Page 54 of Beauty At Stake
Everyone looked at me.
“I have children.”
They accepted that answer with nods of understanding and a few sympathetic looks.
“Okay, let me do my thing, then Losuc can 'rescue' the vampire hunters,” I said.
“Do you want us to separate them, Ambassador?” Team Leader Sullivan asked.
“Yes, thank you.” I looked at Trez, the Tider Vex. “Is there an open room I can use to interrogate them one at a time?”
“Of course.” Trez waved me toward the left of the kitchen.
I followed him into a room with Killian and Star while some extinguishers and vexes went to grab a prisoner.
A few minutes later, they brought a gagged and bound human man into the room. He was handsome, tall, muscular, and had a dark complexion with brown eyes. I star-crossed himas I had Losuc, sprinkling lavender dust in his eyes. The man immediately went still, staring only at me.
“Kill, can you remove the gag?” I asked.
“Sure, babe.” Killian untied the man's gag, then tossed it on a dresser.
“What's your full name?” I asked the man.
“Please say Blade.” Killian clasped his hands together and shook them. “Or even Wesley Snipes would be acceptable.”
Extinguisher Tanya Murdock, who had helped to bring in the prisoner, stopped at the door to gape at my husband. “That's so racist!”
“What? Why?” Kill scrunched up his face at her.
Meanwhile, the vampire hunter said, “Clifford White.”
“What?!” Killian asked again, this time directing it at the vampire hunter. “That's the whitest name I've ever heard! It isliterallyWhite. You are so disappointing!”
“That's even more racist!” Murdock said.
“How is any of that racist?” Killian waved at the vampire hunter. “He's a black man hunting vampires—fact. There was a movie starring Wesley Snipes in which he played a daywalking, half-vampire hunter—fact. And this man's last name is White—fact. So, how can pointing out facts be racist?”
“The way you said it was racist.”
“You're about as white as a woman can get.” He pointed at her. “You're being racist.”
“How am I being racist?”
“By existing! Get a fucking tan, Ms. Spiced Pumpkin Latte! And mind your business. You don't have the right to get offended on behalf of another race.”
People outside the room burst into laughter. Even Star, standing to my right, chuckled.
“That's rather a case of the pot calling the kettle white,” Star drawled, looking pointedly at Killian's pale skin.
I giggled at that.
“Hey, I've tried to get a tan.” Kill grimaced. “I just burn.”
Murdock started again, “I was just—”
“Shut up while you're ahead, Murdock,” Team Leader Sullivan said. “That shit you're spouting is ridiculous, and it's holding up the interrogation.”
“Yes, Sir!” Murdock immediately left the room.
