“Yes, sir. I know, but, sir, he’s-”
“An asshole?” he replied with little surprise. “Even he will tell you that, Jack.”
Jackie felt a warm flush creeping into her cheeks. Great. Just great. He’s going to suspend me this time, I know it, and Laurel won’t be bailing me out of this one. There were no excuses. “I see that, sir. I lost my cool. I apologize.”
“And you will apologize to him, too, after I’m done with you.” He pushed away from his desk and walked around to the window. “What are you going to do next, Jack? It’s embarrassing as hell and makes us look like a bunch of goddamn, punch-happy Neanderthals to the public.” He pointed at the paper on the corner of his fastidiously clean desk. “Made the paper, even. I guess there was a reporter sitting in there having drinks when you went off.”
Jackie cringed. Could it get any worse? “It won’t happen again, sir.”
Belgerman gave her a pained smile. “Damnit, Jackie. At least be truthful about yourself to me. It’ll happen again. You get into shit like this all the time, Jack. It’s your nature. You’re pissed at the world. I get that. It’s part of what makes you good at what you do, but keep it out of the fucking papers. I can deal with the Pernettis of the world. I’ve put up with you for almost ten years now, and I’m still alive.” He finally relaxed a bit, leaning forward again, placing his hands on the desk. “I get paid this shitty salary to make sure you nitwits get along and still catch the bad guys, but don’t go out of your way to make it worse for me. I don’t need the ulcer.”
Jackie stared down at the gray carpeted floor. “Yes, sir.”
“You say ‘sir’ one more time, and I’m sending you home for the rest of the week. I’m not your father.”
She shifted her weight back and forth from one foot to the other. “I had some… personal issues I was dealing with last night. I think it’s all squared away now.”
He looked skeptical. “You sure?”
No, not at all, actually, but hell if I’m going home. “Yeah. Had a little heart-to-heart with Laurel about everything. I think I’m good.”
“Good. You should listen to her more. She’s the most stable agent in this office.”
Apparently, I don’t listen to her close enough. “Can I ask you something, off the record?”
Belgerman smirked. “This conversation never existed unless you decide to go beat up more agents.”
“Did you know that Laurel is… um… actually, never mind. I’ll apologize to Pernetti first chance I get.”
He contemplated her in silence for a moment. “Okay. I’d appreciate that. It won’t change his mind about you, of course, but you’ll have put forth the effort at least.”
“Thank you… John. And I’m sorry. Really. I never want to embarrass you or the organization.” Jackie got up and shuffled back toward the door. “I’ll just go get ready for the meeting now.”
“Jack?” he said, freezing her at the door.
“Yes, sir?”
“Get this anger thing dealt with, whatever it is. It’s going to force you out early if you let it, and it’s been eating at you for a long time.”
“I’ll be fine. I just need to deal with the Pernettis of the world a bit better.”
“You need to deal with yourself.” The tone had an edge to it, a bit of fatherly anger. “Next time I won’t be giving you an option.”
Jackie nodded. “Understood, sir.” She knew he was serious. Next time she would be suspended or, worse, forced to go to the damn shrink. “I’ll just go get ready for the meeting.”
Laurel waited impatiently at her desk when she walked back. “Here. He chewed you out good, didn’t he?”
Jackie stuffed half a croissant in her mouth and plopped down in her desk chair. “Wasn’t so bad.”
“Your face is still red.”
“Christ. Okay, it wasn’t great, but I’ll live. I just have to eat some crow for Pernetti.”
“Ugh. Sorry,” she said, making a face. “Beats getting suspended though.”
“Barely.”
Laurel chuckled. “Okay, two things before we prepare for the morning meeting on this case.” She clicked on her computer monitor and turned it toward Jackie. “First thing is I had a little visitor last night at my house.”
Visitor. With anyone else that might mean the local stray cat. “Great. Am I guessing correctly that you don’t mean the living sort?”
She smiled. “Yes. Something wanted into my house pretty bad, but the spells I have in place kept it out. It left in a pretty shitty mood.”
“Was this the same one you felt before at Anderson’s?” If they had some kind of vengeful spirit running around, that would be bad news. They had actually experienced that type on a case a few years earlier.
“No, but it wasn’t around long enough for me to chat with. I’m not sure what it means, but I don’t like it. I’m beginning to suspect this case has multiple parties involved. Anyway, this other thing is even more interesting. Look at this.”
Another headline from an old newspaper clipping was displayed upon Laurel’s screen. “Bayou Blood Drinker? Should I know this one? Is this the same case we looked at earlier?” The name didn’t ring a bell at all for her, but then Jackie recognized the man in the photo, or at least it looked like him. “Nick Anderson?”
“Nicholas Rembrandt, actually. Hauser sent it over to us.”
“What, his grandfather this time?”
“Don’t think so.”
“Hey! Is that Ms. Fontaine next to him?” Jackie studied the picture closer. It sure looked like her, but they were dressed in very old-fashioned clothing.
“Look at the year, Jackie.”
It took a moment for her to find it. “What the fuck? 1934?”
Laurel nodded. “Yeah, I know. Freaky, isn’t it?”
She studied the picture but was hard-pressed to find anything different in the appearances of this Nicholas character and the current Nick Anderson. Could three generations look that much alike? Unlikely. It dawned on Jackie then, why Laurel looked so excited by the article. “You think it’s the same guy, don’t you?”
She nodded. “Could be. Maybe the geek squad can figure it out for us.”
“You realize that would make Nick Anderson around a hundred years old.”
“Or older,” she added. “I’ll bet you that’s Shelby Fontaine there, too.”
“That’s nuts, Laur. They wouldn’t be-”
“Human. I know. I think they’re vampires.”
Jackie nearly snorted coffee out of her nose, coughing hard for a moment until she could regain her composure. “Can we let the geeks look at this before we jump to any conclusions like that? Vampires. That’s fucking crazy. There’s no such thing.”
“You don’t know that, and I sent an e-mail to Hauser. He’s on his way in now to do an analysis of the pictures.”
“We need a detailed workup on this shit. I don’t want to go into the meeting and claim we’re after a vampire. I’ve been embarrassed enough for one day, thank you very much. Maybe we should get some tails on Anderson and Fontaine and see what they’re up to. I don’t want to confront Anderson with this without some kind of empirical proof.”
“Can I ask Ms. Fontaine?”
It took Jackie a second to get the vague sound of interest in her voice. “Wait a sec. You think…” She paused and rolled her chair over to speak quieter. “You think she’s hot, don’t you?”
Pink crept into Laurel’s cheeks. “No. Well, okay, kinda.”
Jackie didn’t know what to say. This was utterly new territory between them. “That’s… Laur, she’s a suspect. You can’t be interested.”
“Hey, interest does not mean I’m going to do anything about it. Give me a little credit.”
She heaved a sigh of relief. “Okay, fine. That’s… fine. You really think she’s that hot?”
Laurel nodded. “Oh, yeah. Drool worthy.”
“Man, this is weird.” She waved off Laurel’s look of concern. “No, I’m good with it. It’ll be good. We can talk about your sex life instead of mine for a change.”
She laughed at Jackie. “I’ll have to have some first.”
Silence fell between them. Jackie wasn’t quite sure how to respond to that. “Speaking of awkward conversations, where’s Pernetti at? I need to go humiliate myself.”