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My mouth went dry. My throat was too swollen and tight to swallow the lump growing there. Is that what he really thought of me? Is that what he’d been thinking of me the whole time? Was he laughing at me, sneering inside at the poor, pathetic loser he could manipulate with a few flirty suggestions and a pity lay?
Biting my lip, I willed away the hot tears gathering at the corners of my eyes. At least Paul only showed signs of emotional indifference. With Cal, I’d slept with a man who seemed to disdain me actively before even meeting me.
“You will not cry in the middle of the Council office,” I ordered myself with a growl. “You will not cry here. You will not cry in the car. You will finish up here, go home, and shove a stake up his ass. Sideways. ”
Boiling rage, like lava rising from the pit of my stomach, consumed every cell in my body. It was comforting or, at least, more comfortable than the crushing weight of self-doubt. How dare he? How dare he make those “observations” about me without even meeting me? What was he basing this on? Secondhand accounts from Council officials? Had he watched me from a distance like some creepy stalker? Because using a telephoto lens was a great way to sketch someone’s character. And my clothes were not that conservative!
Grinding my teeth, I had shoved the file folder into my bag, followed by the scanner, when I heard a voice outside the door. Terror replaced my righteous spinsterly anger.
Yeah, I was going to have a hard time letting that one go.
Ophelia was berating some poor underling for “not knowing her ass from the sparse collection of cells between her ears. ” I scrambled to restack the files on the table. Should I hide? Should I try to crawl under the desk?
I slipped around the desk to the black leather armchair decorated with zebra-striped pillows. I dropped the tote on the floor and crossed my legs, as if I’d been waiting patiently. I concentrated on my breathing, trying to slow my pulse.
Please don’t let me be sweating right now. Pit stains would both tip off and offend Ophelia.
The door clicked open behind me, and I turned, smiling as Ophelia walked through.
She arched an eyebrow. “Iris, we didn’t have an appointment. ”
Reaching carefully around the scanner, I pulled the shoe-box-sized carton out of my tote. I smiled, easily feigning excitement thanks to nervous energy. “I know, but I couldn’t wait to drop off the Clarenbault!”
For a moment, an honest expression of delight passed over her eyes. She looked like the schoolgirl she pretended to be. She held out her hands and took the box from me, opening it to find a sweet-faced porcelain princess in an intricately embroidered peacock-blue gown.
“Oh, she is a beauty. ” Ophelia sighed. “I am very pleased, Iris. ”
“Wonderful, but I’d be more comfortable if you didn’t look at the receipt while I’m in the room. ”
She smirked at me, crossing her office to sit in her desk chair. “You know what I find interesting about you, Iris?”
“My puckish sense of humor?” I suggested, my voice cracking slightly on the last syllable.
She tilted her head, resting her chin on her hand. She eyed me, her gray eyes twinkling with some mischievous glee. “You’ve never asked why I ask for dolls and toys and frilly dresses. ”
I cleared my throat and answered shakily, “I figure that’s your business. ”
“You’re not wrong,” she said, glancing down at the framed portrait. “You have a sister, yes? Gladiola. How old is she now?”
“Seventeen going on forty,” I muttered, grateful to have something to think about besides the numerous ways I could kill Cal and get away with it. The sideways ass-staking was definitely in the lead.
She snorted. “You have no idea how apt that description can be. I have a sister, too. Georgina. I was nine years older. ”
My brows rose. Did she say “have”? I peered at the gray-eyed little girl in the portrait but decided it was in my best interest not to comment.
Ophelia continued, “Our parents brought us over on one of the crossings just after the Mayflower. It was miserable. Hot, cramped, and smelling to high heaven. At night, I would go aboveboard just to get a breath of fresh air while everybody else was asleep. And I found that there was a vampire stowed away on the ship, feeding on rats and trying to stay under the radar. He didn’t threaten me or try to bite. I think he was just lonely. ”
I sat stock-still, afraid that Ophelia would realize how much she was sharing with me. This marked two very old vampires spilling their guts to me in as many days. Clearly, I had some sort of invisible sign on my forehead that said, “Deposit origin story here. ”
“When we landed, I expected him to forget me, but he stayed near and watched. I think he knew how hard life would be in Massachusetts. There was rarely enough food. We had to work constantly just to scratch out the barest existence. He turned me before I could die of what was probably the flu.
“I rose just in time to find that Georgie had taken ill. I couldn’t stand the idea of letting her be buried in an unmarked grave. My friend and sire, Joseph, ordered me not to turn her, but she was my sister. I broke with my sire and turned Georgie. He had no choice but to take me before what served as the Council in those days. They decided that they would let Georgie live but that I would be responsible for her for the rest of my days. ”
“And Georgie?” I asked. “I take it she’s the proud recipient of frilly dresses and antique dolls?”
“She has beautiful taste,” Ophelia said. She leaned forward on her elbows, staring at me. “It’s difficult being the older sister sometimes. Making the sacrifices we have made to make sure that our younger sisters survive, if not thrive. That survival may not come in the form we would hope, but we do the best we can. ”
Cryptic, thy name is Ophelia.
In the face of my blank stare, she frowned, the classic frustration line forming between her downy black brows. She cleared her throat and tried a different tack. “I’ve always appreciated your discretion when it comes to Georgie’s special orders. Very few people know about her existence. ”
I nodded. “So why are you telling me about her?”
“A show of good faith,” she said. “I want to level the playing field, so to speak. You’re a person who knows how to keep information to herself. You’re someone who realizes how easily misplacing that information could hurt other people. People who are important to you and to the vampire community. ”
Ophelia shuffled some papers on her desk, looked through a page in her calendar. “Sometimes the things we know can put us in danger, particularly if other people are aware of what we know. No matter who we are or what our positions are, we have to keep in mind that someone is always listening, always watching, so sometimes we can’t act the way we wish we could. ”
I glanced down at my tote bag.
“If you ever need help keeping that information private, you let me know,” Ophelia said. “I may not be able to intervene directly, but I am able to prevent you from being bothered by those trying to find that information. You’d be amazed how I can work behind the scenes. It’s a talent I think the two of us share. ”
I nodded slowly. “I understand. ”
She beamed. “Good. Now, Georgie is mad for a first-edition copy of The Secret Garden. She had one, but she put her thumb through the spine. ”
I shuddered, imagining what this vampire child could be capable of with an actual human spine. I didn’t think I wanted to meet Georgie. Ever.
I smiled, a cheerful professional through and through. “No problem. ”
As I pushed myself to my wobbly legs, a thought occurred to me, a question that, frankly, I was embarrassed I hadn’t thought of earlier. Ophelia had already lost interest in my presence and was playing FreeCell.
“Actually, Ophelia, I have a question. ”
She didn’t look up.
“Regarding that private information,” I added.
She glanced up through her long sable eyelashes, looking vaguely interested. “I was thinking about expanding my services to the Council. I noticed that new vampires get a welcome basket when they arrive in the Hollow. I could deliver them when I drop off the new-client contracts. ”
Ophelia lifted a brow. “I’m afraid that wouldn’t work. The point of the baskets is to give the Council an excuse to make contact with recently relocated vampires. Would that I could assign you the task. The Council representatives take turns making the deliveries, and it’s increasingly tedious sending them reminder notes. They try to weasel out of it—shameless, really. ”
“Really?” I smiled. “Well, that’s too bad. ”
“Yes, the lack of whining would have been a refreshing change of pace,” Ophelia muttered.
I stepped away from her desk but turned back on my heel toward her so I could reach the point of this line of conversation. “Just out of curiosity, who was assigned to deliver Mr. Calix’s welcome basket?”
Ophelia gave me a stony look. “You mean the client you never met and who no longer contracts your services?”
I nodded. “I was just curious. They left a bit of a mess, and I had to clean it up. I thought you’d want to know. ”
Catching the potential double meaning, Ophelia clicked a few keys on her keyboard. She frowned. “There’s no name on the schedule. ”
“Well, that’s interesting,” I said in an intentionally bland tone.
“Indeed,” she said. “I’ll look into this. Thank you for bringing this scheduling issue to my attention, Iris. ”
I wrapped the tote handle around my fingers and wondered how soon I could bolt without being rude.
“Run along now,” Ophelia said with a dismissive wave of her hand.
Asked and answered.
—
I stepped out of Ophelia’s office, tucking the bag under my arm like it was a treasured infant. I rushed around blind, heedless of whether I would be seen as I ran through the maze of hallways. I mulled Ophelia’s revelation, worrying it like a loose tooth. Cal said that the tampered blood was delivered to his house before he arrived, which was clearly a break in the usual Council protocol. If Ophelia could track down who was assigned to the task, maybe we could figure out—
I ran smack into a wall of cold, unyielding man, bouncing off of him and into a wall.
I let out a stunned huff as I pitched forward. My nose was pressed into a stiff suit jacket that smelled of woodruff. The scent made me want to gag, reminding me of something unpleasant. I shook my head, rubbing gingerly at the spot that had whacked against the wall.
Peter Crown glared down at me, his hands curled around my arms in an iron grip. “I suppose it’s too much to ask you to show some decorum when it is absolutely necessary for you to be here?”
I nodded, looking down at my shoes. As angry and upset as I was, now was not the time to show an inordinate amount of spine. “Yes, sir. ”
“Why are you here, anyway?”
I shrugged, and his hold on my arms tightened. “Just checking in with Ophelia. ”
He sniffed. “I never have understood why she lets you gallivant around this office like it’s your own personal Chuck E. Cheese’s. ”
A smarter person probably wouldn’t have laughed at that.
“While our fair leader seems to think of you as some sort of pet, please remember that the rest of us expect a minimum of comportment. I would hate for you to stumble into a situation that you can’t handle. Ophelia would very upset if you got hurt. ”
As soon as they landed, the words chilled me to the bone. I had stumbled into a situation where I’d gotten hurt—recently, in fact. Did Mr. Crown know about that, or had he just made an unfortunately timed conversational gaffe?
He rolled his eyes at my nonresponse and pointed an imperious finger toward the nearest exit. “Leave now, before you manage to topple some lesser vampire, you silly thing. ”