Her voice had been light, but something in her tone pinged my intuition. First Trent, then David. Now Ivy? “How many were there?” I said, my grip tightening on the wheel. “And did they drive a brown Volvo?”
“Uh, yes,” Ivy said, and Jenks’s dust went thin. “There were four. All living vamps, though I doubt the one will make it out of the hospital alive. Nina didn’t like his attitude.”
She said it with pride, but my eyes pinched in worry.
“I would’ve called you sooner, but I didn’t know there was a problem until I tried to come home for the first Howlers game.” She hesitated. “How did you know they were in a brown Volvo?”
“Because they’re in Cincy now.” I turned my signal on with an aggressive flick, maintaining a smooth, unhurried pace around the corner to Piscary’s. “Telling all my friends to back off from me and toe Constance’s line.”
“Huh.” Ivy’s voice went faint. “That’s pretty much what they told Nina and me.”
“And you’re okay?” I said, wondering if Stef was reconsidering my offer for a park bench.
“Us? Oh, sure. We’re fine,” Ivy said. “But I doubt we’ll be allowed to leave until you kick Constance to the curb. She’s not well liked here and rumor has it she was sent to Cincinnati with the expectation that one of you would kill the other. Either result will please them. They don’t care. Apparently her appetites are . . . disruptive, but she’s too well connected for them to attempt any sort of correction.”
I took a breath to protest, then let it out. “Constance is the city’s master vampire,” I said, and Stef’s jaw clenched.
“And you’re a demon,” Ivy said. “Stop letting her walk all over you.”
She made it sound so easy, and my shoulders slumped as I turned onto the weed-choked, cracked street to Piscary’s. “At least I’ve got two weeks,” I muttered.
“Ah, that’s really why I’m calling,” Ivy said, but I’d slowed, breath escaping me in a heavy sigh as I saw the onetime restaurant turned vampire lair. It was surrounded by the river on one side, space and abandoned warehouses everywhere else. Today, there were three moving vans parked in the expansive lot with lots of back-and-forth activity. Two of the vans were small local jobs, but one had to be at least forty-five feet long. Constance . . . Son of a bastard.
“I don’t have two weeks, do I,” I said flatly, and Ivy made a soft sound of negation.
“Jenks?” I said, lifting my chin for him to follow my gaze, and the pixy’s dust vanished.
“Mother pus bucket,” Jenks said, and Stef sighed. “What the troll turds on a stick is she doing here? We had two more weeks!”
My breath didn’t seem to want to come back in, and I forced myself to breathe. This is so not what I need right now. “Okay. Ivy, I’ve got to go. You’re sure you’re okay?”
“From them? We’re fine,” she said as I crept up the seldom-used street. “Face it, Rachel,” she added cheerfully. “All your friends are capable of handling ugly vampires. Nip this fast, will you? I’ve got Howler box seats this year.”
“Why does everyone think Constance is my problem?” I muttered.
“Son of a fairy-farting whore.” Jenks hovered before the window, the high pitch to his wings hurting my ears. “Edden did say they moved everything up.”
But I didn’t think Edden had known about this.
“Jenks, is she okay, or is she lying to herself?” Ivy said, and the pixy dropped to the phone, hands on his hips.
“Hang up, blood bag. I got this.”
“I love you, too, sunflower sniffer,” she shot back, and then the call ended.
“She sounds happy,” Jenks said, and I absently nodded, more concerned about where my stuff was. Muscular men were moving mostly light-colored, Scandinavian-style furniture in, and Ivy’s and Nina’s new, mostly dark-colored, comfortable, carefully selected furniture out.
“Well, thanks for the offer,” Stef said, her voice surprisingly even as she held her cat closer. “Maybe I should have gotten myself arrested. I’d have somewhere to stay then.”
Pulse fast, I looked for a place to park that was not too close, not too far. A few boxes sat beside the boat in the sun, and I stopped the car right in the middle of the lot, throwing it into park, grabbing my bag, and getting out. I didn’t see any I.S. agents or rubberneckers, and the thought to call Trent flashed through me, making me angry. This was my problem.
“Give me a second to sort this out,” I said as I looked back into my MINI at Stef.
“I’m good here,” she said, and I carefully shut the door. I didn’t blame her. The vampires milling about all looked cheerful and happy to be moving in, but the thick scars and thin bodies said there was a price to pay when your gnomon, or vampire master, was a long undead.
Jenks joined me, his dust an angry red. “At least they aren’t chucking everything into the river,” he said, and I flicked my attention to the pile by the boat, then back to the mass of beautiful people moving about with an air of excitement and promise.
Okay, they were treating everything with respect, but they were still forcibly moving me. Ivy’s and Nina’s things were slowly filling the two moving vans, furniture in one, boxes in the other. Some of my kitchen things were in there, too. Bis, I thought, stifling a moment of panic. They wouldn’t know he was alive. They would have packed him like a knickknack.
“Pike,” Jenks said, distracting me, and I followed his glare past the shifting people until I spotted him at the open loading dock. He had a clipboard in his hand and was clearly directing the inflow of Constance’s stuff. Sensation rippled through me. Anger mostly, but damn . . . he looked good for a beaten-up, scarred, once-beautiful vampire. His black hair glistened in the sun, cut short to show the scars etched into his neck. Not quite tan, he nevertheless gave the impression of loving the sun as he stood on the loading dock in his short-sleeved black shirt and lightweight black slacks.
The woman with him jostled his elbow and he looked up. My slow pace bobbled as he found me, and I frowned, forcing myself to go a few more steps while he gave the woman his clipboard and a few instructions. He jumped to the pavement, taking the four-foot drop in stride. Hands in his pockets, he started over, wind deliciously ruffling his hair. Behind him, the woman whistled and pointed, and two movers resting in the shade of one of the small trucks pushed off and headed to the boat.
Pike looked meek as he took off his dark glasses and tucked them in a front shirt pocket, smiling at me with his lips closed as he approached, but I knew he was anything but. Not if he was Constance’s scion, and it was obvious that he was the undead vampire’s number one, responsible for seeing that her bidding was done when the sun was up.