Bloody Acquisitions (Fred Book 3) (28 page)

“If I’m so connected and scary, wouldn’t it make more sense to not attack me?” I was, admittedly, grasping at straws here, but with every word she said, Lillian seemed to seal my fate tighter. I was groping for anything that potentially offered hope.

“You’re an abandoned vampire, Fredrick. There are at least a dozen or so ways the clan can annex you into it, at which point your life is more or less theirs, or they can just claim you’ve dishonored them and demand satisfaction. If they come through the treaties, then your friends can’t help, not without calling down the Agency upon themselves.”

Scary as Lillian’s words were, they were made all the worse by the fact that I’d heard them before. That was almost exactly how Krystal had said it would go down, back when we were in Boarback and she’d first voiced her fears. I looked over at her and saw the sad resignation in her eyes. It was all coming true, just as she’d predicted.

“I’ve got a question,” Arch interrupted, his hands twirling a cigarette between his fingers. Charlotte let him smoke in his room, but had banned it in public areas, especially where food was served. “Why are you telling us all this? Shouldn’t you be scampering back to your leaders and letting them know the skinny on Fred?”

The . . . skinny? Sometimes I forgot how old Arch really was. But before I could comment on his word choice, Lillian gave her reply.

“If that’s what you really want, I can. Or I can pretend things are going fine. Doesn’t matter; sooner or later, they’re going to find out the truth. Petre is nothing if not thorough. He won’t stop digging until he finds the source of those amazing vampire rumors, and from the sound of things, there are certainly enough dots to connect him to Fredrick.” She halted, running a pale finger along the rim of her glass, creating a high-pitched whine. “As for why I’m giving you the heads up, I suppose I sort of like the idea that one of our kind can actually form relationships based on genuine affection. In the House of Turva, the only worth you have is how useful you are. After over a century of dealing with that bullshit, I wouldn’t mind seeing them take a failure or two.”

“Are all clans like that?” I asked. Though my question was directed at Lillian, it was Arch who answered.

“Vampire clans are organizations, and they work in different ways, but most of them have some form of hierarchy and need to keep people productive. Inter-clan conflict is almost a staple in the vampire world, so those who don’t shore up resources and numbers are leaving themselves open to takeover. The only thing that keeps them from building an army are the clan-size limits in the treaties, and, obviously, the conversion rate issue.”

While I wanted to ask about what the heck Arch meant by “conversion rate issue,” Krystal added on to his speech and steered my mind quickly away from the topic.

“Some clans are better than others. The Turvas are just especially aggressive, dickish specimens,” she explained. “All of them come with strings and rules, though. That’s why we built a condition into the treaties that exempts all vampire agents from their clan’s authority. If we didn’t, there would be no end to the special treatment and favors they’d be obligated to provide.”

“Bad or not, they do offer protection,” Lillian added. “Protection that you don’t have, Fredrick. My advice would be to abandon Colorado now, before anyone else puts this all together. We’ll be here for a long while, so as long as you leave the region, you should be fine. They might send a runner or two after you, but with an agent at your side, I hardly expect that to be an issue.”

“Damn right, it won’t be,” Krystal concurred. She turned in her chair, laying a hand on my shoulder. “Freddy, you said that if you needed to run, you would. I hate to be the voice of caution, but it sure seems like if there was any time to skip town, this would be it. I can have the jet prepped within a few hours.”

“Albert, Neil, and I would only be a half-day or so behind you,” Arch added. “And I assure you, they would be well protected until they reached Boarback.”

“What about Bubba and Amy?” I asked. “And Charlotte?”

“Amy Wells is a respected mage and student of the King of the West,” Lillian told us. “The clan has no way to come at her that would not invoke retribution. Same for Bubba Emerson, employee of Richard Alderson, whom we must keep in our good graces to survive.”

“As for me, I’m a fortress,” the waiter spoke up, earning a sideways stare from Lillian, who still didn’t know the true nature of the home she occupied. “I could easily keep a whole clan of vampires at bay, if they even decided to attack me. Which, honestly, seems unlikely. You already saved me, Fred. It’s time to save yourself.”

“From the mouths of magical houses,” Krystal muttered. “We have to go, Freddy. You heard Lillian. There’s no way they won’t come for you.”

No, actually, that wasn’t quite right. What she’d said, what lay at the core of all of this wasn’t the fact that I was a vampire. It was my being an unprotected vampire. Quinn the traitor, my sire, had screwed me once again by creating me as an abandoned vampire. But there might still be a way to keep myself—and my friends—safe, while staying in the town I considered home.

“What if . . . what if I joined a vampire clan?”

An Accountant in the City
1.

There were, admittedly, flaws in my plan, issues that Krystal was quick and vocal to make clear. Aligning myself with a different clan of vampires might solve my current problem, but it would undoubtedly open me up to a whole slew of new ones. No clan came without costs, and to throw in with one would mean owing allegiance to people whose goals and ideals didn’t always line up with my own.

Arch was the one who pointed out the more pragmatic issue: vampire clans weren’t often keen on taking outsiders, and we would be working with a limited time frame. Even if Lillian hid what she’d learned from her people, sooner or later there would be a target on my head, and if I hadn’t negotiated protection by then, I would out of luck.

Lillian, who I’d expected to be at least a little supportive of the idea, turned out to be my staunchest opponent, insisting that it was better to run as a free vampire than seek shelter in the cage of a clan. Her metaphor, not mine. The fact that she was the only one of us who was actually part of a vampire clan wasn’t lost on me; yet, all the same, I couldn’t bear to let the idea go entirely. Once I did, all that remained was running, and while I’d never had any issue with fleeing from danger before, something about this occasion just stuck in my gut. I couldn’t explain it, but the idea of abandoning Winslow, of starting a new life in Boarback, seemed intolerable. Which was strange, all things considered, because I’d really liked our vacation there.

Eventually, the bickering wore down as dawn approached. It seemed prudent to get some rest and think things over. Arch and Lillian went to their own rooms, while I followed Krystal up the stairs to hers. We dressed for bed in silence, slipping out of our night’s clothes—stained with blood and soot, respectively—and into comfortable pajamas. Keeping a small stash of clothes in her room had begun as a precaution and was quickly turning into a frequently needed asset. Sliding under the covers, I reached for her, but found she’d taken a perch near the edge of the mattress.

“Why are you doing this?” Her tone wasn’t one of gentle concern, or frustration, like I’d been expecting. No, I’d heard Krystal pissed off enough to know what her anger sounded like, and there was quite a bit of it in her demand for explanation.

“I just don’t want to leave town if I don’t have to,” I said.

“It’s just a place. Buildings and streets and shitty, overpriced restaurants. Our families don’t live nearby. Neither of us is even from here. I know you’ll miss the friends who stay, but life means starting over sometimes. I’ve had to do it a lot, and no one was trying to kill me. So tell me, really, why the hell are you being so stubborn on this?”

“Honestly . . . I’m not even sure I know.” Despite the fact that the room was dark, I could still see the ceiling perfectly as I stared up at it from the soft bed.

“Do you think it’s brave? That refusing to budge is manly? Because it’s not. It’s self-destructive, and pig-headed, and damn it, that’s
my
job in this relationship. I don’t need someone who is unwilling to bend. You’re supposed to be the sane one, Freddy. The one who makes the calls that are actually good for us.” Despite the fact that her fury seemed to be growing, she scooted a bit closer to me, away from the bed’s edge.

“I don’t think it’s brave at all. I know it’s stupid, that I’m being stupid, but I just . . . you were wrong a few seconds ago,” I said. “About us not having family nearby. We have Bubba, and Amy, and Charlotte, and Richard and Sally, and even Gideon, if you count him as the scary cousin with tattoos and a rap sheet. Yes, Albert and Neil would come with us, but we’d have to leave so much behind. Resetting our lives for a good cause or each other is one thing; I don’t want you to think for a moment that I wouldn’t be willing to do that. But I’ve never had something like this before. A community. A family that genuinely cared about each other. The idea of leaving it all behind is more than I can stand.”

Krystal moved closer, wrapping her arm over my chest. “It’s harder to run away when you have to actually leave something behind.”

“Guess I never had anything worth missing before.” I pulled her in close, holding her in the darkness that never seemed dark to my altered eyes. “Am I totally off base with this idea? Be brutal with me. If it’s just going to cause everyone more pain, if it will leave us worse off, if you say it’s a lost cause, then I’ll let it go.”

“You will?”

“I trust you, Krystal. With my life. And no one knows more about this stuff than you do—at least, no one in my social circle. Well, except maybe Arch, but he’s got his own desires to look after. The point is, if you tell me there’s no hope in coming out ahead on this, then I’ll believe you. We can catch the plane to Boarback after dusk.”

Instead of the expected and immediate barrage of reasons why that idea was idiotic, Krystal greeted my request with a long pause of silence. Most who knew Krystal Jenkins operated under the impression that she was impulsive, and that was a very accurate impression indeed. What many people missed, however, was that when a decision truly mattered, she showed more care with it than anyone else I’d ever encountered. That was why I didn’t object to the silence as she thought the problem through; I merely listened to the sound of her breathing from a few inches away.

“Joining a clan just to stay in Winslow is an overreaction,” she finally began. “You’re taking way too big of a jump to handle a problem that could be solved with just a sidestep of location. But the truth is that you’re ageless now, Freddy. There will be more problems in the future, and running might not solve all of them. Belonging to a clan of vampires actually would be helpful in a lot of ways down the line. You understand that the act of joining opens up a myriad of problems all its own, but the clans thrive for a reason. At least as a member, you’d only have to deal with one clan’s bullshit, instead of every House of Whatever that wants to hassle you.”

“So, joining up now might not be worth it for dodging the Turvas, but it could pay off overall in the long run,” I summarized.

“Maybe. You don’t age, but I think we’ve both been around the block enough times to know that that doesn’t mean something else couldn’t knock you off the mortal plane.” Krystal laid her hand on my chest, just above where my undead heart lay. “Though I’d make sure whoever took you regretted it, I’ve seen too much death to think even I could prevent it. No one is promised an eternity, Freddy. No one knows how long they get. You might be trading some wonderful years down in Boarback with me for kissing the ass of some vampire house’s leader and scampering about at their every order.”

“You do know how to make a compelling case for Boarback,” I admitted. “But that seems like a worst-case scenario. We have a little time, here; Lillian said she’d keep the truth a secret for now if I asked. How about I at least do a little research into the vampire clans and see if there’s one who aligns with my own general sentiments?”

A hot wash of air splashed over my chest as Krystal snorted. “Freddy, vampire clans are notoriously tight-lipped about what they do and what their long-term goals are. They file exactly the paperwork the treaties demand each year, and no more. Everything they can conceal, they do, from the Agency and from other clans. You can’t just look that kind of shit up on the internet.”

“Oh. I guess I just assumed someone would know something. I mean, Arch always seems to have the inside track on everything.”

“When you’ve been around as long as him, you’ll seem that way too,” Krystal said. “But he’s still an agent, which means he has way too much on his plate to keep up with the scheming and regime changes of every vampire clan out there. We have some analysts who do monitor what they can in that area, but pretty much all of that is confidential.”

“Well, crud. There goes my brilliant idea of doing research.” I gazed into the depths of the ceiling’s tilework, wondering if I’d be able to get Charlotte a contractor to do updates from Boarback. With no way of knowing who I’d be throwing in with, my idea seemed dead in the water. I was willing to take some risk to stay near my friends and business, but blindly joining up with a vampire organization was a step too far. I might just as easily throw in with someone as bad as the House of Turva, if not worse.