“Going to hell?”
She glared at me. “Neither one of us believes in hell and you know it, but you definitely deserve it. How on earth can you go around slicing and dicing the undead and yet be completely incapable of dealing with ordinary mortals?”
She had a point. Except that it wasn’t all mortals. It was just mortals of the male variety. I simply had no idea what to do with the male of the species. They … befuddled me. If they were undead, I could kill them. That was easy. If they were related or friends or clients, I could handle that. When it came to actually dating them, I was completely useless.
My face heated. Maybe I could pretend it was the curry. I hated blushing. Badass vampire hunters did not blush. It was so completely embarrassing. The absolute curse of the fair skinned. Kabita took pity on me. “Honestly, Morgan,” she said as she stabbed at an onion bhaji with her fork, “we need to sign you up for lessons or something.”
“Why? We both know I’d just embarrass myself.”
Kabita smirked. “That’s very true.”
I glared at her. “Gee, thanks a lot.”
“Eat your curry and I’ll buy you an ice cream.”
“Oh, goodie! Thanks, Mom!” Sarcasm, thy name is Morgan Bailey. Kabita just gave me The Look.
“By the way, I should probably mention that as we were coming out of the restaurant last night, this random vampire attacked me. Out of nowhere.”
Kabita shrugged. “Yeah. You’re a Hunter. Vampires tend to do that.”
I shook my head. “This one was different. He had red eyes. That’s a little weird, right?”
“You’re right. That is weird.” She sat lost in thought for a moment. “I’ll have to go through the files and check, but I don’t recall coming across anything about vampires with red eyes before.”
“It’s got to mean something.”
“Something besides the usual strange that is your life? Probably. I’ll let you know if I find anything. Anyway,” Kabita said in a rapid subject change, “I need your help tonight.”
Now it was my turn to raise an eyebrow. Kabita prided herself on solo hunts. “My help? With demon spawn? You’re kidding, right?”
Kabita sighed and dug around in her curry, mixing it with the pilau rice before taking another bite. She chewed a bit, shrugged then said, “Yeah. This one’s a bitch.”
I blinked. Kabita using a swear word, well, it was rather like hearing the Pope advocating pole dancing. It just didn’t happen.
“Right. OK. What are you not telling me, Kabita?”
She didn’t even have the grace to look shame faced. “They’re nesting. And they’re Zagan demons.”
“Well, shit.” I hated Zagan demons. They spat slime. It was totally disgusting, not to mention lethal. The adults were nearly impossible to kill.
She nodded. “Yeah, tell me about it.”
How Kabita could kill those things without blinking, yet go all squeamish over vampires was beyond me.
“Fine, what time?”
“Say about ten tonight, in front of the Central Library. The nest isn’t too far from there.”
“Gotcha.” I stood up, grabbed my jacket and threw a twenty on the table. “But girlfriend, you so owe me.”
Kabita glared at me over a forkful of curry. “Oh, yay. Can’t wait.”
I wasn’t entirely sure what else I should be doing to piss off the Sunwalker. I mean, Inigo seemed convinced that bandying my motives about a cemetery in the middle of the night was sufficient, but Brent Darroch was paying the firm good money to find his amulet and take out the Sunwalker permanently. It didn’t seem very professional to sit around doing nothing. Not to mention I’d never been particularly good at waiting.
I decided to take a walk in the Park Blocks to clear my head. There was something so bizarrely soothing and at the same time energetic about the Park Blocks. They were simply a narrow strip of park running through the middle of downtown Portland, filled with the usual parky sort of things: grass, footpaths, roses, really weird art, and the occasional bum sleeping on a park bench.
To walk through the Park Blocks was to step out of oneself, out of time, and travel a different path. Or at least it was that way for me. Nobody else seemed to wax particularly poetic about it.
Today the blocks were quiet. A few bees hummed busily about and sunlight warmed the roses sending heady perfume into the air. I strolled slowly, eyes half closed, reveling in the solitude.
As I walked, I shoved my hands in my pockets and felt the edge of a business card. I pulled it out. Cordelia Nightwing. Why not? What harm could it do? Not that she’d been terribly helpful the first time around, but she was nice and you didn’t often meet nice people in my line of work. Even better, according to the card, her apartment was right near the Park Blocks.