56. Déjà Vu
Chapter 56
Déjà Vu
Rolf and Karen’s estate—Twenty minutes earlier
T ig pounded on the front door while Jayden waited in the police van. Of course Rolf and Karen weren’t home. Tig complained as she drove to Henry and Cerissa’s house. None of the four friends answered their phones when she called, so Jayden insisted they continue their search. She’d rather resume plodding through her backlog of paperwork than go on a wild goose chase to find Karen.
Let the poor woman die in peace.
After Jayden spoke to hospice and learned Karen had checked out, he kept repeating his concerns that something was wrong.
Tig disagreed. The mortal had her family, along with Rolf, Cerissa, and Henry, hovering over her as she died. Karen just needed some peace and quiet, with no one yammering at her to let her drift gently into that good night. Maybe that was why she left.
Driving under the arched sign for Rancho Bautista del Murciélago, Tig parked by the driveway fountain behind Rolf’s SUV. They’d found the right location, it seemed. Through the windshield she spotted Henry and Cerissa standing on the side lawn near a flower garden, which led to the dormant vineyard with distant floodlights throwing long shadows. What the hell were they doing outside on a chilly night like this? Walking their dog?
Then a chill ran down her spine. That was the same place they’d buried Christine.
Tig exited the van and sniffed at the air. Something strange, an unfamiliar scent, one she hadn’t smelled before.
Henry waved at them. “Over here.”
“What is going on?” Tig stomped over to them, Jayden trailing her. “Rolf isn’t answering his phone. Karen left hospice and I smell her here, except there’s something more—”
Cerissa gestured at an empty earthen grave. “I kind of did a thing.”
Jayden barked out a laugh and gave Cerissa a quick hug. “You turned Karen.”
Tig’s eyes went wide and her focus whipped from the grave’s direction to where Cerissa stood. “You can make a vampire?”
“Apparently.” She gave a half shrug. “Don’t look so surprised. The Lux made the original one based on our DNA.”
“So you’ve said. But you didn’t make Karen in a test tube.”
“True. Pull up a chair. We were just discussing the ramifications.”
“Which aren’t good,” Henry snapped, his nostrils flaring.
“I had little choice.” Cerissa gave a pleading look. “Karen was dying, and she ambushed me with the idea. I had no time to think through a plan.”
Henry stared at the ground. “Which is what I’m angry about. She had no right to put you in such a situation. Let alone demand you do something so risky and foolish when you two were on your own and she was on the brink of death.”
“Ari was there. He stood lookout. So we weren’t alone.”
“He does not count.” Henry huffed. “And that’s not my main point.”
Tig frowned at Henry. Then her gut twisted as the ramifications sank in. Crap . “The council.”
“Precisely.”
Tig nodded, thinking it through. Even assuming Cerissa hadn’t ever signed the Covenant or the treaty as a vampire, it barely mattered. The law might be on her side, but she couldn’t take advantage of it. “The council will look to those closest to Karen, who are vampires, and assume they are responsible. Henry and Rolf will suffer the consequences, as will Karen.”
Cerissa’s eyes widened. “Karen chose me for her maker. I don’t think she thought—”
Tig pointed at the house. “Let’s go inside. We need to figure out what to do about Karen’s new status. We have to get ahead of the problem before anyone finds out.”
“Agreed,” Henry said with a bow. “After you.”
Tig led the way into the foyer and checked out the surroundings. “Where are Karen and Rolf?”
“Upstairs in the spare bedroom,” Henry replied. “Renewing their relationship.”
Aha . Tig hated disturbing the lovebirds’ reunion, but there was no time to delay. “Please get them.”
Henry climbed the stairs and knocked on a bedroom door. Tig could see him on the balcony above the foyer.
“Go away,” Rolf yelled.
“Tig and Jayden are here. They insist on seeing Karen.”
“Fuck!” Karen screamed.
Tig’s face warmed. Maybe she should have waited and come back later.
After a few minutes, they gathered in the drawing room. Cerissa morphed to vampire, something that never stopped being strange to witness, and Karen and Rolf joined them, dressed but looking a bit disheveled, and they sat on the big leather couch together.
Tig eased onto one of the wood-carved armchairs across from Karen and opened the discussion bluntly. “How do we prove neither Henry nor Rolf are your maker, since we cannot parade Cerissa in front of the council as such?”
“V-DNA markers?” Cerissa asked, sitting on Karen’s other side and sounding uncertain.
Tig gave a wry laugh. Did the scientist really think that would work?
“Yeah,” Jayden said. “Like the council won’t believe you tampered with the evidence.”
Cerissa looked crushed. “I thought we were past that.”
“Hey.” Jayden frowned. “I’m not saying I thought you’d tamper with evidence. But when your husband and his business partner are in the council’s sights, they won’t believe any testimony you give.”
“Fine. Then you can run the tests. I already taught you how. You can use a blind method. Multiple samples. All of Rolf’s friends.”
Tig laughed. “Oh, they will not like that, but your scheme just might work. Except you said the markers weren’t reliable.”
“Not enough to convict someone of a crime.” Cerissa gave a nod. “But the markers I make—and passed on to Karen—will be so radically different from any other vampire, it won’t matter. There’s no room for any misinterpretation—Karen’s V-DNA won’t match any other vampire line.”
Tig thought it through. A blind study was the best option open to them. “Okay. We have a first step. But we still need a viable suspect—someone who isn’t part of the treaty communities, and who Karen knew and can play the role of her maker.”
Cerissa sighed. “So we can’t ask Leopold to shill for us on this one?”
“Correct. Besides, the New York CEO wasn’t in California last night, was he?”
“No.” Cerissa’s expression fell. “We spoke yesterday afternoon.”
“We need someone who Ari can forge travel documents for to prove they were in California and would testify they went behind Rolf and Henry’s back—”
“What? Why?”
“The only way they’re off the hook”—Tig swept her finger from Rolf to where Henry sat on a leather loveseat against the wall—“is if they didn’t know about the plan. If the council believes they gave a nod and wink to the whole thing, they’re still in deep trouble.”
Cerissa pursed her lips together. “Inanna might do it. If we’re able to produce a maker, are there any other obstacles I should know about?”
Tig tapped the carved wood of the chair’s arm. “Assuming we can get a vampire from outside the communities to take credit for Karen, then she’ll still need a sponsor inside the community. Just like when Gavin first came to the Hill and Gaea sponsored him.”
Henry nodded. “Cerissa, you heard Father Matt talk about being adopted by the leader of the Santa Monica collective. It’s a similar concept. When the maker is not from here, the new vampire must have a sponsor. They take responsibility for their training and education.”
“A sponsor? I can guide her,” Cerissa said.
“A vampire sponsor,” Tig clarified.
“Something you can’t openly volunteer for,” Henry added.
Cerissa looked concerned. “Do they take over as maker?”
“Not quite,” Henry said. “You would still have a maker-child bond with Karen. But for all public purposes, her sponsor would be responsible for her upbringing. I have someone in mind I already know Karen respects, and it’s not myself.”
Tig understood why he didn’t name names. If his choice for sponsorship declined the request, he wouldn’t want it to cause hard feelings within their small community.
“Is it Rolf?” Cerissa asked.
“No,” he replied. “That would put a strain on their relationship.”
Smart move. Tig more than agreed with Henry’s analysis. Rolf would make a terrible sponsor for a volatile young vampire, and appointing Henry might place Cerissa in the middle between her child and her husband. No, better to get a neutral third party.
Cerissa huffed. “Especially now that they are married.”
Tig froze for a moment, her brain spinning. “M-married? When did they get married?”
Rolf brought an arm around his mate’s shoulders. “Last night. Karen begged me to.”
Tig gave Karen a reproving glare. “You had this all planned out, didn’t you?”
Karen’s gaze moved to the ceiling, one finger on her lips. The attempt at looking innocent failed miserably.
“That won’t save you from the council, so don’t try it on me.”
Rolf tugged Karen tighter to him. “Marriage is the least of our problems—”
“Except it shows premeditation on your part.” Tig hated to be the only one in the room to see their reality. “Willfully ignoring the laws, getting married without the council’s waiver—”
“Being turned after refusing to ask for permission,” Henry snapped, even as Cerissa shot him a look.
Rolf straightened, eyeing Henry. “Don’t speak to my mate that way.”
“Then she shouldn’t have manipulated my mate into an unlawful act.”
“Henry,” Cerissa barked. “I made the choice I made.” She turned to Tig. “How bad is the marriage issue?”
“ Bah . We’ll deal with that later.” Rolf eased back against the couch. “The more important question is how do we keep the council from executing Karen?”
“No, Tig’s right.” Jayden rubbed his chin. “It’s all part of the same problem.”
Before Tig could say anything, Rolf harrumphed . “Why don’t Karen and I just move to South America or South Asia?”
Cerissa stiffened. “Never.”
Tig bit her lips together, knowing any rebuttal to Cerissa’s never would be unwelcome. Cerissa’s maker instincts must be riding her hard now, only hours after Karen had risen. The instincts were baked into the vampire psyche. Instead, Tig pivoted. “You can’t just flee. If you do, you’ll never be able to return to North America. The treaty communities have a long memory.”
“So? I could establish Vasquez-Müller Wineries South,” Rolf replied. “Besides, at some point, they’ll offer an amnesty. I’ll come back when it happens.”
Henry crossed his arms. “Then you forget what might happen to me. The council may decide I’m complicit, since we’re business partners.”
“I’ll write a letter saying this was all my doing.”
Tig crossed her legs and tapped her fingers on the arm of the chair’s carved claw. Was Rolf living in fantasyland? “I’m with Henry. The council is not going to believe a letter from you. All four of you may have to flee.”“Wait,” Karen said. “We’re talking about disappearing to another continent, more or less… What are we going to tell my parents?”
“I’m sorry, Liebling . We’ll tell them what we would have told them without Cerissa’s meddling. That you passed away.”
Tears flooded Karen’s eyes. “They’re going to be heartbroken.”
“What if—” Cerissa began, her expression brightening.
Henry interrupted her. “A miracle recovery would be the exact attention that Agathe doesn’t want. And neither does the Hill.”
That was one problem Tig could help them with. “When the time comes, I can provide ashes to fill an urn.”
Cerissa rubbed her eyes. “We don’t have to hold your memorial service immediately. We can invent an excuse to wait a week or a month. But we’ll give them closure at some point. First, we have other problems to address. Like how to keep the reporter from discovering you.”
Reporter ? Tig straightened in her chair. “What—”
“ Ach , keeping that news hack from finding you is the easy part,” Rolf said. “From now on, she’s legally Bianca Müller—her middle name and my last name—since we’re married. We’ll get her driver’s license changed before we file the death certificate. She’ll be able to drive for the immediate future, and we’ll work on a new birth certificate right away for her next identity.”
Cerissa’s brow furrowed. “But if we file a delayed death certificate, then the Department of Motor Vehicles will know—”
Tig chuckled. “No, they won’t.” This was one detail she knew that not everyone did. “Usually, the funeral director will file the death certificate with Social Security, and then Social Security notifies other agencies like the DMV. We don’t bother notifying Social Security for new vampires. But she needs a replacement identity soon, just in case this reporter or her family pokes around.”
Cerissa nodded and turned to Karen. “So, we’ll call you Bianca now?”
Karen pursed her lips. “Actually, I’d still like to be called Karen. Karen Müller.” She cut a glance to Tig. “That’s okay on the Hill, right?”
“Of course it is,” Cerissa replied, as Rolf said at the same time, “Yes, Liebling .”
Tig frowned a little. The Hill couldn’t risk a screwup, not with the Mordida Gazette breathing down their necks. “You’ll have to be very careful about it.”
“We will be. I’ll be Bianca elsewhere. I just…” Karen looked at her hands. “It’s a lot of change at once.”
Tig huffed. “Yes, it is. Now, tell me what reporter you’re talking about.”
“Let me get the dossier.” Cerissa dashed from the room without answering and returned quickly. “Here. Karen gave an interview to Ben Fisher in exchange for a full copy of the dossier that Callistus sent the Mordida Gazette . That’s the reporter we’re talking about.”
Tig felt her eyes go wide as she flipped through the folder. “When did Karen do that?”
“Um, yesterday afternoon. Anyway, I read through it, and there’s nothing new—they’ve mined the dossier for everything already, so you can relax. We’ve seen the last report in his series.”
“That’s good to hear.” Tig slapped the folder against her hand, thinking. Yes, the plan they had for Karen’s name change should be enough to throw off a reporter, especially since she’d been dying and looked drastically different during the interview. “Now, back to the larger plan—we have two options on the table: produce a maker or flee to South America. Any others?”
The doorbell rang. Tig raised an eyebrow at Henry. “Are you expecting guests?”
“No.”
“Um.” Cerissa appeared slightly chagrined. “It could be Ari. I texted him that I had good news.”
Henry rushed to his feet and strode to the foyer. A minute later, he returned with Ari, who walked directly to Karen and stopped.
Tig whooshed to Ari’s flank just in case Karen got any bright ideas about tasting mortal blood, which was a distinct possibility, given her pupils expanded, her lips curved, and she sniffed in his direction.
“Ooh,” Ari said. “Another new vampire. She looks great.” He gestured at his cousin. “Ciss, you do good work.”
Tig gripped his shoulder. “I suggest you move away from the newbie.”
Ari stepped backward without turning around and sat when his calves hit the loveseat, squeezing in next to Henry. “I can’t wait to tell Agathe. She’s going to be excited—”
“You’re not telling anyone,” Cerissa said, sounding panicked. “Not until we figure out what to do about the council.”
Tig cleared her throat. Maybe Ari could help. “We were just discussing strategy when you rang. What do you think of using Inanna as the stand-in for Karen’s maker?”
“The mother of all vampires?” Ari’s eyes brightened. “That might impress the bureaucrats.”
Tig turned to Cerissa. It seemed like a long shot to her. “You suggested we tap Inanna. Do you have reason to believe she’d lie for you?”
“Yeah, I think she might.” Cerissa bit her lip. “When you spoke with her, how did she sound?”
“Friendly. She cooperated with my investigation. But that’s a far cry from lying for you in front of the council.”
Cerissa tilted her head, her mouth a straight line. “She sort of owes us a favor. I’ll call her.”
“Why not use me?” Ari asked. “Or another Lux?”
Tig tugged on her chin, giving the suggestion fair consideration. “Cerissa’s instinct is spot-on. We want someone known to vampires in other treaty communities. Someone with an existing lineage—Inanna’s children can vouch for her. I’ve spoken to some of them. Fyodor in Sacramento seemed helpful. We need that kind of connection for believability.”
Ari ratcheted up his eyebrows. “But relying on a stranger—”
“Tig is right,” Henry said. “A vampire who came out of nowhere would make the council suspicious.”
Ari laughed. “Don’t underestimate my ability to create a convincing electronic paper trail.”
“That isn’t enough.” Tig knew how good Ari was, but the problem extended beyond records. “None of us lives in complete isolation from other vampires. We have an innate desire for community. It must be someone others knew about before last night.”
“But—”
Cerissa tsked . “Ari, the council might dig into your fake background and raise the same questions Agathe is concerned about. Let me start with Inanna.”
“Okay.” Tig stood, readying to leave. “Rolf will work out tentative travel plans to South America. Cerissa will contact Inanna. That way, we’ll be able to go in either direction if necessary.”
“I’ll get Inanna,” Cerissa said firmly, then her expression changed and she aimed pleading eyes at Tig. “And you won’t tell the council?”
Tig exhaled a loud breath. “I promised Agathe not to reveal secrets of the Lux. This sounds like one of those.”
“Jayden?”
“I’m on board with whatever Tig decides.”
“But if the council finds out another way, I can’t protect you.” Tig shook her head. “If they twig that someone turned Karen, all hell will break loose, and I can’t stop it.”