven’t even gotten started—"
"Okay, I know you don’t like him—or you think you don’t like him, I haven’t figured out which—but Bets! It was the most romantic thing ever. He caught you before you did a nosedive into the carpet. I mean, you started to go down and he moved. Then he sort of scooped you up and carried you up to bed, although how he knew which room was yours is sort of a mystery, and he never left your side."
"Ew."
"No, the opposite of ew. I came up to check on you guys about lunchtime and you were both … uh … dead to the world, and he had his arm around your shoulders and you were sort of cuddled into his side."
"I was not!" I said, shocked. Was I so shameless in my undead sleep?
"Bets, you totally were. And then, when I checked on you a few hours later—"
"Jeez, couldn’t stay away, could you? Not too creepy."
"Hey, it’s interesting. Anyway, Eric was awake, and he asked if he could borrow one of my old books, and nice as you pleased, asked for a cup of coffee."
"You’re not a waitress."
"No, but I’m a good hostess. Anyway, it was … it was kind of nice. He was really nice. And he’s nice to you."
"No, he isn’t!"
"I think you should treat him better," she said firmly.
Traitor! I took a deep breath, which made me dizzy. "And I think …"
But we were interrupted by a knock on the bathroom, door, so we went back out to my room. To my surprise, Sinclair and Tina were gone.
"He sort of stomped out," Marc replied in answer to my unspoken question. "And she said goodbye, very politely, and followed him." He shook his head. "Are you really going to work tonight?"
"You bet."
"It’s just …" Marc looked worried, which for
him was pretty rare. "Those warrior guys knew who you were. They might be tracking you."
That was a startling—and unpleasant!—thought. "I don’t think so," I said after a minute’s thought. "How would they know where I work?"
"They knew where you parked," he pointed out.
"I have to go. Otherwise, Finklair will think I dodged work because he said to."
"Perish the thought," Jessica said. "God forbid you should take the advice of an older, experienced, extremely intelligent man."
"I’d do anything that guy asked me," Marc said admiringly. "What a hunk! Oooh, and he’s all intense and stern, but you just know that once you got him between the sheets—"
"Stop!" Jessica and I said simultaneously.
"You know it’s true." He wiggled his eyebrows at me. "In fact, Betsy, didn’t you find out for yourself not too long ago?"
"I don’t want to talk about that," I said firmly. "He tricked me. He knew if we had sex, he’d be the king."
No, I didn’t like to talk about it. But I sure thought about it a lot. Not only was it the most pleasurable sexual experience of my life, it had been so intense. Because, for a while there, while he was inside me, I was inside him. I could read his mind. And his thoughts … his thoughts had been very nice. While we were having sex, at least, he had really liked me.
Maybe loved me.
"Come on," Marc was saying in his coaxing doctor voice, "it was three months ago. And there have been compensations, right? I mean, Sinclair and Tina are cool, and it’s obvious they really like you. What’s so bad about that? When are you going to let it go?"
"A thousand years," I said, trying not to show how upset I was getting. Marc, who had a huge crush on Sinclair, just didn’t get it. And Jessica thought I should be nice to him. Nice! "That’s how long I’m stuck in this gig. Thanks to him."
"Well, I know, and I’m sorry. Don’t cry about it," he said, kindly enough. "But there’s worse things than nice vampires thinking you’re in charge, right?"
"I don’t want to talk about it anymore."
"Okay," Jessica said at once. She was glaring at Marc. "You don’t have to if you don’t want to. Look, why don’t you get dressed for work? I’ll make you some tea, and then we’ll go get your car."
I sniffed. "Okay. Actually, I’ll come down with you. I want tea right now … I’m dying of thirst. Don’t look at me like that."
"Sorry," they said in uneasy unison.
"Oh, please. Like I’d ever bite either of you two dorks," I muttered. "I’m gonna change my clothes, and I’ll be right down."
They left, and I thought I heard the front door open, but I was too annoyed to really care. More visitors—great! Well, bring it on.
I turned around to go to my dresser and nearly fell over Marie. "Jeez, don’t do that!" I practically yelled. Okay, I did yell. "Sugar, would you mind clearing out? I’ve had a rotten evening and it’s barely started. Go find your dad, or something."
"Sure," she said, staring at me with big, solemn eyes. "But I don’t think you should open the door."
Yeah, yeah, whatever. She was gone when I came out of the bathroom, and I changed into a clean blouse, khaki shorts, and slipped on a pair of black sandals. I ran a brush through my hair and decided that would do, and decided to head downstairs.
I opened my bedroom door, and got the surprise of my life.
Chapter 13
From the private papers of Father Markus, Parish Priest, St. Pious Church, 129 E. 7th Street, Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Killing the Evil Ones is not as satisfying as I had assumed it would be. And I can hardly believe I am thinking such a thing, much less writing it down. When I am long dead, these papers will belong to the Holy Church. What will they think of me, and however will I explain myself to my Heavenly Father?
At first, I thought God was acting through our employer. I am beginning to wonder if that was the devil, speaking to me in the voice of my pride. Because many things I have long believed may not be true. And if that is the case, what will become of me? What will become of the children? They say all things work toward God’s will … perhaps even the Undead do, as well.
The money, the equipment, the skills of the Blade Warriors … every vampire the children found was dispatched. I assumed we were doing great good. We are commanded not to kill, but are these things not already dead? I thought God was acting through me, through the children, but now …
It started to go bad when the two females escaped. Both were beautiful, looked young, and had the strength of ten tigers. Although we inflicted great damage on the smaller, dark one, she eluded us in the end. It was the first time we had been unable to do our duty, and it weighed heavily on the boys. Ani was more sanguine, but even she couldn’t hide her distress.
Then there was the vampire in the parking garage.
Except was she?
Our employer had never been wrong. But this woman—she did not hiss and snarl when cornered, she did not try to bite. She seemed puzzled, and annoyed, and although she moved with the grace of a jungle cat she did not try any tricks of the dead—the hypnosis, the mind-bending, the seduction. Instead, she yelled at Jon and mocked the rest of us. She made us feel foolish and worse, we feared we were foolish. And after taunting us, instead of engaging, she fled. And we learned something more—heights are a vampire’s friend.
Ani found the purse in the woman’s—the vampire’s—car. And that was another thing. This vampire had a car, a job, and a life. She was carrying full identification, right down to her library card.
Vampires, going to the library.
The name was right—Elizabeth Taylor—but nothing else fit with what we knew of the Undead.
We could all feel doubts start to creep in. In our business, that is fatal.
Jon proposed a simple yet daring plan. And so it was that the next evening, we found ourselves on Summit Avenue, in the state’s capitol.
To our great surprise, the front door was unlocked. There were several cars in the driveway, and when we stepped inside we could see a cook hurrying through the entryway with bags of groceries. She gave us a single, disinterested glance and disappeared through an archway. We heard a car start outside and Wild Bill went to check. When he returned, he informed us the gardener had just left.
"Weird" was Ani’s comment. She was a philosophy major at the University, and we had deep respect for her mind. "The vampire’s driving a beat-up Ford, but she lives here? And what are all these people doing here? Do they know? And if they do, are they with her? Or prisoners? There aren’t any marks on them, and they don’t look like they’ve been snacked on …"
Before we could answer—and troubling questions they were—a lovely young African American woman came hurrying down the steps, and behind her was, of all things, a physician! He was a sharp-looking young man with dark hair, wearing light green scrubs and looking quite surprised to see us.
"Oh, great," the woman said. She was thin to the point of emaciation, but lovely just the same. Her ebony skin had reddish undertones, and her cheekbones made her look almost regal. Her eyes flashed dark fire as she hurried toward us. And, oddest of all, she seemed familiar to me. "Don’t tell me, let me guess. The Blade Warriors. I have a huge bone to pick with you."
"That was our friend you ganged up on," the doctor added. He was right on her heels as they rapidly approached.
This was a bit nerve-wracking. We were quite helpless around humans—we certainly wouldn’t kill them! But we had never met a vampire with human friends before.
And where had I seen the woman?
"Maybe they’re pets," Ani muttered behind me.
"Maybe you’re trespassing," the woman replied coldly. "You assholes are on private property. Mine. So get the hell out, unless you’re here to apologize to my friend. In which case, you can still get the hell out, because we don’t want to hear it."
"The door was unlocked," Jon pointed out.
"So it’s not breaking and entering," the doctor said,
grinning. "It’s just entering."
His little joke caused most of us to relax a bit, but the young woman remained unmoved. "You guys get out of here," she said with clear warning in her voice. "I’m going to count to three. Then I’m loading the shotgun. Then I’m filling the waterguns with bleach. Then I’m releasing the hounds. Then—"
"Jessica Watkins?" I asked, utterly surprised.
She blinked at me, just as surprised. "Yeah. So?"
"I’m Father Markus. You donated half a million dollars to my church." At last, at last I had placed her! I hadn’t recognized her in faded jeans and a Gap T-shirt, because I usually saw the lady at fundraisers, when she was dressed in formal attire. "This is a surprise. It’s good to see you."
Taken aback, she let me shake her hand. "Uh, yeah. Good-good to see you, too. Um. What are you doing with these idiots?"
"These are my children," I corrected her firmly.
She leered. "Oh, you’re one of those priests, eh?"
Although the Church’s reputation had suffered grievously the last few years, I did not rise to the bait. "I take care of them," I explained patiently, "and they look after me in my old age. We do God’s work."
"Not today, Father! Betsy never did a single thing to any one of you. Leave her alone!"
"We’re here to solve a mystery," I said. "We’re not quite sure your … your friend is … is who we think she is."
"So you come to my house at night, bristling with weapons? I’m surprised you didn’t show up at noon like true cowards," she said, her imperious voice dripping with scorn. She was her father’s daughter, all right. The man had been known to make other CEOs cry just before taking over their companies.
"We would never," I said, offended. "Even the undead deserve to be dealt with honorably."
"Outnumbered five to one and cornered and staked to death? Father Markus, I never dreamed you were such an asshole."
How that stung! I was a good man, a good priest. I helped hunt the Undead. I saved lives. I was not an asshole.
As was her wont, Ani stepped in when she felt someone was being disrespectful. "Don’t talk to Father Markus like that," she said in warning. She was a tall woman—easily my height—with jet-black hair cut just below her ears, and lovely, tip-tilted almond-shaped eyes. Her mother had been Japanese; she had never known her father, but from her build and coloring, we guessed he was Northern European. Her limbs were long and slender, and she was one of the fastest runners I had ever seen. She had been considering the Olympics when we found her. "Not unless you want to eat teeth."
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