Chapter 9
I spend ten minutes pacing back and forth. Michael is completely silent, and there‘s an occasional complaint from Vincent because all the vodka is gone. I take a long, deep look at all aspects of the situation.
“Michael, I was really hurt and angry that you didn’t tell me the truth,” I begin, making sure to leave no issue unaddressed. I wanted to be crystal clear in my message. “But, as usual, your over protectiveness came from a good place. And after calmly thinking it through, I’m sorry I said some of the things I said. It was sweet of you to be thinking of me. I understand you were looking for another option in hopes of not risking anyone’s well being. I think it’s extremely nice of you to take it upon yourself to be my own personal protector. I also think it’s incredible that you’re always thinking of protecting people; I don’t think I can even begin to imagine what type of burden that might be. With that being said, Vincent…”
Vincent sits up from the sofa at the sound of his name and turns his attention towards me, draping himself over the sofa. He crosses his hands over the back of the sofa and rests his chin on his hands as he stares at me intently.
“You’re not the bad boy you want to come off as,” I muse aloud. “I think you want to use me as bait because it serves the greater good, and I think that’s what you’re trying to do here. If this Coronam you describe really is behind everything, and they succeed, I can’t imagine how horrific things will get for all of humanity. Vincent, you’re the kind of guy who thinks that the end justifies the means, and I’m not sure I’m comfortable with that kind of mindset. But…this time, I think you’re right. I want to do it and we’re in this together. As three…supers. We’re united in this common cause. Just tell me what you need me to do and how this is going down.”
“Well all right,” Vincent says with a loud clap of his hands as he stands up from my sofa. He has a spring in his step that wasn’t there before. He looks at me smugly and laughs. “And by the way, you don’t know everything about me just because of one little heart-to-heart. I’m a deep and complicated person with many layers.”
“Cut the crap Vincenzo,” Michael advises sternly. It seems Michael is not happy with my decision. “You’re an adult Liz, and rest assured, eventually, I would have told you about everything. I just think this was very premature. But what is done is done, and there is nothing that can change our current situation. If we’re going to do this, we have to come up with a solid plan. Vincenzo, do you have anyone in your information network that could leak a rumor about who the keeper is?”
“Great idea, little brother,” Vincent says as the drunkenness disappears from his appearance completely. “Gathering intelligence is always the first successful step in a well-designed plan. I see you remember my teachings well.”
“Yes, indeed,” Michael says with a warm smile, the first one of the entire evening. “I had a great teacher.”
As I watch them, they really could have passed for family, even despite how completely different they are. Not just in looks, but in their personalities as well. There’s a kinship between the two that is rare, almost nonexistent, I imagine. I begin to fantasize about all the things these two must have seen together in their extremely long lives. It must have been something truly incredible.
“So for now, we just need Izzy to stay put,” Vincent explains with a cocky smile as he looks at me. “And I’m sure she’ll have no problem with the dashing werewolf acting as her bodyguard for right now. Do you have any objections, Michael?”
Michael blushes a little before turning his face away to avoid me seeing his expression. I catch it, though.
“You’ll find no quarrel from me here on this issue, brother,” Michael answers Vincent while still looking away and avoiding me.
“I didn’t think so,” Vincent says with a chortle. “Alrighty then! Let daddy do all the work while you two kiddies sit here and make nice. Incidentally…Michael, there does come the matter of Izzy’s family and friends. By now you should know how I work, and how I would want to handle this situation. Are you fine with that?”
“You know me,” Michael answers with a small bite of his lips. He cracks his neck before turning to me. This issue appears to be a bothersome one. “It’s not something I see anything wrong with, but it’s not my family. It’s Liz’s family. She has to be the one that’s fine with it.”
“Fine with what?” I ask as I try to hide my irritation. “I’m right here you know. We’re all in the same room; you shouldn’t talk like that as if I can’t hear you. What do my family and friends have to do with this?”
“Well, that’s easy,” Vincent says as he lowers his head and raises his eyes up to meet mine. “We’re going to have to keep you under house arrest until we’re done with this whole thing. I can’t give you an accurate estimation of how long this will take, either. I have to treat this very delicately so the witches don’t suspect a thing. And if I’m lucky, I can find out who is pulling their strings, or at least get a clue pointing us in the right direction. Point is, you’re going to be missing for a while. People are going to notice. Your teachers, class mates, Jack, Roy. They have to be dealt with, and don’t get all ballistic on me, either. I don’t mean dealt with like a mobster would mean it. I meant charming all of them. That’ll take at least a day, as I’ll have to charm a lot of people, and I’ll have to do it while no one else is around to avoid arousing suspicion. If I get caught charming someone, that means people that don’t need to get charmed will end up getting charmed just because of what they saw. I’ll have to make the witnesses forget, and blah blah blah, you get the picture.”
“So when you charm someone, you can not only make them do things, you can also make them forget events?” I ask curiously.
“Yep, it’s one of the most important vampire fundamentals,” Vincent states proudly. “With my current expertise, I could pretty much make anyone think anything I want. I can even implant memories that never happened. Well, I can’t do that to you, cheating keeper.”
Vincent smiles before giggling softly to himself.
“Are you comfortable with this, Liz?” Michael asks, his face blanketed with concern.
I take a few moments to think about my answer. “Are there any risks to the people you’re charming?” I ask as I sit down. “You’re messing around with memories and implanting things into their heads, something is bound to get messed up in translation.”
“No, they’ll be fine,” Vincent assures me soothingly. “Some younger vampires do screw up, but that’s always rectified. The damage is never permanent, that’s another thing the Coronam monitors. You’d be surprised as to how many young whelp vampires screw up basic charms. But me? I’m an old hand at this, I got it covered. Don’t I, Michael?” Vincent looks at Michael with a grin on his face. Michael smiles and nods his head.
“For once, he’s not just being arrogant,” Michael backs him up. “He’s really good at charming. It’s really uncanny actually. I’ve never seen him fail.”
“You see?” Vincent says as he inches his way closer to me, pretending to beg. “In truth, the only real problem with this plan is that I can’t give a real timeline. And Michael is a real stickler for our plans being executed without even a second’s worth of fault. Plus, the clock is ticking. We need to get on this immediately. It’s obvious the witches know there’s a keeper here, they’re going to start looking if they haven’t begun already.”
“Yeah, and that means questioning the locals,” Michael says with deep concern heavy on his voice. “If this is our plan, then we really need to hurry up. I can handle anything that might come our way. I doubt it will take you more than a day to charm everyone, will it?”
“Half a day, tops,” he answers confidently. “And then step two? How do we make it so we can ensure Izzy’s safety when the witches come to kidnap her?”
“I’ll be watching the entire time,” Michael says before gulping. “I must admit, I don’t like this plan. But I’m starting to see the logic i
n both of your arguments. I suppose the decision is all yours at this point, Liz. Do you feel comfortable with this? Do you want to go through with it? Please don’t feel pressured at all, we can find another way..”
I once again begin to pace and think of all the different scenarios and how this could turn really ugly. The worst of it is, this really sounded like the best plan. And if my sacrifice meant the town would be safe…well, that was a sacrifice I have no choice but to make.
“I’m ready, and I want to go through with the plan,” I declare, trying to put on my bravest face.
“Very well,” Michael says assertively, his presence filling the room with his authoritative impression. “Vincenzo, get to charming them, if you hurry you can finish by dawn. Leak it out on your information network who the keeper is, and I’ll be watching and listening from a mile out. Remember the purpose of this mission is not only to stop and neutralize these rogue witches. The most important aspect of this operation is to find out who the witches are working for. Vincenzo, when all is said and done, make sure that you leave at least one witch tied and bound and very much alive. The witch will have much to answer for.”
“Wait, wait,” I say hesitantly. “I’m fine with all the rest of this, but how exactly are you going to stop and tie down a witch?”
“Thirteen witches, to be exact,” Michael says, beating Vincent to it. Vincent looks at Michael with a playful sneer. Michael turns to Vincent and smiles. “You’re not the only one that can gather information, you know. I also managed to find out the Russian man is the leader of the ring.”
“Thirteen?” Vincent asks, showing a bit of concern. “A full coven? With a brujo leading the coven? This is some serious stuff.”
“Yep, that’s why I like to not be so reckless,” Michael answers with a small sigh.
“Ok, once again, wait,” I say, growing increasingly agitated. “What can witches do? What type of powers or abilities should I be watching out for?”
“You should lie down on the ground and not move a muscle,” Vincent instructs. “They won’t dare touch you, you’re too important. If you want though, you can definitely watch as Michael and I kick some serious ass.”
“I really hate witches, you know?” Michael muses with a shake of his head. “They were supposed to be helping nature, protecting it. And now, most of them are just either in league with those trying to destroy nature or are out only for themselves. It’s a terrible thing they’re doing to the balance…typical communication, Vincenzo?”
“Absolutely, I’ll link all three of our minds,” Vincent explains. “You however, will have to practice in dropping your guard and letting me in, Izzy. It’s going to be hard to communicate with you because of your keeper status. You’re really going to need to learn how to turn that off, at least with me.”
“Yes and only at certain times,” Michael points out. “This is a team effort, so we’re going to have to act as one. Vincenzo’s telepathy helps that aspect immensely. Even though you’ll be on the ground trying to avoid trouble, Liz, you could still help us by alerting us to any new threats that might come out, if this is indeed a trap. If the Coronam is indeed behind this, we might even have to fight off a few bloodsuckers.”
“Hey now,” Vincent protests.
Michael shrugs his shoulders and holds his hands out to his side in a kidding gesture.
“Alright fine, I’m on board, seriously, totally, 100% on board,” I announce without a doubt in my mind. “But when are we going to have a chance for Vincent to try to train me to drop my keeper’s ability to block his vampire abilities out? We don’t really have a lot of time.”
“I can do it from a pretty good distance out,” Vincent explains it in a way that makes it seem like this will be easy to do. “I’ll give you some basic pointers here, and while I’m out and about during the day, I’ll be trying to reach inside your mind to teach you. It won’t be easy since I’m trying to do this gingerly and the brain is usually a very private thing. The instinctive reaction to me trying to read your thoughts will be for you to shut me out. It will be much harder for me to accomplish my task with you being a keeper and all. But I have to move slowly to not risk you losing any memories; that can happen when someone uses their telepathic gifts on you. If they don’t know what they’re doing, they can turn your brains to goo.”
“Yes and that’s why this is really important,” Michael interjects. “You must only drop your defenses when you’re sure it’s safe to do so. And you must only drop your defenses for Vincenzo. And for the purposes of this mission only.”
“I detect a little jealousy there, brother,” Vincent says..
“Your intuition is spot-on as always,” Michael answers immediately. “Speaking of that, I’m going to need Liz to drop something of hers to leave a trail. I’ll be watching the entire time, but it’s best to have a backup plan, and if possible a backup plan for that backup plan.”
“God you’re anal,” Vincent says in a scoffing tone. “All right, let’s go over the whole thing then, and let’s make it fast. I’ve got a lot of stuff to do this morning.”
“You can walk in daylight? Can all vampires do that? Is that another lie vampires created?” I ask, intrigued by this idea.
“There are a variety of ways a vampire can get around the daylight restriction,” Vincent explains disinterestedly. “I’m just too old; the sun just isn’t hot anymore. I can’t even get a sunburn. Can we focus, please?”
After I apologize for taking the attention away from our main objective, we get down to refining our plan. All possible kinks are talked through, and Michael works out every worst-case scenario. Vincent wasn’t lying when he said Michael was anal. Then again, I suppose if you’re going to do something this important, there’s no such thing as overly cautious.
For once though, there isn’t any fighting between the two of them. But there is a problem that I am now facing.
I truly care about Michael. I could even go as far as to say that I’m falling in love with him. But there’s also something about Vincent…something gritty, realistic…Michael has tried to baby me and protect me, and while I appreciate where the emotion is coming from, I don’t appreciate the secrecy. He really hurt me.
I’ve never been the kind of person who believed in being with more than one guy at a time. Geez, I’ve never even had a boyfriend. But after Vincent’s help, and seeing him tonight…acting like a boy and being so arrogant to the point that it was actually charming…I think I’m actually beginning to have feelings for Vincent.
And I have no idea what to do about that…