by D. R. Perry
“I’ll ask him at my next visit. It’s spell-singers you’re hiding from.”
I nod even though it’s not a question. I’m a golden child and he’s a scapegoat, but we both grew up under narcissistic parents. There are some things we’ll never have to say to each other because of that, bricks embedded in the paths stretching out behind us that are nearly identical. There’s only one thing to say to a person who truly understands this.
“I love you, Francis.”
“Love you too, Z.”
We reach across the table, hands intertwining over his tea and my coffee. Maybe Crispo has got the right idea. That the path going forward is more important than what’s behind. But I’ve always looked at a bigger picture than him, lived larger, bore more with less support.
One thing’s dead certain.
I’m going to save Francis, so utterly and completely that he’ll never have been broken in the first place. The only way to do that is by repaving both our roads to Hell. I’ve almost got everything I need to do it, too. Two more chips to topple. After that, nobody can stop me.
Not even Valentino Crispo.
I wake to my alarm in the twin bed with something draped over me. Not a blanket, a leg and an arm. It’s Maya, who must have had some trouble sleeping with the way she clings to me.
By the time I finally get out of bed without waking her, I wonder whether her touch telepathy let her see my dream. One glance at the clock tells me there’s no time to ask.
I’ve got a head to shrink. Figuratively speaking, of course.
I can figure out the parameters of this crazy dream later. Including why it’s so much more vivid than my last daydream about being someone else.
Chapter Seventeen
Valentino Crispo, you just got out of a therapy session; what do you want to do now?
I’m going to Cranston, which is definitely not Disney World. But it does have the neutral meeting place I need in order to discuss a supernatural crime investigation. Plus my apartment, where I want to check on some things first. So that’s where I stop.
I’m in my car, driving this time, and Frankie’s in the passenger seat because he had the appointment right before mine.
My friend isn’t surprised when we pull up outside the Belfry. This bothers me because I never told him any details about the investigation I’ve got running on Maury’s behalf. Has he been spying on me?
Maybe this is just what happens when I spend so much time in a house full of people. Things get overheard.
Or my dream about him and Zack was true.
“I’ll just be a minute, but you can come in if you want to.”
“Okay.”
He gets out of the car and follows me up to the third floor. I glance over my shoulder as I rattle my key into the door’s lock, remembering how much of a struggle it was the first time he came here, insensible due to his time in the clutches of the Deep Ones. Frankie also floated that night, under the magic of one of Esther’s levitation powders.
“You’ve come a long way, buddy.” I give him a fangless grin. “Don’t forget that.”
“How can I, with you around to remind me?”
I turn back to face the door and shrug. There’s not much else I can say. Practically every one-on-one interaction I have with Frankie Pickering comes with a heaping side order of the feels. He’s just that intense. It makes him hard to take, except in small doses of time.
I can’t push him away because that’s exactly what everybody else does. And anyway, I made him a promise that I’d always have his back. As a vampire, I’ve got to keep to that. It won’t be easy. But I’ve realized something after tonight’s visit to Doctor Young’s.
There’s a worse fate than caring too much about a person as broken as Frankie. Being him, alone.
The weight of this promise lifts, morphing into something more like relief than a burden. Attitude isn’t everything. It won’t correct a chemical imbalance in the brain, replace missing limbs, or cure cancer. But it helps in other ways, sometimes. Especially for someone like me, who’s taking care of friends with all of the above.
Inside the apartment, Frankie curls up on the comfy chair, reminding me of a scruffy stray cat. When he leans back, the chair rocks slightly. Leaving him to relax is easy because that state is so rare for him. The man’s almost always tense, on guard, and it’s not surprising. I hope someday he’ll find a more perpetual peace than a newbie vampire’s favorite reading chair can give him.
In the fridge, I rummage around for blood. I’m glad to have the replacement arm despite Gertrude’s disturbing alchemy since my real arm still hasn’t grown back. Maybe my body’s craving more blood in order to start fixing things, finally.
I’m ridiculously thirsty, so I guzzle the first bag I get my hand on, even though it’s cold. It hits the spot despite everything, so I have another. And then one more. Yeah, three bags of blood in under thirty seconds. Maybe it’s some kind of record. I let out a huge belch.
“Dude!” Frankie chuckles. “Manners.”
“Shitballs.”
I’m not freaking out over being the butt of toilet humor. It’s because of the sudden churn in my guts. One of those bags was dead blood. Because of course, it is.
Frankie blinks as I make a run for the bathroom. Yup. I’m about to pitch a hurl. But even though this is a tiny apartment and everything’s just a few steps away from everything else, I trip and fall flat on my face before I make it there.
Warm hands dart under my home-grown arm and the waxy replacement one. Yeah, my buddy’s dragging me to the bathroom. Just in time, he gets me through the door and over the toilet. The retching starts, but I only really parse a few seconds of it, thank God.
“You’re going to be okay.”
Those words aren’t Frankie’s. Instead, they come out of a woman’s mouth, weathered lips painted in a magenta gloss that’s settled into the fine lines. Her voice trembles, fearful as a mouse under a hawk’s shadow. Whoever’s memory I’m seeing loves this woman and wants to smack her across the face at the same time. They control the impulse more because of the pain in their left arm than anything else.
The pain stabs harder as whoever I am gasps for air, shooting down instead of up.
Great. I’m experiencing a second-hand heart attack.
“Move it, lady!”
The woman gets shoved out of the way by a whipcord-thin EMT with plugs in her earlobes and tattoos winding up her skinny arms. She turns her head, then places one side of it against the chest I only just realized is masculine. Moments later, she sits up, eyes wide and rolling.
“Defib, stat! We can save this one!”
Another EMT drops a case on the ground and opens it, pulling out paddles as the first rips the shirt off the person whose death I’m experiencing.
I want to tell them not to bother. That this dude’s a goner no matter what they do, otherwise I wouldn’t be seeing any of this. But of course, I can’t. I’m not actually in the past, just having a memory with my allergic reaction. They keep on going as the woman, who I realize is vaguely familiar to yours truly, sobs on the driveway outside a nice house in the suburbs.
“Dad!”
I know that voice. It’s Zack Milano. So, I’m watching his father, Zack Senior, kick the bucket here. Everything I’ve seen about the older Milano I’m experiencing this moment through helps me understand why my old frenemy isn’t crying.
“I did it, dad. Everything you taught me. For love.” His lips wear a frown, but his eyes are all mirth.
I’m gasping like a fish after the EMTs make their desperate attempt at a kick-start. All of the mortal sensations are somehow a relief, and horrifying at the same time. Because having visions like these prove that I haven’t forgotten how to feel human, just that my undead body is incapable. I’m puzzled to feel the pain recede, like the medical folk have actually managed to save the day.
“You broke my heart, running around with that man,” are the words coming out of Mr. Milano’s mou
th. “This is your fault.” I practically taste power on my lips, magic he’s trying to use on his own son. But he’s too weak, and the sparks sputter and stall.
I blink, unsure at this point why Mr. Milano’s thinking about Frankie Pickering. Also, not understanding why I’m throwing up. Dead blood means the donor has died, full stop. He couldn’t have survived if I’m seeing this, right?
“Don’t let my dad die.” That first word is practically a whisper, but after that, Zack’s voice booms like he’s delivered a line onstage. But that’s not the most striking thing about his utterance, at least from my perspective.
I’m watching Zack use his spell-singing. It’s unclear whether this is my ability to see magic or Mr. Milano’s. Except that I’m in his head. I’m painfully aware that he knows he’s a victim of patricide.
Another wave of pain starts in my chest, tearing down my left arm. Mr. Milano can’t scream or speak to work his magic. He hasn’t got the breath for it. In fact, he’s stopped respiration entirely. But his brain’s still going like the Energizer Bunny on the last dregs of power in his titular batteries.
“Oxygen!” The tattooed EMT stays put while her partner jumps back into the truck.
As the light dims and the sound turns down on my borrowed senses, I come to the same realization as the dead magician.
Zack Milano just used magic to murder his own father.
I’m sitting in my shower stall, sipping warm blood from my favorite mug. Frankie and Maya talk together in hushed tones in the tiny galley kitchen just outside the door. Of course I can hear everything they say.
“I don’t know.” Maya shakes her head.
“Well, he does, but he’s not talking to me about it.” Frankie shrugs. “I was thinking, since he’s gonna be okay, maybe you could do your thing?” He holds up one hand, palm flat.
“Not unless he agrees.”
“I didn’t know it worked that way.”
“That’s the only way I use it.” She crosses her arms over her chest, side-eyeing Frankie. “Find another vamp with this talent, and maybe you’ll get a different answer.”
“Sorry.” He cringes.
“It’s okay. I get that a lot from folks.” She gives him a tiny grin but doesn’t drop her arms. “But you remember what they say about great power.”
“Yeah, I know the saying.” He nods. “Glad you’re one of the good eggs. So how much should we give him?”
“We’ll warm up one more bag and take a few more on the road with us.” Maya leans to open the refrigerator. “I called to let them know he’d be late, but the Fitzpatricks won’t wait forever.”
I try to drink more from my mug, but it’s empty. I set it down on the floor outside the shower stall, which has been swept. Yeah, I made a mess, and my friends cleaned it up because they’re awesome. The only reason I know I missed the bowl at least once is because my shirt is covered with ashes. But there’s one problem.
“Uh, guys?”
“Hmm?” Frankie turns his head to look over his shoulder at me.
“I’ve, uh, fallen. And I can’t get up.”
“Gotcha.”
And he does. Maya’s still making the blood, so it’s Frankie who gets me off the floor. He also points out a clean shirt hanging from the hook on the wall where I usually keep my towel.
The gesture is oddly familiar. Am I getting flashbacks to the time I helped him clean up after his own supernatural disaster? Or is something else going on?
“Thanks.”
“Just don’t start telling me I’m one hell of a butler or anything cheesy.”
“Don’t worry, you’re safe from that.”
And it’s true, mostly because I don’t get his reference. When in doubt with the pop culture things, I always figure it must be from anime. I can’t imagine anything more boring than a cartoon about a butler, but what do I know? I’m a musical theater geek, not an otaku.
Frankie closes the door and gives me some privacy. Which is sort of too little, too late, considering he watched me hurl my guts up to the point where he had to call my girlfriend. And now, the two of them are together in my apartment, plotting about how best to help me.
I change shirts, thankful that my pants are still passable for the places I’ve got to go and the people I need to see. When I’m done, I head out of the bathroom to find Maya and Frankie with their McPlotpants fully and properly on, although they stop talking abruptly when I emerge.
That’s always nice.
Yeah, that’s sarcasm.
I can’t actually be waxing paranoid about these two, can I? I’ve watched enough sitcoms to know they’re probably planning a surprise party and are not out to get me. My paranoia used to be reserved for people like Zack, which in retrospect, was a good call. So why am I so jumpy?
And that reminds me to go write everything I saw in the patricidal vision before it leaks out of my mind or I run into Sebastian Caprice again. Or Zack himself. I’ve got to assume my frenemy is behind those assaults now.
After the dream I had at the end of yesterday, I’m not telling Frankie what I saw. I don’t know whether my day visions come from actual events, but one thing’s certain. If my pal is in a relationship with Zack Milano, he’s not going to take news that he’s a murderer well.
As I write, it becomes clearer. Zack has never talked about his dad, only his mom. Probably he feared him. Bad enough to have a parent whose disapproving words can physically hurt you. Worse when they can control practically everything you do.
The only missing piece of this puzzle is a motive. Not for the murder, but the assaults. That’s part of calling everyone down to neutral ground, of course.
“Hey, Tino?” My friends call me out in tandem like they’re singing in harmony.
“Yeah?” I stop in the middle of shrugging on my opera cloak.
“We’re late.” Maya taps her wristwatch. Yeah, she wears one of those. It’s not even digital. “Old Man Fitzpatrick’s expecting you, remember?”
“Oh, yeah.” I tuck the notepad away, and we all head out.
Chapter Eighteen
I park my shitbox Miata on a different street in case my parents are home. Don’t start thinking I avoid them all the time because that’s not true. Dinner with the folks still happens once a week, even if my weird hours and PI work made strict adherence to Sundays impossible. But I go solo because I haven’t told them about Leora, let alone the other kids and Frankie. Which is one reason I don’t want them to see me now.
There’s no way to explain my new and unimproved arm without revealing the supernatural world to them. And that’s Whitby’s ultimate power-grab dream. Any unauthorized reveal gets all of us executed. “All” means me and Stephanie, plus Frankie and the kids, because mortal ties equate to vampiric responsibility. Which puts Raven and DeCampo on the chopping block, too.
So we walk to the Fitzpatrick house in a roundabout way that won’t take us past the Crispo abode. But once again, all that paranoia is unwarranted. My parents aren’t home. The car’s gone, and the lights are out. But something flutters on the front door. I head up the driveway to check it out.
It’s a note to my dad, thanking him for setting up the floral arrangements on short notice even though he’s retired. The signature is Mella Milano, Zack’s mother. Of course. Because Zack’s dad is an extremely recent victim of patricide, apparently.
More recent than I’d initially thought. If this note is any indication, he died a day ago. And it also explains where my parents are. Down at Michellino’s, setting things up.
“Looks like a funeral’s in our near future.”
“Huh?” Frankie and Maya both blink even though he’s the one who speaks.
“Zack’s father passed, according to this.” I shake my head, deciding to let at least one fact drop. “Also my dead blood vision. Turns out, he donated blood down at good old Kent County Hospital recently, too.”
“Oh, no!” Maya puts one hand to her cheek.
“Yeah.” I sigh. “But
we’ve got an appointment to keep. Come on.”
I shamble down the driveway, then try to stop shuffling and pick up my feet. Maybe I’m undead, but dammit I’m a vampire, not a zombie. Time to start acting the part, especially since I’m representing the fanged set in a meeting with werewolves, hunters, magicians, and kid Caprice.
“The old man’s expecting you, Crispo.” The wolfish grin greeting me is a surprise. Because this is Jackie Cianci, my old babysitter. No, she’s not related to the late, great Mayor, Buddy Cianci. And don’t ask if you ever meet her. She hates that.
“Huh.” I raise an eyebrow, then peer down at her, which is weird. Last time I saw her, she was taller than me. “Hey, Jackie. How’s things?”
“Lively. Especially compared to you.” She wrinkles her nose and tosses her head. An unruly lock of red hair flops against her forehead. “They said you’d been turned, but I didn’t wanna believe it until now.”
“Well, I’m glad to see you again at any rate.” I grin. “Maybe you’ll finally give me that rematch on Super Smash Brothers.”
“Fat chance, Crispo.” Jackie snorts. “They say you’re the fast vamp, so I’m keeping that high score, thank you very much.”
“Well, you can’t blame me for asking.” I shrug. “See ya!”
“Later, dude.”
Meeting an old friend who seems to be doing well always puts a spring in my step. That was just what I needed to navigate this get-together after all the recent unpleasantness. Walking through the gate and down the stone walkway that leads to the gazebo is way easier now than it would have been just a few moments earlier.
Maya and Frankie appear relatively untroubled, of course. They’re both used to playing things close to their chests.
“Hi there, Mr. Fitzpatrick!” I call out in the gazebo’s general direction, lifting my arm to wave.
And I fail spectacularly because the arm’s misbehaving. I lift the other one instead, then smack my alchemical replacement to show it who’s boss.