Bryan shrugged. “Exactly what I thought. Huge red flag. He also hired a temp to help handle Quill’s estate, and while I was going to investigate further, the temp will need to be paid soon.”
“What’s the problem with that?” Beth asked. “Why can’t the temp be paid?”
“It gets murkier,” Bryan said. “Quill basically burned through the coven’s money trying to impress the young recruits. They’re almost broke.”
“And nobody knew?” Daniel asked. “Don’t they have accountants or assistants for this stuff?”
“Everybody that Vance is investigating knew it,” he said. “And I think they took me to keep me from talking about it.”
I scoffed. “Jeffrey said it was for a joke.”
Bryan’s laugh was dark and humorless. “It was no joke. I was the only one likely to report the lack of money because I was the only one who didn’t depend on it. I've never taken their money.”
“Well, who is the temp?” I asked. “Who did Dreven hire?”
“It’s Faith, the same girl Quill was courting as a new recruit to replace Trista. So, that doesn’t clear any of them.”
“I’ll call Vance. He needs to know all this,” Daniel said. “But I have a different plan in the meantime.”
A short conversation later we had filled Vance in, and he'd agreed to meet us at Clan Scarlet's mansion, which, surprisingly, wasn't that far from the warehouse on the edge of town.
“Can you find it?” I asked Daniel. “Have you been there?”
He nodded his head. “Yeah, I went there years ago for another case.” He proved his ability by driving us down the road that had previously been hidden from me all my life.
Beth, Deva, and Carol looked around, awestruck, as we pulled up to the massive mansion.
The whole place was a beehive of activity. Dreven, Lysa, and Jeffrey ran around like crazy, in and out of the mansion with boxes and bags, stuffing them into vehicles. While other vampires just stood around looking confused.
I wasn't sure I'd ever seen anyone look more guilty than those three.
Bryan pointed to a young woman with fiery red hair and a body that twenty year old me would have killed for. I love my body now. Were there things I wasn't super happy with? Sure, but it supported me, it gave me Travis, and I had to be grateful for that.
“That’s Faith, the temp I told you about.” She was moving as fast as the rest of them, filling up vehicles.
We got out of the car and when they stopped long enough to realize who we were, the vampires began to snarl. Apparently, the coven members who were loyal to them weren't afraid to join in as well. Most of their cronies waited near the door, eyeing us fearfully, but Dreven lunged forward.
Once he moved, Lysa and Jeffrey did as well. So much for the friendliness I’d received from those jerks. They were all too willing to attack now.
The other coven members held back though as though they were willing to threaten us but unsure about actually fighting us. They probably didn't realize who we were in all honesty.
As the three of them ran across the yard, Trista came hurtling out from the mansion as well. I had no idea whether she was guilty as well or not, but if she tried to attack us, I wouldn't have any qualms fighting back, no matter how sweet she seemed.
"What on Earth is going on?" she screeched.
None of them paid attention to her and just kept barreling toward us. I was grateful that they weren't using their full vamp speed because otherwise we wouldn't have stood a chance. Why they weren't was a whole other question. One I didn't have time to think about at that moment.
Daniel stiffened and I could tell he was seconds away from shifting. “Hang on,” I muttered, instinct driving me. Sometimes it felt like Karma was a different entity than me, like I was just a conduit for it, which was exactly how it felt as they came toward us. Stepping forward, I let my powers come to life as they flowed out from me toward the vampires.
To my shock, each of our would-be attackers stopped short, screaming. Their chests glowed with magic. Mymagic! “What in the world?” I whispered.
I’d sort of probed each of them over the last several days. At the time, I’d thought I was just feeling around to see if I could discern anything in them. The little tendrils of power I'd felt were bright in my mind's eye and I knew even though I'd just asked them to keep an eye on the suspected culprits they had been doing something else as well.
It seemed like karma had been doing more than just paying attention to their current actions but had been evaluating them over all. My power had stuck around inside of them and had decided what kind of people, or rather, vampires, they were.
The answer wasn't good.
“It burns,” Lysa screamed as she and Dreven and Jeffrey clutched their chests. “Help us!”
