Sucker Punch (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter 27)

“Probably,” Olaf said.

“She didn’t have to say anything if he smelled them on each other’s skin,” Nicky said.

“She didn’t come here to have him smell their bodies next to each other,” I said.

“She said something to Bobby that made him freak out,” Ethan said.

“If she is as cold-blooded a schemer as this, then Ethan is right: She wouldn’t have just chanced Bobby smelling their scents on each other’s skin. She told Bobby of the affair before she left to let the deputy finish the kill,” Piere

tte said, and the men all nodded in agreement.

“Where’s Angel?” I asked.

“She’s throwing up in the weeds over there,” Nicky said.

I went over and held her hair while she finished, and then something about the smell of her being sick hit me wrong. I had time to stumble farther away from her and catch myself against a tree before I started throwing up, too. I ended up on my knees, throwing up until I was dry-heaving. Nicky held my hair and then brought me some water.

The paramedics in extra ambulances that someone had called insisted on Edward, Olaf, Angel, and me going to the hospital. Edward and I were hurt, though I didn’t need stitches and he did. Olaf was just covered in so much blood, they didn’t believe it was all someone else’s, and when he found out we were all going, he agreed to go. Angel got to go because she was faint after she finished being sick. I’d really expected better of a weretiger. They put the men in the back of one ambulance and us girls in another.

Angel started to cry on the way. “I am so sorry, Anita.”

The thick Goth eye makeup started to run down her face like black tears. She needed to switch brands. Mine didn’t run like that. Thank you, Dior. I felt nothing, watching her cry. It was like the inside of me went to that quiet white-noise place where I could pull a trigger and take a life and not feel anything. Maybe it was shock, or maybe killing Bobby had been the last piece of my soul I could lose and not lose myself.

The paramedic kept trying to take our vitals, while Angel cried like her heart would break and I just stared at her. I finally moved beside her and got the paramedic to leave us alone long enough for me to hold her and let her cry on my shoulder. Somewhere on the drive to a hospital that had facilities for dealing with supernatural wounds, I started to cry with her. We held each other and cried like a couple of girls. I could never have done it with Edward. Part of me regretted that I wasn’t with him, and part of me was ashamed of letting go like this, but a small part of me felt that every tear I shed got me a little piece of my soul back.

79

RICO DIED OF his wounds, so whatever secrets he had to tell died with him. He had a no-resurrection clause in his living will, so we couldn’t even raise him from the dead and ask. Todd Babington’s confession fell apart. Bobby Marchand was the official murderer of both Rico Vargas and Raymond Marchand. Jocelyn technically inherited two billion dollars. The lawyers in charge of the estate released a chunk of money, a small fortune, to her in anticipation of her assuming control of the estate.

Then Hazel Phillips came forward with a video that Carmichael had e-mailed to her in which he confessed not to murder, but to blackmail. He’d been blackmailing Rico and Jocelyn, because he had seen them together in a bad part of town at a motel and he used his phone to get pictures. They were included in the e-mail. He’d been blackmailing them about the affair, threatening to tell not Ray Marchand, but Bobby. Jocelyn had paid him to keep that quiet. It was only after the murder that Carmichael realized the reason: She’d been willing to pay him to keep quiet so she could set Bobby up for murder. Then Carmichael got greedy and tried to blackmail them because he saw Rico’s car near the Marchand house the night of the murder. None of it was enough to prove that Rico was a murderer or that Jocelyn helped kill her dad, but it was enough to make the lawyers begin to argue that she couldn’t profit from a crime. It would take years for the lawyers to fight it out, and Jocelyn decided to wait it out someplace tropical that didn’t have an extradition treaty with the United States.

Two months later Edward and I both received postcards from that country. His read, “My first trip outside the country in years.” It was unsigned.

Mine read,

Adler,

I went hunting and bagged my limit. I hope we can agree on a hunting trip to take together someday.

Moriarty

The headlines read, “Heiress to Marchand Fortune Vanishes!” “Model and Songwriter Angela Warren’s Daughter Missing.” “Billionaire Heiress Lost, Presumed Dead.” There were a lot of other headlines; some of them even hinted that Jocelyn was a person of interest in her father’s death. The majority of the Marchand fortune is going to various museums and charities now, though they’ll have to prove Jocelyn’s dead or wait seven years to divide up the money. They’ll be waiting, because Olaf doesn’t leave incriminating evidence behind, and that includes anything that could prove Jocelyn Marchand is dead.

I don’t feel bad that she’s dead. She deserved to die, but did she deserve to die the way that Olaf killed her? No, no one deserves that. I did my best not to think of what he might have done to her before she finally died. I’m still doing my best not to think about it.

Edward and I talked about it, but Olaf didn’t break the truce between them. He didn’t do the crime on American soil, or when we were working with him, or when he was working for any government. He took a vacation, and he indulged in his favorite hobby. Isn’t that what vacation is for?

Edward got tested for Therianthropy. We expected either a negative or an inconclusive because it can take weeks for Ailuranthropy, cat-based lycanthropy, to show up in a blood test, but he popped hot but inconclusive. The only other marshal who’s had results similar to that is me, so they’re waiting for another two weeks before they test him again. By then, exactly what strains of Therianthropy he carries should be readable. There is a remote chance that it’s a false positive from stray antibodies or something from Bobby’s body or mine, but odds are that in a month, Edward will be coming to visit us so that we can help him through his first full moon. I’d tried to keep Edward safe and instead I’d made it worse.

We’d tried so hard to save Bobby Marchand, and we’d failed. What did Jocelyn tell Bobby to enrage him to that point? Did she leave before Bobby pulled Rico through the cell bars or after? Did she leave Rico to die at Bobby’s hands? Rico hadn’t meant to die. He just got too close and underestimated Bobby’s beast like I had. I’d lived through my mistake. Rico hadn’t. Most people don’t.

Newman and I are both under review by the Marshals Service. We’re not under review because we killed Bobby; that was legal. We’re under review because we didn’t kill him soon enough, and that negligence led to the death of another officer. Newman resigned from the preternatural branch, no big surprise. He’s transferred into the regular Marshals Service currently, but there’s some talk of him joining the state cops.

I’m still waiting for the preternatural branch to figure out if Deputy Rico Vargas’s death is my fault for not executing the warrant sooner, and the fact that we think he was our original murderer might not make a difference. His guilt or innocence will never be proven in a court of law now, but Livingston did find that Jocelyn had left personal items at Rico’s house, so the affair was true. Rico had no alibi for the night of Ray Marchand’s murder, but that didn’t prove he had done it. Livingston wrote up a report that made me look good, or so I was told by people in the Marshals Service who are supposed to be the boss of me.

Even Leduc didn’t bad-mouth me as much as I thought he would. I think he believes that Rico killed Ray Marchand. That took a lot of the self-righteous wind out of his sails. I’m weirdly calm about being on suspension. I don’t know if I could be a regular marshal like Newman, but I’m not sure I can keep being a preternatural marshal either. I don’t know if I want to keep being the Executioner. For the first time, the pride I take in being War to Edward’s Death and Olaf’s Plague doesn’t offset the nightmares I’m having. I keep killing Bobby over and over in my dreams, except sometimes he’s Haven, and sometimes he’s my friend Jason, and sometimes he’s Nicky or Nathaniel or . . . You get the idea.

I got an invitation to Newman’s wedding. I may even go. Maybe I could take a few days and go camping and see what’s left of the girl I was in college—the one who wanted to get her doctorate in biology and be a field biologist specializing in the supernatural. Jean-Claude couldn’t come with me; vampires don’t travel well like that. Nathaniel could come if I insisted, but he’s a comfort-loving cat. Micah camped and hunted until the attack that changed him into a wereleopard; he’d go with me. Nicky grew up out west on a ranch, so he might be game. Who knew? Maybe some of the other people in our poly group would surprise me by being more outdoorsy than I thought. Or maybe we could go someplace more tropical, with a luxury hotel as our base camp and day trips for the more outdoorsy stuff? Yeah, that might work for the men and women in my life and me.