Dead Certain (Eve Benson: Vampire Book 3) (44 page)

“Oh? Nice of you. Thanks. I think
we should have a get together, in a few days, to make sure that’s all set up.
Let me get with Keeley on it? Would next Saturday be too soon for you?” She
didn’t know what anyone else had going on, or if doing it over the phone would
be better for everyone. It kind of made sense, given the tensions.

“Or we can skip that? What will
work best, do you think?”

The Lover looked at her with a
deadly serious gaze.

“Truly? Getting as far away from
this as possible, as soon as you can. I can see the allure of it for you,
protecting your property, The Mistress of Souls, and setting hooks into some of
us at the same time, but the remaining three… They’re pretty much forcing The
Mistress to take them, and know it. Either she does it, or dies, which isn’t a
place for you, Snowflake. I say this as a friend,
and
a person that
wants to have sex with you. Get out of it, and stay far away until the dust
settles.”

Eve could see that one, so
nodded. It was just so confusing, dealing with these beings. They were all so
much more intelligent than she was. Even the insane ones were. They simply saw
so much more, and thought so very far ahead. Even giving her a hint like The Lover
just had, that there were three left, not two, was done subtly enough that she
really could have missed it, if she hadn’t been paying attention.

She was just a clerk, really.
Maybe an apprentice killer, and general pain in the ass. On the good side, she
was able to use magic now, well enough to keep herself from being annoyed at
being called Snowflake. That was kind of like a super power, in its own right.

Now if she could just use it to
make herself smarter.

Which, of course, she realized,
might just be possible. It would take energy, but could she increase her
ability to see things clearly, and remember it all accurately?

The Lover seemed to be content
with things as they stood, and touched Roberta on the arm.

“You were wonderful. We should do
that again, soon.” Then she walked out, her hips swaying from side to side like
she’d invented the idea.

Which for all Eve knew, she had.

The redheaded succubus made a
face at The Lover’s back.

“She’s a Demon? I didn’t know.
She gave off life energy. I didn’t know that anyone other than Humans, and a
few really similar creatures could do that. I wouldn’t have even guessed if you
hadn’t talked to her.”

Fram had mentioned that before,
that it would be possible to fake it, but that he just hadn’t wanted to bother.
It seemed that The Lover was willing to. It would help sell her act, wouldn’t
it?

Trying to focus, as well as she
could, Eve realized that it was another thing she could use magic for. She
pushed herself by concentrating, then added life energy to it, and was soon as
clear as she had ever been. Standing there behind the front counter, near one
of the three registers. Calm, and not hungry, at a level that she hadn’t
thought possible before. Then, trying to remember what it felt like, she tried
to make herself feel smarter, then actually push into it, so she
was
. It
took a few ramping iterations, using being just a bit smarter as a way to
figure out how to get a tiny bit more, but after a while, she had it.

That led to increasing her memory
capacity and clarity, and then working on how clearly she could see the world
around her. It was all effort, and used a constant flow of life energy from her
links, but she was able to pick up the rest that had been active in the blood
she’d drank earlier. That meant, even though it was a lot of work, she had
twenty cows, all sharing their energy with her. Allowing her mind to work
faster, and better than it ever had before.

It gave her a headache, but by
healing faster than normal she held that one off.

The process was damaging her,
since her brain was essentially Human, but that could be handled now, thanks to
the extra power coming in.

Holding that, which took some
doing, she was able to get back to work, and empty a cart faster than she had
before, by a good percentage. It was easier to see where everything belonged.
Before it had been a small fight each time to figure it out. Now it just made
sense to her. A lot of things did.

It wasn’t like every plot and
plan around her fell into place in an instant, but she could kind of tell where
they were now. How things interacted. Like Zack not being able to stop Warren
when he’d been abusing her, Lisa and Bob. She’d figured that it had been about
hiding that he knew Fram was around, but that was silly. He’d been buying time
to work other things around, clearly. Like helping to teach Eve how to be the
best Vampire ever. Keeley was in on that one, and so was Darla. They’d done a
lot more than had been clear to her before. Pushing and pulling her into
actions that left her learning, but also strong.

Each of them had put resources
and time into it, she realized. More than she’d understood at all. It was
subtle but over the last years they’d shaped her mind, so that she’d be ready,
for all of this. Turning her into something more than just Eve, or even a girl
that had practiced being undead before she really started it.

Finias was in on it too, of
course. So was Lyn, though that was well and truly being done in the open, now,
wasn’t it, being her mentor? Even their end goal was solid to her now. They’d
created a Greater Demon analog. They would never call her that, and she could
see that it was in her own best interest for it to never be known. Several of
the Greater Demons seemed to though. Fram, The Lover might, and any of them
that had touched her that she didn’t know about. Tarsus had collected her data,
hadn’t he? It wouldn’t be lost on him.

Still, as a Vampire, no one would
really think of her as being anything more than she was. Strong, fast, and
willing to work hard, but not much else.

As a Greater Demon, even a fake
one, everyone in the world would try to kill her as hard as they could. Thank
goodness she had those personal treaties in place with Fram and Tarsus then.
She needed to ensure The Lover was good with the same thing.

She blinked, and stopped thinking
about that part of things, just in case someone was trying to listen to her
thoughts. Instead she worked, focusing on just that, noticing the world she was
in as closely as possible.

Using a bit of magic, she was
able to see more of it, and prevent her brain from hemorrhaging, at the same
time. The trick there, was that she needed to reshape herself, and not just try
to heal from the damage, going back to what she had been before. It was so
simple, now that she thought of it.

It was how she spent the rest of
the night, noticing things, changing, and healing. She had the time, and between
her and Kait, the books were all on the shelves by four in the morning. Super
speed rocked in regards to things like that. It made the night seem a lot
longer for her, but she made it feel fun, and easy. So at five, when Zack came
out of the Node room, with Hiram trailing behind him, looking exhausted, they
had the place looking pretty sharp.

He raised his right hand in
greeting, and then hugged her, making her skin tingle a bit. In that instant,
she felt it happening, her life being cataloged, the information moving from
her, in a single steady stream of flowing energy. The thing was, she realized,
it could go both ways. She knew that was always part of it, so tried to feel it
come to her.

Zack let her, it was clear, not
blocking it, or stopping it from happening. Not even letting her go. It took
only a moment, but she got it all. Sort of. It was there, kind of floating
around her, outside of her body, but if she thought about him, she could find
it. The pain of his childhood, which was, she realized, a lot worse than what
she’d gone through. Her life had been horrible. Zack’s had driven him
insane
.
The thing there, was that he was healing now, and had been for a long time. The
others didn’t know that though, having already made up their minds about him.

It kind of gave the lie to
Greater Demons being perfectly sane, didn’t it?

He knew it was happening, as her
information came at him. After about ten seconds he let go, and didn’t speak
about it at all. They couldn’t. Not and keep her safe, which, of course, she
was. For now. Maybe forever, as long as she didn’t mess things up.

It occurred to her, why they’d
done it, too. Her friends, all supposed to be evil, and horrible beings, but
not caring what anyone said about them.

They’d all worked together, to give
her what she’d wanted most in all the world.

Safety. As much as anyone could
ever have, and not live in a prison of their own devising. Possibly even more
than that.

“Hey! Kait and I got the new
products on the shelves. Ben wants me to let you know that you own him a big
wad of cash, and a hummer. Just the blowjob, not the truck. We’re going to record
it and put it up online, so make sure you wear cool underwear for it. By the
way, you’re welcome. It
was
going to be an anal gangbang, but I talked
him down.” She grinned then and stepped back a little. “Or, to be honest about
the whole thing,
I
suggested all the cool parts. He was here for nearly
three days straight, so you should at least make sure he gets paid for it.”

“Right. I’ll go with the bonus
option, if you don’t mind? Don’t mention it to Darla, or I’ll be on the
internet inside a week. She’s been looking for an excuse to make me do gay
stuff for a while. I know I can do it, and that it’s not a big deal, but I’m
still close enough to my Human upbringing to find it a bit uncomfortable. So,
any news, other than about books?”

He knew, of course, about what
The Lover had said. She wasn’t wrong either, as far as that went. Not getting
involved made even more sense now. Still, she was going to, being that Eve
would have before, and doing anything too different, too quickly, would be a
mistake, and give a lot of people clues they shouldn’t have.

“Three Greater Demons are
probably going for Keels. We should call her, or better yet, you should. I need
to get to work, at my real job. You know, the one that no one pays me for? Even
though I work my ass off and put in all that overtime?” It was funny, but she
really
wasn’t
being paid. Not for what she was doing.

Not that she was going to whine
about that. She had more money than she could spend, and really didn’t need it.
That was one of those things that she never would have really gotten when she
was a Human. Back then having anything like cash was a treat, and a gift. It
was valuable, because other people said it was. Now, she knew that it was a
fiction. Still, handy to have even if it was built out of paper bits and wishes.

Zack hugged her again, but didn’t
warn her to be careful. In fact, other than grabbing her ass, he didn’t do anything
out of the ordinary. That was just because he was horny though. She didn’t have
enough time to spend with him, she didn’t think. After a moment she was let go,
and given a pleasant smile.

“Don’t worry, we can handle the
Greater Demon stuff. You did your part, and more. You’ve become the Vampire we
all knew you could be.”

She could tell what he meant
though, that she was more than that, and he knew it.

With that she headed off to work,
feeling free finally. Like things were the way they were supposed to be,
finally.

True, that wasn’t going to last.
She knew that before she even got into the yogurt shop. It was, she understood,
quite instantly, due to the three beings standing there, in front of the
serving counter. Eating waffle cones.

Even if she hadn’t had her recent
magical breakthrough, she was nearly certain that she would have gotten that
they weren’t normal. One of them was simply
vast
, for instance. Huge
shoulders that rippled with muscle that was defined even under his red silk
shirt.

The bull’s head was
kind
of a giveaway, as a capper to the rest.

Next to him was a woman so tiny
and cute that she seemed nearly like a living doll. She had honest to goodness
green and purple sparkles coming out of her body and head, and perfect blonde
ringlets. Eve had never owned a doll as a child, but she kind of wanted to pick
this one up and hold her, as ridiculous as it seemed. She was fucking adorable.

It was the last one standing
there that made her blink. A whole long line of things fell into place then.

She blocked it all out for a
second, turned and ran with speed that should have made the sound barrier
holler at her, but didn’t, because she wasn’t actually moving that fast, she
was bending time around. She threw some energy at it, to see what would happen,
which didn’t make her go much faster, but did make it hurt a lot less suddenly.

So it was worth doing that way,
if she had the extra to spare. It was kind of clear that she’d either need
more, or need to learn to conserve things better.

When she was in front of Zack,
she stopped, feeling calm and peaceful about the whole thing.

Speaking instantly, not in pain
from the jog this time, even if it would have left her silent for a minute or
two the day before, Eve managed a tone that was practically mellow.