“Sounds to me like she can take care of herself,” Drogan said.
Campbell couldn’t help his hands fisting at his sides. And by the quick glance he saw, it hadn’t gone unnoticed by Drogan. “My team intervened. She wouldn’t stand a chance against vampires on her own, not even the humans they have working for them.”
“Your team happened to be nearby on both occasions?”
If Olivia’s life weren’t so important to him, he’d tell this guy what a jerk he was, Imperium be damned.
“The first time, we detected human distress while we were on patrol. The second, we were alerted by a tip from an informant.”
Drogan returned to the far side of his desk and sat in his large leather chair. “Protection for a single human hardly seems a concern for the Imperium.”
“I thought all humans were important. Isn’t that why we changed the laws about tapping veins, why we established the blood banks?”
The tick in Drogan’s jaw told Campbell he’d probably just crossed a line and shouldn’t expect any help from the Imperium. He forced himself to calm down and remember that Olivia’s safety was the important thing here.
“All I’m saying is that if the Imperium and the NYPD were to work together, perhaps it would be beneficial for everyone. There are others in her neighborhood at risk, too.”
“Noted,” Drogan said, sounding as if he’d already begun the process of filing Campbell’s idea in the “no action” part of his brain’s file system. “Though it’s my opinion that the less we interact, the better.”
Before Campbell could say anything else, Drogan picked up his phone. “If you’ll excuse me, I have an important call to make.”
Campbell could rant and rave all he wanted, but once an Imperium representative made up his mind, there was no changing it. Anger made his bunched muscles throb as he nodded and turned to go. By the time he hit the hallway, he wanted to punch something, and hard. He was taking such long angry strides that he nearly ran over someone as she came out of the door of the next office.
“I’m sorry,” he said a moment before he recognized her. “Baroness. I didn’t realize you were in town.”
She sighed. “It seems I am always in a town not my own.”
“You do have a demanding job.” Catherine Flanders, the Baroness of Edgemont, called London home, but her position as a liaison between the Imperium’s home and all the offices around the world kept her traveling more often than not. She was what you might call Internal Affairs for the Imperium’s leaders in Bucharest.
“Yes, and it only seems to get more so with each passing year.”
“What brings you to New York?”
She slid her arm through the crook of his and walked slowly toward the front door. “I’m not at liberty to say. What brings you to the Imperium? I know you didn’t just drop by to pass the time.”
She knew him pretty well considering they’d only spoken a handful of times, but he’d liked her the moment they’d met when she’d been in town to bear witness at the trial of an Imperium employee who’d drained a teenage girl almost to the point of death. What made it worse was that the vamp had called the girl, posing as a hospital employee, to say her mother had been in an accident to get her to come outside. Because the girl lived, the man hadn’t been put to death. But if Campbell had to guess, he’d bet wherever he was now he was wishing he had been. A life sentence had quite a different meaning for a vampire.
The baroness had told the man to his face that he not only was a disgrace to the Imperium and vampires everywhere but also gave pond scum a bad name.
Baroness Flanders was what one might call filthy stinking rich, and so she said whatever she wanted and no one challenged her.
He debated telling her about his run-in with Drogan.
“Come, now,” she said as they descended the front steps outside and headed slowly up the sidewalk. “I know you were in with Drogan, and I know that the man is a pompous ass.”
He laughed then told her the extent of his conversation.
“You like this girl.” It wasn’t a question.
He didn’t contradict her. “She is a good person. Sometimes it seems those are hard to find these days.”
“What makes her a good person?”
“She’s kind, selfless, feeds the homeless.” He looked down at the baroness. “She’s only the second human I’ve ever met who believes all vampires aren’t like the Soulless. Granted, our kind hasn’t really advertised otherwise.”
The baroness smiled and patted his arm. “She sounds good for you. It sometimes isn’t a popular viewpoint among my colleagues, but I think it’s very important to remain as close to our human selves as possible. Understanding of differences often takes a great deal of time to come to pass, but I have hopes of one day seeing humans and vampires coexisting in a friendlier, easier way.”
“That’s a tall order, especially when humanity still has problems with acceptance among themselves.”
“Yes, but we will live a very long time. There’s no telling what we’ll see.”
He didn’t know why he’d not thought of it before, but it hit Campbell that even if he and Olivia found a way to make their relationship work, it would only be for a tiny fraction of his immortal life.
“You’re thinking of your lady’s life span?”
He stopped and looked the baroness in the eye. “How did you know?”
“I’m a keen observer, Mr. Raines. How do you think I got this job? Why I’m so good at it?”
“Why do you work, anyway? I know you don’t have to.”
She pushed some of her dark hair behind her ear. “Because I bore easily.” She waved her hand in a swirling motion. “I guess I’m a little like you. Somebody has to keep all these crazy vamps in line.”
He looked off into the night. “Sometimes it feels like a losing battle.”
“I know.”
He returned his attention to her. For the first time since he’d known her, she sounded tired. It was so unlike her that it caused concern to swell in him. What did she know that he didn’t? Did it have anything to do with the fact that she was in New York?
Her abnormal moment passed and she met his eyes. “My advice is don’t think about how long her life is. It robs you of the joy you can have with her while she is here.”
“You sound as if you speak from experience.”
“I do. I loved a man very much, but I spent all the years we had together tied in knots over the fact that I’d lose him too soon, that we wouldn’t be like other couples who got to spend their entire lives together. When he was gone, I realized how much time I’d wasted, time when I could have been truly happy.”
He shoved his hands in his pockets and looked up at the night sky. “If I were sane, I’d stay away from her. I fear hurting her, or worse.”
“You know what my favorite saying is?” the baroness asked. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.” With that, she patted his arm again and turned on her heel. “Well, I better get back. Maybe I’ll think of a way to make Drogan’s night miserable on the walk back.”
He smiled then kissed her cheek. “Maybe I should have fallen for someone like you.”
“My dear, you wouldn’t be able to keep up with me.”
As he watched her walk away, her words reverberated in his head.
Was there? He wasn’t so sure, not with memories of Bridget tormenting him. But if so, he was damn well going to find it.
* * *
Something was wrong. Olivia stared out at the handful of people sitting in the diner, a fraction of the normal morning crowd. And it was too quiet. She’d noticed that as soon as Rusty had shown up. First, he’d been several minutes later than usual. Then he hadn’t been able to meet her eyes, and he’d barely said anything.
“What is going on?” she said to herself.
Could the abductions be keeping people away? Or maybe the fact she’d had two dead bodies found in her alley? She shook her head. It was more than that, and she intended to find out what. She headed for the dining room.
