Chapter Thirty-Four
Ever the helpful brother, Jesse insisted on cooking, making scrambled eggs for his “favourite patients,” and setting out Verity’s pills for her while she found something less revealing to wear.
Theo would have been happy for her to wear her sleepwear all night, especially when she’d swayed her hips towards the bedroom door, giving him the most delicious view of her arse beneath the tiny shorts, but not with his brother present.
Though not the most territorial vampire, Theo couldn’t promise he wouldn’t punch his brother if he caught him looking. Even if it was an accident.
The fact that Jesse already knew what pills Verity needed, and that Smythe was due in an hour, seeing as they’d slept the whole night away, didn’t surprise Theo in the slightest. Jesse always had been a nosy fucker.
Verity was unusually quiet while they ate, listening to the brothers catch up while her heart thrummed a little faster than normal.
He didn’t know if it was thanks to her medical state, unease around Jesse or a bit of both.
Her quick attempt at a smile when he took her hand while Jesse cleaned up told him all he needed to know about Verity’s thoughts on Jesse.
Maybe it had been a fool’s hope that the two of them might get along, especially when Theo didn’t always see eye to eye with Jesse himself.
Once the eating and cleaning and pill taking were done, Jesse joined them at the island with a fake smile to match Verity’s. Whatever he was about to say, they weren’t going to like it.
“So…” Jesse strung out the word, making the most of every second before a hard conversation. “Cliffhaven.”
Theo raised his brow, waiting for his brother to go on.
“Information’s been lacking, but after I heard about the docks I thought I’d drop by. Assess it for myself.”
“And..?” Theo asked, spurring his brother on. “You said the Exchange collapsed?”
Jesse’s eyes flicked to Verity in question and Theo nodded. Anything that he learnt Verity would squeeze from him anyway, she might as well hear it from the horse’s mouth.
“Yeah,” Jesse said, without elaborating.
Rolling his neck, Theo tried not to snap. He was too tired and stressed to drag the information out of him and was about to tell Jesse as much when Verity chirped up.
“There’s no flu?” she asked.
“No,” Jesse replied.
“The whole quarantine, it’s been because the Exchange ran out of donors?”
“Yes.”
“Are the humans being fed?”
Jesse pulled a face, averting his eyes before replying. “Yes?” he made the word sound like a question.
“Is there order?” Verity went on without missing a beat.
“Sometimes.”
“Police?”
Jesse hummed. “Enforcers, not police.”
“Vampires?”
“Plenty of vampires,” Jesse said.
“The enforcers?” she clarified. If it hadn’t been for the weight of the discussion Theo would have felt a healthy amount of smugness for how Verity handled him.
“Oh, yeah,” he said. “The enforcers are vampires. But there’s plenty of other vampires too.”
Verity paused. “But, there’s no Exchange.”
Jesse looked to Theo, not wanting to tell the human what Theo was now guessing. The breakfast turned to acid in his stomach.
“They’re… free feeding?” Theo asked as Jesse nodded.
The heightened thrum of her heart peaked as the blood drained from Verity’s face. “What the fuck is free feeding?” She spoke the words with the contempt they deserved.
Taking a moment to find a less horrifying way of telling her, Theo realised there wasn’t one. “It’s what the Henbrants call it. The freedom to take what you want.”
“You mean…” Verity stared at him, eyes wide, lip trembling until she caught herself. “So, it’s a free for all?”
The vampires only looked at her.
“Fuck!” she screamed, face turning from a sickly white to red with rage, fists clenched as she shook. “It’s happening here! So, vampires can just attack humans, like the Blessed?”
“Oh no,” Jesse said. “The Blessed have more control than what’s going on in Cliffhaven.”
“That’s not helping,” Theo snapped, jumping from his seat to hold Verity. “And it isn’t going to happen here. We’re fixing it, we have a plan. Remember?”
“Yes,” she said, pulling out of his arms. “It is. This isn’t an accident, Theo. They tried to kill you!”
“That was a coincidence.” But even Theo didn’t believe that.
“Oh, please,” Jesse said, shaking his head.
“Bullshit,” Verity snapped. “None of this is a coincidence. None of it.”
“But…” Theo tried.
“You can’t honestly believe that,” Jesse said.
“Di fucking Campbell,” Verity said and the brothers turned to her. The name felt familiar, but Theo couldn’t think where he’d heard it. One look at Jesse told him he didn’t know either.
“Who?” Theo asked.
“Have you got those Cliffhaven articles?” she asked and Theo shook his head. In his rush to get to her before the attack, he’d left his briefcase in the office. Verity went to find her phone. “I can turn it on, right?” she asked. “For pictures?”
“Just don’t call or text anyone,” Jesse told her.
The room fell silent as Verity turned the device on and started searching through her pictures. When she presented him with photos of the articles spread over his coffee table Theo was hardly surprised. Of course she wouldn’t let it go.
Leaving her phone on the counter she retrieved a newspaper from her backpack. It was the curfew story that had dropped the day of the attack, and under the headline was a name. Di Campbell. Verity zoomed in on one of the Cliffhaven articles and there she was again. Di fucking Campbell.
“I don’t understand,” Theo mumbled, looking between the various Cliffhaven clippings. The articles weren’t identical, but they weren’t far off.
“Is this real?” Verity asked, tapping the curfew headline.
“No,” Theo said. “I was furious about it. There’s been a few isolated cases of vandalism but nothing since the donor meetings stopped. I would never condone a daylight curfew for humans.”
“I knew you wouldn’t.” A small, sad smile tipped the edges of Verity’s lips and Theo realised whatever this was, Verity must have worked it out while they were parted.
The Exchange told her he’d used her, cast her aside, and she still knew he wouldn’t allow such a thing.
She still thought the best of him. What had he done to deserve such trust?
As much as Theo loved his brother, he wished he could have a moment alone with her.
With the constant surveillance at the hospital, they hadn’t had a chance to talk, for Theo to really make sure Verity understood how much he cared about her.
How devastated he’d been when he got his letter and how he would never do something like that to her.
He prayed she knew, just as he knew, deep down, that she would never report him either.
They were breaking the rules, but they were doing it together.
“So?” Jesse asked a little too loud and Theo realised that he and Verity had been staring at each other. “Di Campbell?”
“I think it’s an alias,” Verity said, turning her attention back to the paper. “The articles are planted, propaganda to scare humans off joining the Exchange and make it sound reasonable for the curfew.”
“But why would we want a curfew?” Jesse asked.
“It’s just a first step,” Verity went on. “It’s what happened in Cliffhaven. Curfews, restrictions on movement, quarantine.”
“It’s slower,” Theo said, checking the dates on the clipped articles. “Things are bad in Cliffhaven?”
Jesse nodded. If Jesse considered them bad, they must be horrendous.
“Whoever’s doing this is going for a more phased approach,” Theo said.
“If you take a person’s rights away slow enough… If you tell them, it’s for their own safety…” Verity said.
“If you attempt to kill the mayor on the streets…” Jesse said.
“Fuck,” Theo said, head falling into his hands. His city was being taken, bit by bit, and it had been happening for months, right under his nose. How long ago had Harris first come to him? Three months? Four? How long had this been in the works?
“Maybe Cliffhaven was an accident at the start,” Verity said.
“Maybe the first articles were just to cushion the blow, prepare people for the inevitable. But then the vampires started liking the… freedom it gave them, so they thought they’d try it again, but carefully.
Make the fall more structured and,” she swallowed, “repeatable.”
Even the funding cuts started making sense, keeping Theo distracted on the sinking ship while the sharks circled. He’d been such a fool.
“The Roses?” he asked, looking to his brother.
“Doubt it,” Jesse said.
“No,” Verity said. “It’s Vivienne.”
Both men turned to her, and she gave them an eye roll that said it was obvious.
“Why would she take Abe?” Verity said. “She needs to impress the guy, make him want to do business with us. Why would she take him to Cliffhaven if she wasn’t proud of it?
Why would she keep bringing him here? Why not Highhaven or Stonehaven?
We aren’t the biggest city, or the fanciest or most affluent. Why us?”
“She is a bitch,” Jesse said, shrugging when Theo scowled at him.
“Being a bitch isn’t proof,” Theo said.
“Neither’s her taking Abe to Cliffhaven but it’s a good point,” Jesse argued.
It was a good point. If free feeding in Cliffhaven was an accident, and one that the powers that be were trying to rectify, why on earth would Viv show it to a trade envoy?
It had been many years since Theo had visited Salvation, but they were respectful of humans. The ones who grew up there at least.
He turned to Verity, remembering another detail of their morning at SubRosa. “Those girls?”
Verity nodded. “What if Abe’s trying to help them?”
The softness of her words, the sympathy in her eyes, snapped something in Theo. “This is fucking insane,” he seethed. “This is Havenshire. We are the safe place. We are the ones who take care of our own. Not the fucking Blessed.”
His hands shook, heart hammering with a low rage-filled growl.
If all this were Viv’s doing, he’d fucking kill her for it.
To bring such shame on the county—on Cliffhaven, on his city.
Donors were missing, lost, dead, and no one was looking for them.
He’d thought it impossible but if Viv had the power to hide Cliffhaven, then misdirecting a little money and information would be nothing for her.
How many human lives had been lost in Cliffhaven?
How many humans were being forced into unspeakable situations?
A warm, soft hand rested on his arm. “Who outranks her?” Verity asked, cool and steady, grounding him before he lost himself. A simple question for a plan already forming in her mind. He turned to his brother; they both knew the answer, knew the easiest way to get in, but Theo didn’t want to ask.
“Only the Roses,” Jesse said. “There might be a couple of others, but there’s no point going to anyone else. It’s too big, we don’t know who’s in on it. Only a Rose will do.”
“What if the Roses are in on it?” Verity asked.
“I’ll call Petra,” Jesse said, his tone somewhere between defeat and acceptance.
Verity bristled. “She’d help? I mean, she wouldn’t be okay with what’s happening?”
If anyone knew that, it was Jesse. If the term “toxic relationship” was in the dictionary, below it would be a picture of Jesse and Petra.
When they weren’t fucking, they were at each other’s throats, and Theo didn’t know which from one day to the next.
Judging by his brother’s face they were leaning towards the latter right now.
“Help is a strong word,” Jesse said. “But she’s vain, and like Theo said, Havenshire is supposed to be the safe place for humans. She prides herself on being better than everyone else. And she’s the only one I might be able to get here.”
“Tell me what you’re thinking,” Theo said to Verity as she stared into oblivion, deep in thought.
“That her vanity could be our only chance to fix this,” Verity said. “You can’t just tell her? She needs to come here?” she asked Jesse.
The steadying beat of her heart picked up at the idea of having to see Petra again, and Theo didn’t blame her. Hopefully he could keep Verity from having to see her, if Verity would allow it.
Her phone chirped on the counter, making her jump.
Message after message started popping up on her phone now that it was on, all of the people who had noticed her absence.
All the people who cared about her. Mum.
Cecilia. Cora. Adam. Verity’s heart pitched as she swiped the phone and pocketed it, eyes avoiding Jesse’s.
She didn’t trust him, didn’t want him to know of her loved ones.
The realisation hurt more than Theo expected.
“Talking to Petra needs to be face to face,” Jesse went on, pretending he hadn’t noticed the slight. “She doesn’t like technology. And her and Viv go way back. I wouldn’t want to bet on her taking my word over her bestie so, we need to play it right.”
“We need evidence,” Theo said. “I’ll see if Stella can…”
A sharp knock stole his words as Theo and Verity turned to the door.
“Smarmy Smythe,” Jesse said, already texting on his phone as he walked away. “Gonna grab a shower.”
With a finger under her chin, Theo tipped Verity’s head back. It was impossible to read her, her weak body and troubled mind tainting the beat of her heart, her scent, the sparkle in her eyes. Even like this she had pieced it together when he had failed.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“No.”
Theo nodded. Of course she wasn’t okay. He pulled her into a hug, letting Smythe wait a minute.
It was all his fault. Not only the decline of his city, but Verity being dragged into his mess.
If he’d been doing his job properly, it never would have got this far.
His city wouldn’t be on the verge of collapse.
But not yet. They had time to fix this. To save Ashhaven and then help the people of Cliffhaven too.
And with Verity at his side, Theo felt as though he could do anything.