A voice in the back of my head reminds me I’m not like Uncle Lucy and I shouldn’t want to hurt people.
Though Scott deserves it, and it will feel so fucking good to turn the tables and dish out exactly what Scott has served.
So maybe I am a little like Lucifer…and I don’t care.Chapter 28I hold up my hand, waving to Easton and Melinda. They just got into the restaurant and are looking through the sea of tables for me. Melinda waves back and grabs her brother’s arm, leading him to the table.
“Hey, Callie!” she says, taking the seat next to me. “How are you?”
“Pretty good,” I say, and it’s true. I’ve been sitting here for a few minutes, thinking about all the ways I could punish Scott. I have so many ideas, and the thought of seeing his terrified face, of hearing him beg for mercy, is satisfying. “How are you guys?”
“We’re all right.” Melinda unzips her jacket and hangs it on the back of her chair. “We’ve been busy.”
“Tis the season for demons, right?”
“It’s always the season,” Easton quips. He’s looking around the restaurant, surveying everyone. He has a hard time relaxing, always suspicious of everyone and everything. It was the thing that made me suspect him of being a hunter when we were dating ten years ago. “You okay?” He zeroes his attention on me. “The last time we spoke you were…a little rattled.”
I straighten my menu on the table in front of me. “Yeah. That was a little intense, but I’m fine now.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Melinda says. “Which is fine. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”
“He helped me clean up a crime scene,” I rush out. It sucks keeping secrets from your siblings, and I know Melinda and Easton only have each other. I thought he would have told her, and knowing he didn’t means a lot to me. I trust him, though the past is kind of hard to ignore.
He did try to kill me, after all.
The more he proves himself, the easier it is to think of him as a friend again. And we can use all the friends we can get.
“I don’t want you to keep secrets from each other. Tell her whatever you want,” I let Easton know. “Have you heard anything about other hunters looking for Roger?” I ask, nerves pricking. Please don’t tell me he had a wife and kids.
“I have,” Easton says, and I suck in a breath. “Other hunters in The Order found out he’d taken a job from a vampire, and now that no one has heard from him, they think he ran away because he knew he’d be excommunicated.”
“That’s the hunter who was hired to shoot you, right?” Melinda asks.
“Yeah. It’s somehow tied into a group of vampires who are angry others are assimilating” I reply. “And they’re trying to blackmail Lucas into joining their cause or something. We think that vampire is hiding within the VC somewhere. But that’s an issue for another day. Luckily, time passes differently for immortal beings, and Lucas thinks he’s moving slow on purpose as a tactic to drive us fucking insane.”
“It’s working,” Easton grumbles, and Melinda shoots him a pointed look.
“I’ve been a little crazy for years, I know.” I look down at the menu, wanting both a bowl of pasta and a piece of lasagna. Maybe I’ll order both and eat the leftovers later.
“Maybe that’s why…no…it’s too much of a stretch,” Melinda says, shaking her head.
“What’s a stretch?” Easton and I ask at the same time.
“One of the hunters we were with last week mentioned something, but she was pretty drunk, so I didn’t take her seriously.”
“And?” Easton motions for her to continue.
“She dated a guy in The Order of the Mystic Realm and broke things off because he was getting involved in politics and was supporting policies that would hurt a lot of people. She stopped making sense then, because of all the tequila, but something was mentioned about vampires working an inside job with super conservative humans…specifically Senator Martin.” Melinda winces at the mention of his name. “But, like I said, she was really drunk, and the guy sounded like an asshole even before politics were brought up.”
“Wouldn’t that be a plot twist,” I huff. “Though if this vampire wants all vamps to go back to the old ways, getting someone like Dumbfuck Martin to make their lives hell would add fuel to the fire.”
“And they’d want to retaliate,” Easton finishes, and we all look at each other, knowing how bad this could get. I won’t let it come to that, even though I have no fucking clue how to prevent a politically fueled war.
William Martin is too full of himself to realize he’s being manipulated. He thinks he’s too good to have anyone fool him, that he’s smarter than everyone, and everything is his original idea and whatever he comes up with is the best ever and will have no idea he’s just a pawn in an ancient vampire’s scheme.