The Death Thief

Bruises

"What? You can't be serious? Gregory, he's...he's..."

"A doctor? A nice guy? A human being?" Calista suppressed an ill-humored laugh as she gave the street a quick glance before trotting across to the other side. "Blood links are a bitch."

"You think he was compelled to then," I said with a sigh, before making my way across the street.

"I think he was compelled to kill me. Not so sure about the telling Bernadette all my dirty little secrets in the first place though." A growl rattled her voice, her words jumping with each pound of her foot against the pavement. We were taking a side street, leading us away from the center of town, where the festivities were being held and where our villainous doctor would most likely be found.

"So, how did he poison you? You said you didn't eat anything."

"I don't think he poisoned me." Her voice softened with thought and her pace slowed enough that I was able to finally take her side, but she shook her head and returned to her brisk strides. "He might have, but I'm not certain. All I'm certain of was that it was him."

"Why?" I asked, my voice breathy as I worked my shorter legs to keep up. "Maybe there's been a mistake..."

"Oh I made a mistake all right, but not about who killed me. It was him. You'll hear why soon enough, but I don't know if I have the strength to tell it more than once."

I looked up at her long face. Behind the stiff lips and bent brow, sat a distant pair of eyes and a sort of wisdom that did not come with age, but with experience. I decided to drop the matter and allow her some space to digest the sudden shift in her evening plans. I took my eyes to the road ahead of us, running as fast as I could to catch up with everyone else, while the rest of the town had already hit their stride.

I drank in our surroundings. Despite my rather new status as a member of Whisper Valley, after a few days of walking around town, I was starting to grasp the layout. It helped that, in this particular case, I'd seen this row of quaint bungalows and cozy cottages only a few hours earlier. Not much farther down the street was the town's tiny police station.

I sighed with relief. If Calista planned on telling her tale upon reaching her destination, she was certainly heading for the station to find Everett. We'd go there, spill everything we knew, and then Everett and perhaps Kyra could apprehend Gregory and Lady Derosiers before the ceremony. My mouth twitched, sinking a little as I thought of poor Spencer missing out on his lavish party. My stomach then added a mournful growl at the canceled buffet. Surely, I thought, he wouldn't just throw the food out. Maybe it wouldn't be quite as merry as it should be, but there was no reason to just abandon everything after it was set up. My stomach groaned with hope.

"We're here," said Calista, snapping me from my daydreams of roasted chicken, fresh spring salads, and a slice of chocolate cake as big as my head. "Come on."

As expected, we marched through the station doors, where the same receptionist still sat at the front desk, this time with the glow of his computer screen reflecting in his glassy eyes. He gave Calista a quick glance, his eyes darting over to me once he straightened up and cleared his throat. His mouth opened with some sort of greeting, but Calista glided by without so much as a hello and headed straight for the back. I followed along at her heels, offering the befuddled cop an apologetic smile from over my shoulder.

When we reached the interrogation room, Calista wrenched the door open and revealed a surprised Everett and a mildly amused Kyra.

"I have a confession," said Calista, standing in the doorway, blocking me from entry.

"Come in, take a seat," said Kyra, motioning to the chair that Everett soon vacated.

"I think I'd prefer to stand for this." Still she took a step into the room and drew up towards the end of the table. This allowed me to make my way in, though I kept to a back corner instead of taking the seat.

"Good afternoon Del," said Kyra with a nod.

"Good afternoon, Sheriff," I said, my cheeks blushing, surprised any attention was given to me after Calista's bold greeting. "I didn't expect to see you this early."

"We have tunnels for such things," she said with a dismissive wave of her hand. "With the announcement tonight, I decided to rise a bit early. Good thing I did, Sheriff Hathaway was just informing me of some of the information you came to him with today."

"Oh?" I asked, looking over at Calista whose eyes were dark and rigid upon the white board which still had my map of suspects from that morning. "I'm not sure how much it helped."

"We'd have found the pieces eventually," said Kyra with a shrug, "but we appreciate the speed in which you brought them together."

"I take it you've just brought us the final piece," said Everett, who circled the table so that he faced the morose zombie. "I didn't find anything in any of the security footage around town. Perhaps your memory has gotten a bit better Calista."

Her lips pinched at his words, but the tension melted as quickly as it came. "No need to track down any more dead ends. Had I known from the beginning the implications of what I was hiding, I wouldn't have hid it from you."

"That's why our job is to police the town, not yours," growled Everett. "We can decide for ourselves what is and isn't important."

"I was trying to protect someone," she snapped, her eyes finally leaving the board in order to confront the much larger Everett. "And I was trying to protect myself. Had Antonov found out about what I had done, neither of us would be safe from his displeasure."

"Antonov?" I asked, taking a tentative step towards her, the shock of his name propelling me forward. "When did he get involved?"

"Who else were you protecting?" asked Kyra, ignoring my need for answers.

"Gregory Fair," she said, the name dripping off her tongue as if that was the very poison that had killed her. "I thought him a friend and I know he isn't anymore. I care nothing of him and I no longer fear Antonov."

Everett sighed, a hand reaching up to massage his jaw while he took a glance back towards the board, his eyes settling on the one name that never felt like it deserved to be there. He then looked to me before addressing Calista. "All right, let's hear it. No more dancing around."

"Right to it then," said Calista with a contemptuous smile. "I suppose there's no better way to start than to show you."

At her words, her hands reached up and unfastened the clasps of her overalls. As the flaps tumbled down her chest and back, one hand kept the denim from sliding too far, catching it right before it revealed what underwear she had on that day. Keeping her pants low upon her hips, her other hand grabbed the hem of her shirt and lifted it enough to reveal a strip of belly flesh tainted with a deep purple bordering black. She then used her fingers to stretch out her skin to better reveal two small red incisions, one beneath her navel and one just above her pubic area.

"What?" I asked, my mouth gaping as I drank in just how far the bruising had spread along her abdomen. "What happened to you?"

"I had to protect myself from Antonov," said Calista, her voice flat and firm. "I didn't need him hounding me and making my life hell while I waited for Matias. It's not like I could have had children as a vampire anyway."

"Wait, you don't mean?" I took a step back and turned to Kyra and Everett, both of which looked on at Calista with some form of pity.

"I asked Greg to make me sterile," she said with a lazy shrug, "apparently he decided to kill me in the process."