Blood Leverage (Bloodstone Chronicles Book 1) (35 page)

CHAPTER

THIRTY-EIGHT

N
EEDLESS to say, the party was absolute
misery, though not through any fault of its coordinators. In fact, for a party planned in only a few hours it was amazing. They’d accomplished a great deal while I’d put things away and dressed—which reminded me I
had
to get home before mom to trash the food in the freezer and hide Nicky’s laundry.

The courtyard looked lovely, largely courtesy of Immortal Media and the Frontier Bank of Niagara. Apparently my mother’s engagement had been discussed during her flight home and word had spread like lightning. According to Skipper, a truckload of flowers had arrived shortly after I did, along with another truck filled with sweets—all of which had been flown to Niagara Falls from Toronto by Immortal’s helicopters and transported here in Niagara Frontier vehicles.

I would have attributed everything to vampire efficiency, but having occurred in daytime it was clearly the work of humans. I doubted even Mr. Nickleby had a previous set of orders waiting in the event of my mother’s possible engagement.

Within minutes of our arrival, the party was in full swing.

Diane had arranged an admirable variety of food but Immortal Media had focused on desserts, the crowning glory of which was a massively tiered wedding cake. I couldn’t fathom how it had survived the flight and decided they’d assembled it here.

There were piles of pastries and cookies, several of which contained chocolate. Unfortunately, they reminded me of Nicky, which made me too nervous to eat them. In addition to the delicacies, Immortal Media had also contributed four casks of wine, which certainly contributed to the festive
atmosphere. It was the best party I’d ever seen and every moment felt like ants crawling over my flesh.

On the other hand, Amy was in heaven, gushing to the point of giving me a migraine. It might not have been the bridal gown she’d
wanted
to design, but Amy was determined to design my mother’s wedding dress whether she wanted one or not. Of course my mother capitulated good-naturedly.

“You win,” she said fondly. “You can make whatever you like, on two conditions. First, anything you make is subject to Rory’s approval. And as my Maid of Honor, she’ll need a new dress too.”

“Maid of Honor?” No one had mentioned this to me.

“Of course!” My mother looked at me as if it was obvious. “You’ll be my Maid of Honor and Dominic will stand as Luigi’s Best Man!”

Oh shit, just shoot me.

I almost blurted everything then and there, literally biting my tongue to stay silent. It had been hard enough deceiving the general public about Nicky, but deceiving Mom and Gigi felt a thousand times worse.

Fortunately, Amy unwittingly gave me time to recover. “I can handle that,” she agreed. “What’s the second condition?”

Luigi fielded that one. “The second condition is that these feats of fashion be finished by October’s end. This woman will be mine before the first snow falls!”

He snatched my mother up and twirled her around, delighting the crowd.

After several minutes of listening to Amy and my mother talk colors and styles, with Bev and Ms. B. excitedly offering suggestions, I excused myself by saying I needed a drink.

It wasn’t a pretense; I did need a drink. Though I would’ve liked several drinks, I limited myself to one hard cider. The last thing I needed was a hangover tomorrow.

As I emptied my glass in a single gulp, Diane quietly appeared at my side, pressing my house key into my hand.

“It’s done,” she said, her face a pleasant mask of normalcy. She might have been discussing the weather, or our walnut crop.

Deliberately relaxing the grip on my glass before I broke it, I moved in closer. “You mean he’s gone? Just like that?”

She smiled and waved at one of the council members before taking a sip of her own drink. “Not quite
just like that,
but yes, Robert is on his way to 4111 as we speak. He agreed to leave for the reasons we already discussed, and I agreed that my official announcement would be that he’d already been planning to retire and didn’t want to leave with any fuss.”

Setting my glass down on a makeshift barrel-table, I gripped her hand with my own. “Thank you, Diane. I promise you I’ll never forget this.”

Gently disengaging her hand, she took another sip of her wine. “It was the best thing for the community, Rory, but I’ll need you to remain quiet about it. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I see some people I need to speak with.”

As she wove her way through the crowd, I could only stare as she was swallowed up by the sea of revelry.

Unsurprisingly, everyone else was having a fabulous time. In fact, the party was still so strong at sunset that the entire celebration relocated inside by acclamation. For the first time in my memory, we had drunken singing in the hallways and dancing in the community center. My only bit of luck was that in the race to carry everything inside, no one noticed when I slipped home to empty the freezer.

My hands trembled as I groped for the packages. At this very moment, Ian and Keanu were lying in wait with a clutch of severed fingers in their pockets. My spine contracted in a shiver that had nothing to do with the freezer’s temperature. In less than half an hour, my friends might have Nicky safely in their possession, or they might all be dead. There was nothing for me to do except keep my mouth shut and wait until morning.

And deal with the damn food.

Since this afternoon’s box had been soaked through, I was forced to use more unconventional means of storage, stuffing most of the food under my bed to throw it out tomorrow unnoticed. I sacrificed the majority without a thought, but couldn’t bring myself to allow Ms. B’s seafood to spoil.

After conceiving and discarding several elaborate plans, I finally pinned a bow to the carton and walked straight through the party to leave it in Amy’s freezer. Between the dancing, the raucous laughter, the drinking songs and the couples making out in dark corners, I might have been invisible.

Four hours later, my mother decided she was ready to sleep in her own bed. Bev had wrapped a huge assortment of leftovers for the lovebirds—thank goodness I’d emptied the freezer—which she pressed into our hands before we went home. With an internally raised eyebrow, I realized Luigi was staying for a little slumber party.

I began putting the leftovers away while the lovebirds carried in the suitcases they’d stashed at Beverly’s. Then I dropped a frosted cookie on the floor when I realized I’d left Nicky’s laundry in the washing machine. My voice came out an octave higher than I’d intended. 

“Hey mom? Luigi? If you want to leave your luggage downstairs, I’ll start your laundry. After I change out of my dress, I mean.”

“Oh honey, aren’t you exhausted?”

“I need to wind down a bit before I’ll be able to sleep and I already have laundry in the washer. I’ll sleep in an hour or two.”
Or tomorrow night, wherever I ended up
.

And wouldn’t that be fun to explain.

CHAPTER THIRTY
-
NINE

WITH no hope of sleep, I washed six
loads of laundry in an effort to make the hours pass. In between sorting and folding laundry, I raced around making up for lost time.

Between the first and second loads of laundry, I filled my duffle with clean clothes and repacked Nicky’s knapsack, stuffing both bags beneath my desk where the chair blocked them from view. Unfortunately, the stash of frozen goodies beneath my bed had begun to melt, and I spent the delay between loads two and three mopping my bedroom floor and praying the food wouldn’t stink up the house before I could trash it.

The lull while the third load washed was occupied by some quick cooking. Worried about refrigeration, I managed to bake two loaves of walnut quick-bread, and mix an enormous batch of trail mix before it was time for load number four. Hopefully Barb would have something hearty I could buy tomorrow as well.

Unfortunately, at that point I ran out of things to do and was left with pacing as my only option. I paced until my body betrayed me right aft
er I’d started the sixth load.

*     *     *     *     *

I awoke in the dark, despite having never turned the lights off. In what had become my go-to reaction to almost everything, my brain promptly hit the panic button and I leapt off the sofa with an unnecessary adrenaline rush.

Two seconds later, the clinking of silverware and an off-key humming from the kitchen informed me my mom was already awake, and a more genuine fear took over. How late
had I overslept? More importantly, how could I possibly sneak thirty pounds of melting garbage, a loaded duffle bag, and a knapsack that both mom
and
Luigi would recognize out of the house?

I’d banked on being able to creep out before anyone woke up, but once again, my luck had failed me. I now had no choice but to wait until my mother was occupied elsewhere.

Accepting my fate, I composed myself and walked to the kitchen, hoping I could speed her along. As I adjusted to the increased light I happily realized I hadn’t overslept. There was still nearly an hour until the exterior doors would open, and for some reason my mother was up ungodly early.

She sat at the kitchen table, drinking a glass of juice and nibbling squares of candy. She was a million miles away and didn’t even acknowledge my presence in the kitchen. After a moment’s hesitation I sat beside her, pulling her out of her sugar induced reverie.

“Good morning, baby! I’m sorry if I woke you.” My mother was all sweetness and smiles.

“Don’t worry about it, I didn’t mean to fall asleep down here. You’re up awfully early though.” I covered my mouth as I yawned.

She giggled. “I woke up thirty minutes ago and couldn’t fall back asleep remembering all the food down here. I did more dancing than eating last night and the food situation at the conference was grim at best—next time we’ll be better prepared. Anyway, never mind me, how late did you stay up?”

There was no point in saying I’d slept as the piles of folded laundry would tell the truth even if I didn’t. Fortunately, my mother had inadvertently provided me with a perfect excuse and I smiled. “I did more eating than dancing, and all the sugar had me bouncing off the walls. Still, it looks like I didn’t see all the offerings. What type of candy is that?” I asked, gesturing at her plate.

I didn’t care about the candy, but it was better than her asking about my summer. I wasn’t ready for that yet. 

She smiled and gestured for me to help myself. “They’re not candy,” she explained, breaking one in half to show me. “Evidently they’re called
petit fours
, and each piece is a miniature frosted layer cake. The pink are strawberry, the white—vanilla, and the brown—chocolate. Oh, and there were yellow ones yesterday—lemon—but they’re all gone now.” 

I picked up a
petit fours
and examined it. They were clever little things, though I wasn’t hungry. I set the tiny cake back down. “The thought of more sugar makes me nauseous, but you’ll have to save me one.”

As another strawberry
petit fours
disappeared, my mom grinned. “I make no promises.”

Laughing, I gave my mother a quick, hard hug. “It’s great to have you home.” It was only an illusion of calm, but I had no objections to enjoying it until sunrise.

“It’s wonderful to be back, darling. I can’t begin to say how much has happened this summer, or how often I turned to tell you all the news.” In a rare show of gluttony, my mother popped her third
petit fours
in as many minutes into her mouth.

A crazy thought popped into my head as she chewed. “Mom, are you pregnant?”

Though my birth had supposedly left my mother infertile, she was only in her early forties and it wasn’t like she’d been putting her fertility to the test for the past decade or so. How crazy would that be? Amy would be sewing a maternity bridal gown.

Then I realized my mom was laughing herself senseless and reined my imagination in. “Okay, I’ll take that as a no.”

“Take it as a holy shit, no” she gasped, leaving me in stitches. I almost never heard my mother swear and for a few minutes we did nothing but laugh. It felt fantastic.

“My goodness, baby, you would not believe how much I needed that.”

Yes, I would
, I quietly thought, choosing not to say it out loud. Instead, I encouraged her. “What sort of news were you wanting to share?” I still had a half hour to fill.

She looked at me with surprise. “Why, about the conference, of course.”

How distracted could I get? “Of course. What were the most popular topics? Did you make any headway on the reinstitution of mandatory education for children?”

“I did,” my mother said. “However, seeing as I’ve managed to catch you alone, there was one specific topic I’ve been waiting to discuss with you.”

My internal alarm bell began to clang before she could even set her fork down. Her smile stretched nearly flat, something that never boded well.

“Mother,” I said suspiciously, “are you sure you only went to the academic conference?”

She looked surprised at the question and her scary smile morphed into a puzzled frown. “I would never go somewhere without telling you.”

I laughed. “I don’t know, mom. You’ve been unpredictable lately—everything from surprise engagements and chatting with vampires to riding in helicopters.” 

She swiveled her engagement ring around her finger, smiling involuntarily as she did. I would’ve smiled too—the diamond was nearly the size of a walnut. Then she folded her hands together neatly on the table. “That’s what I wanted to discuss.”

I paused for a moment. “Which one? Your engagement or the helicopter rescue?” Personally, I didn’t see what either had to do with the conference, but my mother often conversed this way, circling around before making her point.

I knew she’d get there eventually.

“Well, not the helicopter ride, specifically.” She resumed fidgeting with her ring and didn’t meet my gaze as she spoke. “I wanted to speak with you about vampires.”

That caught my attention. “Um, really? What about them?”

“We’ve never discussed them in any context beyond that of my book. And basic safety procedures,” she added as an afterthought.

“I guess that’s true,” I agreed uncertainly. Where was my mother going
with this? “Other than that, what’s to discuss? We know about them and choose to live here. What else is there to say? I think they’re here to stay.”

My mother took my hand. “But what if they weren’t?”

I retracted my hand slowly. “What do you mean, what if they weren’t? It’s not something we get to vote on.”

She reached over and pulled my hand back. “I wasn’t talking about a vote, honey. I was talking about… Well, I guess I’m talking about removing them by force.”

My mouth fell open. “Wait, what? Removing them by force? As in killing them? Like a war? A war against vampires? What the hell happened at that conference?”

Damn it, I had read the conference agenda. This had
not
been on it.

“A lot of us believe it’s time to take back what was ours, honey. Time to rally humanity and drive out the force that’s plagued us for so long.”

It was like an alien had taken over my mother’s mouth. An insane alien. Since completing her book nearly twenty years ago, my mother had shown little ambition for anything beyond research and teaching and now she wanted to rally humanity for war?

Humanity had been at war with vampires before and it had almost destroyed the human race. And having now seen vampires in action, I understood
why
it had failed better than my mother ever could. War against vampires was a damn suicide mission.

Ignoring my lack of enthusiasm, her eyes all but glowed, which did nothing to dispel my alien analogy. “Oh, we just traded ideas back and forth, you know how it goes.”

I did? Since when?
Apparently it was a rhetorical statement because my mother didn’t wait for me to agree. Not that I would have agreed.

“Honestly, you know, I was rather against the whole idea during the initial discussions, but everything I heard at the conference is making me seriously consider offering our support to the movement. Oh, and you mustn’t say anything yet,” she cautioned unnecessarily. “Nothing is set in stone.”

Thoughts swirled through my mind too quickly for me to express them. The movement? What movement? And what the hell did she mean,
our
support? Did I even get a choice about joining this circus? My mouth was moving, but nothing was coming out.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t say the same for the alien. “Once again, nothing is set in stone.” My mother patted my arm consolingly as if to apologize for making me wait. “There’s a great deal of research to be done and all manner of plans to be made, but think of the possibilities, Rory! Maybe, just maybe, eventually human beings will be able to live in the world as God intended them to.”

I stared blankly, managing enough focus to close my mouth again. When had God entered this debate? Had this been a conference of religious zealots? Of pod people?

“Out in the open, not huddled in little groups, hiding.” My mother jumped up and threw her hands into the air like an old time televangelist. I tipped my head back to watch her, waiting for her to shout “
Halleluiah!
”

“A world that doesn’t revolve around sunrise and sunset, a world without vampires! Think of that, darling.” Her voice rang out with passionate conviction and she bent to hug me tightly, repeating softly, “Darling, think of that…”

Then she straightened, resting her hand on my shoulder. “And don’t you worry, Rory. Nothing is going to happen today, but as soon as I hear more I’ll let you know how you can help. I’m glad we’ve had this talk.”

Blindsided, I squeezed her hand vaguely as she hugged me.

Managing a sort of smiling grimace as she pulled away, I nodded to indicate I’d think about it. Boy would I
ever
think about it—as if anything else was even an option.

As blithely as though we’d been discussing an advance in farm machinery, my mother pranced out of the kitchen and into the bathroom, apparently invigorated by our one-sided conversation. I only wished I could say the same. It felt like I’d aged a decade in ten minutes.

As I stared dumbly after her, I took the final step toward responsible adulthood, leaving any remaining childish ignorance behind forever. After everything I’d faced this summer and everything I’d learned, I’d somehow been waiting for my mom to come home and make it all better. I mean, I hadn’t expected her to wave a magic wand and reverse time—I wasn’t stupid—but I’d somehow imagined that her presence would restore the quiet calm I’d always associated with her.

Judging from our conversation, quiet and calm were now things of the past. Apparently I wasn’t the only person who’d found a new version of normal this summer.

In some dim recess of my mind, I heard the shower turn on and knew I had to hurry. My mom wasn’t one to linger under the warm water.

Racing upstairs, I seized the duffle and knapsack from beneath my desk, wincing upon realizing that, yes, my melted groceries had begun to make their presence known. Cursing wordlessly, I flew down the steps and shoved both bags into the hall, re-closing the door as silently as I ever had in my life.

Then it was back up the stairs without even a pretense at normal speed. Holding my breath, I gripped the dripping sack of rubbish in one hand and gathered the towels I’d used to mop up in the other. As I staggered down the stairs, I heard the upstairs door click open and Luigi call out quietly.

“Eleanor, is that you? I’m getting dressed—I’ll be down in two minutes.”

Ugh, talk about a visual I didn’t need! Muttering snarky thoughts under my breath, I dumped the towels on the living room floor and hauled the garbage into the hall to join the duffle and knapsack.

Not bothering to shut the door, I stormed into the kitchen and ripped the last load of laundry—the one I’d slept through—from the washer and stuffed it into the dryer to make room for the towels. As I crammed the towels in, I heard Luigi’s voice from upstairs.