Bitter Blood

Claire rescued the card and looked at it again. She turned it over, held it under the strongest light available— the window—and frowned. “Better not,” she said. “I think this is chipped.”

“Chipped? Can I eat it?”

“Microchipped. It’s got some kind of tech in it, anyway. I’d have to take a look to see what kind, but it’s pretty safe to say they’d know if you went all paper dolls with it.”

“Oh great, so it’s not just a Drink Me card; it’s a tracking device, like those ear things they put on lions on Animal Planet? Yeah, there’s no way that can go wrong—like, say, vampires being issued receivers so they can just shop online for who they want to target tonight.”

Eve was right about that, Claire thought. She really didn’t feel good about this. On the surface, it was just an ID card, perfectly normal—she already carried a student ID and a driver’s license—but it felt like something else. Something more sinister.

Eve stopped rummaging in drawers and just stared at her. “Hey. We each got one. Four envelopes.”

“I thought they were only for human residents,” Claire said. “So what’s in Michael’s?” Because Michael Glass was definitely not human these days. He’d been bitten well before Claire had met him, but the full-on vampire thing had been slow-building; she saw it more and more now, but deep down she thought he was still the same strong, sweet, no-nonsense guy she’d met when she’d first arrived on the Glass House doorstep. He was definitely still strong. It was the sweetness that was in some danger of fading away, over time.

Before Claire could warn Eve that maybe it wasn’t the greatest idea, Eve shredded open Michael’s envelope, too, yanked out the inner one, and pulled out his letter. Another card fell out. This one was gold. Shiny, shiny gold. It didn’t have any info on it at all. Just a gold card, with the Founder’s symbol embossed on it.

Eve went for the letter. “‘Dear Michael,’” she said. “Oh, sure, he gets Michael, not Mr. Glass…. ‘Dear Michael, I have enclosed your card of privilege, as has been discussed in our community meetings.’” She stopped again, reread that silently, and looked down at the card she was holding in her fingers. “Card of privilege? He doesn’t get the same treatment we do.”

“Community meetings,” Claire said. “Which we weren’t invited to, right? And what kind of privileges, exactly?”

“You’d better believe it’s a whole lot better than a free mocha at Common Grounds,” Eve said grimly. She kept reading, silently, then handed the paper stiff-armed to Claire, not saying another word.

Claire took it, feeling a bit ill now. It read:

Dear Michael,

I have enclosed your card of privilege, as has been discussed in our community meetings. Please keep this card close, and you are welcome to use it at any time at the blood bank, Bloodmobile, or Common Grounds for up to ten pints monthly.

Wow, it really was good for free drinks. But that wasn’t all.

This card also entitles you to one legal hunt per year without advance declaration of intent. Additional hunts must be preapproved through the Elders’ Council. Failure to seek preapproval will result in fines of up to five thousand dollars per occurrence, payable to the family’s Protector, if applicable, or to the City of Morganville, if there is no Protector on file.

Best wishes from the Founder,

Amelie

For a moment, Claire couldn’t quite understand what she was reading. Her eyes kept going over it, and over it, and finally it all snapped into clear, razor-sharp focus, and she pulled in a deep, shaking breath. The paper creased as her grip tensed up.

“Yeah,” Eve said. Claire met her gaze wordlessly. “It’s telling him he gets a free pass to kill one person a year, just on a whim. Or more if he plans it out. You know, like a special treat. Privilege.” There was nothing in her tone, or her face, or her eyes. Just…blank. Locked down.

Eve took the paper from Claire’s unresisting hand, folded it, and put it back in the envelope with the gold card.

“What—what are you going to say to him?” Claire couldn’t quite get her head adjusted. This was wrong, just…wrong.

“Nothing good,” Eve said.

And that was the precise moment when the kitchen door opened, and Michael stepped inside. He was wearing a thick black canvas cowboy-style duster coat, broad-brimmed hat, and black gloves. Eve had teased him earlier that he looked like an animé superhero, but it was all practical vampire sun-resistant gear. Michael was relatively still newborn as a vampire, which meant he was especially vulnerable to the sun, and to burning up.

Now, he whipped off his hat and gave the two of them an elaborate bow he’d probably copied from a movie (or, Claire thought, learned from one of the older vamps), and rose from that with a broad, sweet smile. “Hey, Claire. And hello, Mrs. Glass.” There was a special gentleness when he said Mrs. Glass—a private kind of thing, and it was both breathtaking and heartbreaking.

Heartbreaking, because in the next second, he knew something was wrong. The smile faltered, and Michael glanced from Eve to Claire, then back to Eve. “What?” He dumped the hat and his gloves on the table, and shed the coat without looking away from Eve’s face. “Baby? What’s wrong?” He walked to her and put his hands on her shoulders. His wedding ring matched hers, even down to the ruby inset, and it caught the light the way Eve’s had earlier.

Bloodred.

It was terrible, Claire thought, that he was still so much Michael—still exactly as he’d been when she first met him—eighteen, though they were all catching up to him now in age. It wasn’t fair to call him pretty, but he was gorgeous—tumbles of blond curls that somehow always looked perfect; clear, direct blue eyes the color of a morning sky. His pallor gave him the perfect look of ivory, and when he stood still, as he was now, he looked like some fabulous lost statue direct from Greece or Rome.

It wasn’t fair.

Eve held the gaze between herself and her husband, and said, “This is for you.” She held up the inner envelope with his name written on it in flowing script.

For a second, Michael clearly didn’t know what it was…and then Claire saw him realize. His eyes widened, and something like horror passed over his expression and was quickly hidden underneath a blank, carefully composed mask. He didn’t say anything, but just took his hands from her shoulders and accepted the envelope. He stuck it in his pocket.

“You’re not even pretending to be curious?” Eve said. Her voice had gone deep in her throat and had taken on a dangerous edge. “Great.”

“You read it?” he asked, and took it out again to open it up. The card fell out, again, but he deftly snatched it out of the air without any effort. “Huh. It’s shinier than I thought it’d be.”

“That’s all you have to say?”

He unfolded the letter. Claire was no good at reading those micro-expressions people on TV were always talking about on crime shows, but she thought he looked guilty as he read it. Guilty as hell.

“It’s not what you think,” he said, which was exactly the wrong thing to say, because it made Claire (and almost certainly Eve) think about every guy ever caught cheating. Luckily, he didn’t stop there. “Eve, all vampires get the hunting privilege; it’s just part of living in Morganville—it’s always been the rule, even when nobody in the human community knew. Look, I don’t want it. I opposed the whole idea at the meetings—”

“Which you didn’t tell us about at all, jerk,” Eve broke in. “We’re community!”

Michael took a deep breath and continued. “I told Amelie and Oliver I wouldn’t ever use it, but they didn’t care.”

“Doesn’t matter. You have a free pass for murder.”

“No,” he said, and took her hands in his, a gesture so quick she couldn’t avoid it, but gentle enough that she could have pulled away if she’d wanted. “No, Eve. You know me better than that. I’m trying to change it.”

Her eyes filled with tears, suddenly, and she collapsed against his chest. Michael put his arms around her and held her tightly, his head resting against hers. He was whispering. Claire couldn’t hear what he was saying, but it really wasn’t any of her business.