“You know her?” he asked. “Look carefully before you answer.”
I gazed at the picture long enough to satisfy him. “I can’t be absolutely sure I’ve never seen her on the street, but she’s not familiar. Why?”
“She was murdered in Daytona Beach last Friday.”
“I haven’t been to Daytona.”
“She was a vampire in the nest there. Ike’s second-in-command. You heard from Ike lately?”
“First, nests are supposed to be illegal. Second, I’ve never heard from Ike, never met him, and I’ll be fine if I never do.”
“He hasn’t contacted you at all?”
“Why should he? Vampires don’t do Welcome Wagon gift baskets.”
“Detectives,” Sandy said, “we’ve been at this for close to two hours. My client has been more than open with you. She obviously had no reason to be involved in either of these women’s deaths.”
“But can she account for her movements since Tuesday night?” Saber asked.
“She can. What’s more, the GPS tracker has recorded her movements for months now.”
March cleared his throat. “The tracker should do exactly that, Counselor, but Ms. Marinelli’s tracker stopped sending signals on Monday night.”
“It what?” I blinked at March, touched my right upper arm. “That was three days ago! I’m supposed to be notified if I fall off the radar for more than an hour.”
“Apparently there’s a glitch in the system,” March said.
Sandy turned to me. “No wonder your arm ached. Stony must’ve damaged the tracker.”
“By doing what?” Saber scoffed. “Manhandling you a little?”
I gaped at him, and maybe March and Sandy did, too, because the room fell silent.
“You know,” I said steadily, “I could have filed assault charges if I’d known Stony’s real name. Just because I heal quickly doesn’t mean I can’t be hurt.” I stared at Saber’s sunglasses a long moment and added, “If you prick me, I will bleed.”
“I’ve pricked you this evening, Ms. Marinelli. You plan to bleed me?”
“Hardly. Pay attention, Mr. Saber. I. Don’t. Bite. People.”
“Why not?”
“Because you never know where they’ve been.”
I looked pointedly away from Saber to Sandy. “Resign as my counsel if you want, but I’m done. Detective March—” I cut my gaze to him. “I believe the phrase is charge me or let me go.”
“I’m not prepared to charge you.” He sighed and dug into his jacket pocket. “Here. The VPA sent this by courier.”
March handed me a small disc sealed in plastic. A new Vampire Protection Agency tracker.
“Thank you,” I said. “To show good faith, I’ll leave you with a few facts.” I leaned forward and tapped on his tablet. “You might want to write this down, since your hotshot preternatural investigator apparently hasn’t filled you in.
“First, in addition to a lot of other information, the VPA has a cast of my fangs on file. Call Dave Corey at the Jacksonville office to access them. They won’t match the victim’s marks, because my teeth are wider.”
He scribbled a note without breaking eye contact. “Go on.”
“Second, Yolette was dead before those punctures were made. Vampires are predators, not scavengers. They don’t shoot people,
and
break their necks,
then
munch on them.”
“Shoot them?” March echoed, his eyes narrowing on me.
I realized my goof—giving them more information than they thought I had—and thought fast to cover my tracks. “If what Neil said is right, yes. He told me he felt a bullet hole in the back of her head.”
“He specifically said a bullet hole?”
“I think so. No matter how she died, the point is she was dead before the fang marks were made. No blood flow. No reason to feed off her.”
“Why not?” March asked. “A vamp can suck wounds, right?”
“But they don’t feed that way, Detective. Blood is life. Blood of the dead is just dead. The bites are staging.”
He nodded. “Anything else?”
“On the incident report form, there’s a line to list injuries. Janie and Mick both knew my arm was sore, first from the grabbing and shaking, then from being jerked around in Scarlett ’s. I don’t know if that’s why the tracker stopped working, but Janie insisted we list an arm injury, and now the tour company needs me to sign a medical waiver. In spite of what
some
people think—” I glared at Saber. “—a trauma to a vampire body has consequences. However briefly it may last.”
I pushed back my chair and stood. “I’ll be here at eight to talk to your artist, but if you have any more questions, contact my attorney. Right now I need to get this tracker implanted and get to work.”
I admit it. I sailed out of the room, out of the building, in, as the Regency novels say, high alt. Even the foul, rainy weather didn’t dim my triumph, though it did make me stop to coax my umbrella open.
Sandy was snug in her trench coat when she caught up with me outside the sheriff ’s department doors. “You did well, overall, but don’t push Saber too far.”
“He deserved it.”
“Certainly he did, but he’s at least a state-if not federal-level cop and an unknown factor. I’ll call a few colleagues in Daytona and see what they know about him.” She gestured at my arm. “Can you get the tracker taken care of today?”
“If an ER doctor can work me in, I can get it done now. If not, it’ll be tonight after work.”
“Good. And, Francesca, don’t worry. There’s no way they’ll railroad you for this.”
Why did that have a “famous last words” ring to it?
I followed Sandy’s midnight blue Beemer south on U.S. 1 until I turned into the Flagler Hospital grounds. There I caught a break because—in spite of the rain—the ER was virtually empty, and the doctor who’d inserted my first tracker was on duty. The procedure had to be documented with photos as well as a written report, so a nurse took digital pictures as the old tracker came out and the new one went in. A few stitches later, a quick test of the device, and I was outta there. At seven fifty, the rain had stopped, but the wind gusted strongly off the bay. At times like those, I wished there was a back entrance to our building for tenants. Since there isn ’t, I parked in my reserved space, sprinted around the building to Cathedral Place, and ran up the stairwell.
Maggie wasn’t home yet and didn’t answer her cell. I left her a message about the interview with March and left another message for Dave at the VPA about the new tracker. Those duties done, I refreshed my makeup, then decided to toss down another six-ounce bottle of blood to speed-heal the new implant into place.
Tonight I’d decided on a Minorcan costume paired with a water-repellent microfiber cape with a hood. The cape wasn’t period-authentic, but it was warm, and I’d had a bad day. Why add to it? With my damp hair twisted into a high bun and my teeth freshly brushed, I left for work at eight thirty.
I arrived at the same substation on St. George Street where music pulsed from the Mill Top Tavern and Mick paced the small plaza dressed in street clothes and a windbreaker.
“God, Cesca, don’t you ever check your damn cell phone?” was his cheery greeting when he spotted me. “Janie and I have tried to reach you a dozen times.”
“I’ve been on the dead run all day.”
“Dead run? Har, har.” He punched me on the shoulder, the good one. “Seriously, answer your cell now and then. We were worried about you.”
“You were?”
“Hell, yes. For some reason we like you.”
I grinned. “Thanks. Hey, you’re not on rotation tonight, are you?”
“No. I volunteered to give you this personally.” He passed me a rolled piece of paper and a pen. “It’s the medical waiver.”
I unrolled the form, scanned it, signed it, and handed it back.
“I’ll take this to the office in the morning,” he said, tucking the form and pen in his windbreaker. “You talk to the cops yet?”
“For more than two hours this afternoon.”
“Have they found Stony?”
I pulled my hood tighter as a gust of wind blew off the bay. “They have a sketch, but I don’t know how hard they’re looking for him.”
“Well, Janie and I put in the good word for you.”
“Thanks.” I smiled and looked around. “Is anyone signed up for the late tour?”
“Yeah, nine hearty souls. You’re stopping at the drugstore, right?”
He meant the building that housed the oldest drugstore, circa 1737. The building was once a house of revelry north of town, then moved and plopped atop an Indian burial ground that was part of the Tolomato Cemetery. The drugstore is one of the most haunted places in an entire downtown of haunted places, and one of the buildings I’d skipped on Tuesday’s tour.
“Yep, that’s on tap tonight.”
“Mind if I tag along for a while? Ghosts flock to you, and I want to find the bugger that bit my arm last week.”
“Fine by me, but I’ve had two weird tours this week. Sure you want to risk another one?”
“I’ll chance it. I brought my digital Kodak. And if the ghost biter doesn’t show, maybe Stony will.”
“Oh, yeah, I’d love to hand his mug shot to the cops.”
“Great minds think ali—What the heck?”
I turned in time to be engulfed in a Shalimar embrace.
“Francesca, you poor dear!” Shalimar Millie was back and dressed in Jacksonville Jags sweats again—minus the visor—as were two other ladies from Monday’s tour. Their purses were beach bag–sized and hitched on their shoulders.
“Millie, you’re all right,” I said, smiling.
She pulled away, looking part confused, part indignant. “Did you think I was ill?”
“Oh, uh, no,” I stammered to cover my apparent gaffe. In my admittedly limited experience, people of a certain age either complained about infirmity or denied it. “You just looked tired, or, um, worried or something on Tuesday night.”
She flipped a hand in dismissal. “I simply had some unfinished family business on my mind.”
“Well, I’m glad you’re back.”
“Oh, we plan to keep coming back.” She nodded firmly. “We’ve adopted you.”
I stared for a beat. “Excuse me?”
“We’re sure that frightful man from the other night killed the Frenchwoman and is trying to pin it on you. ” She smiled broadly. “Until that troublemaker is caught, two or three of us will take every tour you lead. And, ” she added, patting her purse,
“we’ll be packing.”
My mouth fell open. Packing? As in armed? I wanted to laugh until I realized she was perfectly serious. Then I felt my eyes widen and stuttered, “B-but, ma’am, you don’t need—”
“Not, ma’am, just Millie. That’s Grace Warner, and that’s Kay Sims,” she said, pointing to ladies who both had short silver hair and identical determination-stamped expressions.
“Millie, I appreciate your thoughtfulness, but—”
“No buts,” she said, holding up her beringed hand. “Some people adopt highways. We’re adopting you. We have disposable incomes, senior discounts, and we’d love to help nail that nasty man. Not that the Frenchwoman wasn’t a pariah, but that wasn’t
your
fault.”
I had two seconds to digest Millie’s announcement—and puzzle over her pariah comment—when someone tapped me on the shoulder. I nearly jumped out of my shoes as I spun around to find a twenty -something man in jeans and a Flagler College sweatshirt standing almost on top of me. When did he sneak up?
Vampire Senses Stunned by Shalimar Lady. Film at eleven.
“Ms. Marinelli? Paul Thoreaux. Has the sheriff’s department made any progress on the French Bride murder?”
“Hunh?” Quick when I’m startled, aren’t I?
“Are you a suspect in the case?”
Yikes, a reporter? I glanced at the press ID clipped to his sweatshirt and gathered my sadly scattered wits.
“I don’t think I can comment other than to say I had no reason to harm the bride, and the groom has my sincerest condolences.”
“He says you didn’t do it.”
I blinked. Not the sharpest knife in the drawer tonight. “Who and what are you talking about?” I asked.
“The husband. Etienne Fournier. He says you didn’t kill his wife but thinks some guy who was following them around did it.”
“Stony, the Covenant guy?” I asked.
“The stalker was honest-to-God Covenant?” Reporter Paul all but wagged his tail in excitement. “Shit, they play rough, but I didn’t think they bothered regular people.” He darted me a glance. “No offense.”
“None taken. Mr. Fournier is right. I didn’t kill his wife.”
“That remains to be seen,” a deep, mellow voice said from my right.
I turned. In slow motion. Hoping what I heard would prove to be a trick of the wind. It wasn’t. Deke Saber sauntered toward our little group in the same clothes he’d worn this afternoon minus the sunglasses. The jacket was buttoned to hide his gun, but I saw the slight bulge at his hip. Could this day get any worse?
I didn’t even try for tactful. “What are you doing here?”
“Taking in the sights,” he said mildly.
“You’re taking my tour?”
“Who’s this guy?” Reporter Paul asked, all eagerness.
“I’m a new…acquaintance of Ms. Marinelli’s,” Saber said.
“She doesn’t look happy to see you,” Millie shot back.
“I’m hoping to grow on her.” He flashed the kind of smile meant to charm the support hose off the older ladies. Shalimar Millie didn’t fall for it, bless her. “Humph. Handsome is as handsome does.”
“Hell,” Reporter Paul groused. “I thought you were that Stony guy. The one stalking the French couple.”
“Oh, no,” Millie supplied. “That man had a long scar on his face. If he tries to pull anything tonight, we’ll shoot him.”
Paul blinked long eyelashes.
“That’s right,” I jumped in. “These ladies are armed with their digital cameras tonight. So is Mick. ” I pointed to my colleague’s goofily grinning face. “He’s also a tour guide. Maybe you should talk to him.”
The reporter brightened and headed toward Mick, whose goofy grin morphed into a dirty look at me. I spun toward Millie and her merry band and shooed them back a few paces. “Ixnay on the gun-ay talk-ay, ladies,” I whispered, hoping Saber couldn’t hear.
“Why? I have a permit,” Millie said.
“To carry concealed weapons?” I hissed in frustration.
“We’re seniors. The fuzz won’t bust us,” Silver Kay said.
“Not unless we actually shoot someone,” Grace added.
Millie shook her head at me. “My dear, you’re looking awfully frazzled. Did you get a chance to, uh, eat tonight?”