Dead Certain (Eve Benson: Vampire Book 3)

by P. S. Power

  The man stared at her, suddenly scared, but he was, as Marissa had pointed out, an intellectual, not a fighter, by nature.

  “We might be able to do that. You have access to such knowledge?”

  Eve looked away, then nodded. It was true that he might try to take her hostage to get the information from her, but if he did that, she’d fight, which was going to happen anyway, if he wasn’t careful about how he reacted.

  Hopefully he was smart enough to work that one out.

  “Off the top of my head, actually. I own the concern back home, along with Marissa. I don’t know why she didn’t just ask me to let you have it here, too. There might be a reason I don’t know about, and in that case I can’t promise anything. If the Council wants you all dead, then, well, that’s just what will have to happen. Still, if it isn’t something like that, or if we can talk them out of it, then it might pay off to try.”

  For a very long time after that they moved in silence, walking at normal Human speeds down the side of a road that was busy, but not too much so for a major city. Finally they turned into a seedy looking restaurant, that was beat up and poor looking. On the outside. The interior was as nice as anything she’d ever seen though, with a lot of rich reds and polished wood. The Human woman that met them at the door was waved away, rather curtly.

  “We do not need you. Close the doors, and allow no one to come in.” Then he turned to Eve, and knelt in front of her, his head bowed low. “I beg you, do not kill the Humans here, even if you must take my life. They are good people, and loyal, so may try to fight, if they see me dying. They are innocent in this though, and simply run this place for us, during the day.” He sounded pretty humble about it.

  Eve waved him up.

  “As long as that’s true, I can try to do that. Can we use a phone? Also, are you willing to do more of that begging? I don’t get off on that kind of thing, but I bet you that some of the Council will. Half of them are a…” She looked at Nikki, then smiled and asked for the translation. Bey hadn’t taught her the naughty words yet.

  Nicole smiled though, when she asked, and spoke the words, as if it were a solemn prayer.

  “A bag of dicks.”

  Bohdan seemed to think that was mildly funny, and gave a dismal sounding chuckle.

  “I agree. That will not save us here, now, if the order for our deaths come. Let us do that now? If you must kill me, it will be best to happen before dark, so news of it may spread, and my people flee, for their lives.”

  Eve could see that. It wasn’t even a horrible plan, really. She decided to keep it on the back burner, and then got Bohdan to take them to a small office with a phone in it, and had him negotiate the system, so that they ended up in contact with Marissa. She was the one member of the Council that Bohdan could just call up, after all.

  The phone was handed to Eve before it picked up, presented as if it might just be the instrument of his own death.

  “Hello? This is Marissa.” The words were in English, so Eve switched up, speaking that way herself. It was a relief, after, the last few days of stumbling to find the right words all the time.

  “Hey. This is Eve. Benson? I’m in Moscow, and have Bohdan here. He’s given up, and is calling off the rebellion. That being the case, we need to know what’s allowed for that? We could open up an animal blood business here, if you want? He’s going to return all the cash that was taken, and I’m planning to kill any of his people that attacked Council holdings directly. Is there anything else that you there want done?” She didn’t know if any of that would even make sense, but after a few moments, the mellow tenor spoke, gently.

  “You have him there? Is he well? Intact? Things didn’t go well between us last we spoke.”

  Eve looked at the other Vampires, who were standing there and listening, and made a face she hoped would be considering.

  “Eh, well, we didn’t have to rough him up or anything. Not yet. I just need to know what’s needed here. I’m way overstepping my job, but Nikki kind of botched things on this end for me, so that’s my excuse this week. Not too bad to save though. Unless you want everyone dead here? That will be harder now, since they kind of know that we’re here.”

  That made sense to her, at any rate, and Marissa seemed to get the basic idea.

  “I need to speak to the others, may we call you back at this number?” That required actually giving it to her, but that was fine, it seemed. It was still early in the day, which meant that they weren’t going to be attacked by an army of Vampire rebels yet.

  No, that would come later, when darkness fell.

  Almost certainly, too. No one would just march in to go to their deaths, and the Council was filled with beings that were kind of harsh that way, Eve knew. Not that she didn’t get it. She really did. Vampires spent hundreds of years being assholes, and it was a hard habit for most of them to break. The best did it, over time, but it could take centuries to master, and even then it was always easier for them to give in to anger and rage, rather than to be logical and detached.

  They weren’t all that slow though, and called back at about three in the afternoon. For her part, she just stood there, making Nikki pace the whole time, as Bohdan looked on, confused. Finally she explained it to him.

  “She’s under orders to learn to be up all day. Being a bit soft, and lazy, she’s avoided doing that. It’s easier to bear the sun, if you stay in motion. I don’t know why, but it’s true.”

  That got a nod, and the much older Vampire seemed to stop and think for a bit.

  “That is a fact. I think that it has to do with the nerves of the body being used for other tasks. Not that we, the dead, use nerves for the perception of pain directly, it is an analog however, for whatever magical system keeps us going.”

  It made some sense to her, so she filed that away, as the phone first chirped, then rang.

  She answered it, speaking in English, and hoping it wasn’t a phone solicitor.

  “Eve Benson here.”

  “Ah! Young Eve! I was told that you and Nicole have broken this rebellion without me? They now seek to deal with the Council, as is moral and correct?” It was Bey, and he actually sounded happy enough about the whole thing.

  “Pretty much. There’s some cleanup needed here, and all that. Some money to be returned, and some bullies to, erm… Chastise for being jerks? I need to know what you all want done though? Bohdan here seems to be willing to play ball, but they’re having a blood problem. They want to follow the rules, at least to the level anyone does, in that regard, but they don’t have access to any of the new products. I was thinking that we could make Bohdan here run it, and not get any profits from it, paying that directly to the Council instead? After I get my cut, I mean, of course. I didn’t do anything wrong after all. Call that twenty years of him seeing to that or so? For free I mean, to pay for what he’s been doing?” Not that she knew what all of that was.

  Gene spoke then, which showed that he was there, on the line, too. She got ready for him to be a giant pain in the ass about it, since as far as she knew that was his place on the council. The one that sat back and made things hard for her, personally. How they’d known to put him in power just for that before she was even a Vampire was hard to know, but it still was probably right. Some kind of psychic power, no doubt.

  His voice was young and piping, since he’d been about ten when he died. It was annoying to listen to, but his words weren’t as bad as she feared they might be.

  “That seems reasonable enough. We’ll trust in your judgment on this, Miss Benson. I suggest that you kill enough of his people to make a point however. If this happens again, we won’t be able to be as merciful. As it stands we’re going to have to put it about that this was a favor to Marissa, the saving of his existence. Which it is. Will you need aid in doing this? I believe that The Bey stands ready to assist you, if you wish to call on him?”

  It was nice to know, and she probably could use the help, but it was a trap, she knew. Either way. If
she called for him, she’d look weak and Gene would use that against her somehow. If she didn’t, and things were different on the ground than she’d come to believe, then she was probably dead.

  She grinned though, since Keeley had mentioned to her once that people could subconsciously hear that in another person’s voice.

  “We’re good here. We’ll handle this tonight, and head back in the morning. Obviously, if we aren’t heard from in three days or so, send in the troops, and kill them all.”

  Gene, her enemy on the Council, actually laughed then.

  “It will be done, Miss Benson. Rest assured of that.”

  Then the line was passed back over to Bey, since there was actually a lot left to be said.

  Chapter five

  Overall things went a lot differently than Eve would have guessed. Bohdan, wanting to live, and thinking, for some strange reason that she was there to kill him, for instance. Even after the Council had pretty much given him a nepotism pass to be a dickwad. So other than trying to compel her almost all day long, after the call ended, he was remarkably polite about the whole thing.

  Then he called in all the essential people in his organization, to announce the good news. The ones from in the city came at least, which wasn’t going to be all the ones she needed to kill by a long shot. Though, honestly, she wasn’t there to punish people for being bad. No, her job was to terrify them into being good little Vampire boys and girls.

  That meant she had to act very carefully once they were all assembled.

  Bohdan waved for silence, most of the people sitting around the room at red covered tables, the establishment being closed for the night, and probably longer than that, since it would be needed for cleaning the next few days, she didn’t doubt.

  “We have special guests. From America. Eve Benson, the owner of the animal blood preservation formula, and her companion, Nicole Transmorguire. They have come to end our, mistake, here. I have been on the phone all day with the Council, and it will be allowed for us to have our own blood farms. Only animal blood, to start, but I’ve been assured that it’s of fine taste and quality.”

  Eve nodded, and waved to the side, where the small batch she made up was sitting. It had taken a while to get the needed chemicals for it, but it was a lot easier to do in Russia than the U.S. for some unknown reason. Or not that unknown. There was a supply house in town for raw materials, and they’d just bribed the workers to get what they wanted.

  The blood was a bit harder, since they’d had to send a Human lackey to a farm to get it, and the man had only managed to get blood from four different animals. The order had been for twenty, but the man was, she’d been assured, more than a little lazy. It didn’t really matter to her. It was just for a taste testing anyway. It was actually a bit plain, not having any flavoring in it. She’d tried some though, and it was pretty mild, and didn’t have any aftertaste of note.

  “We have some samples?” Her accent was too heavy for some of the people in the room, so Nikki repeated it for her, which actually got the beings in the room to calm down a lot. They’d been nervous, before that, it was clear. Some of them still were, and since most of those looked like thugs, complete with tattoos and scars on their exposed skin, which had to be fake, given that they were all dead, and that kind of thing generally healed up when a person came over.

  One of those just seemed seedy as fuck, and was busily fingering a long blade the whole time, not even bothering to hide it. Staring at her while he did it, too.

  “We don’t need to feed like dogs. Let’s cut this American cunt’s head off, and send her back in a box.” Sketchy he may have been, but he spoke in nearly perfect English, so she’d understand what the plan was. That was nice of him, right there.

  It let her respond to him directly, for instance, which she did with a big smile on her lips.

  Eve moved as fast as she ever had, a wall of pure pain taking her. The Vampire, who was a classic, but not that fast, not even seeming to realize that she was there next to him, as she crushed his skull. It was a nicely dramatic thing, but still not fast enough to keep her hand clean. Then she moved back to the place she started, trying to stand in the same location exactly. If she did it right, it would look almost like the man had just exploded.

  Everyone went still then. It was the Vampire equivalent of screaming in fright. They did look at her though, as Bohdan gestured at the red mist in the air.

  “We have been given a reprieve, but there will be payment for this. A toll in death.” He didn’t ask for volunteers, nor did he point at the guilty ones.

  Thankfully five of the beings, three of the remaining men, and two women, tried to rush her. They died, too, in about the same amount of time that the first man had. Six of them was nearly enough to make the Council happy. The whole of the little rebellion only had about eighty people in it. Decimation would mean getting two more, but she’d taken three the night before, so it was good enough.

  Unless anyone else volunteered.

  She just waited, standing where she started. No one was particularly fooled though, she didn’t think. They weren’t looking at Nikki anyway. The entire room stared at her very closely.

  “Is that enough? I think we can sell the Council on this number of your people.” She made herself sound peaceful, and a bit bland, rather than angry or scared. She didn’t feel it in particular. Later she might have a problem with the deaths, even. Then again, she might not.

  It wasn’t like she’d never killed before.

  The rest of the room, the remaining twenty or so that had come did two different things at once. Well, three, but she left the ones that just sat there alone. Half of the remainder attacked though, the other half trying to run away. The attackers all died, but she was at a loss with the runners. They could have been guilty of something. Or just thought they were about to die. If you thought that, then running away was a reasonable thing to try and do, wasn’t it? Instinctual for almost everyone. She waved at Bohdan, to let him decide.

  “Stop.” The black haired Vampire didn’t scream the word, but he may as well have. Everyone in the room, except for her, froze in place, as the wash of compulsion ripped across the room.

  She nodded though, which made him seem afraid of her again.

  “It’s enough now. Explain that to them, please? I’d rather not kill everyone here. It’s a pet project of mine, not going around slaughtering people. Anyway, so you all like the blood well enough? If you get in on it now, I bet you can get yours for free. It’s a decent deal, really.” She didn’t know that, but it got the others, the ones trying to flee, to come back. No one spoke for the rest of the meeting though.

  That meant they were able to get the whole thing handled, as far as paperwork went, and spent most of the night going over how to get funds to buy some farms. People weren’t thrilled to find out they weren’t going to be allowed to use the stolen tax monies. Most of the ones left were scared, but decent enough. It became kind of clear between the lines that a few of them had actually been involved in the attacks on the embassies, and Council people. A few had managed to do the right thing and were, if they played their cards right, probably going to survive the night.

  The people on the ground there were afraid though. That was directed at her, too, as if that made sense. She’d already done what she was supposed to, and while, yes, she was going to lay some fuckers out if they tried to kill her again, it wasn’t like she was foaming at the mouth taunting them into action. People were moving around her like there were real eggshells on the floor. Vampires actually minced in her presence, trying not to set her off. Like she wasn’t in complete control of herself?

  At about four in the morning they had things worked out well enough that Eve thought leaving was a good plan. They had a deadline, after a fashion, and it wasn’t lost on Eve that Gene, The Burning One, was probably pretty damned serious about killing all the Vampires there if she didn’t report in on time. Three days, she’d said, which functionally left a little
over two and a half.

  So it was kind of important that they leave, as soon as possible. Nikki however, felt a strong urge to stay there and make puppy eyes at her part time lover. It was actually pretty cute, and Eve got it. The woman was, if not in love, then at least very fond of the man, and happy he was alive.

  Still, if they didn’t want the rest of the group to be dead in a few days, they needed to scurry along.

  Finally, as day broke, Eve took the bright red-haired punk looking girl aside.

  “Are you staying or going?”

  “What?”

  Eve waved at the good looking Vampire man standing behind them. His suit still seeming sharp and fresh, somehow.

  “If you want to stay, I can get back in time. If you’re coming with me, we need to leave now, and really, you should keep the whining to a minimum on this leg of things. But you have to choose, what are you doing?”

  She looked a bit sad about it, which was probably down to the mind control she was under, and sighed, like a schoolgirl having to leave the dance early.

  “I guess we should go. I just haven’t been to visit for a while.”

  “Great. Bye Bohdan.” Without waiting, she moved, heading back the way they came. It was going to take longer going back, since they needed to make the whole trip in fewer legs and had a longer distance to travel. It was harder than it should have been, because for some reason, probably daylight related, Nicole wanted to stop far more frequently now. Worse, she went slower. Like it was any harder to run now than it had been before?

  It gave Eve a chance to think though, about what was really going on.

  She knew that she wasn’t going to get it all, but that wasn’t an excuse not to see some of it. For instance, it didn’t take a Greater Demon to get that the thing with Bohdan Constantine was a set up. Oh, it might have been real the whole time, but what were the odds that no one else could have set things up like she had? The Council wasn’t filled with retards. The fact that Lenore had clearly let her take Nikki, knowing that it might be a problem…