“Pull that again, and I will arrest you.”
“Draw down on me again and I will eat you.”
“Again,” he sneered. He poured Jessica a cup of water and fixed the bed so she was sitting up. He guarded her like a pissed off mama cat, while she drank it all down.
“Oh, like it was such fun for me, too, that first time! Get it through your head, lamebrain, I was a brand-?new dead girl! I didn't even know I was a vampire until my teeth came out. I went to you for help, remember?”
“Help?” he nearly shrieked.
“How could I know what chomping you would do?”
“You didn't think biting me on the neck and drinking my blood would be problematic?”
Wince. Score one for Nick. Never mind. “In case it's escaped your notice, I'm one of the good guys! I kill bad vampires and stop serial killers and—and—” I was going blank. What other good things had I done? Surely there were at least a few more. . .
'Of course you stop killers, why do you think I've been feeding you information for the last eighteen months? Because I'm soooo in love with you?”
“That was the prevailing theory,” I admitted, feeling vain and stupid at the same time. “Of course, I'm revising it rapidly. So you, uh, don't love me, yeah, I'm getting that.”
“Not fucking likely, you blond leech on legs. I dream about locking you up in a sunny cell.”
Jessica said nothing. And I kept my face perfectly straight. So Nick didn't know everything about me. Thank goodness! He probably thought a cross or holy water would hurt me. Excellent.
“You know something, Nick? I'm glad you don't like me. Because you're a self-?absorbed, overreacting, testosterone-?filled, gun-?toting dipshit.”
“Will you two cut the shit?” Jess demanded. “I'm having a real crummy day. Night. Whatever.”
“He started it.”
“You started it.”
“I'm ending it! I will turn this hospital bed around right now if you two don't knock it off. And before you ask, Bets, I didn't clue him in as to what you are.”
“Of course you didn't.” Jess looked ghastly and had lost more weight. Trouble was, she didn't have that much to lose in the first place. Five pounds from her was, like, 10 percent of her body weight. Or whatever. “Sinclair's mojo wore off. Nick and I already discussed that.”
“Yeah,” she said. “You know, when I'm out of this bed, we're going to have to find a way for everybody to play nice.”
I grimaced. And Nick looked like someone had placed a scorpion on his tongue.
I stepped over the unconscious asshole, gently put a finger on Jessica's chin, looked at her neck, then turned her head and looked at her other side. Then I looked at her wrists.
Clean as a whistle. I'd check her thighs, next (wasn't looking forward to that wrestling match), and then her—
“Don't bother,” Nick grumped. “I already looked.” “Yeah, and here I thought we were going to get sweaty, and it was just another exam. What are you guys looking for?”
“There's a lot of weird stuff happening all at the same time,” I replied. “I thought it was kind of interesting that you had a big-?ass relapse around the time everybody started disappearing.”
“No bites,” Nick told me. “Not even a scratch.”
“So this is just bad timing?” “Luckily for you.”
“Oh, put both your guns away,” I snapped. “Nobody's impressed.”
“I am,” Jess said cheerfully. “In fact, it's turning me on like you wouldn't believe.”
“I'm outta here.”
“Wait! You said everybody was disappearing? Who?”
“I'll tell you the whole story after.”
“After what?” I heard Nick ask as the door started to wheeze shut behind me.
“After it's all over,” Jessica sulked. “She keeps me out of the cool stuff until it's too late to have any fun of my own.”
“Humph,” Nick replied.
I couldn't believe, all this time, that I thought he'd been on my side! That he'd liked me. Here it was all a lie, hated my guts and fed me info just to get creeps off the street. Not caring, I assumed, if I got hurt or even killed in the process.
Jeez, he'd made a special trip to my house to tell me all about the serial killer Laura went to town on! He must have known I wouldn't have known about him, avoiding the news as I did.
What a manipulative bastard! He'd been pulling all our strings for so long, I didn't—
Whoa. What?
I wheeled around, marched back to the room, shoved the door open, waited patiently for it to actually be open, then rushed in and grabbed Nick's head in my hands before he could turn, much less find his gun.
“Betsy! What the hell do you think you're—”
I ignored her. “Nick.”
“Yes.”
“You have to tell the truth, Nick.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Are you responsible for Sinclair's disappearance?”
“I wish.”
“Do you know who is?”
“No. But good luck to them.”
I thought for a second, never breaking eye contact “Do you have any advice?”
“Go back to the beginning. Find them. Kill them.”
“Go back to the beginning?”
“Who else is gone?”
“Marc. Cathie-?the-?ghost. Tina. My father and his wife. Antonia. Garrett.”
“Then it's personal. You already know who's doing it. Go back to the beginning.”
I stared at him thoughtfully. He was dreaming with his eyes open, looking not at me but through me, past me. “I'm sorry for what I did, Nick, and for what I did just now. You'll remember everything. . . in five seconds.”
“Great,” Jessica snapped. “Leave me to deal with the fallout.”
“Sorry, hon. Catch you later.”
“Let me guess!” she hollered. Wow, water had certainly perked her up. “After you go back to the beginning!”
Well, yeah.
Chapter 24
What did it mean? I wasn't a detective, God knew. And the people around me usually did the thinking. That was how I liked it. I liked that Tina and Sinclair dealt with most of the shit. I liked that another vampire looked after the other Fiends, that two other vampires looked after my nightclub, Scratch. Shit, Jessica had even hired someone to feed my cat. My time was spent reading, snacking, fucking, wedding planning, playing bartender in the kitchen with my friends, and occasionally vanquishing evil. . . again, with help.
The answering machine in the kitchen was blinking. I scowled at it, then pressed “Play.”
“Hi, Betsy. Michael Wyndham. We're coming up empty. Completely cold trail. The Pack members in the area haven't seen either of them. We're still looking. Call me if you find anything.”
“Hi, hon. It's Mom. The baby is doing fine. I thought you might want to know. Laura's here, if you need either of us. So. . . talk to you soon?”
My, my. Weren't those two getting thick as thieves?
