I did know. Derik was playing Pin the Blame on the Vampire as an alternative to facing up to the fact that the only reason Antonia left was because most of the Pack disliked her, or was scared of her. I understood, even though I didn’t like it one bit. Where was all this concern when she decided to leave town and never come back?
And here he was, looming over our table. “I’d like you to step away from my wife, please,” he managed through gritted teeth. “I don’t want—aaaggghhh!”
At first I thought he had slipped. Then I realized he’d seen BabyJon and jerked backward so hard, and so fast, that he lost his balance.
“That again! Get that baby away from my wife!”
You know those moments in parties where you have to talk loud to be heard, only you do it the one time everyone’s quiet? So they all hear exactly what you’re shouting?
Yeah. It was like that.
Chapter 24
Dude,
It wasn’t long before Laura had a chance to implement Operation Distract. Yes, another band of devil worshippers showed up. But this time she (we, actually) was ready for them.
“Oh most gracious and dread lady,” their leader was proclaiming, kneeling before her. His fellow lemmings followed suit, which meant there were sixteen religious extremists in one of our parlors. “We but live to serve you in any capacity you require. Only point us to your enemies and we shall wreak vengeance in your name. In your father’s name, Lucifer Morningstar.”
That was kind of interesting, because we knew Laura’s mother had been possessed by the devil. And the devil always appeared to Laura (you can imagine her mood after one of those fun-filled visits) as a woman.
I imagine the Prince/Princess of Lies can appear as anything he/she wants.
“We are yours to command!” he shouted at Laura’s feet, since they were all cowering before her on their knees. None of them could see the way she shook her head in disgust, rolling her eyes. “Oh most dread sovereign, your coming was foretold and it has come at last!”
“Yes, yes,” she replied impatiently. “That’s fine. Now. You. All of you.”
All the heads jerked up at once. It was like watching otters pop their heads out of the water at the zoo.
“I bid ye go forth. All of you find the soup kitchen on Lake and Fourth, in Minneapolis. Volunteer for at least fifty hours a week.”
The leader’s sad basset hound face seemed to sag even further. “But—but we wish to—”
“Are you questioning me?” Laura thundered in a pretty good imitation of an angry demigod wearing a pink sweater. “You dare question how I test your loyalty?”
Practically elbowing each other out of the way, they all denied questioning anything.
“So begone from here, and do my unholy bidding at Sister Sue’s Soup Kitchen. I will know when you are ready.”
They all galloped out, several of them getting wedged in the doorway in their eagerness to obey Laura’s completely unevil command.
They were no sooner out the front door than Laura threw herself into my arms hard enough to rock me back on my heels. “It worked! Oh, Marc, I can’t thank you enough, what a wonderful idea you had!”
“Fifty hours a week should keep them out of trouble,” I agreed, patting her back.
“Oh, I don’t know why I didn’t think of this before!”
Well, honey, you pretty much tense up and close off whenever anything connecting you with your mother gets shoved in your face. When you’re that angry, or that upset, or that sad, it’s impossible to think logically.
(Dude, I prudently kept that to myself.)
“I don’t know how I kept a straight face,” Laura gasped. “I looked at you and I almost lost it right in front of that band of dimwitted sheep.”
In all modesty, I had to admit my idea stank with the reek of genius. Put them to work for you, I’d said. Make them volunteer at homeless shelters, at soup kitchens, at church fund-raisers. That way they’re happy—they think they’re being tested—and you’re happy because not only are they out of your hair, they’re spending virtually all their free time helping the greater good.
I’d saved the best for last: ordering devil worshippers to commit good deeds was a terrific way to defy her mother. If I had needed a deal closer, that was it.
“Marc, if there’s ever anything I can do for you, you have to come see me or call.”
“Are you kidding? You just gave me ten minutes of free entertainment. You’re square with the house, honey.”
Laura turned away for a moment, suddenly lost in thought. “Maybe I’ve been looking at this the wrong way. If they’ll do anything I say—if they’ll do things for me they would do for no one else—I wonder what else I can make them do?”
“Hey, one way to find out,” I said, having absolutely no idea that I was inadvertently, and with the best of intentions, driving Laura to a break with her conscience and her sanity.
I take full responsibility for the following events, which I will narrate as quickly and carefully as I can.
Chapter 25
Derik! Apologize this minute,” Sara practically hissed. “I know you’re upset, but this is ridiculous. He’s just a baby.”
“I don’t know what the hell that thing is,” Derik retorted, “but it’s not a baby.”
“You’re acting like you’ve seen a ghoul, or something,” Jeannie said.
“What baby?”
Jeannie turned to her husband. “What baby? The one she got off the plane with, what are you talking about, what baby?”
Oh, great, here were Michael and Jeannie Wyndham, with Sinclair hot on their heels.
“Everybody just calm down,” I began, but Derik drowned me out.
He pointed. “That baby.”
Michael frowned. “But you don’t have a baby.”
Jeannie stared. “What’s wrong with you?” She nodded toward Derik. “Him, I get. He’s just playing the blame game. But you—”
I was flabbergasted. I’d suspected last night he hadn’t noticed BabyJon, but not noticing or commenting was one thing. Michael didn’t appear to see my brother at all.
“Well, he’s not mine,” I said, trying to recover from my surprise. “I mean, he is now. He’s my brother.”
Michael was staring at BabyJon with his flat, yellow gaze. “Where did he come from?”
“Uh, Michael.” I coughed. “Um, he came with us. On the plane, like Jeannie said. He was in the limo with us last night. And in your office.”
“Oh, well, that’s fine then.”
“I wouldn’t call that exactly fine,” Jeannie began, but Michael had already turned away, gently touching Jeannie’s elbow.
“Hon, would you tell the kitchen they need to send up more—”
“Wait.”
Sinclair might not have been a Pack member, but he had no trouble seizing control of a moment . . . Everybody stopped and looked at him.
“Michael,” Sinclair asked quietly, almost gently, “where is the baby?”
Michael frowned and cocked his head, as if listening to a voice from another room. “What baby?”
“That’s it,” Jeannie said firmly. “I’m taking you to a doctor. Right now.”
“I’m not sure it’s something a doctor can fix,” I said, mentally reeling. I mean, I really needed a minute here.
As soon as Michael had turned his back, he’d forgotten—again—about BabyJon. Derik wouldn’t go anywhere near the kid. And the other werewolves seemed to be picking up on Derik’s extreme stress. Only Sara seemed unperturbed.
“Perhaps it’s time to go,” Sinclair murmured, his fingers clutching the back of my chair.
Perhaps it was time to call the local mental hospital with some new admits. “Uh, okay,” I said, slowly getting to my feet. BabyJon, unmoved by recent events, yawned against my neck. “Well, thanks for the—uh—snacks. I guess we’ll—”
“We’re not going to actually let them get away with this, are we?” A petite, dark-haired woman
with a severe buzz cut was standing on the fringe of our small group. She was dressed in black jeans and a black button-down shirt, and it took me a minute to place her.
It was Cain—one of the werewolves who’d come to the mansion looking for Antonia earlier in the week.
“She gets Antonia killed, then brings some sort of ensorcelled infant—if that’s what it really is—and we’re just going to let her walk?”
“Cain.”
“Well, are we?” she cried, turning to face the man who towered over her. He, too, was dark and whip-thin. He, too, looked weirded out but, even more than that, he seemed almost embarrassed. For her or for me, I had no idea. But I wasn’t going to bet the farm it was me.
“That’s for the Council to decide,” the quiet, dark-haired man said. “Not us. And not here.”
“But she got Antonia killed! And she doesn’t even seem to care!”
And that was just about enough. “I didn’t get Antonia killed,” I said, and I could practically feel ears pricking up all over the room. “You did.”
Sinclair pinched the bridge of his nose and shook his head.
“And then she—what?” Cain’s jaw sagged and she turned to fully face me. “What did you say to me?”
“What’s wrong? Should I get a megaphone? Do you not understand English?” Smiling, I beckoned her closer and, when she bent to hear, I said loudly, “I didn’t get Antonia killed. You did.”
Cain jerked away and rubbed her ear. A few more werewolves sidled over. Sinclair was still shaking his head and looking like the before picture of a sinus headache commercial.
“I am so sick of this bullshit,” I said, knowing my voice was carrying, knowing everyone in the room could hear me, and not much caring. “I guess it hasn’t occurred to any of you to ask yourselves what the hell Antonia was doing living with vampires in the first place. Oh, hell no! After all, it’s much more convenient to blame us than face the fact that she couldn’t get out of here fast enough.”
“And now,” Sinclair sighed, “we fight.”
“Here,” I said, thrusting BabyJon toward Sara, who scooped him up and backed off a couple of steps. BabyJon let out a pissed-off yowl, ignoring Sara’s attempts to soothe him.
“You can’t pass the buck that easily,” Cain retorted. “You were the leader; she was your responsibility.”
“She was a grown woman, you nitwit! You’re making it sound like she was my kindergarten student.”
“You’re still passing the buck,” someone else said, a werewolf I hadn’t met.
“And you’re all conveniently overlooking the fact that not only did you practically drive her to my front door, I didn’t see any of you assholes ever come to visit.”
“She was her own person,” that same werewolf said.
“Well, which is it, dipshit? Either she was a grown woman who could take care of herself, or she needed me to shelter and protect her. You can’t have it both ways.”
“We’re getting a bit far afield,” Sinclair began, but I bulldozed right over him.
“She didn’t get a single phone call the entire time she lived with us. The only time anyone bothered to show up was after she missed her weekly military check-in, whatever it was. When your info pipeline into the vampires suddenly got cut off, then you showed up.”
A furious gabble of voices rose, and rose, and I had to shout to be heard over the din. “Not to mention, not to mention, you guys clearly didn’t want much to do with her while she was alive. So all this postmortem concern is a pile of crap. You guys look stupid trying to come off all morally outraged when it was your fault she was living in my house in the first place.”
The babble of voices got louder, but I was able to pick out one comment from the din: “The bottom line is that she died in your service, so it’s your responsibility.”
“If they’re even telling the truth about how she died,” someone else said. “How can we ever know? She and her mate don’t have a scent. They can make up any story they like and we’d never know the difference.”
“Oh, really? Okay. Here’s a story, fuck-o. Once upon a time, there was a werewolf who could predict the future who lived on Cape Cod. And all her supposed friends and family went out of their way to avoid her because she wasn’t exactly Miss Congeniality.” I ought to know; I used to be one. “And one day she moved away and never came back, and nobody in her Pack gave a rat’s ass. The end.”
More babbling. The din rose and rose. Shouts. Threats. Michael trying to get everyone to calm down. Sinclair rubbing the bridge of his nose. Sara looking like an increasingly nervous tennis match observer. BabyJon crying.
It was stupid, really. Stupid to forget how fast they were. Stupid to pick a fight in a room full of werewolves. I heard the crash of a chair splintering, and turned just in time to get stabbed in the heart with a chair leg.
That was pretty much when the lights went out.
Chapter 26
Dude,
I swear my intentions were good. But I vastly overestimated Laura’s state of mind and underestimated the rapidity with which things could deteriorate. And when Tina started having trouble sending and receiving e-mails, I honestly didn’t make the connection until it was too late.
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
More Satanists showed up and, instead of hiding from them or being embarrassed by them, Laura started briskly giving them orders. She spent a lot of time on the web finding charitable organizations where she could send the devil worshippers, and soon there were Satanists all over the metro area, cheerfully raising money for the homeless or participating in Meals on Wheels.
I admit, dude, I was proud of myself. I didn’t go into medicine for the money, obviously, so helping people always put me in a good mood. And Laura, for all her advantages, needed me as much as any patient. It’s just too damn bad I was too busy patting myself on the back to notice what was really going on.
Tina came and went, always on her own schedule, and I knew better than to ask her what she was up to. Mostly because it was none of my business, but also because she was as closed-mouthed about her work as I was about mine.
There had been a bad crack-up on I-35—no fatalities, thank God—so I didn’t get home until about 2:30 A.M. I headed straight for the kitchen (I had finally gone grocery shopping, so there was actual food in the fridge), where I found Tina sitting at the counter with her laptop, muttering to herself.
“Hey.”
“Good morning,” she said, not looking up.
“Everything okay?”
“Mmmm.” Then, thoughtfully, “You had a busy night, I see.”
Ah. Right. I had found it prudent to change out of my scrubs the moment I got home—or, even better, before I left the hospital. It didn’t matter if the blood on me was ten minutes old or ten hours. They could always smell it.
“Car crash.”
“Mmmm.”
I set about making myself a tuna sandwich while Tina pecked away at her laptop. She seemed a little off—annoyed, maybe, or distracted.
“Everything okay?”
“Hmmm?” She looked around as if noticing me for the first time. “Oh. Yes, everything’s fine. I’m getting a poor wireless signal. My e-mails to His Majesty keep bouncing.”
“So call.”
“I have.”
“Oh. You don’t think anything’s wrong, do you?”
“I’m sure they’re fine.”
I believed her. But I also knew what was bugging her. Tina lived for Betsy and Sinclair, the way most people lived for racing cars or marathons. When she couldn’t keep in touch, she got antsy. Not unlike a drug addict going through withdrawal, to be perfectly blunt.
“Betsy answered my e-mail,” I volunteered. It was a typical Betsy missive: bitchy and shrill. She really hated e-mail acronyms. The woman should really catch up to this century’s lingo. “I’m sure she’s already won over the werewolves and they’re somewhere partying like it’s 1999.�
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Tina slapped the laptop closed and smiled at me. “I’m sure you’re right. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must go out.”
To hunt. And feed. She was too polite to say so, of course. But I sure as hell wasn’t going to stand in her way. A grumpy vampire is a homicidal vampire. Hungry ones were even worse.
“Heck,” I called after her, “they’ve probably declared it National Betsy Day out on Cape Cod. You know she can win over just about anybody.”
Yes, dude, I know. In retrospect that was beyond ignorant. But how was I supposed to know they were going to kill her?
Chapter 27
I opened my eyes and saw a ring of tense faces above me. The first few times this had happened to me I’d been badly startled, but now I was getting used to being killed and then brought back to life.
“Ow,” I commented, sitting up. There was a sizeable hole in my blouse and suit jacket. Not to mention an unconscious werewolf three feet away. And BabyJon was still howling. “You’d better give him to me.”
Wide-eyed, Sara knelt beside me and obliged. BabyJon hushed at once, giving me a chance to take a good look around.
“Oh, man,” I said, eyeing the werewolf who, I assumed, had driven a chair leg into my heart. “Sinclair, what did you do to him?”
“I only hit him once,” my husband replied in that faux-casual tone that didn’t fool me one bit.
“Where’d everybody go?”
Aside from Sara, Sinclair, Jeannie, Michael, BabyJon, and Derik, the room was empty. Oh, and let’s not forget the werewolf who killed me.
“Michael cleared the room after you were attacked. Ah—it’s none of my business,” Sara continued, “but why aren’t you a pile of dust?”
“It’s a queen of the undead thing,” I said, trying to get my feet under me so I could stand. Sinclair gripped one of my arms, Michael the other, and they hauled me up. I stared down at my ruined suit and sighed.
“I must apologize on the Pack’s behalf,” Michael said stiffly. He appeared calm, but I had the distinct impression he was mortified.
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