Dead and Everything (Eve Benson: Vampire Book 2) (7 page)

“Out
with the devil.” The signs the fifteen or so people were far more helpful,
letting everyone know that God, personally, disliked people with fangs, and
wanted them all to burn in hell for all eternity. Because, Eve knew, that was a
thing that had
ever
come up in whatever religion these people had going
on? Most of them probably still didn’t think that Vampires were real, so it was
just an excuse to get some exercise. It
was
good to know, of course,
since Eve would have never known where to go otherwise.

The
fiery pit was apparently the right destination for people like her.

She
grinned, and tried not to take their stupidity personally. Not even the silly
pictures on the signs that were supposed to be fangs. That was all she was
after all, right? A nice set of nice chompers? They could have at least
bothered to draw a set of tits under half the pics, couldn’t they? So much for
equality.

It got a
strange response from the others at the mall, since several of them worked
their way down toward the Vampire and Mage end of the mall. None of them were
armed, openly, but they all walked in a group, with Calley Hale, the Bat
shifter, and her assorted peeps in the lead. They were, as Eve knew, pretty
Human looking as far as the people there went. It might just throw the
protestors off.

For a
moment she was hoping that they’d all come out to the public, and start
changing in the center of the mall, but instead they rather boringly just all
walked in, and started ordering things. They paid too, showing their support,
but she rang them all up with mall employee discounts. That was all they did,
but the numbers had suddenly changed, so instead of fifteen people kind of
intimidating three, there were suddenly twelve fit and large people inside,
looking out at fifteen or so lumpy mouth breathers. If it came down to a fight,
it was kind of clear to everyone who was going to win. Not that it shouldn’t
have been in the first place.

The
second thing happened not too long after that. It presented itself first with a
teen girl, who wasn’t all that cute, but did have a nice, gothy look to her.
Black make-up and heavy mascara. When she got to the counter her eyes went very
wide, and she looked over at Edom like he was made of something good to eat. He
was
, but the girl might have been sixteen, Eve thought. That was legal,
but not inside what Ed would have normally been willing to date.

The girl
spoke to her though.

“Is this
really where the Vampires are?”

Eve
sighed, then nodded.

“Yep.
This is the place. How can we help you today?”

There
was a happy sound, but a slightly scared look on her youthful face.

“Can
I
be a Vampire too? I mean, is there like, an application form?”

Eve
shook her head, but forced a happy expression. The kid was just curious, which
was a good thing, in life, over all. A thing to be nurtured. Even if it was
going to be a huge pain in the ass at the moment.

“It
doesn’t really work that way. I…”

She
stopped, because there was a crowd at the door. Most of them were young, and
all of them were Human. They smelled
lovely
, but she had to shake her
head.

Waving
to them, she closed her eyes.

“Did you
all
come to try and become Vampires?” Not all of them said yes,
thankfully, but better than half did. She looked over at Edom, who sighed.

“We need
to tell them something. Do you want to go, or should I?”

“Me, I
guess, but… Back me up? They look like they might be edgy and ready to fight.”

They
didn’t, but you never really knew.

The
crowd was not happy with her statement, which informed them that, in order to
get in as a Vampire, they’d need to complete a battery of tests, undergo
extensive training that was harder than any Navy SEAL or Green Beret had to put
up with
and
pass psychological tests. That was to show they were well
balanced in mind, as well as body.

In
short, she lied her ass off, trying to drive them all away.

“Now,
don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that you have to be a superman to start
with, but there are so many people applying suddenly that it would be stupid of
us to accept anyone that wasn’t really serious about it. We need people that
are willing to help other people, too, so if you want to fast track on this,
come in over the next few days, and we’ll find someplace for you to volunteer
in the community. Not the Vampire one, your
own
. If you aren’t willing
to help out regular people now, then you can’t handle helping them when you’re
constantly angry and hungry all the time.” Then she covered that part, not
holding back at all about what it was like.

Edom
smiled the whole time, and then described the pain that the sun was causing him
at the moment. Earlier in the day, at least. Eve was feeling good now, since
night had fallen. It was like a soft cloth being rubbed over her whole body
compared to high noon.

“So, if
you can handle being tortured every day, and working all night, we’re
interested in talking to you. Come back later though, since we need to get
things freed up here for the Vampires that are going to be coming in. No one
was really ready for Richard Swerlin to tell all of you about us so firmly, and
with that much proof. Honestly, you shouldn’t be able to even hold the idea of
us being real in your minds, but it looks like this time it’s sticking with a
lot of you. So… See you in a few days? I can’t recommend hanging around right
now to watch things either. Some of us will be on edge, so…” He was at a loss
for words, but Eve had this one. She was used to working with the public after
all.

“So,
take a hint? One of the things we’ll be looking for are people that can get
along and who will follow even the directions they don’t understand. If you
can’t do that now, you won’t be a good time investment as a Vamp.” Then she
looked at them silently, until most of them started to go away. The ones that
stayed, well, they were the ones that had come to gawk, weren’t they? That, and
try to kill themselves a Vampire.

True
that was only the one man, who very slowly and obviously pulled a small firearm
out, and aimed it at Edom, who stepped out of the way smoothly. That meant the
bullets were aimed at an older woman who’d been looking into the shop window,
and been behind him. Eve moved fast, getting her body in the way just in time
to get hit three times. It rocked her back, and hurt, but there was that nice
detachment sense of things that made it just annoying to her, not so
distracting she couldn’t function.

She
started toward the foolish chubby man, and calmed herself as she did it, so
that he wouldn’t simply die there, in that very moment. Carefully she wrapped
her right palm over the black gun, which really wasn’t a big thing, and managed
to tuck her hand under the hammer as it started to trigger again. Fall?
Whichever. It stopped it from firing and gave her a few seconds to use her
other hand to take the man’s finger out of the trigger housing, so that she
didn’t just rip it off.

That
could happen during disarms like the one she was using, twisting the weapon
toward him fast, so he couldn’t aim properly. Even people with regular strength
could cause the gun to go off and cut a finger off doing it.

Once she
had the thing it was tempting to follow up by crushing his skull with the back
of it, since she was more than a little pissed, having been shot like that. It
seemed fair, to
her
at any rate. Instead she forced her fangs back, and
took a breath, which hurt. She was healing from the damage, and the bullets
would kick out as she did, she thought, but there was still damage, and Eve
knew it would take a bit for her to heal from it. Not like losing a limb or
something, but enough to waste her time and worse, ruin her clothing.

“What
the hell? That wasn’t very nice.” There was screaming, and half the people had
run away, even as a bunch of others moved toward them. One of the protestors
came too, pulling a large silver handgun from a holster in the back of his
pants. He was older, and seemed to be angry, but he didn’t aim at her, Eve
noticed. No, he pointed the weapon at
Ed
, until the woman that had
nearly been killed by mistake pointed at the gunman.

“He
tried to kill me! That girl jumped in the way, we need an ambulance!” That the
lady was worried about her was nice, but Eve waved it away, readying a lie
about it only being a flesh wound, or not her blood, when she remembered that
everyone there knew what she was.

“I’m
fine. I’ll heal in a few minutes. We probably need to get with the police
however. I mean, going around shooting people? That’s kind of a shitty thing to
do, isn’t it? I’m
very
disappointed in you, sir.” She glared at him and
then shook her head. “I mean, going off half cocked like that? You didn’t even
take time to research us first. Plus, you also tried to shoot the black man
first? That’s sort of racist isn’t it?” She looked over at the gun toting
protestor, and raised an eyebrow.

He
didn’t get that she meant him too at all, because if he did, if the man had
that kind of introspection and self-awareness, then he most likely wouldn’t
have been there in the first place.

On the
handy side he held the other man at bay while Lenore came out, calling the police.
Actually, she got in touch with Althea Sims, directly. The woman was the Chief
of Police for the city, and also a rather old and powerful Vampire. No one knew
that yet, and it was clear that Lenore was trying to keep it that way. It was
one thing for them to be known, but if people realized that there were Vampires
all over the place, holding real jobs that affected their lives, they might
panic. People were sheep, in the main.

It only
helped a little bit though, when the cops got there.

Again,
because they all kept looking at Edom funny. Like the guy in the thousand
dollar suit was going to be the one making problems for them? It was annoying,
but for his part Ed acted like it was perfectly normal, and just answered questions
when asked. Politely, which given how jazzed up he had to be, would be hard.
Eve tried to match that though, and not take a bit of retribution against the
shooter.

“So…
This guy tried to kill you?” The officer, who looked fit, was white and over
six feet tall. He was also clearly freaked out by having not one, but three
Vampires right there with him. On the good side, after the first bit he really
did figure out that Ed wasn’t the threat, and had helped to handcuff the
shooter. Dwaine. It was such a hick name that Eve had almost not thought it was
real when it had been given at first.

Her
maker nodded.

“That’s
right. I moved out of the way, which left this woman exposed. I would have just
taken the hit otherwise. Luckily my daughter saw it happening, and got there in
time.” He gestured toward her, as if no one else would see the clear family
resemblance. It took her off-guard though, since he’d never called her that
before. A lot of Vampires did, with the people they brought over, but it was a
first for him.

She
pointed at the marks on her clothing. They were black, and almost on cue one of
the bullets worked its way to the surface and fell to the floor. The light
clattering got a lot of people, including some with camera phones, to pay
attention.

So, yay,
she was famous now.

“He owes
me a shirt.” She sounded truly pissed, and like she meant it, but the cop
grinned and looked away.

“Yeah,
he does. Well, let’s get this all taken care of. There’s paperwork to do. There
always is with a firearms charge.” He did not sound thrilled by it, but Eve got
him and his fifteen buddies that came settled inside and made some coffee for
them. It was just the regular kind and not all that fancy, but they had lots of
cream and sugar for it.

In all
the scene was boring though, and took hours to get done. It was nearly seven
when the men in blue were all finally gone, and Eve felt a bit lost, like she
didn’t know how to get through the next day. It was Friday though, so she knew
what to do. It just took a while to click into her brainpan.

“Oh,
right. We need to get to the club. Or
I
do. I guess we should open up,
right?” It wasn’t her call, but she also didn’t know if she was supposed to do
anything in particular either. Blinking, she held up a hand and made a call,
just running to the phone. She dialed from memory, her fingers flying as she
did it.

It was
picked up almost instantly.

“Troy
Lopez, what can I do for you?”

“Troy?
This is Eve. I have Ed and Lenore here. You’re up on everything, but not all
the peeps at the club will be. What’s the plan there?” He could have one, after
all.

There
was no particular hesitation either.

“We’re
opening like normal. It isn’t snowing out, and while a bit cold, there’s no
reason for us not to. Are you and Barb not coming in? I can schedule around
that, if I need to. Explain to the others, if it’s a problem?” He didn’t seem
to think it would be, for some reason. Then, he knew all about them and had for
years.

Vampires
being real wasn’t exactly a big shock to his system was it? Really, it might
not be to a lot of people. Especially the kind that liked to go clubbing.

Plus, in
Vancouver there was only the one place, at least that was any good, so if T2LA
didn’t open, a bunch of people would be stuck, floundering for things to do and
not getting lucky that night. It was practically their civic duty to prevent
that.

Eve
looked at Edom, since it was his call. The man looked around, but finally gave
a single nod.

“Barb
will be there. You too, Eve. I’ll check in if there’s a problem. Eve you’re up
for security. Get with Kevin to set that up. He’s solid. I’m not sure about all
the others though. Some of them might have a problem with this.”

Eve felt
her mouth working before she could even think to stop it, which was all right,
since it was just repeating the plan. Troy couldn’t hear Ed or anything.

“We’re
both in. I need to be on security, too, along with restroom duty. I also need
to change first. Some asshole shot me a few hours ago. Ruined my lavender
pullover. We don’t know why yet, but I’m thinking it was something to do with
him having a small wiener?” She had no reason to say that in particular, but it
got a low laugh.

“Are you
all right? I really can get someone else to take your place, if I hurry.”

“Nah,
I’m good. I’ll be there directly. Almost.” She needed to get with Marissa from
the Council too, because her calling in only made sense, didn’t it?

She was
probably the newest Vampire in the whole world, or at least one of the ten
youngest, so of course the seat of power should be taking her calls. It was
still needed though, since Marissa was the person actually running the animal
blood project for them. In that she was doing all the real work. Eve had the
idea, and the formula for the good tasting anti-coagulant they used, as well as
her special spice blends to make them unique and tastier. It was the Council
member that had purchased the farms they needed and hired people to do the work
for them.

They
weren’t up yet on production or distribution, but if they were all coming out,
they really did need to have food available to everyone. People that had been
cheating a bit and using their Human friends for that kind of thing might just
have to cool it for a while. Possibly not, but if they didn’t have an option,
they couldn’t, even if it was going to be what they
wanted
to do.

Still,
Eve didn’t really expect the phone to pick up, and especially didn’t think it
would in the middle of a meeting with everyone else being there. At least on
the phone. She could tell the difference in how everyone sounded. No one else
was in the room with Marissa. Not directly. That probably meant they were all
staying away from each other, suspecting treachery and back stabbing. They were
all Vampires, so it was probably the right call.

“Good
evening? This is the Council. We’re all listening.” That was spoken in a mild
tenor, but a warning if Eve had ever heard one. Polite, but with a hint of
steal underneath, just in case she was getting ready to call in and use a bunch
of foul language with the hermaphrodite?

She
nearly froze, but simply took a breath and tried not to act like she was being
caught off guard.

“Eve
Benson, here. I was calling to suggest that we pick up production on our
project. I don’t know what’s needed though, so wanted to get with you.”

There
was muttering in the background, coming from a youthful sounding voice. Gene.
The one person she knew for sure sort of wanted her dead. That he was in charge
like he was wasn’t a great thing for her, but so far he hadn’t actually tried
anything. At the moment he didn’t even whine about her annoying him.