Dead Certain (Eve Benson: Vampire Book 3) (13 page)

The first person through the door
though wasn’t a Human at all, being Zack. He looked over at the girl, who
clearly recognized him, and smiled.

“Ginger! Come to take over for
Lenore, now that she got that promotion?” It made sense that he’d know about it
all. Because his girlfriend would have told him. For a half second Eve wondered
how it was going to work, if Lenore was traveling all the time, but then it hit
her.
Line Walker
. This was the one being she knew for certain that could
be with his honey whenever they wanted to take the time. Really, most of the
other Greater Demons probably could, too. They didn’t seem to have anyone
steady though, did they? Not as a group.

“No, sir. Mr. Line Walker, sir.”
The terror nearly cut through the place, and Eve rolled her eyes.

“Remember your breathing and
blinking. Focus on what you’re doing. Concentrate on the motion of the rag, and
feel it all. Everything that you’re doing. I’ll help Zack this time, but later
you’re going to give him a blowjob.”

That got the Vampire to turn and
stare at her, seeming like she was going to pass out. Zack just laughed though.

“Don’t worry Ginger, she’s
kidding. You won’t have to do anything you don’t want to, sexually, with Eve
around. She’s one of the best when it comes to that kind of thing.”

Eve nodded, and started making
some things for Zack to munch on while they talked.

“Hey, just because you scare her,
that doesn’t mean she won’t want the practice. You can pretend to be a Human
for her, so that she’ll learn not to attack, you know, while she does you?”

Standing there, behind the
machines, she felt it happen.

The energy in the room shifted,
and the scent, and instead of Zack, the mighty Greater Demon, it felt like a
regular, and very healthy, Human man was there. Eve stopped what she was doing
and moved around the machine she was getting a stream of vanilla frozen yogurt
from, to look at him.

“
Just
like that actually.
This is perfect. Ginger, why don’t you sit at one of the tables with him, while
he eats?”

The other girl did it, slowly,
and looking both scared and a bit like she was about to frenzy and take the guy
out.

She didn’t though, just sitting
there like a good little Vampire girl. For hours, while Eve provided treat
after delicious morsel, to keep Zack busy. It worked wonderfully, because by
the time morning came, and a few regular people came in, Ginger was well and
truly in control of her desire to eat them.

Scared of them? A bit. But
that
didn’t matter, as long as they all stayed alive, did it?

Very early, well before the sun
tried to come up, Ginger tried to die for the day. That was pretty common for
the very young, Eve knew. She just kept the girl moving and working, glad that
she finally had a chance to chat with Zack, who’d stayed the entire night with
them, more or less. He’d run out a few times, going through the back, to make a
transfer, or in at least one case to get even more food.

As she waited for David and Nikki
to get there, and directed Ginger to keep working, like a boss, she sighed, and
finally turned to her Greater Demon pal.

“So, I have this thing with Fram,
and Maggie Sims. You know about it?” It was clear that he did, but to her
amazement, instead of making a big deal out of it, he just shrugged.

“Yep. You have that in order. He
won’t cheat you, or trick you. You had a problem with him, and came in with an
offer that wasn’t going to end up with him losing that much. A slave, possibly,
but if you do it right she’ll live.
I’d
take out Fram, personally. It
was his fault. Really, what he was thinking, trying to take you on… Still, that
isn’t why I came. Ann was in earlier and wants me to set up some work for you,
with The Cleric? That… Um…”

The Greater Demon stopped, and
finally let himself smile a bit.

“Okay, this is second hand
information, but you might be able to remember it.
I
can, and Keeley is
making herself, but none of the rest of us, our kind, can do it. You’re smart
though and not a Demon, so it might work. Gregor is an Angel. Just
pretending
to be a Greater Demon. That doesn’t mean he won’t trick you or anything, but
he’s
not
like the rest of us. So you can deal with him, and he can’t
take your soul. I don’t think any of the others are like that, but it could be
a thing. Don’t risk it with anyone else though. The Rotted doesn’t know that
though, which means that she’s probably using you in this. I think I can see
what she has in mind, but for your part, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t do
it.”

Eve started to feel her mind reel
at the news, then nodded. Angels. Well,
that
made sense. If there were
Greater Demons, then why not? Though that might mean that God was real, too,
and if that was the case, she was going to be pissed. It was one thing for Zack,
her Greater Demon buddy to leave her to be raped for years by a mind
controlling Mage, but something very different for
God
to let that
happen.

Not that she remembered any of
that, but it was the spirit of the thing that mattered. She got part of what
was going on there now though, since it had been Fram behind it all, and there
were others behind, or at least with, him in whatever he had going on. Starting
a war. That’s what he’d told her.

Zack looked away, then reached
out to touch her hand.

“Your helper needs to be reminded
to stay awake.” He gestured to Ginger then, so Eve shook her a bit, and blocked
the arm that came out, in slow motion, to try and hit her.

“Keep cleaning! You can do it.”

The youthful looking Vampire, who
was still actually younger than Eve was, went back to work like a zombie. It
was like she was on drugs, very nearly.

Zack started to leave then, going
out the front, which had her following and taking his arm, gently.

“Not so fast. What’s the thing
with The Cleric? Do I call him, or something? What does he want done, and do I
have the time for it?” She looked back at Ginger, which got Zack to do the
same.

“I don’t know exactly. He has
something that Darla wants, which will be several pounds of atomically arranged
graphene sheeting. The stuff is hard to come by, but useful, I guess? Gregor
has some of it, but they don’t really talk. Darla is a bit of a bigot, when it
comes to Christians, and Greg started that whole mess.”

Eve still didn’t know what to do,
but Zack jogged around the counter, patted Ginger on the back firmly, and wrote
something down, then fixed himself a large cup of vanilla product.

“You need to start a new batch
soon.” He patted the silver machine like he had Ginger, and walked out eating
as he did it.

She just took him at his word,
and called out for her new little Vampire pal to keep going, as she did that,
talking to Ginger the whole time.

“No, don’t sit. Keep wiping
things down. Do the tables.” They didn’t need to be done, but she wasn’t really
doing much, so it worked out.

Edom came in, at seven sharp,
dressed in one of his nice suits, and carrying a briefcase. Since he was the
boss there now. He looked around at the place, and saw what she was doing, then
grinned.

“No problems then?”

“Nope. Zack came and helped
Ginger, so she won’t want to eat people now, all the time. Then he suggested
that I help out some other Greater Demon, to get something that Darla wants,
which might lead to her helping me keep Maggie Sims alive. The Cleric, which,
if I was told correctly, and it isn’t a trick, is the one Greater Demon we can
all trust. More or less. It might be worth it. I don’t know. It’s
also
probably
something being set up by The Rotted to help her. So, I don’t know. Anyway, no
trouble, embassy wise. Zack sitting there all night didn’t even mess with
people coming in to shop for blood, since he seemed like a Human the whole
time.” It had been true, which was interesting to watch, since a few of the
Vampires that had gone about their business like it was totally normal had met
him before. They didn’t
respond
like that though.

It was like they noticed him, but
couldn’t see what he really was, past the surface of the energy he was
presenting.

Edom moved to the back, and
didn’t put an apron on over his clothing, having several people coming to watch
the shop out front.

“Well, be careful. My
recommendation is to not get involved, but it would curry some favor with the
Council if you could pry Jasmine Transmorguire free like you have planned. It
isn’t worth dying to do though. Very few things are.”

Eve could see that one. It was
brilliantly clear to her, actually. She shouldn’t be involved at all, given the
normal course of things. She was though, since she was an idiot. That’s why she
was babysitting Ginger wasn’t it? Because she’d stepped in when it wasn’t any
of her business.

Still, the girl, zombie at the
moment or not, was doing it. It was daylight, if very early still, and here she
was, cleaning the same table for ten minutes. It was funny, but it didn’t
matter if she was with it or not, as long as she kept moving all day. The rest
would come.

“I hear that. I’ll be as careful
as I can. For now, what am I supposed to be doing? I mean, my actual job?
Working here on nights?” She could do it, but there was a firm head shake.

“Not most of the time. David will
do all the night shifts, until you have him trained for days, too. Barb is
going to split her time, getting mornings off, and working the afternoon
portion here, as well as shifts at the clubs. She’ll need to get up to speed on
managing the various properties around the state, for the Council. It isn’t
that hard. You… Would you look into what happened to Brian, from the club? He
was beaten to death, several months ago. We were told that it was a car
accident at first, but then the story changed and his body vanished. I haven’t
been able to find anything, and it might be that you won’t either, but we
should at least try. He was one of our people.”

Eve could see that. She wasn’t
Nancy Drew though, much less Veronica Mars. What the heck was she supposed to
do that Edom hadn’t already tried?

That would take some thinking,
but it was also kind of clear that she was being given a make-work project.
Edom wanted her to feel like she was contributing, but was holding her back
from the real work, or at least too much of it. That was so the others could do
their jobs and be in charge, of course, like they were supposed to be. She was
younger than the rest of them, which, when she thought about it,
had
to
piss them all off. Barb had told her that much, hadn’t she? Even Ginger was
higher up on the pecking order than she was, and here she was, acting like she
was the one in charge of everyone’s lives.

What a bitch.

She nodded.

“Sure, I’ll see what I can find
with that, and you know, keep the floors clean? Ginger can stay with me for a
bit? Since she’s going to be up for a while?”

That got Edom to seem happy
enough, and he went back to his office, while she worked and kept talking to
the other girl. David and Nikki both came in, the woman seeming far more
chipper than the man was, but both of them were alive and lively enough.

“Hey, David, can you handle the
front here, while the rest of us take a jog around the place?” It was something
to do, and seemed to help a lot more than just standing did, which might be a
good thing for poor Ginger the newb.

They alternated then, with the
younger Vampire doing all the runs, along with Eve, trading in David and Nikki
in an alternating pattern. The girl Vampire sobbed as they moved, and got stared
at, since they weren’t going nearly fast enough to keep people from seeing
them, but Eve was without mercy, and kept her going through the horrid pain.

“Don’t give up.
Never
. Let
all your air out and run, now.” That stopped the sound portion of the crying,
and unlike Nikki, she didn’t
whine
about it hurting, even though it did.
On the good side, even though the sun was up, Ginger started to rally at about
five. By six she was back to normal even.

Eve hugged her, picking the girl
up off the floor and spinning her around once.

“You did it! That’s awesome. Now,
we need to go over the store here once, and then… Get an address, I guess? We
have a mystery to solve.”

It sounded a lot more exciting
than the reality of it was.

Brian, the old bouncer at the
club, who’d been beaten to death it seemed, didn’t have an address on record
with them. No listing in the phone book either. It didn’t take long to realize
that, even though she’d met him, the man had never actually existed. For a
second she found herself hoping he was actually a government spy, but standing
in the back of the Vampire embassy, as David worked the front section, that
didn’t seem too likely. Not even if the CIA had been spying on the undead.

“Well, sidekick girl, do you have
any ideas? I’m tapped. It’s pretty clear that Brian wasn’t himself, the whole
time. Even his last name, Smith… How phony does that sound?”

Ginger stared at her, hard, for a
bit. No hint of red came to her eyes though, so it was probably fake, Eve
decided. Still she waited, to see what the girl was going to say.

“
I’m
the sidekick? I don’t
think so. I’ve been a Vampire like, five times longer than you have. I did the
math on it earlier. That means
I’m
the boss. Doesn’t it?” She seemed
uncertain suddenly, but Eve just looked at her and then made a considering
face.

“Well, if you can come up with a
plan, and control yourself at the same time, then… Yes? If you can’t then no,
but why not? That
is
the traditional way of doing things. What do you
suggest then? Boss.” She didn’t smile, or seem playful about it, which got the
other girl to grin. Just a bit.

“About time I get a minion.
Unfortunately, I picked the bossy one. Slim pickings, so what could I do?
There’s only one person around that I outrank.” She put her hands out, and
looked pretty cute about it. Then winced, waiting for the backhand that didn’t
come.

“Too true. Well, I need to go and
find out which Greater Demon was faking being Brian at the club…” She stopped,
and then looked at the front of the shop, her mind going to the place across
the way. Where Fram had been hiding the whole time, practically, right under
her nose. Putting himself in place, at her orders, on the second or third day
that she was a Vampire.

Using Maggie, his slave, to do
it.

That didn’t mean he was Brian
though, did it? The very idea that the guy hadn’t been a regular person was
hard to buy. He was just so
good
at it.

It fit though. Not that Brian had
been a demon, but that no one had seen him hurt. They’d gotten calls, first
saying a car accident had happened, from the hospital, then later from the
police, claiming that he’d been beaten to death.

Without waiting Eve settled
behind Lenore’s old desk, and used the phone, to call Althea Sims. The Police Chief.
She didn’t even think about it, looking up her home number, since the woman
didn’t have to sleep, and it wasn’t that late yet, but she also didn’t have to
work twenty-four hours a day either.

Suddenly that sounded like kind
of a sweet gig.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Althea? This is Eve Benson.”

There was a dead silence for a
long time, stretching out almost to the point where Eve was about to ask if she
was still there. The woman sounded fierce, but like she was hiding fear.

“The Bey’s protégée? May I ask
why you’re calling? Is there a problem?”