Misguided Angel (19 page)

Was she getting somewhere final y?

"Were they fighting? Did Victoria do something to Piper that might have made her mad?" she pressed.

"Not that I knew," Bryce said, scratching his nose. He seemed to shrink away, and his
affectus
began to pulse in shades of scarlet and black, shining like a flare in the darkness.

Deming charged into the glom, barreling through the wards that protected his spirit from intrusion. She pushed through the haze of his memory. Then she saw it: the memory that had triggered his agitation. The night of the party: Piper Crandal arguing with Victoria Taylor. She couldn't make out what the girls were saying--Bryce had been too far away to hear--but it was clear that Piper was extremely upset when they left together. Which meant that
Piper
was the last person who had seen Victoria alive. Victoria had left with Piper, and then Victoria was never seen again.

That was al she needed to see. Deming pul ed away and scrambled into her clothes. She had to go over Piper's file again to see what she had missed.

"Where are you going?"

"I'm sorry, I forgot to tel you--I have to get back to the city tomorrow to meet my uncle," she said, without looking back.

She left Bryce alone in the bed and crept downstairs. It was past midnight and the party was over. Most of the Blue Bloods had left or retired to one of the numerous bedrooms. A few Red Bloods were slumped on the couch or passed out on the floor, abandoned by their new masters.

"Hey!" she said, coming across Paul Rayburn as he walked out the front door. "Devil boy."

"Oh, hey, what's up," he said, looking surprised to see her. She noticed his neck had no bite marks, which meant he had not been chosen. He was cute enough, but Deming figured most of the vamp chicks at the party didn't go for the smart and sensitive type. "Thin-blooded," they cal ed it. She felt an odd sense of relief at that, which puzzled her. Why would she care if another vampire had marked him as her own?

"Are you taking off ?" she asked. She had planned to run al the way back, at
Velox
speed, but the journey would tire her. "Are you going into Manhattan? Can you give me a ride?"

"Actual y . . ." He looked around. "I was waiting for someone. But it's al right. Yeah, sure. Why not. I've got my brother's car."

"Great." She smiled. "I'm in the Vil age."

THIRTY-THREE

A Tale of Two Friends

Paul Rayburn drove with his hands on the wheel at two and ten o'clock. He kept glancing at Deming shyly. He cleared his throat. "I thought you were with Bryce."

"I was," Deming yawned. "But not anymore." That was definitely done. She had no more use for Bryce Cutting now that she knew his secret.

"That was quick. . . . What are you, some kind of heartbreaker?" Paul asked.

"Since when are you so concerned with my love life?" she teased.

Paul looked over his shoulder to change lanes, and their eyes met briefly. "Since the beginning."

He had a crush on her. She had thought as much, had read it in his
affectus
every time he looked at her. Deming felt an odd thril . She'd left a dark angel panting in a bedroom upstairs, but in a car with a mere mortal she found she was feeling something she hadn't felt just few minutes ago.
Interest
.

Attraction
. It turned out, smart and sensitive was
her
type. She began to wonder what his blood tasted like--she bet those prejudices were wrong.

"I have to warn you, though, you're not going to get rid of me as easily as that," Paul said.

"No?"

"No, I mean--if you were my girlfriend, I'd make sure, for instance, that you didn't leave a party with some other dude."

"What else would you do?" she asked, curious.

"I'm not going to tel you." He blushed.

"Because I can imagine quite a lot." She smiled. This was fun. The conventional wisdom on why certain humans were chosen as familiars was that it was a purely physical response on the vampire's part, submitting to the al ure of the blood chemistry. Deming had yet to mark a human as her familiar.

While more and more vampires were taking their familiars at a younger age, she didn't plan on doing so until her eighteenth birthday.

When Paul reached over to remove the iPod in the glove compartment, his hand accidental y brushed hers, and Deming felt an electric jolt of energy pass between them. It was as if she was a match that had lit with his touch. Suddenly, she couldn't breathe. Was this what everyone was talking about?

Was this the bloodlust? Until now, she had never experienced it--the hunger, the acute, unmistakable desire for a certain human being's blood. It was as if her entire body were cal ing for a taste of his blood, and she would not be satisfied until she drank from him.

"You al right? You look a little pale."

"I'm okay." Deming looked away. She put a hand up to cover her mouth. Her fangs were protruding; her mouth was
watering
. She wanted him. She wanted him so badly it took al of her concentration to stop herself from jumping him. Whatever this was, she had no time for it. Even if she wanted Paul and was experiencing bloodlust for the first time, she had to focus. She had a job to do.

"How'd you know those guys?" she asked, affecting a casual air, and trying not to notice the electricity buzzing between them. "Through Gemma?"

"Uh-huh. But Piper invited me. She kind of had to since I was standing next to her at the time. It was a pity invite."

At the mention of Piper's name, Deming refocused her energy. "Piper's nice. . . ." she said, letting him take the lead. She wanted to find out what other people thought about Piper. Bryce's memory was one piece of the puzzle, but if she was going to pin this on Piper Crandal she'd need a lot more information to build her case.

Paul changed lanes again. "Piper's al right. You guys hang out, huh?"

"Kind of. I heard she was pretty tight with some girl named Victoria Taylor, who left before I got here."

He fiddled with the stereo and the car swerved a little. "Oh great, I missed my exit. Sorry, what were you saying? Piper and Victoria?" he asked, as the Cowboy Junkies played in the background.

"They were best friends?" Deming prompted.

"You mean they were friends, until . . ."

"Until?" Deming leaned closer.

Paul glanced at her. "Look, I don't listen to gossip, especial y about those who are basical y unaware of my existence; it's too demeaning. But what can I say? I go to this school, I'm not deaf. I heard that Victoria and Bryce were hooking up and Piper found out the night of Jamie Kip's party."

"Real y? Victoria and Bryce? They were together?" She hadn't found any indication of that in the reports, and Victoria had not played a prominent role in any of Bryce's memories.

"Yeah. And it real y pissed Piper off." It was clear that Paul was lying when he said he did not enjoy gossip. He was bathed in a yel ow light, warm and glowing, il uminating his features.

"But why would Piper care?"

"Piper and Bryce used to date." Paul shrugged. "I thought everyone knew that."

So that's what the girls had been arguing about at the party, why Piper had looked so murderous. This was the secret rancor Deming had been searching for, the poison inside the apple. She understood the dark violent emotions that claimed lives and caused people to burn and torture their best friends, to decide that they were no better than a pile of wood chips. As a Venator she had seen the consequences that the bitterness of resentment and jealousy could bring to a seemingly close friendship. Piper and Victoria had loved the same dark angel.

Piper and Bryce had been together, but Victoria had come between them. Jealousy over a boy had turned one friend against the other. Deming didn't think Bryce knew what Piper had done, but he had suspected enough to feel guilty about it. The night of Jamie Kip's party, Piper discovered that her best friend had betrayed her.

Final y, Deming had what she was looking for: a motive.

THIRTY-FOUR

Bond Less

Piper Crandal glared at her from across the interrogation table. The Lennox brothers had picked the suspect up Monday afternoon from school, and had taken her to Venator headquarters for questioning.

"You!"
she spat, the minute she saw Deming enter the windowless room. "What do you want? What's this al about? They said I had to come down to answer some questions. You're a freaking Venator? What is this?"

"I want to talk about Victoria Taylor," Deming replied cool y. She had ditched the fashion plate schoolgirl attire and was dressed in regulation Venator black. For the first time since arriving in New York, Deming felt like herself again. It was a relief to stop wearing the disguise. She'd spent the weekend pul ing files and putting her case together. She was ready.

"What about Victoria?" Piper asked nervously.

Deming turned to the television screen on the wal , and hit play. "Have you seen this video?" she asked.

"Sure, it's al over the Internet. Some kind of vampire movie from the Conspiracy."

"It's not a movie trailer. It's real. And that's Victoria in the video. Here's another. Look familiar?" Deming played the video of Victoria's burning and tried not to flinch, but it was hard to watch.

The color drained from Piper's face, and she pressed her hands to her eyes. "Oh my God. Oh my God. Is she--oh my God--is that real y . . . no . . . no.

No, Victoria, no. She's supposed to be at Le Rosey . . . what happened . . . oh my God . . ."

Deming cut her off. The girl was a good actress, she had to hand it to her, but she wasn't buying one second of it. "The night of Jamie Kip's party, you found out that your best friend was dating your ex-boyfriend."

"What are you talking about?" Piper sobbed, her eyes and nose bright red. "Victoria is dead? Oh my God. What happened? Who did this to her?"

Deming felt a moment of pity, but she had seen this al before--suspects who could not admit to the horror of their crime, who honestly believed in their hearts that they had never harmed their loved ones. She continued her relentless interrogation. "Victoria came between the two of you, and you wanted to punish her. You wanted her dead, and you covered it up with a conspiracy threat to disguise the real reason. To hide your motive."

When she had gone over Piper's file again, Deming noticed that Piper was a junior member of the Conspiracy. As such, she had insider knowledge on the workings of the subcommittee; she knew which buttons to push and how to create the il usion of a real security breach.

"I don't understand," Piper whimpered. "Victoria . . . why . . . oh God, why . . . ?"

"Why is right. Why did you want her dead? Because she came between the most sacred relationship you had in the world. Because you and Bryce Cutting are
bondmates
."

When it came down to it, everything always went back to the bond. Being bondless herself, Deming could never quite understand what the fuss was about. From what she could see, the bond just made everything more complicated.

This was just like the kidnapping in Shanghai, where instead of exposure, money was used as a smoke screen. The vampire who had taken Liling was convinced he was her bondmate, and wanted to hurt her for fal ing in love with someone else. He'd meant to take the Code into his own hands.

Deming had saved the girl just in time. Good thing too, since in the end, the boy had been mistaken. There was no bond between them and there never had been.

Some vampires thought the bond was al about love stories and romance. Souls cal ing out to each other through the centuries. But Deming knew nothing was ever that simple. Not in the matters of the heart and the bond. Victoria Taylor wasn't the first to suffer because of a bond, and she would not be the last.

After the shattering silence, Piper final y spoke. "Took you long enough to figure that out, huh?" she said bitterly, wiping away her tears. "That Bryce was mine. You sure didn't care about that when you were hooking up with him at Rufus's party."

Deming blushed. "That isn't important."

"No? Wel how about this, Venator? I don't know where you got the stupid idea that Victoria 'stole' Bryce from me, and I kil ed her. You're absolutely wrong on that count. Victoria was my friend. She was the best friend I ever had. She never came between us. Ask anyone in school. Victoria didn't even
like
Bryce. She couldn't believe he was my vampire twin. 'Not that douche,' were her words. Yeah, it pissed me off. But it pissed me off more that the night of Jamie's party, Bryce wouldn't acknowledge that we had found each other. He wanted more space, he said. He wanted more time, to be
sure
. I was so angry at him, and Vix was trying to calm me down, so I lashed out at her. But Vix was a real friend. In fact, no one has ever come between Bryce and me but
you
, you bondless freak. Get me a blood trial. Scan my freaking subconscious. I'm tel ing the truth."

THIRTY-FIVE

The Second Victim

Deming was shaking when she left the interrogation room. Ted Lennox looked at her with sympathy. "It's clear as day in the glom."

"I know." She col apsed on the nearest chair. She'd seen it too, more clearly than they, who'd needed to be in the twilight world to see Piper's
affectus
.

She had been so sure--Victoria going after Bryce explained everything--nothing was more anathema in the Blue Blood community than someone who came between the bond. Nothing. Just look at the Force twins.

When she'd asked him about Piper, Bryce Cutting had looked guilty and felt guilty and was guilty because he
knew
he was cheating on his bondmate. Bringing up Piper's name while he was hooking up with Deming had spooked him. Bryce had reacted to
Piper
's name, sure, but not for the reason Deming had believed.

Deming had been so certain of her talent for reading the
affectus
, she had immediately jumped to the conclusion that Piper was the murderer, that the threat of losing the bond had driven her to hatch an elaborate plot that entailed the murder of her best friend. She couldn't have been more wrong if she'd tried.