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booksabakingLight seeped into Jayla's new room, gently nudging her to wake up and face the day. Contrary to her usual routine this time she had no trouble getting out of bed, rested and eager to be up and at them. She'd almost forgotten what said day had on offer.
She had a few seconds of blissful ignorance, then Lisa knocked on her door.
"Meeting in the dining room in ten minutes. Ava's got something to share."
That should have stressed her out. Really, it should have. Instead she got caught up in how heartwarming is was to be 'one of the gang' so quickly. The threat of people with magical tattoos faded with the daylight, bogeymen her brain refused to accept as real. Being here was real, being called down to a meeting was real, waking up with a friend and said friend's mattress on her floor was real. Even with the deadly circumstances and the random way they'd all met Jayla couldn't stop being delighted by her current predicament. They were all in this together, cliche as that was. No specific concern for her, no awkward silences, no 'special treatment'. Them against the world, if you wanted to be dramatic about it.
"You don't know how to make real friends," Brandon had told her, first as a supposed joke and then with venom when they'd broken up. She'd show him. Him, and Carla, and Nia and all the other concern trolls. As soon as things were safe she'd start spamming social media with pictures of her new friends. She'd upload videos of their game nights. If they were okay with that.
Can you actually photograph vampires? She allowed the question to distract her from other, less pleasant thoughts. Intrusive remarks lurked at the back of her mind, pointing out how selfish and delusional she was, focusing on rubbing friendships in other people's faces while in mortal danger. How the pack might not want her around after the danger had passed. How they might be putting up with her because they felt guilty.
She let Jesse have the bathroom first and scooped Ginger out of her still warm bed, letting his sleepy purring drown out the shame brought on by calling her childhood friends trolls. Carla had called to check on her three times since she'd moved. She cared! But last time she called, she told me to come home and stop being silly.
That set off an emotional tug-of-war that lasted until she'd made it downstairs, a yawning Jesse trailing behind her.
They entered the dining room to find everyone else there, minus Arturo. Lisa had taken the seat at the head of the table, which had begun to feel like 'Lisa's chair'. Sledge sat next to her, while Dorothy and Melissa occupied the other end of the table. Vivian darted around, handing out plates of steamed buns. The tension could have been cut with a knife, a sword, or any other sharp object you had on hand.
"Good, then we're all here," Lisa said as Jayla and Jesse took a chair each. "Arturo had a rough night. I'll update him once he's had his rest. Ava, the floor is yours."
Today Sledge had her hair in a long braid. It slipped over her shoulder and hit the tabletop as she leaned forward, expression a nearly blank mask with faint cracks of stress.
"Thank you, Lisa. As I hope you've already been informed by Arturo, a further complication has surfaced, along with the threat of vampires."
"He was too tired to speak," Dorothy said, pointedly. She began disassembling a steamed bun, arranging the pieces in a neat row along the edge of her plate. "What seems to be the matter?"
Sledge didn't flinch at whatever undercurrent Dorothy's words held.
"We don't only have hunters in town, we have many hunters," she answered. "An unusually high number to find all in one place. They've been herding preternaturals ahead of them all the way from Chicago. My people are only now puzzling out the full picture of the mess this has caused. It's not looking good. In addition, it's likely our new vampire coven has captured one of my contacts."
"Ah, fuck! You can't be serious," Vivian exclaimed as she parked herself in the chair between Dorothy and Melissa, dumping a plate of extra buns in the middle of the table.
Sledge cocked her head at Vivian, who immediately backtracked with, "Crap, sorry, didn't meant it like that. I totally believe whatever evidence you've got. Just can't believe our shitty luck."
"Thank you."
Sledge pulled a scroll - yes, an honest to god scroll - out of the briefcase she'd placed next to her chair. She unrolled it on the table and blew a long, steady breath on the blank parchment. Along the path of her exhale scribbles weaved themselves into street corners and buildings.
"These," she pointed to three green, inky blotches on the map, "are the scrying beacons Arturo helped me place. I owe him one for this. Without them and his data-based monitoring of Merrihollow, I wouldn't have been able to confirm the rumors I've heard circulating. My coworkers have been too busy with our solo arrivals to aid me."
Ava sought out Dorothy's eyes and got a minute nod, as if in acceptance.
"Anything about the hunters?"
The look Sledge threw Lisa at that question had only a hint of annoyance to it.
"Patience. Our surveillance has helped narrow the search down to the south of town. That's where their barrier muddles things. They've been busy bees, setting up their own beacons across the city, marking houses like they're angels from the Old Testament. They'll keep. The more immediate issue is the vampires."
Jayla watched all faces around the table pale. Even Jesse looked to have caught on to whatever Sledge implied. Jayla raised a questioning eyebrow at him, which got her a nod and a 'later' mouthed in reply.
"How many dead?"
Lisa's words were strangled, and Jayla couldn't blame her because her own thoughts had instantly turned from pleasant hype to terrified mush. Dead. People actually murdered. That was going to take more than one morning to digest. Maybe there would-
"Five. Or rather, five people are missing, presumed dead. All we've found is telltale blood spatter on their last known locations."
-nope, definitely having to deal with possible murders, this got dark.
"In a week?" No one looked particularly chipper any more, but Melissa sounded close to wrecked. "How could they get away with that? Why didn't we know in time to stop them?"
"We're not the police and we're not superheroes." Lisa reached across the table and took Melissa's trembling hands in hers. The attempt she made at a smile looked genuine though more tired than comforting. "We will do all we can, but we can't blame ourselves for what other people choose to do. Remember what I said about not turning a blind eye?"
Melissa blinked away tears and drew in a deep breath, like the start of a meditation exercise.
"I know."
"Well, I don't," Jayla said. "What are the 'dealing with serial killers'-rules in this house?"
"The rules are, I deal with them and you assist me up to a point." Sledge brushed a hand over the map like a parent brushing imaginary lint off their kid's jacket. "I'm a mere mortal. It's good to have werewolves on my side when dealing with a coven, but it's purely for optics. If you choose to help me, I'll never expect you to fight. The leverage I need is help tracking threats and the ability to brag that I've got werewolves to call in, should things go south."
"Got it."
Put like that it sounded kinda neat, helping to solve mysterious disappearances and hopefully saving lives. Could have done without the possible murders, but better to help out than sit around and wait for people to be found dead.
"The plan is this." Sledge tapped a finger on the parchment, calling attention back to the green ink blotches. "The scrying beacons singled out one club and one bar. Scout those out and try to ID our targets. Scare them if you want, mark one if you can, and I'll do my best to track them to whatever hideout they've settled in. As soon as I've got people in the know back in town, we'll go in during daytime and clean up. My people's second priority is finding a key through the hunters' barrier. Right now, things are a mess from here to Chicago, but I've called in a number of favors, and Seong-Jin has people on the way too. I'll have an excellent team to go in with; it'll just take them a while to get here."
"What kind of clean up?" As euphemisms went, that one fell between 'sleeping with the fishes' and 'drawing the short straw' in level of creepiness.
"I'm not planning on setting them on fire, relax." Sledge threw an amusement look Jayla's way. "We'll de-fang them and, if possible, get their victims out alive. Sunlight weakens vampires, the same way radiation would you or me, but there'll be no spontaneous combustion and no permanent damage due to vampires' excellent healing skills. My colleagues and I will go in during the day to have a fighting chance, that's all."
'Fighting chance' didn't exactly scream safe and sound plan of action. Then again, who was Jayla to question a witch and private eye? The 'de-fanging' part sounded iffy but she decided to save that question for later. The tension in the room kept ratcheting up and her playing twenty questions wasn't helping.
Thankfully, Lisa took over the questioning, leaving Jayla to cuddle her cat and try to blend back in with the group.
"You said they likely have one of your contacts. Do you mean the one who-?"
"Got you your new toy?" Sledge rubbed at her forehead as if that would stop her scowl from showing. "Yes, that contact. She's been a reliable source for years but I fear she's in over her head this time. Showed up to deliver in person, which is a first, and I haven't been able to track her since. It's doubtful she's left town; none of my perimeter alarms registered her leaving. Her staying in town this long is a red flag in itself, but on top of that I suspect she got the wand from our current vampire threat and not an auction. The timing of their shared arrival is too much of a coincidence and when I got the wand it had fresh traces of being handled by more than one vampire."
Jayla glanced at Jesse, trying to not be too obvious about it. He looked rather pale, his attention fixed on Ginger snoozing in her lap, petting the cat robotically. Jayla caught his hand in hers and gave it a gentle squeeze before letting go. That got her a stunned look and then a smile she guessed could be grateful. She smiled back.
Lisa drew in a deep breath. "So scouting for vampires, hoping to find your contact. Is she…?"
"I think vampire, but I'm not sure." Sledge folded her arms and glared at the scroll as if it were to blame for this whole situation. "Hadn't seen her face-to-face before. She showed up at night wearing sunglasses."
"I see."
Jayla caught Vivian's eye and gestured at her face in what she hoped was a clear improvised sign for 'why are sunglasses a clue?' Vivian, apparently fluent in made-up sign language, mouthed back, "Can't do the eye-flash that way." Huh. That could come in handy.
Tension still held the room in a tight grasp. Jayla grappled with a steamed bun, more to have something to do than out of genuine hunger. Her stomach tended to shut down when nervous, the traitor.
"God, I am beat." Sledge's chair scraped against the floor as she got up, a little unsteady on her feet. "Arturo might have done all the leg work, for which I am grateful, but I spent a lot of energy on those beacons. I could do with some shut-eye in my center. Let me know when you've got a tracker on someone worth my attention, then get yourselves into full lockdown."
She rolled up the parchment and put it back in her briefcase. Next, she got out a small red snuffbox, which she handed to Lisa.
Lisa took the snuffbox as gently as you'd receive an unhatched egg. "Ava?"
"Yes?"
In a move Jayla hadn't seen coming, Lisa took one of Sledge's hands and gave the back of it the softest of kisses.
"Be careful, love."
Sledge bent to return the kiss, touching her lips to the tips of Lisa's fingers in a quick flutter of contact. Very regency romance.
"You know me, dear. I'm the poster girl for paranoia."
"Please, no self-deprecating humor."
The snuffbox ended up on the table as Lisa too got out of her seat. Jayla eyed the tiny box with cautious expectation, in case it decided to change color, shape or explode. In the periphery, Lisa offer her arm to Sledge. It seemed they'd literally kissed and made up.
"Let me walk you to the door."
Jayla hadn't experimented much with her werewolf super hearing. All she'd managed thus far had been to accidentally trigger it in a busy intersection, which had been the exact opposite of fun. She had, however, managed to figure out that it was a thing you could turn off and on, and that leaving it off seemed to be the thing to do while in polite company. She resisted her curiosity and didn't listen in on Lisa and Sledge once they were out of the room.
Instead, she turned to Vivian.
"How long has that been going on?" she asked, knowing she sounded like a gossiping teenager.
"Lisa and Ava?" Vivian frowned, tapping her lips with one finger while her other hand clenched and unclenched, grasping after something invisible. "Going on two years. Thanks for reminding me that I should poke Lisa to go gift shopping for Ava. They both suck at anniversaries."
"Huh." Choosing to keep her voice low, Jayla couldn't resist asking, "Do they fight a lot?"
"No." It was Melissa who'd answered, her previously anxious expression upped to full distress. "They've never had a fight like that before. Ever."
Damn. Okay, time to backtrack. Was there a way to backtrack from that? What did you say? Jayla's mind was drawing blank.
Vivian jumped up and clapped her hands together in one loud smash, rescuing Jayla and startling the whole room.
"Who's up for a vampire hunt tonight?"
Jayla frowned. "By 'hunt' you mean…?"
"Tracking them down, making sure they know it's best to leave town and that our network knows their faces. Well, some of their faces. Your hunter isn't alone in sniffing about our wards this week and we can't let that challenge go unanswered for much longer." Vivian took up position by the doorway to Dorothy's room, as if she'd decided to guard it. She continued talking, half of her attention on Jayla, half on the entry hall. "We'll check if they're all Hannibal Lecters or if we've got ourselves a group of confused new bats with heads full of lies. See if we can find Ava's contact and if we need to break some fangs."
Seems that 'no fighting' clause is a shaky one. "Soooo, the prospect of us punching vampires tonight is how likely?"
"Hopefully very," Vivian answered, her smile wide.
That smile was infectious. Jayla's heart began to pump faster, flooding her blood stream with the first taste of adrenaline. She gently placed Ginger on the table and got up, muscles shouting at her to do something and do it soon.
"Does Sledge ever get to enact her part of this or do you tend to catch the bad guys first?"
Vivian had the decency to look shamefaced.
"She's a great witch and a great detective, but she's only one person and she can't call in favors all the time. If she got hurt, Lisa wouldn't be able to live with any of us, least of all herself."
"We help out when we can," Melissa said, brushing the last traces of tears out of her eyes. She and Dorothy got to their feet too. "Ava knows that. The whole 'I am the law' talk must have been for you, to not scare you off again. A-and it's not like this is a common thing! We mostly do normal stuff, like work and study and watch TV. We only jump in when people are in danger and Ava is overworked." She bit her lower lip, close to drawing blood. "Are you okay with punching vampires?"
Jayla gave Melissa an exaggerated thumbs up and said with all the confidence she had, "I've never backed down from a fight!"
A far too true statement. It wasn't like this would be the first time she'd gotten into a bar brawl to keep a friend safe. Sure, her previous 'fights' had been very far from life-and-death ones, and had mostly been about pushing away uncoordinated drunks, but she had superpowers now. How could she sit around and ignore that people had been kidnapped when she could literally tear doors off their hinges one-handed? That kind of strength should help people, not only accidentally cost you your damage deposit.
"I, on the other hand, will be staying out of this. If you don't mind," Jesse tiptoed into the conversation. Unlike the rest of them he still sat in his chair, having taken over the duty of bed for Ginger. "When vampires and werewolves square off, it's best for the rest of us to stay clear. I'm sure you understand."
His comments on bench pressing came to mind. Plus, the whole dog thing. If anyone tries to make him go, I'll bite them. She had to stifle an inappropriate laugh. Where the hell did that thought come from?
Jesse's announcement got understanding nods from everyone, except for Vivian, who whirled around to face him with an expectant grin.
"We might need you for one thing."
Jesse cocked his head to the side. Sitting with his legs loosely crossed and with Ginger sprawled in his lap he looked ready to stay put for a long time. His posture had lost some of its tension after Lisa and Sledge left the room, but not all of it.
"What would that be?"
Vivian pointed at him with all the over-the-top drama of a community theater actor, face practically splitting with glee.
"Selecting the perfect clubbing outfits! I like your style and I prefer to look my best when I'm beating up shitty people."
Jesse answered her glee with plenty of his own. "In that I do believe I can aid you."
"Oh dear," Dorothy said, "Are we really doing this again?"
That werewolf doth protest too much. Dorothy didn't put up even token resistance when Melissa grabbed her hand and led her out of the dining room.
Vivian hooked arms with Jayla, which should have been a little awkward since the top her head only reached Jayla's shoulder. Awkwardness was, however, the farthest thing from Jayla's mind.
"Help me with my makeup!" Vivian tugged her along, following Melissa and Dorothy. Jesse fell in step behind them, Ginger gently cradled in his arms. "I want eyeliner wings sharp enough to cut a man!"
Excitement replaced the previous tension in the room. Jayla found herself looking forward to smashing someone's face in. Darn. Mom always joked I'd end up in a gang. Might as well be one that includes superpowers and great makeup.
With makeovers as goal, Vivian and Melissa ran off to gather their joint wardrobes and Dorothy went to gather all makeup available in the house.
This left Jayla and Jesse alone in Jayla's temporary bedroom.
"You, eh, you okay?"
To be fair, Jayla had made worse attempts at being thoughtful and supportive. She just couldn't remember any of those times right now.
Jesse plopped down on her bed.
"Me?" One of his eyebrows wandered upward, underlining his question.
"Yeah." She was starting to sound like a broken record. "I know I'm still leveling up our friendship and all that, but are you going to be okay? Here, I mean."
Jayla hadn't exactly had any hearts-to-hearts with Arturo, but she'd gotten the impression he wasn't thrilled about the 'blood offering'-thing. And Jesse had clearly been upset during the dining room meeting. She wasn't completely clueless, thank you very much.
It took Jesse a moment to reply. He eyed her up and down again, that searching once-over he'd pulled the first night they'd met.
"I'll be fine. Got the day off work and everything." He almost sounded like he meant it. "Wasn't prepared to be sitting on a magical artifact stolen from a blood-sucking cult, but the security here seems tight. You're the one going out chasing vampires. How are you holding up?"
So that was the rub. She'd have to figure out exactly how rare the stuff Lisa had stored in the basement was, later.
"I'm great! Ready to get glammed up and track down the interlopers." She did her best to beam. According to reliable sources - aka Carla - she was usually pretty good at it, even when nervous. "We'll be back before you know it."
Only a nod in reply to that. Tension had begun creeping back into Jesse's shoulders, his casual slump on the bed more fake by the second.
"Do you want me to stay?"
This time, both of Jesse's eyebrows took the trip toward his hairline.
"I know you've got way more experience with this than I do," Jayla soldiered on, trusting her rambling to get this conversation somewhere new if not somewhere better. "You can probably outwit the vampires we're tracking down without breaking a sweat. It's just… some things are better to have company through, y'know?"
Jesse relaxed ever so slightly. His smile lost its edge, turning warm.
"Thanks for offering. It's honestly very kind of you. That said, the best thing you can do is help the rest of the pack track down and deal with the vampires. I'll be safe as houses here." He stretched, let his head loll against the wall. "Got a few words of advice for you though. One: most vampires haven't fought a werewolf. If you end up in trouble, shifting when they've got you pinned is a good move. Two: Sledge is right; vampires and hunters showing up in town the same week as your friends get a powerful magical doohickey isn't a fluke. Finding one group might lead you to the other, but it might also get you trapped between a rock and hard place. Be careful, alright?"
Nodding along, Jayla took a seat on the bed next to him.
"Sounds like you've gone toe-to-toe with both kinds of creeps, not just run from them." Okay, so she was fishing for info. She should have given him a piece of paper to write down topics she should avoid, instead of prodding at him, but hindsight remained twenty-twenty.
In one lazy move, Jesse turned his attention from the ceiling back to Jayla. His smile had that edge again.
"Far too often." Words with weight to them. "I prefer talking over fighting, when I can. I've been unlucky a few times and hope to never be again."
"Good thing you've got me around, then." Jayla wanted to hug him, but wasn't sure if this was a hug-friendly moment. "I've always been better at punching people than talking."
A bit of an exaggeration since she hadn't been in any 'real' fights, but still. She'd gotten pretty good at shoving creeps and with werewolf strength that had to count for something.
Jesse snorted, a genuine noise of amusement and…relief? Yeah, probably relief.
"You'll help me punch things and I'll help you talk to them? Sounds like a fair deal. Though I do think you're pretty good at the talking too."
Footsteps came echoing up the staircase outside. Jesse sat up straighter, eyes sliding toward the door.
"I'll keep an eye on your cat. The vampire too, in case he needs it."
Vivian stormed into the room then, arms full of clothes. Jayla let the conversation end and joined in searching through the piles of jeans and jackets for the perfect outfit. They'd have time to talk more after.
Despite falling asleep on the couch in the living room, Arturo woke up in his own bed. He had no idea who'd carried him there but that didn't matter. Coming back to consciousness hurt, as he'd expected it to, and it was a relief to be allowed to suffer in private.
A knock came at the door sooner than he'd hoped.
"Come in." He didn't bother speaking above a whisper. Concerned werewolves tended to listen hard at closed doors.
The door creaked open, revealing Lisa dressed up in way more leather than Arturo had ever seen her wear. He suspected Vivian or the new girl, and hoped they'd thought to take pictures for Sledge to enjoy later. It was good to see them back at peace with each other and he'd support any action that kept them that way.
"You okay in here?"
Arturo muttered something to the effect of "Fine, just need more sleep." This did not make her go away.
"How are things with you and Sledge?"
The question got him a sigh but no privacy. "We're working things out."
"Are you now?"
"You know she has good reasons not to trust werewolves."
Exactly what he hadn't wanted her to say. No matter how stiff his own interactions with Sledge remained, she'd been good for Lisa. But if this was where they were headed...
"That's not an excuse for what she said to you."
"No, it's not." Lisa spoke with conviction and confidence, worn and tired yet there. "But it's the reason I chose to forgive her, when she apologized to me."
Arturo silently thanked all higher powers for small mercies.
"I hope she groveled."
Lisa snorted. "Hardly. She was sincere though, which counts for much more in my book. She also wasn't completely in the wrong."
He couldn't argue with that.
"We're going out." Lisa sat down on the edge of his bed. Arturo had a brief image of his mother doing the same when he'd caught a bad fever as a kid. He flinched back from the memory, the comfort and worry in it causing mental whiplash. Lisa's cool hand on his forehead did nothing to alleviate said whiplash but he didn't push her away.
"Club hunting?" he managed. His throat had a sandpaper coating he knew drinking water wouldn't ease. He'd have to go to the hospital again before the week was out. That did nothing to urge him out of bed.
"We're taking all precautions, as I trust you'll do too." Lisa stroked his forehead one last time before pulling her hand back and squaring her shoulders. He noted the bags under her eyes.
"Watch over the shapeshifter and the cat while we're gone, okay?"
He'd wanted to tell them to be careful. He'd wanted to say he'd go with them, he just needed another minute to recover. Her last words swept all that aside.
Lisa moved to get up and he grabbed her by the arm before she could leave the bed. She relaxed into his grip and sank back down, forehead wrinkling into a puzzled frown.
"He can't stay." She had to realize that. He had to convince her the shapeshifter needed to leave. Especially now.
"Who? Jesse?" A stony calm fell over Lisa; a cool aura of impending violence Arturo had come to regard with respect and a hint of fear, even though he'd never been its target. "What did he do?"
He'd expected her ignorance. The pack had always stayed true to the no eavesdropping rule. Better come clean.
Stomach curled up in knots, Arturo struggled up into a sitting position, putting his back to the corner where wall met wall.
"He's offered me blood. Twice."
Lisa started. Arturo heard her heart skip a beat and the chilly air around her thawed.
"He what?"
Arturo bit the inside of his cheek, careful to not draw blood. He had fangs again.
"The shapeshifter offered me his blood. He all but bared his neck and spread himself on a table!" All right, exaggerating, but not by much.
"You didn't take him up on the offer?"
The reply hit Arturo over the head. He gaped at her, fangs or no fangs. Two pieces of solid wall behind his back and he still felt exposed.
"What did you just say?"
This time, Lisa's hand landed on his ankle, soft and grounding. Her expression neared pleading, big brown eyes taking on a shimmer he couldn't call anything but puppy-like.
"Arturo, I say this as your oldest werewolf friend: sometimes it's best to not look a gift horse in the mouth."
If he could have shrunk further back, he would have. He allowed her hand to stay on his ankle, more out of shock than anything else.
"You can't be serious." She knew! She knew he never could! She knew. Or maybe she didn't. Even now, despite their many discussions on the topic, she might not fully understand him. That set his thoughts churning.
Lisa's grip tightened, her fingers digging into his calf.
"No, that's my line. You're the one who can't be serious."
She shook him by the leg and he could spot flecks of tears in her eyes. No. Nonono.
"Art, you're sick.”
No pulling the punches this time around. He wanted to close his eyes and block her out, but her words had a raw quality to them that stunned him.
"You've been sick for seven years. There is no telling what permanent damage your starvation is doing to you." She put her hands on his knees and crouched on the bed, moving physically toward him inch by inch and away from him in every other sense. "You need fresh blood. Actual fresh blood, not what you can scavenge out of the hospital trash. This could be the optimal solution."
Arturo shook his head, unable to break eye contact. Bile rose in his throat.
"Lisa, please."
"No! No 'please'." She rattled his knees, literally, voice breaking on the last word. "It's painful enough knowing that my blood, all werewolf blood, is useless to you. I understand your fear at drinking from a regular person, but Jesse isn't one. You must realize that. I can offer to spot you if you think that would help. I'll stand ready to knock you unconscious if that's what it takes. Hell, I can draw his blood and you can drink it without having to ever look at him."
He must have flinched. He couldn't feel himself doing anything, his whole body numb with terror, but Lisa's posture shifted once more. She leaned even closer, one hand landing on his shoulder, the other staying on his knee. She stared him straight in the eye, intently.
"Are you…" She paused, appearing to be searching for the right words. "Is it because you find him attractive that you can't take his blood?"
That kicked him out of his paralysis. Her comment had hit far too close to home and yet been miles off the mark.
Desperate, he grabbed for any kind of reply and came up with, "You don't think it's the least bit suspicious?"
As panicked questions went this was one of his better ones. It had been running through his mind since the moment the shapeshifter had entered their home; he had plenty to build on.
"The guy's new in town, we've known him for less than a week, and he's more than willing to have me drain his blood. To drink it! He seems pretty eager to sidle his way into our home, despite talking big about how dangerous vampires and werewolves can be. Does that sound like a stable person to you? Like someone any of us should get involved with? Why is he even here?"
"The theory of magical attraction-"
"Is a theory." He groped for her hand, grasped it like a lifeline. "Are you ready to risk our safety on a theory?"
The air went out of Lisa. She bent forward, resting her forehead on the hand she'd put on his shoulder, supporting her waist against his knees. Her scent enveloped him; leather, fresh makeup, and the faint but acrid trace of anxiety.
"I hate it when you're right."
Arturo deliberately didn't breathe a sigh of relief.
He pulled Lisa into a hug and they sat in close to comfortable silence, breaths leveling out, pulses slowing to their regular crawls. Well, Arturo's did. Lisa's heart, like most werewolves', kept a regular human pace when not called to push its limits.
"I need to go," Lisa said eventually, untangling herself. "We're going to Diggs first, since it opens earliest. If we get nothing there we head to the Rat Nest. I'll text you when we're finished and heading back."
She hesitated at the foot of the bed, catching his gaze again.
"Think about it, would you? Even if all your suspicions are right and this guy turns out to be super shady, you need to cross that line at some point. Please."
Not the time to argue. He nodded and she left.
He lay down and shut off his alarm clock. Hunger gnawed at him. He'd have to deal with that. Eventually.
'The Diggs' turned out to be exactly the kind of place Jayla tended to end up frequenting. The bouncer at the door let them in with minimal fuss and no creepy comments, and no one looked twice at them as they made their way through the wardrobe and onto the dance floor, which was surprisingly full this early on in the evening. The music was some kind of power metal, the kind that required more jumping than dancing, but hey, music was music.
"Fan out," Lisa said, pitching her voice low. "Remember, only mark people you've confirmed are vampires. We don't want to overtax Ava."
Jayla had to strain to hear, then cut that out as she nearly deafened herself with music. It was loud enough in the club without werewolf senses on.
She followed along as Vivian nudged her to the right, while Lisa and Melissa took the left. Dorothy shouldered her way right onto the dance floor with robotic determination. For an uninformed observer, the short red-haired lady dressed in eye-piercing pink might call to mind the goal-oriented but innocent programming of a roomba going after dust. It had amused Jayla to no end to learn that Dorothy was the pack's most experienced fighter.
"I'll take the bar," Vivian said close to Jayla's ear, her cheery grin contradicting her stone-cold tone. "Stick to the plan and don't worry about regular folks noticing your eyes, 'cause they won't unless you go full wolf. Flash them as often as you can, like I showed you."
It had been an awkward lesson, as it had been conducted in the backseat of a car, but Jayla thought she'd gotten the hang of it. Still couldn't wiggle her ears though.
Keeping to the edge of the dance floor, giving Dorothy plenty of space to do her searching, Jayla scanned the tables along the walls. The eye-flashes took concentration so she settled for the side-step-side-step-nod kind of dancing favored by people too cool for jumping around. To add to her distraction, she couldn't stop thinking about the suspicious bag of white powder in her back pocket, liberated from the snuffbox Sledge had given Lisa. She really hoped no one would notice it because, yeah. Taking that out to smear on a vampire could look call-the-police-weird if done wrong.
"Hey there."
Jayla hid a grimace. Exactly the tone of voice she preferred to avoid, even when not on the lookout for murderous vampires. Better make this guy get the hint quick.
Said guy screamed 'frat boy', from the white t-shirt combined with a half untied tie, to the shorts in the middle of winter, down to his boat shoes. The amount of product in his hair must have cost more than the color in hers.
"Hey," he said again, his slack grin hinting at more than alcohol in his system. His eyes swam across her face, pupils struggling to focus. "I like tall girls. And you're, like, super tall. Wanna come back to my place?"
Vivian popped up at Jayla's shoulder, a jack-in-the-box of bared teeth and personal space invasion.
"Hands off, Trevor," she said and wrapped an arm around Jayla's waist. "Mine."
Frat boy Trevor blinked at Vivian, looking far less surprised than Jayla felt the sudden appearance warranted. Realization seemed to dawn on him in slow motion. He took a stumbling step back and flinched, as if Vivian had shone a bright flashlight into his eyes.
"Fuuuuck, not again."
"Not my fault you keep hitting on all my girlfriends, Trevor," Vivian said, leaning her head on Jayla's shoulder and wrapping her arm tighter around Jayla's waist.
Jayla did her best to glare at Trevor and not break down in a fit of giggles.
"How was I supposed to know?! You have so many! You've got a whole lesbian collective over at your shop. So unfair."
Whining like a toddler who'd been denied a taste of dishwasher soap he back-pedaled across the dance floor, dodging flailing elbows and stomping boots.
Vivian stepped back once Trevor had disappeared out of sight.
"Sorry about the unasked for touching. That's just the quickest way to get rid of him."
Jayla shook her head at the apology, slinging one arm over Vivian's shoulders in a gesture of camaraderie.
"That happen often?"
"More than you'd think." Vivian stood on the tips of her toes, struggling to get a look over and around the milling crowd of dancers. "Don't feel sorry for him, he'll be hitting on the next girl in about ten seconds."
Jayla knew the type. "I think we need to introduce Trevor to Jesse."
"Sounds-" Vivian stiffened, every muscle in her shoulders tensing in preparation. "Fuck."
A spike of electricity darted down Jayla's spine. Her first instinct was to move, to go searching for whatever had Vivian freaking out, but Vivian didn't move with her.
"What?"
"Do you smell that?"
Jayla closed her eyes and inhaled, doing her best to sort through the scent impressions. Sweat, perfume, smoke, alcohol, something coppery-
"Is that blood?"
"Yes. They must have a newly minted vampire or a sick sense of humor." Vivian unlocked her phone as she spoke, activating a conference call. "We need to get a move on."
Eyes darting around the room to try and locate the source of the smell, Jayla moved to casually and briefly stand back to back with Vivian, keeping an eye on her and another on their surroundings while doing her best to look happy. She was really putting her acting chops through their paces.
"Okay," she said, unable to keep quiet with her nerves basically on fire. "Uhm. Why did you say-?"
The screen of Vivian's phone blinked over to an active call. She kept the phone at arm's length, not bothering with hellos or other check-ins, only said, "Possible Blood Mark, back of the club."
"A possible what?"
Vivian glanced up, her attention only partly on Jayla.
"Fresh vampires all have a new sense of hunger that they don't know how to deal with. Their Makers tend to help them out a little, through Blood Marks." She drew a finger along her throat, the nail digging into the skin hard enough to leave a faint scratch. Then she brushed her hand against this imaginary wound, before reaching out and touching the back of Jayla's shirt. "Long story short, the Maker slaps their own blood onto a person and the new vampire becomes a targeted, ravenous missile."
Jayla bit back a surge of bile.
Dorothy was the first to make her way toward them from across the writhing and jumping crowd. She weaved in and out between the dancers with a look in her eyes that spoke murder. For a small, plump woman in a pink glittery jumper she sure knew how to radiate an air of 'move or be crushed'. Jayla felt extra grateful that she wasn't on Dorothy's hit list.
"Let's go people! Find the target and get them to safety, chop chop!" Hanging up, Vivian shifted her weight to the right, signaling the direction with a nod. "I've got a trail. Follow close by and watch my back."
This probably shouldn't be fun. Maybe hunting was a werewolf instinct? Yeah, she'd blame the giddy thrills crashing through her on instinct for now. The short nausea had died down quick.
"Lead the way!"
Arturo stared at the well-stocked shelves, letting cool air wash over him. He needed to eat. Knowing this still made nothing in front of him look the least bit appetizing.
"You sure the fridge has what you want?"
The fangs appeared swifter than ever before, drawing blood from his unprepared tongue. He stifled a whine and swallowed, shutting the fridge door with a slam. The bottles and jars inside rattled, but the noise barely registered over the taste of his own blood. His stomach cramped and the room spun around him. He did his best to not let it show, to keep his breathing even, his shoulders relaxed and his fingers uncurled.
The shapeshifter had situated himself by the kitchen's door, leaning against the wall. Leaning. The man seemed incapable of standing up straight. He still wore that leather jacket that framed his neck with the subtlety of a push-up bra.
Arturo put a hand on the fridge. The soft chill of it grounded him. A sensation he hadn't felt for years had begun to claw its way out, pushing past even the hunger. It burned as it reached the surface of his skin. Despite his best efforts it left his body in a silent explosion.
For a second, he was deeply grateful for the shapeshifter's multitude of talismans.
"That bad, huh?" The shapeshifter drummed his fingers against one of the pins on his jacket. It shone red in the dim light of the kitchen, a stark contrast to the black leather behind it as well as the dark swirling scribbles on it. "It might not work on me, but I can still feel when someone's trying a glamour."
Arturo pressed back further against the fridge. The wound in his tongue had healed, leaving only the fainest trace of blood on his palate. Bile rose to eradicate the last particles of that taste, fueled by the white flash of shame the glamour left in its wake.
The shapeshifter pushed off the wall. Maybe the man had come to his senses and was going to leave. But of course Arturo had no such luck.
"You know hypnotism isn't necessary, right?"
The shapeshifter moved in the slow manner with which you'd approach a nervous horse, not a literal monster that could rip you to pieces. The casual air about him put Arturo as much on edge as his lovely brown eyes and tantalizing pulse.
"I thought my offer was perfectly clear."
He crowded Arturo against the fridge with ease, as if he invaded the personal space of vampires every goddamn day. Arturo wanted to make a break for it, run back to his room, bury himself under his covers and wait out this nightmare. But he didn't move. He couldn't, didn't trust himself to. The shapeshifter kept a hand's breadth away, arms at his sides, but proximity was enough. He might as well have drawn a capture circle on the floor.
"Is it me?" The question didn't hold any accusation that Arturo could hear, only curiosity. "Would it work better for you if I looked like a woman? Taller? Shorter? Do you prefer blonds or brunettes?"
The shapeshifter smelled of warmth. Other things too, yes, but the warmth had Arturo by the fangs, beckoning with its messed up siren call.
"No," he choked out, barely daring to open his mouth to answer.
The shapeshifter chuckled. The noise brushed against Arturo's cheek on a soft puff of air that shouldn't have felt like a caress.
"Man, you're a wreck. Am I going to have to get this started? Make you take your medicine?"
That tone of voice, sultry and teasing, rubbed Arturo in all the wrong and right ways. Two emotions flared up in response, and Arturo let rage take over. The other option was unthinkable.
A gasp tore from the shapeshifter as Arturo reversed their positions, pinning him against the fridge with strength drawn from both frustration and helplessness. He secured the smaller man with one hand on his shoulder, the other on his throat, squeezing just short of cutting off his air.
"Is this what you want?" Arturo stopped fighting his eyes, let them shine red and bright. Their color reflected in the shapeshifter's, lighting them answering neon blue. He curled his fingers tighter around the other's throat, digging his nails in, nearly breaking skin. "Do you want me to tear your throat out? Rip your head off?"
The fucker didn't panic. He didn't scream. Instead, he relaxed in Arturo's grip as if he'd been expecting the violence and accepted it.
"That would be rather counterproductive. You can only drink from me once if you kill me." The grip Arturo had on his throat gave his voice a raspy quality. That definitely didn't help.
"What makes you think I'd know how to stop once I'd started?" Arturo searched the shapeshifter's face for any flinch, any hint of fear. He was playing at something, but Arturo couldn't tell what.
The ever-present smirk grew on the shapeshifter's lips, sly and knowing.
"Honey, sorry to break it to you, but you're not my first vampire. Even if it's been a while for you, I can take it. I know my limits." He pushed forward, putting more pressure from Arturo's hand on his throat, and whispered, low and rough, "I've been told I'm delicious."
Arturo didn't shriek, but only because all air left him in one fell swoop. He let go of the shapeshifter and backed up, smacking right into the kitchen table.
The shapeshifter remained against the fridge, relaxed and giving what had to be bedroom eyes. The bloodlust burning through Arturo dampened briefly, only to be replaced with equally shameful desire. He could hold that man down, could tears his veins open, could drink his blood, and he would be welcome to more.
"I won't let you trick me."
For the first time, the shapeshifter looked honestly taken aback.
"What?"
"I won't," Arturo said and knew he had to sound close to tears because he was and not that far from hyperventilating either. "I won't, I won't, I won't. I didn't take my fucking Blood Mark and I'm not taking you, in any way, shape or form. Get out!"
He was shaking terribly. His abuela had suffered from Parkinson and if someone had told him he'd inherited that, despite it being literally impossible now, he would have believed them. His limbs wouldn't obey him. He remembered how abuela Juana had struggled to reach for her knitting, how her hands had gone everywhere but where she wanted them, how she'd slowed down. Not the time! Keep it together.
The shapeshifter hesitated, head cocked to the side in thought. After what felt like forever but likely was less than a minute, he pushed off the fridge.
"I'll go see if the cat needs feeding."
Arturo collapsed into the nearest chair the second he was alone, tuned out the rest of the world, and began to sob.
"Stay close to me." Vivian gave Jayla a reassuring smile, edged with manic glee, as they neared the back of the club.
"I've activated a charm," Lisa said, the last to join back up with the pack. In contrast to Vivian, she looked tense and uncomfortable. "Unless we break something big, no one will look at us twice. I brought along Ava's music box too, should we need it, so keep to human hearing. Everyone ready?"
Jayla stopped herself both from asking 'Music box?' and answering 'I was born ready!', mighty proud for resisting both temptations. Her heart pounded like a jackhammer and her ears were ringing for no reason, but somehow in a good way. The small bag of white powder burned in her back pocket.
Okay, fine, can't blame this on being a werewolf. Getting to hunt down murdery vampires was even better than tracking down a guy who'd spiked your friend's drink. Righteous fury, here we go! She carefully avoided thinking about how she'd never truly been in a real fight and how violence, when it actually happened, generally left no one involved particularly perky or happy.
They burst out the club's back door with little fanfare and found themselves in a parking lot. Out there were a handful of cars, a fading streetlight and a small group of people.
Lisa took the lead, approaching the group until they all stood just out of arm's reach, lined up like football teams preparing to shake hands before a match. Jayla tried to memorize the faces before her, but her attention was mostly drawn to the woman in the middle of the group. She had a vacant look about her, as if she was sleep-walking, and her shirt was spotted with blood. When Lisa flashed her eyes gold, all before them answered with red except that woman. Hers remained a human brown and continued to stare off into the distance.
“About time you lot showed up.”
Surreal as all hell. Of all the confrontations in empty parking lots Jayla had been through in her life - and there had been a fair amount of those, though with far lower stakes – this one took all the cakes.
"This is all of you?" The woman talking wore a jean jacket and bright pink lip gloss that matched her wavy, pink hair. She stood out starkly against her gang of six black-clad goons of various genders, both as a spot of color and because they all towered over her. "Man, I was expecting more of a fight."
"You want a fight, you came to the right place!" Vivian shouted. Lisa put a hand on her shoulder, holding her back. Jayla got the impression that tracking powder wasn't on the agenda anymore.
"Why are you here?" Dorothy's tone was the coldest Jayla had heard her use yet. "Merrihollow is spoken for. You aren't welcome here."
"Calm your tits, doggie," pink-hair said, cool as ice, and nodded toward the hostage. "Don't want Sleeping Beauty here to lose any blood, do we?"
She paused, seemingly for dramatic effect, and when no one spoke up, continued, "That's what I thought. Bit weird being that attached to food, but I'm not complaining. Now, listen up. We're not planning on sticking around, we're only here on business."
"Business?" Lisa said, one hand still on Vivian's shoulder.
"You've got something we want. Simple as that. We'll be leaving when we have what we came for."
"What could we have that interests a coven of blood suckers?"
One of the vampires snarled and flashed his eyes red again. Melissa of all people answered this by baring...yeah, those were fangs. Jayla would have dwelt more on that if a scent hadn't hooked her attention. The lead vampire had a scarf hanging from her belt and it smelled weirdly familiar.
"Look, mutt," pink-hair said to Lisa, "I haven't got all night and I'd much rather be home than in this backwater of a town. I'm offering you a deal: Give us the wand and we'll get out of your hair. Keep it and suffer consequences. That clear enough for you?"
The air around Lisa trembled. Jayla wasn't sure if it was a magical effect or if her rage had amped up to a palpable level. Either way it made standing next to her about as comfortable as standing next to a soccer mom who's asked to speak with the manager. Also, the scarf in the lead-vampire's belt was unnaturally distracting. Jayla's fingers itched to grab it. Magical trap? Are magical traps a thing?
"Crystal," Lisa said, cold and unmoved. "End your glamour on that girl and leave. Do not threaten us again or suffer consequences."
The shadow cast from the streetlight flickered and grew under Lisa's feet. Jayla did her best to pretend that was an everyday sight for her and that she definitely wasn't freaking out. Locking eyes with the tall guy holding the hostage helped. She'd stared down assholes before and red glowing eyes was far easier to deal with than moving shadows. It also kept her eyes off that damn scarf.
Pink-hair didn't back off, but she flinched and grimaced.
"Fine, no parking lot brawl, no dead girl. For now." She snapped her fingers. "Alex, let her go."
The goon took his eyes off Jayla long enough to frown at pink-hair, then hissed and shoved the hostage away. On pure impulse, Jayla darted forward as the hostage stumbled away from the vampires and, without thinking, grabbed the scarf.
Dorothy was quick to catch the limp girl before she could face-plant on the asphalt.
"What the fuck!" Pink-hair lunged at Jayla. "Give that back!"
Thankfully, Vivian and Melissa jumped between them, razor-sharp teeth bared. Jayla clutched at the scarf, panting as if she'd run a mile. Why did I do that?! Why didn't I throw the tracking powder instead?! Talk about wasting a surprise attack!
The vampires' eyes lit up red and stayed red. Jayla's own eyes began that odd soft shiver she'd learned meant hers were glowing too.
"Leave!" Lisa said, breaking the brewing stand-still with pure force of personality. That and the fact that everyone on her side of the parking lot looked ready to rip people limb from limb. Even Melissa's posture screamed violence.
"We're going, we're going. Keep the damn scarf." Pink-hair snapped her fingers again and her entourage took a slow step back. "But we're not leaving town. Meet us here tomorrow night with the wand. This is your final warning, all right?"
"Kid, you don't want to mess with us," Vivian said, words garbled by her inhuman teeth. She had a growl going as a base beneath her words, a far more threatening version of a cat's purr. "You lot might be quick, but we can rip you apart like tissue paper. Get lost."
Jayla relaxed her stance a fraction, keeping her grip on the scarf tight. Her attention stayed mostly on Alex, as her friends seemed to have picked their own personal opponent to stare down and it felt good to follow suit. Kinda like instinct. Though she did dare spare a second to look closer at the vampire leader. Under the makeup and cocksure attitude, pink-hair looked to be in her late teens. But hadn't Lisa said something about vampires physically staying the age they got bitten at? How the hell do you tell the age of an immortal? As if telling a person's age wasn't hard enough already.
The vampires took another step back. Melissa and Vivian took a step forward, but didn't attack or throw powder.
"Just so you know," pink-hair said, hands on her hips, "we have allies who also know where your den is."
Vivian snorted. "'Den'? Are you fucking serious?"
"Like a heart-attack." Pink-hair dropped back a third step. "I'm being generous here, letting you know. That one there is holding the proof." She nodded at Jayla. "Take a look at that and see if I'm lying."
"You creeps better stop lurking outside our house!"
Pink-hair gave them the finger, then all the vampires were gone, each leaving a blurred afterimage for a handful of seconds. White powder rained in their wake, thrown by Lisa, Dorothy and Vivian. Jayla remained frozen, braced for attack.
Nothing.
Vivian was the first to break the ensuing silence. "The hell was that?"
"Trouble." Lisa pulled a pair of gloves from a pocket. "I don't like that they knew to take an uninvolved person hostage. They must have researched us before coming here. If they truly have Ava's contact, that means we've got an even bigger complication on our hands than I feared."
She put the gloves on and held a hand out to Jayla, who managed to give her the scarf after only ten seconds of hesitation.
"Hell," Vivian said, word no longer obscured by fangs.
"That's a succinct way of putting it."
Jayla took a deep breath and let the last of the adrenaline shake through her. Her pulse beat a mile a minute and tension hung thick in the air, but she managed to force her attention back to the conversation happening around her. She kept an eye on the shadows at the end of the parking lot, because she wasn't stupid. The whole deal with the scarf would have to wait.
"Should we go after them?"
"Tracking vampires at that speed is close to impossible. Their scents won't linger long enough for us to follow." After pressing the scarf to her face for a deep inhale, Lisa stuffed it into a small plastic bag she produced from another pocket and glared at it.
"Wonderful." She shook her head as if to clear it. "We'll have to hope at least one of us hit with the trace powder and leave the tracking to Ava. For now."
"They have backup." Vivian made it sound like a curse.
"Most definitely." Lisa gestured with the scarf bag. "They wouldn't have dared approach our home if they didn't. God only knows how they've convinced hunters to work with them." She spoke with the voice of a teacher who'd been grading papers all evening only to realize she'd forgotten half of them on her work desk. "I need to get this to Ava. If we're lucky, it'll work to get us through the hunters' barrier even if there's no actual hunter wearing it."
Lisa's words made no sense at first. Then: That's why I recognized it! Way to not put two and two together. The image of the hunter, shaking in the snow, flashed back in ridiculous detail. She'd definitely been wearing a scarf.
Vivian's hand came down on Jayla's back in a friendly thump. "Sweet reflexes! I did not place that scent until Lisa pointed it out. You're scary in-tune with your nose already!"
Jayla managed a shaky smile. "Thanks?"
Vivian's smile looked kinda off since she'd kept up the growling. Having voiced her praise she turned her attention to Lisa.
"You sure we shouldn't give tracking them the old-fashioned way a try?"
"Very." Lisa folded the plastic bag with the scarf into a neat square and hid it away in her jacket, before motioned for them all to gather close. "Melissa and Dorothy, you come with me to pick up Ava. Vivian, Jayla, take the girl back inside and make sure she's all right. Tell her you think someone spiked her drink and that you found her outside about to be dragged into a car. See if she has friends capable of helping her home or pay for a cab. We all meet up back home as soon as we can. Watch each other's backs."
That I can do. Bit of a nightmare to push on the girl, but a far better cover story than 'vampires hypnotized you'.
"How long will she be out?"
"Glamour can last up to twenty minutes after you've separated a vampire for its prey. Longer, if the target is drugged as well or is a vampire who's been hypnotized by their Maker," Vivian said as she accepted the limp girl from Dorothy, text book level precise. "This girl smells like a regular, drunk human. I'd give us fifteen more minutes, tops. Let's get her inside. I'll get her some water, you look for her friends. Okay?"
"Okay." Jayla let her eyes sweep one last time over the parking lot. No vampires. "Should we call Arturo? Let him know what happened?"
"The house wards will keep him and Jesse safe even if the vampires try something. I'll fill him in as soon as we've talked to Ava." Lisa straightened her jacket and looked down at herself in what might have been dismay. "I'm almost tempted to switch to wolf form."
"You look great!" Vivian called over her shoulder as she nudged Jayla to help her steady the girl. "Ava will love it. Stay safe, you lot!"
"Stay safe!"
The parking lot's streetlight flickered out, leaving the waning moon to alone illuminate the dark silhouettes of the cars. It looked like the ideal place to get strangled by a stranger hiding in your backseat.
"You think they'll be okay?" Jayla had to ask before they went inside. "Never a good idea to split the party."
"Lisa and Dorothy can handle pretty much anything a vampire or five can throw at them." Vivian adjusted the hold on the girl's arm and gave Jayla a sympathetic smile. "But I'm one hundred percent with you on not splitting the party for too long. Let's get this poor girl to safety and then hurry home. All right?"
Jayla allowed herself a sigh of at least temporary relief. "All right."
Arturo had made sure to shut the door to his room before Ginger could follow him inside. It had taken him three attempts to get up from the kitchen table and he didn't trust himself around anything living.
It's just temporary. He focused on that, clung to it, desperate to not shake apart. This will go away and you can go to the hospital tomorrow night. Sleep off the worst of it, deal with the rest later.
Hunger had shifted more toward nausea which was both a relief and a further complication. He'd collapsed in bed after pulling the waste paper basket up to it. He'd had nothing to throw up and had thus ended up dry-heaving nothing into it. Good thing he had his bedside alarm clock or he'd have completely lost track of time.
Seeing that the pack had been gone for less than an hour and a half, he hissed out a string of curses. Ninety minutes should not feel like this much of an eternity.
He couldn't hear the shapeshifter anywhere in the house. Had he left?
I should be so lucky. The suicidal idiot had probably gone out for a stroll in the yard. Getting a breath of fresh air, plotting how to get bitten, leaving his safety up to the perimeter wards alone. Infuriating!
What was the shapeshifter angling for? No one had that extreme a fetish for vampire teeth. Lack of energy and an abundance of pain made sorting out the plausible reasons from the ridiculous ones impossible. He needed to rest to be able to think clearly about it all.
He most definitely wouldn't be thinking about how tempting it had been, pinning the shapeshifter to the fridge. Absolutely wouldn't. That way led to Mordor and murder. All memory of how warm and inviting that whole spiel up in the kitchen had been would need to be locked away, preferably until the end of time.
Eventually, Arturo began to drift off to sleep, staring at the glowing numbers of the alarm clock until his eyelids became too heavy.
The numbers told him he'd dozed for about fifteen minutes when a perimeter notification woke him up.
No one should be back this soon.
Bathed in cold sweat Arturo tumbled out of bed, slammed one knee into his bedside table and scrambled over to his main computer. Thankfully reflexes and practice made pulling up the camera feeds easy despite his tattered focus.
The third feed he open showed what he'd dreaded. There were vampires in the backyard. They'd entered the premises too fast to be anything else. Three of them, strolling across the snow-covered lawn as if they owned the place.
Not only were they vampires, they were older vampires. They'd come out of their inhuman bursts of speed with grace and ease. No spring chickens could pull that off. But older or not, they shouldn't have been able to go through Sledge's wards without triggering a world of hurt along with an alarm. Yet there they were, walking, unharmed.
Terror enveloped Arturo like an avalanche. With one hand he numbly maneuvered the cameras in the backyard to track the intruders more closely; with the other he began the lockdown activation sequences. He couldn't afford to panic. He'd have to call Lisa and-
The shapeshifter was in the yard.
The camera feeds recorded sound, because visual surveillance alone had never felt secure enough, but Arturo couldn't make himself activate the audio track.
He didn't trigger the lockdown.
He didn't pick up his phone to call Lisa.
He couldn't move.
The shapeshifter stood leaning on the back porch railing, calm as ever, and nodded a greeting to the approaching vampires. The fucker even smiled at them; the same smile he'd been giving the pack since they'd welcomed him into their home. The smile that told you he knew a secret that he'd share, for a price.
The vampires didn't attack. They sauntered through the snow and stopped on the porch, keeping a conversational distance from the shapeshifter. Their apparent leader, a woman frozen in her mid-twenties, spoke, and the shapeshifter replied. Leader vampire appeared to chuckle as her two tag-alongs brooded behind her, eyes sweeping around the yard, taking in the cameras.
The shapeshifter kept smiling and angled his body toward the leader in open invitation. She stepped closer, her own body language telling Arturo all he needed to know about what they were saying to each other.
You were prepared for this. He had been. He had been. The shapeshifter had been, pun or no pun, 'shifty' since day one. With the number of talismans he wore, he had to know a thing or two about wards and disabling them. He'd been around the house for less than a week and all but thrown himself at a bite! He'd outright said he had experience with vampires. Why should this obvious display of his loyalties come as any kind of hurtful surprise?
Because you're an idiot. An idiot who's all alone in a house full of things no bloodsuckers should get their hands on.
While Arturo's emotional processing ran slow as molasses, his logical side began taking stock of all the dangerous things stored in Lisa's lab. Her research needed to be protected at all costs, and the artifacts even more so. Nothing was worth the risk of them ending up in enemy hands.
He tore his eyes away from the screen as the shapeshifter titled his head back. Not as obvious as earlier in the kitchen, but far from subtle.
Arturo shook his head hard enough to hurt. This wasn't high school. There were three monsters outside his house that regular measures wouldn't help against. He'd better think fast or he'd be dead and the pack would have a horrific mess to deal with. Without him.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the shapeshifter lean closer to the leader and whisper something in her ear. She laughed.
With a strangled curse, Arturo activated the enhanced lockdown.
"Counting the hours, huh?" Rahul threw himself down on his bunk bed, disappearing out of Isha's line of sight. His legs remained in view, kicking back and forth in an attempt at casualness. Isha knew him better than that, but didn't have the energy to call him on it.
"Uh-huh."
Isha stared at the ceiling, not two feet above her. She could almost see patterns in the stained plastic, shapes that formed accusing eyes. Her guts had been out of sorts all day, twisting and freezing as if she were waiting for a hunt request to get rejected. She'd thought those nerves would go away once she'd reached full hunter status. Guess I was wrong about that too.
"Is this about..." Rahul paused, leaving the silent tension to grow. "Are you being all broody about the merging tool?"
"No."
"Right." Another pause. "What really happened during your patrol?"
"Nothing," she answered far too quickly.
The ensuing second lapse in conversation stretched between them like day old taffy, tough and cloying. Isha closed her eyes to block out the illusions of accusing stares, but there was no avoiding her brother's silence.
This could be the last time before the communal hunt they had the trailer to themselves. She'd only get one chance.
"I-" Isha began, dangling above the abyss. Time to see if she'd get company for this terrifying leap. "I saw a werewolf."
A painful thunk announced that Rahul had brained himself on the underside of her bunk.
"You what?!"
"Ssssh!" Isha rolled over and reached down for him, relieved beyond words when he accepted her offered hand and let her pull him up to her bunk.
They huddled close, seated with their backs against the wall, like they'd done as kids when sharing ideas or pilfered candy. On reflex, Isha pulled the covers around them, making them a cocoon ripe for secrets.
"You saw one. Up close?" Rahul asked, a hushed whisper far too loud in the stillness of the trailer.
Isha resisted the urge to glance toward the door. "Close enough to talk to."
"Talk to?!"
"Yes!"
Rahul's shock was expected, yet a weight fell from Isha's shoulders. A small part of her had been wondering if she'd been lied to, kept in the dark; that everyone else knew full well that werewolves could hold conversations.
The whites of Rahul's wide eyes stood in stark contrast to the soothing darkness that enveloped them. He was either frowning or gaping or both.
"You're sure it was a wolf? Maybe you ran into a shifter?"
"A nudist shifter in that case. Also, she said that she's, and I quote, 'new to the whole werewolf thing'." Absurd, yes, but sharing the absurdity made it less nightmarish. It was actually kind of hilarious, in a hysterical way. "She thought I was a witch."
"What the hell?"
"Exactly."
It's strange how other people's panic can clear your own head. Isha had always thought this trait made her a good hunter; alone against danger she panicked, but in the role of older sister or person in the know she stepped up to lead. The same happened when she stood faced with uncomfortable questions. She and Rahul had seen their first corpse together, learned of the unnatural together, seen the dangers of camping together.
They'd figure this out together, too. Rahul would always have her back.
"I don't think it was an illusion," Isha whispered into the dark of their cocoon. Even shoulder to shoulder with Rahul her voice thundered in the otherwise empty trailer, each word risking to deafen her. "Viveka helped me through all counter curses that I thought could be relevant while she fixed my tattoos, in case my judgment had been impaired. Nothing."
"You didn't go to Emma?"
"She was busy." Which was true.
In the dark, Rahul's hand found hers. He laced their fingers together and gave a squeeze.
"You think it's some messed up prank?"
"I hope so." It was the only answer that made sense. "I've antagonized my fair share of people."
Another squeeze.
"Not your fault we're surrounded by jealous prima donnas. But risking a hunt this big to be petty would be mad." He inhaled suddenly, in the way Isha had hoped he wouldn't. "Oh. So that's why you didn't go to Emma."
"She was busy."
"She'd have gone ballistic if she'd seen signs of tampering." Stupid, clever brother. "Taking the high road, huh? Either Viveka's in cahoots with whoever cursed you or you're curse free and werewolves like to chat with people."
"It must have been a trick." Must have. "There were two unnaturals, all wolfed out, right in front of me. I was in their territory. I got away by running." Saying it out loud made it even more ludicrous. "Can you think of a better explanation than 'prank curse'?"
Rahul drew breath to speak. Isha braced for what he'd say, feared it'd be 'I can't see any curse shine', but the door to the trailer opened before he got the chance to share.
"You kids telling ghost stories under there?" Jamerson hollered at them, already chuckling at his own cleverness.
Isha pulled the duvet down before he thought up any more 'hilarious' one-liners. "Just a bit cold. Planning our patrol route."
"Shouldn't you be out there on one already?"
They'd been told no such thing, but Isha wasn't about to argue. If Jamerson and Emma wanted them out of their hair, they'd make themselves scarce.
"On our way!"
"Rahul, you stay." Woxell entered the trailer and the conversation with equal brusque efficiency. "Your sister has gotten her tattoos touched up, the same should be done for you. We can't afford any slip-ups tomorrow. Got it?"
Rahul groaned, but since it was Woxell who'd spoken he kept the groan barely audible. With an apologetic look thrown Isha's way he vaulted down from the bunk and over to Emma, who'd bent to retrieve her needles from under the kitchen sink.
"I'll catch you up, sis."
"See you in a bit," Isha said, knowing she'd likely have to walk the whole perimeter check on her own. Rahul didn't do well with needle binding. Emma had never said why, nor had Rahul, but Isha suspected it had to do with his predisposition.
She didn't need more upsetting things to deal with tonight. Better leave it.
Woxell caught her attention with a glance before she got out the door. Avoiding him was unthinkable, so she stopped in the doorway, waiting.
"You all right, kid?" he said, gruff but clearly both expecting and wanting an answer. "Viveka see to you?"
"Fit as a fiddle," Isha answered, truthfully. "Got my backups restored and she made sure I hadn't dragged anything unpleasant home. I'm good."
A huff of acknowledgment and she unfroze. Without looking back she stepped through the door, out into the night.
