“Well, well,” he said in a slick voice that sounded as if it were well lubricated from years of ass kissing. “It's been a while since you've been up in our neck of the woods, my dear Lu...”
“How many times do I have to tell you, Colin?” she said, cutting him off. “It's Sally. Coven protocol and all.”
“Of course,” her oily friend replied. “My apologies, Sally.”
Did he just...? Huh, I had never even bothered to wonder whether Sally wasn't her real name. Now that I thought of it, though, I guess that was kind of stupid of me considering all the idiotic pseudonyms running around our coven. I'd have to ask her about that later.
She brushed off his greeting and got straight to business. “We're here about James.”
“We?” asked Colin, once again shifting his eyes in my direction.
“Hi,” I said, sticking out my hand. “I'm Bill, but everyone in the coven calls me ... Dr. Death.” Yeah, you guessed it. It was another one of those cases where something sounded a lot cooler in my head. It probably also didn't help things that my hand was stuck out there like a doofus. I quickly lowered it when it became apparent that no return greeting was forthcoming.
Instead, he frowned and began typing on his keyboard. “Dr. Death?” he commented more to himself than either of us. “Oh, well, I guess it's not any stupider sounding than ‘Night Razor.’”
“That's what I said.”
He ignored me, though, and was still looking at his screen when his eyes opened wide. “You're the Freewill?” His tone was one of disbelief.
“What are you looking at?” I asked.
“Your profile.”
“I have a profile?”
“All vampires have a profile,” he said with a sniff. “Gods, Sally, don't you people at least give the newcomers an orientation down there?”
“Nope. Not even a flyer for my troubles,” I quipped, right before I felt her foot hit me in the side of the leg.
He gave me the once-over yet again. “I thought you'd be more ... well ... not you.”
I shrugged. “I get that a lot.”
This prompted Sally to interrupt us. “James?” she reminded him.
“He's not here.”
“Where is he, then?”
Colin answered her question with another. “Why do you need to know?”
“I've been trying to call him all week and haven't been able to get through.”
Giving her a smile that was both sympathetic and condescending all at once, he said, “My dear Sally, James is a busy man. You can't really expect him to answer the calls of every love struck puppy that chases after him.”
“It's not like that,” she snapped. “I've been working with him on coven-related business. He was supposed to smooth some static between us and another group, but he no-showed. I'm trying to get some answers.”
“When was all this supposed to happen?” Colin asked, starting to type again.
“Beginning of the week.”
“Ah, that makes sense, then,” he answered whilst looking at his monitor. “He was called away on business. Unexpectedly, I'm afraid.”
“What kind of business?”
“The kind that's none of yours.” Damn, he was a snarky little fucker.
“Cut the shit, Colin.”
He scoffed, “Or what? You'll sic him on me?”
She seemed to consider this for a moment and then said, “Well, he is the Freewill. I'm sure you've heard the rumors.”
“Oh, please, as if I believed half of that garbage.”
“James believes it.”
“Sorry, love, but just because I work for him doesn't mean I drink the same Kool-Aid he does.”
I was really hoping the next words out of Sally's mouth weren't going to involve ordering me to kick this guy's ass. Regardless of my chances at doing so, we were in a building full of all sorts of God knows what. I really didn't want them all to descend upon me just because her panties were in a bunch.
Before she could respond, however, Colin added, “Apparently Jeff doesn't believe it either.”
“Jeff? How do you know that?” she asked, quickly hiding the look of surprise that appeared on her face.
“He called not an hour ago. I haven't heard a peep from you SoHo coveners in months and suddenly, bam, you're crawling all over me like fire ants. Interesting coincidence, isn't it?”
“What did he want?” She sounded perhaps a bit more frantic than she had meant to.
“Same thing as you.”
“What did you tell him?”
“Remember what I said before about none of your business? Same principle applies. You needn't concern yourself with the conversations of beings above your pay grade.”
She let out what sounded like a sigh of exasperation. “Come on, Colin. If he sent me here in person, then obviously he trusts me to relay the info back to him.”
“Why does it matter if I potentially already told him what he wanted to know?” he slyly asked.
“Because we both know you. Jeff ... Night Razor realizes that you'd be more than happy to give him half a story over the phone just to get rid of him. He sent me here as backup to make sure there wasn't anything left lying on the table,” she lied ... or presumably lied. I still wasn't entirely convinced what side of the fence she was playing on.
“Please help me out here. It's important,” she continued. Vinegar hadn't worked, so I guess she was trying to use a little honey to catch this fly.
That seemed to deflate his asshole sails a little. “Even if I wanted to, I couldn't,” he replied. “James is working on something for the Draculas. Official business. Need to know only.” He paused for a moment, and then added, “It's all right here on the screen. I'm sorry, though. I can't talk about it.”
“You can't talk about it?” she asked, a grin starting to work its way onto her face.
“Exactly. I can't talk about it.” He leaned toward her with a sly smirk. Oh, I think I got it. I'd seen this in the movies before. Any second now, I was going to be asked to leave the room and then they'd settle their differences the old-fashioned way. If I had my guess, I'd say that would involve something that started with the word blow and ended with job. Man, maybe I should consider shooting off a résumé to this place.
Sally and Colin locked eyes for a moment, and then she asked in an innocent voice, “You got coffee in this dump?”
He smiled. “Vending machine's down the hall.”
Sally reached into her purse. “I'm afraid I'm a little tired from the trip up here. Colin, would you be a dear and get me a cup?” She pulled out a couple of bills. Not sure how much she had there, but I distinctly saw Ben Franklin staring back at me from the top. She held them out to him. “Here, this should cover it. Feel free to keep the change.”
But Colin wasn't done yet. “You know, it's kind of odd that Jeff didn't mention he was sending you up, now that I think of it...”
Sally had apparently played this game before, though. A few more bills appeared in her hand as she purred, “Must have slipped his mind.”
“Must have.” He accepted the “coffee fare” with a greasy smile. “Back in just a sec,” he said before getting up and walking out of the office.
Sally immediately jumped behind his desk and started reading what was on the screen.
“That's it?” I asked.
“What's it?” she replied, eyes on the information in front of her.
“A bribe? That's so ... so ... un-vampire like.”
“What? Should I have offered him my immortal soul and then sealed the pact in blood?”
“Well ... yeah. Something like that. There should be something dark and demonic going on, not just you handing the guy a few bucks to let you read his email.”
She continued scrolling through the document. “You know, you really need to get out more. There's this thing called reality. You should try it sometime.”
“Oh, you're a barrel of laughs, Lu ... whatever he was going to call you. What is you
r real name, by the way?”
“Can't talk, busy reading.”
“C'mon,” I said, not so easily dissuaded. “What is it? Lucy? Maybe you're really Lucille Ball ... nah, she was a redhead. Ooh, I know. You're that girl from Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.”
“No.”
“Well, then, what about...”
“Did you ever think that maybe there's no mystery? Maybe I just like ‘Sally’ better? Sally's a nice name. I had an aunt named Sally. She was cool.”
“Sally Sunset?”
“It's only that last part I don't like. Sally is fine.”
“So, in other words, there is a mystery!” I exclaimed.
“Oh, enough of this shit.” She hit a button and the page she was reading started printing out on the LaserJet sitting on the desk. “I can't concentrate with your stupidity hovering over me.” She grabbed the printed pages. “Let's go. We can finish this in the car.”
♦ ♦ ♦
We ran into Colin again as were exiting James's office. Oddly enough, he didn’t have Sally's coffee with him.
“Find what you need?” he asked with a smug grin.
Sally just gave him a grunt as she walked past, the printout safely in her pocketbook. I, on the other hand, couldn't leave without having a little fun first. The slimeball had reminded me a little too much of some of the directors at my company whose sole marketable skills were apparently an expertise in brown nosing. Taking them down a peg was usually a political no-no for people in my position, but I didn't work for Colin.
“Thanks for all your help,” I said a little over-energetically. “By the way, your machine back there was running a little sluggish. Probably a virus or something. I took the liberty of reformatting your hard drive for you.”
The remaining color drained from his already pale face and he raced into his office.
“You're welcome!” I shouted after him as I caught up to Sally. She was smiling. “Liked that, huh?”
“Maybe just a little,” she admitted.
On the Road Again
My roommates were waiting for us when we got back to the Escalade.
“Did you know this place has zombies?” Tom excitedly asked while we climbed into the back seat once again.
“Yeah,” Ed affirmed. “One came by a little while back and validated our parking.”
I nodded. “There were a bunch of them inside. Apparently they do office work, too.”
“Really?” Tom asked. “I wonder how much they make. I don't know about the rest of you, but I'd be pretty pissed if I found out a rotting corpse made more than me.”
Ed smirked as he started the Escalade. “But would you be surprised?”
“Not in the least.”
“If you two are done jerking each other off, can we get moving? It's a long ride back,” complained Sally, taking the printout from her purse.
“What about those microbrews we were gonna tour?” Tom asked from the shotgun seat.
“Do I need to kill you as an example for everyone else?” she nonchalantly commented as she started to leaf through the sheets of paper.
After a few impatient minutes of waiting, I reached out for a page. “Can I see?”
She pulled them back from my grasp. “No.”
“Why not?” I complained. “Besides, you read really slowly.”
“Sorry if my Latin is rusty.” She finally held out a page to me. “Can you do any better?”
I took the paper and saw that she was right. It all looked like incomprehensible lorem ipsum garbage to me.
“Not unless it's Pig Latin.” I handed it back. “So, is there any particular reason it's in Latin?”
“It's simple. Nobody reads it anymore, especially not this dialect.”
“Except for vampires?” I asked, dreading a future that saw me sitting in some ghoulish classroom studying for a final on a dead language. Damn, I barely passed basic Spanish in high school.
“Not really. Most vampires can't read it, either. It's usually for guys of James's rank or higher.”
“Let me guess, it cuts down on the shoulder surfing,” said Ed from the driver's seat.
“Pretty much,” Sally explained. “Although I think it's also an elitist thing for the elder vampires.”
“But you can read it?” I asked.
“Not really, but I know enough to fake it. Each of the coven heads is supposed to have a remedial understanding of it for courier purposes.”
“But you aren't the coven head,” I pointed out.
“No shit,” she replied. “But Jeff can be one lazy S.O.B. He likes to think of some of us as his own personal secretarial pool. Hence, I've picked up a few things here and there. Now if you'll excuse me, this might take a little while. If you three chimps can fling your shit amongst yourselves for a bit, it would be most appreciated.”
♦ ♦ ♦
We drove on in the fading light of the afternoon. Sally had pulled out a pen and was busy scribbling notes. We three guys tried to keep quiet so as not to bother her, but ultimately that lasted all of ten minutes at most. Fortunately she seemed well-equipped to tune us all out as long as we weren't directly bothering her. I made the mistake of doing so at one point and almost got her pen jammed into my forearm. Lesson learned.
As the last of the light was fading from the sky, we made a pit stop for burgers. Sally opted to remain with the car. When we finally returned, full of burgery goodness (rare meat didn't need a blood chaser to be fulfilling, thank goodness), she announced, “I think I’ve finally got it.”
“Please tell me you didn't spend the last seventy miles translating out to lunch, back in five,” Ed said.
“No. Otherwise we would be turning our asses around to get a refund,” she replied. “It looks like Colin was right. James did have some official business to take care of.”
“Okay, so are you going to tell us, or do I have to beg for it?” I asked.
“While I have no doubt that you're a master at begging women, I think we can dispense with the formalities this once. It would appear that James was given a summons by one of the Draculas. He...”
“Okay, hold on a second,” Tom interrupted, “Draculas as in plural? What, did The Count have himself cloned?”
“There is no Dracula, genius. Bram Stoker's book was entirely fictional,” Sally replied with a sigh.
“But you just said...”
“I said Draculas, yes, I know. They're the ruling council of the vampires, traditionally the thirteen oldest and most powerful of our kind. They're officially known as the Coven of Midnight, or sometimes just the First Coven.”
The Tome of Bill Series: Books 1-4 (Bill The Vampire, Scary Dead Things, The Mourning Woods, Holier Than Thou) Page 21