A/N: Well, looks like everyone gets their wish: more agents, AND more E and B action.
As always, many thanks to the lovely people who help get each chapter out of the gates: AerosolDoc, Twilightzoner, and the ever helpful members of the Coven (I promise it isn't a cult). Thanks also to you, dear reader.
Mark Britt paced up and down a long hallway on the 12th floor of the J. Edgar Hoover building, eyeing the Assistant Director's office door with trepidation. He gripped half a dozen case folders tightly in his hand, and his fingers were starting to cramp. Dropping into a chair in front of the AD's office, he flipped through the reports for the third time in the last twenty minutes.
What if he was wrong? What if he managed to sell the AD on the biggest case in the department's history and then failed to deliver? When Angela Carter had brought him the first file, he'd blown it off, fed up with "leads" that went nowhere. But he did go back to read it – there wasn't exactly anything more promising to go on – and somewhere between putting his two-year-old to bed and a round of good, albeit predictable, intercourse with his wife, it hit him. He had spent the last 18 months paying his dues in the Vampire Crimes department – up to his neck in dried up bodies and paperwork, laughing off the supposedly good-natured ribbing of his fellow agents, waiting for the Assistant Director to nod and breathe some life back into his career – but it wasn't going to work like that. He needed to pull his own ass out of the gutter. Do something unexpected, unconventional. Impress people. And if he'd gotten it right, professional redemption was the stack of cases he now held in his sweaty hands.
To be fair, his own idiocy had gotten him here in the first place. Getting busted with a DUI while he was supposed to be on surveillance had gotten him pulled off Narcotics so fast it'd given him whiplash. No matter what bullshit the PR people fed the media, everybody knew that the guys in V-Crime were far from the FBI's best and brightest, and in the eyes of his superiors, Mark Britt had become the latest fuck-up for the job. A Congressman for an uncle was the only reason he even got to keep his badge, and he knew it. McLeary, his partner, hadn't gotten so lucky. Last he'd heard, the poor bastard was a traffic cop somewhere in podunk, Maryland. But Mark Britt wasn't going to end up like that. He would earn his reputation back, one blood-sucker at a time.
He reshuffled the files in his lap and forced his foot to stop bouncing against the floor. When the door to the AD's office opened, he sprung out of his seat, barely keeping the paperwork from tumbling onto the floor.
Kristen, the director's secretary, smirked as he fought to tuck the folders back under his arm. "Special Agent Britt. The Assistant Director will see you now."
He scowled and followed her into the office suite. As she settled back at her desk, he paused in front of the AD's closed door. She smiled at him again, a friendlier smile this time, and nodded. "Go ahead. She said to send you in."
Mark replied with a curt nod and pushed the door open.
Assistant Director Price looked up from her computer as he entered. She was a tall, thin woman in her fifties who always wore dark pant suits and never drank at the holiday party. Her salt and pepper hair was cut into a straight bob that reached just past her narrow jaw and pointed chin. Removing a pair of black reading glasses, she gestured to one of the two chairs in front of her desk.
"Have a seat, Agent Britt."
Mark crossed the office with large, firm steps, and lowered himself into the offered chair.
"You have an ID on that Jane Doe yet?" the director asked.
"Yes ma'am. Elizabeth Robbins, 47 years old, from Crofton, Maryland. The husband confirmed the ID this morning."
"Any relation to either of the bodies from last week?"
"No ma'am, not that we've been able to glean."
The director pursed her lips. "Then what is it that you are here to tell me, Agent Britt?"
Licking his lips once, Mark placed the case files carefully on the director's desk. "There appears to be some vampire activity in Chicago that we weren't previously aware of," he began.
AD Price spared the case files a brief glance and looked back at him.
He cleared his throat and continued. "These are unsolved missing persons reports from around Cook County. Most victims were reported missing within twelve hours, and seem to have disappeared in the middle of the night. Four out of the seven have prior records, mostly for possession or petty theft. The other three are working professionals, upper middle class types with jobs downtown and nice houses in Evanston and Naperville. The latest victim – " he opened the top file " – was reported missing almost two weeks ago."
A chime sounded from the computer, and the assistant director glanced at the monitor. Mark waited as she typed a few words, navigated the mouse and typed some more. He was beginning to sweat.
"The thing about these cases – "
The director frowned and held up an index finger, not taking her eyes away from the screen. He bit back an objection and fell silent. As she continued to type, he forced himself to not fidget.
With a final click of the mouse, AD Price turned her attention away from the computer. "All right then, Agent Britt, you were explaining to me how a handful of missing persons cases in a city of ten million is going to lead us to our very first live vampire."
"I don't – I'm not suggesting that, ma'am. But these circumstances do seem noteworthy. People who go missing in Chicago usually turn up as kidnapping victims or dead bodies in the river with bullet holes in their heads. These – " he gestured at the files in front of him " – don't fit any of the usual patterns."
"They don't fit the usual vampire feeding patterns either, Agent Britt. As you surely know, vampire victims are usually found within a few days of the attack. These animals hide the bodies just well enough to give themselves a head start. They don't bother with a full burial. The fact that your cases have been missing for months suggests to me that we're not looking at vampire attacks at all."
"Yes, but there are some similarities. The timing and regularity of each disappearance, for one thing. They all occurred at night, and within three to five weeks of each other. And I know," he hurried to add as the AD pursed her lips in thinning patience, "I know that the typical vampire feeds every seven to ten days, but what if we're not dealing with a typical vampire here? What if, instead of killing each victim, it keeps them around for a while, tied up somewhere for a month or two so it can feed more than once without worrying about finding a new body?"
The director's eyes snapped back to him, and she frowned tightly. "Look Agent Britt, I appreciate the amount of time and energy you have obviously spent looking into this. Really, I do. But our investigative strategy was developed by people with far more experience than you. Not to mention more success in the field. It is your job to adhere to that strategy. You find bodies, you compile the forensics, and you write reports for your superiors. We have enough public pressure on this department as it is. We don't need to start any mass hysteria by attributing cases to vampire kidnappers without any proof. You find me one of these bodies, bitten and drained, and then we'll talk about your theories."
When he didn't move, still trying to compose a proper response, the AD pushed the case folders to the edge of her desk.
"You're dismissed, Agent Britt."
***
As Edward got out of his car at the curb in front of Bella's house, his steps felt light and elastic, as though the ground were made of rubber.
The front door slammed, and Bella came hurrying down the porch steps. An unbuttoned raincoat barely covered her pajamas, but its yellow hood was pulled up over her forehead, concealing her face. A blue bundle of plastic was tucked under her arm, and she pressed it stiffly to her side. She approached him with tense steps, moving quickly despite an obvious limp.
They stopped in front of each other in the middle of the yard. "What happened to your leg?" he asked.
"My foot," she replied, her voice quiet and unsteady. "I fell off the ladder."
You should have called me sooner, he opened his mouth to say, but she had already turned away. "Come on, we have to go around back," she muttered.
He moved to follow the tracks her feet made in the wet grass. They walked around the house in silence. Nervous eagerness mounted inside him with each step – nervous because, though he could swing a hammer just fine, he didn't know the first thing about carpentry. Eager because … well, he didn't know what he felt eager for, exactly.
In the back yard, a ladder lay on the ground next to a hammer and a box of nails. Bella moved to pick it up, but he stopped her. "I won't need that."
She hesitated, her expression stolid as she considered his words. Then she stepped back and jerked the blue tarp out from under her arm, offering it to him. Rain drops splattered against the plastic, running down its wrinkled surface and falling to the ground. When he reached out to take it, their hands touched, and as she let go, her wet skin slipped under his fingers. His grip tightened, crinkling the tarp. Bella drew her hand back, and their eyes met for a split second before darting apart again.
His glance landed on the tarp, and he examined it intently. "What – uh – what would you like me to do with this?" The words came tumbling out of his mouth like lumps of wet clay.
Her shoulders sagged. "Fuck, I don't even know. The one time I remember the roof leaking, it was missing shingles." She glanced up, her forehead creasing. "I figure – I dunno, if you could get up there and see anything that looks messed up, it might do some good to nail this thing over it." She gestured half-heartedly toward the tarp. "You know, cover it up or something."
He nodded and took several steps back. That sounded simple enough. Wrapping the tarp around the hammer, he eyed the edge of the roof some twenty feet above, and with a tight flick of the wrist, sent the bundle sailing over it. It landed with a soft thump and rolled a few feet down the angled surface before catching on the lone boiler pipe that protruded from the roof. Satisfied, he took the cardboard box of nails from the ground and stuffed the entire thing into the back pocket of his jeans.
Bella had watched each of his movements without comment, but now the anxious lines on her face gave way to skepticism. "I don't think that's such a good idea," she said, eyeing the arrangement doubtfully.
He pulled out a nail. "These will not hurt me," he said, pressing the pointed end into his thumb. The skin began to curve under the pressure, but did not break. He looked past the nail at Bella's incredulous expression, and jabbed his thumb a few times for effect. "See?"
Her eyes were glued to the point of contact between his skin and the sharpened metal. He handed the nail to her, not wanting to slip it back into his pocket. His skin may have been impenetrable, but the denim of his jeans was not.
"There are certain advantages to my condition," he said with a soft smile as she plucked the nail from his fingers. Bella didn't reply.
He turned to the house. A light hop onto the windowsill, a leap upward, and he was hanging by a slanted beam that lined the edge of the roof. Swinging sideways, he flung his legs in an upward arc, letting go of the beam just as his feet crested his head. The momentum of the swing propelled him through the air, and he twisted to land on top of the house in a crouch. The slope of the roof was steep, but his shoes gripped the rough, gritty shingles well enough. Straightening, he took a few small steps to retrieve the hammer and tarp, and looked down. Bella was staring up at him, mouth ajar, and he smiled again, unreasonably pleased with such a trivial display of acrobatics. But he had never had an audience before.
***
When they went inside, Edward couldn't help but feel a small sense of triumph at entering as a guest rather than a trespasser. Seeing the pile of footwear by the doorway, he hurried to remove his own, noting with pleasure that this was a custom he and Bella shared. As he stepped out of his running shoes, Bella pulled off her raincoat and flung it over the banister of the stairs. She was wearing a different shirt than the one he had seen her sleeping in before. This one was a deep blue color, nearly black. The way it wrapped around her body reminded him of a photograph he had once seen – a black and white image of ocean water smothering a pearl. He felt a sudden urge to reach out and slide his hand under the shirt's thin straps, which bisected her shoulder blades. As thin as she was, the cloth seemed to bind her body too tightly.
She turned to face him, her mouth and forehead lined with uncertainty. "Upstairs," she muttered. "There's some boxes upstairs. They need to come down, but I can't … Could you – "
"Of course," he answered. "Where?"
"I'll show you." She began to climb the stairs, one hand on the banister, still favoring her right foot
Scowling at his ineptitude – he'd somehow managed to forget that she was hurt – he leapt three steps to stand beside her. "Let me help you."
She glanced at his offered arm, hesitating, then shook her head lightly. "No, it's all right. I got it."
He let his arm drop, unable to keep the frown off his face. Again, she was rejecting him.
Bella's brow twitched, and she looked away. "I mean – thanks. I just – I'd like do it myself." Her voice was soft, without the edge he was expecting. It requested his compliance rather than demanding it.
"You'd like to do it yourself," he repeated. She needs to do it for herself, his mind echoed. As Bella nodded, his frown eased, and he stepped aside.
Upstairs, moisture from the carpet seeped into his socks, but he barely noticed as he followed her to the end of the hallway. The pants she wore were an inch too long, their cuffs dragging along the ground as she walked. They sat low on her hips, the waistband swaying side to side with each step, a pendulum of green and yellow cloth. His eyes followed the movement, momentarily unable to focus on anything else.
At the last door, she stopped. "There's a closet–" she began. "This is – "
"Your sister's room," he offered, seeing the difficulty with which she formed her words.
Her jaw tightened, and she ducked her head. "The boxes are in the closet. Will you take them to the den?"
He pushed the door open and stepped inside.
The room smelled of mildew and wet drywall. Eight days ago, when he had first come here, he noted how sterile the space looked, how unused. Fastidious order was something he normally appreciated, yet the arrangement of objects in this room spoke more of a lack of life than respect for organization.
"Hm," was the only thing he said of the sight before him now. The crumbling ceiling, the mess of drywall on the floor, the leak forming in the opposite corner of the room – it inspired a stronger reaction, but he held his tongue to avoid upsetting Bella, who stood behind him in the hallway. The sight was certainly dismal… and yet, he could help but feel that it was also, in a relative sense, an improvement. At least something was finally happening in this room.
Stepping around the worst of the rubbish, he slid the closet door out of the way. Among shoes and other items he didn't recognize, several brown, unmarked boxes were stacked haphazardly on the closet floor. While he had been curious about the closet's contents before, and even went as far as to peek inside, he did not linger now, too eager to complete the task at hand. The first box flopped awkwardly in his hands as he picked it up, the soggy cardboard barely managing to hold together, so he moved quickly to take it to the den. On the second and third trip, he balanced two boxes at a time.
Bella did not go with him. She stood leaning against a wall on the other side of the hallway, and he could feel her eyes trained on his back each time he moved toward the stairwell. When he approached on the way back, though, she wouldn't return his gaze, studying the wet carpet or a patch of skin on her hand instead.
He closed the bedroom door behind him, a final box in hand, and she pushed away from the wall without a word. He slowed his pace as she followed him down the stairs. In the den, he set the box on the floor next to the others and stood in the darkness as she made her way to the lamp in the corner of the room. Watching her halting but determined gait, he fought the urge to go and turn it on for her. But, in all likely-hood, her reaction to this display of chivalry would be no different than the one earlier when he tried to help her up the stairs. It was, he supposed, a matter of control. The less of it life granted her, the tighter she clung to what little she could still manage. This compulsion he could understand.
With a click, the lamp flared to life, coloring the room with its soft, yellow glow. Bella stepped around the unfolded futon and sank slowly to the floor among the boxes. She reached for the nearest one but did not open it, letting her hand rest against the wet cardboard flaps. Edward sat down as well, crossing his legs under him, and grimaced absently as the wet fabric of his jeans pressed against his ankles.
For a while, they said nothing. Bella's eyes drifted from one box to another, her face grey and expressionless. More than anything, she looked exhausted. He followed her gaze, wondering if she would speak first or if he ought to, but his mind had gone blank – he had no idea what to say. Getting up on the roof, hammering in a dozen nails, moving some boxes – these were tasks he could to handle. Now…well, he couldn't help but feel that he was outstaying his purpose. But he did not want to leave.
The silence began to weigh on him. Bella seemed to recede farther and farther into herself, slumping forward like a marionette cut from her strings. He searched her face for some recognition, some acknowledgement of his presence, but when their eyes met, her blank look glossed over him as if he were a shadow on the wall. Suddenly, he was seized with an urge to shake her, to dig his hands into her bare shoulders and force her out of this stupor. Purpose be damned, he didn't come here for manual labor! He wanted to talk to her, to have her respond. She was a live person, not some character in a film, not a figment of his imagination. He wanted – no, he needed more than to simply sit there and stare at her.
He opened his mouth, intending to say something useful or profound, but instead, the most inane of all questions popped out. "Are you going to call someone?"
Bella's chin jerked forward. Her eyes refocused on his face, her forehead creasing with confusion.
"About the roof, I mean," he clarified, cringing inwardly. He should have kept his mouth shut.
"Yeah," she shook her head slowly, her voice impassive. "Tomorrow. It's my day off."
"Good, good. You should." The words seemed to be coming out involuntarily now. "I don't know much about home repair, I have always rented, but from the look of things up there, it will not be a trivial job. Apart from damage to the shingles, the wood underneath is rotting. That entire section will probably need to be replaced. It must have been leaking for quite some – " He stopped, finally noticing the growing dismay in her expression.
She dropped her eyes to the floor. "I should've gone up there." Her voice was barely a whisper.
Though he'd heard every syllable, he asked, "Pardon?"
"Upstairs," she said. "Before you took that book, I hadn't been upstairs for almost a year. If I'd gone up there, if I'd paid more attention … I would've noticed a leak, I would've noticed something." Twisting her hands in her lap, she pursed her lips into a tight, disparaging line.
"Why didn't you?"
Her face snapped up again. "Because! Because I was too busy crying my eyes out down here. Because I come home and get drunk to fall asleep. Because I do this – " she thrust an upturned wrist at him "–instead of thinking about my little sister. Why the fuck do you think?" She pushed the last words out through clenched teeth, blinking furiously.
He shifted uncomfortably, didn't even bother to get defensive at her tone. Words were crowding the tip of his tongue, words he had been mulling over for the last three days. "Bella, I – I've been reconsidering – " He stopped to rub the back of his neck. "Some of the things I said to you – about the choices you have made – they were not entirely accurate."
"Yes, they were," she nodded fiercely. "Spot-fucking-on. Alice is dead, and she's gonna stay that way. And I couldn't even take care of her things. Fuck." A sob sounded in the back of her throat but she choked it back, her hands tightening into fists. "What's wrong with me? I can't even go into her room, I can't even look at pictures." The anger in her voice was dying out, giving way to something darker, more despairing. Her next words were little more than a whisper. "You were right. It's a waste. My life is a fucking waste."
No," he said quickly. "No. That isn't true. That wasn't what I said to begin with, and – "
"Yeah, it was," she muttered. "You said – "
"It doesn't matter what I said. I was wrong."
Her expression was raw, rebellious, and imploring all at once.
"I was wrong," he repeated, softer.
How? Her lips formed the word, but expelled nothing more than a gust of air.
His brow furrowed, and he swallowed. Until now, the notion had been something that he'd examined exclusively in the privacy of his own head. The more he'd thought about Bella, reflecting on the evolving interaction between them, the more he had become aware of a nagging sensation in the back of his head. Something was off, something about the way he perceived her, the way he'd categorized her situation. Identifying it had come as something of a relief, akin to discovering that he had skipped a page while reading. Still, it was one thing to analyze one's mistakes privately, and entirely another to confess them to the very person they concerned.
He ran a hand over his mouth and shifted again. Bella's expression had lost none of its urgency as she waited for him to speak. "I have met people," he finally said, "whose lives are barely worth the air they breathe. They want to hire me to kill their business rivals, or colleagues, or spouses. Or even their children. You would not believe the depravity of some, the utter lack of shame or decency." Feeling a swell of frustration, he shook his head.
"One man – he wanted me to beat a woman to death. She'd had an affair, and for that, he didn't simply want her dead, he wanted me to make her suffer. Just hearing him speak of it, so righteous in his cruelty, I nearly – " He stopped, turned away, tapped a fist against the floor to dispel the burst of anger. He could feel Bella's eyes boring into the side of his face.
"You… " he began again when his voice was calmer, "You are different. Yes, on some level, you are also seeking vengeance. But it is not your ultimate motivation, not really. You did not come to me to dole out punishment, you came to reclaim your life. To repair it. You … feel … so much, so acutely, that – " He broke off again and let out a clipped sigh. Why were some words so much harder to say than others? They were, after all, just words.
Bella had looked away, the muscles of her jaw and temples clenched tight, and pulsing. When he fell silent, she caught his gaze again, eyes glistening in the dull light, and then it was his turn to study the floorboards.
"The grief you wrestle with … " he said softly, "it nearly crushes you, but still, you have not given up. You resist." He heard her exhale, caught the scent of gathering tears. Lifting his head, he met her gaze with all the gravity and sincerity that he could muster. "This struggle – your struggle – to live well... It is not a waste. It can never be a waste."
Her expression dissolved at his words, and tears began to run freely down her cheeks. She jerked to her feet, stumbling backwards, one hand flying up to her mouth. Each breath became a sharp, uneven gasp as she began to sob out loud. He couldn't stand that sound. Suddenly, he was next to her, reaching out, pulling her shaking body forward and pressing it against his chest. She stiffened at first, but as another sob reverberated though her back and shoulders, he felt her hands unravel and dig themselves into the fabric of his shirt.
Later, he would recall this moment again and again, each time focusing on a different detail: how her hair brushed the underside of his chin; the texture of her bare skin under his fingers; the scent of her tears as his shirt wicked them away from her flushed cheeks; the angles of her arms, the rigid curve of her hip pressing into his thigh. He would remember how, as her grief subsided, he and she began to breathe together, their lungs expanding and falling in synchrony. He would also remember the sound of her pulse, throbbing along her arms and neck and temples, echoing in his ears as he fought to ignore it.
But in this instant, he was not conscious of any of those things, overcome instead by the intensity of her sorrow, and weighed down with it as though it were his own.
They stood in the middle of the room for no more than a few minutes, but when Bella lifted her head and loosened her grip on his shirt, he felt like he had been awoken from an eternal trance. The awkwardness with which she moved snapped him back into place, and he let her go instantly. She continued to cry, but the tears were calmer now, slipping from the corners of her eyes in a trickle rather than a flood.
He lowered his arms uncertainly. Though he was loath to put distance between them, he stepped back to catch a glimpse of her face, searching there for some hint of what, if anything, had just transpired between them. But her expression was one he could not interpret. Her eyes roamed the floor as she wrapped her arms around herself, and he felt a sudden, unreasonable burst of jealousy – those should be his arms. Still, he did not dare to reach for her again.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, sniffing. "I didn't think I'd lose it like that."
He shook his head. "It's all right. I understand – " I understand despair,he wanted to say. I understand helplessness. I understand loneliness. But the words would not come , he mumbled "I understand that you are sad."
She nodded, bending down to wipe her cheeks with the hem of her camisole. The skin of her torso flashed like a beacon in the dim light, and he looked away, suddenly uncomfortable. No, uncomfortable was not the right word, but he had no better way to describe the vague, restless tension in his chest and his gut at the sight of her bare stomach.
Bella stepped toward the futon, her fingers brushing against his forearm as she passed, and he moved to follow. But as she pushed the comforter and pillow aside, his eyes drifted over the window in the far corner, the one farthest away from the lamp. It should have been dark there, the world outside nearly black compared to the illuminated room. Yet, the glass in the windowpane was losing its opacity, transforming back from mirror to window, lightened by the faint but unmistakable glow of dawn.
He spun to face the kitchen, his eyes landing on the microwave that sat next to the sink. There was a clock in its front panel, and its green digits blinked menacingly back at him.
"Shit," he breathed. "Is that clock accurate?"
"What?" Bella straightened and turned to follow his gaze.
"The clock!" he repeated, his voice rising. "Is that the proper time?"
"Yeah, I … think so," she said, looking back at him. "Why? Are you – do you need to be somewhere?"
"Yes," he answered quietly, any lasting feelings of satisfaction replaced by self-flagellation. How could he have been so careless??
Bella was still watching him, eyebrows arched in expectation.
"Do you have basement?" he asked.
End notes: So, I've been going back and forth on how much to write in EPOV vs. BPOV. Which do you prefer?
