Laurell Hamilton - Kiss The Dead

“Vampires need the same thing,” I said.

He shook his head. “That is not true.”

“Bullshit,” I said, “the newly risen can be just as animalistic as any first-time shapeshifter.” I pulled my shirt collar to one side to expose the collarbone scar.

“That was no vampire,” he said.

“You have my word of honor on that.” I slipped out of my jacket, and since I’d had to give up all my weapons to enter the interrogation room, I could show off the scars really well, no sheaths to hide them. I showed him the bend of my elbow where the same vampire that did my collarbone had torn at my arm like a terrier with a rat.

“You have a cross-shaped burn scar.”

“Yeah, some human Renfields thought it would be funny to brand me with it.”

“And the scar that pulls the skin so it’s crooked, what made that?”

“A witch that had shape-changed.”

“Not a shapeshifter?” he asked.

“No, it was a witch that used magic to steal the animal of a real lycanthrope.”

“I was there for that one,” Dolph said. “Anita helped save one of my officers.”

It had been Zerbrowski with his guts spilling out. I’d held them in with my hands while uniforms refused to help, because they thought the witch was a real lycanthrope and they might catch it. I’d held pressure on his wound, and screamed at them that they were fucking cowards, but Dolph and I had gotten Zerbrowski out of there alive. I’d been the one who held Katie when she fainted at the hospital. There were reasons that Zerbrowski and I partnered, and that Katie made sure I and my sweeties were invited to the barbecues and dinners. She wasn’t comfy with the vampires visiting, but she let my furry sweeties come visit. She’d made sure the other cops knew that if they couldn’t deal with it, they could leave. Katie seemed so soft, but there was steel under that silk, and she’d used it to defend me and Nathaniel and Micah at the last summer cookout. I loved Katie for that day.

“The vampire that tore at you, he was the newly risen?”

“No,” I said.

He shook his head. “No vampire that had been undead for any length of time would do that, unless it was one of the revenants, those poor things that are little better than ghouls.”

“The vampire that did this to me was over a hundred years old, and no revenant. He chose to hurt me like this; he wanted to make me suffer.”

“Why?” he asked.

“That’s something he’d have to answer,” I said.

“Is he alive to answer it?”

“No,” I said.

“There are bad vampires, as there are bad people, I suppose,” he said.

“They’re people, Weiskopf, just people, and like all people, some of them are good, and some are bad, but now they’re bad people with super-strength, super-senses, and bloodlust. Without a master to hold their leash, they’re like most people, power drunk.”

“No,” he said.

“They’ve killed two police officers. It was a trap to kill me.”

He looked at the table. “They had talked of slaying you and Jean-Claude. We had told them no, but apparently they went ahead without us.”

“If you’d really been their master, you could have prevented that, and all of this.”

“But that would defeat our purpose, Anita. We wanted them to be free, to prove that vampires did not need to be herded and controlled like animals.”

“You mean like the wereanimals,” I said.

“They are part animal, Anita.”

“I have more lovers who turn furry once a month than sleep in coffins.”

He shuddered, actually shuddered, as if it made his skin crawl. “That is your choice, but vampires have no taint of beast in them.”

“No, just like human serial killers, they’re just people that do unspeakable things.”

Dolph said, “We found bombs at the last house we raided.”

That was a partial lie; we’d found the makings, or leavings, after bombs had been made, according to Alvarez, but the look of shock and horror on Weiskopf’s face made the white lie worth it.

“Oh, no, no.”

“What do they plan on doing with the bombs?” Dolph asked.

“How many did you find?”

And there is the problem with lying, you have to keep doing it.

“Two,” Dolph said.

Weiskopf looked pale. “No, they can’t.”

“What are the targets?” Dolph said, and he leaned on the table, using his size to intimidate, but it was lost on Weiskopf. He was truly shaken by the news.

“They spoke of making bombs, but we told them no.”

“But you didn’t have any real authority over them, because you didn’t make them take your oath,” I said.

“They were better when we were with them.”

“Yeah, the pheromones,” I said.

He shook his head. “We worried that our very presence was affecting them, so we began to sleep elsewhere, away from them.”

“Fuck, Weiskopf, that lost you and your Benjamin what little control you had over these people.”

He looked at me, and there was real anguish in his face. “There has to be a way to be free. There has to be a way to be just human again.”

“You’re vampires, Weiskopf,” I said, and my voice was soft, because I heard the pain in his voice. “That can’t be changed, and that means that you need a master.”

He shook his head faster, as if trying to shake a thought out. “No, no, that would make everything we’ve done… useless.”

“What are the targets for the bombs?” I asked.

He looked at me. “The Church of Eternal Life; they feel that Malcolm betrayed them all by making them take oath to Jean-Claude. Jean-Claude’s clubs and businesses. You and Jean-Claude. There were many who felt if they could kill him, and you, that they would be free. We told them that wasn’t true, that you were the best and most modern prince that we had ever seen. That you gave us hope.”

My pulse had sped, but he wasn’t actually telling us anything we hadn’t suspected. The guards would triple-check everything. We had good people. I believed that, I did, but I was still scared. “Are there any other human servants in your group?” I asked.

“No.”

A little bit of the panic subsided. There was no one to use bombs during the day, and we’d killed their demolitions expert at the warehouse.

“Wait,” I said, “are there Renfields; two-biters?”

He made a face of distaste. “ Two-biter is an insult to humans we are bringing over.”

“Renfields, then; do any of the vampires in your group have them?”

“A few,” he said.

My pulse was back in my throat. “What are their names?”

He hesitated.

“If the bombs are used, then you and your master will be just as guilty as the rest,” I said.

“You can stop this,” Dolph said.

“If anyone dies because you didn’t tell us, then you are as guilty as they are, and human servants are treated the same as vampires under the law if the vampires in question commit murder and the servants aid them in any way.”

“We would never forgive ourselves if more innocent lives are lost,” Weiskopf said, staring at his hands where they lay clenching each other on the table.

He told us the names. One of them wasn’t in the system at all, but one had a record for assault, and the other was in the system because he’d worked as a court officer before he became a vampire; then he’d lost his job. The government, not just the military branch, didn’t want vampires working for them. There was a case before the Supreme Court right now that might change that, but until it did, Clarence Bradley had lost his job, his pension, and over a decade of time in the system. That sounded like an excellent motive for all sorts of bitterness.

We put out an all-points bulletin on the one we had pictures for, and then started working to get the last picture we needed. My phone rang in the middle of it all, and I was only half-surprised when I heard Nicky’s voice, “We have a problem.”