Once Bitten, No Longer Shy by Julie Steimle (chrome ebook reader txt) 📕

you make love to me when we get home? Can I stay with you? You’re not still mad at me, are you?”

JJ looked back to Deidre who nodded severely to him.

Troy tried to fight his tears. She kissed everyone that fell, rubbing her ghostly hand against his cheek, trying to wipe them away.

“I won’t leave you if you don’t want me to.”

“You can’t move on if she haunts you,” Deidre said from the side of her mouth, pretending that she was not listening in.

“What makes you think I want to move on,” Troy muttered, wishing Nicole was still alive.

Deidre huffed. “Unless you intend to go crazy, you have to move on.”

Troy cringed.

“Is that really what you want?” Deidre asked.

Troy shook his head. “No. But…”

She side glanced at him.

“I could always drink blood and go full vampire. Then let the sun take me,” he said.

All of them halted.

Andrew turned around. “You do that, and you will have wasted all the effort Eve had made to spare your life.”

“I didn’t want to be a vampire!” Troy shouted.

“We don’t always get what we want!” Andrew shouted back. “Do you think I wanted to end up the way I am now?”

Troy pulled from him. Andrew was this noble knight—a gloriously handsome man—for a redhead. Who really didn’t want to be that?

“You have no idea the kind of crap that I have gone through!” Andrew snapped. “The friends who have died in my arms? The countless deaths I have caused myself? Man! I wanted to be a pro-basketball player, and maybe retire in the medical field—if that was possible. Troy! Snap out of it! And wake up! You have a full life before you! It is a gift. Eve preserved your life because you can do good for the world!”

“Two people have died from what I’ve done!” Troy shouted back, anger swelling in him.

“Not from what you’ve done,” Andrew countered. “Connor, from what I’ve seen, was going vampire long before you gathered together your group. You just made it easier for him to get caught.”

“But Brandon and Nicole—”

“Connor would have targeted Brandon anyway,” JJ said. “I’ve heard enough from his ghost to know that. And his friend Joshua would have died next. Then maybe that guy Dalton. Any of those guys who had gone to that party would have been toast.”

“But Nicole…” Troy broke into sobs.

Nicole’s ghost kissed his tears, leaving frost on his face.

“She just provoked him,” JJ said with a shrug. “Even if you hadn’t brought her in connection to him, it would have been another woman. Trust me. I’m just sorry for you.”

“Because I liked her?” Troy said, wiping his eyes. More frost kisses formed, some in his hair. “And you think she’s some…”

“That you think you are not worthy of love,” JJ said.

That was a weird thing for him to say. Troy flinched.

“Troy,” JJ moaned out. “If you were not worthy—none of us would be here—as if that were possible.”

Deidre patted his back, sighing.

“Hang in there,” JJ said.

Humbled, Troy nodded his head.

Silence.

“Wow, I’m abashed,” Steve muttered. “That was nearly poetic.”

They took him to the morgue. Steve didn’t look at the body. There was no point. He did, however, stare at the severed head. Steve groped his own neck and said, “What a… what a clean cut.”

“Thanks,” Andrew replied.

Steve’s eyes widened on him.

“Who is it?” JJ asked.

Nodding, Steve swallowed.

“Do you know him?” Troy asked, not so sure every vampire out there really would know every vampire.

Yet Steve did nod again. “I know him. He’s Lloyd Vangerstoff—though he also goes by the appellations of John Hills and Teddy Smoot.”

JJ wrote them down.

“Lloyd is not top brass in the Order,” Steve said. “He’s not even an average vampire. He’s rather small fish. But I would not be surprised if he was striving to get some clout by targeting Troy. I know the Order has the equivalent to a fatwa on him.”

“Fatwa?” Andrew looked puzzled, unfamiliar with the term.

“A hit,” Troy said, nodding. “A price on my head, basically.”

“Glory goes to the vampire who can take out Troy Devlin Meecham,” Steve said, nearly quoting.

All three with Troy made a face. Troy inwardly groaned. He hated his middle name.

“But why?” Deidre exclaimed, unable to handle the idea.

Turning to her, Steve said, “Because he is most likely going to find a cure to vampirism.”

Troy shuddered. “Uh… no. To the bite. I could not possibly cure vampirism.”

Steve shrugged. “I was hoping you would. You are like the scientist who could truly cure cancer—and the Order of Blood hates that.”

They looked to him.

“But…” Troy shook his head. “Why did they even try to make me into a vampire? Why didn’t they just kill me when they first found me?”

With another shrug, Steve said, “Convert you? Sometimes the best way to defeat an enemy is to convince him that your way is the better way. Admittedly, vampirism has its perks.” He then looked down to Troy’s crotch, as if to indicate that most definitely his increased ‘manhood’ was due to the vampire change.

Nicole giggled. Deidre and JJ rolled their eyes.

Moaning, Troy hung his shoulders.

The coroner put away the body and the head. Troy noticed the head was put in a separate compartment, just in case.

As they walked back to the lobby, Troy had one more question for Steve, “Ok, so the Order of Blood has a fatwa on me. I knew this already. But why would they think I could cure vampirism?”

Steve scratched the back of his neck and shrugged, “I don’t know… something about a prophecy. The End of Days. All magic becoming undone in the End Times….” He then let his eyes drift to Andrew who gazed at him curiously. “Some vampires dabble in divination. It’s a rare gift—not one we take lightly. Usually it is used to predict financial futures, useful stuff. But, uh, one time there was a prediction about the End of Days that was made… and it predicted the last vimp, who would be spared by her father—which happened.”

“Eve,” Andrew said, nodding.

Steve looked to him, confirming it. “Yeah. Well, there is another figure who was predicted—the daytime vampire.”

Troy moaned. He never gave much credence to things like this. It was hokey, like the stuff Hanz and Art believed in. He still wasn’t sure there was a God… even if he had seen angels. For all he knew angels were nothing more than more dangerous forms of elf. They were too much alike.

“So they think Troy is the daytime vampire?” JJ asked with heaps of gratifying incredulity. “Even before he wasn’t one? I’m with Troy. Wouldn’t it have made more sense to kill him?”

Steve shook his head as they reached the lobby where the others were waiting. Randon and Silvia were there with Rick, Jessica and the baby. “No. Because they were not exactly sure.”

Those with him stared, just as the eyes of the other lifted towards them. Randon grinned with relief at Troy.

“That is, until they realized exactly how connected Troy was to the Holy Seven.” Steve halted at the end of the hall, his eyes resting on Rick who gazed with relief at Andrew. “By then it was too late.”

“Exonerated!” Randon went up to Troy, hugging him.

Troy embraced the hug, his body shaking. What Steve had said had rattled him. The vampires suspected he could end vampirism. Was that even possible?

“How are you?” Randon whispered near him. He then looked around Troy at the frost in his hair. “Damn. Are you being haunted now?”

Troy nodded. “Nicole.”

“Do you want me to banish her ghost?” Silvia asked.

Nicole pulled back and practically hissed at her.

“Don’t do that.” Deidre stepped up, her eyes raking over Silvia. Likewise Silvia was eyeing Deidre up. “Let the natural process work itself. Nicole will let go of her fixation when Troy finished grieving.”

Silvia blinked at her. She thought a moment and stepped back. But then she stuck out a manicured hand and said, “I’m Silvia. And you are?”

Deidre gripped her hand in a firm shake. “Deidre Johnson.”

Matthew quickly went up to her side. “Uh, Silvia, I need to talk to you about that girl from your coven, the sister of the one who was arrested during your… situation. The one I told you about?”

With dry hooded eyes, Silvia nodded with a peek to Deidre. “So Tricia’s sister really did come to New York?”

Matthew nodded. “But she had gotten picked up by the Unseelie Court, whom we’ve been handling. You might be able to help us deal with her.”

Silvia shrugged and went with him, probably to talk with another policeman about it.

Steve walked up to Rick who was engaging Andrew in conversation over what had transpired in the morgue, specifically talking about funding Troy’s research and details about his personal assistants beyond Bobo. “I would like to take this occasion to have a word with you, Mr. Deacon.”

Heads turned. Troy perked up, listening intently. He had a feeling this was coming.

Rick shifted his wolfy gray eyes onto Steve, heaps of questions behind them. Yet he only said, “Ok. What is it you would like to speak about?”

“Richard Howard Gannon,” Steve said.

Automatically, Rick went pale. He stared at Steve. “The priest?”

Steve nodded now with a steely gaze. “You grandfather murdered him—”

Rick shook his head. “To be fair—”

“Was it fair that he was killed?” Steve practically shouted, spit flying from his mouth. “He was helping me! The Deacon Gannon was helping me! He was helping me reform! He said my soul was not eternally condemned if I truly did not take lives! I never once killed those I drank from! He was saving me! And your grandfather mauled him to death!”

Such a hush went over the police station.

Rick lowered his eyes for a second in shame, then lifted his gaze to meet that of the vampire’s. “He did.”

“So you do not deny it?” Steve shouted, his pale face whiter.

Shaking his head, Rick replied, “My grandfather was selected by the witches of Middleton Village to be an assassin. He was just a wolf from the local pack who didn’t—”

“You’re still pretending that—!”

“—who didn’t know any better! He was just a wolf!” Rick shouted back. His face was red. His teeth, however, elongated a little.

“A sorry excuse,” Steve growled back.

Andrew stepped forward, but Rick held out his arm to keep his best friend back. “Say what you will. My grandfather had no idea the crime he was committing. He was just a wolf—a wolf taken from the forest and used by witches. He did not understand what he had done until after when had returned as a man with no life or background. He put himself at the mercy of the priest, Lemuel Gulinger, Deacon Gannon’s friend who could have hauled him off to prison, or had him killed.”

“Lemuel Gulinger betrayed his friends’ memory,” Steve said through his fangs.

Rick shook his head. “No. You and I both know Deacon Gannon was a man all about forgiveness. Gulinger was doing what his friend would have done in the same circumstance. It is also why my grandfather took on the name Howard Richard—to live out is life as Deacon Gannon would have, if he were still alive.”

“What?” Steve let out a loud snort. “Become a rich CEO and build up a huge corporation that benefitted himself?”

“No,” Andrew interrupted, seeing those words stab through Rick. “Deacon Enterprises benefits billions around the world. Instead of having a small influence in a small parish in a tiny corner of Boston, he found way to help so many rise out of poverty and care of the world we live in.”

Steve snorted. “A likely story—”

“Stop it.” Troy stepped up. He shook his head at Steve. “If you are reforming as a vampire, you have to be equally open to the reformation of others. Can’t you see those werewolves are doing their best to make up for what happened?”

Paling more, Steve stared at Troy.

“Rick is funding my research,” Troy said. “If I am indeed the one to end vampirism, then he is helping me do that. Who is to say that maybe Deacon Gannon