By the time I stumbled out onto the main road, I was exhausted. I had given too much of myself to the land and to the dying sapling. I crossed the ditch and sat down hard, the frozen earth penetrating through my pants instantly. I shoved the blanket under me and huddled into my coat, hands in my pockets, where I discovered a pair of gloves I hadn’t known I carried. That was stupid. My fingers were so cold they ached bone-deep. I pulled the coat high on my neck and huddled down, searching for body warmth that seemed dangerously lacking.
Down the road, I saw bright lights coming my way. A car, slowing.
I was alone. On a county road before dawn. I should be afraid. I should open my coat and have my hand on my service weapon. But I was mad. And if anyone tried to hurt me right now, pulled over in a car and tried to abduct me, I’d drain them into the earth and feed the land. And feed myself. And that thought was scary. When had I thought about replenishing my own energies with the life force of another? A dark pit opened up in me, full of dread dreams and fear.
The car stopped and the door opened. “Nell?”
It was Occam. I blinked against the glare and squinted at him. And remembered him asking me to dinner only a few weeks or so ago. The dread and fear spread. We had never addressed that invitation. We had gone on as if he had never spoken, never asked. But I remembered. And I was apprehensive and fretful at what dinner with the wereleopard might mean.
“You okay, Nell, sugar?”
“Not really.” He started toward me, and I barked, “Don’t touch me!”
Occam stopped, backed slowly to the car and behind the door. “Come on. Get in the car. I’ll take you back to the house. Rick should never have sent you out alone.”
“Why? ’Acause I’m a woman?” I asked in my strongest church dialect, indignant.
“No. Because this is a dangerous situation and we should be working in pairs.”
I thought about that. If I’d had someone with me, would I have spent less of myself trying to save the sapling? Probably. I’d have been smarter because I’d have been thinking more about humans and not so much about trees. Occam stood by his car, letting me think. In a more townie accent I asked, “Where’ve you been all night?”
“In the office off the master suite, questioning the partygoers,” he said, his Texas accent stronger than usual, deliberately calming, soothing. “Bunch a self-entitled snobs. Useless in a firefight. Two of ’em wet their britches.”
A chuckle burst out of me. Dark cop humor, bloody and coarse, but it helped newbies to adjust, to view death and horror impersonally. My laughter faded away. Yes. I had needed a partner. The wearies pulling at my muscles like claws, I stood and dragged my blanket with me, trudging to the passenger door. I got in to find the heater blasting on full. I pulled my gloves back off and held my hands to the vents as Occam’s fancy car took us back to the house.
I watched him as he parked in the drive, his blond hair swinging, his amber eyes looking fully human. He glanced at me and away. As if sensing my mood, Occam said nothing, just got out of his fancy car, taking my blanket and putting it in my truck before he followed me inside the house and went back to whatever he had been doing before he came to check on me.
•••
Standing in the cramped space of the security system, I made my report to Rick and Soul.
“Can you prove he—it—wasn’t human?” Soul asked.
“Empirical evidence in a few days,” I said, speaking in my work accent. “Maybe. But not scientifically.”
Soul heaved a sigh she might really need. I wasn’t sure if her species needed air the same way humans did. Maybe they breathed through their pores or had holes in their rib cages or something. “I’d like you to speak with Ming ofGlass and her bodyguard. See what you can get out of them. When you are done, they may leave, with our thanks.”
I stood, flatfooted, meeting Soul’s gorgeous and slightly amused eyes. At her side, Rick looked as surprised as I felt.
“Ummm. Don’t you think there might be someone better than me to talk to a vampire?”
“No,” Soul said. “You are precisely the right person to address the issue of paranormal beings who’ve committed first-degree murder and/or hate crimes with the highest-ranked vampire in Knoxville. And it will be an opportunity to rebuild bridges that you set fire to when you referred to all Mithrans as smelling ‘maggoty,’ I believe?”
I blushed hotly, and the last of the chill flushed out of my body. “Ohhh. You think she knows—”
“I am quite certain that she knows. Your reaction to Mithrans has made all the rounds. Go make nice with the head of Clan Glass. Rebuild some bridges. She’s waiting on you upstairs in the office we are using as an interrogation room. Go on,” she added when I stood there. “Take Tandy with you.”
I left the room, which had suddenly grown too close and lost all oxygen. Tandy was outside the door, his reddish brown eyebrows lifted. Like Occam, I hadn’t seen him all night.
“You heard?” I asked. “That you’re supposed to go with me to question the vampires?”
“No. But I felt. What happened?”
Tandy was the unit’s empath, which meant he could tell what other people were feeling—humans and paranormals both. The gift had been forced on him by Mother Nature when he was hit by lightning three times, and the reddish Lichtenberg lines that crossed his pale skin like the veins in leaves were a lasting legacy. I told him what had happened and about my punishment as we climbed the stairs to the second floor. He didn’t laugh, which was nice. He handed me a folder containing several printed papers, including the questions that had been asked of all the party guests and two floor plans of the crime scene room, one withXs for where everyone had been standing. A dozen more. There was notime to memorize any of them. I shoved them back into the manila folder.
My thoughts were rattled and I pulled what I could remember about proper protocol with a powerful vampire to the forefront of my memories. I needed excellent manners, a calm attitude, and the ability to play conversational chess, thinking ahead a dozen moves or so. And if Ming had ordered the shooting? There was nothing I could do.
Vamps were policed by their up-line boss, which in Knoxville meant Ming of Glass. And Ming could be judged and punished only by the Master of the City of New Orleans, Leo Pellissier, her up-line master. Or any vampire who managed to challenge her to a blood duel. Or any non-law-enforcement human who got close enough to stake her and managed to survive. The position of vampires as regarded by law enforcement was hazy.
