Dead Certain (Eve Benson: Vampire Book 3) (34 page)

Darla got up suddenly, and
started toward the front door of the house, her right hand digging something
out of her jeans pocket. It was silver metal and glass, and looked like a fine
writing instrument, rather than a weapon. It wasn’t held that way though. Eve
followed her, ready to move if she had to, but not so much that her intent
would program her white shoes into forcing her to do anything. That was good,
since when the door opened, it was just Keeley.

Darla stared at her for a long
time, then nodded.

“In.
Quickly
. There has
been a bit of change in plans.”

The words got movement, though it
was clear that Keeley, who looked like she was about one coating of face paint
away from being a model, was moving into the space like a ninja. Wary, ready to
kill, and using all her senses without shame. Sniffing the air, testing each
step on the floor, and looking around like paranoia was her new favorite hobby.

Eve nodded.

“That’s about the right level of
awareness.”

Darla moved too, and got them all
into the living room, then… Offered drinks. Because that was polite,
apparently.

Keeley asked for a soda, but Eve
was about to demure, when she realized that a bit of plain water probably
wouldn’t hurt her too much. She’d seen Bey do that, on occasion. Warm water, to
be exact. So she asked for that, since it was more grown up than sitting there
tensely, with nothing to hold on to.

It didn’t take Darla long to get
things set up, even with an unusual request like hers. Then they all sat, with
Darla looking at her, as if she were the one that should speak.

“I guess I’ll start with the
punch-line, and then double back over the good parts? A group of Greater Demons
is trying to kill you. They tried to take out Darla, um, trapping her in a
medallion? Then one of them The Ferryman, pretended to be Finias, to lure me
here for some reason. Another one claimed to be Tarsus, The Librarian, and came
in to work, saying he was searching for Darla, too.” She was about to go on,
when Keeley reached her hand out and touched Eve’s cool arm with her soft warm
hand.

It tingled, and after a moment,
the other girl took a very deep breath.

“Okay. That wasn’t The Vile, I’m
willing to bet. I’ll make a call in a minute and check on that. There’s a lot
going on, isn’t there? Well worth what I’m paying you for this info. You really
killed The Ferryman? More to the point, isn’t he supposed to be on our side?”
That was said to Darla directly.

The blonde nodded, her blue eyes
shining a bit.

“In general the sane Greater
Demons tend to stick with their own, but it isn’t unheard of for people to work
together when they have common goals like this. What can I say, Keels? You just
naturally bring people together.”

“I know, it’s a curse. Okay, I
need to go and deal with this. I’ll try to be there for you on Sunday, Eve.
With Fram, and all that? He’s clearly part of this, so it might afford me a
chance to chat with him.”

Eve winced.

“I, uh, have that agreement with
him, so there can’t be any traps or tricks involved. Otherwise… You can’t
come.” Not that she could really stop that from happening, she didn’t think.

“That won’t be a problem. I
actually
like
Fram, his plotting to kill me aside. I won’t make a liar
of you. Now, let me check that bit of info out. With Marcus? The good one, not
Fram being a raping piece of trash. Not that
I
haven’t had some people
raped, but your Maggie Sims seems like a nice Vampire. A master, too. I wonder
how he enslaved her, exactly? Normally that should be very hard for him to pull
off. Not impossible, maybe, but difficult enough that doing it wouldn’t be
something he’d bother with. We can ask about that, at the meeting.” Then she
rose, her body still in combat ready mode.

The phone call didn’t last too
long though, the man on the phone speaking in a rasping and slightly slurred
voice. It was familiar, but that was probably just due to the attack earlier in
the day.

“Vile! This is Keeley? The
Mistress of Souls? A friend of mine, the Vampire Eve, called Snowflake and
White Death, was attacked by one of us earlier. That being claimed to be you.”

“Tash is notsh reality. I have
not attacked, or fought with, The White Death. Cans yous tellsh me about thish?”

The rundown got polite murmurs
until the very end, when Keeley described the feeling of overwhelming
attraction for the rotting stink pile of wretched disgust.

Then the other Greater Demon
laughed. His voice cleared up almost totally, too, sounding more normal by far.

“The Lover, most likely. You
recall the small… Difficulty we had some years back? It wouldn’t be outside of
either her abilities or desires to set me up as the villain in this piece. It
could be someone else, but if so, given those factors, my analysis would still
continue to point at her still, if working through a proxy. That is within her
normal pattern.”

“Ah. Good to know. Are you, by
any chance, part of a plot to have me killed? I hate to ask, but there have
been some rumors of late. I’d hate to think that I upset anyone that much.
Especially you.”

There was no pause, just a
rustling in the background.

“Yes. It isn’t a personal thing,
but it was pointed out that you could be a rather large threat to me in the
future. Removing that as a possibility seems prudent, don’t you think?”

Eve rolled her eyes, and moved
across to the phone, speaking calmly, even as she took the hand piece away from
the other girl.

“Fine. This is Eve, the Vampire.
I’m setting up an arrangement, so that Keeley won’t do that to a select group
of beings that sign on. Steal their free will, I mean. There’s a hundred
million dollar buy in, so that you know it’s quality work, on top of whatever
trading is needed to make it happen. It makes more sense than setting off a
giant fuck storm of doom, just because you feel your dick is a bit too small
today, don’t you agree? Especially since you can make it grow if you want. So,
are you in, or not?” She was ready for The Vile to growl and hang up.
She
would have, at that point. It was so far from diplomatic that she probably
couldn’t save the thing, she knew.

The Vile, crazy or not, was
smarter than that, and didn’t seem to even take offense.

“I can do that. The buy in is
payable on completion of the agreement? Who else is involved in this so far?”

She lied, sort of, “The Ferryman,
you, and probably The Bold, after I talk to him in a few days. If he doesn’t
realize that his personal best plan is
dating
Keeley, then he’s a moron,
and I know him well enough to get that evidence to the contrary at times, he
really isn’t that. He’ll deal.” She couldn’t guarantee that, but The Vile
didn’t call her on it.

“I see. Well, that would be
several of the seven. Will The Mistress of Souls abide by such an arrangement,
however?”

Eve looked at Keels, who stared
back a little blankly.

“If the terms suit her, too? Yes.
As far as I’ve ever heard, she keeps her word, really well. Most of you do, so
that isn’t a real question. No, the real one is this: why the
fuck
didn’t you all see this for yourselves? Not that
I’m
complaining, since
I’m going to make a pretty penny off of this, but this seems like you’ve all
been set up, doesn’t it? Who did it? Tarsus? He’s in charge of your council,
isn’t he?” She was throwing things out, because the name had come up and it was
clear that someone wanted her to go there. The others would correct her, no
doubt.

Except no one did at all.

“Tarsus… I cannot confirm that,
and denying it would be no better.” It was the kind of thing government
officials said all the time to make it seem like they were hiding things, when
what they were covering up was something totally different.

“I see. Still, get with the
others, if it’s safe for you, and have them get in touch with me, if they want
in on this. Fast, since I doubt I can stall more than a few days. Luckily,
Keels is a better person than I am, so she might cut you all some slack. Maybe.
I’ll let her know not to make a try for you right now, for say, a month, if you
agree not to act against her, or plan to, for that time? No loopholes though.
No tricks. Is that agreeable?”

The voice was a bit warmer then,
“it is, Snowflake. Can we extend that to be between you and I as well? For the
same duration? I will not act against you, for one month, and in return, you
offer me the same protection?”

That seemed a bit weird, but
after thinking about it long enough that it probably seemed like she was going
to say no, Eve agreed.

“With no tricks involved?”

“I can agree to that, if you do,
too?”

“Fine then. One month. That
doesn’t go for the others, unless they get in touch and confirm it however.”

“I’ll inform them all of this.
Thank you for your help, Eve. I hope that, in the future, we can be friends,
you and I?”

She didn’t know what to say to
that, but it sounded good, even if he was a disgusting mess of rotten flesh all
the time. They could be email buddies, maybe?

“I’d like that, and hope so, too.
Thanks.”

“Goodbye, for now, Snowflake.”

“Vile.”

Then she hung up, wondering how
many mistakes she’d just made.

Darla grinned at her, and winked
at Keeley.

“See Keels,
that’s
how a
Greater Demon acts. A hundred million buy in to broker a bargain that doesn’t
even exist yet, making it seem like it’s worth doing. Brilliant. That’s a whole
month of a truce, too, if you noticed? That cuts down the potential attacks by
nearly a seventh, unless there are hidden players in this. It’s likely of
course. Now we just need to find where Finias is being held. My bet is that
Tarsus has him.”

Eve furrowed her brows, “um,
isn’t he your leader, more or less?”

Keeley gave her a look that
looked ancient, even if they were really the same age, more or less. It wafted
off of her though, sending a greater chill down Eve’s spine than she’d
experienced since she’d died.

“Better than
that
, he’s my
grandfather. We don’t get along that well though. I blame that on…” She looked
over at Darla, and then shrugged, “okay, so, I found out that Angels are real,
and that Greater Demons can’t hold the concept very easily. I’ve told you about
this before, and had you write up a statement to that effect, and hide it in
your safe spot. We’ve done this about ten times now, but the fact is that
Tarsus has worked out that the Arch Angel Michael is a Greater Demon, called
The Void. It goes deeper than that, too, but the end point is that he isn’t
really certain that I’m not involved in this somehow. It’s making him wonder
how dangerous I really am.”

Darla didn’t seem amused, “I
don’t think so. I can go and check…”

Keeley just sat, and Eve looked
from one to the other.

“
Or
Keeley can go off and
do her thing, and you can go shopping with me? I need to borrow your fashion
sense, not having much of that myself. I have some things I need to dress up
for, including a date tomorrow night. Though given everything…”

Darla seemed happier with that
idea.

“We can do that. Now that this is
a known thing, the attack on Keeley, the rest of us should be safe enough. You
especially, since ruining a chance for a binding truce wouldn’t be worth
getting rid of you. Either of us, most likely. Notice that they just locked me
up in a very good trap? It was too, which argues for Tarsus. He both insists on
that method in the main, and is one of the best when it comes to complex
magics. I’ll take it apart later, and see if he left any signs on it.”

That got a grin from Keels,
“Darla, what were we just talking about? In your secret vault? Do you member?”

“We were talking about shopping,
and what a prick Tarsus is…”

Eve sighed, “got it. So it really
is a blind spot for you people? Like Humans… And almost everything?”

“Yup. No big thing. In the end it
probably won’t make a difference. This
does
mean that I’m the single
sanest Greater Demon in reality, however. Just to point that one out.” Her
words were smooth, and her sister looked annoyed, but didn’t comment.

Instead she clapped.

“Fine. We should go and get Zack
to take us shopping. Really, we should pick up Lyn and Bente for this, too. We
used to get into so much fun and trouble, a few hundred years ago. I think
you’ll fit right in with them, Eve.” She grabbed the cool hand and stood up,
like she couldn’t wait to get out of the room and away from the uncomfortable
topic.

Angels.

It sounded lame, but not
impossible. That was to her though, and
she
was just a Vampire. It was
interesting that Greater Demons couldn’t hold the idea in their heads though.
Not as anything more than a story.

That
had
to be useful,
somehow, didn’t it?

In the end, everything probably
was, so she decided to keep that one, for later.