Daylighters (The Morganville Vampires #15)(47)
“Let’s go and see him,” Fallon said grimly. “I’ll have some questions for him, and all the rest.”
There was something in those words that warned Claire to get out of the way, and she turned and ran quickly down the corridor to the intersection, whipped to the right, and pressed herself against the wall. She made it with only a second to spare before she heard Fallon’s door click open and heard Eve say, in that lazy, almost dreamlike voice, “Where are we going?”
“To visit young Michael, remember?” Fallon said. “And show you that he isn’t worthy of your love. Come on, my dear, let’s have your arm—there you go. How are you feeling?”
“Dizzy,” Eve said. She didn’t sound good. “Did I drink? I really should get home now. It’s late. Claire’s going to worry. She’s a worrier, you know. Claire. She thinks too much. Thinks all the time. I wish she’d just let go sometimes and be . . . you know. Just be.”
“I’m sure she’s fine,” Fallon said, and Claire gritted her teeth. What a liar he was—he’d have known exactly what had happened to her at the house, known all about the dead guard, too. He’d know she’d been arrested and taken to the police station. He probably even knew she’d been broken out, and that there were hellhounds on her trail.
The thing was, no matter how many date-rape drugs Fallon gave Eve, she wasn’t going to get over loving Michael—which meant that she was going to be in even more danger once he realized that.
Claire heard footsteps and wondered if she ought to move, but there really wasn’t any place to hide; the door behind her was locked, and running to the storage closet would be noticed. So she stayed very still, held her breath, and listened as Fallon and Eve made their way past her to the corner and then turned left, toward the lobby. Away from her.
Eve was walking on her own, but only just barely; she seemed unsteady in her combat boots, and was holding on to Fallon for support. He seemed happy with that. Claire’s eyes narrowed when she saw that he’d put his other arm around Eve’s shoulders, as if he had the right to do that.
No doubt about it, Fallon intended to do something to Michael; he wanted Eve to have her heart crushed, her love destroyed. And Claire couldn’t let that happen—but she had no idea how to stop it, either. As Fallon and Eve reached the lobby, she realized that one thing Eve didn’t have on her was her purse, a black coffin-shaped thing with silver studs. Eve loved that purse. She’d never leave it behind, unless she’d been drugged enough to forget it.
Claire backed up and ran as quietly as she could down the hall to Fallon’s office. He hadn’t locked the door—confident of him—and she quickly scanned the room. It was big, which she’d expected; a golden sunrise plaque decorated the wall behind Fallon’s large wooden desk. The whole room was done up in golds and oranges and browns, tasteful and soothing.
Eve’s black coffin purse lay discarded on the floor next to the visitor’s chair across from the desk. Claire picked it up, checked inside, and found Eve’s car keys. There was a small container of pepper spray clipped on them, for emergencies. No sign of the giant backpack she’d brought, unfortunately; Claire really could have used an arsenal right now, but Fallon must have confiscated it and locked it away. She slung Eve’s purse over her shoulder and went around to the other side of the desk, sat in Fallon’s still-warm chair, and began pulling open drawers. Boring stuff. Office supplies. A few folders, but mostly they were concerned with civic planning and nothing to do with vampires.
There was, however, a locked drawer. Locked drawers were always interesting.
Claire opened the office supply drawer and found a long steel letter opener. She slipped it between the cracks at the top of the locked drawer and tried to pry it open; she managed to get it separated a bit, but the letter opener was too springy to really work.
A pair of sharp, long-bladed scissors worked much better as a lever.
The lock broke free with a snap, and the drawer slid smoothly open, revealing a whole collection of neatly ranked files. They all had printed labels, and Claire recognized every single name in there.
Every one was a vampire.
She grabbed Amelie’s, Myrnin’s, Oliver’s, and Michael’s and spread them out on the desktop. Amelie’s was thicker than the others, and she quickly flipped through it, looking for clues. What she found instead was history—in-depth history that she’d never seen before, about Amelie’s birth, her death, her resurrection. Her parentage, both human and vampire. A list of all those she’d made vampire in the years after—a long list, but the intervals between making new ones got longer and longer in the most recent hundred years, until there was only Sam Glass, and then his grandson Michael.
In strangely loopy, antique handwriting, someone—probably Fallon—had left a note beneath Michael’s name that said, end of line. That seemed ominous.
At the back of the file was a page, all handwritten, with Fallon’s observations about Amelie—strengths and weaknesses. Claire scanned it quickly and felt a real chill crawl over her, because her own name was in it. Under both columns.
Under strengths she was listed as Strong human advocate and ally. That wasn’t how Claire would have described her relationship with Amelie. But under weaknesses, he’d written Amelie shows a great fondness for the girl, and threats to her may be successful in weakening A.’s resolve.