Dire Straits (21 page)

‘What was the word?’

‘I just told you.’

‘Eh?’ I rub my forehead and comprehension dawns. ‘Bo. He said Bo?’

Montserrat doesn’t reply.

‘So now you think that it was me who gave him the spell? It was in the blood he drank! It had to be.’

‘There aren’t many people who had access to that blood.’

‘It was left unattended in the recruits’ social room. Anyone could have got to it.’

‘Were you alone in that room at any point?’

I gape at him. I was, of course, but to believe that I had anything to do with it is crazy.

Montserrat continues. ‘O’Shea never saw his attacker. Then you magically showed up right afterwards. You were present at the massacre at Dire Straits and yet you didn’t intervene.’

‘Because Arzo told me not to!’

‘Arzo was half dead. How could he have told you anything?’

‘His eyes…’ my voice falters. This is ridiculous. ‘I saved O’Shea.’

‘You’re barely five foot. How could you save a thirteen-stone daemon?’

I shake my head. ‘You’re nuts. I had a good life. Why would I mess with it?’

‘Bo, even the police think you’re involved. I was blinded by Arzo’s faith in you. I won’t make that mistake again.’

‘Michael, this is all circumstantial…’

His face closes. ‘You will address me as Lord Montserrat. And you’re right. So far this is all circumstantial. But I won’t tolerate anyone threatening my Family. The second I find a shred of evidence,’ he smiles at me grimly, ‘and, believe me, Bo, I will find that evidence, then you will feel the might of Montserrat justice.’

‘Beth…’ I begin.

He silences me with a wave of his hand and picks up the phone on his desk. ‘Ursus, I’ve had a complaint that one of the recruits is hiding some illicit material. Beth, I think her name is.’ He listens for a moment. ‘Yes. Apparently it’s underneath her water jug. Can you check it out for me?’

He hangs up and raises his eyebrows. I sit back down, shoving my hands underneath my legs to avoid curling them into tight fists.

‘I’m not involved in this. I have no motive. You’re jumping to conclusions based on one word from a semi-conscious guy. I was the last person he saw before he tried to hang himself. That’s probably why he said my name.’

Montserrat doesn’t respond. I lapse into silence. Beth’s little white envelope is the best thing I have to prove my innocence right now. I’m going to have Lord bloody Montserrat begging at my feet for forgiveness in about two minutes’ time.

It takes less than that for the telephone to ring. Montserrat answers it. ‘Yes.’ I watch him smugly. He is going to be so damn sorry. ‘I see. You’re sure?’ He listens for another moment then replaces the receiver. ‘There’s nothing there.’

‘What? They didn’t look hard enough then! It’s right underneath the jug. It was there less than an hour ago. Have them look again.’

A muscle throbs in his cheek. ‘You can go now, Bo.’

‘I had nothing to do with this!’

His gaze is implacable. I feel numb, as if I’ve wandered into some bizarre episode of
The Twilight Zone
. ‘If you’re so sure I’m involved in this, why are you waiting?’ I ask him quietly. ‘Why not execute me and be done with it?’

‘I owe it to Arzo to find the proof first. And losing another recruit at this stage without the evidence of your betrayal will merely unnerve the others.’

‘So what am I supposed to do?’

His eyes are hard. ‘Pray.’

Chapter Twenty: Vodka

I feel empty inside and more alone than ever. I’ve given up everything and now I’m trapped in the Montserrat House with vampire blood running through my veins and not a single friend. Beth could be about to unleash hell upon every single Montserrat vampire any minute now and there’s nothing I can do about it.

To add to my woes, I seem to be suffering from permanent nausea, although whether it’s from my growing bloodlust or despair at my situation, I have no idea. I’m incredulous that Michael Montserrat believes I’m involved. Time is ticking away on the real mastermind’s invisible deadline and he’s wasting his days thinking I’m one of the culprits. Jeez, maybe he even thinks I’m the one who started it all, who wants to create a new Family. Considering how little I want to be part of the bloodguzzler world, how could he entertain such a thought?

The first opportunity I have, I sneak back into Beth’s room. There are no longer any traces of whatever it was she was hiding. My only hope is to find the real traitors but I’m getting no joy from the recruits and now I have nothing substantial on Beth, even though I try to keep her in my sights at all times. Besides, all the Families are involved in this, not just Montserrat, so I can hardly pin things on her and hope for the best. I have to find the root but I have no idea how. Tempting as it is to sneak up on Beth and force her to spill her guts, it doesn’t seem particularly realistic. Torture is hardly my thing. I got lucky before in that O’Shea genuinely wanted to share his problems with me and gave in when I pressed him; somehow I don’t get the same feeling about Beth. Besides, given my current situation, I’d probably have less than five minutes alone with her before Montserrat’s goons descended. I’m certain I’m being watched constantly although I never catch anyone following me.

Ursus continues with his nightly themed PowerPoints. Fortunately, there are some breaks and we have the pleasure of other vampires as trainers. Alongside the best ways to drink blood directly from a human (which has the few of us who still haven’t partaken of O negative squirming in our seats), there’s some basic combat and fitness drilling. I imagine Lord Montserrat’s face on a punch bag. When that stops working, I switch to the blond vampire who so callously killed Charity Weathers, and the dark-haired beast responsible for slaughtering everyone at Dire Straits. Imagining whipping their arses is, however, no substitute for the real thing.

My physical strength and vampiric abilities may be developing, but I’m feeling more and more strung out and less and less in control of my destiny. I don’t like it at all and, by the end of the seventh night, one full week after I officially turned, I’ve just about had enough.

‘Maybe you should drink,’ Nell says. ‘It’ll make you feel better and help you to sleep more.’

‘No.’ Beth’s answer is sharp.

‘It’s not as bad as you think,’ Nell informs us. She’d succumbed the previous evening, ravenously downing three glasses of thick gloopy blood in a row.

‘The longer you avoid drinking,’ Beth says with a nasty look at Nell, ‘the more powerful you’ll eventually become. It’s about time the Montserrat Family had some powerful women to deal with.’

I perk up at her words. This is the kind of thing I’ve been waiting for. I’ll have witnesses this time too.

‘Yup,’ agrees Nicky, stretching out her legs. She’s still not used to being able to move her limbs. ‘They are a bit testosterone heavy.’

‘But some of that testosterone is so tasty,’ Nell interjects with a wink.

I try to steer the conversation back to where I want it. ‘It’s a shame that only the Bancroft Family has a female Head.’

‘Yeah, apparently she’s a bitch, though.’

I sigh inwardly at Nell’s words. You can’t beat women for cattiness against their own sex.

‘Imagine if it was the other way around,’ I say casually. ‘If it was four female Heads and only one man.’

‘There’d be a lot of wine and chocolate,’ grins Nicky.

‘And episodes of
Sex and the City
.’

‘It’s not fair though, is it?’ I push, looking at Beth as I speak. ‘Out there, the fact that women hold fewer top jobs than men is explained away by them spending nine months out of the workplace pregnant and then staying at home to look after their kids. That’s not the case here.’ We’d already made much of the fact that we no longer had to worry about our periods. I’d wondered, albeit to myself, whether that would be the same if I made it to Sanguine. I wasn’t sure whether it would upset me or please me.

‘Women are weaker than men,’ Nell asserts.

‘Bullshit! No man could walk in these all smegging day long.’ Beth points to the stilettos she continues to wear. I try to chuckle.

‘When my family was attacked,’ Nicky says softly, ‘my mother tried to protect me while my father tried to fight back.’ A dark shadow crosses her face. ‘They broke in at exactly two o’clock in the morning and were there until almost five. I remember because I had a huge red digital clock on my bedside table. They went into my parents’ room and I woke up and heard them so I followed them in. My father fought as hard as he could while my mother threw her body between them and me. That’s the difference between men and women.’

I don’t agree with her but I’m not in a position to say so. The others obviously feel the same and we lapse into an uncomfortable silence while Ria walks in with today’s tray of blood offerings. Nell has been drinking all day and ignores her. Beth, Nicky and I look away.

‘You know what we should do?’ Nell says to no one in particular.

‘What?’

Her eyes gleam with mischief. ‘We should sneak out. Hit the town. Have a little fun.’

Nicky is shocked. ‘Leave the house?’

Nell punches her arm. ‘Live a little! We’ve been toeing the line up till now. We deserve a break.’

I try to assess whether she’s serious or not. I’m surprised by how much I want to agree. Getting out of the stifling atmosphere of the Montserrat house might just be the tonic I need. Besides, by staying here all I’m doing is delaying the inevitable. Whether I’m executed first, or the Families all fall, the results for me personally will probably end up the same. I need to clear my name on the outside as well as here. This might be my chance to do both.

‘We only have training until 2am,’ I point out. ‘Then we’re free.’

‘It’s breaking the rules.’

‘Not the real, serious, “we will execute you” rules.’

Nicky gives Nell a suspicious look. ‘How do you know?’ She doesn’t make explicit reference to Nell’s pre-turning comment about stealing but it hangs unspoken in the background.

‘What were Ursus’s exact words? Do not go out in the sunshine. You must live in the Montserrat House. There’s nothing to say that you must stay here trapped like a prisoner.’

‘I like the idea,’ I say, decisively. It’s about time I took matters into my own hands again. And something to do will take my mind off the gnawing hunger leaching from my stomach into the marrow of my bones. I continue, ‘It’ll be pretty late by the time we can escape but I know just the place. The bouncers don’t ask questions and we’re unlikely to bump into any vampires.’ We may bump into a lawyer of dubious intentions, though.

‘No.’ Beth shakes her head firmly. ‘It’s too dangerous.’

‘How can a few dances and some tequila shots be dangerous? We’re vampires now. It’s not as if we need to be concerned with cirrhosis of the liver.’

‘It’s not drinking tequila that worries me,’ Beth mutters.

She flicks me a worried glance, as if she thinks that I’ll pounce on the nearest human and sink my as-yet non-existent fangs into their carotid artery. Why she has decided to pick on me instead of the younger and frailer Nicky, I have no idea. She should be more worried about me finding the evidence I need to prove her guilt – and my innocence.

‘Don’t come if you don’t want to,’ I tell her airily. I’m fairly confident she’ll join in but for once I don’t care. My gaze falls upon Peter, sitting morosely in the corner. He’s the only other person apart from Nicky, Beth and me who’s not yet partaken of the salty red stuff. Somehow I don’t think it has anything to do with wanting to become a powerful vampire. ‘In fact, safety in numbers. Let’s ask Peter along.’

Nicky’s face twists but Nell grins agreement. ‘Brilliant!’

Less than two hours later, the five of us gather next to Montserrat’s portrait. His dark eyes make me feel guilty so I turn away. Everyone has decided to come – even Nicky; it’s just as well that she’s with us as she appears to be the only one who kept her credit card when the rest of her things were taken. I have no idea where she normally hides it – perhaps under her own water jug – but I’m glad we’ll have money to buy some drinks. There would be nothing more depressing than getting to the nightclub and realising we couldn’t pay our own way.

‘How exactly are we going to get out of here?’ she enquires.

‘Shhh,’ I whisper, tentatively stepping down the path towards the towering perimeter wall.

The night is cloudy, although there’s enough of a wind to reveal the crescent moon from time to time. Its gleam is heartbreakingly tiny. I’m torn between needing more time to do some proper investigating and wishing it was already the full moon so I could make my escape.

We skirt round the edge of some bushes and duck under the low hanging branches of an apple tree. There’s a muttered curse from behind and, when I twist round to see who it is, I spot the lapel of Peter’s jumpsuit caught in one of the twigs. His fingers scrabble at the offending branch but he only succeeds in getting more tangled. A scowling Beth traipses back to help with an exasperated sigh. She just succeeds in freeing him when a large shape flies overhead, cawing loudly and making us all leap in fright.