“You gonna be okay?” he said.
“Even knocked up, I think I can take on a vampire.”
I waited while Clay slipped inside. A moment later, he stuck his head out and gave me the all clear-he’d found a place to watch over me from upstairs.
In the movies, vampires and werewolves are often portrayed as mortal enemies. Not true. There’s no gut-level antipathy, no centuries-old feud. I’m just not…keen on vampires. Chalk it up to a bad experience.
The first vampire I met tried to befriend me. Nothing wrong with that. I was flattered; who wouldn’t be? Then I’d been taken captive by supernatural-collecting psychotic humans. Her response? What a tragedy…but, as long as Elena’s gone, I might as well help myself to her boyfriend. Clay had told her where to stick it. When I’d escaped, she thought we could pick up where we left off. The lesson I learned from that? Compared to vampires, Clay is downright empathetic.
I shouldn’t tar all vampires with Cassandra’s brush, but later encounters taught me that with few exceptions, vampires are self-absorbed egomaniacs. Paige says it’s self-preservation, because they live so long and watch everyone around them grow old and die. They learn not to form attachments. I can see that. But there’s a big difference between understanding a type of person and wanting to hang out with them. When I walked into that bar to meet Zoe Takano, I knew this encounter would take some serious acting skills.
A wave of cigarette smoke rolled over me when I opened the door. Someone was giving a big middle finger to the city’s antismoking laws. A glance around, and I knew the owner wasn’t in danger of being reported. The kind of people who cared about secondhand smoke issues didn’t come here.
A dozen patrons, most of them alone, seemed dedicated to prodding the night into oblivion with beer and third-rate whiskey. A few huddled by the bar, not talking, just drinking, as if being within two feet of another person was as sociable as they could get.
Xavier had said the bartender was a supernatural. He didn’t say what kind, and it didn’t matter. But it explained why the bartender, and some of the clientele, could see a woman come in here for decades without aging, and not care. The nonsupernatural regulars could probably see a vampire feasting on the guy beside them and only decide they’d had their limit for the night.
Zoe Takano was easy to spot. For one thing, she was the only woman. For another, she was clean-with gleaming black hair, a tight white T-shirt, black jeans and motorcycle boots. And she looked more alive than anything in the bar, which, all things considered, was kind of sad.
She sat at a corner table, reading the Sun, her hand wrapped around an icy beer bottle. When I stepped in, she was the first one to look up-the only one to look up. She gave me a slow once-over, then made it a twice-over, her index finger tapping the bottle neck. Sizing up my potential as a more satisfying thirst quencher? Maybe if I played this right, we could skip the whole “small talk” portion of the meeting and get straight to the “invitation into a dark, deserted alley.”
This might not be Zoe. Xavier said the bar did attract supernatural criminals looking for a safe place to conduct business. But she was the only vampire in Toronto -a quick call to the council’s second vampire delegate, Aaron, had confirmed that. He’d given me a brief physical sketch too. Although Aaron hadn’t seen Zoe in years, with vampires, vital stats don’t change in two years or two hundred.
She fit Aaron’s description, but as I approached, I still ran a sniff test. A vampire’s smell is all artificial. I could track Cassandra or Aaron by their particular blend of soap, shampoo, cosmetics, laundry detergent, but underneath that, there was nothing. When you don’t have bodily functions, you don’t have a smell.
This woman had almost no scent at all, only a faintly chemical odor, as if she used all unscented products. The better to confuse guard dogs.
“Zoe Takano?” I said.
Her gaze slid up me, taking my measure. When she reached my eyes, I expected to see a predatory gleam. Here was a healthy woman, alone and weighted down with child. Mother Nature’s version of convenience food-dinner too dumb to keep out of danger’s path. Yet her expression was only one of curiosity.
Across the room, the bartender stopped wiping the counter and looked over at us, eyes narrowing. She must have given him some signal because he nodded and returned to his wiping.
“Zoe Takano?” I repeated, almost certain now that she wasn’t who I thought she was.
“At your service, ma’am.” Her eyes glittered then, in anticipation, but there was no hunger behind it, still only curiosity. “And I presume it is service that you’re looking for, a service I can provide?”
“I have a proposition-”
She chuckled. “Exactly what I was hoping.”
“It’s a job-”
“Ah, business. Too bad.”
I hesitated. “You aren’t taking clients-”
A tinkling laugh, like wind chimes. “Oh, I’m always taking clients. Don’t mind me. It’s been a slow week, and when there’s little to amuse me, I start to amuse myself. Sit, sit. Get off your feet. That-” a nod at my stomach, “-can’t be terribly comfortable. Not in this heat.”
“Er, yes. I mean, no, it isn’t.” I pulled out a chair and sat down. “Thank you.”
“A cold drink?” she said. “Something nonalcoholic, I presume?”
“Um, no. I’m fine. I was told-”
“First things first,” she said, leaning back in her chair. “Credentials. I presume you come on a recommendation. May I ask from whom?”
I cast an anxious glance around. “I, uh, was hoping we could do this someplace less…public.”
Another tinkling laugh and she leaned forward. “Does anyone in here look like they could summon the energy to eavesdrop, much less the inclination?”
“Er, no, but-” I tried to look nervous. “I’m really new at this and-”
“And you want me to follow you outside, where anyone could be waiting for me.” Her smile was brittle now. “I don’t know who you are or who sent you-”
“His name’s Xavier Reese. He said you don’t know him personally but…” I could tell by her expression that Xavier’s name, if it meant anything to her, wasn’t enough to get her outside. “I also spoke to Aaron Darnell, for his recommendation.”
A spark of interest behind the caution, but still cool. “Did you? And what did he say?”
“That you were reasonably trustworthy…for a thief.”
Her dark eyes danced as she grinned. “Ah, Aaron. He tries to be understanding, but he can’t shake his disapproval.”
She sipped her beer and looked thoughtful, as if even that recommendation wasn’t enough. Oh, come on. She was a vampire, impervious to harm. What was she worried about? A very pregnant blond?
She tapped her fingernails against her beer bottle then, gaze still down, gave a tiny “What the hell” smile, and pushed back her chair.
“All right,” she said. “Let’s go outside and you can tell me what all this is about.” I stepped out of the bar first. Zoe paused in the doorway, looking, listening, sensing, then followed me out.
I got two steps into the adjacent alley, turned to ask, “Is this good enough?” and Zoe was already lunging toward me. Her fangs met my fist and she flew into the brick wall with a yelp. She dove for me again. An uppercut to the jaw sent her sailing down the alley.
Not normally the way I’d treat a potential source, but short of lopping off a body part, I couldn’t do any lasting damage to a vampire. And, as with any predator, if you plan to establish dominance, you have to do it fast. So before she recovered from the uppercut, I pounced and knocked her to the ground, then pinned her.
“Hope you weren’t too hungry,” I said.
“Hungry?” She only laughed and stretched out on the ground under me, as if relaxing. “Not at all, but it seemed like the quickest way to get past all that ‘I want to talk someplace private’ nonsense, and find out what you really want…and what you are.” She slid her tongue over her split lip, and the skin mended. “Half-demon, I presume?”