Page 13 of Ophelia's Vampire

Despite Blair’s unwillingness to discuss it, the dragon doesn’t fool me for a moment. He’ll figure out whatever’s got him so tied in knots, I’m sure, and the sight of him so obviously undone seems like it might be a good wake-up call. Something to shake him out of the stasis he’s kept himself in these past few centuries.

The hollow husk in the center of my chest aches for a moment with the idea of my two closest friends having found their fated ones. And even though a vampire takes a bloodbound partner by choice, not fate, it still leaves a strange, unwelcome bitterness in the back of my throat.

“Fine,” I tell him, ready to leave the Bureau and be back out in the fresh air where Ophelia’s scent doesn’t linger like a personal taunt. “Then I’ll look forward to stopping by before I head back to Boston.”

5

Ophelia

Cleo and I make a pit-stop in her office after talking to human resources.

I’ve already decided to leave bright and early tomorrow to head out to Boston. Knowing Cleo will probably work late tonight, I settle in for a few last moments with her before I’m on the road and won’t be back in Seattle until who knows when.

“It can’t be traced back to the Bureau,” Cleo says, resting her elbows on her desk and rubbing at her temples. “But all this political bullshit has been a nightmare these past few months, and I’m ready to hit back at the bastards.”

I huff a humorless laugh, more than aware what she means. Congressman Daniel Sorenson attempting to abduct his former girlfriend with information he funneled through the Bureau. The recent sensation of a dragon plucking a woman up off the street in downtown Seattle. The grumblings by those who would see the Acts reconsidered.

It all weighs on Cleo’s shoulders, and I’m more than happy to do whatever small part I can to help her and the Bureau out. To do exactly what she says and fight back against the naysayers who would keep the world stuck in the past.

She looks at me with a familiar spark in her eye—determined, dauntless. “I want to know who’s really behind these rogue vampires, and whether it’s all just a crock of shit cooked up by the Haverstad campaign.”

“The mayor?”

“Exactly.” Cleo stands and walks to the wall of windows at the side of her office looking out over Seattle. “This power struggle between the covens and Boston’s leadership has been going on for decades, and it’s only gotten worse since the Acts.”

She gives me a brief rundown of what she knows. Legal and not-so-legal businesses run by the covens, silent partnerships and back alley deals, formal power challenged by informal power, and all of it ramping up with the passage of the Acts and the acknowledgment of the paranormal world.

“Haverstad fucking hates the influence the covens still have in the city, and if he can knock them down a few pegs while winning some political points for himself, all the better.”

I hum in acknowledgment. “And the Bureau?”

“Can’t be involved.” She lets out a long breath. “If we get any information we can use to nail him, we’ll have to find another way to bring it to light. We’re supposed to be neutral in all of this.”

“But?” I prompt.

“But both Blair and I agree staying neutral when we could start firing back would be a mistake. It’s a bad look for all paranormals, this circus they’ve created and all the negativity it’s stirred up in the media, and it needs to end. So we’ll have to be smart about how we handle this.”

“Understood.” My mind whirs with a mental list of contacts I have in Boston, a few from my days back in uni who didn’t abandon their journalistic ambitions after graduation. “You can count on me.”

I try to say it with more conviction than I’m truly feeling right now, considering how sideways this entire morning has gone.

Cleo’s gaze narrows, and she comes back to sit down across the desk from me. “Lia…”

“You can,” I assure her. “It’s not too much. Even if… even if Casimir’s involved. I can handle it.”

She stays silent for a few moments, lips pressed into a thin line. I can almost hear the cogs turning in her mind, the warnings and advice she probably wants to give, how she’s weighing whether to rescind her offer completely.

“I’ve got this,” I say. “And if it turns out to be too much, you’ll be the first to know.”

She nods, though the wariness doesn’t leave her eyes. When I get up to leave her office, I feel her worried stare on the back of my head the whole way out.

I wish she wouldn’t worry so much. Or, maybe more accurately, I wish she wouldn’t make it so obvious that she worries.

It’s gotten worse these last few years. When we were younger, it was easier to ignore—all the differences between us and the fact that our lives have always been destined to take different paths.

It’s not something we’ve ever really talked about, not in any way that matters. Every time I want to broach the topic with her, it sits in the center of my chest like a giant, black, gaping cavern.

I don’t want her to see me as more vulnerable than the rest of my family, as different, as mortal, even though I just so happen to be all of those things. I want her to trust me to handle myself, to not have her worry about things neither of us can change.

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