It was two someones, actually. Shane stared at them for a long, bloodshot second, then stepped back to let them in. “Wow, a visit from the mayor,” he said. “And it’s not even election season. How you doing, Dick?”
Richard Morrell—who was never known as Dick, except to Shane—gave him a pained, long-suffering look. For all his faults—and God knew he had a lot, starting with being related to that psycho-bitch Monica—Dick never let the little things get to him. Which was why it was so much fun to try. He looked tanned and fit, and he was wearing an expensive suit, though why he bothered in Morganville was anybody’s guess.
“Shane,” said the second person, a tall, dark-skinned woman with a scar on her face, tightly cornrowed hair pulled back in a bun, and who was wearing a crisply ironed police uniform, all her brass gleaming. She wore the gun like she’d been born with it on her hip. “Sorry for the early visit. I heard you had a late night.”
He shrugged, but he was glad he was wearing the sunglasses to hide his expression. And the bloodshot eyes. “No problem, Chief Moses,” he said. “Coffee?”
“I never say no to coffee,” Hannah Moses said, with a charming, professional kind of smile. Shane got a couple of mugs out of the cabinet and filled them, brain churning furiously against the numbing fog of the hangover. Why are they here? What did I do? Because the chance they could be here for anyone else seemed pretty long, and pretty small. He was always the one in trouble with the law.
He carried the mugs back to the kitchen table, which was piled with old, discarded copies of the Morganville Daily and flyers for things he never paid attention to; he shoved it all to the side. “Sorry,” he said. “Not my kitchen duty day.” As Hannah and Richard sat down and started sipping their drinks, he said, “No offense, but we’ve got a coffee shop about six blocks away. Vampire owned. Any particular reason you’re dropping in on me for your caffeine fix?” Please say no.
Richard and Hannah exchanged glances, and then Richard Morrell said, “We need you to do something for us.”
Well, that was different. Really different. Shane cocked his head and tried to sort through it, because it wasn’t making any sense. “You. Need something. From me.”
“Don’t make it a thing, Shane.”
“Kinda is a thing, though.” Neither of them cracked a smile. They both looked very, very serious. “What is it?”
“Michael.”
Michael? Shane’s eyebrows rose on their own, and he said, “You have got to be kidding. Our Michael, the Boy Scout? No freaking way. What’s he supposed to have done, littered? Jaywalked?”
“No,” Hannah said. She sounded regretful, and very sure of what she was saying. “We think that he’s hiding a fugitive from justice. A dangerous one, and one who could easily get him killed. And we need to find out why, and where.”
Shane didn’t mean to, but he sat down, hand cradling the hot ceramic of his coffee cup. No way. It wasn’t like Michael, not at all. But Hannah wasn’t one of those people who went off half-cocked, either. She knew her business, and if her business was Shane’s best friend . . . well, that was bad. Real bad.
“Who’s he supposed to be hiding?” Shane finally asked, through a throat that felt way too tight. “Osama bin Laden?”
“He’s hiding a vampire. I’d rather not tell you who we believe it is.”
“What, Dracula? Man, that guy gets around.” Neither of them smiled. “Kidding. Jeez. Lighten up a little.”
Richard reached out and grabbed Shane’s wrist as he started to raise the coffee cup. “Lighten up,” he repeated. He looked way too pale, and way too angry now. Not the usual Dick Morrell at all. “You stupid punk, you don’t know what you’re talking about. If you want to save Michael’s life, you’d better get your head out of your ass and quit joking around.”
“If you want to save your life, you’d better take your hand off me, asshole!”
Richard did, sitting back and crossing his arms. Hannah’s gaze darted from him to Shane, then back again. “We’re all going to just calm down,” she said. “Because this doesn’t help anyone, least of all Michael. Shane, he’s not wrong. This is serious, and if we don’t do something, it’s going to go bad, especially for your friend, and maybe for the rest of you, too. Please. We need your help.”
“To do what? Spy on my best friend? Screw that.” Shane felt his jaw muscles bunching up, and his aching hands—still bruised from last night’s little scuffle—tightened into fists. “Never gonna happen. Not unless you’re straight with me. Who is it you’re looking for, exactly? I’m guessing not Dracula, probably.”
The house seemed very quiet, to Shane. He knew Claire could feel the house’s moods, somehow, but he didn’t really. It was just a house. Except it wasn’t, and somehow, he knew it was . . . listening.
“I can’t tell you that,” Hannah said. “And you don’t need to know. It’s better if you don’t.”