Last Vampire Standing (16 page)

Well,
that
thought dispelled my melancholy, and so did seeing Jag Queen Millie waiting for me.

“Cesca!” She grabbed me in a fierce hug. “Thank God you’re in one piece! Kay heard from her hairdresser that there was a shooting at your place last night. What in the world happened?”

“Someone took potshots at us from a tree and got away.”

Millie tut-tutted. “I’ll bet it was that nasty Gorman character giving you trouble again. But, my dear, should you be out in the open with this armed nut running around?”

“I’m sure the tour patrons will be safe, Millie. I refused to hide from Gorman the last time, and I won’t hide from him or anyone else this time.”

“That’s the spirit. Now, Cesca,” she said with a jerk of her head, “who is that strange skinny man with all the cameras and gadgets?”

I didn’t have to look to know Millie was talking about Kevin Miller, but I glanced at him anyway. He held one of his precious meters and wove his way through the fifteen other tourists waiting for me to start.

“He’s a post-graduate-school ghostbuster,” I told her as I bent to retrieve the lantern from the substation cabinet.

“Well, he certainly is odd. He’s been telling all and sundry that he’s about to crack your code for connecting with ghosts and make a killing. What is that supposed to mean?”

I straightened fast enough to make myself dizzy. Make a killing? Could Saber’s intel be wrong? Could Kevin be the shooter? He was young, wiry, and had to be strong to carry that equipment like a pack mule. Maybe those high-tech gadgets fit together to make a .22 rifle, just like in a James Bond movie.

As I watched, Kevin tripped on a cobblestone, then tiptoe-danced his lanky frame around three couples in the effort not to mow them down.

Okay, if those gadgets fit together to make a rifle, it would be more like Maxwell Smart than James Bond. Still, Pandora had warned me of betrayal and treachery. Despite his earnest eyes and guileless grin, was Kevin a killer in geek clothing?

“Cesca!” Millie said near my ear.

I flinched. “He’s a little odd but harmless. Are you taking the tour tonight, Millie?”

“No, dear, but I didn’t come just to grill you about the shooting either. Fact is,” she said with a faint blush, “I met a new gentleman friend for a drink earlier. Dan was walking me to the parking garage when I heard that Kevin person blabbing.”

“Is your friend still here?”

Millie nodded at a man in his sixties sporting navy cotton slacks, a sky blue shirt, and a head of white hair a movie star would envy. He gazed at Millie with an endearingly besotted expression.

“I’d introduce you to Dan, but I think it’s rather early in our acquaintance for him to meet my friends. I don’t want to pressure him, if you know what I mean.”

I chuckled. “He doesn’t know about the Jag Queens yet?”

“I need to break that to him soon, don’t I? By the way, will you be able to make the preseason game?”

“Not this time.” I patted Millie’s arm. “You go be with your gentleman, Millie. I’ll talk to you soon.”

Millie and Dan walked off arm in arm, and I dove into my opening spiel.

“Welcome to the Old Coast Ghost Walk. I’m Cesca Marinelli, born here in St. Augustine in 1780.”

“That was during the British period, wasn’t it?”

“Exactly,” I answered the studious-looking woman. “The Peace of Paris returned Florida to Spain in 1783, which marked the second Spanish period. Of course, the city was over two hundred years old by that time, and the ghost population only grew from there.

“Now, if you’ll start toward the city gates and hand me your tickets as you go by, we’ll begin our tour with the Huguenot Cemetery. Oh, and if you feel a ghostly presence at the gates, say hi to Elizabeth.”

The group moved out, passing me their tickets. Kevin came last, fumbling a meter as he searched his pockets.

“Hi, Ms. Marinelli. Can you hold this a minute?”

He shoved the gadget in my hand, and when the meter immediately screeched, he grabbed it back and peered at the screen.

“Wow, wicked awesome EMF reading.”

“Anything for science,” I said dryly. “Find your ticket?”

“Uh, no.”

“Never mind. Let’s go.”

“The Huguenot Cemetery,” I said when I caught up with my tourists, “was established in 1821 to accommodate those who died from the yellow fever epidemic that swept through St. Augustine. The last burial here took place in 1884, and most who are interred here are Protestants. During Spanish rule, only Catholics were buried inside the city proper.”

As we approached, three ghosts waited for us, two who looked positively gleeful. I also spotted Gorman on the opposite side of the stone-fenced cemetery but ignored him to launch into the stories of Judge Stickney, and of Erastus Nye, John Lyman, and John Gifford Hull.

“Erastus and the two Johns are said to have come to St. Augustine from the north shortly before their deaths, and all were buried side by side, their tombstones nearly identical.” I didn’t mention that the three could be pranksters, too. I didn’t want to influence an experience anyone might have.

While Kevin muttered excitedly over his equipment, I told the stories of graveyard lore, stories I only told once a week and only because they were required. They hit disturbingly close to home.

“Especially in the height of plagues such as yellow fever, the dead were buried quickly to prevent further spread of the disease. However, not everyone who was buried was quite dead.

“In some cases, victims presented all the outward signs of death but regained consciousness after being buried. We know this because, when coffins were later moved, claw marks were evident inside the lids. The victims had desperately attempted to free themselves.”

Several people in the crowd visibly shuddered, me right along with them. The residual energy of victims buried alive and clawing to escape made me sick with horror.

“Thus, those who died of certain illnesses,” I continued, “began being buried with a string tied to one hand. That string was also tied to a bell at ground level. Families, friends, or those hired to do the job began keeping watch in graveyards at night. If a bell rang, the person interred was quickly unearthed and freed. From this practice, the phrases
graveyard shift
and
saved by the bell
are said to have come into use.”

As I shepherded my group to the rest of the sights, Kevin seemed to grow more subdued. That is, until we reached the south end of town near the plaza then moved to the bay front. Kevin said a litany of
ohmygods
as he filmed, enough to spook even the hovering Gorman.

At eleven o’clock that night, with the lighthouse beam sweeping the sky, Saber and I arrived at the park to find Pandora in her house cat form lounging on the rim of the well. No Jo-Jo.

“You didn’t frighten Jo-Jo away, did you?” I asked her.

Pandora snorted.

“I take it that’s a no. Has she patrolled the area?”

“Why don’t you ask her?”

Saber frowned. “Cesca, I don’t hold conversations with werecreatures.”

“Pandora isn’t a were. She’s—”

“A magical shape-shifter, I know.” He gave Pandora the eye.

“All right. Did you see anything suspicious?”

No, and I admire this man for speaking to me.

“She says no, but thanks you for talking to her directly.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Who’s welcome for whaaa—” Jo-Jo said, flying in from behind us, but faltering in his landing when he saw Pandora. If a cat could roll its eyes, Pandora did.

“It’s okay. Pandora is our lookout tonight.”

“Uh-huh. Just as long as she stays that size. By the way, I got a call from Vince tonight. He has me booked to open for a band at

the Hard Rock Hotel in Vegas on Wednesday. Can you believe it?”

“That’s great, Jo-Jo,” I said. “Congratulations.”

“You’ll have Jemina eating crow in no time,” Saber added. “Just don’t gamble away your paycheck.”

“That’s no problem. I don’t have the face to bluff.” He grinned and rubbed his hands together. “All right, Highness, let’s start with jumping levitation since we had to cut that short last night.”

Pandora hopped off the well and trotted around the park, stopping now and then to sniff the grass or the air. Was that just a cat thing, or was she detecting trouble?

I jumped and hovered, then practiced standing levitation. I didn’t get off the ground much in either exercise, and tripped over myself trying those walking takeoffs. I knew it was all in my head, but I kept hearing those
phfft
sounds of bullets whizzing by me the night before.

Forty-five minutes into the lesson, Saber’s cell phone rang, startling us all. He flipped the phone open, barked, “Saber,” then listened.

The last of my pitiful concentration was shot as soon as he asked, “How many of them are dead?”

015

Saber walked away from us, the cell phone vacuum-sealed to his ear.

Which didn’t mean I couldn’t turn on the vamp hearing and eavesdrop, but I didn’t.

“Should we sink a fang in it and call it done?”

When I must’ve looked blank, Jo-Jo added, “The flight lesson, Highness. We’re done, right?”

“Right. Is that a new line for your comedy act?”

“That depends. You like it?”

I wagged my hand in the so-so sign.

He glanced at Saber. “Same time, same place tomorrow?”

“Unless I call you, yes. And thanks, Jo-Jo.”

He gave me a little bow, turned, and executed a perfect walking takeoff. I didn’t care about hovering, but I sure would save a lot of gas money if I could do that kind of flying.

On the other hand, I couldn’t see me flying to the beach with my surfboard. That would just be weird. Yes, I was distracting myself from listening in on Saber, but I didn’t have to be good for long.

“Right, Candy,” Saber said as he walked toward me again. “I’ll call you back from Cesca’s as soon as we do a sweep.”

Saber flipped his phone shut, and Pandora loped to join us.

“Trouble?”

“Candy and Crusher went to see Vlad, but they were am-bushed on the way out.”

My breath hitched. “Are they all right? I mean, I guess they are since Candy called you, but—”

“We’ll talk about it at home.” He looked down at Pandora. “This is a stretch for me, but I need you to ride back with us and sweep the neighborhood. Will you do that?”

Pandora chuffed and trotted toward the SUV.

Saber grabbed my hand. “Let’s go.”

We drove up and down every block in my neighborhood so Pandora could alert us to any lurking danger. When she gave me the mental thumbs-up, Saber parked at the curb in front of Maggie’s and hustled me inside the cottage. He even asked Pandora into the house to scope my place for bugs. Listening devices, he’d clarified in case Pandora thought he meant stray water beetles. Saber brought his own bug-detecting equipment from his car. Pandora didn’t say a word—or rather think a thought—while she and Saber worked their way through my house. Within ten minutes, Saber declared the cottage clean. Then he went to the kitchen to get Candy on the phone.

Pandora insisted on leaving.
I will patrol,
she said in my head as she stood at the door. I let her out, and she grew to full panther size as she padded across the lawn. Five months ago, it had freaked me out to see her do that trick. Heck, five months ago, Pandora herself had freaked me. Had my perception of normal changed or what?

When I joined Saber in the kitchen, he not only had Candy on the line, he’d turned the phone on speaker. We huddled over the handset resting on my retro table.

“Candy, tell me everything now. I want Cesca to hear this from the beginning.”

“Cesca, this is Candy Crushman,” she said with a Southern drawl. “My husband Jim and I did a drop-in on Vlad and his nest tonight. Somehow they expected us.”

“So you didn’t arrange to see them?” I asked. My VPA handler always called me to schedule a visit. Then again, I went to see him most of the time, not the other way around.

“Did I make an appointment, you mean? No. The goal was to catch them off guard, but they weren’t surprised. And weren’t remotely cordial either.”

“What happened?” Saber asked.

“We observed a hell of a lot of tension in the nest, and, when we asked who was being punished, the tension amped. Vlad said two vamps were being restrained, and admitted one was this Marco dude you asked us to look for.”

“Did Vlad say why they were in lockdown or when they’d be released?”

“Nope, only that they were learnin’ not to defy him.”

“What about Marco being immune to silver? Did you have the chance to ask about that?”

“Yeah, and we got stonewalled. Vlad shook his head at us like we were particularly stupid or gullible to believe such a tale. He said it was impossible, but Saber—” She pronounced it
Say-buh
. “You know how vamps can go utterly still?”

“Yeah.”

“The energy in that room went from tense to dead still when I asked about the silver immunity.”

“Shit,” Saber said, running a hand through his hair. “I don’t suppose Vlad showed you where he’s imprisoned the vamps.”

“Hell, Saber, he wouldn’t have shown me the bathroom if I’d threatened to pee on his carpet. He barked at a female called Jemina to show us out, and—”