Blood Leverage (Bloodstone Chronicles Book 1) Read online

  Nicky fidgeted in his seat as he passed me the soap. “You know, Rory…”

  “Hm?” The green smudge wasn’t washing away.

  His words came out in a rush. “I don’t think you should write any more articles until after the hearing.”

  The soap slipped from my hand and shot across the tub under the force of the jets. I grabbed for it and missed. “Why would you say that? Writing articles isn’t even against the rules, let alone the law.”

  Nicky’s fidgeting became an outright squirm. “I know it doesn’t break the rules, but you said your next article is about council term limits, right?”

  The soap bobbed toward me and I snatched it triumphantly. “Yeah, what about it?”

  “Well, maybe you should think twice about offending the people in charge of your hearing. People might think you’re trying to stir up trouble and it’s not a good time to make a scene.”

  Forgetting my droopy bikini top, I sat straight up in the bathtub. “That’s the reason you think I push for change? To ‘stir up trouble’ and ‘make a scene’?”

  It was an accusation I’d expect from Robert, but not Nicky. Sure, I didn’t mind thumbing my nose at people now and then, but it was a side benefit as opposed to my goal. The thought of people viewing my efforts as agitation or a cry for attention stung, and Nicky was smart enough to realize it. He was also smart enough to apologize immediately.

  “Rory, I’m sorry. That came out wrong. I’m sorry I brought it up at all. I brought you here as a distraction from your problems, and all I’m doing is harshing on you. Still,” he gestured around the bathroom, “as far as distractions go, you have to admit, I’ve done well.”

  I was far more upset about how Nicky saw me than any harshness in his words, but I knew I’d regret pushing the argument further and accepted the change in subject silently. After all, he’d brought me here out of kindness, and, if nothing else, this place was an excellent distraction.

  “This place is great,” I said honestly. “It’s hard to imagine that everyone used to live like this back before the second Dark Age.”

  Nicky’s answering snort echoed off the marble walls and floor. “I don’t think everyone lived quite like this, Rory.”

  Considering the opulence displayed throughout the residence, I nodded. “Okay, maybe not quite like this, but you know what I mean. Not everyone would’ve had marble bathrooms and golden harps or whatever, but supposedly everyone had the internet. Everyone had cellphones and airplane rides and as much television as they wanted to watch. They vacationed in outer space and had, I don’t know… credit cards and hospitals and genetically engineered pets and universities. Hell, there might’ve been flying cars by now.” I giggled at the thought.

  Nicky shrugged, ever pragmatic, and scooped a few handfuls of water over his dusty hair. “Humans in the cities still have most of that stuff, I think. Except for the flying cars and genetic pets and vacations in space. As for me, if I can’t have it, why think about it?”

  Soap in hand, I laughed as I resumed my attack on my grass stained leg. “Oh, come on. Don’t be so boring. If the conversions hadn’t happened, what do you think your life would be like?”

  Startled, he lowered his hands and stared at me. “I’ve never thought about it. That was all hundreds of years ago. Why? Was there something you would’ve wanted to do if everything was different?”

  I didn’t have to think twice as I rinsed the soap from my now-scoured leg. “I would’ve been a professor at a huge university. I’d teach law, or astrophysics—something amazing I’ll never have the chance to learn now. Or maybe I’d be a doctor, or a lawyer, or a politician who helped pass laws for millions of people.”

  Nicky rose from the water and reached for the towels, apparently finished with both our bath and our conversation. “Yeah, I hear politicians were particularly admired back then. Didn’t you once tell me that political assassinations were at an all-time historical high right before the conversions? Great choice, Rory.” Snickering, he turned back and offered one of the towels to me.

  Irritated by his dismissal, I accepted it without comment. As I climbed out of the tub, I resolved to forget my annoyance, but when Nicky turned to flip the water jets off I saw an opportunity for a little petty revenge. Without a moment’s hesitation, I gave in to temptation and snapped my towel across his ass.

  Upon losing the resulting towel war, I followed Nicky to the kitchen to retrieve our dry clothes, anxious to return to the living room. I’d barely glanced at the artwork and I also hoped to find a book explaining the harp. However, Nicky had another card to play.

  I felt a flutter in my stomach when he said his plan involved the bedroom, but it subsided as he approached the misshapen table I’d noticed earlier.

  “Hey, I meant to ask about that,” I remembered. “You sidetracked me with pecan pie and your enormous—” I broke off as Nicky leered.

  I shot him a look. “I’d planned to say ‘enormous bathtub’.”

  “Yeah, I like my interpretation better, but anyway, this is a roll top desk. They went out of style centuries before the conversions.” I watched with interest as he slid the front panel back, revealing the flat surface one normally associates with desks.

  The desk had any number of cubbies and compartments, but my attention was riveted on the laptop the curved panel had concealed. My pitiful computer at home was cobbled together from ancient parts but this was clearly post-conversion manufacturing. (I felt certain there hadn’t been a manufacturer named Fang Innovations before the wars.)

  Despite the stupid name, I bounced in the chair as Nicky turned it on, my mood successfully restored. “Okay! Tell me how to operate this bad boy.”

  He snorted derisively. “Fang Innovations is slightly less innovative than its name implies. The operating system is a direct rip-off from Microsoft, and you already know how to use it. This just works faster.”

  “Oh.” I didn’t want to waste time on a new version of what I already owned and would rather have stayed in the living room, but Nicky clearly considered this a treat.

  “Why don’t you bring another chair in here?” I suggested. “Let’s find a game we can play together.” It wasn’t the evening I’d wanted, but Nicky’s ego would certainly benefit from any smackdown I could dish out.

  He shook his head. “Ms. Parkes has a couple books on automotive maintenance I’d like to read. If this summer’s deliveries go well, I’ll be able to afford some upgrades.”

  Nicky reading? That had to be a first. I tried to look enthused as Nicky left to enjoy the evening I’d wanted. He’d barely passed the doorway when he turned, smirking. After a day of surprises I braced for a curveball and he didn’t disappoint.

  “By the way, did I mention this computer is connected?”

  Bombshell delivered, he retreated while I stared after him in disbelief. A connected computer—hot damn! Ms. Parkes had to be beyond rich to afford a rural internet connection she wasn’t even around to use.

  My own computer had a browser, but I’d never been able to access anything. Despite my excitement, I laughed out loud when Ms. Parkes’ home page opened to a search engine titled VAMPOOGLE. I was loud enough for Nicky to hear, even over the music he’d turned on in the other room.

  “Let me guess,” he shouted over a chorus of guitars. “Welcome to Vampoogle?”

  Still snickering, I managed to holler back, “Is this the vampire version of Google?”

  Grinning, he reappeared in the doorway, book in hand. “It accesses less than five percent of the original Google, but it works,” he assured me before returning to the sofa.

  I shook my head in mild amusement. If my observations of the last ten minutes were accurate, vampire tech consisted of stealing the best of previously existing human ideas and re-naming them something silly and self-praising. Or, in the case of Vampoogle, something merely silly.

  However, no matter what vampires chose to call the internet, the sirens’ song of information was irresistible
and I wallowed in the luxury for the rest of the afternoon. I did research for several articles and even double checked the address for Immortal Media to make certain I’d mailed my submissions to the right place.

  I had.

  Pushing my disappointment aside, a new idea occurred and I typed ‘Eleanor Strong’ into the search box and hit enter. The search returned an astounding number of entries.

  My next three hours were spent researching my own mother, working my way from curious, to surprised, to stunned, and to speechless—finally stopping somewhere around numb. It stupefied me to read that Mass Conversions was the single best-selling book of the current century. She’d won a Pulitzer Prize for it and had never said a word.

  My evening went downhill from there. Three years after publication, mom had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her ‘enormous contribution in easing tensions between the two sentient species’. A global accomplishment and I’d had no clue. The Eleanor Strong the rest of the world knew was a stranger to me.

  When I found her in an article titled, “The Richest Humans in the Americas,” I couldn’t read anymore. In fact, my pie nearly made a reappearance. It didn’t help that Ms. Parkes had also made the list, and it infuriated me that no photos were included.

  After a deep breath I hit the power button—not bothering to shut the computer down properly—and flopped onto the enormous bed. My mom and I needed to have a long chat when she returned.

  These discoveries would’ve wrecked my mood under any circumstances, but after a few days of no sleep and constant excitement they hit doubly hard. By my calculations I’d slept maybe ten hours over the three craziest days of my life, remaining upright through adrenaline rushes, orgasms and metabolism-defying quantities of sugar. Small wonder I felt like such a bitch.

  Walking to the living room door took more energy than I had to spare and attempting a friendly smile nearly killed me.

  “Nicky? I’m tired. Would you mind if I went to bed early?” I tried for an easy tone, but the question came out flat and monotonous. Fortunately, I’d interrupted what must have been Nicky’s nightly exercise routine and his mind was focused on his push-ups.

  He mopped at his face with a corner of his t-shirt before answering. “Are you sure you don’t want any dinner? There’s all kinds of stuff in the freezer. And a lot more pie.”

  My stomach churned at the thought. “My stomach is still working on the previous pie. I think I just need some sleep.”

  Nicky bounced up from the floor and clicked off his music. “Tomorrow’s scavenging will be demanding—lots of lifting and lots of stairs—so sleep as much as you can. I’ll join you in another hour or so.”

  Not trusting myself with anything more than a “Goodnight”, I slogged back into the bedroom. In my current state scavenging sounded more akin to torture than anything fun. With that cheerful thought resonating, I stripped and crawled into bed, kicking the covers until I’d scrunched them beneath my feet the way I liked them.

  After nearly an hour, I gave up. As exhausted as my body was, my brain was too wired to sleep. And then I remembered the key lime pie Nicky had mentioned.

  It had stuck in my mind because I’d never tasted a lime—I’d never even heard of a ‘key’ lime—and if I couldn’t sleep I may as well get another sugar rush out of it.

  It was a sound plan, but it never came to fruition.

  I shrugged back into my clothes and put more effort into my smile this time as I left the room. After all, none of this was Nicky’s fault. “Hey, I’m getting the key lime pie from the freezer, would you like…?”

  Halfway to the kitchen I stopped mid-question as I took in the strangest tableau I’d ever seen. Nicky wasn’t alone, and I’d definitely interrupted… something. I just didn’t know what. Whatever it was, I couldn’t look away. I couldn’t do anything but stare. However I’d imagined a vampire would look, I’d been wrong.

  The woman looked at least a decade older than I, though that meant nothing with vampires. She was of Asian descent and strikingly exotic.

  By exotic I wasn’t referencing the vampire’s ethnicity, but rather her fashion sense. She had black hair with deep purple streaks to match her outfit, which was skintight and made from the shiniest material I’d ever seen. It looked like she’d been dipped in melted plastic.

  In any other setting the outfit would have been shriekingly noticeable, but the effect was strangely muted in the purple living room—another plum in a bowl of plums. (Upon further observation she was slightly darker than the rest of the room, a lone eggplant in my hypothetical plum bowl.)

  On appearance alone I might not have pegged the woman as a vampire, though I would have gawked regardless. However, the fact that she stood behind the sofa cradling Nicky in her arms served as a big clue she wasn’t normal. Nicky dwarfed the dainty vampire and the contrast would have been hilarious if I hadn’t been struck dumb at the sight of her. I was viewing them from the side, but from the front it must have looked like he was levitating over a pair of shiny purple boots.

  Nicky didn’t even realize I was there. I was relieved he wasn’t hurt but he was no help in deciding what to do. It felt like I’d intruded on a private moment and I had a ludicrous urge to apologize.

  The eggplant vampire hadn’t noticed me either, though they supposedly have great hearing. However, I had no problem recognizing the precise moment she did notice. She turned and snarled, baring her fangs and dropping Nicky on the floor behind the sofa.

  In all fairness to the eggplant, I thought she’d been aiming for the sofa. It looked like Nicky had flipped when she’d meant for him to flop, resulting in a crash that jarred me out of my fascinated stupor and straight into terror.

  The eggplant turned to face me and I bolted for the nearest door, hoping to simultaneously evade Eggplant while distracting her long enough for Nicky to barricade himself in the bedroom. It wasn’t a well-defined strategy—I’d skipped the planning and had gone straight to execution—but it was all I had.

  Unfortunately, the closest door held the forbidden black box and was unsurprisingly locked. Panicked, I spun around and re-aimed for the open bedroom with no belief I’d make it, lobbing the crystal sculpture I’d admired earlier behind me in a futile attempt to slow Eggplant down.

  I didn’t have a precise bearing on her location at this point, but Nicky was no longer behind the sofa and my path to the bedroom was clear. The world’s most flamboyant outfit acted like camouflage in here. What were the odds?

  I raced to the bedroom and was already pulling the door shut as I charged through. A surge of triumph flooded through me as I shot the deadbolt into place and struggled to catch my breath.

  I had no clue how Eggplant had entered—maybe she knew Ms. Parkes?—but the invitation rule was clear. This bedroom was intended as guest lodging and we’d claimed it for the night. Unless Nicky had been whammied into an invitation we’d be safe.

  My shaky smile turned to glazed shock as I turned to ask what the hell had happened. I’d been certain he’d moved—I’d had a clear view behind the sofa—but nonetheless, I was alone in the bedroom.

  Nicky was still out there.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  STILL panting, I scanned the room repeatedly like he’d magically reappear. When the pounding on the door began, it seemed unimportant in comparison. I barely managed mild interest as the metal deadbolt tore a chunk of concrete from the wall beside me. Then I took an unexpected flight as the door slammed into me, answering my invitation question.

  As I collided with the wall, gravity reasserted itself and I crumpled to the floor, stunned. Just as quickly, I was hauled upright and slammed back against the wall, my toes barely brushing the floor.

  It seemed crucial to notice everything in my last moments, but that wasn’t easily done. Between the unfamiliar room and the shock—not to mention the pain from girl meets concrete—I felt disoriented. I also had a terrified moment where I thought I’d gone blind in one eye, but a few blinks reassured me I
was simply bleeding from a cut along my hairline.

  It almost made me laugh. You know your day officially sucks when bleeding into an eyeball counts as good news.

  The vampire had me by the throat and held me with a single white hand, despite my best efforts. The few blows I managed to land were as effective as slapping stone and once I met his eyes I was unable to do even that.

  Wait.

  His eyes?

  I sucked in as much oxygen as his grip allowed me, and the fog in my brain cleared enough for me to realize this wasn’t the vampire who’d attacked Nicky—if attacked was even the word. This vampire was less flamboyant, wearing black corduroy slacks and an ivory sweater. His feet were bare and he had skin even paler than mine, with black hair and green eyes.

  No streaks in the hair, but tiny flecks of gold in the eyes.

  Feeling more like myself I gave him the dirtiest look I could—the only show of defiance I was capable of. The heat in my eyes only amused him but if I had to die, it wouldn’t be while staring at the floor. My pride was small consolation compared to my life, but I recognized it as the only thing I might be capable of saving.

  The gash on my scalp kept bleeding, as scalp wounds do. Blood ran down my chin, dripping onto the vampire’s hand where it remained locked around my throat. His pallor made my blood look even redder and I pettily hoped he didn’t recognize it as the ‘exquisite vintage’ I’d heard it was. Damned if I wanted him to savor this.

  Then my blood trickled down his forearm and his nostrils flared in a bewildered expression. In a lightning quick movement, he released my throat and I staggered before collapsing to the floor.

  “I know you.”

  My neck and throat throbbed from their use as a human handle but I was coherent enough to know the vampire could have killed me. I’d seen him rip a steel bolt through a concrete wall. (Okay, technically I hadn’t seen it, but I felt confident he was responsible.) My neck was far flimsier than the door and yet I was still breathing. For the moment.