by SM Reine
Damn the news. Damn their leaks of information that nobody should have had outside of law enforcement. Damn Cèsar Hawke—and damn Nissa Royal too. “Vlad the Impaler?” Dana prompted.
“You know, the historical mass murderer. An ancient vampire who would spear his enemies, often through their rectums, vaginas, throats…”
That wasn’t what Dana had been asking. Of course she was familiar with the historical figure. “Vlad the Impaler wasn’t a vampire. There were no vampires before Genesis.”
“Whether or not Vlad the Impaler was bloodless, our new killer thinks that he was. You’re going to find that he idolizes him,” Nissa said. “Mimicry is, after all, the highest form of flattery. Isn’t it? I mimic the people I admire most too.”
Dana felt cold even though the stuffy plastic tent had trapped all the desert’s heat against her skin. “Are you saying you’ve been mimicking Mohinder? Keeping people in glass cages?”
“There’s someone I admire more than even my sire,” Nissa whispered.
Her eyes punctured the veil of heat like needles into Dana’s skin.
I didn’t learn this from the Fremont Slasher. I learned this from you.
“Remember how good it felt to kill the draugr?” Nissa asked. “When you held my hand, helping me push the blade through the vampire’s ribs? I saved those bodies, you know. I kept the draugr for myself so I could remember.”
That was so fucked up. “You killed the draugr with the same sword used to kill innocents.”
“People you deem innocent,” Nissa said. “You might be the master of killing, but you’re not the master of morality. Why’d the draugr deserve to die? Why don’t the humans deserve to die? Don’t you think it’s all so arbitrary?”
“I came here because you said that you had something for me. If I’d thought you were going to bore me to death—”
“You’re looking for someone local who was made into a vampire recently,” Nissa interrupted. “Achlys and Mohinder were the only Paradisos vamps who could have made a new guy this strong, and they didn’t.”
“There’s nowhere else venom could come from,” Dana said. “It’s not like vampires are all over the place outside Vegas. How’d they get venom into the city if it didn’t come from inside?”
Nissa smiled faintly.
She knew something. She knew something, and she wasn’t going to spill.
Dana turned to stride back to the entrance portal. Penny was lingering behind the door, listening with a hand on the frame. Her other hand wasn’t visible. She had tucked away the gun intended to shoot Dana. So considerate of her.
Nissa spoke again, voice all cold. “You’re going to be back here before you know it, and I’ll be waiting for you.”
“Yeah you will,” Dana said. “You can wait here until the heat death of the universe for all I care. It’s not like you’re going out for a walk in the sun. But I am. I’m gonna go enjoy this nice summer day.”
The walk back to security felt even longer than the walk into Nissa’s cell. Penny was still awkwardly holding that gun, but she had one free for Dana to grab, lacing their fingers together.
Penny didn’t speak as they walked together. She looked troubled by the visit to Nissa.
Dana didn’t want to know why. Gods, she could barely handle her own moods right now. “It’s hot and I’m tired. Let’s go home.”
“Um,” Penny said.
“What?”
“I’m just wondering…which home?”
Dana frowned at her. “The penthouse?”
“You gave it to me,” Penny said. “We’re separated.”
“I’m human again.”
“We didn’t separate because you turned into a vampire. We separated because there was no room for me in your life with all the space your vendetta occupies. And the condo is mine.”
“You visited me in prison. You came here to help back me up against Nissa. I thought that you—”
“I care about you, I do,” Penny said softly. “I have to think about myself. I still need space. Everything with Nissa and this killer, this Il Senesino—I don’t think anything’s changed with you.”
How could she think nothing had changed when literally everything had changed? Death, rebirth…the city…
Penny didn’t want Dana to go home.
Dana dropped her wife’s hand. Forcefully. “I can’t believe you’re still upset about my ‘vendetta’ when, first of all, my vendetta did lead to killing the actual Fremont Slasher. And second of all, Count von Count is here to prove that vampires are exactly as bad as I think.”
“They’re not all the same,” Penny said. “I seriously hoped that you’d have realized that when you vamped out. But no. I think you still see more of Nissa in your future than you see me. You’d rather kill her than walk away. And that’s why I need my space.”
Why Dana still needed to keep her lawyer on retainer, too.
“I can’t believe you still feel jealous of Nissa,” Dana said.
Penny’s eyebrows crimped. “Shouldn’t I? You were nice to her in there. She’s obviously different for you.”
Dana glared.
Penny stared.
Neither of them spoke.
They had reached the end of the hall. It took a full minute for security staff on the other end to open the first door for them. Cèsar was waiting on the other side.
“Look, Nissa didn’t get me under thrall,” Dana said. “Told you it’d be fine.”
“Just because you’re not enthralled doesn’t mean everything’s fine,” he said cheerfully. “Want me to show you to your hotel room to freshen up before the next thing? Or is there somewhere else you want to stay while you’re in town?”
Dana glanced at Penny, who wasn’t looking at her. “I’d rather work,” she said.
Cèsar rubbed his hands together. “Great. Let’s work.”
7
Dana might not have been able to go home, but getting to the Hunting Lodge felt a lot like that. She strolled through those doors she hadn’t been confident she’d ever enter again, and…it was home. As much a home as a place without Penny inside of it could be.
So many familiar smells washed over her when she butted the doors open. Gun oil, cheap coffee, the lemon cleaner that the secretary favored.
Speaking of Chris, he ran over to Dana the instant she came through the door, looking as panicked as though the Hounds of Hell were on his heels. “Thank the gods you’re here,” he said. “I needed to talk to you away from the rest of the Hunting Club. It’s bad, Big D. It’s so bad.”
She was immediately on high alert. “What happened? Did the OPA do something to you guys?”
“Worse,” he said. “Brianna only buys decaf now, and she stopped movie nights. I couldn’t tell you at the taquería because she was there. But it’s true. She only buys decaf. We don’t watch movies. It is worse than Hell.” The last part came out all in a hurry, like he was afraid Brianna was Voldemort and would be summoned by talking about her.
“Shit, that’s serious.”
“You’re telling me! You haven’t been here drinking decaf!”
“No, I’ve been in prison,” Dana said.
“Bet they have the good stuff in prison,” Chris said, shooting a mutinous look through his square glasses at Brianna’s door. “Decaf. She’s a psychopath.”
“I’ll fix that shit while I’m here,” Dana said.
“You’re a saint, McIntyre.”
She found Brianna in the workroom, drinking from a dainty mug that smelled like coffee, though it must have been the stink of lies. Because decaf wasn’t real coffee.
Dana took the mug off the desk and dropped it in the trash.
“What in the…?” Brianna spun her chair around. The monitor behind her showed news articles on the economic collapse of the city. “What’s wrong with you? That was my coffee.”
“Decaf? For shame,” Dana said.
Brianna’s eyes narrowed. “I see that Chris got to you.” She stoop
ed to grab her cup out of the trash, shaking its now-empty shape at Dana. “I can’t believe I actually wrote a letter to Secretary Friederling requesting your release from prison.”
“That was your mistake if you wanted to keep decaf in the pot,” Dana said. “Is this how your depression’s manifesting? Inflicting decaf on the office? Are you a sadist now?”
“My depression?”
“Over Anthony,” Dana said.
“I will not have this conversation with you,” Brianna said.
She shuffled off to refill her coffee cup.
“Suit yourself,” Dana said to the door that swung shut behind her. “It’s your loss.”
Alone in the computer room, Dana logged in to the system. She was surprised that her credentials still worked. Also surprising was the loading screen that came up had the OPA logo faded into the background. The OPA hadn’t taken over the business. They had gotten into the Hunting Club’s proprietary programs to switch the branding around.
That was exactly the kind of petty, shallow bullshit Dana expected a sidhe to get up to. “Fuck these people,” she muttered.
The stupid OPA logo didn’t go away, even when she started searching for non-Paradisos vampires who might be responsible for Il Castrato Senesino.
The search came up with zilch. Nada. Absolutely nothing.
Any vampires who lived in Clark County for the last half-decade had been Paradisos, and they had never allowed foreign master vampires to travel to the area. Achlys had been too smart to allow actual threats to enter her territory.
Dickless’s existence was basically impossible.
Brianna Dimaria shuffled back into the room with a brand new mug. Even though it was hot outside, she was wearing a light sweater that hung to her knees over baggy jeans and sandals. “Budge over. And stop looking so weepy if you’re not going to be honest about how you feel. It’s getting on my nerves.”
Dana’s brow lowered over her eyes. “What did you say?”
“You look weepy. Stop it.” Brianna hunkered down. “Even if Penny never forgives you, you’ll live on. You don’t need any one person to keep living.”
Brianna thought that Dana was moody over Penny. Dana wasn’t. Really. Why would Dana care that the woman she’d dedicated her life to didn’t want her to come home?
“I’m not thinking about Penny,” Dana said. “Sounds like you’re thinking about Anthony, though.”
Brianna had never looked so old as she did now, with bruised bags under her eyes and deep lines on either side of her mouth. “I’ve been thinking about him a lot since he died.”
“I always wondered about you two. You’re weirdly close.”
“We were,” she said, toying with the handle of her mug. “He wasn’t interested in me the way I was interested in him, though. It never went anywhere.”
“Why not?” Anthony had been an old guy, Brianna had been an old lady. Old people getting together made sense. Especially since they were both charter members of the Hunting Club.
“He wasn’t interested in me in that way,” Brianna said. “I shouldn’t have cared so much, but before Genesis, we were partners. Kopis and aspis. We’d been magically bound for what was supposed to be our entire lives. The bond broke after Genesis, but just because we didn’t have that tie anymore didn’t change the fact that he saved my life. It meant something to me.”
“Anthony saved lots of lives,” Dana said.
“I know. I think it’s hard for heroes like him—like you—to realize what an impact you have on the victims. We need you so much. Or so it feels.” Brianna sucked in a breath, scrubbed at her nose, sat back in the chair. “Gods, he’s gone. I keep remembering and it hurts all over again.”
Dana’s jaw clenched, her shoulder muscles screwed up so tight that it hurt. “Get over it. He was a hunter. Dying’s what we do.”
“I know you’re crushed about Anthony too. You don’t have to say it.”
“Don’t act like you—”
“You’re gonna be fine.” Brianna’s hand rested on Dana’s arm. She was tanner than Dana, and her skin was looser. Dana didn’t remember Brianna’s skin having so little elasticity. She was around the same age Anthony had been, but so much less healthy. “It’s hard to breathe without Anthony now, but life is gonna go on, and one day you’ll wake up to find it’s easy to breathe.”
Dana pulled her arm away from Brianna’s touch. Clenched her teeth so tightly that her jaw throbbed. Stared at the computer monitor.
“I know you won’t ever want to talk about it, but I’ll still be here if you ever change completely as a human being,” Brianna said. “In the meantime, let’s talk about whatever information you got from Nissa. Penny told me she’s back in town again.”
The change in topic felt like a lifeline tossed to Dana right when the ocean was about to suck her under. “Nissa said that Dickless turned into a vampire recently, but he wasn’t made by any local vampires. I’ve got no idea how that’s possible.”
“She could be lying,” Brianna said.
“She could be, but… Man, I don’t know. I don’t think she’d lie to me.”
“If Nissa’s certain about her information, then she must know where the vampire venom came from.”
“I was thinking the same thing. But Nissa’s not talking.” Dana started swiping through the files on the computer again, listless, dissatisfied. This was the kind of repetitive work that Penny would have enjoyed, had she been willing to help Dana. “Cèsar shouldn’t be trying to contain Nissa. He should kill her.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t take a stake in to finish the job yourself.”
“They confiscated mine.”
“It’s never stopped you before,” Brianna said. “Something about Nissa appeals to you. It makes you want to keep her alive. Is it because she’s a Fremont Slasher survivor, like Penny?”
Dana kept blindly paging through files. “When I was bloodless, Nissa and I killed these vampires together. The draugr.”
“The ghost-vampires from Norway,” Brianna said. “Right?”
“Yeah. And what’s weird about it…” She scratched her aching arm thoughtfully. “Nissa’s not scared of me. She doesn’t think it’s gross or strange, the things I do. She liked it.”
“Sounds like she’s as fucked up as you,” Brianna said. Dana barely heard her.
She was thinking about Nissa again. Dana had initially interpreted Nissa’s talk about the draugr as taunting, but what if it had been a clue?
“Draugr,” Dana said aloud. “After I killed the draugr, Nissa disposed of the bodies. The Paradisos often killed their own. Their evidence disposal was so thorough that Charmaine never found proof they ever did it, but even vampires do leave remains. So where’d they go?”
Brianna rolled her chair to another workstation. “Let’s see what the OPA has found while raiding Paradisos businesses.” Her fingers flew over the keyboard. “It appears dead vampires were stored in some place below Vampire Vegas.”
Dana snorted. “What is this place? An ashtray?”
“I don’t know. They haven’t logged many details yet. The OPA operatives are spread thin, so I’m sure they’ll get around to it…eventually.” Brianna stood up, grabbing her purse. “Luckily, Hunting Club associates who cooperated with Undersecretary Hawke have elevated security permissions. Want to go look at Vampire Vegas?”
8
The room underneath Vampire Vegas wasn’t an ashtray, but it did have a lot of urns. The remains of dead vampires were collected in an oversized, dimly lit closet. Mohinder had nailed a cross over the doorway—probably some hint of a sick sense of humor, since vampires were fabled to be repelled by crucifixes, yet few were actually hurt by them.
It was a room more functional than glamorous, but there was a quiet elegance to its carved wooden shelves, the lone bench upholstered in velvet, and the candles dotting the floor. This was a place of mourning as much as any mortal cemetery.
The urns had a thin layer of dust on them—onl
y as much as they would collect after a few days without being cleaned. They had been well tended by the Paradisos.
Dana slipped the lid off of one urn to peer inside. “Yep. Ashes. At least half a vampire in here.” And there were hundreds of other urns that looked like cheap coffee pots. Clean but inexpensive. Respectful but not reverent.
Brianna and Dana weren’t the only OPA operatives at Vampire Vegas, but they were the only ones in that particular storage room. As the records had indicated, the OPA hadn’t worked their way this far into the sub-basements of Near Dark.
It was amazing how few looks Dana had caught on the way down. There was plenty to keep the OPA agents busy: the human kennels, the vault-like rooms where vampires would have been prepared to wait out Vegas’s daylighting, even some torture equipment. Dana passed a broad variety of clever nightmares on her way down to the mortuary. This was one of the few rooms in Mohinder’s chamber of horrors that was unoccupied.
“At least there’s tape on the door,” Brianna said. “The LVMPD has been marking doors like that when they clear an area. So Charmaine’s people have already been here, even if the undersecretary’s haven’t.”
“The OPA’s double-checking everything the LVMPD does?”
“The LVMPD has a habit of letting people run amok. The OPA’s keeping them on a short leash,” Brianna said with no small hint of bitterness.
“Woof woof,” Dana said.
Brianna lifted a jar off the shelf, angling it toward Dana. “Look at this.” There was a label on its underside. It had a short inventory, which Brianna read off. “Ashes. Bone fragments. Left fang. But there’s no name.”
“Wonder if the Paradisos have records of who’s in what jar somewhere. Wonder if they even cared.”
“Different inventories on some of the jars.” Brianna kept tipping them over to look at the undersides. She tipped one too far. The lid wasn’t sealed, so ash spilled over her hand. She grimaced and wiped it on the wall. “All of them say that the jars contain fangs, though. Do fangs not dissolve when vampires die?”
In truth, Dana had never looked at the remains of vampires closely enough to know. Once they were staked, they weren’t her problem. “Vampires keep their venom in the roots of their fangs.”