Page 92 of Twisted
“That’s it?”I ask after a few seconds pass and nothing happens.“We can just walk away from that?”
“What do you want?”Theo asks.“To call and report ourselves to the police for murder?”
“Obviously not,” I retort.“But like…it doesn’t have to be reported to the VC?”
“Do hunters report vampires they kill to the VC?”he asks pointedly.“Or werewolves or witches?Technically, they are tax paying humans, right?”
“Look, I’m not going to get into a debate about that.I just wanted to know how it works.”
“If you pay any attention at all to the VC, you’ll find the fewer vampires they have to deal with, the better.Besides, Vampire Law of ownership still stands.”
“No one owns me.”
Theo leans in, eyes narrowed and fangs drawn.“You should be glad Xavier is claiming you.Not even you would last long in a place like this.Magic and training aside, you are a human in a building full of vampires that outnumber you ten to one.”
He’s right: I am outnumbered.But I’ve had worse odds and hey, I’m still standing.
“Why are we here?”I ask.
“Vampire business,” Theo replies, looking smug, as he’s trying to annoy me right now.
“I’ll find out one way or another.”
He shrugs.“I’m sure you will.My brother seems to be blurring the lines with you even more and sometimes you just have to step back, watch someone make a mess, and then sayI told you sobefore helping clean it up.”
“You sound like you need to get laid.”I pat his arm.“I’m sure there are a few fangers in there who would jump at the chance to get railed by a vampire as old as you.”
He just snarls at me and I chuckle.“Well, if you’re not going to tell me what’s going on, I have some of my own questions to ask,” I tell Theo and take a step toward the doors leading out of the little hall.
Theo grabs my arm.“Questions about what?”
“That’s for me to know,” I say, repeating his own words back to him.
“Real mature,” he huffs.
“Thank you.And since I have nothing to hide, I’ll tell you.There’s been a lot of weird deaths amongst the homeless.The official cause of death is written as an overdose, but they didn’t die from drugs.They died from demonic possession, where their bodies rapidly aged and essentially rotted from the inside out.”
“What do vampires have to do with that?”
“Probably nothing, but come on, we know that homeless or otherwise forgotten people are easy to feed on.I just want to know if anyone has seen anything off.”
Theo cocks an eyebrow.“You raise a valid point, but no vampire is going to willingly talk to a witch about that.”
“Well, I can try.Or you can tell me what’s going on here.”
He lets out an annoyed sigh.“There’s a group of new vampires wanting to protest against assimilation.”
“And that’s bad?”
“For business.”
“Oh,” I say as it dawns on me that Xavier keeps the peace in this area and vampires going against the VC also go against him.“They’re here?”
“Their leader manages this place.”
“Good to know.”
Theo’s eyes narrow as he looks at me.“You have been privy to some very sensitive information.”
