Joy rested a soothing hand on Mrs. Perkins’ shaking shoulder. Her hands clung to the edge of Alan’s casket, frightfully white knuckled. “Mrs. Perkins? I’m so sorry. I won’t tell you how I understand your pain, because I don’t, but I do know Alan would want you to come and sit with me for awhile and share a cup of tea. Maybe we could talk about Alan? I’d love to hear all about him.” It was Joy’s experience that when a mother grieved, sometimes part of the process was sharing happier times.
Mrs. Perkins clung to Joy’s hand and rose from her kneeling position unsteadily. Joy held her elbow and tucked it under her own arm. “Tea would be nice, thank you,” Mrs. Perkins said weakly as her frail body moved alongside Joy and away from Alan’s casket.
As they made their way out of the viewing area Mrs. Perkins stopped dead in her slow tracks. “Larkin?” she squeaked, her nasal passages clogged and her throat scratchy.
Larkin McBride nodded and held his hand out to Mrs. Perkins. Adelaide Perkins fell into him and the detective embraced her, his face solemn and his eyes worried.
Mrs. Perkins’ muffled voice cracked against Larkin’s wide chest. “Larkin, oh God, it’s so good to see you. They say Alan killed himself, but I don’t believe it. Not for a second. You knew Alan. He was your best friend. He would never take his life. I can’t bear it. I just can’t,” she sobbed.
Larkin stroked her back and whispered to her soothingly, thus allowing Joy her escape. Mrs. Perkins was obviously in good hands.
Joy was just about to clear the double doors when she heard Larkin whisper softly, because even if her nose didn’t have vampire sensitivity, her ears did. “We’re not done, Joy Polanski…”
Chapter Two
Joy stripped off her suit and kicked off her shoes angrily as she stomped through her apartment in her bra and panties. Damn Larkin McBride for existing. And what the fuck was this mind reading thing? Joy’s legs shook for the umpteenth time that night. He was reading her mind. Sure, plenty of people could probably read minds, but not a vampire’s mind. How was that possible if he wasn’t a vampire? It was impossible, wasn’t it? Or did she have yet another defect she could be mocked to eternity and back over? The ability to read minds for vamps of her ilk came with some scary territory. Lifemate territory…
Who could she ask anyway? If her mother even had a hint that a human might believe they were vampires, she’d lose her cookies and most probably her mind shortly thereafter. Her mother would be a paranoid mess. Joy was all too aware of what human society thought of vampires.
The Polanskis had opened up shop in many towns, throughout many different centuries, including a town or two they might have been run out on a rail if not for some quick thinking on her father’s part.
Society might be liberal about many things, but it sure as hell didn’t include vampires in its enlightened state. Joy’s family was peaceful; just because they were vampires didn’t mean they wanted to steal your soul or bite you to make you one of them. Some humans, in Joy’s opinion, weren’t worthy enough to be vampires. Humans mostly had no problem with alternative lifestyles of all shapes and sizes, so why couldn’t they accept that vampires were people too? What was the big deal about a little blood drinking amongst friends? It wasn’t like they forced their lifestyle on anyone, for crap’s sake. They didn’t invite the neighbors to do blood shots with them at block parties.
But just let a human get wind of the fact that you were a vampire and all of a sudden you were being chased through the night with a loaf of garlic bread and some holy water in a cup by a bunch of Dracula mongers.
Thanks, but no thanks.
Joy loved Easton. It was one of her favorite towns in the many they’d been in. She didn’t want to leave it and she wasn’t going to let some nosy detective with a sideshow affliction for mind reading fuck with her happiness.
Wearily she decided maybe Detective Larkin McBride would just go away. Adelaide Perkins had mentioned something about how impossible she thought it was that Alan might kill himself. Maybe the nice detective would go Sherlock Holmes Alan’s demise to death and leave the Polanskis alone.
A foreboding chill crept up her spine as she glanced out her window into the black ink of night.
And then again, maybe not, because look who just came to dinner.
Larkin McBride.
Joy closed her curtains, blocking out the persistent detective in his very obvious white car.
Idiot. He’s a real super sleuth.
What kind of detective sat in plain view of their suspect?
Joy’s phone rang and she rushed to grab it, hoping it might be her brother. “Hello?”
“The kind who wants to know what the hell is going on.”
“What?” she asked innocently, smothering a groan.
“You wanted to know what kind of detective sat in plain sight of their suspect. A super sleuth is what you thought me, I believe.”
“Detective, it’s late and I’m tired. If you don’t go away I’m going to report you to your superior.”
“Don’t vampires stay up all night long?”
“Not if they just worked a double shift.” He chuckled into the phone and an odd electricity shifted Joy’s insides.
“The fact remains that we have some things to discuss.”
“Your vampire fixation, perhaps?”
“Yeah, my vampire fixation,” he said dryly. “Answer the door, Joy, or we will play cops and vampires because I’ll slap some cuffs on you and haul you to the station if I have to in order to get some answers.”
Joy didn’t have the time to protest before the line went dead and she heard her doorbell. Shitpissfuck! Joy threw on a robe and rolled her shoulders. He wasn’t going away. He’d made that clear. So she’d just have to empty her mind of everything. How did you do that anyway? If she didn’t play this right her family could be in danger and she refused to let that happen.
“Open the door, Joy,” Larkin demanded from behind the shiny oak of her apartment door.
Blowing out a breath, Joy flipped the locks and flung it open to a more casually dressed Larkin McBride.
He pushed his way past her and stood in the middle of her living room, all big and intimidating. A crisp pair of blue jeans molded to his muscled thighs, and his black T-shirt hugged his wide chest.
“I should make you show me your badge, Detective,” Joy said for lack of anything better to say. Besides her mouth was kinda dry and her legs were weak again.
He reached behind him and whipped out a flash of something shiny and held it up before he shoved it back in his jeans pocket. “Now, let’s cut the bullshit and tell me what the fuck is going on.”
Joy brushed past him, making a beeline for her kitchen. She flipped on the light in the small kitchenette and went to the cabinet to find some coffee. She couldn’t really taste coffee per se. She kept it because her human friends seemed to like it, and right now it seemed like a very human thing to do. “Shouldn’t you be out hunting down the nearest all night donut shop?”
Larkin remained silent as he followed her into the kitchen and went to the cabinet where she kept her coffee cups, presumptuously taking out one for him too.
Joy fought a smile. Pushy bastard.
“I’m a cop. We’re all pushy.”
Hookay, now this was bordering spooky. “Well, Mr. Pushy Cop, what do you hope to accomplish by forcing your way in here and drinking coffee you weren’t invited to drink?”
“An answer to my question.”
“Could you remind me again what the question was? Oh, wait, now I remember. You want to know if I’m a vampire, right?” Joy snorted, hoping to put him on the defensive -- or at the very least make him think she thought he was one egg shy of a dozen. Only nut-jobs thought they were vamps, right?
“I want to know why I can read your every thought and yeah, I want to know if you’re a vampire.”
“I don’t know and no, but I play one on TV.” Joy turned her back to him to fill the coffee pot, then went to sit at h
er small table, purposely moving with an unhurried pace.
Larkin leaned back on the countertop and gave her a “methinks the lady protests too much” look. He continued to stare her down.
Joy refused to be ruffled, so she stared back. “Is this the good cop, bad cop thing? Where you make me confess to something just by virtue of your best scary staring technique?”
His immobile features cracked a bit. “Yeah. Is it working?”
“Um, no. Maybe you should find a new profession.”
“Like what? Embalming?”
That’s it, pick on the embalmer. It wasn’t a glamorous job, but someone had to do it.
“I’m not picking on you. You were good with Adelaide tonight.”
Joy softened a bit at the mention of Adelaide’s name. “Is she okay? She was so torn up.”
Larkin nodded his dark head. “She’s fine now. I left her with a neighbor who offered to stay with her tonight. Alan was her only child.”
And Larkin’s friend, obviously. Damn death for leaving behind those who felt they should have gone first. “I’m glad. I feel better knowing she’s with someone.”
“I know you do.”
Of course he did. Joy sat up stiffly. It was time for the good detective to take his leave. Maybe chase a nice glazed donut or something.
“I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what’s going on, and I like jelly.” Larkin went to her refrigerator, probably looking for milk for his coffee.
“No milk?”
“I like it black. Milk is for sissies.”
“What about sugar?”
“Again, another pansy condiment.”
Larkin poured two mugs of coffee and brought them to the table, setting one in front of her. He pulled out the chair opposite hers and sat down. “I can stay here until daylight, you know. Won’t you fry to a crisp by then?”
Silly, silly detective. A myth that some good SPF and sunglasses cured quite nicely.
“How high of an SPF do you need for a vampire as fair as you?”
Joy rolled her eyes. Good hell. Think empty, Joy. Vapid and airy. She took a calm sip of her tasteless coffee and ignored his question.
Larkin leaned forward so his face was but inches from hers. His lips began to move, but Joy couldn’t quite make out what they were saying for the sensuous movement of them. He sounded like the adults in a Charlie Brown cartoon. Kind of muffled and distorted. Joy stirred in her chair as something pounded in her ears. It sure as hell couldn’t be her heart, cuz she didn’t have one. Waves of crashing thunder like the rush of the tide drowned out everything. She wondered if he could hear that too.
“Hear what?” he asked.
Oy. “You know what, Detective? Shouldn’t you be really freaked out that you’ve all of a sudden developed bionic mind reading abilities?”
He grinned out of nowhere, as if a revelation had been made and Joy was the keeper of the answer key. His teeth were white and set perfectly behind that mouth that actually had dimples bracketing it. Deep crevices she wanted to run her tongue over.
Eek! Another thought, unbidden and not meant for sharing with smug detectives, flew through her brain. Joy bit the tongue that wished to betray her. Hard.
Larkin folded his hands on the table in front of him. “You know what? I should be pretty freaked out, but I’m not. Maybe it’s the cop in me. I could hear everything you were thinking, from the moment you walked across the room to go fix the flowers that were threatening to fall over, right up until now and it didn’t trouble me one iota. Just made me want to solve the damn puzzle. Now, you’re more like one of those Rubik’s Cubes. Remember those?”
If he only knew how far back her memory spanned.
“You know those square things with the colors all over them and you had to match all the colors up? That’s what this is like. I know there’s an answer to this. I just don’t know how to find it. That’s where you come in, Joy Polanski. You’re going to help me solve the puzzle,” he said definitively, brooking no question about it in her mind.
Joy crossed her arms over her chest. “By matching up all of my colors?”
“You’re a funny lady, Joy.”
The beginnings of sunrise caught Joy by surprise as she glimpsed a ray of orange sun on her wood table. She needed to sleep -- feed and then sleep some more so she could prepare to do battle with the detective. Joy had a funny feeling he wasn’t going to let this go. She pushed her chair back and stood, tightening the robe around her waist. “Well, Detective, this has been a real gas. Loads of fun, but I’m a working girl and I have to get back up in a few hours. Oh, and look,” she pointed toward the window, “the sun is coming up. Are you going to stay and watch me turn into chicken-fried vampire or leave me to my dignity so that I can run a wooden stake through my chest and end it all?”
Larkin laughed out loud. Low and with a resonant rumble. Joy’s nipples seemed to like that -- they waved hello from the top of her bathrobe. “I’ll let you get some sleep, but we’re not through. Tell me something, Joy?”
Joy cocked an eyebrow and drummed her nails on the tabletop.
“Is there a radius on this mind reading thing? I mean, can I go like ten miles down the road and still hear your thoughts?”
Now Joy laughed because she was tired and this was utterly absurd. “I think that’s a skill you hone over time, grasshopper.”
Larkin pushed back his chair too and left her standing in the kitchen. “I’m gonna go do that. Hone my mind reading skills. You get some sleep. I’ll be back, Joy Polanski. Don’t get too comfortable without me.”
Somehow Joy didn’t think she would. But then, she wasn’t supposed to think anything, now was she?
* * *
Joy brushed a strand of shoulder length blonde hair from her face and leaned back in her office chair. Her mind was on anything but preparation to embalm her next patient. Her cousin Cathy had dropped by earlier to fill her in on Alan Perkins. Apparently Alan Perkins didn’t kill himself. At least that’s what his mother told the police and they seemed to think enough evidence pointed to the notion that he, in fact, might not have.
Joy looked back over his file again. She’d covered the scars on his wrists herself. Nothing out of the ordinary popped out at her then and nothing was popping out at her now. Of course she was no detective.
But Larkin McBride was.
Asshole, asshole, asshole!
Joy let her mind run free with expletives starting with the letter “A” and was working her way down to “C” when she realized Larkin might be able to hear her from wherever he was. The radius thing bothered her. Joy’s body tensed in preparation for the phone to ring or Larkin to appear at her office door.
What the fuck was she going to do? He was a detective, for God’s sake. He’d dig and dig until he found out she really was a vampire and then, she and her family were as good as baked in the midday sun. Should she tell her parents? If she did that they’d pack up and leave rather than risk harm.
And did he have to be so sexy while he was being such a prying pain in the ass? Larkin McBride was downright, abso-fucking-lutely hot in a pain in the ass kind of way and she had no explanation for that either. Joy wasn’t sure what troubled her more. The hormone patrol on full alert or her fear that she might be caught.
Shit, shit, shit.
A knock on her office door startled her out of her misery. “Come in,” she said, clearing her throat.
“Hey, Joy.” Her cousin Andrew grimaced at her as he flopped down on the chair in front of her desk. “The cops are taking Alan Perkins’ body in for further investigation into his death.”
And they’d ruin a perfectly good stitch job while they were at it. “How is it that the coroner’s office didn’t think to do that before he was released and I gussied him up?”
Andrew laughed derisively. “Because this is Podunk-ville and it’s not like someone is murdered here every day. The last murder was in nineteen-seventy-two. Some woman clocked her husband over the head
because she caught him screwing the school nurse. Murder wasn’t even on her mind, apparently. She just threw the nearest thing she could get her hands on, which happened to be some old football trophy.”
Joy shook her head. “What can they possibly hope to find if the body is flushed with embalming fluid? They had the body for three goddamn weeks and they didn’t once think to look for anything suspicious? Who runs the coroner’s office anyway?”
“I guess it wasn’t that important to them until that guy Larkin somebody suggested it should be.”
Ahh, the ever-vigilant detective, of course. This was just fucking ducky. “Mrs. Perkins told him last night she didn’t believe he’d killed himself, but I saw his wrists, Andrew, and not much else.”
“What are you, CSI?” Andrew grinned as he teased her.
Joy threw a wad of paper at him and his reference to one of her favorite forensic shows. “Smart ass. No, Andrew. I’m just saying it looked pretty clear to me. The guy whacked himself and maybe it’s just too hard for Mrs. Perkins to fathom. No one wants to believe their child would kill themselves.”
Andrew shrugged and ran his hands over his legs. “Well, the cops think he didn’t now and so does that Larkin guy. So they’re going to take his body.”
Joy’s eyes glittered with anger. “And hack him all up again because they’re too Small-ville to get it right the first time.” Joy believed it was not only a disservice to her work as an embalmer, but to Alan who couldn’t rest in peace if his body kept playing rounds of the game Operation. “When are they coming to pick him up?”
“Three o’clock.”
Joy glanced at the clock on her desk. Good, that gave her an hour or so to poke around. “Well, I’ve got another body on the table to deal with and if I don’t get moving he won’t be ready in time for the wake tomorrow.”
Andrew’s eyes probed hers. “You look tired, Joy.”
The Polanski Brothers: Home of Eternal Rest Page 2