Accidental Sire (Half-Moon Hollow #6)

“I regret nothing,” Ben insisted, shaking his head.

I laughed, but when I looked into Ben’s big green eyes, I could see that he was perfectly serious. He didn’t regret being bitten by me. I wrapped my arms around him and kissed him hard.

I thought back to what my dad had said in the tape about dating (or not dating). Love wasn’t always pretty. It wasn’t always smooth. Nothing about my relationship with Ben had been smooth. But at the end of the day, he was the first person I thought of when I was upset. He was the first person I wanted to tell.

It was possible that I was in love with Ben. That I wanted to be with him for the rest of my unnaturally long life.

Now, how did I tell him that?

Also, this was a super-weird time to have such a realization, surrounded by my family while we discussed murder timelines.

The room exploded into a series of “aws” and “ews.”

“Enough of that, or I’ll get the hose!” Dick exclaimed. “What next?”

“We brought Meagan and Ben into our home for wayward youthful vampires,” Gabriel interjected.

“Nice.” I snickered.

“Just after we smuggled you to the Hollow, a fire took place off campus. At first, the authorities assured us that no one was injured, and then vampire remains were found in the basement,” Jane said.

“Ophelia was questioned by the police about those remains,” Jamie said, to Ophelia’s mortification. She smacked his arm without even looking at him.

“Dude,” Ben said again. “Please stop helping.”

“Their investigation was unsubstantiated and inconclusive,” Ophelia spat.

“You should have that tattooed on your forehead to save time,” Jane told her.

Ophelia shot her a rude gesture I only recognized because my World Literature professor had an inappropriate sense of classroom boundaries.

“Do we know who owns the building Ophelia was suspected of burning?” Jane asked.

Ben opened his laptop. In a weird flash, I saw a picture of a campus map in my head. Ben was going to look up the house in some sort of real estate database—which he wasn’t supposed to be able to log into, but he knew his mom’s work password. He just needed to know the street address. He was trying to remember the exact location of the building and picture it in relation to the campus.

How the hell do I know all of this?

I glanced at Jane, who did not seem to be aware of any sort of psychic turmoil in the room. I opened Morgan’s campus newspaper article about the fire on my tablet and highlighted the street address. I showed it to Ben.

“Thanks,” he said, smiling. “You saved me the trouble of looking it up.”

“You kids and your newfangled devices,” Gabriel harrumphed.

“The building is owned by a rental company. The renter is listed as New Life Endeavors Inc. for the last three years,” I said. “It’s an LLC registered through Delaware, which is not super-helpful. You don’t have to include the names of the applicants on public paperwork.”

“Sort of a dead end there. What else do we know about the building?” Jane asked.

I bit my lip. “Remains of three vampires were found in the basement. But they still haven’t been identified.”

“Four of the friends on Ophelia’s list are missing and cannot be accounted for,” Jamie said.

“The list that was given to Tina, whom Meagan also suspects of padding the undead-student numbers to scam extra funding from the Council,” Dick said. “Which is pretty smart, when you think about it, using our own paperwork against us. We tend to think humans are too scared of us to steal from us, so we get a little lax . . .” Dick realized Jane was frowning at him. “OK, Tina was clearly wrong, and stealing is not a nice thing to do.”

“And now Tina is dead after a mysterious car accident,” I said, steering the conversation back on track. “Which seems convenient.”

Jane and Dick took a step back to observe the neatly lettered timeline Dick had created.

“Great, so we think that Tina arranged for you to be turned by a friend of Ophelia’s. And then that friend, possibly more than one friend, may be the remains in the basement. And that she might have paid that vampire to turn Meagan with money she stole from the Council?” Jane tilted her head as she stared at the whiteboard.

“Why would she do any of this?” Gabriel asked.

“Tina has what I would call an unhealthy reverence for vampires. I mean, subservient and fawning to the point that even I can’t enjoy it,” Ophelia said. “I don’t doubt she’s involved, but I doubt she came up with this on her own.”

Jane’s cell phone buzzed in her pocket. She checked the screen. “I’ve got to take this. I’ll be right back.”

“So we’re dealing with a Renfield?” Ben suggested. When no one responded, Ben hunched his shoulders and raised his voice to a tinny whine. “Yes, oh, mysterious and powerful master of the dark, let me do your bidding while I munch on these tasty bugs!”

“Never do that again,” I told him.

“Fine, but you get my point,” Ben said.

“That was the least sexy thing I’ve ever seen you do.”

He threw his hands up. “OK, I won’t do it again.”

“Really, really unattractive,” I added, smirking.

“I’ve got it!”

“Now that we’ve established that Ben is no longer sexually attractive to Meagan,” Gabriel interjected, “I think we need to focus on trying to find Tina’s Dracula.”

“And how do we do that?” Jamie asked.

“Well, who would be our prime suspect?”

“Dr. Hudson,” Ben said. “He’s been way too excited about our ‘special-ness.’ Proud, like he had something to do with it.”

“Also, he’s the only one we can think of,” I agreed.

“Well, all of the Council’s resources are already devoted to looking for Dr. Hudson, so way to go, us,” Dick said.

Jane reappeared at the door, a grim expression on her face. “The resources of the Council have located Dr. Hudson, or at least a seedy motel room registered in Dr. Hudson’s name. The UERT is standing by; we should get there ASAP. Ray’s going to fire up the helicopter. He’s very excited.”

“Helicopter?” Dick said. “Where’s this seedy motel?”

“Cooter Holler. We’re going back to the Possum’s Nest Lodge.” Jane sighed.

“Aw, man. Really?” Dick groaned.

“Apparently, it’s on some sort of sleazy vampire Zagat guide for best places to hide out.”

Dick grumbled as he slid into his jeans jacket. “Finn isn’t sleazy. He’s just . . . OK, he’s a little sleazy. But the motel has to be a coincidence.”

“I’m going with you,” Ophelia said, rising to her feet. “I hired Dr. Hudson. I once made him cry over a misfiled requisition form. He’s terrified of me.”

“Where she goes I go,” Jamie said. “There are fewer casualties that way.”

“Georgie, you’re in charge.”

“What?” Gabriel, Ben, and I were all equally offended.

“I just want to see what happens,” Jane said, shrugging.

“I’m standing right here,” Gabriel said, raising his hand.