Chapter Fourteen

After the limo took us back to the hotel, I rushed up to the suite, my friends and boyfriend following behind.

“Just in case Travis isn’t telling us the truth,” I said, remembering the stack of paperwork I still hadn’t made my way through. “I’ll call Granny. All those records are at her place. Rose and Thorn have been helping me figure out what to do with all of his stuff. Who needs three castles in Spain, anyway?”

“It’s after midnight,” Vaughn said.

I didn’t want to disturb her, but I needed the information. She would understand.

I called Granny, who didn’t answer her cell for the longest time. Long enough that I was starting to worry.

“Tansy, can I call you back?” She sounded out of breath.

“Sure,” I said. “Everything okay?”

“Come back here, honey,” a man’s voice said.

“Is that the Silver Fox?” I asked.

“Hush,” Granny said. I wasn’t sure if she was talking to me or the hot older dude I knew she’d just started seeing. Get it, Granny. “Give me a second. I’m talking to Tansy.”

He said something else. It was definitely the Silver Fox.

“Um, no rush, since you’re entertaining a gentleman caller and all, but could you look through the stack of vampire queen paperwork I left in my bedroom and tell me if Jure owned any homes in Vegas? I already know about the place near the Strip. Rose thought Jure owned something in the desert.”

“Give me ten minutes,” Granny said briskly.

“Take your time,” I said. She started to hang up, but I added quickly, “Tell the Silver Fox I said hi.”

Vaughn stared at me. “The Silver Fox?”

“Granny’s new boyfriend,” I explained. “Remember, the author she met at the Last Stop?”

“That seems like ages ago,” he said.

“Not that long ago,” I said. “Just long enough for The Drainers to change their name and look again.”

Granny came through and sent me a text with a list of the properties I now owned in Nevada.

It turned out that I was the proud owner of a mini mansion about twenty minutes outside Vegas, as well as a couple of empty warehouses and a nail salon, which was handy, considering how fast my nails grew.

“I’ll bet you money that’s where she’s staying,” I said, showing Vaughn the listing. “Vanessa probably thinks I didn’t know about it.”

“You didn’t,” Rose said. “Not until Travis told you.”

“True,” I said. “I wonder what else I own?”

Ten minutes later, the van was gassed up and the entire crew was headed to inspect one of my new properties.

There was a guard, big and bulky, stationed at the front entrance. He wasn’t a vampire, but he was something.

I got out of the van and walked up to him. Definitely a shifter but not a werewolf. Bear, maybe.

“Please open the gate,” I said.

He looked at me with eyes that had no pupil. He didn’t respond, just spat on the ground not far from my feet. Which pissed me off.

It pissed Vaughn off more. “Do you want to lose your job?” he asked the guard.

The guy snorted and said, “Who’s gonna fire me? You?”

“Not me,” Vaughn replied. “Her. Queen Tansy. The owner of this fine-looking place.”

“Fine-looking” was an excessive description. From the outside, it was all peeling paint and a sagging porch—not exactly Vanessa’s style.

Still, we were already here, and Vanessa was nothing if not unpredictable.

But the place was empty. There was a stack of paintings leaning against one wall and splashes of dried paint on the wooden floor. I couldn’t quite figure out why Jure had someone guarding the place.

After searching it from top to bottom, I approached the guard, who had been leaning up against the porch column but stood straight when he saw me emerge.

“Queen Tansy,” he said. “How can I help you?”

“How long have you worked here?” I asked.

“About a month,” he replied.

“Who hired you?”

His face went pale. “You did.”

“I hired you?” Something was odd. I hadn’t hired guards for any of Jure’s properties, but maybe I should have.

“Not you personally,” he added. “Someone who works for you.”

“I see,” I said. Rose and Thorn had been helping me, but would they do something like this without asking me first?

I took out the photo of Vanessa. “Have you seen her here?”

He squinted at the photo and then nodded. “Yeah.”

Vaughn and I exchanged a glance and waited, but the guard didn’t say anything else. “When exactly did you see her?”

“Dunno,” he replied. “A couple of nights ago.”

“Was she alone?”

“She had her donor with her,” he replied. “Some middle-aged guy.”

“What makes you so sure he was her donor?”

He stared at me like the question was ridiculous. “She’s a vampire. He’s a human.”

Vaughn’s face went red. “That donor is my father.”

The security guard was nervous, and I didn’t think it was because I showed up.

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Has anyone else been here?”

He looked away. “No, of course not.”

He was lying.

“Look at me,” I commanded.

His head slowly turned my way.

“Who was here?”

“Some woman,” he said. “Not the one in the photo you showed me.”

“Did you ever see the two of them together?” Vaughn asked.

“Never,” the security guy said.

“Did she give you a name?” I asked.

“I don’t know who she was,” he admitted. “She paid cash.”

“You were running some kind of bed and breakfast here?” I asked.

“Nah,” he said. “She didn’t sleep here. Said she just needed a place to paint. But she hasn’t been here in over a week, so I figured she found somewhere less…rustic.”

“No more unauthorized rentals,” I said. We thanked him for his time and then rejoined the others in the van.

We’d barely left the driveway before I started to feel woozy. “Stop the van,” I said.

Beckett screeched to a stop, and I stumbled out of the vehicle.

My stomach heaved. I wanted something to make this feeling go away.

Vaughn was holding my hair back as I coughed up what felt like the inside of my stomach.

He handed me a bottle of water, and I rinsed out my mouth with it.

“Better?” he asked, helping me to my feet.

I nodded and searched my pocket for a breath mint. There was something going on with me. My body was starting to reject the tonic or something. Or maybe it was that I’d been through a lot since the summer and was still processing.

After we got back on the road, I mulled over what we’d learned. There was no obvious connection between Vanessa and the mystery woman, but something about the fact that they’d been at the same place bothered me.

I hadn’t done more than glance at the paintings. “Turn around,” I told Beckett. “We need to go back.”

“What? We’re ten miles away,” he complained.

“Beckett, quit complaining and do it,” Connor said.

Beckett whipped a U-turn, and we headed back down the one-lane road. When we pulled up again, there was no sign of the security guard.

I hurried inside, but the paintings were gone.