position. "Thanks for asking, Claire. Considering I subjected myself to unimaginable danger to protect the contents of your veins and your immortal soul, one might imagine you to be able to ask." He was trying to be the old, casual Myrnin, but he was rattled, badly rattled. Claire found herself clutching her phone like a life preserver as she stepped away from him, and also realized that the police were still on the other end of the line, asking questions.
"Hello?" she said. "Police? You need to send a patrol car to--"
Myrnin took the phone away from her with a casual swipe of his hand and said, "Never mind. Everything's fine now, no problem at all. Thank you for protecting and serving. Please don't mind her at all." And hung up.
"Hey!" Claire lunged for the phone. He held it up out of her reach.
"If you send human police after him, they'll be handy snacks," he said. "And they will also die, if they're lucky. Come on." He grabbed her wrist and dragged her along at a quick-march pace. He was using a little bit more force than he should have, and Claire tried not to wince. She'd already been grabbed way too much at that particular collection of bones.
"What just happened?" she asked. "And don't tell me it was just a random vamp attack."
"It wasn't," he said. "And we'll talk when we're there. Not before."
They were coming up on the guard checkpoint now, and the uniformed policeman stepped out to give them a once-over. He nodded and waved them on. Myrnin didn't even slow down, so neither did Claire.
"Where are we going?"
"To talk to Jason, obviously."
"What? But--"
"I believe it's connected. Jason is a pawn on the board, and we need to confirm just whose pawn he is. It's thought that you might be able to extract that information from him."
"Wait--you...you want me tointerrogate him?"
"Talk to him. You established a rapport with him before; he may say things to you he would not to vampires. As a fellow human, you're already advantaged."
"Advantaged?"
"Let's just say that he's developed a deep distrust of vampire kind."
"What the hell did you do to him?"
Myrnin didn't look at her. Now they were walking down a wide sidewalk, spacious, framed by tall dark trees on both sides. Pretty in daylight. A prime ambush place in the dark. But there were vampires out strolling in the moonlight, living their lives in an entirely weird and alien sort of way from what she knew.
Here, that awful skeletal thing wouldn't attack. It wouldn't dare.
She suddenly, badly, wanted to be back home.
"Myrnin? Whatwas that?"
He didn't say another word, all the way to the building where Jason was being held.
Chapter Five
FIVE
Being in a vampire stronghold, essentially alone, was horribly unnerving...especially since Claire realized that she'd sneaked out a window, and nobody, not even Shane, knew where she was. That hadn't been the best plan ever, probably.Note to self: in the future, leave an I-know-who-killed-me message. Morbid, but practical, at least in her social circles.
This wasn't the clean, sterile confines of the building where Amelie had her offices--although that was funeral-home creepy--but a different building, a windowless structure that didn't have the chilly elegance of marble and thick carpeting. It was more...functional. Bare walls. Harsh lights. Plain floors.
And it smelled like disinfectant, which was very frightening.
There was a plain wooden desk in the entry hall, and a vampire Claire recognized--one who'd originally had dark skin, but vampire life had lightened it to an unsettling ashen gray. He was blind in one eye, and when he saw her, he smiled, all teeth.
She'd first met him in the library at Texas Prairie University, and he'd tried to kill her. Not a very nice vampire at all, in her experience.
"It's the apprentice vampire hunter," he said. "Good. I was getting hungry. Thanks for bringing me lunch."
"She's with me, John," Myrnin said, and waggled his finger. "No snacking. And, besides, you'd have to ask Amelie's permission first. Which you wouldn't get, you know. You're on probation for your last, ah, incident concerning a Morganville resident with a pulse."
The vampire shrugged and looked disappointed. "Fine. What do you want?"
"None of your business, John. Just do your job and be quiet," Myrnin said, and pulled her along. "This way."
They passed through avery thick steel door, one that slammed shut with a finality that made Claire shiver, and then through a series of barred gates that looked thick enough to discourage even vampires. Some were warped. Some even had fingerprints