Chapter 4

4

Galactic Soap Opera

When Father steppedinto the office, I was neck-deep in intrigue. Aaron had given me files upon files of information on the vampire nobility. They certainly led very colorful lives. The case dossier read like a galactic soap opera.

“Hey,” Father said, lingering in my doorway.

I looked up and smiled at him. “Hey.”

“Have you been sitting there working the whole time?”

“Pretty much.”

“You need to get out. Move around a little.” He did a silly little dance that embarrassed me as much at twenty as it had at thirteen.

“I was thinking of getting one of those treadmill desks.”

“I meant get outside,” he replied, clearly amused. “Party a little. Go on a date.”

“No time for dating.”

“You can make the time. Multitask.”

I arched my brows at him. “Like you multitasked tonight on the job by hitting on a police officer?”

A smile twisted his lips. “Are you sure you want to do that, Terra? You tease me about my love life and it’s open season on yours.”

“I don’t have a love life.”

“Oh? How about Cabochon’s assistant?”

Cabochon was the mage we bought some of our weapons from. He made accessories too, but they were really expensive, so we didn’t buy many of them. The birthday present accessory I had reserved for Father was from Cabochon’s shop.

“Cabochon’s assistant? You mean August?”

“He gives you puppy dog eyes every time we’re in the shop.” Father batted his eyelashes.

“That’s not true.”

Father nodded vigorously.

“He’s not my type.”

“What is your type?”

“I don’t really know.” I frowned. “Why?”

“I can picture you with a nice, sensible, rule-abiding boy who’s never had a warrant on him.”

I chuckled. “Sounds boring.”

He let out a martyred sigh. “Don’t tell me you’ve been befriending those rogue elves down on Shadow Alley again.”

I shrugged. “What can I say, Pops? I do love a man with a dragon tattoo and a rocket launcher.”

His eyes narrowed with suspicion. “You’re getting me back for Cowboy Beach, aren’t you?”

“You pushed me into the sewers!”

“You’re being melodramatic.”

“Melodramatic?” I repeated, incredulous. “Melodramatic! I had to fight a colony of abnormally large rats who wanted to turn me into a snack.” I shivered at the memory. “And then I had to trudge through two kilometers of muck to get out of there.”

“Terra, you’re taking this completely out of context,” he said as we walked to the waiting room. “I pushed you into the sewers to protect you from the giant trampling through downtown New Carmine, trying to reduce its buildings to gravel. I didn’t want you to get trampled too. I was trying to be a good father.”

“You pushed me into a river of black sludge. You’re the worst father ever.”

He pointed out the pizza on the reception desk. So that was his trump card: the galaxy’s favorite fast food.

“Did you get extra cheese?”

He nodded.

“With the magic pineapples?”

He opened the box to reveal a pizza with gold pineapples all over it. My nose almost drowned in the divine scent.

I looked around the room. “You forgot the ice cream.”

“No, I didn’t.” He pulled out a tub of strawberry ice cream. With real strawberries in it.

I tackled him with a hug. “You’re the best father ever,” I said seriously.

“You bet I am.” We sat down. “How’s the research?”

I grabbed a slice of extra-cheese, magic-pineapple pizza. “Research?”

“On the Wolf Poodle.”

“Oh, that.” I took a bite, chewing it with relish. “I didn’t get to it yet.”

“Oh?” His eyes lit up with mischief. “Did a boy stop by to distract you?”

“Kind of.”

He laughed. “I was just kidding.”

“It wasn’t a boy. Not exactly.” I met his eyes. “It was a vampire.”

He chewed on his pizza, waiting for me to continue.

“It was Major Aaron Pall of the Diamond Edges.”

Father’s face was eerily calm. “What did he want?”

“He wanted to hire me.”

“I hope you turned him down,” he said, taking another slice of pizza.

“Not exactly.”

His hand froze, the pizza stalled right in front of his mouth. “By not exactly, you mean…”

“I took the job.”

He looked at me like I’d set my hair on fire and he had no idea how to put it out.

I dropped the photos on the table, of Hayden and Ian, of Ambrose’s corpse. Then I told him about my foresights, about the princes being tortured.

“I can’t let them suffer like that,” I finished.

He glanced down at the photos.

“I covered my bases,” I said quickly. “I had him sign a contract, which I will file with the PI Directory, so he can’t pull that same stunt as last time. And his down payment is sitting in our safe. If he so much as sneezes in the wrong direction, the contract states I can walk away and I keep the payment.”

“It sounds like you’ve got it covered.”

I watched him closely. “And this is where the ‘but’ comes in.”

He smiled. “But Aaron Pall is a highly trained sociopath. If you learn anything that threatens him, he will kill you without a second thought.”

“No. I don’t think that he will. He doesn’t want me dead.” I chewed on my lower lip. “He wants me to join him.”

“He hasn’t given up on that?”

“Apparently not.”

Father considered it. “That only means your life isn’t in danger from him. You still need to watch out for everything else.”

“Like what? My heart?” I smirked at him.

“Yes, Terra,” he replied, his face serious. “Exactly that. You are drawn to darkness and lost causes. And people like Aaron Pall know exactly how to make themselves into a tempting lure.”

“So you don’t think I should have taken the case?”

“No, you were right to take it.” He slid the photo of Hayden and Ian across the table to me. “What do you know about them?”

“They are the twin sons of Ambrose Selpe, heirs to the vampires’ empire. They are twenty years old. Hayden is known to be a partier, and he always treats everyone in the bar to drinks. Very popular and well-loved by the people. A born ruler. Charismatic. Ian is quieter, a dreamer and scholar. He’s interested in archeology and ancient civilizations.”

“That is how the public knows them, yes.”

“But there’s something more to them?” I guessed.

“What do you know of their mother?”

“Not much. Her name was Livia Selpe. She died about ten years ago.”

He nodded slowly. “Before she became Ambrose’s empress, Livia was the high priestess of Rosewater.”

“She was a mage?” I gasped.

“Yes. The vampires only ever knew her as Livia Selpe, but her real name was Livia Cross. She was your mother’s sister.”