Falling Apart
Copyright © 2014 Jane Lovering
Published 2014 by Choc Lit Limited
Penrose House, Crawley Drive, Camberley, Surrey GU15Â 2AB, UK
The right of Jane Lovering to be identified as the Author of this Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher or a licence permitting restricted copying. In the UK such licences are issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90Â Tottenham Court Road, London, W1P 9HE
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available
from the British Library
ISBN 978-1-78189-115-5 (epub)
ISBN 978-1-78189-116-2 (mobi)
ISBN 978-1-78189-114-8 (epdf)
This book is dedicated to the memory of Aslam â he was very much loved and is very much missed.
For the people of York, who never complain about the liberties I take with their lovely city, even when I drop vampires on it; my friends at work, the RNA and Choc Lit, who all creak under the effort of keeping me sane; and my children, whose life's work is to drive me the other way â¦
And to TMMQ, for the owls.
TOP SECRET â FOR YOUR EYES ONLY
From: Government Department for the Suppression of the Otherworld
To: Members of Parliament (HUMAN ONLY)
Date: 20 July 2012
This document is covered by the Official Secrets Act and should be destroyed after reading.
Gentlemen,
To summarise the situation: there are increasing rumours regarding a possible uprising by those termed Otherworlders, despite the apparent peace in which we currently live. (For the purposes of this document âOtherworlders' comprise vampires, werewolves, zombies, wights and Shadows, with whom we are forced to share this planet as a result of a magnetic flux fracturing the barrier between our universes.) These rumours are from a reliable source and we fear that this uprising may generate a renewal of the violence that followed the Otherworlders' original incursion into our world, just over a century ago. For those unfamiliar with recent history, please advise this department and we can provide you with the documentation regarding the Troubles, the seventy-year period prior to our Treaty with the Others.
You may have been made aware that we have not been idle in our attempts to ensure the safety of the human race, vis-Ã -vis a possible vampire uprising. We consider the vampires to be the leaders, and therefore the most dangerous, among the Others, since they wield most power, and offer a degree of control over other species.
After the commencement of the Troubles our department established a small enclave of humans who seemed naturally immune to all vampire magick and glamours. These people were reserved by us and a process of selection was undertaken in order to produce a sub-species of human who could be used, if necessary, to fight and overcome the vampires without risk of their being infected with a vampire demon (communicated through the vampire's bite â for further information please refer to this department). This enclave was somewhat divisive in terms of government approval and was largely disbanded prior to the signing of the Treaty for Peace. The whereabouts of the engineered humans is currently unknown.
It is the opinion of this department that moves should be made to reconvene these individuals, or as many as remain alive. We are aware that it is some thirty-five years since the termination of the genetic experimentation, and many of these persons may have found adjusting to life away from the compound to have been beyond their capabilities.
Sirs, your urgent attention is required on this matter.
Yours,
Deputy Minister for the Department.
Blood. Blood on my hands, dripping onto the carpet, staining my sleeves, staining everything I touch
 â¦
âJessie?'
I jerked awake at the touch on my shoulder to see Liam, my co-worker, his face upside down in my field of vision.
âWhat the hell are you doing in my bedroom?' Life began to pull together in front of me, bleary shapes gradually resolving into boxes, weird noises into computer beeps and hums. âAnd why does my bedroom smell weird?'
âI can only suggest that's because you collect mould.' Liam moved away and I heard the rattling of mugs being collected. âBut this is the office. Such as it is.'
I sat up slowly. My head had been resting on a sheaf of A4 paper and my left cheek had a seam running down it from the edge of the package. âOh, bollocks.' I stretched my arms and yawned. âHow long have I been asleep?'
âFourteen e-mails, two phone calls and a cup of coffee with doughnuts. I thought the doughnuts might wake you, but you just dribbled a bit in your sleep.'
âI am going to open your next pay packet and do something spectacularly horrible inside it.' I yawned again and scratched at my head.
âOh, York Council do that already. It's called my pay slip.' Liam went out to the kitchen, fist full of mugs. Working, as we did, in the Otherworld Liaison office of York Council meant lots of contact with the Otherworlders, acting as their PA (which, in my opinion, stood for Professional Apologiser) and tranquillising them for Enforcement to deal with when they got out of line. It also meant a hefty dose of standing on school stages explaining to hyperactive teenagers what being a vampire
really
meant. However, it did not mean earning very much money. They'd have paid us in book tokens if they thought we could read. Endless cups of coffee were our coping mechanism.
âWhy so tired?' Liam went on. âYou and Sil having wild, rampant sex all night every night?' He sounded slightly wistful, but then he and his girlfriend had a small baby to keep them up at night rather than anything rampant. âAnd please say yes, because anyone who lives with two gorgeous vampires had better not be watching late-night telly and crocheting into the small hours.'
A small burst of pain erupted, as though someone had detonated a bomb just under my navel, but I contained it. Walled it in. âI don't!'
âLive with gorgeous vampires or watch late-night telly? Because being the girlfriend of the City Vamp and sharing a house with him and his sidekick qualifies you on the first count. Your lack of knowledge of
Dexter
would seem to rule out the second.' More clanking and the sound of kettle-filling. âAnd I already know you can't crochet. Or knit, but Sarah says thanks for trying. She's going to use that cardi you knitted for Charlotte to cover the sofa. On account of our baby not being ten feet long and everything.'
âYeah, well, at least I tried.' I worked my shoulders to try to lose the Quasimodo sensation and fiddled my mouse to wake up my computer. There was an odd feeling somewhere around my middle, as though someone had opened a window in my lower intestine. Not the same as the anxious pain that was pretty much permanently clenching my gut but something different.
âJessie, what's up? You look weird. And considering I'm comparing you to zombies, werewolves, vampires and wights, that's really weird. Here's your coffee, but if you're going to throw up, don't drink it.' He swept a few papers aside to make room on my desk for my mug, then sat at his own and placed his mug squarely on the coaster which sat amid absolutely nothing at all. âI am really tired of mopping.' He adjusted the picture of his baby daughter, Charlotte; framed, dust-free and the only thing on his wall-shelf apart from a calendar and a pot of paper clips. âLove her to bits, truly, but there is one hell of a lot of mopping involved in fatherhood.'
âI ⦠don't know,' I said, rather faintly. âI think lack of sleep might be making me hallucinate. And, before you drop the inevitable innuendo, no, it isn't nights of passion that are keeping me awake. I haven't
seen
Sil for ten days.' And here the anxiety came crowding in again, released from the tether that usually kept it away from conscious thought, and accompanied by the image of my lover â slender, with hair darker than a slate quarry at midnight and eyes like a storm at sea. Sensitive, sexy, overhung with guilt about what he was and what he'd done, but living with that pain for the sake of letting himself feel love for me.
Where was he?
âHe said he had something he needed to do, and then he was gone.'
Liam raised his eyebrows. âWhat, leaving York to run itself?'
Liam didn't know what Sil had told me in confidence, that Sil's apparent Liam-equivalent co-worker Zan was the one who really ran the city; Sil was the figurehead, the apparent chief,
the target
. âI think Zan has got it covered,' I said, rather weakly. The image of Sil kept repeating on the back of my eyeballs like cucumber-burps after a large salad. âEverything seems to be quite calm at the moment; no mental demons trying to raise an army like a few weeks back.'
âSo, where's Sil gone? Setting up Gretna Green for the wedding of the decade? He hasn't asked you about your preference in ring design lately, has he?'
I gave him a conversation-killer face. âLiam, exactly what were you thinking, bringing me this cup of coffee without so much as a Rich Tea to dunk? You know that we've got a whole new biscuit allowance since I managed to save the world, and if you're trying to siphon it off so that you can renew your
Doctor Who
Fan Club membership then you're going to find yourself at the Job Centre with no reference and a âcyberman fetishist' label against your name. Good luck getting another job for the council with
that
kind of stigma.'
It worked. Complaining but distracted Liam got up and headed back into the kitchen, leaving me to worry about where Sil had gone. And, more importantly,
why.
Vampires are bad enough when you can keep your eye on them, when they start disappearing, it's time to worry.