Heir to the Coven Read online

“Not right now, but I may want to order dessert.”

  She dropped her pen and stared at me. “Sure thing. Be right back with your order.”

  While I waited, I pulled out my phone and called Christopher. I was a little disappointed to get his voicemail, but some people did have to work real jobs. “Hey Chris, this is Natasha. I think I’d like to take you up on that date. Give me call. Bye.” Short, sweet and to the point. Speaking of sweet.

  “Here you go,” said the waitress as she brought me my order.

  “Thanks.”

  The cake was as good as it looked. In fact I wanted another piece. I looked around for my waitress, but didn’t see her. A crash from the kitchen assaulted my ears and then I knew where she vanished off to when I heard her angrily speaking to a red faced man I could see through the ordering window.

  “You can’t be serious Fred. I’ve been here since seven this morning. I want to go home!”

  The red faced man, Fred I assumed, said, “Calm down Lily. I know you and the other ladies have been covering for Megan a lot recently, but she needs our understanding right now. She doesn’t have an easy life.”

  “Who does?” the waitress asked. “It’s not like I’m living the dream either, but I get my butt into work on time, do my job and expect to go home at some point. I don’t promise this time I’ll come in and then stay home so someone else gets stuck with my shift. And I don’t care what Natalie and Hannah do; I am not giving that slacker bitch the tips I make while I work her shift. If she wants money she can get in here an earn it.”

  “Calm down Lily, ok? I’ll see if I can get someone else to come in early so you only have to do part of it. Now get yourself together and get back out there.”

  Fred walked off and Lily looked like she wanted to hurl knives at his back. After a few minutes she returned to the counter, but her smile had been replaced by a scowl. I heard her muttering about Megan and her mewling brat. When she came over to check on me, I asked, “Who said you have to stay if what’s her face doesn’t show? I’d walk out and leave him to wait his own tables.”

  “You heard that?”

  “Kind of hard to miss.”

  “Fred will fire me if I just walk out and I need this job.”

  “Why would he fire you and not that other woman?”

  “Megan? Because he feels bad for her. She’s a single mom who can’t get a sitter most of the time because her kid is a freak so she winds up staying home to take care of it herself. Even her own family wants nothing to do with it.”

  “Does it have horns or something?” I asked with a laugh.

  “No, but it probably has fangs.”

  “Excuse me?”

  Lily leaned in to whisper, “Megan is the woman who had that half vampire baby they wrote about in The Sun not too long ago. She was kidnapped by other half vampires and forced to drink blood and it made her baby some freaky little thing no one wants to be around.”

  Now I was torn. Part of me wanted to defend the freaky little thing since it was not to blame for what it was and since I had once been one of the freakiest little things ever born, but the other part of me was deeply interested in what else I could get out of Lily while she raged. Like maybe an address or the name of a boyfriend who might be classified as a freak too. What was the politically correct way to ask someone if their co-worker liked men who looked like they didn’t have a pulse? Asking straight out if Megan was a vampire groupie didn’t really work either. That’s when it came to me.

  I put on my best girly attitude and asked, “So what’s the father like? Was he hot? Was he a vampire or something? I can’t imagine doing it with a guy who is, like, basically dead. Although if he’s been around that long I bet he’d know a thing or two about what a woman wants.”

  Wouldn’t Anton turn purple hearing me say this?

  Lily shook her head. “I’ve never seen Megan with the same guy twice. Whoever this kid’s father is didn’t stick around after his fly was zipped.”

  “Gotcha. This is going to sound weird, but-”

  Fred popped his head out of the kitchen, “Lily you’ve got three tables waiting to order. Stop chatting and take care of them.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Real charmer that one.”

  “Sometimes I imagine him meeting with some horrible accident.”

  Hmmm, I guess I could have just offered to off her boss in exchange for the information. I might have gotten more out of her, but I don’t do humans as a rule. Still…no, no humans. “I don’t want to get you into trouble with your boss. You’ve been a big help Lily. Thanks.”

  I slid a bill across the counter, told her I didn’t need change and got up to leave. I was in the parking lot when I heard her shriek. I had tipped her a hundred bucks. She had helped me a bit and she had a jerk for a boss. It was the least I could do.

  Chapter 5

  According to Lily, the half-caste baby had made the rags. That was interesting since there was no way to tell a baby was a half-caste at birth unless there was a vampire or half-caste present to sense it. No human was going to look at a newborn and say, “That there is a half-caste baby.” At the most people just said, “That is one pale kid.” It meant someone had to have leaked the information to the magazine to try to create tensions or that no legitimate publication would take the story; either because they knew it wasn’t news that another “abomination”, as some humans called us, existed or because they knew what it could mean. There had been human casualties during the war and they would not promote a story that could lead to more violence. My bet was the mother was looking for some quick cash since she was not going in to work and sold herself out to the highest of the low bidders. And since The Sun was a rag, no one in the coven would have paid attention to it because if it were true, the Elders or the Order would have stepped in by now so they shrugged their shoulders at it and moved on.

  At least that’s what I told myself so I didn’t consider the possibility that the whole coven except Rainor and myself were in on this and weren’t bringing it up so as not to attract my attention. Great Tash, I thought to myself, now we’ll be paranoid in addition to bad tempered. I needed to pay Megan a visit. I pulled out my phone, but when I flipped it open I found I had inadvertently answered a call.

  “Hello?” a man’s voice said.

  “Who is this?” I asked.

  “Who is this?”

  “You called me, so you’re going to talk first.”

  “Actually, you called me and asked for date.”

  It was Christopher. “Hi Christopher.”

  “That was sort of intense. Are you always so suspicious?”

  So my newfound paranoia was noticeable and growing faster than expected. “Sorry, but I opened my phone to call someone and there you were.”

  “I was surprised to get your call. You’re a hard read. I wasn’t sure if you were humoring me or playing it cool.”

  “I don’t humor anyone. Thing is I just got back in town and I’m not sure how long I’m going to be here. I didn’t want to start something I might not be able to finish.”

  “Then I’m ‘startable’?”

  I laughed. “Let’s just say you were worth putting the key in the ignition, but don’t expect me to turn over easily.”

  “Are we still talking about seeing each other to see where this might go? Because I’m getting a subtext.”

  “Stick to the text.”

  “Fine, I’ll be good, for now. How about dinner?”

  “Uh…dinner? I was thinking about drinks or dancing.”

  “Either one works for me,” Chris said. “Why don’t we have drinks Friday night? I can pick you up.”

  “I’ll meet you there.”

  “Embarrassed for the folks at home to see me?”

  “You haven’t seen what I live with.”

  “I watched you knock one of them flat on her ass in the middle of club.”

  “Yes you did, but it’s better this way; trust me.”

  “I’ll call you lat
er with when and where?”

  “Sounds good to me. I’ll talk to you later.”

  “Bye.”

  I had a date. A normal date where I was going to have to make conversation and do my best not to freak Chris out or hit anyone. What the hell was I thinking to get myself into this? I was tempted to call him back and cancel, but opted to make my original call instead. The coven had one go to guy on information and technology. His name was Fitch, short for Arnold Fitchson, and if you wanted to know where the mosquito that just bit your arm was born he was likely to be able to tell you.

  “Talk to me,” he said when he picked up.

  “I need a last name and a last known address on a waitress from The Hodgepodge Diner and I need you to be the only person in that house that knows that I need them.”

  “You got it. What’s her first name?”

  “Megan.”

  “Just give me a sec to run their tax records….there we go. Megan McCoy is her name. Last address for her is 117 Sycamore Pike. It’s an apartment complex. Give me a second…oh, she lives on the ninth floor. Third window from the left.”

  “Why are you telling me which window is hers?”

  “Because you’re not the door using kind. Never were. Anything else Tash?”

  “That should do me for now. Thanks Fitch.”

  I drummed my fingers on the steering wheel while I tried to decide what to do. I risked tipping off the people behind this mess if they found out I paid Megan a visit. No one needed to know I was in on the secret until it was time for me to slit their throats; that was why I had been reluctant to see her so soon. I could keep from being seen on my way in and out, but unless I was going to lock her up after we talked she could tell them about my visit. Although if they came after me I would know who they were, assuming they only came after nosy little me and did not decide to try to take out the coven to keep the truth a secret. I wanted a civil war between covens even less than I wanted the war with the vampires to flare up again. But fate had handed me a key to the mystery and I could not ignore it.

  *****

  I timed my arrival at Megan McCoy’s apartment building with the setting of the sun. For a woman who was supposed to be chained to her house taking care of a baby no one else wanted to get near, there was not a glimmer of light coming from the window to indicate she was inside. Since the building only had street parking there was no way to tell if her car was there. Time for a peek inside.

  With a leap I landed on the second floor fire escape. The shade was up giving me a view of a woman in a thong bathing suit checking herself out in a mirror. My advice: return it fast. It was a simple thing to jump from the railing of the second floor, grab the third floor railing and swing myself up and so on. It was on the fifth floor that I learned why I shouldn’t indiscriminately peer into peoples’ windows. Let’s just say it gave new meaning to doing the nasty and no matter how long I lived there was no way that image was going to be erased from my brain. I continued on until I reached the ninth floor at long last.

  At Megan’s window I focused my hearing for any sound of a baby so much as turning over in its crib and got nothing. The shade was down so I was going to have to let myself in. Bracing my fingers against the bottom of the windowpane I used my strength to force it up and break the latches. I slid it up and gently put the shade up. The apartment was empty. All the furniture was gone. I climbed inside and did a sweep of the place. Every last personal item had been removed; even the trashcans had been emptied. I sniffed the air. Not a hint of dead body, blood or of bleach used to clean up blood. Megan had left here alive. But where oh where had my missing waitress gone?

  I called Fitch again and told him to keep tabs on where else she might turn up. Then I asked him to look into her bank records. So far there had not been any unusual activity to indicate she had been paid off or had withdrawn money to move. I was about to let myself out the way I came in when I heard footsteps come up the hall and stop outside the apartment door. As a key was inserted into the lock I zipped into the bathroom so I could see who else had come to visit without being spotted.

  A female voice I didn’t recognize said, “The last tenant left rather abruptly and stiffed me for the month so I’m looking to get someone else in here as quickly as possible.”

  An all too familiar male voice said, “It sounds great, but first I have to see it and then I have to talk to my girlfriend. She’d kill me if I took a place without talking to her first.”

  It was Kain, and Mercy was not the person he should be worried about right now.

  I held myself as still as a corpse and did not take a breath. Kain could not sense me, but if I made a sound he would hear it. The landlord showed him the bedroom and the kitchen before they came to the bathroom door. As they started to swing it open I spotted a window next to the bathtub that had been blacked out. Moving as fast as I could, I had it opened and jumped out. There was no ledge and if I landed on the fire escape the thunk my shoes would make on the metal would tip Kain off. It was a nine-story free fall to the ground where I landed on my feet like a cat and blended into the shadows. Kain would likely know someone had made an escape, but he would not know it had been me.

  Well my old friend, what were you about?

  Chapter 6

  Friday morning I had the unpleasant duty of informing Anton’s assistant that I would be entering his territory for a few hours. Christopher had picked a human bar in the vampire quarter. Because he didn’t belong to a coven he was free to move about the city at will thanks to ignorance, but I had rules to follow. Protocol dictated that I had to inform Anton at least four hours before I visited his territory unless I was tracking a “hostile presence”, so as soon as Chris, who obviously was not a “do it early” sort of person let me know where to meet him, I made the call. From the tone of the assistant’s voice, you would have thought I was calling up to say I would be spreading manure on Anton’s door sometime this evening and hoped he wouldn’t mind the odor.

  When I hung up I noticed Dawn hovering outside my door. We had not spoken since the night I disciplined her. Kain had made sure to keep her out of my path and I had not sought her out. Truth to be told, I was not sure if I wanted her in my path or not. I had never felt fully comfortable around Dawn; I often had the feeling she was only nice to me because she thought it would get her somewhere. Like if I weren’t heir to the coven she would have no use for my presence in her life. Mercy said it was my usual isolationist tendencies coming out to give me an excuse to wall myself up alone, but I thought not. I readily admitted when I couldn’t stand to have company, so what would make me lie about my impressions of Dawn? Last time I was home, I knew my stay would not be a long one so I put my reservations aside and just had fun with the girls, but now that I was going to be running things, it gave me a new perspective. But Dawn was still part of the coven and it was my duty not to exclude her even if I didn’t trust her or necessarily want to share my spare time with her.

  “Was there something you wanted Dawn?” I asked. If she wasn’t going to hide her eavesdropping, I wasn’t going to pretend she was invisible.

  “I wanted to know if you would need guards for your date tonight.”

  “How do you know about that? I didn’t say anything about a date during the call you listened to.”

  “Please Natasha. Everyone is talking about our soon-to-be leader’s big date with the outsider it’s not like it’s a big secret.”

  “Why is my date anyone’s business but mine?”

  “What you do impacts us now. If you like this guy he could become your consort and that would make him our unofficial second. They say he’s not that strong, that could cause problems.”

  It was slights painted up as concern that reminded me why I hated having to deal with other women on a regular basis. Dawn didn’t want to promote the good of the coven; she wanted to knock the guy I was dating. “Well, Dawn, you can tell everyone that who I take to my bed is no one’s business but my own. And that no matter w
ho I wind up sleeping next to, once the coven is mine it is mine. The man who shares my bed will find that is all he shares because I lead alone.”

  Dawn laughed. “I told them not to worry.”

  “Did you?” I wondered how many conversations I was the topic of. It never occurred to me that my private life would be the hot news at the house this soon.

  “I did. What are friends for?” I think she wanted me to validate her claim to my regard, but when I kept silent Dawn continued, “Will you want guards?”

  “No. I can take care of myself.”

  “Suit yourself, but if you think better of it, let me know.”

  She turned to leave, but I stopped her. “Dawn?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Why did Kain send you to ask?”

  “Kain didn’t send me. I’m not sure where he went off to, but I figured someone should make sure you were looked after if you needed it.”

  “What are friends for?”

  “Exactly.”

  Against my better judgment I asked, “Do you want to help me decide what to wear tonight?”

  “Only if you promise we can shop for new stuff if nothing you own works.”

  “Have I ever been opposed to shopping? My wardrobe probably needs a refresher anyway. It’s mostly stuff I can wear to fight in.”

  Having barely waited for me to finish, Dawn was through the door and vanishing into my closet. A series of “nos” and “maybes” mumbled their way out of the closet. After several minutes had gone by, there came a triumphant, “Ha!” Dawn emerged holding a red silk tank dress. “We have a winner.”

  “An excellent choice,” I said. “But we’re going to have to go shoe shopping. The last time I wore that I ruined the shoes I liked to wear with it and none of my other ones really go.”

  “What happened to them?”

  “I wound up stabbing this guy with the heel of the right shoe and it snapped off.”

  “Must have been some date.”

  “It was the waiter. I ordered my steak medium well and he brought me a rare one.”