Werewolves Don't Wear Cowboy Boots

Chapter 15: You can Riverdance a vampire to death, actually

Bridget wouldn't meet O'Neill's eyes when he walked into the kitchen. The set of her lips sent a message of, "I hate you and don't want to lay eyes on you right now," but the way she kept blinking her eyes to ward off tears told another story entirely.

Rather than deal handling that problem, he left a disgruntled Rory with Bridget and her American friend and went back outside to do some investigating. He was slightly encouraged that he could only detect the scent of two vampires – though how encouraging he couldn't decide. If they'd known Colum was a werewolf, only sending two vampires could be a sign it was a small, struggling coven with not enough people to spare. If they'd thought he was human, however, two vampires was overkill. The truly worrying thing, though, was the scent of blood in one of the fields. Not enough blood to think a fatal wound had been inflicted, but enough to cause concern.

When O'Neill walked back into the house, Bridget was making tea while Rory and James sat at the kitchen table, the latter looking highly uncomfortable.

Rory held up a phone and then set it back onto the table. "They put a tracker on his phone."

"How?" O'Neill said. "And why? If they crossed paths with him to do that, then they already knew how to find him."

Rory gave a shrug. Bridget, without turning around to face them, added softly, "And where to find him. He doesn't go anywhere other than home and work."

"And to get you," O'Neill added in the most diplomatic tone of voice he could manage. "Maybe one of the vampires went to the restaurant and saw you there?"

"Why would vampires go to an Italian restaurant?" James asked, then added, "I mean, they can't eat Italian with all that garlic, can they?"

Rory and O'Neill both looked at him as if he were an idiot, then ignored him completely.

"Doesn't matter now, anyway, does it? The damage is done," Rory said, sliding the bullets and note across the table. "And while you were outside sniffing for clues, Bridget showed me this."

O'Neill read the note, feeling slightly ill as he did so, then put it down and accepted a cup of tea from Bridget before she said, "And did you? Find any clues?"

It was his turn not to meet her eyes as he slowly sipped the tea. "Nothing very useful. There were only two vampires. And your brother shifted before they took him."

Her expression darkened, and James said, "I thought they could only do that when there was a full moon?"

O'Neill threw an incredulous glance his way. "You thought what? What sort of hunter are you?"

"He isn't," Bridget said wearily. "He's more just a boy who happens to carry a machete."

O'Neill glanced between the two of them, then sighed and rubbed his forehead while Rory gave a snort of laughter. "Well, that's just fecking grand. And what's he still doing here?"

James looked offended but said, simply, "Trying to help. I couldn't exactly leave her on her own, could I?"

"And he'd killed two vampires now, which is a start." Bridget winked at James in a rare show of friendship that struck him dumb. "They probably would have killed me if not for him, so I imagine he has some right to help if he wants."

"Well, then, he can help by taking you somewhere else and guarding you with his machete and his very impressive kill count." O'Neill looked toward Rory, his body language clearly communicating that he considered the conversation finished.

Bridget drew her eyebrows together and folded her arms over her chest. "I'll be doing no such thing. It's my brother they have, Bran, and you're an eejit if you think I'll stand by and do nothing while you all run into danger."