Accidental Sire (Half-Moon Hollow #6)

Working from home didn’t mean that Jane’s schedule was any less busy. She just spent a lot more time teleconferencing. Dick worked from River Oaks, too, out of “solidarity,” but I suspected it had more to do with worrying about our safety and the gourmet blood blends Tess was delivering on a regular basis. I sat at the dining-room table and answered the calls rerouted to Jane’s landline and answered her e-mails and spent a lot of time apologizing for the lack of face-to-face Jane time. Jane was in her kitchen, stress-drinking and commanding the search team that was sweeping the Hollow for Dr. Hudson.

Ophelia sat at the other end of the dining-room table, typing furiously into her laptop and answering her phone every ten minutes or so. She answered in a different language every time, so it was difficult to guess what she was working on. Maybe it was a really complicated homework assignment? Frankly, the fact that she could yell at people in so many languages made her either ten times more awesome or ten times more intimidating. Fitz was completely oblivious to this, dozing at my feet.

Ben shuffled out of the kitchen and set a mug of bloodychino in front of me, kissing me on my head. He’d spent most of the early evening holed up in Jane’s library/office with a bunch of thumb drives and papers Gigi had sent home with Dick. He dropped a stack of papers in front of me.

“You look tired,” I told him, stroking my thumb along his cheek.

“I would say you’re wrong, but I did fall asleep a minute into your dad’s video last night, which is embarrassing.” He smiled sheepishly. “Sorry about that. After all that fuss I made, I fell asleep. I was exhausted, I guess.”

“It’s OK. It was just a bunch of advice on car repairs,” I said, shaking my head.

“Yeah?”

“My dad wanted to make sure I knew how to jump-start a battery, change a tire, that sort of thing,” I said. “Thanks for doing that for me. It’s the most thoughtful thing anyone’s ever given me.”

“You’re welcome.” He leaned forward and was about to kiss me when Ophelia suddenly started yelling in German. And she sounded very angry. Even angrier when she stood up and knocked her chair back.

“That doesn’t sound good,” Ben said, grimacing, as Ophelia stomped outside and continued her conversation on the porch.

I pursed my lips. “No, it does not. So what are you working on right now?”

I leafed through the papers he had dropped onto the table.

“Oh, just reading through the personal papers and files from Dr. Hudson’s office. Jane said I could read over them since I read faster than she does. I’m hoping I can catch some sort of clue, like a Post-it that says, ‘I have a remote cabin on the lake and run there when the Council officials are looking for me. Here are the coordinates.’?”

“That would be a helpful but oddly worded Post-it to leave for oneself,” I said. “But Dr. Hudson has used Post-its for evil purposes before.”

“True.”

The phone rang, and I reached for the receiver. “I wish I could help you with your speed-reading. But I have three conference calls to reschedule and a copier-paper vendor to yell at.”

“Good luck with that,” he said, ducking his head for a quick kiss before grabbing his papers. I answered the phone, listening as a Council rep out of Buffalo requested a meeting with Jane the next week. I opened her schedule on my laptop and glanced down. Ben had dropped one of his papers on the floor.

I picked it up, giving the Buffalo rep a string of “Yes, ma’ams” and “Mm-hmms” while scanning the paper. It was the bibliography for one of Dr. Hudson’s bonkers academic articles. Most of his work seemed to be based on legitimate genetic research, but then there were a few journal articles with titles like “Genetic Chameleons: Vampires and Their Magical DNA Adaptability” and “Better Vampires through Chemistry.” All of them were written by an Allan Fortescue, PhD, Professor of Biology, University of Kentucky.

“Hello?” the Buffalo rep called testily.

“S-sorry,” I stammered. “Yes, I have you confirmed on Mrs. Jameson-Nightengale’s schedule for Tuesday at three A.M. She’s looking forward to talking to you.”

The Buffalo rep hung up without thanking me. I stared at the bibliography. Why did the name Fortescue seem familiar? Just because he was a professor at my college? Had I heard the name on campus? I hadn’t taken any classes with him, but that didn’t mean that I hadn’t glimpsed his name on a door plate or in the campus newspaper.

I opened my Internet browser and went to the college’s Web site. No matter how I searched, I could not find a Dr. Fortescue in any of the science departments. I even tried the political science department. Nothing.

I chewed on my thumbnail, listening to Ophelia continuing to rant from the porch. I felt sorry for the German speaker on the other end of the line. I called Morgan’s cell phone, using Jane’s “ghost phone.”

“What is it with you using landlines now? Are you becoming Amish? Is that where you are? Pennsylvania Dutch country?”

“Yes, I’m becoming Amish. It’s like that old movie Witness but with more fangs.”

Morgan snorted. “Are you calling because you need me to order you a fancy new bonnet on the forbidden Internet?”

“No, I’m calling you because I am going to ask you to use your remote access to the school’s intranet to find some information you probably shouldn’t be looking up.”

I could hear her typing, so I guessed I had caught her near her laptop when I called. “That’s fine.”

“No, you could probably lose your job over this. This will be considered an abuse of the newspaper staff’s access to the school’s internal servers.”

“Yeah, probably, but I’d rather go out for helping a friend than, say, playing ‘Candy Crush’ on my workstation, which is probably how I’ll be fired.”

I nodded. “That’s true. Can you look up someone called Allan Fortescue? F-O-R-T-E-S-C-U-E? Allan with two Ls. The name seems really familiar, but I can’t put my finger on where I would know it from.”

“Ummm . . . he’s showing up on the personnel server but not as a current employee. Dr. Fortescue was let go about three years ago for being a complete wackadoo. He attempted to publish a bunch of journal articles with reputable academic publications, claiming that he could find a way to change vampires’ genetic makeup through chemical intervention, whatever that means. His supervisors asked him to drop the research interest a couple of different times. He was written up for insubordination, showing up to class late, or skipping classes altogether without making them up. He earned himself a rating of negative two on Rate My Professor.”

“I didn’t know they did negative numbers,” I said.

“They do when you forget to give a final in two of your classes and then count the grades as zeros.”

“Ooooh.” I winced. “Any forwarding address on his file?”

“According to the HR rep who handled his exit interview, he wrote, ‘I will see you all in hell.’?”

“So, a no, then.”

“Is that helpful?” she asked.

“No. But I appreciate the effort. Just clear your browser history and blame Joanie the hyper girl if anyone asks.”

“I’m using Joanie’s login.” Morgan snorted. “I would say it’s for plausible deniability, but honestly, she ate the last of my emergency desk ramen last week. She has this coming.”

“Agreed.”

“Welp, I have to go, because my mom is trying to force me into meaningful bonding moments at least every forty-five minutes. And it’s been forty-three. She has not handled empty-nest syndrome well.”

“You love it.”

“I do,” she admitted.