Dead and Everything (Eve Benson: Vampire Book 2) (5 page)

“I saw.
I was up all night, actually, but… Yeah. I’m coming. Half an hour?”

“Hurry.
Thanks.”

She went
back to work, happy that she’d thought of it. The guy was a geek, and a bit of
a whiner, but apparently not the weakest Mage ever. More importantly he didn’t have
a job, being a lotto winner he didn’t need one, which meant he had a
lot
of
free time to use helping out. Technically speaking you weren’t supposed to rig
the lottery using magic, not by the official rules, but it seemed like her
little fatbeard had managed to do it within the rules somehow. So he was pretty
much loaded.

That
meant he had a good vehicle, and showed up not too much later than she’d told
him to, clean and ready for work.

She
walked to the door of Lenore’s office.

“Hey,
I’m going to Candles and More for a bit. Call it fifteen minutes? Is that all
right with you?”

The
strawberry blonde looked up at her and nodded.

“That
will be fine. Are you courting the Mages to be on our side in this then? It’s…
Not the worst plan.”

She let her
head move side to side.

“Well,
we may need them to find whoever is really behind this. I’m betting a Greater
Demon or Mage. Right now at least. Not a
real
wager though, since I have
no money. Everything is going into the new blood project. Oh, I called about
the counter?”

“I
heard. Good work. Run up a bill and give it to Linda when she returns the map?”

It made
sense, so Eve did it first thing, using enough speed that she had to be careful
not to break the pen or rip the paper she was writing on. Then she dashed over
to Candles and More, just in time to walk in with Mark. He’d showered for them,
and everything.

Then she
started calling out, since it was important that Lisa know who was there.
Taking her by surprise now had to be a poor plan. She’d been tricked once, but
even hinting at it now would probably cause something to blow up.

One way
or the other.

Given
everything, the woman didn’t really look awful. She’d clearly been a little
light on sleep, which showed up as dark circles and bags under her eyes, but
that was all. Even at that, she could hide it all with make-up if she wanted.
She was clean though, and that counted for a lot. She hadn’t decided that the
best defense was making herself too disgusting for anyone to ever want to touch
again, for instance.

Her face
was confused, when she saw who was standing there, though she managed to smile
a bit for both of them. Eve cut through the bullshit with a wave.

“Mark
volunteered to come in and take over for Warren. The whole thing right now over
on our side, well, you get that, right? If it affects us, it might do the same
to you over here. So he felt you might want the help.”

That
meant that she and Marcus had to get Lisa caught up on everything, since
whatever she’d been up late doing it hadn’t been monitoring television for the
latest news. She ran to her office in the back of the strongly scented store,
and put on the local AM news channel, which did talk radio during the day.

Eve was
ready for the news to either not exist or be horrible, but the man on the air
sounded to be roughly… Bland about the whole thing. He was conservative, but
was showing support for the Vampires, since it was out that most of them were
actually conservatives too.

That,
was a thing that she hadn’t counted on at all. If most of the people on the Right
saw it that way, they might not have as many problems as she feared. Better, it
was even true, more or less. As far as voting went, Vampires either didn’t do
it, or were pretty Republican.

After
five minutes Lisa went wide eyed, catching on better than most had.

“The
stuff with Warren?”

Eve
shook her head.

“Maybe
connected? Probably not, but it would be best if the Council didn’t have to put
out a press release letting everyone know that this was all down to some Mage
or another controlling Vampire minds. And, oh, by the way regular Humans of the
world, the Mages can do that to you too…” She wasn’t making it into a threat,
not yet. Lisa wasn’t the one doing that kind of thing, after all. Neither was
Mark or Bob. Which was why they were the right people for the job at hand.

“I have
to get back to work, but anyway, Marcus here is stepping up. Mark, you still
need to make your work-outs down at the power lifting gym, and Lisa, remind Bob
to get someone in to work with the new guy here on healing magic? Wards and all
that too, unless you have that stuff down already?” She looked at the man,
never having bothered to ask that kind of thing before.

He
looked away and then nodded.

“Sure. I
don’t do that much magically speaking. I can, but… Really it doesn’t come up
all that much.”

She
threw that noise out with the back of her hand, waving it at him cutely.

“Good.
Stop being lazy, then. You should be handling eighty, ninety percent of what
comes in for now. Bob and Lisa need to be getting with their higher ups in case
this is a real problem and not just me being wrong. I… have to run.”

There
was an actual person standing at the counter, a man that seemed Human to her,
even from a distance.

He was
dressed nicely enough, and had a pad in his hand, along with a black ink pen.
It was a little strange, but he seemed normal enough. The energy inside of him
was all pink and inviting.

“Hi!
Sorry, I was visiting over at the candle shop. What can I get for you?”

The man
looked at her and then didn’t smile. Given that she was a pretty girl, and used
to that kind of thing, having a man not respond to her was a bit telling. What
it said she didn’t know, but…

“I’m
Brent Wise, from the Oregonian? I was wondering if you might answer some
questions about the allegations that this place is a front for Vampire
activity?” He seemed a bit embarrassed to be asking at least, which was a good
thing in her book.

He
should be.

Eve was
about to lie, but then tilted her head at the man.

“I don’t
suppose you’d be willing to explain that? Who’s saying it and all?”

“Wait,
you aren’t just going to deny it?” He was suddenly a lot more interested in
her, it seemed, and leaned forward. Smelling
delicious
. She moved back a
little, since biting a reporter was probably always going to be a poor idea.

“Nope.
If you share with me, I’ll do the same with you. Understand, if you lie about
us, you won’t live to see the morning. So make sure you get it all exactly
right. Some of the people that you’re going to be dealing with won’t put up
with sloppy work. Tell me, who told you what, exactly?”

He
checked his notes, which he seemed to have four pages of.

“It just
says,
Jonas
. I don’t have more of a name than that. Does that mean
anything to you? He said that this place, the entire chain of stores, was
actually owned and run by Vampires and used as a sort of meeting place? That
you sell blood from here? Human blood?”

Lenore
walked out of the back, her face collected and calm, and she was clearly ready
to stuff the man into the trunk of her car. Probably dead. That wouldn’t work
though, since things were all over the news, and if Jonas was off calling
reporters one by one, then things weren’t just going to go away on their own.

Looking
at her boss, she shrugged.

“Jonas
is Rich Swerlin’s assistant. A New Vamp. That means he’ll be up all day. So,
uh, Brent… What do you want to know? We probably shouldn’t say anything, but
then you’ll just write that we had no comment and make us look guilty and like
we’re hiding things, won’t you? I suppose it’s too late to try and convince you
that this is all about role playing games taken way too far? That really
is
part of it.” It wasn’t, but hey, lying to the press was fair game, wasn’t it?
They weren’t the police. Not that she wouldn’t lie to them, too.

Lenore
shook her head a bit, and then held up a single finger.

“Let’s
call this in and see what the Council wants done?” That would probably involve
death for the reporter, even if that wasn’t going to make any difference in the
long run. Too many people already knew the story and Eve was willing to bet that
it was huge online.

It made
her want to go and check herself, but she didn’t bother mentioning it, since
Lenore fled the room rather directly.

They
could
just compel the man, and make him not only leave, but forget about the whole
thing, but they couldn’t do everyone in the whole world, could they? There were
whispers from the next room, but five rather awkward minutes later, the boss
lady came out again, and spread her hands.

“It
seems, and I don’t know that I agree with this, that we’re supposed to simply
answer any questions that anyone has of us? About public information. If you
want to know whom I’m dating, then you’ll have to soften me up first, like
anyone else.”

The man
seemed relieved, or possibly less tense, then. Like they were really going to
do more than send him away. It would make for a better story if he had
information.

Eve
stood back, knowing that Lenore would do a better job with things, since they
might well still be hiding a lot of information from the public. Things that
she wouldn’t have been briefed on yet.

“Great,
can I get your names?”

“Lenore
Hawthorn, and Eve Benson.” She waited, poised and ready to simply pounce on the
man, it seemed like, though the man didn’t really get that yet.

He
scratched the names out slowly, asking for spellings. She
had
told him
to make sure he got everything right, on pain of death, hadn’t she? It was a
real enough thing, too, so she didn’t take it back. If he screwed up, he was
probably toast. Maybe even if he got it all correct, depending on how things
all fell out. She was a bit put off by the fact that anyone higher than her was
willing to even say anything.

“So, are
you both Vampires? Or, Human, um, slaves to Vampires?”

 Lenore
shook her head, firmly.

“Slavery
isn’t allowed in the United States, Mr. Wise. That goes for Vampires, too. To
answer your question, yes. Both my colleague and I are Vampires.”

He
pulled a small camera from his right hand pocket, and then looked sheepish.

“I don’t
suppose I could get a picture? Can you do the eye and fang thing? That was
pretty impressive, on television last night. We can’t really compete that way,
but
whoa
!” He actually jumped back, as Lenore flashed her fangs at him.

She
didn’t go red eyed, but Eve did, since it was part of what the man would want
for his pictures. He recovered enough to snap several, and then check them to
make sure they were coming out all right.

“This is
good. Very good. So, you… Drink blood? Crosses and garlic aren’t making a
showing at Thanksgiving dinner? Do you eat food?”

There
were more questions than that, and Lenore actually covered all of it pretty
openly.

“Crosses
do nothing, of course. Garlic has a strong odor, but won’t drive us away, and
we can enter places as easily as the next person. As a rule we don’t uninvited,
because it would simply be rude to do otherwise. We do consume blood, but only
to form links to others, so that we may draw energy from them. They need to be
alive for that, and we never take enough to harm them, since that would be
counter to survival. We don’t eat, for the most part. Some of us can manage to
nibble a bite every now and then, but it isn’t a habit of mine. Eve?”

She
shook her head, then lied, knowing that doing so would be important, soon
enough. Darla and the others had been right, and she knew it. The real trouble
was going to come from the religious people that would instantly think they
were all demons.

“We do
holidays, though. We like parties, and a lot of us are
really
religious
and conservative. God is a big part of our community. I’m Catholic, myself,
but… Lenore, you’re Baptist, right?”

There
was no hesitation at all, but she shook her head.

“Lutheran.
Most of us follow the religions we were born into, but there’s no rule saying
that we have to. There are even a few atheists in our clans. Not many, of
course. Being what we are informs most of us that there is more outside of
ourselves than what Humans regularly get to know about.”

“Really?
That’s new. I don’t think anyone has thought to ask about that yet. So if I
call up Richard Swerlin, he’d tell me that you’re all into God?”

Eve
nodded a bit.

“Yeah.
He would. If you can get a hold of him? I mean, don’t get me wrong here,
I’m
going to try and kick his behind as soon as I see him, but it’s the truth. It’s
like regular people though. I mean, I’m a Catholic, but I haven’t been to
confession in a while, you know? Life gets in the way, just like with everyone
else. Plus, not all of us like to be up during the day.”

She stopped
there, but Lenore took over, her face pleasant, if forced to be that way.

“It’s
rather torturous and painful to some of us. The new breed of Vampire can walk
in the light without effort, but the rest of us must fight horrible pain to do
so. Even right now both Eve and I are in agony. We’ve simply learned not to let
it show. It doesn’t take direct exposure either, even being inside offers
little relief, until the sun sets for the day.”

Then the
man asked about boring things, like what powers they had and all that. He
didn’t ask for tests or anything, and after forty minutes, where Eve kept
mentioning how important god was, and how they very definitely weren’t demons
or anything like that, and loved them some church and holy water, the man left.

When he
was out of earshot she turned to Lenore, feeling half panicked.

“I laid
it on too thick, didn’t I? The whole religion thing…”

“A
trifle
,
perhaps. I did take your plan however, and agree with it. Setting the mood and
groundwork early will be important. We should recommend it to others. I don’t
suppose you could use your contacts to get in touch with Mr. Swerlin? If he
still lives, I mean. Before you kill him yourself?” There was no hint that she
wasn’t serious about that last bit, though it was a bit insane.

“
I
just said that I was going to try and kick his ass. Which, by the way, is
pretty tempting. I don’t know if I
can
do it, but someone has to. He outed
all
of us, not just himself. It was implied before, when he said he and
his wives were Vamps, that there were more of us, but a lot of people didn’t
believe him. No one did, really. I mean, I
knew
first hand that Vampires
were real and I kind of thought he was fake at first, you know? This though, it’s
forcing all of us to respond now. To play this game that no one was ready for.
We didn’t get three years to set things up, and get our families ready for the
news, did we? I mean, mine knows, but how rare is that? So, unless he really
was controlled by someone else, yeah, I’m going to be kicking his behind.” The
part where it probably wouldn’t work didn’t get said. She was pissed, but it
was mainly for other people. For Lars and his gang at the role playing thing.
For other Vampires that didn’t have what she did, and who would end up being
really hurt if everyone knew who, and what, they were. A lot of people working
for Human businesses would probably be losing their jobs, for instance.