"Vampires?" He managed to make the single word both a question and an accusation.
"I was attacked on campus."
My mother gasped, clutched a hand to her heart, and looked back at my father. "Joshua! On campus! They're attacking people!"
My father kept his gaze on me, but I could see the surprise in his eyes. "Attacked?"
"I was attacked by one vampire, but a different vampire turned me." I recalled the few words I'd heard, the fear in the voice of Ethan Sullivan's companion. "I think the first one ran away, was scared away, and the second ones were afraid I was going to die." Not quite the truth - the companion feared it might happen; Sullivan seemed supremely confident it would. And that he could alter my fate when it did.
"Two sets of vampires? At U. of C.?"
I shrugged, having wondered the same thing.
My father crossed his legs. "And speaking of, why, in God's name, were you wandering around campus by yourself in the middle of the night?"
A spark fired in my stomach. Anger, maybe mixed with a hint of self-pity, not uncommon emotions when it came to dealing with my father. I usually played meek, fearful that raising my voice would push my parents to voice their own long-lived desires for a different younger daughter. But to everything, there is a season, right?
"I was working."
His responsive huff said plenty.
"I was working," I repeated, twenty-seven years of pent-up assertiveness in my tone. "I was heading to pick up some papers, and I was attacked. It wasn't a choice, and it wasn't my fault. He tore out my throat."
My father scanned the clear skin at my throat and looked doubtful - God forbid a Merit, a Chicago Merit, couldn't stand up for herself - but he forged ahead. "And this Cadogan House. They're old, but not as old as Navarre House."
Since I hadn't yet mentioned Cadogan House, I assumed whoever had called my parents mentioned the affiliation. And my father had apparently done some research.
"I don't know much about the Houses," I admitted, thinking that was more Mallory's arena.
My father's expression made it clear that he wasn't satisfied by my answer. "I only got back tonight," I said, defending myself. "They dropped me off at the house two hours ago. I wasn't sure if you'd heard from anyone or thought I was hurt or something, so I came by."
"We got a call." His tone was dry. "From the House. Your roommate - "
"Mallory," I interrupted. "Her name is Mallory."
" - told us when you didn't come home. The House called and informed us that you'd been attacked. They said you were recuperating. I contacted your grandfather and your brother and sister, so there was no need to contact the police department." He paused. "I don't want them involved in this, Merit."
The fact that my father was unwilling to investigate the attack on his daughter notwithstanding, my scars were gone anyway. I touched my neck. "I think it's a little late for the police."
My father, evidently unimpressed by my forensic analysis, rose from the couch and approached me. "I've worked hard to bring this family up from nothing. I will not see it torn down again." His cheeks were flushed crimson. My mother, who'd moved to stand at his side, touched his arm and quietly said his name.
I bristled at the "again," but resisted the urge to argue with my father's assessment of our family history, reminding him, "Becoming a vampire wasn't my choice."
"You've always had your head in the clouds. Always dreaming about romantic gibberish." I assumed that was a knock against my dissertation. "And now this." He walked away, strode to a floor-to-ceiling window, and stared out of it. "Just - stay on your side of town. And stay out of trouble."
I thought he was done, that the admonishment was the end of it, but then he turned, and gazed at me through narrowed eyes. "And if you do anything to tarnish our name, I'll disinherit you fast enough to make your head spin."
My father, ladies and gentlemen.
By the time I made it back to Wicker Park, I was red-eyed and splotchy again, having cried my way east. I didn't know why my father's behavior surprised me; it was completely in keeping with his principal goal in life: improving his social standing. My near-death experience and the fact that I'd become a bloodsucker weren't as important in his tidy little world as the threat I posed to their status.
It was late when I pulled the car into the narrow garage beside the house - nearly one a.m. The brownstone was dark, the neighborhood quiet, and I guessed Mallory was asleep in her upstairs bedroom. Unlike me, she still had a job at her Michigan Avenue ad firm, and she was usually in the Loop by seven a.m. But when I unlocked the front door, I found her on the couch, staring blankly at the television.
"You need to see this," she said, without looking up. I kicked off the heels, walked around the sofa to the television, and stared. The headline at the bottom of the screen read, ominously, Chicagoland vamps deny role in murder.
I looked at Mallory. "Murder?"
"They found a girl dead in Grant Park. Her name is Jennifer Porter. Her throat was ripped out. They found her tonight, but think she was killed a week ago - three days before you were attacked."
"Oh, my God." I dropped onto the sofa behind me, pulled up my knees. "They think vamps did this?"
"Watch," Mallory said.
On screen, four men and a woman - Celina Desaulniers - stood behind a wooden podium.
A swath of print and broadcast reporters huddled before it, their microphones, cameras, recorders, and notepads in hand.
In perfect sequence, the quintet stepped forward.
The man in the middle of the group, tall with a spill of dark hair around his shoulders, leaned over the microphone.
"My name," he said, in a wine-warm voice, "is Alexander. These are my friends and associates. As you know, we are vampires."
The room erupted in flashes of light, reporters frantically snapping images of the ensemble. Seemingly oblivious to the flash of the strobes, they stood stoically, side by side, perfectly still.
"We are here," Alexander said, "to extend our deepest sympathies to the family and friends of Jennifer Porter, and to promise to do our part to assist the Chicago Police Department and other law enforcement agencies in any way that we can. We offer our aid and condemn the acts of those who would take human life. There is no need for such violence, and it has long been abhorred by the civilized among us. As you know, although we must take blood to survive, we have long-established procedures that prevent us from victimizing those who do not share our craving. Murder is perpetrated only by our enemies. And rest assured, my friends, they are your enemies and ours, alike."