ABVH 01 - Guilty Pleasures

by Laurell K. Hamilton

  Animators, Inc., had new offices. We’d been here only three months. There was a psychologist’s office across from us, nothing less than a hundred an hour; a plastic surgeon down the hall; two lawyers; one marriage counselor, and a real estate company. Four years ago Animators, Inc., had worked out of a spare room above a garage. Business was good.

  Most of that good luck was due to Bert Vaughn, our boss. He was a businessman, a showman, a moneymaker, a scalawag, and a borderline cheat. Nothing illegal, not really, but . . . Most people choose to think of themselves as white hats, good guys. A few people wear black hats and enjoy it. Grey was Bert’s color. Sometimes I think if you cut him, he’d bleed green, fresh-minted money.

  He had turned what was an unusual talent, an embarrassing curse, or a religious experience, raising the dead, into a profitable business. We animators had the talent, but Bert knew how to make it pay. It was hard to argue with that. But I was going to try.

  The reception room’s wallpaper is pale, pale green with small oriental designs done in greens and browns. The carpet is thick and soft green, too pale to be grass, but it tries. Plants are everywhere.

  A Ficus benjium grows to the right of the door, slender as a willow with small leather green leaves. It nearly curls around the chair in front of its pot. A second tree grows in the far corner, tall and straight with the stiff spiky tops of palm trees—Dracaena marginta. Or that’s what it says on the tags tied to the spindly trunks. Both trees brush the ceiling. Dozens of smaller plants are pushed and potted in every spare corner of the soft green room.

  Bert thinks the pastel green is soothing, and the plants give it that homey touch. I think it looks like an unhappy marriage between a mortuary and a plant shop.

  Mary, our day secretary, is over fifty. How much over is her own business. Her hair is short and does not move in the wind. A carton of hair spray sees to that. Mary is not into the natural look. She has two grown sons and four grandchildren. She gave me her best professional smile as I came through the door. “May I help . . . Oh, Anita, I didn’t think you were due in until five.”

  “I’m not, but I need to speak to Bert and get some things from my office.”

  She frowned down at her appointment book, our appointment book. “Well, Jamison is in your office right now with a client.” There are only three offices in our little area. One belongs to Bert, and the other two rotate between the rest of us. Most of our work is done in the field, or rather the graveyard, so we never really need our offices all at the same time. It worked like time-sharing a condo.

  “How long will the client be?”

  Mary glanced down at her notes. “It’s a mother whose son is thinking about joining the Church of Eternal Life.”

  “Is Jamison trying to talk him into it or out of it?”

  “Anita!” Mary scolded me, but it was the truth. The Church of Eternal Life was the vampire church. The first church in history that could guarantee you eternal life, and prove it. No waiting around. No mystery. Just eternity on a silver platter. Most people don’t believe in their immortal souls anymore. It isn’t popular to worry about Heaven and Hell, and whether you are an absolutely good person. So the Church was gaining followers all over the place. If you didn’t believe that it destroyed your soul, what did you have to lose? Daylight. Food. Not much to give up.

  It was the soul part that bothered me. My immortal soul is not for sale, not even for eternity. You see, I knew vampires could die. I had proved it. No one seemed curious as to what happened to a vampire’s soul when it died. Could you be a good vampire and go to Heaven? Somehow that didn’t quite work for me.

  “Is Bert with a client, too?”

  She glanced once more at the appointment book. “No, he’s free.” She looked up and smiled, as if she was pleased to be able to help me. Maybe she was.

  It is true that Bert took the smallest of the three offices. The walls are a soft pastel blue, the carpet two colors darker. Bert thinks it soothes the clients. I think it’s like standing inside a blue ice cube.

  Bert didn’t match the small blue office. There is nothing small about Bert. Six-four, broad shoulders, a college athlete’s figure getting a little soft around the middle. His white hair is close-cut over small ears. A boater’s tan forces his pale eyes and hair into sharp contrast. His eyes are a nearly colorless grey, like dirty window glass. You have to work very hard to make dirty grey eyes shine, but they were shining now. Bert was practically beaming at me. It was a bad sign.

  “Anita, what a pleasant surprise. Have a sit.” He waved a business envelope at me. “We got the check today.”

  “Check?” I asked.

  “For looking into the vampire murders.”

  I had forgotten. I had forgotten that somewhere in all this I had been promised money. It seemed ridiculous, obscene, that Nikolaos would make everything better with money. From the look on Bert’s face, a lot of money.

  “How much?”

  “Ten thousand dollars.” He stretched each word out, making it last.

  “It isn’t enough.”

  He laughed. “Anita, getting greedy in your old age. I thought that was my job.”

  “It isn’t enough for Catherine’s life, or mine.”

  His grin wilted slightly. His eyes looked wary, as if I was about to tell him there was no Easter Bunny. I could almost hear him wondering if he would have to return the check.

  “What are you talking about, Anita?”

  I told him, with a few minor revisions. No “Circus of the Damned.” No blue fire. No first vampire mark.

  When I got to the part about Aubrey smashing me into the wall, he said, “You are kidding.”

  “Want to see the bruises?”

  I finished the story and watched his solemn, square face. His large, blunt-fingered hands were folded on his desk. The check was lying beside him atop his neat pile of manila folders. His face was attentive, concerned. Empathy never worked well on Bert’s face. I could always see the wheels moving. The angles calculating.

  “Don’t worry, Bert, you can cash the check.”

  “Now, Anita, that wasn’t . . .”

  “Save it.”

  “Anita, truly I would never purposefully endanger you.”

  I laughed. “Bull.”

  “Anita!” He looked shocked, small eyes widening, one hand touching his chest. Mr. Sincerity.

  “I’m not buying, so save the bullshit for clients. I know you too well.”

  He smiled then. It was his only genuine smile. The real Bert Vaughn please stand up. His eyes gleamed but not with warmth, more with pleasure. There is something measuring, obscenely knowledgeable, about Bert’s smile. As if he knew the darkest thing you had ever done and would gladly keep silent—for a price.

  There was something a little frightening about a man who knew he was not a nice person and didn’t give a damn. It went against everything America holds dear. We are taught above all else to be nice, to be liked, to be popular. A person who has set aside all that is a maverick and a potentially dangerous human being.

  “What can Animators, Inc., do to help?”

  “I’ve already got Ronnie working on some things. I think the fewer people involved, the fewer people in danger.”

  “You always were a humanitarian.”

  “Unlike some people I could mention.”

  “I had no idea what they wanted.”

  “No, but you knew how I felt about vampires.”

  He gave me a smile that said, “I know your secret, I know your darkest dreams.” That was Bert. Budding blackmailer.

  I smiled back at him, friendly. “If you ever send me a vampire client again without running it by me first, I’ll quit.”

  “And go where?”

  “I’ll take my client list with me, Bert. Who is the one that does the radio interviews? Who did the articles focus on? You made sure it was me, Bert. You thought I was the most marketable of all of us. The most harmless-looking, the most appealing. Like a puppy at the pound
. When people call Animators, Inc., who do they ask for?”

  His smile was gone, eyes like winter ice. “You wouldn’t make it without me.”

  “The question is, would you make it without me?”

  “I’d make it.”

  “So would I.”

  We stared at each other for a long space of moments. Neither of us was willing to look away, to blink first. Bert started to smile, still staring into my eyes. The edges of a smile began to tug at my mouth. We laughed together and that was that.

  “All right, Anita, no more vampires.”

  I stood. “Thank you.”

  “Would you really quit?” His face was all laughing sincerity, a tasteful, pleasant mask.

  “I don’t believe in idle threats, Bert. You know that.”

  “Yes,” he said, “I know that. I honestly didn’t know this job would endanger your life.”

  “Would it have made a difference?”

  He thought about it for a minute, then laughed. “No, but I would have charged more.”

  “You keep making money, Bert. That’s what you’re good at.”

  “Amen.”

  I left him so he could fondle the check in privacy. Maybe chuckle over it. It was blood money, no pun intended. Somehow, I didn’t think that bothered Bert. It bothered me.

  18

  THE DOOR TO the other office opened. A tall, blonde woman stepped through. She was somewhere between forty and fifty. Tailored golden pants encircled a slender waist. A sleeveless blouse the color of an eggshell exposed tanned arms, a gold Rolex watch, and a wedding band encircled with diamonds. The rock in the engagement ring must have weighed a pound. I bet she hadn’t even blinked when Jamison talked price.

  The boy that followed her was also slender and blond. He looked about fifteen, but I knew he had to be at least eighteen. Legally, you cannot join the Church of Eternal Life unless you are of age. He couldn’t drink legally yet, but he could choose to die and live forever. Funny, how that didn’t make much sense to me.

  Jamison brought up the rear, smiling, solicitous. He was talking softly to the boy as he walked them towards the door.

  I got a business card out of my purse. I held it out towards the woman. She looked at it, then at me. Her gaze slid over me from top to bottom. She didn’t seem impressed; maybe it was the shirt. “Yes,” she said.

  Breeding. It takes real breeding to make a person feel like shit with one word. Of course, it didn’t bother me. No, the great golden goddess did not make me feel small and grubby. Right. “The number on this card is for a man who specializes in vampire cults. He’s good.”

  “I do not want my son brainwashed.”

  I managed a smile. Raymond Fields was my vampire cult expert, and he didn’t do brainwashing. He did do truth, no matter how unpleasant. “Mr. Fields will give you the potential down side of vampirism,” I said.

  “I believe Mr. Clarke has given us all the information we need.”

  I raised my arm near her face. “I didn’t get these scars playing touch football. Please, take the card. Call him, or not. It’s up to you.”

  She was a little pale under her expert makeup. Her eyes were a little wide, staring at my arm. “Vampires did this?” Her voice was small and breathy, almost human.

  “Yes,” I said.

  Jamison took her elbow. “Mrs. Franks, I see you’ve met our resident vampire slayer.”

  She looked at him, then back at me. Her careful face was beginning to crumble. She licked her lips and turned back to me. “Really.” She was recovering quickly; she sounded superior again.

  I shrugged. What could I say? I pressed the card into her manicured hand, and Jamison tactfully took it from her and pocketed it. But she had let him. What could I do? Nothing. I had tried. Period. Over. But I stared at her son. His face was incredibly young.

  I remembered when eighteen was grown-up. I had thought I knew everything. I was about twenty-one when I figured out I knew dip-wad. I still knew nothing, but I tried real hard. Sometimes, that is the best you can do. Maybe the best anyone can do. Boy, Miss Cynical in the morning.

  Jamison was ushering them towards the door. I caught a few sentences. “She was trying to kill them. They merely defended themselves.”

  Yeah, that’s me, hit person for the undead. Scourge of the graveyard. Right. I left Jamison to his half-truths and went into the office. I still needed the files. Life goes on, at least for me. I couldn’t stop seeing the boy’s face, the wide eyes. His face had been all golden tan, baby smooth. Shouldn’t you at least have to shave before you can kill yourself?

  I shook my head as if I could shake the boy’s face away. It almost worked. I was kneeling with the folders in my hands when Jamison came in the office. He shut the door behind him. I had thought he might.

  His skin was the color of dark honey, his eyes pale green; long, tight curls framed his face. The hair was almost auburn. Jamison was the first green-eyed, red-haired black man I had ever met. He was slender, lean, not the thinness of exercise but of lucky genetics. Jamison’s idea of a workout was lifting shot glasses at a good party.

  “Don’t ever do that again,” he said.

  “Do what?” I stood with the files clasped to my chest.

  He shook his head and almost smiled, but it was an angry smile, a flash of small white teeth. “Don’t be a smart ass.”

  “Sorry,” I said.

  “Bullshit, you’re not sorry.”

  “About trying to give Fields’s card to the woman, no. I’m not sorry. I’d do it again.”

  “I don’t like to be undermined in front of my clients.”

  I shrugged.

  “I mean it, Anita. Don’t ever do that again.”

  I wanted to ask him, or what, but I didn’t. “You aren’t qualified to counsel people about whether or not they become the undead.”

  “Bert thinks I am.”

  “Bert would take money for a hit on the Pope if he thought he could get away with it.”

  Jamison smiled, then frowned at me, then couldn’t help himself and smiled again. “You do have a way with words.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Don’t undermine me with clients, okay?”

  “I promise never to interfere when you are discussing raising the dead.”

  “That isn’t good enough,” he said.

  “It’s the best you’re going to get. You are not qualified to counsel people. It’s wrong.”

  “Little Miss Perfect. You murder people for money. You’re nothing but a damned assassin.”

  I took a deep breath, and let it out. I would not fight with him today. “I execute criminals with the full blessing of the law.”

  “Yeah, but you enjoy it. You get your jollies by pounding in the stakes. You can’t go a fucking week without bathing in someone’s blood.”

  I just stared at him. “Do you really believe that?” I asked.

  He wouldn’t look at me but finally said, “I don’t know.”

  “Poor little vampires, poor misunderstood creatures. Right? The one who branded me slaughtered twenty-three people before the courts would give me the go-ahead.” I yanked my shirt down to expose the collarbone scar. “This vampire had killed ten people. He specialized in little boys, said their meat was most tender. He’s not dead, Jamison. He got away. But he found me last night and threatened my life.”

  “You don’t understand them.”

  “No!” I shoved a finger in his chest. “You don’t understand them.”

  He glared down at me, nostrils flaring, breath coming in warm gasps. I stepped back. I shouldn’t have touched him; that was against the rules. You never touch anyone in a fight unless you want violence.

  “I’m sorry, Jamison.” I don’t know if he understood what I was apologizing for. He didn’t say anything.

  As I walked past him, he asked, “What are the files for?”

  I hesitated, but he knew the files as well as I did. He’d know what was missing. “The vampire murders.”
/>   We turned towards each other at the same moment. Staring. “You took the money?” he asked.

  That stopped me. “You knew about it?”

  He nodded. “Bert tried to get them to hire me in your place. They wouldn’t go for it.”

  “And after all the good PR you’ve given them.”

  “I told Bert you wouldn’t do it. That you wouldn’t work for vampires.”

  His slightly up-tilted eyes were studying my face, searching, trying to squeeze some truth out. I ignored him, my face a pleasant blankness. “Money talks, Jamison, even to me.”

  “You don’t give a damn about money.”

  “Awful shortsighted of me, isn’t it?” I said.

  “I always thought so. You didn’t do it for money.” A statement. “What was it?”

  I didn’t want Jamison in on this. He thought vampires were fanged people. And they were very careful to keep him on the nice, clean fringes. He never got his hands dirty, so he could afford to pretend or ignore, or even lie to himself. I had gotten dirty once too often. Lying to yourself was a good way to die. “Look, Jamison, we don’t agree on vampires, but anything that can kill vampires could make meat pies out of human beings. I want to catch the maniac before he, she, or it, does just that.”

  It wasn’t a bad lie, as lies go. It was even plausible. He blinked at me. Whether he believed me or not would depend on how much he needed to believe me. How much he needed his world to stay safe and clean. He nodded, once, very slowly. “You think you can catch something the master vampires can’t catch?”

  “They seem to think so.” I opened the door and he followed me out. Maybe he would have asked more questions, maybe not, but a voice interrupted.

  “Anita, are you ready to go?”

  We both turned, and I must have looked as puzzled as Jamison. I wasn’t meeting anyone.

  There was a man sitting in one of the lobby chairs, half-lost in the jungle plants. I didn’t recognize him at first. Thick brown hair, cut short, stretched back from a very nice face. Black sunglasses hid the eyes. He turned his head and spoiled the illusion of short hair. A thick ponytail curled over his collar. He was wearing a blue denim jacket with the collar up. A blood-red tank top set off his tan. He stood slowly, smiled, and removed his glasses.