Chapter Text
Raylan watched Tim negotiate with Art and wasn’t surprised to see it not really going Tim’s way.
“Now tell me again why I need to bring this guy in from out west?” Art asked. He’d leaned back in his chair and was rubbing the back of his head with his palm.
Tim was trying to talk Art into signing off on an order to pull Bernardo Spotted-Horse in from Wyoming. Raylan knew the whole thing sounded fishy when Dr. Lillian brought it up. He didn’t know why Tim thought he’d be able to get it past Art.
“Well, with Raylan out now and then on maternity leave…” Tim started.
And Raylan watched Art shoot him down. “But he’s back now, right? Seems like I’ve got two of you preternatural division boys on the payroll now—and Rachel’s up to speed on these snuff videos. Not that that investigation’s going anywhere.”
“It will be,” Tim said. He waved a hand between Raylan and himself. “We got an appointment tonight with the City Master in Louisville to follow up on the tip that this guy’s connected to Detroit.”
“Still… don’t think we need another one of you cowboys underfoot,” Art said.
“I ain’t a cowboy,” Tim muttered.
Raylan tipped his head down to hide a smile under the brim of his hat so neither of them would see it.
Apparently unsuccessfully.
“Somethin’ funny, Raylan?” Art asked.
Raylan pressed his lips together into a thin frown. “Not at all, Chief.”
“Huh. When’s your meet?” Art asked.
Raylan reached over and checked the watch face on the inside of Tim’s wrist. Tim said nothing in response but slid his eyes up to Raylan’s face letting them linger there. Raylan ignored the stare knowing Tim wasn’t really going to push him about the casual gesture, even in the office. When it came down to it, he knew Tim liked being touched as much as Raylan liked touching him.
“Couple hours now,” Raylan said. “Thought we’d head out and show Tim around their new preternatural district.”
“The meet is with Tarron, the Louisville city master and his mate. I called Nikki his human servant to set it up,” Tim said.
“Who now?”
“Nikki. She handles all the ‘day business’ for the city masters for Louisville and Lexington, Tarron and Sabine,” Tim explained.
The Louisville Metro Council had voted the previous fall to build their district around the established vampire tourist business area in the city—lumping Tarron’s vampire “family-friendly establishments” into the city’s new preternatural red-light district.
When Raylan and Rachel initially inspected their district that spring, Tarron and his mate Sabine had not been happy that a lycanthrope-owned brothel was now only a block away from their vampire clubs and that adult-themed restaurants would be peppered through the district. Raylan had just shrugged and told them to open a vampire bawdy house next door to compete. He’d earned a hard elbow jab to his ribs from Rachel for that one. The vampire masters hadn’t been amused at the time. But now he reckoned that’d changed some.
“You gonna inspect them while you’re there?” Art asked. “Didn’t I see a permit come through for a vampire whore house out their way?”
Raylan winced. They’d acted offended by his suggestion but that hadn’t stopped them from taking him up on the idea. “Thought better of it, actually,” he said. “We’re just hoping to ID the vampire in the snuff vid to finally nail down a warrant, and they can be a little… um… touchy.”
Art frowned. “When are you heading out?”
“In about an hour,” Tim said. “Raylan’s got to meet some professor at a graveyard.”
“You’re animating tonight ? While you’re on marshal business?” Art asked.
Tim snorted. “More like geiger-counterin’ for the dead.”
Art looked confused.
Raylan let his head fall back. “I’m just walking the cemetery for her. Since last year, the Anthropology Department agreed to let me walk the grounds before they dig. I can tell them if there’s someone buried where they want to excavate.”
“Uh-huh,” Art said skeptically.
“It’s more of a favor than a job,” Raylan explained.
Tim shook his head at Art. “He’s still getting paid for it.”
“What are you complaining about? It’s not much, and it keeps the zombie raccoons away.”
Tim shrugged.
“How much is ‘not much’?” Art asked.
Raylan shifted in his seat uncomfortably. “This is more community service than about the fee,” he said.
“Five grand,” Tim said.
“Huh,” Art said. “Buy a lot of diapers with five grand.”
Raylan rolled his eyes and swiveled his head to stare at Tim who gave him a “what’d I do?” look. Raylan sighed and answered Art’s question. “Compared to the usual fee—this is community service.”
Art squinted, his nose crinkling up. “Never did ask… what is the going rate for animating the dead?”
Raylan didn’t answer. Art shifted his eyes over to Tim whose eyes slid over to Raylan, then he held his hands up and tipped his head toward Raylan.
“Raylan? You can either tell me or I’ll call Vasquez and get him to tell me what your agent charges the court system every time you raise a witness or the subject of a will dispute.”
He pursed his lips together. “About twenty grand per animation. More or less depending on how long the deceased has been gone.”
Art studied Raylan for a long moment—longer than Raylan was comfortable with. “Why are you still with the Marshal’s Service? If you’re pulling down that kind of money as a sideline, why bother with this?” Art waved his hand around.
Raylan pulled himself up straight in his chair, a little angry with the question. “What kind of question is that, Art? You think I’m in this for the money? Are you in it for the pay? Don’t see you askin’ Tim why he’s in the Marshals Service when he’s got a helluva lot more money than I do.”
Art shot Tim a surprised look. “Fair enough. You’re right. Leslie’s clamoring for me to retire.”
Raylan narrowed his eyes at Art. He wasn’t as much irritated by Art asking him the question as he was that he didn’t really know why himself.
Now that he thought about it, the job just seemed to fit into his life. He’d have been satisfied enough hunting vampires but by the time he came of age, US vampire and bounty hunters had been grandfathered into the Marshals Service’s Preternatural Division. The “monster squad” as folks still called it was just lawless enough to suit him, and most days made him feel like a marshal of the old West. If he had to do Rachel’s job, he would retire to raising the dead to get by. With the way he was drawn to the dead and how attractive his power was to vampires, he’d have been going after the lawless undead with little to no regard to his official job title: animator, necromancer, vampire hunter, or US Marshal. They’d have eventually come after him anyway. Having a badge just made hanging onto his human side, his moral center, a whole lot easier.
“I’m exactly who I want to be.”
Art looked at him evenly. “Boyd Crowder’s human servant?”
Raylan tried to set his jaw to keep it from jutting forward. “Maybe not that part.”
“Huh.” Art huffed a sour laugh and the room grew quiet.
Tim sat stock still but his eyes moved between Art and Raylan. “So, we clear to head to Louisville, then?” Tim asked.
“Sure. Go shake some trees in the Detroit camp and see if any names fall out.”
If only getting out the door had turned out as easily said as done.
Raylan shut his computer down, and Tim got Sheeba together to leave when Rachel stalked in through the office doors.
“Where are you two off to this evening?” she asked Raylan. “Nelson could use one of you as backup on a prisoner transport. Human, but we need the coverage.”
He ran his tongue along the back of his bottom teeth gauging how he should answer her. About that time, Art strolled through the office heading toward the break room.
“They can’t. Going to Louisville to see if they can pin down a name to put on that warrant for Delroy Baker’s accomplice,” Art said. “Call in someone from the Frankfort office or offer OT to one of our guys.”
Raylan winced at the way Rachel’s face tightened up. “All right,” she said, following Art’s orders and going to her desk to begin pulling folders but clearly chafing under them.
“Y’all were going to just leave me here?” She looked at Raylan and then Tim. Finally, she turned to Art and raised her eyebrows, stopping to let her hands fall in front of her and her fingers fold together. She rolled her thumbs around each other and Raylan knew it was one of her tells for how much she was reigning in her frustration.
Art must have seen it too. Raylan could have sworn he actually stumbled before he stopped and turned to Raylan.
“Yeah, Raylan, you were just going to leave Rachel here?” He had the stones to stare straight-faced at him. He wondered what Rachel was picking up off Art because Raylan couldn’t get a scent of anything but Rachel’s ire.
“After all, I put in a lot of work into this case?” Rachel added, her voice taut. His eyes fell down to her thumbs; they were still circling.
“Yeah Raylan, why not? You’re just gonna leave her behind?” Art repeated.
Raylan heard Tim snort and risked sliding his eyes in his partner’s direction to see him working his mouth to hide a smile.
Raylan shrugged. With everything going on at home with Winona and Willa, he’d closed ranks around Tim and himself. He’d been a marshal coming on twenty years. He wouldn’t have even included Tim before—he’d have just gone off to hunt down this Nikki and her masters on his own. But now his natural inclination was to take Tim wherever he went.
“Rachel, you want in? Tim and I are gonna go and interview the Louisville city masters. Show them the stills from the video and see if we can get a line on the vampire who blew off the parley. Name was Quarles, right?” Raylan asked Art who nodded in agreement.
Rachel should be able to feel that Raylan and Tim hadn’t meant to exclude her intentionally. But he didn’t exactly want her plumbing the depths of their emotional wells either. Not that he really thought she’d invade either his or Tim’s privacy like that, but they’d been playing Winona’s status close to the vest for a while, and apparently Tim hadn’t anticipated Art vetoing his idea to bring in Bernardo. They’d had a new set of secrets of late, and he wondered if she’d pick up on that.
Rachel tapped her foot. “They didn’t know anything about Quarles when we asked this spring.”
Raylan sighed. He remembered. When Tim’s contact and Chris had traced the hit on Raylan and Boyd back to one of the masters in the Detroit organization, they’d questioned Tarron and Sabine in Louisville and he and Rachel had flown up to Detroit to question Theo Tonin. According to the master of Detroit and corroborated by vampires in his outlying territories, he’d cut all ties with Quarles.
“Well, are you coming or not?” Raylan said.
Rachel folded her arms across her chest. “Sure, since you asked so politely.”
Tim drove and Raylan rode in the back with Sheeba because Rachel gave him the hairy eyeball when they walked out to Tim’s truck. “I am not riding in the back with that dog,” she said.
Tim huffed at that. “That dog’s a Deputy US Marshal, thank you.
Rachel had just climbed into the front seat. “So what are you two hiding from Art?”
Tim turned and stared at her with a dumbfounded look on his face and Raylan just rubbed his forehead before pushing his hat back a bit.
“Why do you ask that?” Raylan said.
Rachel turned in her seat and looked at him with narrowed eyes and disbelief. “Are you gonna make me say it?”
Raylan tipped his head to the side and pressed his lips into a frown.
“Dammit. You two even feel sneaky.”
Tim looked back at Raylan and shrugged. “She’s your wife.”
“Ex-wife,” he muttered.
“What’s wrong with Winona?” Rachel asked, concerned.
“Nothing. She’s just having some problems with the part of adjusting to being a werewolf that means she can’t be with Willa,” Raylan admitted.
“That seems logical,” Rachel said. “What’s the problem? Why do you two feel all cloak and dagger?”
“We’re concerned if word got around the courthouse she’d lose her job. Being out on maternity leave is a lot more acceptable than being off work while she adjusts to lycanthropy.”
“You really think Art would do something to betray that?” Rachel asked, sounding disappointed.
Raylan met Tim’s eyes in the rearview mirror and watched them crinkle just a bit and Raylan read that as maybe Tim didn’t want him to bring up his failed attempt to bring Bernardo into the office for a spell. “No, we’re just bein’ overly cautious,” Raylan said, trying to emit as much earnestness as he could. He knew Tim could hide his emotions from Rachel when he wanted to, so Raylan concentrated on his worry for Winona’s future. “We met with a lawyer. Told us to volunteer as little as possible.” That was true.
Rachel frowned and turned back to face the road ahead.
Tim turned into the darkening cemetery to meet Dr. Dallas. Once night fell, Raylan could feel the dead more acutely. This pit stop would give Tarron and Sabine the chance to get up and around for the night as well. They figured the city masters would be more cooperative if they’d had a chance to eat and settle in for the night.
“You can drop me off at the cemetery if you want, then you and Rachel can go get a bite to eat,” Raylan said.
“We can wait,” Tim said.
“Hey, I’ll even keep Sheeba with me,” Raylan offered.
“Actually, I didn’t have a chance to grab lunch—” Rachel started.
“Nope. Last time I let Raylan and Sheeba loose in a cemetery together, Sheeba ended up in surgery,” Tim said. He parked behind Dallas’s car and opened the center console. He pulled out a protein bar and tossed it to Rachel.
“So you two are just going to sit here?” Raylan asked.
“No, we’re gonna hang around and Sheeba is gonna run a perimeter,” Tim said.
“That’s how she got shot last time,” Raylan said.
“And saved your sorry ass,” Tim muttered.
Tim was right. “All right then. We’re just walking the stones. Gonna suggest where to dig and where not to.”
Dr. Dallas hadn’t changed much since he’d met her the first night when she’d brought a cow to sacrifice. She said that her dean wouldn’t approve raising any more zombies for a while, but they did like the idea of Raylan walking the sites before they started a dig. He could feel if there was more than one body in a single grave—many of the graveyards more than a century old ended up with multiple bodies in most of their designated plots or between them. The dead in this graveyard tasted at least that old if not older. Dr. Dallas told him they city planned to build some kind of shopping mall on the land and had given her department an impossibly short turnaround time to clear the land. Making the impossible deadline was where he came in.
Raylan walked the graves while Tim and Rachel floated in his proximity. They didn’t come close enough to interfere, but they also never strayed too far either. Periodically, Sheeba would appear beside him before taking off again when Tim whistled.
“Your marshal’s much more protective of you than he was when we first met,” Dallas said.
“You think?” Raylan asked.
“If you were a woman, I might be concerned he was overbearing,” she countered. “Maybe wonder if that ran as far as being abusive?”
Raylan chuckled wryly. “Kind of a double-standard there, don’t you think? You think just because I’ve got a penis he can’t what? Hit me?” Raylan adduced, then tried to throw her a red herring. “Do I seem like I’ve been abused?”
Recently, anyway, he acknowledged to himself but not to her, never to the likes of someone nosy like her . The suggestion that Tim was anything like Arlo was sickening. Arlo never sought to protect Raylan from anything—hell, it hadn’t even been a year since his father traded him to Bo Crowder to pay off his debts to the vampire.
She looked at him evenly. “I meant no offense. You don’t seem like the kind of man who’d allow his spouse to abuse him.”
“He’s not my spouse.”
“Your partner, then, your significant other?”
“Yeah. I got yer meaning,” Raylan said. “I think the word you’re looking for here is ‘mate’.”
“He’s…?” she trailed off.
“Lycanthrope, yeah.” Raylan laid a hand on a headstone that was a hundred years old if it was a day. “You got three dead here.” He pointed down in a general circle at their feet. “And there’s another over there between this grave and the next.”
She made a notation. “Fascinating,” she murmured.
“The dead?” Raylan asked.
“No, your mate. As a wolf, does he—”
Raylan could smell her curiosity. “Dr. Dallas, Deputy Gutterson isn’t up for discussion.”
She nodded at him once and moved ahead to the next headstone.
When Raylan finished the cemetery survey sooner than he expected, they had some time to kill before he and Tim thought that Louisville’s vampires would be ready to receive them. Tim decided they should just take the time and get something to eat.
Raylan was fine with a drive-thru burger. Rachel drew the line at attempting to eat a fast-food salad in Tim’s truck, and Tim won the argument from the driver’s seat. “You need the protein after expending all that energy,” Tim said, his eyes on Raylan in the rearview mirror.
“I didn’t raise the dead, just poked at them a little. And ain’t the whole point to burn off power?”
They ended up in the worst fast-food establishment out there in Raylan’s opinion: Subway with no vanilla soft serve machine in sight and a pimply kid behind the counter scowling at Sheeba while they ate and she drank water from an empty salad container he’d made them pay a whole dollar for.
“So, we’re not inspecting their new vampire establishment at all?” Rachel asked between bites of her salad.
Tim shook his head, his mouth full.
“Figured that we’d keep it nice and friendly since we’re showin’ up hat in hand, so to speak,” Raylan said.
Rachel tipped her head in agreement and stabbed at cucumber slice with her plastic fork.
Tim pulled into the parking lot next to Lugosi’s, the club where Nikki had told Tim that Tarron and Sabine would meet them.
“Run this down for me again,” Rachel asked. “Tarron is the Louisville city master and he has a vampire mate, Sabine, who was or still is the Lexington city master?”
“Both of ’em are blood-oathed to the Detroit city master Tonin,” Raylan said. “It’s a downright unnatural arrangement for vampires.”
Rachel turned from Raylan to Tim. “You agree with Raylan?”
Tim nodded. “Pretty much. I haven’t heard anything about what the Indianapolis’ city master thinks of the situation, but Auggie in Chicago is pretty vocal about it. He didn’t approve of Boyd’s spread of power and I don’t think he’s a real big fan of this setup at all.”
“Detroit seems to be moving south,” Rachel said. Raylan thought she was musing over the thought.
“Honestly, I’m surprised someone hasn’t forced their way into Louisville and Lexington by now,” Tim said. “Tonin must have put up a show of power that we’re just not seeing to keep the ambitious masters at bay.”
Lugosi’s, like much of the red-light district in Louisville, was vampire themed. The lycanthropes were lagging behind because the vampires were already so well established. The new laws allowed the Metro Council to draw the district lines around Tarron and Sabine’s existing vampire tourist restaurants and clubs. They’d had to put age limits on their restaurants and clubs and moved one year-round “Spook House” that catered to teenagers out of the district altogether.
Lugosi’s was supposedly Tarron’s first restaurant, and Raylan thought of it as dinner theatre. Dinner, drinks, and a show. He knew that this was where the city master’s central office was located since Tarron played host, wandering through the crowd dressed up as Bela Lugosi’s Dracula with his dark blond hair slicked back while wearing the prerequisite flowing black cape. The rest of his getup was a helluva lot tighter and more revealing than the real Lugosi would have ever attempted. Raylan had intentionally not taken notice of the vampire’s pale collarbones in the open-necked white shirt he wore at the club or how round his ass looked in his pants whenever that cloak flipped around his hips. He’d been glad that Tim hadn’t been around the night he and Rachel first inspected the district in the spring. Raylan wasn’t looking forward to interviewing the vampire with his partner present.
In the entryway of the club, a young woman—Raylan sniffed the air and picked up a hint of leopard—stopped them.
“You can’t bring a dog in here,” she said, pointing to Sheeba.
Tim flipped open his wallet and handed her a card with Sheeba’s credentials on it, then flipped his badge over for her. “She’s with us. K-9. We have an appointment with Nikki.”
The woman seemed a bit perturbed but reached for the phone and made a call. When she hung up, she pointed to the sign on the wall that declared the club rules: “All Holy Items Must Be Checked at the Door.”
“Uh-huh,” Rachel said, flipping out her own badge. “See this badge here? This is my exception to that rule.”
“Lady, I can’t let anyone into this establishment if you’re wearing… what is that?” The woman reached out to pull Rachel’s shirt aside to display her cross. Raylan didn’t even see Tim’s hand move. The next thing he knew the leopard’s wrist was tight in Tim’s grip and Sheeba was growling.
Rachel met Raylan’s look and he could tell she was trying not to laugh. He was relieved at that—he’d been afraid that she would react badly to Tim stepping in for her.
“Hey there Ana,” Nikki said, slipping into the foyer taking in Sheeba’s stance and Tim’s grip on her hostess’ arm. “What’s going on?”
Ana had been trying to twist her wrist away from Tim, but he evidently was much stronger than she—even lycan to lycan. “They don’t want to check their holy items,” she said. Tim released her wrist abruptly and she ended up nearly punching herself in the face when the force she’d been working against to free herself was suddenly absent.
Rachel raised her eyebrow at Nikki who just shrugged.
“Ana, I think we can make an exception just this once—assuming they promise to behave themselves. These are Deputy US Marshals from Lexington—Deputies Brooks, Givens and Gutterson.”
“Death?” Ana whispered, staring horrified at Tim and rubbing her wrist. She backed away from them.
“And the Executioner,” Nikki said, tipping her head to Raylan.
“Tarron is expecting you but Sabine is running late. If you could follow me?” Nikki turned on her heel and led them into the club.
Rachel shook her head at Raylan. “I feel like not having a terrifying nickname should give me an inferiority complex,” she said.
Raylan dropped a hand on her shoulder. “Trust me Rach, if the monsters knew any better, they’d realize you’re just as terrifying.” When she looked up at him over her shoulder, he squeezed her tense muscle softly before letting his hand fall away. “Maybe more,” he added under his breath.
Rachel smiled.
Nikki led them back to Tarron’s office to leave them with the city master who was sitting behind a boat of a desk.
He waved them into chairs and eyed Sheeba suspiciously. “Who do we have here, Nikki?”
“You’ll remember Deputies Givens and Brooks from this spring. I think the Executioner was the one who gave Sabine the idea to open the new club.”
“Ah, yes,” Tarron narrowed his pretty blue eyes at Raylan. He still wore his hair slicked back like Bela Lugosi making it look darker than his blond eyebrows. Tarron still wasn’t buttoned up to the neck like the famous Hollywood vampire. His white shirt hung open half way down his chest. As he swiveled to and fro in his executive chair, Raylan was half-sure he caught a glimpse of a dusky-pink nipple. Tarron’d eaten well that night; giving him and his mate time for dinner before they arrived had been a good plan.
“An inspired idea you had Marshal,” he said, his eyes lingering on Raylan too long, making him want to guard his reaction. Soon enough though, Tarron turned his eyes to Sheeba and sniffed, as if the Trollhound smelled bad. Raylan knew she didn’t. There was no way Tim would tolerate that—even before he’d turned. Tarron then moved on to Tim and his face cleared. “But this is a face I don’t know, do I?” He turned to Nikki with the question in his eyes.
“Perhaps not. This is Deputy Tim Gutterson,” she explained.
Tarron ran his forefinger across his lower lip. “Gutterson. Gutterson. Now, why is that familiar, Nikki?”
“Some prefer to call him Death.”
Tarron’s face lit up. “Oh yes! Wait. Both of you are in Kentucky?” His eyes tracked between Tim and Raylan.
“We are,” Tim confirmed.
Tarron’s expression became more perplexed as he focused more closely on Tim, but he didn’t ask. “Sabine is finishing up some details over at Cabaret, then we can head over to begin the inspection.”
“Actually, we’re not here to inspect your club,” Rachel said.
Tarron spread his hands wide. “But I don’t understand…” His fingers weren’t as delectable as Tim’s but they’d long reminded Raylan of his partner’s. The vampire wielded them in the same way. Raylan shifted in his seat and crossed his leg, propping his boot on his knee. He could see where his partner had scribbled his name across the sole in Sharpie. Tim’s eyes slid over to meet his and Raylan felt something settle in him that if he had to name, he’d call relief. It bothered him to find himself loving Tim and then still finding other men and women attractive—especially men like Tarron who he shouldn’t want at all. But one look from Tim put that attraction into its place—inconsequential.
“We’re here about another matter,” Rachel said.
“But—”
The door swung open and Sabine swished into the room cutting Tarron off.
Raylan had no idea what the hell kind of getup the vampire was wearing but it looked complicated and maybe a little bit lethal. He thought parts of it on their own were supposed to be sexy. He recognized something that might be considered lingerie here and there, with a girly silky skirt in black and red open in the front to show off stockings and thigh-high boots. Her breasts looked like they were pushed up into her neck. He’d always thought she’d been too scrawny to have that kind of rack. But the whole thing was tied together with lace so stiff he was sure that if he touched it, he’d get a hand caught—or cut. And was that a bullwhip at her waist? What did a vampire possibly need with a whip?
Sabine propped her hip on Tarron’s desk. “We’re ready for inspection. Did you show them the paperwork for Cabaret, love?”
“What’s Cabaret?” Raylan asked.
Sabine smiled at him, flashing her fangs.
“A vampire burlesque revue, with a little twist of BDSM,” she said. Her voice sounded melodic and Raylan felt his necromancy rise and tingle at the hint of vampire power she was pushing. Sexual flavor, maybe. Her power had no effect on him, but still, the taste of it turned his stomach a little.
Her eyes lit on Tim, then Raylan, and then she winked over at Rachel, grinning and showing her fangs again.
“Sabine. If you’re using vampire powers…” Raylan warned.
Tarron interrupted, his voice breaking through with his tone serious. “There won’t be an inspection.”
“Oh poo.”
Poo? Tim’s eyes found Raylan’s again and Raylan refrained from rolling his eyes back at him.
She pushed herself off the desk and walked a circle around Tim’s chair, stopping at Sheeba and backing away and circling back around him the other way. “Why, you’re new.” She flirted with Tim.
“I’m not new.”
She leaned close to breathe him in. Raylan thought she was going to lose her breasts out the top of the black contraption she had on. “And a wolf!”
Sheeba growled and Tim reached down and dug his fingers into her scruff. “Down, Sheeba.”
Sabine returned to the desk to lean against it and turned to Raylan, then Rachel. “Well now, hasn’t the Marshals Service gotten even more forward-thinking on us?”
“Even more?” Rachel asked.
“Well, Deputy Givens has always been a little bit bent for my Tarron here, hasn’t he?” she said, winking at Raylan. “First y’all support gays, now lycanthropes. Who’s next?”
Raylan drew in a long breath.
“Ohhh, that makes you mad.”
“Sabine—” Raylan started.
“No, not you, dear,” she said, dismissing him. “Him.” She pointed a shiny lacquered nail in Tim’s direction. “Interesting.” She looked at Tim, then Raylan. “He’s jealous.” She tsked. “’Fraid you've got some ’splainin’ to do later Marshal Givens,” Sabine said to Raylan. “So sorry.”
Raylan didn’t think she looked a bit sorry.
“This is Deputy Tim Gutterson, my dear,” Tarron said, unamused.
“Gutterson…” She tapped that same long black fingernail against the cherry wood of Tarron’s desk. “Why do I know that name?”
“Well, you remember Deputy Givens, don’t you?”
“Oh yes, she purred. The Exxxecutioner…” She drew out the x in a long insouciant hiss. “I remember you, my dear, you who just zinged with the power of death.”
“Well, his partner here goes by a similar name.”
She snapped her fingers. “Oh, Death! My, my, my. Aren’t you two just the scariest.” She said it like they really, really weren’t. “And you boys are working out of my territory, now, aren’t you?”
“You still hold that territory then?” Tim asked.
Her brow furrowed, her tone serious. “What kind of question is that? Of course, I do.”
Tim shrugged. “It’s not the usual arrangement for a city master. To hold a territory and not live there.”
She crossed her booted heels in front of her and leaned her weight back on the desk, her hands grasping the edge. The effect made her chest seem even more pronounced, which amused Raylan. He knew that would have little effect on his partner. “Doesn’t seem like a whole lot in Kentucky is all that usual these days, does it?”
“You and Tarron are blood-oathed to Theo Tonin out of Detroit?” Tim asked.
Sabine stood up and crossed her arms. “We are.”
“Well, that’s actually something we came to speak to you about,” Rachel said. “We are looking for a vampire who was representing Tonin earlier this year, Quarles. He was supposed to show up at a parley down in Harlan and never did.”
Sabine cocked her head and turned, propping a hip on the desk. She looked back to Tarron and then to Rachel again. “We spoke with you about that this spring and nothing’s changed. The last we heard, he was working in and around Kentucky. Sometime last year. Since then, I hear he and Theo have parted ways.”
Rachel’s eyes narrowed. “You sure about that?”
Raylan was surprised to hear Rachel tip her hand that openly.
Sabine raised her eyebrows. “Are you callin’ me a liar, Deputy Brooks?”
“Now Sabine, no one’s saying that,” Raylan interjected. His impression was that since she seemed to think she could read his libido, she thought he was harmless. “The thing is… you and Tarron work for Tonin. This Quarles works for him too. Or did, as you say. They parted ways, right?” Raylan spread his hands and shrugged, sending her a conciliatory smile.
She narrowed her eyes at him in reply.
“Now let’s say Theo’s more forgiving than most city masters. Seems like you might hear where he’s been working lately if anything’s changed.”
“Nothing has,” Sabine insisted. “And we haven’t.”
“All right. All right,” Raylan said, holding up his hands. “Well, we’re pursuing another matter. Got a few deaths—lycanthropes and humans—and we’re looking for a vampire. Word on the street is that this vampire has connections with Tonin’s house, too.”
Sabine didn’t say anything, but Raylan watched her practiced inhale and exhale. She was good; vampires didn’t need to breathe. They just tended to in order to fit in. The younger dead did it from a lifetime of habit and the older dead like Sabine from decades of passing for human before the preternatural community went public. She and Tarron both felt to Raylan like they were a good hundred and fifty years dead. If he had to put money on it, Raylan’d say Sabine was about twenty years older than Tarron.
And yet when the younger vampire joined her in front of the desk, she deferred to him.
“Ask your question,” Tarron said, nodding to her. She dipped her head to him in acquiescence.
Rachel pulled out her tablet and handed it over with the photos displayed. “We discovered snuff videos with this vampire in them. We believe he is killing primarily male lycanthropes, but we have one recorded human death.”
Sabine swiped through the still images and blanched. Raylan thought she lost her rosy pallor from her evening meal.
“We have a witness who believes that this vampire works for Tonin,” Raylan said. “Do you know him?”
Sabine laughed bitterly. “Oh yes.”
Raylan looked over at Tim, then Rachel. “Well, who is he?”
“You really don’t know?” She was incredulous. Tarron’s demeanor had grown into a stony shadow of his mate.
Tim sighed. “Sabine? The name. You don’t know me. So, you don’t know how serious I am when I spell out for you that we didn’t drag our asses all the way over here to look at your tits—” then Tim pointed to Tarron. “Or his ass. We came for a name. If you don’t know it or won’t tell us, someone in your organization does know and will tell. We can go on out there into the district and hang out every night with our gory pictures asking every John, Jane, and Joe, every working stiff and every lycan in this here Stew who this vamp is until someone coughs up a name.”
She choked on the word “but” trying to interrupt him.
“In…” he said over her words repeating himself to shut her down. “In the meantime, how many customers are going to decide that maybe they don’t think a little bump and grind is worth being questioned every night by a deputy US Marshal? Raylan, take a bet we can clear this district in a night,” Tim said.
Raylan squinted out of one eye as if seriously considering it, then winced. “Dunno Tim. I think if we gave it a full week we could shut the district down for good.”
Sabine sighed.
“I—” Tim started.
“Wait,” Rachel said.
“What?”
“Let her talk,” Rachel added.
“You’ve not been to our new club. The Cabaret.”
Raylan shook his head.
“ You’d like it,” Sabine said, and nodded at Tim.
“Me? Why?”
She smiled at him and shrugged. “Come on then. I’ve got someone you need to meet. Get your inspection forms… Tarron, pull the permits. We’re not doing this again. And if Tonin asks why you were here, y’all inspecting us gives me an out.” She sighed and ran her eyes over them. “I’m going to need it.”
They ran through the paperwork in the office of Cabaret. They’d traipsed through the club that Raylan thought matched Sabine’s outfit.
The main part of the club was dark and throbbed with sound and energy, glowing green with fluorescent lights in some areas and red in others. Vampires danced on a stage and in cages. There was an elaborate sex scene playing out on a second stage with a naked vampire restrained face-down across the top of a coffin while another had her way with a crop and his backside.
“What is hell is this place?” Raylan had asked.
“It’s a Goth Burlesque BDSM club.”
“I said ‘open a bawdy house’ and you got this from that ?” Raylan looked around.
“We’ve got private rooms upstairs and a huge web presence. That’s an entire second stream of revenue,” she said.
Raylan was appalled. “What makes her think you’d like this ?” He said to Tim, bending his head down to speak quietly in his ear. He knew Sabine could probably still hear him but with the ambient noise, he hoped against it.
Tim turned his head toward Raylan while he was still bent close enough to hear Tim’s reply. “What? You think I don’t have layers?” He said, smirking. “Just because you’re a vanilla ice cream kind of guy…”
Sabine smiled back at them and eyed Tim, then Raylan watched her hand land on the whip clipped to her waist. “I bet Marshal Gutterson knew exactly what I meant.”
“I did actually,” Tim whispered to Raylan and he stopped in his tracks letting Tim stride ahead of him.
“The day you bring a bullwhip home for sex is the day you call someplace else home,” Raylan said more loudly.
Tim stopped and twisted his head around to look at him. “It’s not about the whip.”
“Pretty much my point there,” Raylan said.
Tim narrowed his eyes at him. “She’s just talking about dominance. Not the…” he waved his hand around at the entire club… “toys.”
“Toys?” Raylan looked around and didn’t see anything that qualified as a game to him.
Rachel put a hand on Raylan’s shoulder. “Guys, is this the place for this?”
Tim just lifted one shoulder in a shrug.
“She’s not wrong,” Rachel said, lifting her eyebrows at Tim pointedly, then turning to Raylan. “I think becoming wolf has made Tim even bossier. But maybe this isn’t the place to hash that out?”
Rachel was right. About Sabine and Tim. He was bossy. Raylan had begun to notice that since he’d become a werewolf and they’d resumed their sex life. Tim sure liked to top lately...
“Sabine,” Rachel said, cutting off Raylan’s train of thought. “We’ve done your inspection. Now we need to know the name of the vampire.”
She sighed. “All right. I think he should be finished with his aftercare now.” She left the room.
“His what?” Raylan asked.
Rachel shrugged.
Tim waved his hand. “After… when they do scenes, it’s the part where the submissive comes down from… like a high. The dominant takes care of them. Applies lotion, ice, whatever.”
Raylan narrowed his eyes at Tim. “How do you know this?”
Tim rolled his eyes. “I know how to google, Raylan.”
“I do too,” Raylan mumbled.
“Barely,” Tim interrupted.
“But I never had call to google that.”
Tim just stared at him blankly raising Raylan’s ire.
“Are you into this?” Raylan hissed, his eyes circling around the bare walls of Sabine’s office.
Tim grinned flashing his crooked front tooth at Raylan, like it was a fang.
“Hush, you two,” Rachel said just as the door opened.
Sabine came in with the vampire Raylan had seen on stage earlier, tied to a coffin. He was dressed now and clearly freshly fed from the pink tone of his skin. He had on a loose silky black shirt and ridiculously tight pants.
“This is Phillip,” Sabine introduced him. “Phillip, these are deputy US marshals from Lexington. Deputy Brooks, Gutterson, and Givens.” She waved at each of them.
Phillip took a seat. His eyes landed on Sheeba sitting next to Tim and widened. “What is that?”
“K-9,” Tim said.
“Yeah but…” Phillip countered.
“Trollhound,” Tim explained. “She’s harmless as long as you are.”
Phillip nodded like that made sense to him.
“Deputy Brooks has some questions,” Sabine said.
Rachel pulled out her tablet and handed it over to Phillip.
He took the device and began swiping through the images.
“We’re looking for a vampire who we believe killed a couple young men,” Rachel said. “We believe he had sex with them either for pay or for some other reason… filming it with or without their knowledge and then killing them.”
Phillip gasped. “Sabine?” The word caught in his throat and Raylan thought he sounded wounded.
Sabine took the computer away from him.
“It’s him. The one who took me.” Phillip’s eyes swam with red tears—the blood from whomever he drank after his scene spilled over and down his cheeks.
“Who?” Raylan asked, incredulous.
Phillip turned to him, confused. “Quarles.”
Phillip told them about the night Quarles had talked him into leaving the Louisville district with him. Rachel took notes. At the end of their conversation, Sabine pulled Phillip aside and sent him out of the room. “Go to your room and pack a bag.”
“You’re sending me away?”
Raylan thought he sounded heartbroken.
“Not for forever,” Sabine replied. The words tasted true enough to Raylan but something in the way his neck itched told him they weren’t. Raylan thought to he’d try to remember to ask Rachel later if Sabine was lying.
“But you are.” Phillip was apparently no fool, either.
“You need to go with the marshals tonight. Do what they say. You’ll be back to me soon enough.”
“Yes, Mistress.”
When Phillip had left the room and a moment had passed, Sabine spoke. “You’ll find him somewhere safe. Isn’t that what you do?”
“WITSEC?” Tim asked, his tone incredulous.
“You’re after an execution order on Quarles, aren’t you?” Sabine asked.
“Yes,” Raylan said. “How did you know?”
She waved at the tablet by Rachel as if that was self-evident. “Tonin is not going to be happy if you execute his man. It’s not just Quarles you’ll need to shelter Phillip from if he testifies for you to get your kill slip.”
“Quarles is still Tonin’s man, then,” Tim concluded.
Sabine licked her lips and paced the office in her tall boots, seeming to choose her words carefully. “He was. He could be. Theo won’t be happy,” Sabine said, “Either way—Quarles is, or was, Tonin’s. An execution for something this heinous will stain him, too.”
“Aside from these snuff vids, Quarles took a hit out on Raylan,” Tim said. “He took a hit out on Boyd Crowder, too. We find out either hit was on Tonin’s order, we can put Tonin down too.”
She paused, as if shocked, then laughed. “Boyd Crowder, that infant. What a shit show, that one. A vampire saving souls.” She rolled her eyes.
Rachel raised her eyebrows. “How so?”
“Well, you know word out is he betrayed Tonin the moment he got turned. Quarles was supposed to put that whole”—she waved her hand again—“Crowder house in order. In vampire terms, he’s just a baby. So young to have so much power. It was just a matter of time before some Big and Bad came and took it from him.”
“Sabine, are you telling us Quarles is down in Harlan?” Raylan asked.
“I thought you didn’t know where he was,” Tim said.
“I don’t,” she said. “Just rumors.” She rubbed the pad of her forefinger and thumb together. “Ain’t there just a tiny kernel of truth in most rumors though? Besides blood and power, there’s little else vampires love more than a good dose of gossip with a side of rumor. Probably more than old church ladies.” She tilted her head to the side for a moment. “Huh. Maybe that makes Crowder less of a shit show than I thought.”