Fiona had just slipped into the long, soft cotton T-shirt she loved to wear to bed and crawled under the covers when she heard the tap on her door that announced Caitlin’s arrival. Her sister knocked, but didn’t wait for an invitation.
“Well?” Caitlin demanded.
The room was dark, but with the hall lights on, Fiona could see her sister’s anxious face.
“It’s done,” she said.
“Thank God,” Caitlin breathed. “For some reason the media have been trying to hide the details of Tina Lawrence’s life, but finally—one of the anchors started reading her police sheet, and … I literally shivered. Can you even imagine? The best vampire is a bloodthirsty beast and—”
“Caitlin, please. We know plenty of vampires who are fine citizens. And let’s get serious. There’s no more violent beast out there than man, when he chooses to be,” Fiona argued.
Caitlin sighed softly. “Look, I know that they’re your charges, but … well, I just don’t believe there’s ever been a truly good vampire.”
Jagger DeFarge.
The name came unbidden to Fiona’s mind.
She realized that despite her earlier misgivings, she believed that he was a force for good. After all, was anyone really all good or all bad? Everyone, every being, every creature, came with a form of free will, and free will led to behavior that was good, bad and everything in between.
“Jagger DeFarge was there,” she told her sister. “He was already attending to the matter, as he should have been.”
Caitlin sniffed. “Was he? Or did he decide he had no choice, once he saw you?”
“Caitlin, please. I have to have some faith in his ethics and his commitment to our laws. The vampires, like all creatures, are supposed to police their own, and I believe that they will do so. I also went to see David Du Lac, and I know that the higher-ups among the vampires are deeply concerned. Caitlin, they like their lives. They’re not going to risk everything they have, all to protect a rogue.”
Caitlin looked at her gravely, the softly glowing hall light making her appear angelic.
“I’m just worried,” she said. “Worried … for you.”
Fiona rose and walked over to the door, where she took her sister into a warm hug. “I understand.”
They stayed close for a minute, sisters who had seen the worst. Then they broke apart, and Fiona smiled. “I’m fine, honestly. Have some faith in me, if not the vampires. The truth is, I need your help.”
“My help? We’re talking vampires. Not my thing, remember?” Caitlin said.
Fiona nodded. She had been born with the sign of the bat, a tiny birthmark at the base of her spine. Caitlin had been born with the sign of the mist, shapeshifting. She loved her sister’s birthmark, which was magical, changing continuously, though most who saw it thought it a trick of the eye.
Shauna bore the mark of the werewolf Keeper, the wolf, howling at the moon. No tattoo artist had ever created a work of such perfection.
Their friends had marveled at the marks on those rare occasions when they’d been revealed by a low-cut bathing suit. They hadn’t tried to hide them, had merely shrugged them off, leaving their friends to wonder how and when they’d come by them.
Before Fiona could reply, Shauna popped up behind Caitlin.
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