Page 21 of Silent Stalker
“I will have the first check done tomorrow night before you lose your mind or your mouth gets you into additional trouble.”
I giggled, fought to contain my amusement, and failed with a snort. By the time I worked my way to doubled over laughing so hard I cried, Salania strolled across the garage.
She dangled a pair of handcuffs from a single, elegant finger. “You can’t just break so many hopeful hearts asking for evening entertainment with your conditions, Pepper, but we’ll humor you. I took the liberty of asking for a test to be prepared to confirm your status as blood bound. This car is his, yes. It was his first mortal vehicle, and he has many attachments for her and no skill at vehicle repairs. He does not want to leave his baby with some strange man.”
“Oh. This is your firstborn daughter, Emerick?”
Emerick bowed his head. “She is now, apparently.”
“Salania, we are going to be doing a project to get his precious daughter properly restored. We will ignore his protests, but we will paint her his choice of color.”
While he kept his head lowered, Emerick shot a glare my way. “Silver, to match my Civic, of course.”
Of course. “She will be painted a good silver, then. We’ll do our best to preserve her original parts, but if she needs new parts, we’ll have them custom machined if we can’t find a donor car.” I forced myself to stop laughing, straightened, and gave the Beetle a pat on her hood. “This is a good car for a spoiled brood master, and I will not have such a cute vehicle bring shame to this garage. I am pleased to become her wicked stepmother, making her do things like put on clean clothes and go in for a checkup.”
Then, with a wicked smile, I pointed at one of smaller SUVs. “I want something like that. I don’t care what brand it is, but it needs to be reliable, it must fit at least one body in the back, and it has to fit at least five live bodies.”
Salania giggled. “I see you have decided you will transport future bodies in style. You should get a luxury model so you can commit your bounty hunting in true comfort. It is worth pointing out that if it can fit five live bodies, it can also fit four additional dead bodies, assuming you will be driving the vehicle.”
“We’re going to need a lot of protective material to keep all that blood off the upholstery.” I abandoned the Beetle, looking over the selection of SUVs littered throughout the garage, pausing at a bright blue one capable of fitting in most parking spots. “This is on the smaller side, but it looks like I can take it more places, too. What is it?”
“A Toyota,” Emerick complained.
“Ah, I see. You are a stalwart Honda man. Salania, make me a date in a week or two to go to a Toyota dealership. Make certain Mr. Lowrance is available for this adventure.”
The woman snickered. “I shall do this. Do you like that color?”
I shook my head. “I’m going to have my new vehicle custom painted in a nice purple, I think. Perhaps to match my necklace, so I can venture into the world in style. My prey will see me coming from a mile away and know the true meaning of fear. And as I have no desire to hide that I have bodies in my SUV, I will be easy to spot by local law enforcement. They can put the bodies in their vehicles if they don’t like it.”
“The Toyota would be a good choice, Master Lowrance. It has a good safety record.”
Emerick twitched. “Why are there so many vexations tonight?”
I grinned. “How do I escape the garage?”
Salania pointed at the far wall. “There is an elevator over there that leads to the lobby level, then we change elevators to the penthouse floor. Is there anything else I can assist you with?”
I took the handcuffs from her and marched in the direction she’d pointed. “If you can ask for information on Luca Henry-MacDognall and have everything brought to the penthouse, I will check to see if the brood’s master has done sufficient nibbling of my person to progress on the blood bound front of things. If not, he will be spending the rest of the evening nibbling on my person before I conk out for the night. Tomorrow, we resume our hunt, hopefully without taking another detour, however important that detour was.”
“It seems Mistress Lowrance has identified her place as the true ruler of the brood,” Salania teased, and the sly smile she leveled at Emerick won us an exasperated sigh.
“I’ll be upstairs if you two need me, pestering someone about how this testing for being blood bound is supposed to work,” I announced, leaving them to their discussion of the vampires we’d rescued.
Rachella,the mortal wife of one of the brood’s vampires, Kieran, held the fort down at the reception. At seventy-six, I expected she’d become a candidate for being turned when her natural lifespan came to a close—assuming we could figure out how to turn her safely. I hadn’t gotten a chance to talk with her as much as I would like, so I flopped on her desk and stared at her with my saddest eyes.
“I have a son who uses this same look on me when he wants something, but I will admit, you are better at it than he is. I won’t suggest he takes lessons from you, as he might. How can I help you, Pepper?”
“Salania said there was some testing method to figure out if Emerick has been doing sufficient nibbling of my person.”
“Ah, the blood bound test. Yes, we have several of the tests here. We test each person individually for the best results. We are all fully confident you are sufficiently blood bound, but if you would like to see how the test works, I can administer it. It’s quite simple. You prick your finger, put your blood on a test strip, and submerge it in a solution. The solution will change the color of your blood to match your current state.” Rachella leaned over, opened a drawer, and pulled out a wooden box. “I’ve the test right here. It takes less than five minutes.”
“What states are there?”
“Controlled, weakly bound, moderately bound, strongly bound, unbound, standard human, brooded vampire, and unaffiliated vampire.”
“It can detect if a vampire is in a brood?” I blurted.
“It can detect all of those magical states. There are also other tests that can detect certain types of preternatural. Humans can’t be tested without a formal accusation containing sufficient proof of being preternatural at this point in time. It’s quite an interesting situation.” With a smile, she pulled out a packet of single-use strips, pulled one out, and retrieved a tiny plastic rectangle. When she gave it a shake, I realized it was a little larger than the strip and contained some form of fluid. “It’s also smart enough to identify primary sources of blood. Vampires typically just pierce their finger with a fang, but I have needles if you would prefer.”
