"Get dressed and we'll go out. I'll show you around the shop, explain some things."
"Great!" Lucky jumped up and headed for Flo's bedroom.
I just hoped I could control her once she got some skills under her belt. I got dressed and transferred my stuff into my new purse, doing a quick strut around the living room for Valdez.
"It's a purse. What's the biggie? Except that it costs a lot and
obviously Lucky didn't want to give it up." Valdez lounged next to the door. "That alone makes it a sweet deal."
"They're hard to come by. And not just expensive. Very expensive." My phone beeped. Text message. I flipped open the phone and sat on the couch. "I NO WHAT U R." I looked up, but Valdez was busy chewing on the end of his tail. I took a shaky breath. Wrong number. Obviously. Then I realized there was a video attached. Oh, shit. There I was, kneeling in a pool of blood, biting Lucky's wrist. How? Who? Valdez was in the picture, peering over my shoulder. Quality wasn't great, but it was definitely me.
"I NO WHAT U R." The phone beeped again. My stomach cramped, and I headed to the kitchen for a Fangtastic before I checked the new message. How had this messenger gotten my number? I saw my laptop on the breakfast table. Duh. The information was everywhere. I gulped my drink, then sat again. New message.
"I NO WHAT U R, VAMPIRE. TO KEEP UR SECRET, PAY $500. LEAVE BEHIND DUMPSTER IN ALLEY BEHIND
UR STORE. 2NITE."
Money. Blackmail.
"Glory? You okay? You look a little freaked." Valdez walked up, and I snapped the phone shut.
"Just a text that I'm over my cell minutes this month. I'm going to have a hell of a bill." I wasn't about to share the text. Not yet anyway. Text message. Fairly small payoff. One of the teenage Goth types who hung around my shop had probably wandered into the alley while Valdez and I had been focused on Lucky and had taken the video with a cell phone. I'd play along for now. Even scrounge up five hundred bucks and follow instructions. A vampire against a kid with black lipstick and spiked hair? What a laugh. All I had to do was catch him or her picking up the cash, and the whammy would take care of this situation. That thought did a lot to calm me down.
I made a quick call to check on things in the shop. A locksmith had been in and repaired the back-door dead bolts. Lacy wanted me to deduct the cost from her pay. Tempting, but I didn't take her up on it. Hey, she'd been attacked while working for me. Vampire attacks behind my shop and inside it. Could Lucky's killer be the same one who'd tried to take out Lacy?
I didn't have to go in to work tonight, but now I had to get down there and pull out some cash, somehow get to the Dumpster without Valdez seeing the envelope . . . This was complicated as hell. But if any Goth types were stupid enough to aim a cell phone at me for Vampire at Play, Part Two, I could wrap this up in short order.
When Lucky met me in the living room dressed head to toe in one of Flo's outfits, I had a new reason for my frown lines. My roomie is a kind and generous person, but when someone pours what I now realized were size-eight hips into her favorite size-six jeans . . .
Both of us jumped when the hall door opened. Flo and her date, Richard Mainwaring. Lucky took a second to check out Flo then took a minute or more to stare at Richard. He was definitely stare-worthy with his white blond hair and startling blue eyes. Tonight he was especially yummy in a blue sweater that had the look of cashmere. Not that I was lusting for anything more than the sweater. Or having a flashback to a night when he and I had almost . . .
"Those had better not be my new Prada peep toes on your feet." Flo turned to me, her dark eyes, so much like her brother's, flashing. "Who is this shoe-stealing skank?" Her nostrils quivered. "And why does she smell like you, Glory?" Lucky sat down, reverently plucked off the shoes and placed them in Flo's outstretched hands. "You must be Florence. God, you have the most incredible shoe collection I've ever seen. I would never harm such an exquisite pair of pumps, but I just had to try them on. We wear the same size!" Lucky said this like she'd just discovered her long-lost twin.
"Who the hell are you?" Flo examined the shoes carefully.
"This is Lucky Carver, Flo. A temporary houseguest."
"Silly name," Flo sniffed, but I could see the compliment to her shoes had cooled her off considerably. "A houseguest? If I didn't know better . . ." She focused a narrow-eyed gaze on me. "Did you turn this woman vampire?" She sounded incredulous. Hey, I'd made no secret of my reluctance to do the deed. "I had to. Valdez and I found her bleeding out behind the shop."
"You shoulda seen our Glory, Flo. She saved Lucky's" -Valdez's snort was the doggy equivalent of a laugh- "life." He bumped against Flo's leg until she handed the shoes off to Richard and gave the dog an ear rub.
"Behind the shop! Who did this?" Flo looked from me to Lucky and back again.
"Good question." Richard set the shoes on the coffee table.
"By the time I got there, Lucky was near death with no sign of her attacker. She had a bodyguard who's still missing."
"Maybe the bodyguard did it." Flo picked up her shoes again. "You should get another one. You wear another woman's shoes without permission, Lucky, and anything can happen."
Lucky put her hands on her hips. "Glory told me-"
"It was an emergency. Come on, Flo. This is serious. If the bodyguard did it, she had help. She's a shape-shifter. This was definitely the work of a vampire. I healed Lucky's throat, then, uh, you know."
"I'm proud of you, Gloriana. How did you know what to do?"
I basked for a moment in Richard's look of approval. "I got Blade on my cell. He talked me through it." I moved closer to Lucky and inhaled. "Does she really smell like me? I can't tell. I thought so at first, but now . . ."
"Slightly." Richard smiled and put his hand on my shoulder. "Because she is so recently made. The similarity will fade in time." Hmm. Richard sounded like an expert on the subject. I wondered how many mortals he'd "saved" since the Crusades. Yep, he's really ancient.
Flo looked at his hand on my shoulder. "Where is Jeremiah?" She'd said the magic word. Richard frowned and stepped away from me.
"Jerry's in Louisiana, but he'll be home soon." I bit back a sigh. I guess Jerry and I are considered a "couple" if only because we'd been on and off for over four hundred years and he'd "made" me just like I'd made Lucky. But, while we connected in bed like nobody's business, out of bed we'd always had our issues. That first flush of lust and love had settled into familiarity territory.
"Are Jerry, Jeremiah and Blade all the same guy? Or does Glory have several guys on the hook?" Lucky's admiring glance made it clear she had no problem with that.
"All the same handsome man." Flo tossed her hair and stared at Lucky. "Tell me your real name. This Lucky is not it."
"Luciana Carvarelli. Sue me, but I got tired of the whole Mafia princess thing." Whoa! Mafia?
Lucky laughed. "Kidding. Papa's a tough bastard, but not into kissing anyone's ring." Florence said something in Italian and Lucky answered in the same language. Next thing I knew they were headed down the hall toward Flo's bedroom, both talking a mile a minute complete with hand gestures.
"They're going to find some shoes for Lucky to wear. Apparently Lucky's good boots were ruined by a huge bloodstain." Richard grinned and sat on the couch, patting the seat beside him. "This could take a while. Tell me more about finding Lucky. We need to figure out who tried to kill her." He'd lost his smile and wasn't that a shame?
But I'm not the airhead I sometimes pretend to be. If whoever tried to kill Lucky really wanted her dead, he or she'd be damned mad that Lucky had survived and not too happy with the vamp who'd saved her either. But I get pretty brave when there's a million dollars at stake. Hmm. Richard could be a help. The former priest believes in justice in a big way. And nobody's better than he is at finding rogue vampires-those out of whack freaks who think taking out mortals is their right. I sat beside him. No need to bring up a reward just yet. "Lucky told me she'd met with a were-cat earlier, but claims that meeting was uneventful." I had to smile. To someone not in the paranormal world, a were-cat meet would seem anything but ordinary.
"She give you a name?" Richard had actually whipped out a notebook from his jeans pocket. He grabbed a pen from the coffee table.
"No, but I have my suspicions. You have to wonder why they met in our alley." I gestured toward Lucky's large tote bag, which was now mine, mine, mine. "Lucky's cash was missing and one of her credit cards, but they didn't take all of them. So I don't think it was a typical robbery. They did pick up a pair of diamond studs and a Rolex though." Richard made a note. "That bag looks expensive." He smiled. "I guess I've gone shopping with Florence one too many times, but I've gotten to know a designer bag when I see one."
"You're right." I smiled back. "It costs the earth and whoever attacked her left it." I leaned closer. "Lucky's surprisingly cool with our world. Her family runs a loan business for paranormals. She calls herself an 'enforcer.' " Richard frowned. "Someone is damned careless to send a mortal female out to collect from paranormals."
"It's an unusual family."
"But an ambush in your alley. Damn it, she is lucky you happened along when you did."
"I was tempted to let her die." I said this in a small voice, like I was making confession to the former priest. "Now I've created another vampire." I grabbed Richard's arm. "I'm responsible for her, Richard. Forever."
"Now you know how I feel about you, Gloriana." The hall door had opened and closed silently, and Blade, hunky in worn jeans and an untucked white shirt, stood just inside. He nodded at Richard, then at Valdez, who'd hopped up when Jerry had appeared.
