Thank you to the reviewers! You're awesome.
Disclaimer: Stephanie Meyer owns Twilight and she can have it. I'm just playing with the characters.
It was an eight hour drive to Moses' home. It would've been four hours, but Val got lost a few times because the GPS had been pre-programmed and kept telling him the way back to Forks. Beck couldn't help because he had fallen asleep hours ago (right after insisting he wasn't tired, of course) and Leah had passed out. Val kept his flashlight on so he could see whether her chest was still moving or not. A few times he stopped and tried to wake her up and got a few choking noises for his trouble.
By the time they got to downtown Seattle, Val needed a pill and a bottle of wine. And maybe some reliable directions. Famous as he was in the supernatural world, it didn't seem like Moses did anything at all in the human one. Val spent an hour in the same neighbourhood before an old lady with a broom came out of her apartment building and threatened to charge him with loitering. Before she beat him up, Val asked if she knew anyone named Moses and discovered that he was living in the same apartment building. It took a lot of ass-kissing to convince the woman to put down the broom and let him in, lugging the albatross known as Leah, with a very sleepy Beck trailing after them. The woman looked like she was going to call the police.
That was the final straw. If Moses wasn't home, then Val was going to leave the girl on someone's doorstep.
He really hoped Moses was home.
…
He was home. The dhampir was leaving what was presumably his apartment, looking like he was off to church. The same Moses; short, blonde, with a British accent that refused to fade, even after centuries in America. Val almost cried with happiness (but he'd never admit it) and resisted the urge to hug him. Moses, however, did not seem as happy to see Val.
"Jeppeson Valentine, what have you done now?" Moses unlocked the door and walked back inside. That was one of the great things about him. Moses was one of the few dhampirs with gifts—i.e., he could look through someone's memories at will. Plus, he'd been in the field for centuries before pulling his disappearing act, so he knew venom poisoning when he saw it.
All Val really needed to do was convince Moses that saving a werewolf, who might possibly try to kill them when she came to, was not a bad idea. Which was probably going to be easier said than done, considering that it sounded exactly like a very bad idea and Moses thought Val was a moron anyways.
Hopefully, Leah could hold on for just a little bit longer.
Seeing as Moses didn't slam the door in Val's face, he let himself in. Moses had a large chesterfield in his living room and Val set Leah down on that. Beck curled up beside her and fell asleep again.
"Is she your girlfriend, Jeppeson?" Moses asked. Val was sorely tempted to suggest that the dhampir visit that fiery world opposite Heaven.
"I bring you a dying girl and all you say is that? When I die, you stay away from my funeral," he snapped.
Moses kept his cool. "Well, if that's not the case then why do you care?"
"The code of conduct. The code of friggin' conduct. I want to save this girl for completely selfish reasons, alright? You know just as well as I do that if we take an innocent life, or make no attempts to save one, we have to pay with our own. If I remember correctly it was you that beat it into my head!"
The stupid little dhampir had the nerve to smirk. "Of course that's the reason. This couldn't possibly be because you're as soft-hearted as they come." Seeing Val's expression seemed to make him happier. "Alright, then. Take the girl to the bathroom and then go make me some tea with lots of sugar. Venom is disgusting."
…
And that was how Val found himself guarding the bathroom door from the inside for two long hours. He would've been sleeping, but Moses said he needed someone to refill the teacups and keep people out of the bathroom. The door was locked, but Moses was probably the same age as his biblical namesake, so he was allowed to be paranoid. Besides, the other option was to ignore the bitchy little dhampir and wake up with something very important missing. The other Senior Assassins had been calling the guy 'the Headless Horseman' for two hundred years.
Although Val had to admit that if someone did walk in, and they saw an unconscious girl covered in dried blood sprawled on the floor, Moses with his fangs in her neck, and Val (who suspected he looked like a washed out flower child with his overly long hair and bloodshot eyes) guarding the door, they were really going to get the wrong idea.
However, he wasn't about to give Moses the satisfaction of knowing that he agreed with him.
"This is horrible," Moses declared after spitting out a mouthful of venom.
"As horrible as your last relationship?" Val asked, laughing when Moses actually stopped to consider it. "No, not quite that bad. But have you ever tasted vampire venom?"
"No, but I'm planning to. Right after trimming my toenails with a lawnmower and skin-diving for piranhas."
Moses rolled his eyes. "I would've thought having a child of your own would've taught you to respect your elders."
"I'm twenty-eight. You're physically nineteen. Who's the elder?"
"I'm only physically nineteen. I'm still old enough to be your grandfather."
"Yeah, but I can legally smoke and I don't get carded for alcohol."
Leah groaned, which saved Val from becoming the Headless Horseman's new Ichabod Crane. However, Moses' eyes screamed murder and the next mouthful of venom was spat at Val, who promptly moved to the bathroom counter. Unfortunately, that put him near the mirror. Val realized that he didn't look like he had been doing drugs; he looked like he'd died from an overdose already. But with Moses now on a hair-trigger, it seemed like a bad idea to ask if he could sleep.
So he helped himself to the tea and just concentrated on keeping his eyes open.
…
"Jeppeson…Jeppeson…VAL!"
Val fell off the counter. It had to be serious. Moses never called him by his nickname in normal circumstances, and nothing would persuade him to do otherwise.
"I only slept for five minutes!" Val insisted. Moses rolled his eyes.
"Actually, you slept for half an hour. But look." He held up Leah's arm. All the white streaks were gone. Now that she wasn't in danger of dying, Val could focus on other things.
Like Leah's face. She was actually very attractive, with copper skin and eyelashes like feather dusters. Val hadn't thought of a girl as beautiful since-
Don't think about that. What is wrong with you?
"Will she wake up soon?" Val asked, trying to distract himself. Moses either didn't notice or he'd finally decided to be nice. "Yes, very soon, I would think. What are you planning to do with her then, Jeppeson?"
"I'll take her back to wherever she came from." As soon as he said that, Leah's eyes flew open and she screamed.
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