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  Seeing Tabitha again made me realize how much I wished I’d thought to make her the same kind of offer. You can be with me or you can be a vampire. What would she have said if I’d laid it all out for her like that? Instead, I gave her what she wanted and then pushed her away so that we couldn’t hurt each other.

  Because that’s what happens with vampires. Sometimes it happens to the woman first and other times it’s me, but one or both parties always wind up betrayed and angry when a young attractive living human comes between them. The warmth is too much of an aphrodisiac and it isn’t like Tabitha could have both warmth and immortality. It doesn’t work that way.

  I shook my head vigorously, trying to wipe thoughts of her and her human boy toy out of my head, but visions of her, the boy toy, and a faceless male vampire clung to my brain like a porno decoupage. In the absence of her vampire fuck buddy’s true appearance, Winter filled in.

  Winter. Thinking of him brought me back to the task at hand—finding the asshole demon holding Marilyn’s soul. Winter obviously knew more than he’d given me, but even Rachel had been surprised when he’d offered me not just a name, but contact information. “His name is J’iliol’lth. He maintains an office at the Lovett Building. Demons adore the Lovett Building.” Winter had handed me a business card with a number printed on it.

  “Dig a little deeper, darling,” he’d told me. “Do your research and by all means, keep your eyes on the demon. They’re tricky and you should know that he isn’t working alone. Most important, you should know that I had nothing to do with it.”

  “Nothing to do with what?” I’d asked.

  “Exactly.” He had laughed in a way that reminded me of golden raindrops falling on my brain. I think I was supposed to be charmed. Instead, I’d been irritated, especially when he’d added, “Now, run along.”

  Outside the window, Void City blurred past. Seeing me with Rachel had shaken Tabitha. I almost had Tiko turn around, but I didn’t know what else I could do. The reasons we couldn’t be together were still valid and she’d obviously moved on. If I went back it would just start another scene. Maybe she really was happy with those High Society leeches. It occurred to me that I wanted her to be happy. I rolled that thought around in my brain for a while.

  It didn’t take as long as I thought it would for us to get back to the Pollux, or maybe I was just too distracted. Rachel’s pulse beat too fast. Nervous or guilty? I asked myself. She smelled excited, ready for sex, but I didn’t trust the scent. Around her that odor was as constant as the cinnamon smell and the little thoughts that weren’t quite mine. I didn’t want to think about that, either. I hoped she’d just pull whatever scam she was trying to pull without me figuring it out. Ignorance is still bliss.

  I felt the Pollux before I saw it, like recognizing an old girlfriend’s footsteps in the mall. Certain things felt more real to me since Magbidion and Rachel had brought me back. I felt Fang, too. He wanted to be driven, to hunt.

  When we got there, Rachel followed me upstairs to the office. Greta was sitting in my desk chair, typing on the computer. She hadn’t been able to keep all of the furniture in the rest of the building when the state had come for my assets, but my office was intact.

  “I just reclaimed your e-mail address. I meant to have that done already, but…” She shrugged. Vampires get a weird waxy smell when they haven’t fed and they’re hungry. It takes a few days for me to get to that point, but Greta gets hungry fast. She smelled already. Never turn a human with an eating disorder. You’d think the change would cure the disorder, because you can’t gain weight, but it doesn’t. It’s either famine or feast with that girl and stress makes it worse.

  “You haven’t fed,” I said.

  “I wanted to make sure you got back okay.”

  “You didn’t smell like this when the resurrection thing happened, so you can’t have gone more than a day. Go eat.”

  She hugged me. “I missed you, Dad.”

  “I missed you, too,” I said as I returned the hug. “Go eat, but only one person and don’t kill them; you can’t afford to pay Magbidion right now.” I glanced around the room and listened hard. “Where is Mags anyway?”

  “He said he wanted to get a buddy of his to pull the info on whoever filed to have Eric Jones declared dead. I told him it was okay if he kept parking in the deck.”

  She bounded out of my office.

  “Take Fang,” I called after her. “Run over a cat or something. It’ll cheer you up.”

  “Okay. Cool,” she called back.

  I picked up the phone, an old-style handset, while Rachel flipped through the CDs stacked on my desk.

  “Iron Maiden. Metallica. The Rolling Stones. Are any of these still around?” she asked.

  “They are.” I pulled the business card Winter had given me out of my wallet and started to dial. Rachel hung up the phone with her finger and leaned over my desk so that the silver rings in her nipples peeked out at me from beneath her dress. “What?” I asked.

  “This demon you’re supposed to meet, J’iliol’lth? Winter said he was a power broker, but that’s not the part you need to worry about. He’s a demon, a scary one; I’ve…um…heard people talk about him at the Irons Club before.”

  I was tired of hearing about the damn Irons Club. I moved her hand away from the phone and dialed the number for J’iliol’lth. Rachel wrinkled her nose at me and stuck out her tongue. She slid past me, grinding against my crotch on her way to the computer.

  “Samhain Industries.” The voice on the phone was reminiscent of Ebon Winter, curiously androgynous with a dash of civilized disdain. Samhain Industries? Cute, a funny demon.

  “How can you help me?” I asked flatly.

  “Excuse me, sir?”

  “You’re supposed to ask how you can help me or how you can direct my call.”

  “Excuse me, sir?”

  “Just let me talk to the demon.”

  “Excuse me, sir?”

  Rachel pulled up a picture of a beautiful girl with lines of piercings laced like a corset up her sides.

  “Do you like it?” Rachel asked. “I was thinking about getting one.”

  I held my hand over the receiver. “It looks painful.”

  “Sir?” called the voice on the phone.

  “Sorry. Look. I need to speak to Jill E. Olth or however you say his name. He may be expecting my call.”

  “Vampire, human, demon, or other, sir?”

  “Vampire.”

  “Is this issue soul related, ascension based, or other?”

  “Soul related.” Jesus, she sounded like she was reading from a script.

  “Yours or another person’s, sir?”

  “My aunt Trudy’s! Just get the demon on the fucking phone!”

  “I don’t have to listen to that kind of language, sir.”

  “You know what? You’re in the Lovett Building, right? Why don’t I just come down there? I’m sure you’ve got all kinds of cool wards, but my car recently became undead and I think I ought to see if I can just drive it into the lobby. Then, I think I’ll turn into a giant uber vamp and start tearing the place apart. Ooh, or better yet, I’ll turn into a revenant and start sucking people’s souls out. That would be fun.” I don’t know why I said that. Turning into a revenant had to be near the absolute bottom of my to-do list. Then again…I wondered. Could I change back and forth if I wanted?

  “Hold on a sec.”

  I turned into a revenant. Done on purpose, it felt as if I were expanding and contracting at the same time, my body bursting and then drawing into the center of my spectral self as my skin went even colder than usual. The receiver fell through my hand to the top of the desk and I changed back quickly, afraid that I might get stuck again. That answered my question, though. I could do it if I needed to do it.

  The voice laughed at me.

  “You must be the being for whom we’re holding Marilyn Robinson’s soul.” It wasn’t the same voice, but it sounded like the same person. He no
w spoke with a polished, educated accent, almost British.

  “Yeah, that’s me.”

  “Then it’s my great regret to inform you that you’ve been speaking to a very talented, but quite mischievous answering imp.” The voice changed again. Now it was nasal and annoying. “Call the master’s human secretary at the following number.” I scribbled the number down, hung up, and closed my eyes for a minute.

  Rachel was afraid again. Her body pressed into the left side of the chair.

  “Problem?” I asked.

  “How are you doing that?” she blurted.

  “Doing what?”

  She looked stricken, biting her lip rather than answering. I held up my hand in front of my face. Purple light illuminated my palm. With a little effort, I changed the light from purple to red.

  “I’m not that mad. I don’t know what makes my eyes glow purple.”

  “But how…never mind.”

  How can I still lose my temper with you doing whatever it is you’re doing to try to control me? I thought to myself. Good question.

  “Get the piercing,” I told her. “Why don’t you go get it now, tonight? I want to see it tomorrow.”

  “It’s awfully late.”

  “I’m sure you can find someone to do it.”

  “Okay.” She sounded cheerful again, but her heart was pounding. She was pissed, but hiding it. If she was a good little thrall, she’d have to go, wouldn’t she? But was she a good little thrall? Based on what Marilyn told me, I could order her to do it and she’d have to obey. Something rose up in the hindmost part of my brain…something quirky about frogs, or maybe tattoos, then it was gone.

  I dialed the number. Someone answered before it even rang. “Yes?”

  Rachel moved past me without the grinding.

  “I want to set up a meeting with the demon.”

  “Lord Eric.” The speaker sounded like she’d never been happier to speak with anyone in her entire life. “I’m so pleased you called. Lord J’iliol’lth has been waiting to talk to you.”

  “How soon can he meet me?” And how’d he know my name? I guess he’d had four months in which to do some digging.

  “Perhaps this evening around eight?” the voice offered.

  The clock on the wall said it was after midnight, almost one o’clock. “No, I want to meet him now…this morning, before dawn.”

  “I’m sorry.” Her tone told me everything I needed to know; she thought my request was absurd. “Lord J’iliol’lth has already retired for the evening. We can’t all be nocturnal. If you didn’t suffer from your condition, of course, then he would be happy to meet with you at his offices in town as early as seven o’clock this morning.”

  I could hear Rachel changing out of her prom dress in my bedroom down the hall. “Fucking Emperor,” she mumbled under her breath. I heard her fingers touch her lips as if she were covering her mouth, having spoken out loud by mistake.

  “Where are his offices again?”

  “Suite 603 in the Lovett Building.”

  I scrawled that on my notepad. Everyone in Void City knew the Lovett Building. It was the skyscraper downtown with the big golden dome on top. Rumors said that all kinds of satanic rituals took place there late at night. Obviously, the rumors were wrong. The satanic rituals took place early in the morning. It just goes to show that you can’t trust rumors. “What’s the window situation?”

  “Sir?”

  Rachel stopped in the doorway wearing jeans and a T-shirt. She smiled at me and I motioned for her to wait. “The window situation,” I said more slowly. “What is it like? Does he have windows in his office?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Do they have blinds?”

  “Well, yes, sir, of course they do. They were designed by Lady Gh’st’na’kzi herself. They are quite stunning.”

  “Tell him I’ll see him at seven, then, and he’d better be prompt. My assistant Rachel will be with me as well. Is that an issue?” Rachel raised an eyebrow at that, but I held a finger to my lips to keep her from asking any questions.

  “No, sir. But if you don’t mind my asking…won’t you be asleep, sir?”

  I laughed. “Just confirm the appointment, lady, and make sure he has the damn blinds closed.”

  She did so and I hung up. It felt good to have a plan. Smiling at Rachel, I put my arms around her and kissed her full on the lips. She returned the kiss passionately before disengaging herself. “Do you mind telling me what I just volunteered for?”

  “In five hours I need you to run an errand for me.”

  “I don’t take much sleep, Eric, but even I have to get three or four hours. Otherwise, I’m useless,” she complained. “That’s the only reason I was worried about getting the piercing tonight.”

  Sure, that was the reason. I would have believed her if the office didn’t smell like a whorehouse running a special on cinnamon-scented panties.

  “I think you’ve told me that before.” I walked around behind her, pushed her facedown onto the desk, and helped her off with her jeans.

  Later, as she slept, I spooned with her, feeling the faint reverberation of her beating heart against my skin, wallowing in her warmth, in the unconscious rise and fall of her chest as I held her. My fingers traced the intersection of flesh and metal at her nipples. Asleep, there was no cinnamon, no little not-my-thoughts.

  “You’re making it awfully hard to ignore whatever it is you’re doing,” I whispered. She gave me a sleeper’s sigh in response.

  What had been up with the piercing anyway? Why offer to get it if she didn’t want it? If I’d been turned on by the piercing, would she have gotten it? I had no doubt that she would have done so gladly, but why? Because it would have enhanced the sex, the attraction? That felt like the right answer. Everything was tied up in that. I disentangled myself and she stirred, reaching back unconsciously not for my hand, but lower. I climbed out of bed. A frown, brief but present, touched her lips before she settled back into her normal circadian rhythm.

  I took my clothes with me and changed into them out in the hall, not sure where I was going until I was already in the parking deck near Magbidion’s RV. I pounded on the door and was answered by a bleary-eyed Mags wearing nothing but a poorly tied bathrobe.

  “What is it?” He clearly wasn’t awake yet. “Where’s the car?”

  “Don’t worry about the car,” I told him, “and cover up.”

  He drew the robe tighter, the light of intelligence behind his eyes growing brighter as he fought his way free of the sleep toxins I no longer possessed. “You look intense this morning.”

  “Yeah. Sorry to wake you. Look, I need to ask you a question.”

  “As long as it’s nothing too complicated.” He leaned against the door, not inviting me in. Not that I needed an invitation. Vampires don’t.

  “What do you know about vampire thralls and sex magic?”

  “So you’ve been thinking it, too?” He smiled.

  “Thinking what?”

  “That your girlfriend Rachel is a tantric witch.”

  “Yeah,” I lied. “I was thinking something like that.”

  “Come on in.” He stepped clear of the door. “If you don’t mind, can you tell me exactly what you did, step by step, when you made Rachel your thrall?”

  I told him everything that I remembered, and then he told me how it was supposed to work and I had him write it all down. We ran some tests. Could I sense my vampiric offspring if I concentrated? Yes. Could they tell I was sensing them? Yes. Even if I focused on hiding from them? Yep. Could I sense Rachel? No, or not always. Could I see through her eyes? No.

  “It’s called the dark tantra,” Magbidion said finally. He clarified before I even asked. “Normal tantric magic is about healing energy, divine union. It’s healthy and positive, but what Rachel is doing sounds like what succubi use: sex of power, by power, and for power.”

  “That doesn’t sound too bad.”

  Magbidion balked at that. “She’s a
human using magic that’s meant for demons, very specific demons that suck your soul out through your privates or use sex to control you.”

  “Is she sucking my soul out?”

  “No, or I don’t think so. Hold on.” Magbidion made a circle with the thumb and forefinger on his right hand, then looked through it at me. “It doesn’t look like it, but I can see why she might want to.”

  “Why is it that? Do I have a really cool soul or something?”

  “Um, well, okay, yes, sort of, but I don’t think you understand how rare this is. It’s like the core of your being exists in a state of grace. There’s something else weaving through it, too, a curse or an enchantment. You—”

  “Now you’re sounding like Talbot.” I covered Magbidion’s hands with mine, blocking his view. “So I have the York peppermint pattie aura. Whoopee. I don’t want to hear anything else unless it has to do with Rachel.”

  “The short version?” Magbidion said.

  I nodded.

  “My best guess is that she’s trying to control you, but at your power level, I don’t know how effective she’d be…maybe she could influence your emotions, put thoughts in your head, but very little direct control. She could even leech power off of you, but I don’t think it’s something you’d miss. I’m talking little dribs and drabs.”

  “Tell me how it works.”

  By the time Greta pulled back in with Fang, I felt like I might be ahead of the game.

  15

  ERIC: EVERYBODY LOATHES JILL

  Rachel approached the Lovett Building a little before seven o’clock. She was dressed in a smart-looking red business suit that showed just a little too much cleavage and way too much leg to be appropriate for the workplace (well, this particular workplace, anyway). The lenses of her sunglasses were also tinted red and the heels of her shoes were three or four inches high.