Charlaine Harris - Dead in the Family

“No problem.” There was no telling where the other two resident vampires were or if they’d survive to return before the dawn. If they did, they could all sleep in Eric’s big bed or in the other light-tight bedroom, if the coffins were required. I thought there were a couple of the fiberglass pods stashed in the laundry room, too.

Now the carpets and the furniture would be cleaned. We just had to make sure no one else died tonight. After I hung up I felt super efficient but strangely empty, which I attributed to having lost everything that had been in my stomach. Since I was so light, I floated when I walked. Okay, maybe I still had more drug in me than I’d thought.

Then it suddenly hit me—Eric had said that Pam was in the house, too. Where was she? “Jason,” I yelled, “please, please—find Pam.”

I returned to the foul-smelling living room, marched over to the windows, and opened them. I swung around to face my boyfriend, who before this night had been many things: Arrogant, quick thinking, strong willed, secretive, and tricky were only the short list. But he’d never been indecisive, and he’d never been hopeless.

“What’s the plan?” I asked him.

He was looking a little better now that Jason had done his thing. I couldn’t see any bones anymore. “There isn’t one,” Eric said, but at least he looked guilty about it.

“What’s the plan ?” I asked again.

“I told you. I haven’t made a plan. I don’t know what to do. Ocella may be dead by now, if Alexei was clever enough to waylay him.” Eric’s bloody tears ran down his cheeks.

“Bzzzzzt!” I made the noise of a buzzer going off. “You’d know if Appius Livius was dead. He’s your maker. What’s the plan? ”

Eric shot to his feet, with only a slight wince. Good. I’d goaded him upright. “I haven’t got one!” he roared. “No matter what I do, someone will die!”

“With no plan, someone’s going to die. And you know it. Someone’s probably dying right this second! Alexei is crazy! Let’s have a plan .” I threw my hands up in the air.

“Why do you smell strange?” He’d finally taken in the PEACE T-shirt. “You smell of Were and of drugs. And you’ve been sick.”

“I’ve already been through hell tonight,” I said, maybe overstating a little bit. “And now I get to go through it twice, because someone’s got to get your Viking butt on the road.”

“What am I supposed to do?” he said, in a strangely reasonable voice.

“So you’re okay with Alexei killing Appius? I mean, I sure am, but I would’ve thought you would’ve objected. Guess I was wrong.”

Jason staggered in. “I found Pam,” he said. He sat down very suddenly on an armchair. “She needed blood.”

“But she’s moving?”

“Only barely. She’s cut, her ribs are kicked in, and her left arm and her right leg are broken.”

“Oh God,” I said, and dashed back to find her. I definitely hadn’t been thinking straight because of the drugs, or she would’ve been my first priority once I found Eric alive. She’d begun crawling to the living room from the bathroom, where Alexei had evidently trapped her. The knife slashes were the most obvious injury, but Jason had been right about the broken bones. And this was after she’d had Jason’s blood.

“Don’t say anything,” she grunted. “He caught me unawares. I am. so. stupid. How is Eric?”

“He’s going to be okay. Can I help you up?”

“No,” she said bitterly. “I prefer to drag myself along the hardwood floor.”

“Bitch,” I said, squatting to help her up. It was hard work, but since Jason had donated so much blood to Pam, I hated to ask him for help. We staggered into the living room.

“Who would have thought Alexei could do so much damage? He’s so puny, and you’re a great fighter.”

“Flattery,” she said, her voice ragged, “is not effective at this point. It was my fault. The little shit was following Bobby around, and I saw he’d gotten a knife from the kitchen. I tried to corner him while Bobby got out of the house. To give Ocella a chance to cool the boy down. But he went for me. He’s fast as a snake.”

I was beginning to doubt I could get Pam to the couch.

Eric rose unsteadily and put his arm around her. Between us, we maneuvered her over to the couch he’d vacated.

“Do you need my blood?” he asked her. “I thank you for doing your best to stop him.”

“He’s my kin, too,” Pam said, settling back on a pillow with relief.

“Through you, I’m related to that little murderer.” Eric made a gesture with his wrist. “No, you need all your blood if you’re going after him. I’m healing.”

“Since you got a few pints of mine,” Jason said weakly, with a ghost of his usual swagger.

“It was good. Thank you, panther,” she said, and I thought my brother smirked a little; but just then, his cell phone rang. I knew the ring tone; it was from a song he loved, Queen’s “We Are the Champions.” Jason extricated the phone from his pocket and opened it. “Hey,” he said, and then he listened.

“You okay?” he asked.

He listened some more.

“Okay. Thanks, honey. You stay inside, lock the doors, and don’t answer them until you hear my voice. Wait, wait! Until you hear my cell phone! Okay?”

Jason flipped the phone shut. “That was Michele,” he said. “Alexei was just at my house looking for me. She went to the door, but when she saw he was a deader, she didn’t ask him in. He told her he wants to warm himself in my life, whatever that means. He’d tracked me there from your house by my smell.” Jason looked self-conscious, as if he were afraid he’d forgotten to put on deodorant.

“Did the older one come after him?” I asked. I leaned against a handy wall. I was beginning to feel really ragged.

“Yeah, within a minute.”

“What did Michele tell them?”

“She told ’em to go back to your house. She figured if they were vamps, they were some problem of yours.” That was Michele, all right.

My cell was out in Jason’s truck. I used his to call my house. Claude answered. “What are you doing there?” I said.

“We’re closed on Monday,” he said. “Why’d you call if you didn’t want me to answer?”

“Claude, there is a very bad vamp headed to the house. And he can come in, he’s been there before,” I said. “You gotta get out. Get in your car and get out. ”

Alexei’s psychotic break plus Claude’s fairy allure to vampires: This was a deadly combination. The night, apparently, was still not over. I wondered if it ever would be. For an awful moment, I looked into an endless nightmare of wandering from crisis to crisis, always one step behind.

“Give me your keys, Jason,” I said. “You’re in no shape to drive after your blood donation, and Eric’s still healing. I don’t want to drive his car.” My brother fished his keys from his pocket and tossed them to me, and I was grateful for someone who didn’t argue.

“I’m coming,” Eric said, and pushed to his feet once more. Pam had shut her eyes, but they flew open as she realized we were leaving.

“All right,” I said, since I would take any help I could get. Even a weak Eric was stronger than almost anything. I told Jason about the cleanup crew that was coming, and then we were out the door and into the truck with Pam still protesting that if we loaded her in she would heal along the way.

I drove, and I drove fast. There was no point in asking if Eric could fly so he could get there faster, because I knew he couldn’t. Eric and I didn’t talk along the way. We had either too much to say, or not enough. When we were about four minutes away from the house, Eric doubled over with pain. It wasn’t his. I got a backwash of it from him. Something big had happened. We were rocketing down the driveway to my house less than forty-five minutes after we’d left Shreveport, which was pretty damn good.