Necromancing Nim (19 page)

“Morning,” said Colin without turning away from me.

“Evening,” said Sebastian. “Is there coffee?”

The boys settled down amiably to their coffee, leaving me to try to sort through the mishmash of feelings Colin had left me with. So many feelings. A lot of them were stupid. The rest were annoying. I didn’t like having my state of mind disrupted, determined and discombobulated by my hormones. Stupid boys with their hot selves and their concern and their taking care of me and their…their stupid lips.

They seemed unconcerned about their inability to not be annoying, sitting with their feet on the coffee table, bumping toes companionably. No, weirdly. Guys don’t do that, as a general rule. Once they’d gotten sufficiently caffeinated, though, the conversation returned to deciding what to do next.

“We’re going to have to call out Pieter and his people somehow,” Colin stated. “I’m sure they’ve gone underground again by now.”

He watched me as he spoke, shrewd in a way that made me nervous. He was cooking up a plan.

Sebastian clued in to this, as well. “I don’t think it’d be the best idea to use her as bait.”

“It’s the perfect idea,” Colin protested. “As far as he knows, she’s been transformed. He’ll try something within the next twelve hours to be sure he has control.”

I rolled my eyes. Of course. They were going to argue about me now and expect me to sit by and listen while they decided my fate. Idiots. So much for any kind of caring focused in my direction. When it came to executing the plan, I was just another cog in the wheel. That was what it felt like anyway. Or maybe that was another one of my defense mechanisms—assuming they didn’t really care.

“Especially since we still have the stone.” Colin had gone thoughtful. Thoughtful Colin was rarely a good thing.

“Look,” I said. “Due to a great deal of incredibly excruciating pain, I am still in possession of my intellectual faculties, so maybe you dickweeds would like to involve me in this conversation?” It was so much easier to just be mad at them.

Colin blinked at me. Sebastian ducked his head, chuckling, maybe, and I was about to tell them a bit more about what I thought of their dumb plans when my doorbell rang.

All three of us fell silent, staring at each other, as if the idea of someone ringing my doorbell out of nowhere was incomprehensible. Which it kind of was.

Since it was my house, and I’d actually heard the doorbell before, if not often, I recovered first. I went to the door and checked the peephole.

“Shit.” I swung around the face the men. “It’s the friggin’ cops.” Not just any friggin’ cops, either, but Eric and his partner. I supposed it had only been a matter of time before they showed up.

Colin tilted his head at Sebastian. Sebastian headed for the back rooms.

I turned to Colin. “Are you going or staying?” Last time Eric had darkened my doorway, he’d seemed pretty interested in Colin’s whereabouts, so I thought Colin might want to make himself scarce.

The doorbell rang again, and Colin gestured toward it. “I’m staying.”

“Okay, fine.” I reflexively straightened my hair and opened the door.

“Hey,” said Eric, grinning.

“Hey,” I replied. His partner started to say something, but I kept going. “Why are you here?”

“Solely in an official capacity, Ms. Taylor.”

“Well, damn. I thought maybe you were here to ask me out.”

Eric’s self-satisfied grin wavered a little at my sarcasm. I wasn’t sure why he always seemed to think I was going to welcome him with open arms. He stepped over the threshold, his partner following. Reynolds, his nametag said. I hadn’t managed to read it when they’d dropped by my office. Reynolds touched his hat brim and gave me an apologetic smile.

“Just need to ask a few questions.” He sounded apologetic too.

I decided I liked him a little better than Eric. “Sure.” I closed the door behind the two of them.

By the time I turned back around, Eric had settled into his official mode, neutral as he faced Colin’s perusal. Colin had settled into my ratty recliner as if it were the Throne of the World and regarded Eric over steepled fingers, his elbows braced against the arms of the chair.

“And you are…?” Eric said, officious now.

“Colin.” He tilted his head, giving Eric one of his more intimidating looks.

“He’s my boss,” I put in. The testosterone was getting a little thick. Apparently, even undead guys had wacky boy hormones.

“Ah. You’re the vampire.”

“Well. I’m
a
vampire. I don’t know about
the
vampire.”

I rolled my eyes. That joke hadn’t been funny the first time. “What can we do for you, Officer Harrison?”

“Just a few follow-up questions.” He grinned his grin. “Oh, and a search warrant.”

“A search warrant?” I panicked, trying desperately to hide it. “What the hell are you searching for?”

“Sebastian Marcheleto.”

Oh, wonderful. “Why are you searching for him here? I barely know the guy. Haven’t seen him since that night at the police station.” Except, of course, that he was somewhere in my house, and if Detective Eric started snooping around and found him and took him in, Sebastian would likely end up burnt to a crisp. I shut up, realizing I was protesting too much. Great. Now I was getting all protective and mushy about Sebastian. Could I get any more confused? Jesus, so many feelings. I wished they’d pack up and get the fuck off my emotional porch. I just didn’t know how to handle it all. I’d never felt this strongly about anything.

“We received a tip he’d been seen here,” Eric clarified. “So I’ll just take a quick poke around.”

“Can I see this warrant?” My voice sounded squeaky. This was bad. Squeaky sounded suspicious.

“Not a problem.” Eric produced a piece of paper and handed it to me. I glanced over it. The wording was all very official, full of convoluted language and with a scrawly signature at the bottom that claimed in the typewritten section below it to belong to a Denver County judge.

Colin rose to his feet and snatched the warrant from my hand. Rudely, I thought, but I decided to give him a break just this once. “There’s no reason to still be searching for Marcheleto,” he said tightly to the cops. “There’s no murder—the girl was turned.”

Eric gave a barely perceptible nod. “We’re investigating her disappearance now. And since Sebastian Marcheleto remains a person of interest…” He trailed off in a manner undoubtedly intended to evoke some sort of authority on his part.

I took the warrant back from Colin. “Okay, well… Whatever, then.” I handed the warrant to Eric indignantly.

“I’m sure it’ll be all right.” Colin’s voice came calm and steady. Threatening, even, in a smooth, careful way that reminded me of the sleek arch of a cobra. God, he was fucking hot. I needed to stop thinking that. “I’m sure Detective Harrison has been trained to perform these necessary evils in a professional manner.”

Colin had one eyebrow lifted and a scary sort of challenging smolder in his eyes. Eric met his gaze squarely. Reynolds had taken a step back, as if he felt out of his depth in the sparking conflicts racing back and forth across the room.

“No slitting the pillows,” Eric said. “I promise.”

“All right, then.” I took a seat on the edge of the couch, not sure what else to do. I could only assume Colin’s nonchalance meant Sebastian was likely to go unnoticed. Somehow. I tried to copy his unconcern. “And stay the hell out of my underwear drawer.”

Eric made a mock salute. “Will do.” I watched him and Reynolds head toward the back rooms, then arched a brow at Colin in question. Colin just nodded, as if to affirm that everything would be fine. I shook my head a little, not at all sure how Sebastian could avoid being found if Eric gave the house a thorough searching.

Finally, unable to keep still in spite of Colin’s pervasive calm, I got up and went to make still more coffee. Not that I wanted any—it was more reflexive, something to keep my hands busy. And they were shaking, much to my chagrin. I didn’t like the idea of Eric going through my house, regardless of whether he managed to stay out of my underwear drawer.

I heard noises from the back bedroom, where Gwen had been staying—clattering, rattles, drawers being opened and shut, then the same sounds from my room. I thought it was unlikely he’d find Sebastian in a drawer, and wondered if there were limits on what he could search, given his possession of a warrant. Not much I could do about it now, I supposed. I didn’t like Eric, and I was relatively certain he had pulled some not-entirely-appropriate strings to get the warrant, just because Sebastian was a vampire; but on the other hand, he wasn’t exactly what you’d call a dirty cop. Anti-vampire, yes, but he played by the rules.

Finally, the coffee was brewing, the smell filling the house again. Eric meandered back up the hallway, muttering under his breath.

Colin, who had settled back into his chair, gave him a sardonic once-over. “Find anything?”

Eric shook his head. “No vampires hiding anywhere that I could see.” He stopped not far from Colin’s chair and stood with his arms crossed. “Got a source tells me you and Marcheleto go way back.”

Colin seemed disinterested. “I see.”

“Well? Do you?”

Colin shrugged, an insolent lift of one impossibly wide shoulder. “I knew him a long time ago.”

“How long?”

“Well, let’s see.” He frowned and made a show of puzzling it out. “A hundred years? A hundred and fifty? When was the French Revolution?”

“No fucking idea.” Eric seemed miffed. “It was in France; what the hell do I care?”

“Very isolationist of you.”

“Sir, I must advise you this is an official investigation. If I find out you’re withholding information or harboring Mr. Marcheleto, the consequences will be serious. For you too, Ms. Taylor, since it’s your house. You could both go to jail for a very long time.”

Going to jail didn’t seem like something I wanted to get involved in. But it would have concerned me a lot more if I hadn’t just then spotted Sebastian, standing unconcerned in the hallway. With effort, I kept my face neutral, not wanting to alert Eric to his presence.

“Thank you for clarifying that,” said Colin, “but as you’ve already seen, he’s simply not here.”

Eric nodded. “Well, I hope for both your sakes that you’re not hiding anything from me.”

“Only my undying devotion,” I put in. Sebastian still stood there in the hallway, just watching, so still he could have been carved from marble. Or, you know, undead.

Eric turned to me. By all rights, he should have seen Sebastian then, but he only gave me a self-satisfied smile while I tried not to freak out at Sebastian’s precarious position.

“You’ll admit to that soon enough,” said Eric, once again his naturally annoying self rather than the officious prick he’d been about to morph into.

I smiled at him. “In your dreams.”

“Every night,” he shot back and headed for the door. Reynolds managed to beat him to it, holding the door open. Somehow, neither of them had seen Sebastian. “Sorry to bother you.”

I nodded. “I’d invite you to stay for coffee, but I don’t really like you.”

He turned in the doorway, big green eyes locked to mine. “Give me a call if this Sebastian happens to drop in on his old buddy here.”

“I will. Now go terrorize some other innocent bystander.”

“Sure enough.”

He tipped his head in a nod and stepped out. I closed the door behind him, put my back to it and glared at Sebastian.

“What the hell? Are you just trying to land us all up shit creek?”

Sebastian’s response took me by surprise. It was complete, unguarded shock. More surprisingly, Colin’s face echoed it.

“Wait,” said Colin. “You can see him?”

“Well, yeah. Duh. Of course I can see him. He’s standing right there.” I pointed at him accusingly.

“Shit, Nim,” Colin said. “I can’t even see him.”

I lowered my hand slowly as the implications of this development hit me. “I can see him, but you can’t?”

Colin nodded. Sebastian’s image wavered, as if seen through water; then he stepped away from the wall.

“Now I can see him,” said Colin.

“The cop couldn’t see me,” Sebastian said smugly. “I followed him around the whole time. He had no idea.” He turned the grin on me. “Nice panties, by the way.”

“Oh, he did not. I’m gonna strangle him. And you too.” Just when I’d decided Sebastian was my favorite.

“Why me? I didn’t open the drawer.”

“For snooping.”

“Children,” said Colin. “We’re missing the point.” He narrowed his eyes at me and said firmly, “Take off your clothes.”

“Screw you,” I snapped back.

Colin nodded. “That’s it, then. That explains the changes.” He turned his attention to Sebastian, who had his shirt half-unbuttoned. “Not you. Stop it.”

“Oh.” Sebastian shook his head, as if recovering from a dizzy spell. “Sorry.”

I planted my hands on my hips and glared at them both. “What…the fuck?”

“You’re immune to persuasion,” said Colin.

“What persuasion?”