Bitter Blood tmv-13

by Rachel Caine

  And then Monica said, “I heard people talking around town today. Your friends ought to be watching their backs, ’cause the knives are out.”

  That got Claire’s attention, fast. Shane’s, too. They both stopped walking, and Monica clomped on a few more steps before coming to a halt and saying, “What? Like you didn’t know?”

  “What are you talking about?” Shane closed the distance toward her, fast. “What did you hear? Spill it!”

  “Hey, hey, hold on!” She tried to back up, but she overbalanced on her precarious heels and almost went down; Shane grabbed her arm and steadied her, and didn’t let go. “Look, I don’t know why you’re so surprised and all! Let go!”

  “Not until you answer the question. What about Michael and Eve?”

  “Oh, come on. A vamp marrying a human gets the fanged ones all upset, and Eve made herself look like the ultimate fang-banger to all the humans by putting a ring on one, so what did you expect, exactly? Flowers and parades? This is Texas. We’re still figuring out how to spell tolerance.”

  “I said, what do you know about it? Where? When? Who’s involved?”

  “Let go, jerk!”

  He didn’t say anything, but Claire was almost sure he squeezed, because Monica made a funny little sound and went very still. “Okay,” she said. “Okay, jackass, you win. It’s just general talk as far as I know, but some people are saying an example should be made. Michael and Eve are just handy targets standing in the middle of the war zone. Come to think of it, so’s your girlfriend, what with all her cozying up to Amelie.”

  Shane let her go. “You’re one to talk.”

  “Yeah, I am. I know what it’s like to think you’re secure and safe and all of a sudden be standing all alone. You think you and your friends are the only ones in the crosshairs? Do you have any idea how many people want to hurt me?”

  Monica was more self-aware than Claire had ever given her credit for. She knew how things were—maybe better than Shane, surprisingly enough. She’d probably had to learn how to protect herself fast, once the town had stopped being cowed by her status as Self-Crowned Princess.

  “Then you shouldn’t be pissing off the only ones who might listen to you when you scream for help,” Shane said. “Get me?”

  Monica finally nodded, a little unwillingly. She shot a quick, unreadable look at Claire, and then turned and strode up the walk to her apartment. They watched as she produced a key (though where she’d kept it on that skintight dress was a mystery) and unlocked her door. Once she was inside, and the lights were on, Shane put his hands in his pockets and extended an elbow to Claire, who threaded her arm through his.

  “You’re super nice to her, all of a sudden,” Claire said.

  “Ha. If I was super nice to her, she wouldn’t have bruises on her arm right now,” he said. “But I’m willing to forget to hate her, every once in a while. She’s had it rough these past couple of years.”

  “So have you.”

  He flashed her a smile. “I never did have much, so having it rough came with the territory. I was conditioned for it. And you’re forgetting the most important thing that’s different.”

  “You don’t have a fashion addiction to skintight clothes?”

  “I have you,” he said, and the warmth in his voice took her breath away. She let go of his arm and crowded in close as they walked, and he hugged her close. It was awkward making progress that way, but it felt so sweet. “Okay, and I don’t have a fashion addiction. Valid point.”

  “You don’t think she knows something about a plot to hurt Michael and Eve, do you? The way she said that back there…”

  “I don’t know,” Shane said. “I don’t think she’d hide it; she’d really like teasing us with it, but she’d give it up. She’d want to, I think. It’s not as if she wants Michael dead, anyway. She always had a little bit of a thing for him.”

  “And you,” Claire said, and elbowed him. “More than a little bit.”

  “Ugh. Please don’t say that or I’ll lose my will to live.”

  “I love you.” It came out of her spontaneously, and she felt a little jolt of adrenaline, then a little burst of fear right on the heels of it. There had been no reason to say it now, walking down the street, but it had just seemed…right. She was a little afraid that Shane would think it was clingy, or fake, but when she glanced over at him, she saw he was smiling—an easy, relaxed smile, uncomplicated and happy.

  It wasn’t something she saw very often, and it made her feel glorious.

  “I love you, too,” he said, and that felt like some kind of milestone to her, that they felt easy enough with each other to just say it whenever they wanted, without feeling awkward about it, or afraid.

  We’re growing up, she thought. We’re growing up together.

  He put his arm around her, and they walked close together, all the way home. The setting sun was lurid reds and golds, spilling into the vast and open sky, and it was as beautiful a thing as Claire had ever seen in Morganville.

  Peaceful.

  It was the last of that, though.

  EIGHT

  AMELIE

  I knew of no one, vampire or human, who could detour Myrnin from a course once he had decided on it, whether it was mad, manic, destructive, or simply single-minded. So when the guards informed me that he had refused to stop at the checkpoint to the hallway of my office, I did not bother to order them to try to detain him. It might have been possible for a few moments, an hour, a day, but Myrnin wouldn’t forget. He would simply start again, and sooner or later, he’d succeed.

  I pressed the button on my phone—still such an awkward and common device, to my mind, nothing attractive about it—and informed my assistant that upon his arrival she should not stand in his way. Poor thing, she had taken enough abuse lately, from humans as well as from vampires.

  Only I could handle Myrnin with any measure of success.

  He exploded through my doorway with the force of a tropical storm, and indeed the riot of colors about his person reminded me of that…so many shades, and none of them complementary. I did not bother to catalog all the offenses, but they began with the jacket he had chosen. I had no name for that particular hue of orange, other than unfortunate.

  “This is my last attempt at making you see sense,” he said. Shouted, actually. “Damn you, how long have we worked, how many sacrifices have we made? To see you throw that all away for him…”

  I had already decided, well before his grand entrance, what my first move would be, and with an economy of motion, I slapped him full across the face. The force of it would have felled a strong mortal; it certainly made Myrnin pause, with the mark of the blow blushing a very faint pink in the shape of my fingers.

  He blinked.

  “You may save your well-rehearsed speech,” I said. “I’ll hear none of it. This ill-advised intrusion is at an end.”

  “Amelie, we have been friends for—”

  “Don’t presume to tell me how many years. I can count as well as you, or possibly better on the days when you’re insane,” I snapped back. “Sit down.”

  He did, looking oddly watchful. I paced. I’d been doing that more frequently than was my normal habit, but I put it down to raw nerves. Morganville lately had seemed exasperating, a broken toy that would never be put right no matter how much time and love I lavished on the repairs.

  Myrnin said, “You even move like he does now.”

  “Silence!” I whirled on him, snarling, and knew my eyes had gone deep crimson.

  “No,” he said, with an eerie sort of calm. Myrnin was many things, but he was rarely calm, and when he was, it was time to worry. “There are some people who may say this is a good match for you, that you needed a strong right arm to calm the fears of the vampires and subdue the human population. I am not one. Sam gentled you, Amelie. He made you feel more a part of the world you rule. Oliver will never do that. He feels no responsibility for those he crushes, and—”

  “Foul his name again
and we’re finished,” I interrupted. I meant it, and it dripped from every syllable I spoke.

  Myrnin sat still for a moment, staring into my eyes, and then he nodded. “Then we are indeed,” he said. “I just had to be certain that you were beyond my hope, and my help. But if he has you tied this close, he will have you do as he wishes. Whomever it hurts.”

  “Do you think I am so—so stupid? So utterly weak that I would allow any man to—”

  “Not just a man,” Myrnin said. “He swayed a nation to kill its king, once. He persuades. He influences. Perhaps he doesn’t even intend to do so, but it’s in his nature. And while you are more powerful than he by far, once he has your trust, there is no saying what he might be able to accomplish, through you.”

  His words left me cold inside, a chill I’d not felt since the moment I’d finally acknowledged the aching need for Oliver’s regard, for his loyalty, for his attention. I had been alone for so long; Michael’s grandfather Sam Glass and I had loved, but save for a few precious times, always carefully, and from afar. Oliver had come at me like a storm, and the fury of it was…cleansing.

  But was Myrnin right? Could I be falling victim, as so many had, to Oliver’s deadly charm? Was what I was doing here right, or simply convenient to his ambitions?

  I slowly sat down in a chair across from my oldest living friend, the one who—in the end—I trusted more than any still walking the earth, and said, “I know my own mind, Myrnin. I am Amelie. I am the Founder of Morganville, and what I do here, I do for the good of all. You may trust that. You must.”

  He had a sadness in his eyes that I could not understand, but then, who ever had understood Myrnin fully? I couldn’t make that claim, and neither could Claire, the girl he trusted so much. And then he stood, and with the ease of thousands of years of experience, he made a graceful, ages-old bow, took my hand in his, and kissed it with the greatest of love and respect.

  “Farewell,” he said.

  And then he was gone.

  I slowly drew my hand back to my chest, frowning, and became aware that I was cradling it, rubbing the spot where his lips had pressed as if they had burned me. Farewell. He’d thrown tantrums many times, threatened to leave, but this—this seemed different.

  It was a calm, ordered, and above all sad departure.

  “Myrnin?” I said softly into the silence, but it was too late.

  Far too late.

  NINE

  CLAIRE

  Shane preceded Claire into the house by a couple of steps as she shut and locked the door behind them; apparently that was a lucky thing, because as she was turning the dead bolt, she heard him say, “Oh, crap,” in a voice that was choked with laughter, and then a startled yelp from Eve, followed by the sound of scrambling and flailing. Shane backed up next to Claire and held her back when she would have moved forward.

  “Trust me,” he said. “Wait a second.”

  Michael and Eve were in the parlor, the front living area that was so rarely used, except for dropping coats and bags and miscellaneous stuff, and from the hasty whispers and rustles of clothes, Claire quickly figured out exactly why Shane was holding her back.

  Oh.

  “I guess I should have said, Put your pants on,” Shane said, loudly enough that they could hear. “Alert, there’s a barely legal girl out here.”

  “Hey!” Claire swiped a hand at him, which he easily avoided. “What were they doing?”

  “What do you think?”

  Pink-faced, Eve leaned around the frame of the doorway and said, “Um…hi. You’re early.”

  “Nope,” Shane said with merciless good cheer. “It’s sundown. Not a bit early. You got clothes on?”

  “Yes!” Eve said. Her cheeks burned brighter. “Of course! And you didn’t see anything anyway.” There was a bit of worry to her voice, though, and Shane made it worse with a big, utterly unsympathetic smile.

  “Married people,” he said to Claire. “They’re a menace.”

  Eve eased out of the door, zipping up her blouse—it was one of those with a front zip—and cleared her throat. “Right,” she said. “We really need to talk, you guys.”

  “You know, my dad sucked at most things, but he did give me the birds and bees Q&A when I was ten, so I’m good,” Shane said. Man, he was enjoying this way too much. “Claire?”

  She nodded soberly. “I think I understand the basics.”

  Eve, still blushing, rolled her eyes. “I’m serious!”

  Michael finally appeared behind her. He was dressed, kind of; his shirt was unbuttoned, though he was doing it up as quickly as he could. “Eve’s right,” he said, and he wasn’t kidding at all. “We need to talk, guys.”

  “No, we don’t,” Shane said. “Just text me or something next time. We could go grab a burger or a movie or—”

  Michael shook his head and walked inside the parlor. Eve followed him. Shane sent Claire a look that had a little bit of alarm in it, and finally shrugged. “Guess we’re talking,” he said. “Whether we want to or not.”

  Michael and Eve hadn’t taken seats, when the two of them came in; they were standing with their hands clasped, for solidarity, apparently.

  “Uh-oh,” Shane murmured, and then put on a cheerful smile. “So, Mikey, what up? Because this looks like more than just a ‘how was your day’ kind of discussion.”

  “We needed to talk about something,” Eve said. She looked nervous, and—for Eve—she’d dressed super plainly, just a black shirt and jeans, not a single skull or shiny thing in evidence, except for the subtle glimmer of her wedding ring. “Sorry, guys. Sit down.”

  “You first,” Shane said as Claire dumped her backpack with a heavy clunk by the wall. Michael exchanged a look with Eve, and then sat beside her on the old velvet sofa, while Claire settled in the armchair and Shane leaned on the top of it, his hand on her shoulder. “If we’re playing guessing games, I’m going to go with—you’re pregnant. Wait, can you be? I mean, can the two of you…?”

  Eve flinched and avoided looking at the two of them. “That’s not it,” she said, and bit her lip. She twisted her wedding ring in agitation, and then finally said, “We’ve been talking about getting our own place, guys. Not because we don’t love you, we do, but—”

  “But we need our own space,” Michael said. “I know it seems weird, but for us to feel really together, married, we need to get some time to ourselves, and you know how it is here; we’re all in one another’s business here.”

  “And there’s only one bathroom,” Eve said mournfully. “I really need a bathroom.”

  Claire had suspected it was coming, but that didn’t make it feel any better. She instinctively reached up for Shane’s hand, and his fingers closing over hers made her feel a little steadier. She’d gotten so used to the idea of the four of them together, always together, that hearing Michael talk about moving stirred up feelings she’d thought she’d outgrown…feelings that hadn’t been on her radar since she’d first walked in the door of the Glass House.

  She suddenly felt vulnerable, alone, and rejected. She felt homesick, even though she was home, because home wasn’t the way she’d left it this morning.

  “We want you to be happy,” Claire managed to say. Her voice sounded small and a little hurt, and she didn’t mean it that way, not at all. “But you can’t move out—it’s your house, Michael. I mean, it’s the Glass House. And you two are…Glass. We’re not.”

  “Screw that,” Shane said immediately. “Sure, I want you two crazy kids to be happy, but you’re talking about busting up something that’s good, really good, and I don’t like it, and I’m not going to be all noble and pretend I do. Together, we’re strong—you’ve said that yourself, Michael. Now all of a sudden you want more privacy? Dude, that’s about as logical as Let’s split up in a horror movie!”

  Michael gave him a look as he finished buttoning his shirt. “I think it’s pretty obvious privacy’s an issue.”

  “Not if you don’t decide to get crazy in a room with
out a locking door. Or, you know, a door.”

  “It’s just that we were waiting on you guys, and we were nervous, and…it just happened,” Eve said. “And we’re married. We have the right to get crazy if we want to. Anywhere. At any time.”

  “Okay, I get that,” Shane said. “Hell, I’d like a little spontaneous sexytime, too, but is it worth putting us all in danger? Because Morganville ain’t safe, guys. You know that. You go out of this house, or make us leave it, and something is going to happen. Something bad.”

  “Have you taken up Miranda’s fortune-telling?” Eve asked. “I could say something about crystal balls….”

  “Don’t need a psychic friend to tell me it’s nasty out there and bound to get worse. Michael, you’re on Team Vampire. Are you saying you don’t think it’s going toxic with Amelie and Oliver in charge?”

  Michael didn’t try to answer that one, because he couldn’t; they’d all agreed on it already.

  Eve jumped in, instead. “We could get a house in the vampire quarter,” she said. “Free. It’s part of Michael’s citizenship in town. It wouldn’t be a problem except—”

  “Except that you’d be living in Vamp Central, and the only thing with a pulse in a couple of square blocks, surrounded by people who think of you as an attractively shaped plasma container?” Shane asked. “Problem. Oh, another problem: Mikey, you said yourself that being around us, meaning all of us, helped you cope with your instincts. Now you’re talking about isolating yourselves with a bunch of also-deads. Not smart, man. It’ll make you more vamp, and it’ll put Eve in more danger, too.”

  “I never said we were moving to the vampire quarter,” Michael said. “Eve was just pointing out we could, not that we would. We could find something else, something close. The old Profit place is still for sale down the street. Amelie gave me a bequest, so I’ve got money to put down.”