Daylighters (The Morganville Vampires #15)(77)

“Of course,” Oliver said. “Fallon does so need his righteous justifications. Once he whips the people of Morganville into a frenzy of fear, he’ll be free to do whatever he likes with us, and no one will stand in his way. He can burn us all on pyres in Founder’s Square if he likes. And he might find that a just punishment.”

“As somebody you once sentenced to that kind of execution, maybe the shoe fits,” Shane said.

“Shane!” Claire said.

He shrugged. “Sorry, but there are plenty of regular people who’ve been hurt in Morganville. Who’ve lost family. That flapping sound? It’s the chickens coming home to roost.”

“He’s right,” Oliver said, which was a little unexpected—even to Shane, as evidenced by the startled look he threw back toward Claire. “The problem with ruling by fear is that eventually, when the fear fades, fury replaces it. That’s a lesson I should have learned in my breathing years, perhaps.”

“Damn straight,” Shane said, but his outrage had lost its force. “So . . . is there anything we can do to stop Fallon tonight? If it’s not too late already?”

“No,” Oliver said. He had turned his head, and was staring out at the desert whipping by beyond the window. “But it’s possible, just possible, that Fallon’s plan might backfire. Most of us older vampires have vast experience in managing our hunger; the poison he put in our blood supplies made us restless and peckish, to be sure, but not uncontrollably so. It’s the younger fledglings who have . . . difficulty. He might have lost enough touch with his vampire roots to think he can drive us so easily into marauding.”

“I thought you were all just waiting for the chance,” Shane said.

“Did you?” Oliver shrugged. “I’m not saying a hunt isn’t something we crave, but to a man, we hate to be manipulated. And this is our town, as much as any human’s. Our home, and our neighbors and perhaps even our friends. You fall into the trap of thinking as Fallon does, that there are only heroes and villains, monsters and victims, and nothing between. We all stand in that space, crossing the line to one side, then the other. Even you.”

That was unusually chatty for Oliver, and strangely lyrical, too. They all sat in silence for a while, until Michael cleared his throat and said, “I’m making the turn up ahead. Should take us straight to Blacke.”

“Hope that diner’s open,” Shane said. “Because now you made me think about French fries.”

Claire’s stomach rumbled again, right on cue, but she was watching Oliver. Watching the calm strength with which he cradled Ayesha, still locked in her coma. He hadn’t asked for blood for her, or more for himself, though she could see from the color of his skin and the shine in his eyes that he needed it.

He was teaching them all something about vampires, simply by being who he was. Maybe bad things, maybe good. But that had been his point.

That nothing, absolutely nothing, was all that straightforward.

? ? ?

Blacke kept its town purposefully dark; it didn’t want casual travelers looking for gas stations, or all-night diners. In fact, if Claire hadn’t known that the town had a population of at least five hundred, she’d have been fooled into thinking it was a ghost town. Only a few cars in sight; and the lights were off inside businesses locked up tight for the evening. It was a tiny little one-stoplight place anyway.

The hulking courthouse was just as Claire remembered it, though the damage to the iron fence had been fixed and the statue of Mr. Blacke, the town’s most eminent (or at least richest dead) citizen, had been restored, except it still leaned a little bit. They’d knocked him down with the school bus, hadn’t they? It seemed like such a long time ago. She swore that Morganville years were worse than dog years. The people of Blacke had boarded up the courthouse windows, though, and a faded red CONDEMNED sign creaked in the night wind. The only light in the place came from the glow from the clock tower, permanently frozen at three a.m. Claire checked her watch to be sure, but her instincts were right; the time was just past midnight.

The witching hour.

“We’re being watched,” Oliver said as Michael eased the car to a halt. “Although I expect it is thoroughly unnecessary to say it. Even a breather ought to be able to feel it.”

“Is that some bigoted term you guys use for us?” Shane asked.

“In the same way you use bloodsucker, leech, parasite? Yes. Although considerably more flattering.”

“He’s right,” Eve said, and Claire saw her shoulders bunch together as she shivered, even though she was warmly wrapped up now. “They’re watching us.”

Oliver stepped out and raised his voice. “Enough of this, Morley. You’ve had your gawk. There is serious work ahead.”

“Is there?”

Claire heard the lazy voice drifting down from far above. From the clock tower. She tilted her head back and spotted the shadow then, standing just under the glare of the light on the dials of the clock. Morley himself. He walked to the roof’s edge and stepped off, as if the four-story drop were nothing—and it might have been, for vampires. He hardly even flexed his knees on landing, and as he rose, Claire saw he’d managed to find clothes that suited him in Blacke—a dramatic full-length leather duster in faded brown, a long red scarf that trailed in the wind, a flat-brimmed hat. His eyes gleamed crimson in the darkness.