Only Shane stays standing, blocking the path between Adrian’s chair and the exit. “You were turned in ’75. By Jim alone?”
Adrian lowers his head. “By Jim and Kashmir, in California. I was the first of what they called the Magnificent Seven.”
“After the movie?”
“It was Jim’s favorite when he was growing up.” Adrian’s light-brown eyes skip over us. “Kashmir would find the fledglings. He’d befriend us, promise adventures, then hand us over to Jim, and the two of them would turn us together. If we fought back, we died for good. And sometimes, even if we didn’t fight back, we died for good. Sometimes Jim and Kashmir overdrank.”
“Were you really in medical school when they found you?” I ask Adrian. “Or was that a lie, too?”
“It was the truth. Sometimes I’d patch up the humans they left for dead and get them to a hospital.” His gaze drifts slowly to the floor like a falling leaf. “Sometimes I was too late.”
“Why didn’t you finish school?” Regina asks.
“Day classes, obviously. Jim said he was giving me a long future, but really, he took my future away when he made me this.” He gestures to his body with disgust.
“Did you leave them,” Noah asks, “or did they leave you?”
“Both. Jim wanted to take the Magnificent Seven back to England, find his own makers, and show them what he’d become. They wouldn’t let him turn anyone, because they thought he was too crazy.”
“He was too crazy,” I interject.
Adrian nods. “I wouldn’t go with them. So they left me behind. I heard that on their way across America they created a new vampire so they could still go by the Magnificent Seven.”
That would bug me, too. It was an excellent movie, after all.
“We met Kashmir eleven years ago,” Regina tells him. “Jim seemed to blow him off. Do you know why?”
“I only know that Kashmir hates this radio station for what he calls Jim’s ‘domestication.’ ”
I scoff. “ ‘Domestication’? He went crazy here.”
“Not as fast as he would’ve out there.” Adrian looks toward the door that leads to the studio. “There’s something about this place. It’s a haven, and not just for good music. I feel safe here. Places like WVMP threaten everything Kashmir stands for. He thinks you destroyed what made Jim special.”
“Do you agree?”
“Just the opposite. I’ve heard Jim’s shows. This station brought out the best in him. He knew music inside and out. Not just the notes, but the people and the society. He could tell you the exact length of any song, the day the record was printed and how many copies, which recording label executives pushed it, which stations supported it. All that knowledge died with him two weeks ago.”
Shane shifts his stance as if to step back, but stays where he is. “I didn’t kill Jim the DJ or Jim the musical historian. I killed Jim the monster, who would’ve killed me and Ciara and maybe even you one day.”
“I know.” Adrian slumps forward, elbows on his knees and face in his hands. “Vampires are supposed to live forever. What good is this kind of forever? We fade and go crazy, and people pity or fear us, and then they kill us so we don’t kill them. If I’d known what a curse this was, I would’ve said no.”
“They would’ve turned you anyway.” Regina twists her chain-link bracelet. “Jim never cared about what anyone else wanted, only what made him happy for a brief moment before he lost interest and moved on to something else.”
I force my mind back to the fact-finding mission. It’s a solace amid all this death and doom. “How did you end up back with Kashmir?”
“He wrote to me in Albuquerque a few months ago saying Jim was in custody and did I want to help break him out before the Control killed him? Of course I came.”
“But before you guys sprang Jim, Kashmir set the bomb under the Smoking Pig to try to kill us. How did he pull that off?”
“It was in an empty keg. The bartender had left it outside for pickup. Kashmir stole it, inserted the bomb, then snuck it back into the basement dressed as a beer delivery guy.”
“Do we want to know what happened to the real beer delivery guy?”
“He’s one of Kashmir’s donors now.”
At least he’s still alive.
Adrian continues. “Kashmir didn’t tell me until half an hour before the bomb was meant to go off. I managed to get away to phone the police in time.”
I watch him carefully as I utter the next sentence. “You probably saved Franklin’s life.”
Adrian’s shoulders droop at the sound of the name.
“Was that real?” I ask him.
“Franklin was part of what changed my mind about the station. But I expect he’ll hate me now.”
“He should. With me you get points for coming forward and confessing, but all Franklin will see are the lies you told him and the way you made him feel.” Anger boils inside me at the thought of Franklin’s imminent hurt. “After what he went through with Aaron, he was finally starting to live again.” My voice catches, which fills me with even more rage. I want to pummel Adrian’s face until his perfect nose is pointed sideways. “And now you’re some kind of scummy double agent.”
“I thought I was being neutral. I thought that was the path to peace. But I was wrong. I was a coward.”
“So now what?”
“After what happened to Deirdre, I’m on your side all the way.”
“Why should we believe you?”
“You shouldn’t. If you want, you can follow me everywhere, monitor all my phone calls. I’ll only tell him what you want me to tell him.”
“Kashmir trusts you?”
Adrian considers this for a moment. “No, but he needs me. I’m his only connection to you, now that he’s gotten rid of Deirdre.”
“You can tell us where to find him? How to get rid of him?”
“On one condition: you don’t kill him.” Adrian puts a hand to his chest. “I don’t know if I’d survive having my other maker die so soon after the first. Not sure if any of us would. So, by killing him, you might kill ten of us, maybe more.”
I think of Franklin. He’ll break up with Adrian the moment he finds out the truth, yet it would still hurt him to see the death of another man he cares about.
“We can’t promise not to kill him,” Shane says. “But I’ll let the Control know that they should use nonlethal methods when possible. If you cooperate with them fully, they’ll protect you.”
“Thank you.” He puts his hands on the chair’s armrests and stands slowly.
Shane steps in front of him. “Where are you going?”
Adrian has the look of a man on his way to the gallows. “To tell Franklin what I really am.”
21
Our House
When informed of this latest development, the Control lends us resources we could never get on our own.
First they procure the 911 tapes from Halloween to confirm that it was in fact Adrian who called in the warning. Though the Control is a secret agency, they work with law enforcement at all levels in every nation. Local cops think they’re with the FBI or Department of Homeland Security, and the top officials at those agencies are happy to “confirm” their identities.
The fact that Adrian warned us about the bombing doesn’t prove he’s on our side. It may have been part of the plan all along. Maybe no one was meant to be killed at the Smoking Pig.
He still has to prove himself to us, and that means putting the Magnificent Seven into our hands. Deirdre said that it was Kashmir and three others who had kidnapped her, so the other three must be somewhere else—somewhere they can be taken before Kashmir can return to town tonight.
But where? They don’t carry cell phones, so it’s not as if Adrian can just ring them up and be like, “Hey, man, where you guys hangin’ today?” He’s called every motel they’ve stayed at since arriving in Sherwood, with no luck. Teams of human Control Enforcement agents turn up nothing.
By mi
dafternoon, Shane insists I get some sleep. Every time I close my eyes, I see Deirdre burning from the inside out, her beautiful skin turning to flames, then ash. I stare at Shane’s bedroom ceiling, putting myself in her place, playing out alternative scenarios to avert that fate. But with so many captors, how could she have escaped or resisted? They all came for her, and then three took her away, so she had no chance to—
Suddenly it hits me. I sit up in bed. “Duh!”
Out in the lounge, I find Shane going over the layout of Crosetti’s Monuments with Captains Fox and Henley, in preparation for Monday’s memorial service. Spencer and Noah are watching the four security-camera monitors mounted on the wall. Adrian sits at the other end of the table, talking to Agent Rosso.
“Any news?” I ask them.
“None good, I’m afraid,” Captain Henley says in his clipped British accent. “Ms. Falk’s phone burned before it could give us its location. So we’ve no idea where Kashmir and Billy and the other two have gone to ground, only that it’s within a three-hour radius of Sherwood.”
“That’s based on the time stamps of the messages she left on my cell phone,” Shane says. “But she didn’t give us much more to go on.”
Elijah scoffs. “Yeah, ‘on a hill near power lines and maple trees’ doesn’t exactly narrow it down.”
I hate when clues add up to nothing. Why can’t real life be more like TV? “So now we wait for them to come to us?”
“It seems unlikely they’d attack the station now,” Captain Henley says. “They know we know they’re coming.”
“But you can’t just leave us here unprotected.”
“We won’t.” He adds under his breath, “Not for the next few days, at least.”
Great. Kashmir only has to wait for the Control’s budget on Operation Rock-and-Roll-Can-Never-Die to run out.
“I think I know where the others might be,” I tell them, “the ones who didn’t go with Kashmir. Deirdre’s house is their last known location. She had a safe room there, the storeroom under the stairs.”
Agent Rosso plops the lounge phone’s cordless handset in front of Adrian. “Call the house. Remember, it oughta sound like you’re doing it in secret. Everyone else, complete silence.” He distributes a warning glare that he’s clearly been practicing for years.
I sit on the sofa so I don’t fidget. The rest of the room goes totally still.
Adrian dials, then gets up suddenly and starts to pace. That’s good—it’ll help him sound nervous and maybe cover up any of our own noises.
He stops. “Bonnie, it’s Adrian.” He gives us a thumbs-up and speaks to her in a loud whisper. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you guys!”
“How’d you know we were here?” asks a woman with a high-pitched voice. “Is Deirdre with you?”
“Bonnie, Deirdre’s dead. Kashmir left her to burn in the sun.”
“What?” she shrieks. “He said they were taking her to a safe place. Why did they kill her? And how do you know?”
“She called Shane here while she was dying. I heard it all.”
“Oh my God.” She sobs. “Are you okay?”
“No, I’m scared to death. You should be, too. Any of us could be next.”
“Why would he kill her? She’s our sister.”
“She told Shane about Kashmir and all of you guys—that you were out to kill him and Ciara. She even told them about Thanksgiving.”
“Ugh, fledgling bitch! But still, she didn’t deserve to die. Not quickly, anyway.”
I curl my lip at Bonnie’s words.
“Are you at the station now?” she asks Adrian.
“Yeah, I’m in my room. They’ve got Control agents swarming all over, but not our apartment.”
“I wish you were here. It sucks, three of us in her teeny little storeroom. Wesley and Oscar both snore. By the way, Kashmir wants to move again.”
“Where?” Adrian asks.
“I don’t know. Not far. We have to stick around for Jim’s wake Monday night and the bloodbath we’re having in his honor.”
“Have Kashmir call me when he gets in. I want to talk to him about Deirdre.”
“A little advice, Adrian? Kashmir’s had it up to here with your lectures. You better watch out, or you’ll be the next one greeting the sunrise.”
She hangs up, and Adrian slowly puts down the phone.
“Either she’s a really good actor,” I tell him, “or they don’t suspect your loyalty.”
“Didn’t you hear what she just said?”
“You don’t threaten someone you’re about to off,” Shane says. “It scares them away, sends them running into the arms of your enemy.”
Elijah picks up the phone. “I’ll call in their location. We’ll have a team there at sunset to take them into custody.”
“But no one dies, right?” Adrian asks Elijah.
“They’ll wait until after dark, then go in, holy-water pistols a-blazin’.”
“Wait,” Shane says. “If the Control takes out three of the Magnificent Seven, that still leaves Kashmir and the other three on the loose. And Adrian’s cover’ll be blown. They’ll know he ratted them out.”
“Good point.” Elijah starts to dial. “I’ll tell them to keep one vampire at Deirdre’s to answer the phone in case Kashmir calls and gives a rendezvous point. But since they don’t carry cell phones, they’ll probably just show up, straight into our arms. Bada bing, bada boom.”
I wish I shared his optimism, though I’m sure much of it is a façade.
To occupy my mind until sunset, I ask Jeremy to help me finish addressing and stamping our wedding invitations, since David made Lori stay at home today with a Control bodyguard stationed outside. This simple task feels irresistibly bold. It asserts that yes, we will be alive on Monday to mail these things. And alive next month to get married.
We sit on opposite sides of my desk. David’s in his office with the door open. Behind Jeremy, Franklin’s door is closed and locked, the way it’s been ever since he found out the truth about Adrian.
Jeremy picks up a fresh sheet of violet-adorned “Love” stamps. “My girlfriend Lea went to a bridal shower last weekend. When they walked in, the guests had envelopes on their plates. Turned out to be the bride’s thank-you notes for them to write their addresses on, so she wouldn’t have to do it herself.”
“I’m an etiquette idiot, and even I know you have to address everything yourself. I would’ve written inside: ‘Dear Ciara, Thank you for the blank. What a blank gift! It will come in handy when we blank.’ ”
“Like Mad Libs. You could even fill in the part of speech. Noun here, adjective here, verb here.”
“I would. I’m courteous that way.”
Jeremy picks up the next envelope and stops. “I guess we don’t need a stamp for this one.” He puts it in front of me. Deirdre Falk. “You invited your fiancé’s former blood-donor-slash-lover to your wedding?”
“We needed to fill the vampire side of the church. Shane’s Irish-Catholic, so his human family is huge.”
He takes the invitation and traces the outline of her name. “I can’t believe she’s dead.”
“Sorry.” I put my hand on his arm. His dreams of being a vampire died with her. “I know you had a bond with Deirdre. You saved her life.”
He sets the invitation aside and picks up the next. “I hadn’t decided yet whether I wanted her to turn me. After you and Shane left last night, I thought about it for a long time.”
“It’s a scary thing to have to plan.” I should know.
“In college I worked on a suicide hotline. They told us to ask the callers if they’d figured out how they would kill themselves.”
“You’d just ask them straight out?”
“Yeah, they’re used to everyone in their life beating around the bush about it. People worry that if they say the word ‘suicide,’ it’ll make it real. It’ll make it happen.”
“Like saying ‘Beetlejuice’ three times makes Michael Keaton appear in
wacky makeup.”
Jeremy blinks. “Kinda. Anyway, on the hotline we knew it was serious if the caller had a method in mind. I guess at that point it becomes about more than just wanting to escape life. It becomes about wanting to die.”
I think of Shane before Regina turned him. He wanted eternal death, and instead she gave him eternal life. “What about you? Are you making plans?”
“I’ve got those blackout curtains in my apartment.”
“But you need them to do your job. You work the night shift.”
“I know which song I want playing when I die: ‘Asleep’ by the Smiths. I’ve told Shane and Regina.”
Sometimes he reminds me a bit of that band’s lead singer, Morrissey. But to say that would encourage his fantasy.
“What about Lea?”
He raises an eyebrow. “I like Lea, but I’m not ready to make life-or-death decisions based on her.”
I go to the next address on the list, for one of Shane’s aunts in Ohio. “I don’t think Deirdre would’ve been a very good maker. You should stay away from anyone with Jim’s blood in them.”
“You’re probably right.” He peels off another stamp from the sheet. “You’d be a good—”
“Nooooo, la la la la la, can’t hear you!” I put my hands over my ears and sing “Mary Had a Little Lamb” off-key at the top of my lungs until Jeremy throws up his hands in surrender.
“Okay, okay, sorry. You’d be a terrible maker.”
“Thank you. Can I get that in writing, with your signature?”
“Yeah, but I get to sign it in blood.”
The station phone rings. I reach to answer it, then notice it’s an internal call from the lounge to Franklin’s office. It rings five times before he answers it. With my sensitive hearing I can usually pick up on his every word, even with the door closed, but his side of the conversation is nothing but a series of monosyllabic grunts.
Then a roared “NO!” and he slams down the receiver. Ten seconds later, the phone rings again. Franklin yanks open his door, pulling on his coat.
I stand up. “Franklin, can I—”
Lust for Life Page 17