Bone Crossed (14 page)

“Amber Chamberlain,” Charles repeated. “That should limit it to a hundred people or so.”

“She lives in Spokane,” I said. “I went to college with her.”

“That helps,” he told us. “I’ll get back to you.”

“Arm yourself with knowledge,” said Bran when he hung up. “But I don’t see why you shouldn’t go.”

“Take some insurance with you.”

“It’s Stefan,” I shouted. Before I had the last word out of my mouth, Bran had Stefan up against the opposite wall from where he’d been sitting.

“Da.” Samuel was on his feet as well, a hand on his father’s shoulder. He didn’t try to pry Bran’s hands off Stefan’s neck—that would have been stupid. “Da. It’s all right. This is Stefan. Mercy’s friend.”

After a very long couple of seconds, Bran stepped back and dropped his hands from Stefan’s throat. The vampire hadn’t fought back, which was good.

Vampires are tough, maybe tougher than wolves because vampires are already dead. Stefan had been one of Marsilia’s lieutenants, powerful in his own right. He’d been a mercenary in life ... which had been in Renaissance Italy.

But Bran is Bran.

“That was stupid,” said Samuel to Stefan. “What part of ‘never sneak up on a werewolf’ don’t you understand?”

The Stefan I knew would have bowed gracefully, expressed his apologies with a hint of humor. This Stefan gave a stiff jerk of his neck. “I’m no use here. It’s a good idea to get Mercy out of the line of fire—she’s the weakest target. Send me to keep her safe in Spokane.” He sounded almost eager ... and I wondered what he’d been doing since he’d left Adam’s. What was there for him to do? Maybe I wasn’t the only one who was trying to find some action to take that wouldn’t get me and everyone I cared about killed.

Still, I couldn’t let him get away with calling me ... “Weak?” I said.

Samuel turned on Stefan with a growl. “Stupid vampire. My father had her nearly talked into going, and you ruined it.”

I laughed. I couldn’t help it. I hoped going to Spokane would keep my friends safe, and they hoped me going to Spokane would keep me safe. Maybe we were both right.

Bran’s phone rang, and we all listened to Charles tell us that Amber was married to Corban Wharton, a moderately successful corporate lawyer about ten years her senior. They had an eight-year-old son with some sort of disability, hinted at in various newspaper articles but not expressly stated. He rattled off an address or two, cell phone numbers and real phone numbers ... and social security numbers and most recent tax reports, personal and business. For an old wolf, Charles knows how to make computers sit up and beg.

“Thank you,” said Bran.

“I can go back to sleep now?” asked Charles. He didn’t wait for an answer, just hung up his end of the connection.

I looked at Samuel. “It will make your life easier if I leave.”

He nodded. “We can protect ourselves ... but you are too vulnerable. And if you aren’t here, if Marsilia doesn’t know where you are, we can get her to the table for negotiations.”

Bran looked at Stefan. “A vampire might draw too much attention in Spokane.”

Stefan shrugged. “I’m not without resources. I was in this room for a quarter of an hour, and none of you noticed me. If I feed well, no one will know what I am.”

“You always smell like vampire to me,” I told him. Vampire and popcorn. The good buttery kind. No, I don’t know why. I’ve never seen him eat the stuff—I don’t know that vampires can.

He raised his hands. “No one without Mercy’s nose, then. If I’m in the room with the Monster, then perhaps he’ll notice. Otherwise, he’ll never know I was there. I’ve done it before.”

“The Monster?” Samuel asked.

“James Blackwood.”

Vampires give titles to some of the more powerful ones. Stefan was the Soldier because he’d been a mercenary. Wulfe was the Wizard ... and I knew he could do some magic. I resolved to stay away from any vampire that other vampires called the Monster.

“There is this, too,” Stefan said. “I can jump from one location to another—and I can take Mercy with me.”

“How far?” asked Bran with sudden intentness.

Stefan shrugged ... and never quite straightened up, as if it was too much trouble. “Anywhere. But taking another person with me has a cost. I’ll be useless for a day afterward.” He looked at me. “I have the address.” He’d have overheard Charles give it to the rest of us. “I can get there tonight and find a safe place nearby to spend the day.”

Bran raised an eyebrow at me.

“I’ll call Amber in the morning,” I said. It felt like running away, but Bran seemed to think it was the right thing to do.

Stefan swept me a perfect bow and disappeared before he stood up.

“He used to hide his ability to do that,” I told them. It worried me that he wasn’t hiding it anymore. As if it didn’t matter what people knew about him.

Samuel smiled at me. “You decided to go to Spokane because he needs to do something, didn’t you? You were all set to stay until he started looking pathetic.” I gave him a look, and he raised his hands in surrender. “I didn’t say he didn’t have a reason to look pathetic. You just need to remember that sad sack or not, he’s still a vampire—and more than a match for you if he decides not to be friendly. You’ve cost him a lot, Mercy. He might not be your friend.”

I hadn’t thought about it that way. So I did, for maybe a tenth of a second. “If he was mad at me, he’d have killed me when he dropped in here starving. For that matter he could have come here anytime tonight and killed me. You need me gone—so quit trying to make trouble.”

Samuel frowned at me. “I’m not trying to make trouble. But you have to remember he is a vampire, and vampires are not nice guys, no matter how chivalrous and gallant Stefan appears. I like him, too. But you are trying to forget what he is.”

I thought about the two dead people whose only crime was that they had seen me when I staked Andre. “I know what he is,” I said stubbornly.

“Vampire,” said Bran. “Evil, yes.” He grinned, and it made him look like he should be going to high school. “But I think his Mistress made a mistake when she chose to throw him away.”

“She broke him,” I said. And looking into Samuel’s eyes, I whispered, “You stay safe, you and Adam. I’ll keep Stefan busy looking for ghosts.”

If I was really looking for ghosts, of course, it would be stupid to bring Stefan. Ghosts don’t like vampires, and they won’t come out when there are vampires around. Samuel knew that, and he grinned at me with serious eyes. “We’ll be fine.”

“Call me if you need me,” said Bran—to both of us, I thought. “If I’m going to stop in to have a look at Mary Jo, I need to go now.” He kissed me on my forehead, then did the same to Samuel (who had to bend down). I didn’t know if he really knew who Mary Jo was, or just seemed to. But I’d never seen him meet a wolf he didn’t know by name.

Speaking of which ... “Hey, Bran?”

Halfway to the door, he turned back.

“What about that girl we sent to you? The one who was Changed so young and hadn’t learned control. Is she all right?”

He smiled and looked a lot less tired. “Kara? She did fine last moon. Give her a few more months, and she’ll be fully in control.” Waving casually over his shoulder, he walked out into the dark.

“Get some rest,” I called after him. He shut the front door behind him without answering.

We listened while Bran drove off—in a doubtlessly rented Mustang. Once he was gone, Samuel said, “You have a few hours. Why don’t you get some more sleep? I think I’ll hop the fence to Adam’s and see what Da does for Mary Jo.”

“Why didn’t he just call?” I asked.

Samuel reached out and ruffled my hair. “He was checking up on you.”

“Well,” I said. “At least he didn’t ask me if I was okay. I think I’d have had to do something to him if he had.”

“Hey, Mercy,” said Samuel with false solicitude, “are you okay?”

I punched him, connecting only because he hadn’t expected it. “I am now,” I told him, as he dropped to the ground and rolled—as if I’d really had some force behind my fist, which I hadn’t.

 

 

 

SPOKANE IS ABOUT 150 MILES NORTHEAST OF THE TRICITIES , and you know you’re getting close when you start seeing trees.

My cell phone rang, and I answered without pulling over. I usually obey the law, but I was late.

“Mercy?” It was Adam, and he wasn’t happy with me. I guessed Samuel had told him about the vampires being responsible for the debacle at Uncle Mike’s. I’d told him he could do it once I was safely out of town.

“Uh-huh.” I pulled around an RV as we chugged up a small hill. It’d pass me on the downhill side, but I had to take my passing pleasures where I could—Vanagons are not speed demons. One of these days I was going to put a Subaru flat six in it and see what that would do. “Before you yell at me for not telling you about the vampires, you should know that I am risking a ticket by talking to you while I drive. Do you really want me to get a ticket for letting you yell at me?”

He gave a reluctant laugh, so I supposed he wasn’t too upset. “You’re still on the road? I thought you left this morning.”

“Fixed a shift linkage in a Ford Focus at that rest stop near Connell,” I told him. “Nice lady and her dog were stuck after having a clutch job done by her brother-in-law. He hadn’t tightened down a few bolts, and one of them fell off. Took me an hour or so before we found someone who had a bolt and nut the right size.” And I had the oil stains across my shoulders and the grit in my hair to prove it. In my Rabbit I kept a towel to put on the ground. I also kept a selection of useful car bits. It was going to be a while before my Rabbit was up and running.

“How is Mary Jo?”

“She’s sleeping for real now.”

“Bran helped?”

“Bran helped.” I could hear the smile in his voice. “You be careful ghost hunting—and don’t let Stefan bite you.”

There was just a little edge to the last.

“Jealous?” I asked. Yep. The RV passed me on the downhill.

“Maybe a little,” he said.

“Don’t be. We’ll be fine. Ghosts aren’t as dangerous as crazy vampire ladies.” I couldn’t help the anxiety that crept into my voice.

“I’ll be careful—and Mercy?”

“Uhm?”

“Consider yourself yelled at,” he purred, then hung up.

I grinned at the phone and closed it.

 

 

 

AMBER’S DIRECTIONS TO HER HOUSE HAD BEEN CLEAR and easy to follow. The relief in her voice when I’d called that morning made me want to believe she really had a ghost problem and wasn’t part of some secret vampire conspiracy to get me somewhere I’d be easier to kill. Despite Bran’s assurances that it was unlikely Marsilia would ship me off to Spokane, I was still feeling ... not paranoid, really. Cautious. I was feeling cautious.

Zee had agreed to work the shop while I was gone. I probably could have gotten him to work cheaper than usual because he was still feeling guilty about stuff that wasn’t his fault. Cheaper would mean I could eat peanut butter instead of ramen noodles for the rest of the month, but I didn’t think any of it was his fault.

He had talked to Uncle Mike about the crossed bones on my door. Definitely vampire work, he told me. The bones meant that I had broken faith with the vampires and was no longer under their protection—and anyone offering me aid of any kind was likely to find themselves on the wrong side of the vampires as well. The broad interpretation of that was horrifying. It meant that people like Tony and Sensei Johanson were at risk, too.

It meant that it was probably a good thing that I get out of town for a few days and figure out how to limit the number of victims Marsilia could claim.

Amber lived in a Victorian mansion complete with a pair of towers. The brick porch had been freshly tuck-pointed, the gingerbread work around the roof edge and the windows bore a new coat of paint. Even the roses looked ready for magazine display.

Frowning at the leaded glass glistening in the sun, I wondered when I’d last cleaned the windows in my house. Had I ever cleaned the windows? Samuel might have.

I was still thinking about it when the door opened. A startled boy gawked at me, and I realized I hadn’t rung the doorbell.

“Hey,” I said. “Is your mom home?”

He recovered quickly and gave me a shy look out of a pair of misty green eyes under long, thick eyelashes, and turned to ring the bell I hadn’t.

“I’m Mercy,” I told him, while we waited for Amber to emerge from the depths of the house. “Your mom and I went to school together.”

His wary look deepened, and he didn’t say anything. So I guessed she hadn’t told him anything.

“Mercy, I was beginning to think you weren’t coming.” Amber sounded harassed and not at all grateful, and that was before she saw what I looked like—covered in old oil and parking-lot dirt.

Her son and I turned to look at her.

She still looked like a show dog, but her eyes were stressed. “Chad, this is my friend who is going to help us with the ghost.” As she spoke, her hands flew in a graceful dance, and I remembered Charles had said her son had some sort of disability: he was deaf.

She turned her attention to me, but her hands still moved, letting her son know what she was saying. “This is my son, Chad.” She took a deep breath. “Mercy, I’m sorry. My husband has a client coming over for dinner tonight. He didn’t tell me until just a few minutes ago. It’s a formal dinner ...”

She looked at me, and her voice trailed off.

“What?” I said letting sharpness creep into my voice at the insult. “Don’t I look like I’m up to a formal dinner? Sorry, the stitches in my chin don’t come out for at least a week.”

Suddenly she laughed. “You haven’t changed a bit. If you didn’t bring anything suitable, you can borrow something of mine. The guy who’s coming is actually pretty well house-trained for a cutthroat businessman. I think you’ll like him. I’ve got to do some inventorying and run to the grocery store.” She tilted her head so her son could see her mouth. “Chad, would you take Mercy to the guest room?”