“Chief Reed,” Sven said with a nod. His arms were crossed, hands tucked under his armpits. He’d only been in town for a few years, arriving as the newest “cousin” of the Rossi clan, which was a wide and varied melting pot.
Old Rossi, the patriarch of the vampire clan, never turned away a new family member looking for a better life.
Not all of the Rossis stayed in town, of course. There were rules, strict rules, and those who broke them were never seen again.
Old Rossi made sure of that.
Sven was built like he might have been a fisherman, or maybe someone who worked a farm a hundred years ago. Here, he worked the night shift at Mom’s Bar and Grill, which was more bar than it was grill.
He must have just gotten off work.
“Sven,” I said. “You here when it happened?”
He squinted and tipped his head the way his sort did when they were scenting for blood, fear, and sometimes other things they hungered for.
“Nope. I got here right after the blast. Perkin’s furious.” His smile pulled up on one side, revealing a flash of his sharp canines. “Thinks someone wants him dead.” His eyes widened. “Imagine that.”
“Yeah, well, you let me know if you hear anything.”
Dan Perkin’s voice cut through the night air. “Throw him in jail! Throw that dirty, lying, cowardly, thieving scrap of garbage in jail!”
“Sounds like he’s singing your song, chief,” Sven said.
“I mean it. You hear anything…”
He nodded. “We’ll bring it to you. Rossi word.”
“Good.”
Fire, but not ambulance—must have called them off—took the corner, lights flashing, sirens off.
I strode past Sven, across the yard, alongside the house to the backyard.
Looked like someone had used dynamite to start a bonfire. The fire wasn’t spreading—early May was still too wet for anything to do much more than smolder—but the hole had blown the heck out of the burn pile and a couple nearby tire planters.
Dan Perkin stood in front of the fire, cussing. From the dirt on him, he’d either been standing right in front of it when it’d blown, or had fallen on his way to see what the commotion was about.
“Hello, chief,” Pearl said from his porch at my right. “Everyone’s all right here.”
Pearl was in her early seventies—mortal—and a retired nurse out of Portland. She wore her hair back in a long braid and always carried her emergency kit backpack wherever she went.
Dan Perkin was lucky to have her as a neighbor.
“Thanks for coming over, Pearl.”
“Couldn’t sleep through this excitement, could I?” she said with a smile.
“Hey-up, chief,” a male voice called out behind me.
I glanced over my shoulder. Ben Rossi, the angel-faced, pale-haired, slender but incredibly strong chief of the volunteer fire department grinned as he hauled a hose out across the lawn. A lot of the Rossis held jobs in the first-responder and emergency departments.
It might seem weird to have a fire department full of vampires, but they were cheerfully immune to human suffering, and their strength and un-aliveness made them solid allies in times of disaster.
Building burning down? Send in the guys who don’t need to breathe and can’t die by fire. Stuck in a ditch? A vampire was one of the fastest, surest climbers around. Kitten stuck in a tree? You’ve never seen a scary fanger go gooey and sweet so fast. Turns out vampires loved cats.
I wasn’t sure if that was a Rossi thing or a fanger thing, but it was adorable.
Jame Wolfe, Ben’s partner both at work and home, strode along behind him, the hose over his shoulder. Built like a wrestler, he had the Wolfe family dark good looks and swagger that pretty much made sure he never went to bed alone.
