lowered his head for a minute. “Yes. Eventually. The blockades grow tighter, and for every Federal killed, another steps off a ship from another country, barely speaking English, ready to die like a canary sent into the coal mine of freedom. I’m done talking, Lisette. Tell me what you want, but, please, make no more references to the evil of Texas and my brethren. Just tell me where we are with the trauma at hand.”
She pursed her lips with displeasure. “You did well last night. Extremely well. But we know that a number of the creatures escaped.”
“How?”
“Have you seen the paper this morning?”
He shook his head. “No.”
She reached into her bag and produced the morning’s newspaper, unfolding it so that he could see the headline—Murder on Florida Avenue.
He took it from her hands and read the article. A Joshua Brandt, his wife, mother and two servants had been found dead. The bodies, white as sheets, had been discovered strewn about the house.
BREAKFAST HAD LONG been cleared away. Martha had gone to be with her children. Alex had tactfully taken Brendan for a “constitutional” walk. And Megan sat with Cody in the parlor, sensing what was coming next.
“You knew about me all your life?” he asked her.
She shook her head. “No, not all my life. But I knew about my father. Well, when I was young, my mother would tell me that he’d been a wonderful man, but that he didn’t stay long in one place. That he…that he had a quest in life, and that his quest was important and undertaken for the sake of all humanity. I never saw our father. I was born in North Carolina, where my mother had friends. I would tell the children that I played with at parties and so on that my father was a great man, but when I was about six, I think, one of the older boys told me that my father was a drifter and I was a bastard. Shortly after, we moved to Richmond, my mother married a fine man named Andrew Jennison and my life went on from there.”
She had barely finished speaking when the door opened and Cole stepped in. The woman, Lisette Annalise, was not with him. Megan had to admit she was glad. She didn’t like Cole Granger and she liked him less alongside the actress who seemed to think she was the Army of the Potomac.
Cole looked at them then closed the door carefully. He walked over to Cody, placing a newspaper on his lap.
Cody groaned.
“What is it?” she asked.
“The plague at the prison might have been stopped, but we didn’t get them all,” he replied.
Megan stood and hurried over to Cody’s side, brushing past the solid granite that was Cole Granger, and looked down at the giant headline on the newspaper.
“At least it’s not—Battlefield at Antietam, at Gettysburg, the Wilderness…Tens of Thousands Dead,” she said weakly, looking for something positive to say.
“How many do you think made it out?” Cody asked Cole.
“Can’t be many. But even one is enough.”
Cody exhaled. “Well, hopefully, the ones who escaped were new, young vampires that will need rest by daylight. But where?” he asked softly, frowning.
“St. Paul’s, Rock Creek—Prospect Hill?” Megan suggested. The former, a Colonial church, had quite an impressive burial ground. The latter was a large expanse, fairly new, but with many plots sold. “Oak Hill Cemetery? And beyond. The law stipulated not so long ago that new interments had to be outside the city line…but there are crypts and vaults in the oldest churches, as well. Most likely new vampires would find rest in a cemetery—I don’t think they’d be able to endure the burn of trying to sleep within an actual house of worship.”
“My bet is on Prospect Hill,” Cody said. “It is all hallowed ground, but many who would have been buried there perished on battlefields far away, and their remains were never returned.”
“Though Prospect Hill is German-American,” Cole noted, “I remembered reading a small article on it the day it was consecrated.”
“Yes, but many bought plots there,” Megan said.
Cody stood and looked at them with determination. “We’ll flag down a carriage,” he said. “It’s not walking distance.” He was thoughtful and then shook his head wearily. “Oak Hill is possible, too—its natural landscape lends itself to many places where a vampire might find enclosures in which to rest.”
“And if one of the older, seasoned vampires survived, he might have a place already set up…anywhere,” Megan said.
“We’ll just keep searching. We’ll start with Prospect Hill, move on to Oak Hill…and go from there.”
Cole nodded in agreement. “The surviving attackers must be found, but we also must get into the hospital morgue where the remains of the deceased were taken. Quickly. I don’t want to wait for nightfall—better that we handle the situation now.”
“All right,” Cody began. “Brendan will come with me. We’ll start on the cemeteries. You can bring Megan—”
“What? Oh, no,” Cole said.
“You know, cowboy,” Megan said, irritated, “one day, you’ll be grateful to have me at your side, when your weakness is shown to be great next to those you choose to pursue.”
“I know my business. You ask your brother. I learned to hold my own the hard way,” Cole said. “Why, I nearly killed you last night.”
“Oh, no, you did not,” Megan corrected him. “I could have killed you, but instead, I saved your skin. You were with Cody. And then I offered you my services.”
“You were at my mercy,” Cole said softly.
“I—”
“All right, stop!” Cody said. “Cole, you come with me, and I’ll send Megan and Brendan—”
“No! I know she’s technically on our side, but you’re not going to risk Brendan going with her,” Cole said.
“It’s early enough,” Megan said. “And, Cody, you’re a trained medical doctor. It will make sense if we both go to the hospital. Then, we’ll go to the cemeteries together. We are talking vast tasks at each location. The hospitals are huge, and—”
“Even the morgue area will house many,” Cole interrupted quietly.
“I think, since resources are limited, the murdered family might be kept separately,” Megan concluded. “In the morgue area, but separate from those who have died of their battle wounds, or of disease.”
“All right. We go together. Cole—Megan is my sister,” Cody said.
“One you’ve known for less than twenty-four hours,” Cole pointed out.
Megan moved toward the door. “Sheriff Granger, we need to leave. You may come—or not. As you see fit. But I am going.”
She wasn’t sure what he said; it
