Glass Houses

Her mouth wasn’t dry anymore; it was mummified. She tried to swallow, but got nothing but a dry click at the back of her throat. She hastily picked up her tea and sipped it, tasting nothing but glad of the moisture.

“I wasn’t going to—”

“Don’t,” he cut her off, and his voice wasn’t so kind this time. “Why else would you be here today, when you know Brandon is likely to show up any time after dark? You want to make a deal with him to save Shane. That much is obvious.”

Well, it wasn’t why she was here, but still, she tried to look guilty about that, too. Just in case. It must have worked, because Oliver sat back in his chair, looking more relaxed.

“You’re clever,” he said. “So is Shane. But don’t let it go to your heads. Let me help.”

She nodded, not trusting her voice not to quiver or break or—worse—betray how relieved she was.

“That’s settled, then,” Oliver said. “Let me talk to Brandon and a few others, and see what I can do to make this problem go away.”

“Thanks,” she said faintly. Oliver got up and left, looking like any ski

She couldn’t rely on adults. Not for this. Not in Morganville.

She opened up the laptop, maximized the browser window, and went back to work.

Like always, time slipped away; when she looked up next, it was night outside the windows, and the crowd in the coffee shop had switched over from studious to chatty. Eve was busy at the bar, talking and smiling and generally being about as cheerful as a Goth chick could be.

She went quiet, though, when Brandon slouched in from the back room and took his accustomed seat at the table in the darkest corner. Oliver brought him some kind of drink—God, she hoped it wasn’t blood or anything! — and sat down to have some intense and quiet conversation. Claire tried to look like she wasn’t there. She and Eve exchanged a few glances between customers at the bar.

Putting together the book, Claire had learned during the long research marathon, was work for experts, not sixteen-year-old (nearly seventeen) wa

All of which brought her back to square one, Shane Gets Bitten. Not acceptable.

A line in one of the dozens of windows she’d opened caught her eye. Nearly anything can be created for the movies, including reproductions of ancient books, because the reproduction only has to fool one of the senses: vision….

She didn’t have time—or cash—to get some Hollywood prop house to make a book for her, but it gave her an idea.

A really good idea.

Or a really bad one, if it didn’t work.

Nearly anything can be created for the movies.

She didn’t need the book. She just needed a picture.

By the time midnight rolled around—and Common Grounds ushered the last caffeine addict out into the night—Claire was reasonably sure she could pull it off, and she was too tired to care if she couldn’t. She packed up the laptop and leaned her head on her hand, watching while Eve cleaned up cups and glasses, loaded the dishwasher, chatted with Oliver, and deliberately ignored the dark shadow sitting in the corner.

Brandon hadn’t taken off after his walking snacks. Instead, he kept sitting there, nursing a fresh cup of whatever it was he was drinking, smiling that cruel, weird little smile at Eve, then Claire, then Eve.

Oliver, drying ceramic cups, had been watching the watcher. “Brandon,” he said, and tossed the towel across his shoulder as he began slotting cups into their pull racks. “Closing time.”

“You didn’t even call last round, old man,” Brandon said, and turned that smile on Oliver.

Where it died, fast. After a moment of silence, Brandon stood up to stalk away.

“Wait,” Oliver said, very quietly. “Cup.”

Brandon looked at him in utter disbelief, then picked up the cup—disposable paper—and dumped it in the trash can. First time he’d bused his own table in a few dozen years, Claire guessed. If ever. She hid a nervous grin, because he didn’t seem like the kind of guy—much less vamp—who’d appreciate her sense of humor.

“Anything else?” Brandon asked acidly. Not as if he actually cared.

“Actually, yes. If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like the ladies to leave first.”

Even in the shadows, Claire saw the gleam of sharp teeth when Brandon silently opened his mouth—flashing his fangs. Showing off. Oliver didn’t seem impressed.

“If you wouldn’t mind,” he repeated. Brandon shrugged and leaned against the wall, arms folded. He was wearing a black leather jacket that drank in light, a black knit shirt, dark jeans. Dressed to kill, Claire thought, and wished she hadn’t.

“I’ll wait,” he said. “But they don’t need to worry about me, old man. The boy made a deal. I’ll stick to it.”

“That’s what I’m worried about,” Oliver said. “Eve, Claire, get home safe. Go.”

Eve slammed the door on the dishwasher and turned it on; she grabbed her purse from behind the counter and ducked out to take Claire’s hand and pull her toward the door. She flipped the front sign from OPEN to CLOSED and unlocked the door to let Claire out. She locked it back behind them with a set of keys, then hustled Claire quickly to the car, which sat in the warm glow of the streetlight. The street looked deserted; wind whipped trash and dust into clattering ghosts, and the blinking red stoplights danced and swayed along. Eve unlocked the car in record time, and both of them slammed down the locks once they were inside. Eve started up the Caddy and motored away from the curb; only then did she sigh a little in relief.

And then she gasped, because another car turned the corner and whipped past them in a black blur, stopping at the curb where they’d been parked. “What the hell?” Eve blurted, and slowed down. Claire turned to look back.

“It’s a limo,” she said. She didn’t even think Morganville had a limo, but then she thought about funeral homes and funerals, and got chills. For all she knew, maybe Morganville had more limos than any city in Texas….

This one wasn’t part of a procession, though. It was big and black and gleamed like the finish on a cockroach, and as the Caddy inched along, Claire saw a uniformed driver get out and walk around to the back.

“Who is it?” Eve asked. “Can you see?”

The driver handed out a woman. Small—not much taller than Claire herself, she guessed. Pale, with hair that glowed white or blond in the streetlights. They were too far for Claire to get a really good look, but she thought the woman looked…sad. Sad, and cold.

“She’s not very tall—white hair? And kind of elegant?”

Eve shrugged. “Nobody I’ve met, but most of the vamps don’t mingle with the little people. Kind of like the Hiltons don’t shop at Wal-Mart.”

Claire snorted. As Eve turned the corner, she saw the woman standing in front of the door of Common Grounds, and saw Oliver opening it for her. No sign of Brandon. She wondered if Oliver had already sent him out, or if he was making the vamp give them a head start. “How does Oliver do this?” she asked. “I mean, why don’t they just…?”

“Kill him? I wish I knew. He’s got balls of platinum, for one thing,” Eve said. Passing streetlights strobed across her face. “You saw how he did Brandon back there? Dissing him? Unbelievable. Anybody else would be dead by dawn. Oliver…just gets away with it.”

Which made Claire even more curious about the why. Or at least the how. If Oliver could get away with it, maybe other people could, too. Then again, maybe other people had already tried, and ended up as organ donors.