Vampire Zero (Laura Caxton, #3)(22)

“Next new message.”

“Laura, it’s Clara. I heard about—I heard—the guys here are talking about it, they’re talking about you, just call me. I’m scared. I’m scared for you, so just call me, alright? Call me, damn it.”

“End of new messages. You have forty-?five saved messages.”

Caxton flipped the phone shut. Thought about whom to call first. Glauer shouldn’t be working the Rexroth angle. It wasn’t even an angle! Finding and killing Jameson Arkeley was the only thing that mattered. She called his number, but it went straight to voice mail. Typical. For two months while they’d had nothing real to do he was always at her heels, always waiting for his next order. Now that she actually had an order to give him he was out of cell phone range.

“Officer Glauer, this is Caxton. I want you to stop playing around. You’ve heard what happened last night. Well, you’re right, this is it. This is what we’ve been waiting for. This is what we’ve been studying for and working toward, and it’s happening now. I have no doubt that Arkeley will want to kill again, and we need to get him before that happens. So when you get this, start putting together an action item list we can send around to everyone in the SSU.” She glanced down at the star on her lapel. “There are going to be some changes to how we work, but I’ll tell you about them when I see you next. Stay focused, Glauer. Stay with me.”

She snapped the phone shut. Centered herself. The next call required her to be calm and collected. She scrolled down to Clara’s cell number, then pressed SEND.

She got Clara’s voice mail. The phone didn’t even ring once.

“Hi, baby. I got your messages,” she said. “Listen, I’m okay. I’m going to be okay.” He didn’t even want to hurt me, she started to say, then stopped herself. Clara was no idiot. She knew that if a vampire didn’t kill you one night it only meant he was saving you for the next time he got hungry. “Let’s do lunch, okay? Get to Harrisburg, to the HQ, whenever you can and we’ll eat and talk and I’ll tell you everything. I miss you too.”

She ended the call—and then immediately wanted to call back, to say that she loved Clara, that she wanted nothing more than to go home and be with her alone and quiet and not talk or think about anything, just be in each other’s arms for a while with nothing to do, nowhere she had to be. She should just call back, she told herself. She really should. She even started reaching for the phone again.

Then it rang on its own. Thinking it might be Glauer or Clara calling her back, she responded immediately. “Trooper Caxton,” she said.

“Good afternoon, Officer,” a woman’s voice said. She didn’t recognize the caller.

“I’m not an officer. I’m a state trooper.” She thought of her new star. “As of today I’m also a special deputy of the U.S. Marshals Service.”


“Really? How very wonderful for you. Why, that’s the same title Jameson had.”

Caxton’s blood went cold hearing the name of the vampire. “Who is this?” she demanded, then regained control of herself. “I’m sorry. May I ask who’s calling?”

“Of course. This is Astarte Arkeley. The widow. I believe you’ve been trying to get my attention.”





Vampire Zero





Chapter 15.


“Yes! Yes, I have,” Caxton said. “Thank you so much for calling me. Can I ask who gave you my number?” It seemed like everyone had it these days—even Malvern.

“You may,” Astarte told her. “It was my son, Simon. He was quite intent on my contacting you. He seemed to think I could appeal to your mercy and convince you to stop your desperate pursuit of the vampire. I told him I would do no such thing.”

Caxton pulled over on the side of the road. This was important—she needed to focus on the call. “I’m kind of glad to hear that. I need to tell you something, Mrs. Arkeley. It’s sort of upsetting.”

“Then I’m very glad that I am sitting down. Please proceed.”

Caxton rubbed at her forehead. “Last night Jameson killed his own brother. He killed Angus. I was there.”

“How sad. I suppose the vampire attempted to kill you as well. That’s what they do, of course.”

“Actually—” Caxton stopped herself. She knew almost nothing about Astarte. She had no idea how far she could trust her. Deciding to err on the side of full disclosure, she said, “Actually he didn’t. I tried to kill him.”

“Which is what you’re supposed to do.”

“Yeah. Yeah, it is. I tried to kill him, but I couldn’t. He was stronger than I expected. Stronger than any vampire I’ve ever seen. He could have killed me easily, with just his bad hand, but he didn’t. He said he owed me something. You don’t have any idea what that might be, do you?”

“I couldn’t begin to imagine.”

“Okay. Alright. Listen. I’d really like to come meet you. Today if possible. I’d like to sit down and ask you some questions about Jameson and the last time you saw him. Is that something we can do?”

“I think not,” Astarte told her.

“This is very important, ma’am. A man has already been killed and others are sure to follow. I wouldn’t ask, not in your time of grief, if I didn’t think it would help keep people safe.”