Bad Blood (19 page)

Please. I must be crazy.

Rayne is so going to have a field day when I tell her. A big “I told you so” fest if she can drag herself away from the poker table to celebrate. None of this makes any sense still. Why would Jane pretend to be someone like Sasha and star in a stupid off-Strip Vegas revue? How did she afford Oxford while living in a trailer? But, I suppose, these are just minor details at this point and don’t matter in the grand scheme of things. In the end, she’s exactly who she’s said she is and there’s no practical reason on Earth she should not become my boyfriend’s blood mate.

I realize that dusk is fading into night and I still need to call a cab to get the hell out of here. Feeling dejected, I reach in my bag for my cell, but when I pull it out I realize I have no bars. No coverage way out here in the middle of the desert. Not good. Anxiously I scan the trailer, looking for a landline phone and find one of those old-fashioned rotary dial types sitting on a side table in the living room. Relieved, I pick up the receiver.

No dial tone.

I sink down to the sofa, anxiety now warring with my hopeless depression. I’m way too far away to get back to Vegas on foot even if I could navigate my way in the pitch dark. Damn that cabdriver for taking my money and abandoning me like that. What am I supposed to do?

I suck in a breath and force myself to remain calm. Panicking is not going to help the situation at all. Maybe one of the neighbors has a phone that works. After all, the whole park wouldn’t have ducked out on their monthly phone bills, right? Or maybe one of them would even take pity on me and drive to the nearest gas station where I could find a pay phone.

Hi, I just broke into your neighbor’s trailer to prove she’s not an evil demon
bent on destroying a coven of vampires. Can I use your phone?

Seeing no other choice, I rise from my seat and wrap my hand around the front door handle. But noises make me pause before turning the knob. I peek out the window, trying to discern what’s going on.

My eyes widen as I realize the once deserted town is now teeming with people of all shapes and sizes. Some wandering around, seemingly aimlessly, others hanging out on rocking chairs on their porches. Still others . . .

. . . are catching and gnawing on live, squirming rats. Realization strikes me like a bad bolt of lightning.

Oh God, this is a vampire trailer park.

My heart slams against my chest in a staccato beat as my mind whirls with panic, wondering what I should do. I mean, most vampires I know are completely civilized and would have no problem letting a human girl use their phone. But then again, not all vamps are members of the consortium or live by the Slayer Inc. creed. Magnus warned me that some still hark to the old ways, forgoing twenty-first century traditions like blood donors and instead living barbarically, sucking the blood out of rats. And humans, if they can get ahold of any. Humans like me.

I let go of the door handle and slowly back away, realizing my position is more precarious than I could have ever believed. And here I was worried about the police and a little breaking-and-entering on my record. Not being trapped in a town full of probably cannibalistic vampires.

Part of me tries to remind myself that I’m safe; no one knows I’m here and I can stay quiet until morning and then leave once they’re back inside sleeping the day away. But then again, what if someone comes back? Jane? A roommate?

I try the phone again. I try my cell. Nothing. No bars. I’m stuck. I sink down to the faded couch, my stomach churning. What had I been thinking, coming out here by myself? Not even telling anyone where I was?

How could I let some random cabdriver serve as my only protector? No wonder Rayne is the vampire slayer and I’m just the dumb twin. She would have never gotten herself into this mess to begin with.

The last wails of a dying rat assault my ears, followed by a horrible crunching sound. I pull my legs up onto the couch, hugging them with my arms, concentrating on not making a sound.
Please don’t let anyone figure out I’m
here
. Thank goodness I didn’t turn on any lights to alert them to my presence. At the same time, sitting in the darkness isn’t all that comforting either. The only light comes from a streetlamp outside that shines in through the living room window above the couch, illuminating the wall across from me. My eyes come to rest on a framed photo, affixed to this lit-up wall. A photo I hadn’t noticed during my initial search of the trailer. Oh. My. God.

I slowly climb off the couch and walk toward the picture, my breath permanently lodged in my throat as it comes into closer focus as I near it. Two girls, smiling into the camera.

Two identical girls to be precise.

Jane . . . and . . . Sasha.

Twins.

Suddenly all the puzzle pieces click into place. I dive for the file folder again, paging through documents under the dim light from the streetlamp outside. It was all so obvious—why didn’t I think of this before? After all, I’m a twin myself—my sister and I have had a billion cases of mistaken identity between us. I find a second folder, this one labeled SASHA, and dig through, finding rehab records, pay stubs from strip clubs, the works.

Why would an ex-druggie stripper living in a trailer park pose as a Rhodes scholar from Oxford? Because she was playing the part of her twin sister, who actually did go to Oxford. And all the Blood Coven’s DNA testing wouldn’t have exposed her lie because identical twins have identical DNA, as Rayne and I know from our own past case of mistaken identity.

But where is the real Jane? The one who did go to Oxford? The one who actually would make a good blood mate for my boyfriend?

A paper falls from one of the files and I grab it off the floor. My eyes widen as I realize what it is. A Massachusetts death certificate. For one Jane Star, who died from unknown causes just a week ago.

Oh my God. Did they kill her? Kill her and replace her with her twin?

Suddenly the trailer park front door creaks open and I realize my problems are about to get much, much worse.

17

My eyes dart around the trailer, looking for some place—any place to hide. But there’s nothing—not even a closet. And the man is already inside. Except that he’s not a man. He’s a vampire. And not just any vampire. Cornelius.

His eyes fall upon me and he smiles a sick, twisted smile. He knows I’m caught. A deer in headlights. He shakes his head slowly.

“My dear Sunshine,” he says in his Southwestern drawl. “Fancy finding you here.”

“Um, hey, um, Cornelius,” I say, stumbling over my own tongue. I don’t know why I’m even trying. There’s no excuse on Earth I can come up with that will make my presence seem coincidental. “My, um, well, the vampires are looking for Jane for tonight’s ceremony. You haven’t, um, heard from or seen her, have you?”

Yeah, nice try, Sun.

Cornelius laughs heartily, still blocking the only exit, I might add. Though it’s not like I’m going to go running outside with all the hungry rat-eating vampires on the prowl.

“Why yes, I have seen her,” he says, his velvety voice almost a purr. “She’s with her future blood mate, Magnus, getting ready for tonight’s ceremony. Don’t you worry my little one,” he says, chucking me under the chin.

“Everything is right on schedule.”

“Um, great?” I say, taking a step back. His breath is utterly foul. “So maybe I should get over there then. Magnus is . . . expecting me.”

“I’m so sorry,” Cornelius replies, his tone full of pseudo-sympathy, “but I can’t let you do that. You see, I know you’ve figured out our little ploy—our little twin switcheroo, you might call it. And I’m afraid if I let you go, you’d just go run and tell your little boyfriend the truth and ruin everything I’ve worked so hard preparing.” He shakes his head, as if weary of the world. “I knew I should have killed you the second I smelled your tainted blood and saw your scar. I can’t believe you thought you’d get to me by posing as an actor. And then that computer trick—you think I would just download some executable file without investigating its origins? Please. I let you in. I watched as you took her address. And then I simply waited until dark to follow you here.”

My heart sinks as I realize I haven’t been half as clever as I thought I’d been. And now I’m trapped. Screwed. About to become a vampire snack. Unless . . .

“So what are you going to do?” I demand, mustering as much false bravado as I can. Channeling my inner Rayne. “Suck me dry? I think you’re forgetting about my tainted blood. Yeah, a little Holy Grail goes a long way. A small taste of me will be like gargling holy water. I can just walk out of here and never look back.”

I storm past him, starting for the door. He places a hand on my shoulder, stopping me in my tracks. “You might be able to get past me,” he says, his voice way too self-satisfied for my comfort. “However, the vampires outside don’t have quite the same refined tastes as I do. They’re also very, very hungry. So I’m guessing they’d bite first and ask questions later, if you know what I mean.”

I look out the window just in time to see a zombielike vampire chomp greedily on a grime-covered bone. If they’re willing to eat something like that, Cornelius may be right about their lack of refined palette.

“Besides,” Cornelius adds, another smirk on his face. “You’d be leaving something—or should I say someone—very valuable to you behind.”

Oh God, what now? I turn to him. “What do you mean?” I demand.

“One moment. I left him in the car.” He steps out of the trailer. The zombie vampires look up hungrily, then seem to realize it’s one of their own kind and go back to their meals. Cornelius walks over to his Cadillac SUV, looking very out of place in the midst of the carnage, and opens up the back hatch. He grabs what appears to be a body bag and lugs it back into the trailer. The door slams shut behind him and he tosses the bag on the couch.

“Ow!” cries the bag—or more accurately the person in the bag. I cover my gaping mouth with my hand, realizing I know that voice very well.

“Jayden!” I cry, diving for my friend. I unzip the body bag and help him out. He’s hogtied and gagged. I struggle to release him while Cornelius just watches with laughing eyes. Oh God, I can’t believe he got Jayden. This makes things much more complicated.

I yank the gag out of his mouth and he erupts into a choking cough. Helplessly, I pat him on the back while glaring up at Cornelius. Bastard. How dare he take poor innocent Jayden who has nothing to do with any of this world? He could have lived his whole life blissfully ignorant of all of this dark otherworld around him. Gotten married, had children, been happy. Now, for the rest of his life, he’ll be scarred. If he has a “rest of his life,” that is. At the moment, the Magic Eight Ball would say that the outlook is not so good.

“Sunny!” Jayden’s eyes widen as they focus on me for the first time. “Oh God, he got you, too?”

I nod, not having the heart to tell him I walked into the trap myself, no “getting me” necessary. “Are you okay?” I ask him. “He didn’t . . . bite you . . . did he?”

After all, a vampire bite is bad enough; imagine adding hemophilia to the mix. Jayden shakes his head. He looks over at Cornelius, who currently appears to be fixing himself some sort of bloody beverage over in the kitchen area. Jayden’s normally beautiful eyes darken with fear. “Crazy psychopath,” he whispers under his breath. “He really thinks he’s a vampire. Like, for real.”

I swallow hard. “Jayden, he
is
a vampire.”

“What?” He shoots me a look. “But there’s no such—”

“You have to trust me,” I hiss back. “I’ll explain later. Just know that we’re in serious danger and it’s best to just sit here and don’t move. I’ll think of something.”

“What, are you like Buffy or something? A vampire slayer?”

I wish. “No, but my sister is. And my boyfriend’s a vampire so I know a lot about their kind.”

Jayden shrinks back from me, wide-eyed.

“No, no. He’s one of the good ones. Not all vampires are evil,” I assure him.

“So . . . you’re dating . . . Edward Cullen.”

“Sure, if you have to relate it all to a Stephanie Meyer book,” I grudgingly agree. “But don’t say that to Magnus’s face. He’s a card-carrying member of Team Jacob. Even has the T-shirt.”

“Oh God,” Jayden moans, leaning back on the couch. “I can’t believe this is all real. I mean, vampires! Real vampires? And I’ve been employed by one all this time and didn’t even know it? No wonder we’ve gone through so many Minas. He’s probably eaten each and every one of them.”

I glance over at Cornelius who’s now cutting up a stalk of celery to stick in his probably literal “Bloody Mary” cocktail. “Well, sucked them dry, at the very least,” I reply wryly. “Except for Sasha, that is. The two of them are involved in some kind of huge plot to infiltrate and take over my boyfriend’s coven. That’s why I tried out for the play. I wanted to go undercover and figure out what was going on.”

Jayden nods thoughtfully. “That’s why you needed Sasha’s address,” he realizes. “Which, I assume, is where we are right now?”

“Yup. And I have all the proof I need. Problem is, I need to get to the Mandalay Bay Hotel by midnight to have any of it do any good.” I glance at my watch.

“In an hour it’ll be too late to stop them.”

Cornelius picks that moment to sink down into the worn armchair across from us, glass of blood in hand. He’s so tall it’s as if he’s sitting in a chair meant for a child. There’s no way Jayden and I could possibly overpower him physically. Especially with Jayden’s blood condition. One scratch and he’d be a goner. I watch as Cornelius takes a sip from his drink, the blood staining his lips. Then he makes a face. “Goddamn desert rat,” he mutters. “What I wouldn’t give for a little human martini infusion.” He looks hungrily at Jayden, who shrinks back in his seat, eyes wide.

“So,” I interrupt quickly, hoping to change the subject. “Why did you do it?

Why did you kill Jane and put Sasha in her place? What’s the goal here?” I force my voice to sound casual and unafraid.

A sly grin spreads across Cornelius’s face. He glances at his watch. “I guess I can tell you,” he says, “since there’s no way you’ll be able to warn your little boyfriend. In less than an hour the biting ceremony will be over. Magnus will have transformed Sasha into his vampire blood mate. And then the High Stakes Coven can have our revenge on the Blood Coven.”